Monsters (A Detective Pierce Novel Book 1) Read online

  MONSTERS

  A DETECTIVE PIERCE NOVEL – BOOK 1

  By

  REMINGTON KANE

  Table of Contents

  Title Page

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  QUOTATION

  CHAPTER 1

  CHAPTER 2

  CHAPTER 3

  CHAPTER 4

  CHAPTER 5

  CHAPTER 6

  CHAPTER 7

  CHAPTER 8

  CHAPTER 9

  CHAPTER 10

  CHAPTER 11

  CHAPTER 12

  CHAPTER 13

  CHAPTER 14

  CHAPTER 15

  CHAPTER 16

  CHAPTER 17

  CHAPTER 18

  CHAPTER 19

  CHAPTER 20

  COMING SOON!

  COMING SOON FROM REMINGTON KANE

  A PLEA

  ALSO BY REMINGTON KANE

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  COPYRIGHT

  Further Reading: Desolation Lake

  About the Author

  Join my Mailing List and Learn about New Releases. Also, get Exclusive Access to FREE Books and Short Stories, including The TAKEN! ALPHABET SERIES & THE FIVE STAGES OF TANNER

  REMINGTON KANE

  http://www.remingtonkane.com/contact.html

  QUOTATION

  “He who fights with monsters might take care lest he thereby become a monster. And if you gaze for long into an abyss, the abyss gazes also into you.”

  Friedrich Nietzsche

  CHAPTER 1

  Dave Owens climbed into the passenger seat of Jack Murphy’s van and waved goodbye to his wife.

  It was their scheduled Boys’ Night Out and both men wore wide grins, as Jack pulled the van away from the curb.

  “Sorry I’m late,” Jack said.

  “Did you have to work overtime again?” Dave asked.

  “No, it wasn’t that, although, I did have to stay a little late, no, it was Jenny.”

  Jack wore a flannel shirt with jeans and work boots. His dark hair was cut short and his green eyes looked tired.

  Dave, dressed in black, was full of nervous energy, his blond hair and blue eyes seeming to sparkle in the light from the street lamps they passed.

  “What’s wrong with Jenny? I hope it’s nothing serious.”

  “Nah, she just had a bad dream last night and now she’s afraid to go to sleep, you know how four-year-olds are.”

  Dave smiled.

  “Yeah, I remember when Kathy and Sammi were that age, now they’re both teenagers. Man but the years do fly.”

  As the van came to a stop at a red traffic light on Main Street, Jack asked Dave a question.

  “So, what will it be tonight? Hey, how about Italian?”

  Dave shook his head.

  “We had Italian last time; I was thinking Chinese.”

  The light changed and Jack turned right, towards Chinatown.

  “What’s with you and Chinese? All the time with the Chinese.”

  “So sue me, I like it. I didn’t see you turning it down last time.”

  Jack grinned.

  “Yeah, I gotta admit, it was good, but why don’t you try picking something different sometime? Variety is the spice of life; you know?”

  “It’s my turn to pick and I want Chinese,” Dave mumbled.

  “Don’t sulk, I’m just saying, look, I love Italian, it’s my favorite, but sometimes you have to mix things up. Remember that time we had the Hungarian, and oh yeah, what about that soul food?”

  Dave nodded his head in agreement.

  “Yeah, you’re right, that soul food was damn good.”

  “So what do you say? Let’s skip the Chinese and get something else?”

  “Nice try Jack, but no, I want Chinese.”

  “Damn, I could really go for some Italian tonight.”

  They drove the next few blocks in silence. It was something they were accustomed to. They had known each other since the first grade and didn’t feel the need to keep a patter going just to fill the void.

  Three blocks from Chinatown, the traffic came to a halt, as a spate of emergency construction brought everything to a standstill.

  Jack rolled down his window and spoke to a passing cop. The cop looked so young that Jack wondered if he had even begun shaving yet. His nameplate had the name, J. COLLINS stamped on it.

