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  I need to call an agency that delivers vehicles. Damn it, I hate leaving a paper trail, but at least I’m in Ellenwood and not in the immediate Atlanta area.

  Greg typed “car rental agencies that deliver vehicles” into the search bar on his phone. There were five agencies in Ellenwood proper and only two that delivered vehicles to customers’ homes. He called the first one on the list and ordered the least expensive economy car for a two-day rental. After that, nothing else mattered.

  With a half-hour wait for the car, Greg went to the second hidden room and checked on Tristan. She barely moved when he kicked the side of her cage. She’d been without food or water for several days and seemed to be deteriorating quickly. “Hey, wake up!”

  She lay centered on the cold cage floor in a fetal position. Greg noticed her eyelids twitch, but she didn’t open them, and she didn’t speak.

  Maybe sedating her will be easier than I thought. I’ll reach in through the wires, grab her by the leg, and pull her closer. At least the hair will be dyed tonight, and the right eyes should arrive tomorrow.

  He checked the time. The car rental agent was due any minute. Greg turned off the light and closed the door behind him.

  I’ll deal with her after I take that driver back to the rental agency.

  Chapter 46

  Once again with my notes spread out across the bed, I looked over everything.

  What am I missing? The truck hasn’t been seen on surveillance cameras, and it hasn’t been serviced at the classic car shop. That means it probably isn’t anything special, just old. And then there’s the connection with the word oak, which none of us can figure out.

  I folded over the last page I’d used in the legal pad and started fresh with a new list of bullet-pointed issues. I wanted to know if what was left of the head belonged with the torso and legs found in the cemetery or with the set of legs found in Oakland City—or with neither.

  There aren’t enough parts to complete two full bodies. We’re missing a head, a torso, and two sets of arms. So, what has he done with them, or maybe they just haven’t been found yet?

  I tapped the pen against the paper and gave that more thought.

  What if he’s piecing different parts together to make one complete body?

  My mind went back to last year’s Halloween discovery. Arms, legs, and a torso were found but never a head. I wondered if he kept it as a souvenir.

  “This is getting really sick really fast.” I rubbed my forehead and tried to press the thoughts into a logical explanation, but nothing a sadistic killer could do would be logical. “Focus, Kate. Two of those street names from last year contained the word oak. The woman was never identified, but she must have been important to him since he took the risk of being caught in the act of disposing limbs and a torso on a night where so many people were out and about.” I scratched out a note to check on every owner of that house on Lone Oak Avenue, going back to when the house was built.

  Maybe the victim lived there at some point.

  Why my thoughts always pulled me back to Greg McMillian, I didn’t know. I scrolled through my gallery again and looked at his picture.

  Could he possibly be the man with the flashlight against his face? Did he kill and cut up that woman on Halloween and spread her body parts all over the neighborhood? Did she do something that was unforgivable to him, or am I letting my imagination get the best of me because we need somebody to apprehend? What would Greg’s motivation be to turn from a longtime meat butcher into a human one?

  I remembered I had his card in my wallet and pulled it out to make sure I had the correct spelling of his name as I did an online search of his address.

  “Hmm… the age seems right for this man in Ellenwood.”

  I’d found three Greg McMillians in Fulton County, but two were pushing seventy years old. From what I’d remembered about the butcher, he appeared to be in his forties, and a guy nearly seventy wouldn’t be chasing somebody through a field on an ATV. I logged on to the people search database and found the address then typed it into my computer’s search bar. An aerial view of the property showed up but was little help since tree cover blocked everything beneath it. Keeping that tab open, I brought up a map of the greater Atlanta area too. Ellenwood was south of the city and just east of Interstate 675. I zoomed in the map and saw that Moreland Avenue ran parallel to the interstate, and by cutting east on Forest Parkway, a driver would land dead center in Ellenwood.

  Hmm… that seems more than coincidental, and Confederate Avenue, where the butcher shop is located, runs directly into Moreland. That has to be the route Greg travels every day.

  I thought about the fast-food restaurant and the chances of Greg being the perp. If he was, he dropped the bag into the dumpster either Friday on his way home from work, Saturday morning as he went to work, or later that day when he left for home. Since I knew when the butcher shop opened and closed, we could check all the nearby cameras in both directions during those approximate hours. The sooner I could eliminate him as a suspect, the sooner I’d get him out of my mind, or if he was the killer, the sooner we’d arrest and convict him. My plans for tomorrow would include driving to the butcher shop to see what kind of vehicle was parked in the back and paying a visit to Ellenwood, Georgia, too.

  Chapter 47

  “That takes care of that.” Greg unlocked the front door, and just before crossing the threshold, he looked back at the green Honda Fit he had rented for the next two days. He chuckled with a sense of accomplishment. “You cops think you can outsmart me? Well, think again. I need to complete this task by Halloween since it’s the only way to get back in Kamila’s good graces. Nobody is going to stop me, so thanks for the heads-up about the BOLO.”

  He entered the house, locked the door at his back, and went directly to the operating room. As he loaded a syringe with the sleep medication needed to render Tristan unconscious, he paused as he thought about how long she needed to be asleep.

