CHAPTER FORTY TWO
The automatic doors to Apollo House granted Ella entrance to the monolithic building of glass and steel. She entered into a barren lobby and charged towards the stairwell.
‘Thank God this place is open twenty-four-seven,’ Ella said.
According to the police database, Maxwell Tanner lived nearly fifteen miles outside of Cedarburg, so she’d sent Ripley to his house to cover more ground.
She made the two-mile trip to Maxwell’s offices because, if her profile was on the money, this was Maxwell’s operating hub during his nightly jaunts.
He was stationed somewhere near the crimes, she was certain.
‘Crap.’
Her fingers curled tighter around the handle to give it one more futile shake. Despite what people thought, willpower absolutely could best steel.
Sometimes, at least. Tonight it couldn’t.
‘You okay there, missy?’ a voice carried down the corridor.
Ella spun around, startled by the unexpected company. She saw a janitor idly holding onto a cordless mop.
A plan instantly sprung to mind.
‘FBI,’ she said as she flashed her badge. ‘I need access to this office, pronto. Can you help?’
The janitor rubbed his chin as his stare jumped from Ella to her badge to the office door. ‘Not sure. The guy in this office… he’s never asked for cleaning services. Keeps to himself.’
‘This is urgent,’ Ella said. She didn’t have time to weigh up the legalities of such an intrusion. If it became an issue, she’d just accept the punishment. ‘Has the guy been here tonight? Have you seen him?’
‘Yeah. He was here an hour ago. Walked past me as he left. He’ll know it was me who let you in, plus there’s cameras up there.’ The janitor pointed to the ceiling.
An hour ago, Ella said to herself. It meant Maxwell was still in Cedarburg, but it also meant he could be on the move. 'Did you see where he went? Was he carrying anything?'
‘Not sure. He had a bag with him. Looked heavy.’
Ella clasped the handle again. She didn’t have time to mess around. ‘Look, either you can unlock this thing for me, or I can break it down. Either way, I’ll be in that office in twenty seconds. What do you say?’
The janitor’s brow furrowed. He looked up at the camera and then back at his keyring.
‘The guy is in trouble?’ he asked.
‘Depends what I find in there. I promise you won’t get in trouble for this. If anyone says anything, just say you figured a privacy violation was preferable to a replacement door.’
The janitor scratched his head and then, as if conceding to an invisible force, began sifting through his keyring.
‘Alright,’ he murmured. His keys jangled as sorted through them, then he pushed one into the door of office 9AA and clicked it open. ‘I’ll be downstairs. Let me know when you’re done.’
‘Thank you,’ Ella said as she flashed him a nod. She pushed her way into the office and shut the door behind her with a click, sealing herself in Maxwell Tanner’s lair.
The air held a sterile cleanliness, and she could see a mile off that the place had been purposely designed to put any visitor at ease.
The far corner hosted a plush couch, and opposite it was a glass-topped coffee table that bore a selection of textbooks.
Directly ahead, a large, polished wooden desk dominated the space, its surface clear except for a modern desktop PC.
However, the room, for all its orderly appearance, felt hollow, as if the warmth it tried to project was just another layer of the facade Maxwell Tanner hid behind.
Ella searched the room for any hint of Maxwell’s next move, and her instincts honed in on the desk, the epicenter of Maxwell Tanner's world within these walls. It was the only place where he could hide something – every other facet of the room was visible.
She invaded the desk drawers until she found paper. She inspected them sheet by sheet, possibly violating several privacy laws, but reassured herself that the ends would justify the means. She found professional paperwork, client files, empty letterheads.
Then, Ella’s fingers brushed against something different amongst the sea of papers.
A solid folder.
Ella yanked it out, ran her fingers over the black surface. She tried to open it but found it padlocked shut.
In the detective’s world, a lock was always a cause for concern.
Locks only guarded things worth hiding.
A surge of determination coursed through her veins.
With no regard for subtlety or preservation, Ella gripped the folder in one hand and the lock in the other, and she tore the folder open.
A stack of papers fell from within.
