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Dartmouth, June 14
1:14 a.m.
At their cores, the murders were similar. This time the suspect had used the shotgun. This time he had plunged a knife into his victim’s skull instead of an axe.
The scene was a dark, unlit parking lot in back of two three-deckers on Primrose Street in Dartmouth. People stood at surrounding windows, brought out of their beds by the lights and sirens.
Rain dripped off the hood of Allan’s jacket as he squatted down and directed his flashlight over the body. Blake Kaufman lay on his back in the middle of the lot with his hips torqued to the side and one leg bent over the other. His arms were splayed across the wet pavement, and the fingers of his right hand looked as if they were reaching for the set of keys two feet away. His face, frozen in a painful grimace, stared straight up at the roiling sky. Rainwater had filled his open mouth and ran out in rivulets down the sides of his jaw.
Allan directed the beam over the black handle sticking out of the left eye. The handle resembled that of the chef knife he had at home in the kitchen drawer, only a bit smaller. He paused a moment, considering it. The axe. The knife. The suspect had chosen weapons from his own home?
On further inspection of the body, Allan saw a ragged tear in the right knee of the jeans caused by a single shotgun blast. He counted three fliers—single pellet holes—around the edge of the entrance hole, indicating the shot mass had started to spread. This told him the suspect had fired at a distance, possibly more than ten feet.
Beneath Kaufman’s mangled leg, Allan noticed the white plastic wad from the shotgun shell, and he nodded to himself. At a closer range of five feet or less, the entrance hole in the jeans would appear squarer with no fliers, and the wad itself would fly into the wound tract.
Allan played the beam around the parking lot, under the vehicles, looking for the profile of an empty shotgun shell. But the light reflecting on the raindrops and slick asphalt made it hard to detect anything. Better to search at daybreak. Natural light always worked best.
As Allan studied the scene, he came up with three key points. Dark parking lot. Ambush. Quick getaway.
The suspect had probably hidden behind the cars or the garbage bin at the south edge of the lot and waited for Kaufman to come home. He kneecapped him first with the shotgun—a ruthless and excruciating tactic meant to hamper mobility—then finished him off with the knife. Unlike Dory’s murder, the suspect spent little time fooling around. The murder was quick and strategic.
Allan stared at the knife again. He wondered why the suspect hadn’t finished the job with the shotgun. He’d already used it once and alerted tenants in the building. Had it malfunctioned in some way? Had he short-stroked the pump, causing the gun to jam?
Allan frowned, shook his head. Maybe the use of the knife had been deliberate, like the axe in the first murder. It brought him closer to his victim, made the crime personal.
Allan heard a voice shout over the rain pelting his hood. “That’s two.”
He looked up to see Staff Sergeant Rehnquist peering down at him. He was a twenty-five-year veteran, balding and bantam with a cleft chin and close-set eyes.
“One left,” Allan said.
“You think Higgins is next too, huh?”
“It’s a safe bet.” Allan stood up. “We better put a car on his residence. Keep an eye on things.”
“Ten-four.” Rehnquist reached inside his rain jacket and keyed his mike, placing the call to dispatch.
Allan took out his camera and began photographing the scene and body from all angles. Around him, uniformed officers finished cordoning off the area with barrier tape. The first officer found shelter under an awning atop the back door of Kaufman’s apartment building and scribbled down particulars for his report.
Allan walked around the parking lot, shining his light over the asphalt. The bad weather brought any item found into question. It could be potential evidence or useless debris washed or blown there from somewhere else.
He came up behind the vehicles parked on the right side. He examined the vegetation piled against a chain-link fence for signs of damage—flattened grass or broken limbs on the shrubs. Something that told him the suspect had been around there. Nothing.
Allan went to the south end of the lot, guiding the beam over the Dumpster sitting on a concrete slab. When he looked behind it, he saw a glistening path of trampled grass leading straight across a green lawn to a stand of trees several yards away. Allan looked over the trees to the rooftop silhouette of an apartment building fronting Jackson Road.
He turned the flashlight to the backside of the Dumpster again. The concrete underneath extended out a good foot or more, providing a wide enough lip for a person to rest his ass on. Did the suspect hide there? Seemed likely. Seemed very likely, in fact.