  “What’s the trouble, Officer?”

  “A water main broke two blocks up, and so the traffic is down to one lane, just be patient and we’ll get you moving.”

  Jack nodded. “Thanks officer.”

  “What was the dream about?” Dave said.

  “What?”

  “You said that Jenny had a bad dream; what was it about?”

  “Monsters.”

  “Monsters?”

  “Monsters in the closet, hungry monsters according to Jenny.”

  “That’s funny, Kathy used to have the same dream, Sammi too. Hey, did I tell you that Sammi wants to go to Stanford? I don’t know how Janet and I will swing that, not on top of all our other bills.”

  “You think you got it bad? My in-laws are moving in with us.”

  Dave turned in his seat and stared at him.

  “Are you serious?”

  “Yeah, Linda’s old man got laid off over a year ago and next week they foreclose on the house.”

  “What about Linda’s brother, Chad, is it? I thought he was worth big bucks?”

  “Him and the old man don’t get along. He told Linda that he’d send her some money to help out, but I’m not holding my breath until that money comes.”

  “Damn Jack, if you ever need anything, let me know, okay?”

  “Thanks, but you’ve got your own troubles, don’t you?”

  “You mean mom, yeah, but there’s not much I can do about that.”

  “Is the Alzheimer’s getting worse?”

  Dave nodded his head while wiping at his eyes.

  Jack reached over and gripped his shoulder.

  “You’ll get through it, brother. I know it sucks to watch her waste away like that, but you’ll get through it.”

  After sighing, Dave said. “You know, there really are monsters, old age, disease, poverty, hell, even bad luck, and sooner or later, they get each and every last one of us.”

  “Jesus, Dave!”

  “I know, it’s depressing to think about, but am I wrong? You know Saul Myer, my neighbor on the left? His grown sons both moved back in with him this year. They’re both college graduates and neither one of them can find work, so they moved back in and took jobs stocking shelves at the supermarket. Saul also told me he doesn’t have a thing saved for retirement, and he’s already sixty.”

  Jack hung his head.

  “I’ve only got ten thousand in the 401K and a couple of grand in an IRA. But how the hell can I save for my future when the present is so damn expensive?”

  “Monsters,” Dave said. “There really are monsters waiting to get each of us. If poverty doesn’t ruin our lives in old age, then some horrible disease will probably take us down or just make our last years miserable, like what my mom is going through right now, goddamn Alzheimer’s.”

  The traffic in front of the van began moving as suddenly as it had stopped, and they continued towards Chinatown.

  Jack punched Dave on the arm.

  �
�Screw everything! It’s Boys’ Night Out and we’re going to have a great time. I’ll tell you Davey, if it weren’t for these... breaks, I mean, if I wasn’t able to let off steam once in a while like this... I think I’d go crazy.”

  “What do you say we get shit-faced tonight?”

  “Sounds good, I could drink a gallon whenever I think about my father-in-law moving in.”

  “We’ll do it then, but first, Chinese.”

  ***

  Jenny Liu was so engrossed in the conversation she was having with her boyfriend, on her cell phone, that she never noticed the van that eased by.

  Moments later, the van, with lights off, coasted to rest against the curb under a broken street light.

  As Jenny walked near the van, a shape jumped out of the shadows and pummeled her in the face. Jenny fell against the van, her unconscious form sliding towards the sidewalk, even as her phone tumbled into the gutter.

  Dave Owens grabbed her before she could hit the ground and Jack opened the van’s sliding side door from inside the van. Before closing the door, Dave removed Jenny’s driver’s license and tossed her purse into the gutter beside her phone, then, Jack moved back behind the wheel and pulled away from the curb.

  Dave sat on the floor in the back with eighteen-year-old Jenny Liu laying limp in his arms.

  At the next red light, Jack stared into the rearview mirror and watched as Dave slapped duct tape over Jenny’s bloody mouth and cuffed her hands behind her back. The light turned green and Jack drove on, while Dave cut off Jenny’s clothing.