  Am I only dying her hair, or am I taking off her legs tonight too?

  He thought about the expedited delivery of the eyes.

  “Hmm… I didn’t see that box on the porch, and I insisted on overnight delivery, damn it.”

  Greg set the syringe on the counter, next to the box of hair dye, and walked through the house to the front door. He searched the porch, the bushes, and alongside the garage. The box hadn’t been delivered. He slammed his fist on the wall of the house, bloodying his knuckles, then stormed inside. With the invoice in hand and the phone number dialed, he waited as the phone rang on the other end. After three rings, a recorded message came on and stated the hours of operation and said to press one to leave a message. He threw the phone across the room, where it bounced off the wall and fell to the floor. He had to have those eyes in time, and they had to be the right color. His entire plan depended on it, and if they didn’t arrive by Halloween, there would be no reason to continue. Removing legs and a head would be a time-consuming project and reattaching them to the torso and arms he had in the refrigerator would take even longer. The end result had to be perfect.

  Greg rifled through the cabinet, shoving bottles aside until he found the whiskey. He yanked out the bottle and gave it a look. Only an inch of the golden elixir remained. He twisted off the cap and guzzled it down. He was more than pissed and marched back into the operating room. With just enough sleep medication in the syringe to give him time to dye Tristan’s hair, he dropped it in his pocket and opened door number two.

  Tristan lay on the floor of the cage, in the same fetal position she had been in an hour earlier. Greg kicked the side and watched. She didn’t flinch.

  Good enough.

  He wedged his arm through the diamond-shaped links and swatted at her leg. He was within an inch of grasping it. He pressed his body deeper against the cage and extended his fingers as far as he could. “Son of a bitch! Come on!” He smacked, swatted, and shook the cage but couldn’t reach her. Resigned to the fact that he’d have to open the ga
te again, he dipped his hand in his pocket and pulled out the key.

  Chapter 48

  I woke at six thirty to my cell phone alarm. Even though I was thankful for a good night’s sleep, disappointment washed over me that I hadn’t had a dream that would give me more clues.

  I showered and dressed then grabbed a breakfast bar to eat on my drive. That day would be a busy one, and I vowed I’d do whatever I could to uncover something that would move us one step closer to solving the case.

  At the precinct, I met with Dave in his office, where he updated me on our last chance to find footage at the intersection of Memorial Drive and Carroll Street.

  “The night shift detectives reviewed Friday’s footage, Kate, and that truck never showed up.”

  I felt my shoulders slump, but I wasn’t surprised by the results. The perp knew the best ways to avoid being seen, and we needed to think like him instead of going with the common sense route. I pulled out my notes and, with Dave, went over the summary of what I had put together last night.

  “I don’t know why my instincts lead me toward Greg McMillian, but usually they’re right. He is a butcher and would be well acquainted with how to dismember bodies. He lives in Ellenwood just east of I-675, and his shop is on Confederate Avenue, which links up with Moreland.” I showed Dave the rough sketch I had drawn last night of the flow from the butcher shop to Greg’s house. “See here?” I tapped the drawing. “Moreland runs parallel to I-675, and all Greg needs to do is exit onto Forest, go east a few miles, and he’s home. He could have dumped that head off Friday after work, Saturday morning on his way to work, or Saturday afternoon on his way home. Knowing when he passes by would make checking camera footage from any store along Moreland an easy task. We’d see the truck enter the fast-food restaurant and have him dead to rights.”

  “But my guys already reviewed Quick Break’s street-view footage. That truck didn’t enter from Moreland.”

  “Maybe not within that camera’s reach, Dave, but it got to the dumpster from somewhere. We need to look at a map of the surrounding streets and see if he entered that lot from another location.”

  Dave scratched his cheek, appearing to give that some thought. “There was an adjoining driveway that led to a small strip mall behind Quick Break. It entered from a street north of the restaurant.”

  “Then that’s what we need to look at.”

  We pulled up a map of the area from Dave’s computer, and I followed Confederate Avenue with my finger to the point where it intersected with Moreland. The fast-food restaurant was two blocks south of that.

  I pointed at the street Greg had likely turned on. “Here! I bet he turned on Sky Haven Road and took that to Ripplewater Drive. There are multiple driveways that lead to those retail spaces from the rear, and Quick Break is among those buildings. We just need to find a camera that points to the intersection of Moreland and Sky Haven Road.”

  “Why don’t we just make it easy on ourselves and check the DMV database to see what vehicles are registered to Greg McMillian?”

  I rolled my eyes. “No luck there. I already went that route.”

  “And?”

  “And the only vehicle shown is a 1989 Olds Toronado that hasn’t had the plates renewed for seven years.”

  “So he sold it?”

  “No clue, sir. I’m only stating what the DMV shows for him.”

  Dave glanced at the map again. “Okay, what’s on that corner that likely has a camera?”

  I gave him my best confident smile after I zoomed in on the retail spaces along Moreland. “How about Atlanta General Credit Union? Their building is on the opposite side of the street and faces that intersection.”

