And then, just as quiet as a church mouse, he slid open the living room window and dropped beneath the dense cover of the evergreen, still wet from the torrential storm that had since passed over. Then the Clown quietly slipped unnoticed into the purple-blue night, just as slivers of orange light began to slice across the sky and day broke over the deserted streets of New York City.
10
Marie Catherine Murphy stood outside Apartment 1B and simply knew that something was wrong. Especially since it was already ten to nine, Marie was running late, today was the practice multistate exam, and Chloe was not answering her door. And while it was not unusual for Chloe to be late, too, which was partly why they were such great friends, she always eventually answered. Albeit, usually in her pajamas, but always with a great excuse and two enormous mugs of freshly brewed coffee in hand, as well as a box of Stella D’oro Breakfast Treats. They had carpooled to St John’s Law School for the past three years, and Marie could not think of one time that Chloe had stood her up. No matter how late Marie had been in getting there.
An elderly woman had buzzed her in the building, and Marie had practically sat on Chloe’s doorbell for the past five minutes. She knew that Chloe and Michael had gone out last night, and she initially thought that maybe he had spent the night and they had both overslept. That thought made her pause for a few moments and hope that Michael would not answer the door in his underwear. Coffee or no coffee, Marie certainly didn’t need to see that. But after five minutes there was still no response to the ringing bell, and Marie was getting more than anxious. She tried to peep in Chloe’s mail slot, but found that it was covered with something from the inside.
She headed back outside and lit up a cigarette. Upstairs, behind his window, she saw Chloe’s strange neighbor staring down into the courtyard at her, black coffee cup in hand. He certainly was creepy, half naked, with those thick glasses and that weird sneer on his face. A chill ran through Marie’s body. She saw that Chloe’s front curtains were still drawn shut and her bedroom blinds closed. Her car was missing from its usual spot and Michael’s BMW was nowhere to be seen.
Don
’
t panic. I
’
m sure it
’
s nothing.
She padded around to the other side of the brick building to where Chloe’s kitchen window was. The window was closed, but the curtains were pulled back. The window towered above Marie’s 5’2” frame by another ten inches. She sighed. She had to work that afternoon and was dressed in a skirt and three-inch-high heels. She put down her purse, cursed herself under her breath for not picking out a pantsuit and flats, and crushed out her cigarette. She climbed up on to the brick half wall that ran adjacent to the kitchen window and gated off the steps to the building’s basement. Using a garbage can for leverage, she hoisted her husky frame up to the window, holding on to the sill for both dear life and for balance, and peered in. In front of her on the kitchen table was Pete, still covered in his cage. To her left was a pile of dishes in the sink. She could see through the kitchen doorway into the hallway and the living room, and saw the table was covered with newspapers. Marie immediately felt better. If the apartment had been clean, she would have known something was definitely wrong. It looked, instead, as if Chloe had never even come home last night.
She must have stayed at Michael’s apartment and forgotten to call me. He probably dropped her off at class this morning with a hot cup of Dunkin’ Donuts coffee and a Boston Cream doughnut and she’s now learning how to pass the bar and become a lawyer while I stand here with my fat ass flapping in the breeze peering into her dirty kitchen like a moron.
Now she was annoyed. And she was going to be late for the practice test. She had begun her precarious descent down off the garbage can when a thought occurred to her.
If Chloe had not come home last night, who had covered Pete
’
s cage?
She paused for a moment, troubled by something else she thought she had spotted on the hall floor, just outside of the kitchen. Something in the back of her head forced her to turn around again for a closer look, and she pulled herself back up on the garbage can and placed her face up against the window. She cupped her hands around her eyes and squinted hard.
It took several seconds before she recognized that the dark spots she was looking at were actually footprints. It was another several seconds before she realized that they looked like they were made in blood.
That was when Marie Catherine Murphy fell off the garbage can and started to scream.
11
We’ve got a pulse,’ a voice yelled out in the darkness. ‘And a beat.’
‘Is she breathing?’ Another voice.
‘Barely. I’ve got her on O2. She’s in shock.’
‘Jesus Christ. There’s blood everywhere. Where is it all coming from?’ Another voice.
‘You mean, where is it
not
coming from? She’s a mess. I think most of the bleeding is vaginal, though. She may be hemorrhaging. Man, this psycho really did a number on her.’
‘Cut those cords, Mel.’
A fourth voice. A deep, heavy New York accent. ‘Easy, guys, that rope is evidence – don’t hack at it. Touch it with gloves. Crime Scene needs to bag and tag.’ The room, it seemed, was full of people now.
‘Christ, her wrists are completely torn up.’ The voice sounded disgusted, panicked.
Police radios squawked with static and voices. Piercing sirens, more than one, in the distance and coming closer. The click of a camera, the sound of a flashbulb.
Angry voices now. ‘Be careful, careful, with her! Hey, Mel, if you can’t handle this shit, just step back and get out. Now’s not the time to freak.’
Silence filled the room for a few seconds, then voice number one. ‘Start an IV of fluids, and give her some morphine. She’s about five five. Looks about one-ten, one-fifteen. Call Trauma at Jamaica Hospital and tell ‘em
we’ve got a twenty-four-year-old white female, multiple stab wounds, possible internal bleeding, probable sexual assault, in shock.’
‘Okay, okay, lift her gentle now. Gentle! On my count. One, two, three.’
Pain, intense and biting, rolling in waves over her body.
‘Jesus Christ. Poor girl. Does anyone know her name?’
‘Her friend outside says that it’s Chloe. Chloe Larson. She’s a law student at St John’s.’
The voices faded away and the blackness folded in on her.
12
Chloe slowly opened her eyes and was immediately blinded by the bright light. For a moment she thought that perhaps she had died and was in heaven, just moments from meeting her maker.
