Tracking Evil, a Podcast Pt. 05

Authors note: This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, events and incidents are the products of the author's imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.

Tracking Evil, A Podcast: Part 5

Episode 1: "Mors certa, hora incerta." *Death is certain, its hour is uncertain

Erica missed her family. She missed the awkward early morning conversations with her mom and the random hugs and unsought lectures on life from her dad. But not being able to see them or visit them wasn't the worst thing about her hiding out.

She missed her bed. Moving from motel to motel, town to town, county to county, state to state. It had worn thin by the second week. A parade of lumpy mattresses and less than clean bed linen made her appreciate her own bed all the more. But that wasn't the worst thing about hiding out.

Erica also missed the simple pleasure of a good night's sleep. Since she had gone on the run it had become a regular occurrence to wake up, shaken from her sleep by an unfamiliar sound. Sitting bolt upright in bed while straining to identify if the shadow at the window was a lamppost or a man intent on killing her. But even that wasn't the worst thing about hiding out.

The worst thing was that she and Arlene hadn't been able to attend Amos's funeral. Losing the chance to pay her respects to a brave man who had become a friend in a very short time was a big blow to Erica. He had deserved more, a better ending to a life packed with no regrets, than to be cut down by a coward. Erica knew that whatever pain she must be feeling was only a fraction compared to the hurt that Arlene would be going through.

They had spoken a few times since Arlene had called to warn Erica after Amos's murder but as yet neither had felt they should meet up. At this point, distance and anonymity were their best defence. Both of them had dumped their old phones as soon as they could get their hands on disposable cells. Erica felt secure enough that her email and notes had remained undisturbed by Butterman as neither her files or laptop had been in the motel room for him to find when he'd apparently snuck in there. Just to be safe, she had given Tiny a heads up on the danger. Predictably the big man had shown little concern for himself, confident in his own prowess. However, Erica had been able to persuade him to send his grandmother away for a few weeks to visit her sister, just to be safe.

Duncan refused to hide.

He had attended Amos's funeral heavily armed, hoping Butterman would be stupid enough to attend. Butterman hadn't complied with this wish, it wasn't his style to put himself in danger. After the funeral, Duncan had shared the suspicions as to who had killed Amos with some of Amos's nephews and cousins. From her last conversation with him, Erica had been led to believe that a small army of men were constantly on the watch for the suspected serial killer and that by living in their midst, Duncan was as safe as he could possibly be given the circumstances.

He was so confident in the security provided by his late friend's family that he had devoted an hour trying to persuade both Erica and Arlene to join him there for their own protection. Both women had refused his offer but for different reasons. Arlene felt that she had already cost Amos's family enough and she wasn't ready to face them, not with his killer at large. Instead, the deputy sheriff was relying on her own wits and skills to keep herself safe. She had taken a leave of absence from her job and like Erica, she was keeping on the move.

Erica didn't have the same training as Arlene, her only defence at this point was avoiding being found. Her reason for not wanting to stay with Duncan was not from a sense of shame like Arlene, it was from a growing realisation that she was becoming increasingly at the mercy of her own blossoming sexuality. The idea of being confined in a house with multiple black men for an unspecified length of time excited her and her level of excitement actually terrified her somewhat. So, using her head and not her body as the decision maker, she had politely but firmly rejected Duncan's offer.

The cheap motel just outside of Lewisburg West Virginia made Erica think that she should arrange for a tetanus shot the next morning. She peered at the mould growing in the corner of the shower stall and shuddered.

"Just one night, just one night. Keep it together." she muttered to herself. Still, she closed the bathroom door firmly behind her in case that fungal mess began releasing spores during the next twelve hours. The still unfamiliar ring from her new cell phone was a welcome distraction from the poor housekeeping in the motel and Erica crossed the room quickly to snatch up the phone from the table she'd set it down on.

Only two other people had this number so without even looking at the caller id she had a good idea who was calling. "Hey Arlene." she said as she answered.

"Just checking on you. How's the accommodation?" Arlene sounded tired on the phone, her words coming across with forced joviality.

