Chapter 15 #2
“The mermaid killer took his time, and he was smart,” Bel said, dodging an oblivious family.
“Unlike Jax Frost, he didn’t record his victims. If Frost hadn’t left cameras for us to find, we might not have traced him to the news station.
He didn’t kidnap a cop and take her to his mountain hideout like Blaubart.
This killer is meticulous, clean, and almost detached.
Once they’re dead, he forgets about them. ”
“Leaving nothing for us to find or follow,” Olivia said. “I hate the smart ones. Why do we always get the smart ones… does this have something to do with Eamon and Ewan? Are they like… evil magnets?”
“I think that’s the scientific name for it,” Bel teased.
“You know what I mean.” Olivia swatted her arm.
“The Mermaid and Matchstick Girl Killers were here long before Eamon, but knowing what I do about the supernatural world, I believe evil calls to evil. Darkness always finds a way to hide from the light, and yes, Eamon’s presence makes it worse.”
“Then why be with him? Why risk welcoming all that death and destruction into your life?”
“Because I’m someone evil is afraid of. At least, I make Eamon nervous.
” Bel winked. “Evil will follow him for the rest of his life. Better it finds me than someone who will allow it to fester, which is why we should bring Erik to the station. Let’s see if our questions shake something—” Without thinking, her hand shot out of its own accord and seized a pre-teen’s biceps.
“What the—?” The girl’s mother shrieked and snatched her daughter away from Bel’s grip. “Get your hands off my daughter.”
“I’m sorry.” Bel fumbled for her badge, Olivia’s eyes burning a hole in her neck with her confusion.
“I’m Detective Isobel Emerson with the Bajka Police.
I didn’t mean to startle you.” She pointed to the girl’s throat, and she felt Olivia tense at her back when she saw the seashell hanging from a delicate chain, the pendant an exact replica of Ariella Triton’s necklace. “Where did you get that?”
“From the gift shop.” The mother pulled her child further away from the detectives, clearly not trusting their badges. “It’s the only souvenir that’s affordable.”
“The gift shop?” Bel repeated. “Here?”
“Yes, here.” The mother slipped her hand into her daughter’s, readying to flee the second Bel released her.
“Thank you.” Bel nodded, granting the woman her freedom from the strange conversation.
“One of the mermaid victims had the same necklace,” she told Olivia as they followed the signs to the shop.
“Two dead women had nautilus necklaces… which apparently were bought here.” The detectives lunged through the shop entrance, and after a minute of searching, Bel skidded to a triumphant stop.
“That’s it. That’s the same necklace as Ariella’s. ”
“Oh, those are pricey.” Olivia grimaced. “That’s the most affordable thing here?”
“Did you see the stuffed seal?” Bel pointed to where a price tag hung in plain sight from the animal’s fuzzy ear, and Olivia faked a gag.
“Okay, so this necklace is cheap,” she said.
“The glass mermaids, the Prince & Sons signs, these necklaces, the mermaid drowning. That’s too many coincidences.
This aquarium played a part—albeit probably unwittingly—in these deaths, and one person’s name keeps popping up.
What if this is how he found his victims? ”
“He targeted girls who bought these necklaces,” Bel said.
“We aren’t in Bajka, which gives the killer separation from the lake, and aquariums are places people travel to.
That would be one way to find girls who live out of town.
” She left the necklace stand and approached the register, flashing her badge.
“How long have you worked here?” she asked the cashier.
“For three years, but only during the summer,” the girl answered.
“Are there any cashiers who’ve worked here long term?”
“Nope.” The girl shook her head. “The pay isn’t great, so it’s a revolving door of students. I work only during my college breaks, but I rarely see the same people.”
“These necklaces.” Bel held up the shell. “Are they popular?”
“Oh, for sure. We sell hundreds.”
“So it wouldn’t stand out if someone bought this?”
“I’ve sold fifteen today alone.”
Bel nodded her thanks and pulled her partner aside. “A cashier’s small talk would be the perfect cover to learn if potential victims were from Bajka or not, but if this shop is a revolving door of student employees, it ruins that theory.”
“Well, we’ve seen just how charming Erik can be with the younger female crowd,” Olivia said. “A good-looking guy doesn’t need a song and dance. Girls will flirt with him simply because he smiled at them… maybe the necklace was part of the flirting.”