Ella caught sight of the first page - just a few words centered on an expanse of white.
And it felt as if a cold hand had reached into her chest and squeezed her heart with an iron grip.
Ella turned through the first few pages, and despite her desperate need to find Maxwell Tanner tonight, couldn’t pull her eyes away.
It was all here.
Every little detail had been documented.
These hadn’t just been homicides.
They’d been experiments.
Every victim, every approach, and every killing method – all laid bare right in black and white.
Now, Ella understood why there’d been marks in the dust at Julia Dawson’s crime scene. Now the presence of the camera that captured her whole ordeal made sense. This was why there were no elements of sadism, no overkill, no sexual assault.
The killer had watched, scrutinized, and documented every last detail of all of his murders.
Maxwell Tanner was no ordinary psychopath driven by bloodlust. He was a researcher of the macabre, and judging by these notes, he was an author penning a textbook of terror that cataloged the anatomy of fear itself.
The notes detailed observations weren’t merely the ramblings of a madman but the cold research of a scientist dissecting the human psyche.
Ella’s stomach twisted into knots as she skimmed the details of the fifty-or-so-page manuscript that lay in front of her.
I laced Julia Dawson's drink with a mild dose of Gamma-hydroxybutyric acid, calculated not to kill but to weaken, ensuring her compliance without immediate alarm. Capture followed during Julia’s journey home, where I transported her to an abandoned cabin I’d selected for its isolation.
This setting was crucial, a controlled environment where variables could be minimized, and observations could be conducted without interruption.
The experiment required a direct interaction with primal fears, a test of human response to extreme psychological torment.
Preparation involved binding Julia, ensuring mobility was restricted but consciousness maintained.
It was essential she experienced every sensation and every psychological twist of the forthcoming ordeal.
To incite the rats' natural feeding behavior, small incisions were made on Julia's abdomen.
These were not random but strategically placed, enough to draw blood and provoke interest without immediate fatality.
Ella held back the forthcoming bile, trying to keep her composure and not slam her fist through Maxwell’s desk. She skipped ahead on the hunt for something that might suggest Maxwell Tanner’s current whereabouts.
The burial was deep, a mere six feet below the surface, enough to muffle cries yet shallow enough to instill a false hope of escape.
Before sealing the coffin, I whispered to Thomas that a phone lay outside the coffin, buried under a thin layer of dirt, a cruel addition to the experiment.
It was a lie, of course, designed to add psychological torment to his physical entrapment.
Another section said:
The study of human behavior under the threat of immolation presented a unique opportunity to observe the instinctual fight-or-flight response.
Rebecca Morgan, selected for her phobic fear of fire, was lured to a remote cabin under the pretense of a therapeutic session designed to confront her anxieties.
The cabin was prepared in advance, doused in gasoline with trails leading to a safe distance, allowing for ignition without immediate danger to myself.
Upon her arrival, Rebecca's trust was visibly palpable.
The escalation of the fire triggered an immediate and visceral response from Rebecca, and the intensity of Rebecca's screams, coupled with the fear that they might attract unwanted attention, compelled me to abandon the observation prematurely.
Maxwell Tanner studied his victims so he could turn their final moments into case studies for a dissertation written in blood.
The shrill ring of her phone alerted her. Ella glanced and saw Ripley’s name flashing up.
‘Talk to me,’ Ella answered.
‘Dark, I’m at Tanner’s house. It’s empty. No car on the driveway. Neighbors haven’t seen him.’
‘Damn it to hell,’ Ella cried.
‘Anything at his office?’
Ella let the papers slip through her fingers. ‘A lot. Tanner’s our guy, no question. He’s been documenting the details of every murder, and it’s all written like some psychology textbook. The guy is out of his mind.’
There was a moment of silence. ‘What?’
‘I’ll explain later, but we need to find out where he is.’
‘Hold up, I’m driving back. I got two guys here watching his house in case he comes home.’
‘He’s still in Cedarburg because the janitor here saw him earlier. He can’t be too far away – but where?’
Ripley’s deep breaths crackled down the line. ‘He’s documenting everything, you say?’