"Same as yours I expect. Like a nature programme on the discovery channel whenever I turn off the lights... so I sleep with them on." Erica replied, her own light-hearted quip sounding wooden to her ears. "Actually, I'm glad you called. I've been thinking about something, I wanted to run it past you."

"Go ahead." Arlene said, "I need something to focus on."

Erica made herself as comfortable as possible and then launched into it.

"I kept going back to the fact that Butterman returned to the same town he killed his wife in. The same town he grew up in. It never made sense to me, even allowing for him being a fucking psycho. Then I thought to myself, this is a guy who ate at the same place every day, the same meal. He is a real creature of habit. He went back to his hometown because it was somewhere familiar, somewhere he knew. Now he has been forced to move, he isn't the type to do what we've done and live day to day in different locations. He especially wouldn't plan and execute a murder if he was feeling off kilter. So that means that wherever he has gone to, wherever he is hiding out, it's somewhere he knows, somewhere familiar."

There was a silence from Arlene's side, Erica knew she was mulling it over and so remained quiet herself, letting the professional work it through her mind.

"I like it. It makes perfect sense. Home run girl, fucking home run!" Arlene finally said, a trace of energy in her voice now. "Any other brilliant deductions?"

Erica colored in pleasure at the compliment and answered straight away. "I checked and he has no living relatives, nobody around who was close to him when he lived there as a young man. I figured if anyone might know where he might go, maybe it was someone he was stuck in a cell with for a long time. Even someone as cold as Butterman might get to talking when there is nothing else to do except stare at bars and a wall. I still have a copy of his record that you gave me and I looked through it. His longest cellmate was a guy called Cranston Haywood, they spent eight years in the same cell. I checked online and he was paroled just under a year ago. I haven't been able to find out where he is now."

"Leave that to me, I'll track him down." Arlene said, "It might be worth our while heading to the prison as well. Sometimes the guards pick up on stuff, maybe one of them recalls pictures or photos Butterman might have kept in his cell. Might be a clue there."

"Good thinking, only..." Erica began to answer.

"Only what?" Arlene snapped out the question

"Only maybe I should talk to Cranston Haywood. He will make you for law enforcement and anything he gives up will likely be just bullshit, assuming he talks to us at all. Maybe we split the workload and you go to the prison instead?" Erica offered mildly.

There was the unmistakable sound of breath being released in a long, slow calming manner before Arlene spoke again. "You're right, sorry I took your head off. Just want to get this son of a bitch. Okay, I'll run down an address on Cranston and send it to you straight away. Want me to contact Duncan to help you out?"

Erica got a mental flash of herself getting her ass fucked by Duncan and her pussy immediately voted yes for him joining her for the interview.

"Ummm no, probably not a good idea." Erica said, overruling her pussy, "His emotions are raw right now, don't want his anger putting this guy off either. We need answers, clues, leads and Duncan waving a gun in this guy's face might not get them for us."

Arlene grunted in accord and promised Erica the information soon.

Erica turned off the phone and looked around the shitty motel room. The next clue couldn't come soon enough, she needed to get a decent night's sleep.

Episode 2: "Memento vivere" *Remember to live

As Arlene pulled up outside the prison, she noted that the weather ideally suited her mood, the sky heavy with dark rainclouds. She parked her car in an empty visitor's spot and checked herself in the rear-view mirror. She didn't normally wear much make up but the lack of sleep and bouts of crying had left her paler than usual with dark smudges beneath her eyes. She had freshened herself up, adding a small amount of lipstick as well, pale in color but still noticeable nonetheless. Getting out, Arlene straightened her uniform before pulling her cap on. The tan uniform shirt over dark green trousers were in order but she straightened her dark green tie in the wing mirror to her satisfaction. She'd pulled her shoulder length red wavy hair back into a severe pony tail so that, cap in place, she looked the complete professional that she took pride in being.