“How do you mean?”
“Prince & Sons does the aquarium’s signs, but that doesn’t allow Erik time to watch for girls buying necklaces. So what if that isn’t how he picks them? What if that’s how he signals he’s chosen them? His way of getting close enough to follow the girls.”
“He doesn’t choose women who bought a necklace. He gives it to the ones he wants,” Bel said, catching on.
“Ariella didn’t fit his M.O., but perhaps she got the necklace by accident. Most girlfriends who spot jewelry among their man’s belongings would assume it’s for them. He’d have to hand it over to keep her from digging.”
“Eamon left this by my hospital bed, and I never take it off.” Bel pinched the chain around her neck and offered her partner a view of the book pendant. “I didn’t even know him then, and I still assumed it was mine. Ariella would’ve probably reacted the same.”
“Turns out, the necklace marked her as a victim, anyway.”
“Before we question Erik, we should talk to Ondine again.” Bel couldn’t help but stare at the looming whale above their heads as they exited the aquarium.
“She’s pissed enough to give her boyfriend the silent treatment, so maybe we can play that angle to get her to spill his secrets.
She fake-dated him, and she knew Ariella wore that nautilus necklace.
She’d recognize it on another woman. It’s time we drove a wedge between a couple. ”
“We thought she was with Erik,” Ondine’s mother said when Bel and Olivia knocked on her door looking for her daughter. “She left her car here.” The woman pointed to the modest vehicle parked in the driveway. “That usually means he picked her up.”
“We’ll check with him,” Bel said, hiding the fact that twenty-four hours ago, Erik had no idea where his new girlfriend was. “But if she comes home, can you ask her to call us?” She handed the mother her card. “We have some questions for her.”
“Yes, of course.” Mrs. Mar tucked the card into her jeans pocket.
“Thanks.” Bel smiled. “Oh, and one more thing. How well do you know Erik?”
The mother shrugged. “As well as any parent can know their kid’s college boyfriend.”
“Were you aware that he dated Ariella before she was murdered?”
“I am.” Mrs. Mar sobered. “It’s odd, I admit, but trauma bonds people. Ondine likes him.”
“Okay, thanks. Have a good…” Bel trailed off. The woman had called Erik a college boyfriend. She didn’t know the truth about who her daughter spent her days with, but did Bel have the right to break the trust between mother and daughter?
“You coming?” Olivia asked, and Bel decided. Murderers didn’t deserve her protection.
“Were you aware that Erik wasn’t in college?” Bel turned back to Mrs. Mar as her husband finally joined them at the front door. “He’s really twenty-eight, and Ondine is the second teenage girlfriend he’s had this summer.”
“I thought Ondine’s father was going to punch you,” Olivia said as the duo sat in Bel’s SUV outside Erik’s residence.
On the improbable chance that Ondine had spent the night here, the detectives had left her home and driven the short distance to Erik’s, but upon finding her expectantly absent, they wondered if following the young Mr. Prince would lead them to her.
So far, the impromptu stakeout had been uneventful.
“I survived kidnappings, IEDs, and shootings only to be taken out by an angry dad.” Bel’s smirk didn’t reach her eyes. “Erik better hope we arrest him before his girlfriend’s father finds him.”
“Both of his girlfriends,” Olivia said.
“Yeah, Mr. Triton’s reaction wasn’t all that different.”
“My dad would’ve had the same reaction when I was nineteen.”
“Same,” Bel said. “He had a similar response to Eamon, and I’m in my thirties. Girl dads do not play when it comes to their babies.”
“Thankfully, I don’t have to introduce Ewan to my parents,” Olivia said.
“So, I’m guessing your talk when he returned the car didn’t go well?”
“No, it went fine. I just… I don’t know how I could ever be with him now.”
“You can’t see yourself forgiving him? I mean, I get it.
It’s hard. I wear proof on my skin of Eamon’s violence.
It took a lot for me to forgive him… but it was easy after the Darling case.
The way he saved my life when I stepped on that IED—I’ll never forget what that explosion did to him.
There was no hope for me after I saw that level of sacrifice. I knew I would love him forever.”