‘Everything, from the pre-abduction M.O. to the killing methods. These pages can secure four life sentences.’
‘Anything about a fifth victim in there? Plans, notes, anything?’
Ella madly rifled through Maxwell Tanner's papers.
Each page she turned sent her deeper into the maelstrom of Tanner's bizarre psyche.
She pressed a palm to her forehead in a moment of overwhelming frustration, because what if she was too late?
What if, even now, Tanner was enacting his most heinous experiment yet?
The idea that another victim might be suffering, that she might be powerless to stop it, clawed at her with talons of panic.
‘I don’t know. I’m reading the ramblings of a deluded monster.’
‘But nothing is accidental with this guy,’ Ripley said. ‘He doesn’t act on impulse, he plans everything in advance. Whatever he’s doing, it’s premeditated.’
Ella flipped to the final pages of the manuscript.
‘You’re right, it’s just…’ she trailed off as she caught sight of something. Something that made her blood heat up to infernal levels. ‘Oh, Jesus.’
‘What? I’m doing ninety down the freeway. I’ll be there in ten.’
There, in printed text, was an overview of Maxwell’s Tanner's grand design.
Three quarters of it had been crossed out.
And only one section remained.
In the concluding segment of my extensive study, I intend to explore the quintessential fear of heights. This primal dread, ingrained deeply within the human psyche, offers a unique vantage point from which to scrutinize the intersection of physiological response and psychological torment.
The experiment will methodically evaluate the subject's reaction when confronted with the imminent threat of a precipitous fall.
The subject will be positioned at a significant elevation, secured only minimally to instill a profound sense of vulnerability.
The anticipation of the fall, rather than the fall itself, will serve as the primary stimulus.
The selection of the subject for this final experiment will be based on a demonstrated acute phobia of heights, ensuring that the induced fear is not merely theoretical but deeply personal and palpable.
It is my hypothesis that the fear of heights, when amplified to its zenith, can induce a state of psychological disarray that transcends conventional fear, touching upon the very essence of human survival instinct.
‘Heights,’ Ella shouted. ‘He’s testing someone with a fear of heights.’
‘That’s what it says?’
‘Right here. That’s his final experiment.’
‘Shit, where could he do that? Elevator? Mountain?’
Ella stood frozen, as if nails had been driven through her feet.
Her mind spun wildly, trying to thread threading through every conceivable lead and bit of evidence she’d gathered, trying to conjure a face, a name, anyone who could be the final victim in Maxwell's series.
And where in Cedarburg could he exploit such a fear to its fullest?
A bridge? A tall building under construction? An abandoned tower?
‘No mountains around here. Wisconsin is flat. An elevator would need to be indoors. He couldn’t drag a body up to the top of a building.’
Her thoughts raced — not just where, but who? Who had Maxwell been observing in secret, someone possibly hidden in plain sight, their fear of heights known only to him?
No. All of Maxwell’s victims were from the therapy group.
Then, like a torchlight finding its path in the dark, a memory of her first session at the therapy group emerged.
I remember this one time, I was on a school trip to the mountains. Everyone was excited about the cable car ride, except me. Just the thought of being suspended in the air made me feel sick.
The words of the young girl. Ella racked her brain, recalling every little thing she’d said.
I tried to tell myself it's just a ride, nothing will happen, but when we got there, and I saw the cable car, my legs just wouldn't move. I couldn't step in. I felt so embarrassed, standing there, frozen, while everyone else got on.
Each fragment of memory and the shadowy contours of the manuscript's horrors aligned in her mind's eye. They crafted a map so lucid it might as well have been tattooed on her hand.
The other day, I stood on the Helmsley Bridge, and it gave me a panic attack. It feels like I'm missing out on so much.
‘Ripley,’ Ella said. ‘How long before you can get here?’
‘Two minutes.’
‘Meet me outside the building. I know where we need to go.’
This was not mere conjecture; it was as if Ella had been handed a script to the final act of a tragedy. Ella knew exactly where he was going to be
And with this knowledge, the hunter became the hunted.
Ella was ready to end this game tonight.