Strictly speaking she wasn't on duty but Arlene thought that her showing up in uniform would help reinforce her position when she began asking questions. She'd rung ahead and the lead prison guard on shift today had said he'd be able to make time to talk to her. Arlene hadn't given him any idea of what she wanted, she figured that if she had he might have just claimed ignorance and shut the phone conversation down there and then. Less easy for him to walk away when she was stood in front of him, if he couldn't help then she'd at least work some names from him of other guards or convicts who might.

At the main building check in, once she'd navigated the two checkpoints leading up to the main prison building, Arlene suffered surrendering her side arm and spare magazines. She elected to keep her gun belt in place, it was as much a part of the uniform as far as she was concerned as her badge was.

The guard waited for her to sign in and then buzzed her through to a small waiting area, just a half dozen metal chairs lining two of the walls, each chair leg was bolted securely onto the floor. There was about a ten-minute wait before the interior door buzzed open and a man near enough her own age stepped through.

Rob Pierce had been a guard at the prison for over ten years and from the little she had gleaned from her enquires he was a good guy, willing to cooperate, bend rules even, when tapped by local law enforcement.

His dark blue uniform looked a little rumpled as did the man himself. Despite wearing a weary expression as he came through the doorway, Erica could see him straightening slightly and fixing a friendly welcoming smile on his face as he made eye contact with her.

"Rob Pierce" he said by way of introduction, extending a dark-skinned hand towards Arlene. She took it, feeling her own white hand swallowed in the firm handshake.

"Deputy Arlene McGuigan, thanks for agreeing to meet me." she replied. Arlene noted the neat clean fingernails and the well-groomed moustache on Rob as she made a quick appraisal of the man. Clearly, he took pride in his appearance so the state of his uniform indicated a tough shift for the man rather than a personal choice.

"Problems?" She made the question casual as he released her hand.

"Nah, well nothing out of the ordinary. Same old frustrations that come with the work. So how can I help you Deputy?"

Arlene took out a mugshot image of Butterman, holding it up for Rob to see. "Any chance you remember this convict?"

"Ghost? Yeah, I remember him." Rob replied, indicating they should sit as they spoke.

Arlene sat down, putting the mugshot back into her file folder. "Why did you call him Ghost?"

"Just a nickname he picked up, guards and con's all used it. Man had a habit, a skill, of just fading into the background. Rarely spoke, rarely interacted with anyone, just became part of the furniture. People used to jump some when he did move or speak, startled because they'd forgotten he was even there... so... Ghost. What's your interest in him?"

"Person of interest in a case I am following up on. Anyone around who could tell me a bit about him? I'm looking to get some background on him, specifically places he spoke about, on the outside, while he was incarcerated." Arlene said.

Rob frowned as he considered her question, tapping the face of his wristwatch with a finger in an unconscious action.

"Not really. I would have had as much interaction with him as any guard here and he never spoke about his life outside around me. If I remember right the couple of people, he spent any time with were either sharing a cell with him or close by. They've all gone now, paroled, back in the world."

"Damn it." Arlene muttered in frustration.

"We could always try storage." Rob offered.

"Storage?"

Arlene found she had to skip with every fourth stride just to keep up with the tall prison guard's long strides. Rob Pierce had a strong muscular build but on a tall frame and Arlene figured he was well capable of protecting himself and instilling order in this institution. As they moved through a maze of corridors, he explained to her about the storage.

"After an inmate is released, we toss the cell. Standard practice before moving a new inmate into the bunk. Anything we find we stick into a box in storage. Sometimes we will get a request for a forgotten memento, a photograph, a letter... that kind of thing. We hold onto it for a while and then every so often we go through the pile, dump whatever has been there a while."

"And was there something in Butterman's cell he left behind?" Arlene huffed as she trotted alongside him.

"Jesus I couldn't remember that. Even if there was, it might have been trashed already. No promises, just a chance."

"It's all I got right now." Arlene muttered beneath her laboured breath.

Finally, he pulled open a door, leading Arlene inside. The faint odour of chemicals hit her first as she stepped inside. She saw mops and wheeled buckets parked to one side of the room, a few sparsely stocked shelves of assorted cleaning products beside them. A metal table was on the other side of the room, a clipboard with some paperwork sitting on top of it.