Allan took out his cell phone and made a call to the K-9 Unit. Wet grass can hold a scent better than dry, but a heavy downpour like the one coming down could scatter the scent on pavement. Drive it into ditches or the graveled shoulder of a road, possibly confusing the dogs.
Allan drafted a rough mental picture of what had taken place. The suspect had parked somewhere on Jackson Road, probably so his car wouldn’t be noticed in the immediate area. Much like he’d done with the first murder by parking on Birmingham Street, then walking to Todd Dory’s apartment.
He came down through the property in back and entered the fenced backyard of two occupied apartment buildings—28 and 30 Primrose. He crouched behind the Dumpster, where he waited for Kaufman. When Kaufman came home and walked toward his apartment building, the suspect came out, grabbed Kaufman’s attention somehow, then shot him in the knee as he turned around. Whether or not he tried a second shot was uncertain. In any case, he stabbed Kaufman through the eye after the latter dropped to the pavement.
Allan heard a sudden commotion, several people yelling at once, their voices bouncing off the two buildings on either side of the lane. Cops ordering someone to stay back or be arrested. A male dropping an f-bomb on every third word.
Allan turned around and saw Rehnquist head over to the mouth of the lane for a look.
He glanced back over his shoulder at Allan. “Speak of the devil.”
“Higgins?”
“He got wind of this fast.”
Allan squared himself and walked to the lane. He saw Lee Higgins on the sidewalk, his face picking up the light from the street. Animated. Pacing. Ready to rip through his own skin and kill someone. He was a brawny guy, six-two, and probably tipped two hundred thirty pounds. He had a burr cut and a close-shaven chinstrap and mustache. Water beaded his black leather jacket.
Two officers had converged on him, holding up their hands. “Stay back,” they said. “Stay back.”
Allan came out of the lane, and Higgins became still, seeing him.
“That you, Stanton?” he called in a hoarse voice. “Huh? That you?”
Allan met his smoldering glare through the veil of rain, dipped his head once.
“Is that my boy down there?” Higgins pointed toward the lane. “Is it? You tell me, Stanton.”
“Calm down,” an officer said.
“Fuck you. Tell me to calm down.”
Color flushed into the officer’s face, and he reached around to his Taser holster and thumbed off the retention strap. Allan could feel the tension becoming electric. Lee Higgins was dangerous and unstable, a man who would probably kill a cop without giving it a second thought.
“Yeah, it’s him,” Allan said, approaching the barrier tape. “It’s Blake.”
Higgins breathed in heavily through his nostrils, both fists clenching and flexing at his sides. He shut his eyes and tipped his head back, revealing Άρης tattooed across the front of his throat.
“I find who did this,” he snarled. “I’m gonna cut his fucking heart out.”
Allan stared at him. He had never believed in karma, the whole “what goes around comes around” idiom. Bad things happened to good people. Good things happened to bad people. Life was strange like that, unfair and pretty much determined by luck. But after all the gang-related crimes Higgins and his crew were responsible for—thefts, drug trafficking, murder—they seemed to be getting what they deserved.
Higgins opened his eyes, looked straight at Allan. “You got any leads yet?”
Allan shook his head. “I’m wondering if you know who this might be?”
“If I knew, he’d be dead already.”
“Yeah? I think you better start watching your back.”
Higgins rolled his eyes. “Don’t worry ’bout me. If you catch this fucker before me, I’ll get to him in prison. I guarantee you that. He won’t be safe nowhere.”
Allan decided to let him vent.
“I wanna see him,” Higgins said. “I wanna see Blake.”
“You know I can’t allow that.”
Higgins leaned his face into Allan’s, and fury poured out of his eyes. “Fuck you, Stanton. You and these two gimps with ya.”
Allan looked at him, wondered if he was going to take a swing. In his peripheral vision, he saw the man’s fingers grazing the hem of his jacket. He knew Higgins probably had a gun tucked under there in his pants. And he was crazy enough to use it too.
Without another word, Higgins spread his arms wide and spun around, crossed the street to a black Honda Accord tricked out with Razzi ground effects, big rims, and spoiler. He stomped on the gas, spinning the tires on the wet pavement, and sped off down Primrose.
“That’s a scary fella,” an officer said.
“Yeah,” his partner agreed.
Allan watched the red taillights turn left onto Victoria Road. “He’s scary all right. Scary and batshit crazy.”