“It’s not that I can’t forgive him… wait, back up.” Olivia twisted in her seat as if looking at her partner would change the words she’d heard. “You stepped on an IED? People don’t survive that.”
“If Eamon had been human, he wouldn’t have. He knocked me off the pressure plate and shielded me from the blast. It blew his back to pieces.”
“But he was shirtless at the lake. He’s fine.”
“He told me he cut his wrist in front of you to demonstrate his healing. Imagine that, but stretched across a torso missing every inch of skin and muscle.”
“No thanks.” Olivia shook as if trying to shed that image. “I knew something happened on that case that you weren’t sharing. I just hadn’t expected something quite so fatal.”
“I wanted to be honest with you. I really did… at least I can be now… if you’d like that?”
“I think so.” Olivia returned her gaze to Erik’s house. “As long as you don’t lie to me again.”
“I won’t tell you what isn’t mine to share.”
“But you don’t have to lie.”
“I don’t have to lie,” Bel repeated. “So, Ewan?”
“I don’t know. Maybe I can forgive him.” Olivia shrugged.
“I wouldn’t know how to tell me his secrets either, but forgiving him and letting him back into my life are two different things.
Do I really want to be with someone who hides life-altering information?
Do I want the burden of trying to rationalize him to my parents or bears for kids? ”
“Kids…” Bel trailed off. That dreaded topic wouldn’t leave her alone. “I don’t think I have to worry about those.”
Her trilling phone saved her from having to explain that comment.
“Emerson,” Agent Jameson Barry said when she answered on the second ring. “My team followed up on the embalming fluid from the mermaids, and I have updates for you.”
“Oh, awesome. I’m putting you on speaker.” Bel clicked the button and placed her cell on the center console.
“Don’t get too excited. It’s a lot of dead ends,” Barry said.
“We tried to question Blaubart, but he refused to speak. Without hope of parole, he has no incentive to help us. My team also found a black market listing on the dark web for what we think is this fluid, but the sales weren’t conducted electronically.
The listing’s wording is predominantly code, but what we could translate suggested that sales were either made in person or through drop-off locations.
There’s no digital trail linking the sellers or the buyers.
Personally, I’d bet money that our Mermaid Killer bought his supply directly from Blaubart, but professionally, I have no proof. ”
“Both the Matchstick Girl and the Mermaid Killer operated for at least a decade,” Bel said.
“What are the chances that two serial killers lived in the same town for that long, completely unaware of each other? One froze girls, and one drowned them. One watched them die, and the other tattooed them. Do we really think they were strangers?”
“I doubt they were friends,” Barry said, “but oblivious to each other? That’s a hard pill to swallow.”
“And if the Mermaid killer knew Jax Frost, he knew Charles Blaubart too,” Olivia said. “But we already looked into Frost’s known associates. We found nothing.”
“You wouldn’t,” Barry said. “They would’ve kept their distance from one another.”
“Hey… Prince & Sons did the signs for both the funeral home and the aquarium.” Olivia’s eyes lit up. “What do you want to bet they installed the signs at the news station too?”
“Where Jax Frost worked.” Bel smiled at her partner. “Barry, I’m going to hang up and call the station because if Prince & Sons did their signs, that’s our connection.”
“Installing signs at the funeral home, aquarium, and news station might be a connection between our killer, Frost, and Blaubart, or it could simply mean that we have one reputable sign business in the immediate area,” Griffin said after the detectives delivered their morning briefing.
“Trust me, I want this to be significant, but we need something concrete before I can even think of asking the judge to sign off on a warrant.”
“That’s what’s driving us nuts.” Olivia collapsed onto the office couch.
“We have all these theories, all these coincidences, but nothing technically illegal. Nothing that’s considered evidence.
The aquarium deletes its footage after a few years.
There are no fingerprints, no witnesses, no DNA, no physical, or trace evidence. He’s going to get away with this.”
“Let’s not spiral yet,” Griffin said. “A case of this magnitude cannot become a cold case. Not on my watch. Our killer made a mistake. They always do. Some mistakes are just harder to find.”
“This one is exceptionally hard,” Bel said as a deputy knocked on the office door.
“Detective Emerson, Gold,” he interrupted. “The Mars are here. They are asking for you.”
“Ondine’s parents?” Bel asked. “Why?”
“They’re filing a missing person’s report.”