"Some of the older con's or those who are in on non-violent offences are in this wing. They access here to mop out their cells. Plumbing is a joke in some of the older parts of the facility, we get the occasional backed up toilet so they access this room to clean it up. We're this way."

He led her further into the room and she saw that the last quarter was adorned ceiling to floor by bars, a locked cell door separating it from the cleaning storage. Behind the bars she could see metal shelving stacked with a variety of plain brown carboard boxes and large brown envelopes. Rob fished out an impressive bunch of keys and sorted through them before selecting one to open the door with. Inside Arlene noted the bare mattress on a small bed. Beneath a pile of boxes, she could see a toilet and sink.

"Used to be used for isolating an inmate in transit, we ran out of storage before we ran out of cells." Rob explained in passing.

They checked Butterman's convict number on Arlene's file against the numbers scrawled on the outside of the packages. Arlene began to lose the last glimmer of hope by the time they reached the last bank of shelves until she heard Rob's grunt of satisfaction, turning to see him straighten up from the bottom shelf, a large envelope in his hand.

Arlene took the envelope from Rob, it felt heavy in her hand and she moved over to the table to inspect it contents. She took out a pair of latex gloves, donning them before ripping open the envelope, which she then emptied onto the tabletop. Three magazines and some papers slip out onto the metal surface. Straight away she picked up the papers to inspect them, acutely aware of Rob hovering close behind her, his breath kissing her cheek as his curiosity overruled any concept of personal space.

The papers were from a lawyer dispositioning some inheritance from an aunt who had died. Arlene glanced at them quickly then set them aside to read more thoroughly later. She fanned out the three magazines. Two were on antiques and one was on chess. She picked up the first to fan through the pages in the slight hope that he had secreted something inside them. Flicking through the first couple of pages she realised that the magazine didn't have as much to do with old vases and jugs as it did cocks and tits.

Butterman had somehow acquired a number of porno magazines and had disguised them so that anyone finding them wouldn't show any interest. She opened up the other two to confirm that yes, they were all pornography. Not just Penthouse or Playboy though, he had managed to get his hands on interracially themed magazines. Big black cocks and willing big breasted white females were entwined in a variety of poses and outfits on every page. Behind her, Rob gave a slightly embarrassed sounding cough.

"Who would have thought it? Ghost sitting up in his cell jerking off to this. I didn't think the guy had a single emotion inside him." Rob commented from over her shoulder.

Slowly she leafed through each magazine in turn. On the third page of the first magazine there was a full-page picture of a black guy resting an improbably large cock on the bare stomach of a woman, illustrating the depths he could reach inside her. Beneath the picture was the familiar calling card of Butterman. BILLII. Arlene continued slowly, methodically through each magazine, looking to see if Butterman had written on any other pages.

It never occurred to her how it looked to the prison guard beside her. An attractive white female deputy sheriff seemingly enthralled by the images of black men sexually ravaging white women. Not just looking through the magazines but occasionally pausing, letting out small sighs of satisfaction as she did so. Arlene was so pleased to have found this evidence, something that directly linked Butterman to the crimes that how her behaviour might be construed just didn't enter her mind.

And then it did. Rob pressed forward to peek over her shoulder and she clearly felt the hard bulge of a cock pressing into her soft rear as he did so. Her eyes widened as two and two finally made four and Arlene's face began to flush crimson with mortification. Hurriedly she stuffed the magazines and paperwork back into the envelope, clutching it to her chest. Rob backed off but only slightly when she turned around to face him. She proffered the envelope towards him, spotting the glint of the gold band of his wedding ring as he took it from her.

"Ummm, can you put this back. It might be required as evidence later on but I want to get an independent officer with me when I collect it, just to ensure the chain of evidence is flawless." Arlene said.

"Sure, I'll put it back now." he said and did so promptly, returning to stand in front of her again before she had a chance to move towards the door.