  When it grew quiet, Jack took a glance into the rearview mirror, and watched his friend stare down at the now naked and helpless girl.

  Dave leaned over and licked Jenny Liu’s face; he then looked up and smiled at Jack.

  “Man, I love Chinese.”

  CHAPTER 2

  Detective Ricardo Pierce stared down at the evidence bag containing Jenny Liu’s cell phone and the number fourteen flashed across his mind.

  “Why the hell is the phone bagged?” Bob Jerold asked. He was Pierce’s partner and a good cop, but also had a tendency to be lazy at times. Jerold was a Twenty-Year man, he was looking to put in his twenty and then retire to half pay for life. His wife had already retired from her job at city hall; both she and Jerold were only in their forties.

  Despite Jerold having more years on the job, Pierce was the senior partner. Although he was younger than Jerold, Pierce had been a homicide detective for over a decade, while Jerold had only transferred in from auto theft two years earlier. To Jerold’s credit, he didn’t resent his junior position, rather, he recognized Pierce’s experience and skill at homicide investigation, and had learned much from the younger man.

  Pierce pointed at the patrol car parked in front of them, and more specifically, at the young cop who called them to the scene.

  “It was the kid’s idea, and a good one it was, we may just have discovered victim number fourteen.”

  Jerold rolled his eyes.

  “Oh not that shit again, I keep telling you, just drop it. God, the last thing the department needs is a serial killer. Those bastards are always a bitch to catch, and in the meantime, they bring nothing but bad press. Who needs us looking into that shit?”

  Pierce stared at his partner.

  “Who needs us looking for the killer? Future victim number fifteen, that’s who.”

  Jerold looked embarrassed, then turned and pointed to a coffee shop on the corner.

  “While you’re playing Sherlock, I’ll go get us some coffee.”

  “Fine, and remember I want it—”

  “Black, no sugar, no nothing, I remember, but I’ll be damned if I know how you can drink it that way, I mean, what’s the point?”

  Pierce smiled.

  “A medium coffee will be fine, and I’ll pay for lunch later.”

  “It’s a deal,” Jerold said, and walked off to get the coffees.

  The young cop came over with his partner, an eight-year veteran named Tubbs, who Pierce knew slightly. Tubbs was black, tall and round, but the round was a lie. Pierce had once seen him run down a teenage suspect in less than a block and not even break a sweat.

  Tubbs grinned at Pierce as he slapped a friendly hand on his rookie partner’s shoulder.

  “So, Pierce, what’s the verdict? Is that phone a clue or just a lost phone like I told the kid?”

  The rookie sighed, his name was Jake Collins and he had been on the force for less than a year. He was blond, early twenties, and just shy of six-feet tall.

  “I never said it was a clue. I just said that it reminded me of the way that other girl went missing, you know, Sue Kim? Her father found her cell phone lying in the gutter just like I found this one, and the girl who owned this one has been missing for nearly a week.”

  Pierce held up the bag with the phone in it.

  “I don’t know if this will help us locate Jenny Liu or not, but finding it was good work, Collins. If she was abducted, we now know where it most likely happened.”

  Jake Collins grinned.

  “I’ve been eyeballing gutters everywhere we went; I almost couldn’t believe it when I spotted it.”

  The radios attached to the cops’ collars squawked.

  Tubbs answered and listened. When he was done talking, he tapped his partner on the shoulder.

  “Let’s go kid; we got a shoplifter at the ManyMart.”

  Collins nodded, waved goodbye to Pierce, and sprinted back to the patrol car.

  Tubbs shook his head.

  “The kid’s a tiger; he treats every call like life or death.”

  “I remember being that way,” Pierce said. “I couldn’t wait to put the uniform on in the morning.”

  Tubbs waved goodbye.

  “I better go before he leaves me; see ya around, Pierce,”

  Pierce said goodbye and watched the patrol car take off. A moment later, Jerold returned with the coffees, and handed one to Pierce.