  Dave’s expression gave away the doubt percolating in his mind as he tapped his fingers on the desk. “So a guy who’s run a legit business for years suddenly becomes a murder suspect? Just like that, without any evidence? Wrongly accusing him of being the Fulton County Butcher could ruin his career and life.”

  I nodded. “I agree, and I’ll tread lightly, but at this point, we have no suspects at all. There won’t be a hint of publicity leading to him unless I find solid evidence substantiating my claims, I promise you that.”

  Dave let out a long breath. “Okay, I’ll get somebody over to that intersection right away and check for camera footage from Friday and Saturday.”

  “And I’d like to go back to the butcher shop and do some recon myself. He’s seen me twice before but only as a paying customer, and I doubt if he’d even remember. The store was crowded with people both times. I’ll check around, see if that truck is behind the building, and give him a closer look.”

  “Okay but be careful. You don’t want to spook him.”

  I gave Dave a thank-you smile. “I won’t, and my sister needs another jar of muffuletta salad, anyway.”

  As I waited for ten o’clock to arrive, I crossed off a few bullet-pointed items on my list. I didn’t want to be the first person in the butcher shop when it opened and blending in with the crowd would lessen my chance of looking as if I was snooping around.

  Minutes earlier, I’d hung up from a conversation with the coroner, who confirmed that the tissue from the head matched the tissue found in the bag of body parts from the cemetery. That body, nearly complete, was now missing only its arms. I put a note next to that on my list.

  Looking online, I reviewed every deed issued to the house on Lone Oak Avenue. Built in 1968, it had gone through three owners in the past. The most recent buyer after the Halloween incident was owner number four. I wrote down the names and set the paper aside. I’d do a background check on each owner later that afternoon and see if any had a connection to Greg McMillian. I glanced at the clock and still had fifteen minutes to kill. I thought about the likelihood of Greg being a car buff and wondered why he would have an old Oldsmobile and an old truck unless he had a fondness for those types of vehicles.

  Maybe they’re memories of better times or possibly vehicles handed down from his folks.

  I scratched out a note to delve deeper into that later and checked the clock again. The driving time between the police department and the butcher shop was ten minutes. I gathered my gear and made a pit stop in the ladies’ room before leaving, then as I took the hallway toward the exit, I popped my head in Dave’s office and said I’d see him later.

  “Be extra careful, Kate, and keep me posted.”

  “I will, but he’s stuck at work, anyway. He can’t do me any harm.”

  I left the building and arrived at the butcher shop at ten thirty. Relief washed over me when I saw four cars already sitting in the lot. I parked the rental away from the floor-to-ceiling glass storefront and climbed out. Keeping an eye on the front door, I peered down the side of the building to see if any windows lined that wall, and none were visible. With another quick look at the entrance, I hugged the wall and made my way to the back of the building. Only one vehicle sat in that rear lot, and it wasn’t an older truck.

  What the hell?

  Next to the exit door sat a green Honda Fit, and I wondered if my instincts were wrong.

  If that’s his car, then why didn’t it show up in the DMV database?

  I checked my surroundings before pulling out my phone and snapping a picture of the back of the car. Clicking on the image, I made sure the plate number was legible and complete. With that done, I returned to the front of the building and entered the butcher shop. I milled around the refrigerated cases while taking a longer look at Greg, who was filling orders behind the counter. With a jar of muffuletta salad in hand, I moved a little closer, tore off a ticket, and stood on the customer side of the counter, with two people in front of me.

  “Number five,” he called out as my turn came up.

  I stepped forward and set the jar on the counter.

  “Anything else?”

  I smiled and pulled out my wallet. “Nope, that’s all for today.”

  The look he gave me sent chills up my spine.

  “Are you a
regular here?”

  I forced a laugh. “Well, if I was, you’d probably know me.”

  His suspicious stare told me I looked familiar. I gave him the quick explanation of having been in the store on Friday and Saturday.

  “I ordered burgers and dogs for a birthday party from you.”

  He nodded. “Yeah, I remember now. Eight pounds of ground chuck, thirty dogs, and a jar of muffuletta salad.”

  “Wow, you have quite the memory.” I slid a ten across the counter while he bagged the pickled salad and counted out my change.

  “Here you go.” He gave me another stare that lasted longer than I was comfortable with then called out the next number in line.

  I exited the building and held my breath as I gave the inside of the dumpster a quick look. A black bag, very similar to the ones found at the crime scenes, lay inside. I stretched my arm over the side and extended my fingers as far as I could, but the bag was out of reach. I searched the ground for something I could use to pull the bag closer to me, but just then the front door opened at the same time a car pulled in the driveway. I knew I would risk being questioned if I continued my snooping. If I had a chance, I’d drive back that night and check it out.

  I resigned myself to leaving and knew it was the smartest thing to do. In the car, I checked the distance and time between the butcher shop and Greg’s home. It was a twenty-minute drive. Last night, I had drawn several sketches, one of them the layout of the killer’s property from what I’d remembered in my dream. I pulled it out of my backpack and placed it on the passenger seat.