  “Black, just the way you like it.”

  “Thanks.”

  “So, what’s the story with the cell phone?”

  “I’m going to drop it off at the lab, and then I’ll speak to Lieutenant Dyer again, try to make him see what we’ve got here. These girls aren’t just running away, they’re being abducted.”

  “Yeah, but Rick, there are no bodies, there’s no evidence of violence, no evidence of anything, and the lieutenant’s not going to let you run with your serial killer theory until you find something more than a few lost cell phones.”

  “I still have to try and convince him, Bob. Every day we ignore this is another day that this guy gets away with it, and gets a chance to kill again.”

  ***

  The “guy” that Pierce sought, was actually two guys, Dave Owens and Jack Murphy.

  They were together at Murphy’s house in the suburbs, and were busy unloading boxes and furniture from the back of a rented truck.

  Jack Murphy’s in-laws were moving in.

  As the two men wrestled with a heavy china cabinet, Murphy’s father-in-law, Phil, gave them instructions on how to do it right.

  “Pick your end up higher, Jack, and don’t scratch it, that thing cost a fortune,” Phil said, in a deep, raspy voice. Phil had been a heavy smoker for most of his life.

  “Hey Phil, while Dave and I are doing this, why don’t you bring in a few of those boxes?”

  Phil Garner looked at his son-in-law as if he had asked him to fly.

  “With my back? No way, if I tried to lift even one of those things I’d be laid up for a week.”

  Jack looked at Dave and rolled his eyes.

  ***

  Three hours later, Jack’s in-laws were newly planted in his home and he and Dave were returning the rental truck.

  Jack climbed into Dave’s car and let out a breath of relief.

  “All right, that’s done. Now let’s go to O’Neil’s and have a beer.”

  “A beer sounds good, but I can’t. My mom’s visiting h
ours end soon and I haven’t seen her all day. After I drop you off, I’m going by to see her.”

  “How’s she doing?”

  Dave let out a sigh, as he fought back tears.

  “It’s not good, and the way the doctors are talking, it’s... it’s like they’re trying to prepare me... I think she could go any day.”

  “Oh Christ, I’m so sorry, Dave.”

  “I know, and thanks... fucking Alzheimer’s.”

  ***

  They drove the rest of the way back to Jack’s house in silence. When Dave pulled into the driveway to let him out, he pointed at Jack’s van.

  “Why don’t we get together later and have a Boys’ Night Out, hmm?”

  “So soon? It’s only been a few days since the last one, and Linda’s still pissed at me for staying out as late as I did.”

  “I know we just had one, but I could really use another, and hey, we’ll even have your favorite, Italian.”

  Jack shook his head.

  “It’s too soon. As much as I’d like to blow off some steam... it’s just too soon.”

  “You’re right, I know you’re right, but think about it, I really need to have a night out soon.”

  Jack patted his friend on the chest.

  “Go see your mom, and give her my love.”

  Dave winced.

  “Give her your love? I can’t, hell, she doesn’t even remember who I am.”

  CHAPTER 3

  Detective Ricardo Pierce returned home that night to a house that had been in his family for generations. It was a four-story relic from another time, with real plaster walls and gold filigree on every doorframe.

  The house had five bedrooms, and each bedroom had its own full bath, while three of them had working fireplaces. Four of the bedrooms were on the second floor, while the fifth bedroom, the master bedroom, comprised the entire third floor and could rightly be called an apartment, except for one thing, it had no facilities for cooking.

  It did however, have a wide balcony, and Pierce walked out onto it with a bottle of beer in his hand to gaze about.

  The home was surrounded by farmland, land that Pierce rented out, just as his father had, in fact, no Pierce had ever farmed the land as far as Pierce knew. At the time the home was built, the family was far too wealthy to personally soil their hands with such work, and by the time his father had nearly bankrupted them, there was no one who had the knowledge to successfully do so.