‘Follow the light, please.’ The penlight tracked across her face. She smelled the overpowering smell of disinfectant and bleach and knew that she was in a hospital.
‘Chloe? Chloe?’ The young doctor in a white lab coat flashed his penlight again in her eyes. ‘I’m glad to see you’re waking up. How are you feeling?’ Chloe read his tag:
Lawrence broder, M.D.
It seemed like a really stupid question to Chloe. She tried to answer, but her tongue was thick and dry. She could manage only a whisper. ‘Not good.’
Everything hurt. She looked at her arms, both of which were wrapped in heavy white gauze bandages, and saw tubes connected everywhere. Her abdomen throbbed in the most excruciating pain, which was growing more intense.
Michael sat in a chair in the corner of the room. His body hunched forward, hands folded under his chin, elbows on his lap. He looked worried. Outside the window in the room the sky was tinged pink and orange and light was fading. It looked like sunset.
Another man in green scrubs stood silently by the door. Chloe assumed he was a doctor, too.
‘You’re in the hospital, Chloe. You have experienced
quite a trauma.’ Dr Broder paused and looked around the room. The three men exchanged awkward glances. ‘Do you know why you’re here, Chloe? Do you remember what happened to you?’
Chloe’s eyes welled up, and tears rolled out. She nodded slowly. The Clown’s face flashed into her mind.
‘You were assaulted last night. Sexually assaulted. Your friend found you this morning and the paramedics brought you here, to Jamaica Hospital in Queens.’ He hesitated and shifted his feet, obviously uncomfortable. He spoke fast. ‘You suffered some severe injuries. Your uterus was badly torn and you were hemorrhaging. You had lost a great deal of blood. Unfortunately Dr Reubens, here, was forced to do an emergency hysterectomy to stop the bleeding.’ He motioned to the green scrub doctor, who held his position by the door, his head down, his eyes purposefully avoiding Chloe’s. ‘That was the greatest injury, though, and that’s all the really bad news. You do have some cuts and wounds on your body for which we called in a plastic surgeon to do the stitching and minimize any scarring. These other injuries, though, are not life threatening, and the good news is that we expect you will be fine and make a full recovery.’
That’s all the really bad news. That’s it. That’s all, folks
. She looked around at the three men in the room. All three, including Michael, avoided her stare, their eyes darting among each other and to obscure objects on the floor.
Her voice was barely a whisper. ‘A hysterectomy?’ The words even hurt as they escaped her throat. ‘Does that mean I can’t have a baby?’
Lawrence Broder, M.D., shifted to the other foot and frowned. ‘I’m afraid that you will be unable to carry a
fetus, that is correct.’ She could tell Dr Broder wanted this conversation to end. Now.
He quickly continued, twisting his flashlight pen back and forth like a baton in his right-hand fingers. ‘A hysterectomy is major surgery, though, so you will be in the hospital for at least the next couple of days. The recovery period for something like this is usually six to eight weeks. We’ll start you on some limited physical therapy tomorrow and progress slowly. Are you having pain in your abdomen now?’
Chloe winced and nodded.
Dr Broder beckoned the sullen Dr Reubens over. Then he closed the curtain around the bed, blocking Michael out, and lifted the hospital sheets back. Chloe could see white bandages wrapping her stomach, her breasts. Dr Reubens gently palpated her abdomen, sending fireballs of pain through her body.
He nodded, not at Chloe, but at Dr Broder. ‘The swelling is normal. The stitches look good,’ Dr Reubens said.
Dr Broder nodded back and then smiled at Chloe. ‘I’ll have the nurse up the morphine dosage in your IV. That should make it better.’ He replaced the sheets and again shifted feet. ‘There are some detectives outside who would like to speak with you. Are you feeling up to it?’
Chloe hesitated, then nodded.
‘I’ll send them in.’ He pulled the curtain back. Obviously relieved to end the conversation, Dr Broder and Dr Reubens, his eyes still cast downward at the floor, then moved quickly toward the door. Dr Broder pulled open the door handle and paused. ‘You have been through a terrible ordeal, Chloe. We are all pulling for you.’ Then he smiled softly and walked out.
The victim of a sexual assault A hysterectomy. No kids.
The nightmare had been real. The words were coming too fast at her, there was too much information to absorb. Images of the Clown’s twisted smile, his naked body, the jagged blade, all flashed in her head. He knew all about her. He knew her nickname. He knew her favorite restaurant. He knew she had missed the gym. He said he was always watching her.
Don’t you worry, Chloe. I’ll always be close by. Watching. Waiting.
She closed her eyes and remembered the knife, remembered the pain that had engulfed her body when she had first felt him cut her. Michael came up beside her now and held her hand.
‘It’s going to be okay, Chloe. I’m here with you.’ He spoke softly. She opened her eyes and noticed that he didn’t look directly at her, but somehow past her, as if focused on some spot on the wall. ‘I spoke with your mom, your parents are on their way now. They’ll be here tonight.’ His voice was choked, and he let out a slow, deep breath. ‘I just wish you had let me stay with you last night. I just wish I had stayed. I would have killed this sick fuck. I would have… ‘ He bit down on his lip, and his eyes scanned over the outline of her body under the crisp white hospital sheets. ‘My God, just look what he’s done… this mother-fucking pervert…’ His words trailed off and he balled his hands into fists and turned away toward the window.
I just wish you had let me stay with you last night.
A faint knock interrupted them, and the door slowly opened. The hall was bustling with activity. It must be visiting hours. A short woman with frizzy red hair and an outdated red-and-black pantsuit walked into the room.
She wore no makeup, except for white under-eye concealer to help hide the dark circles, and her face bore too many lines for her age, which Chloe guessed to be about thirty-five. She was followed into the room by an older man in a cheap blue suit who towered over her by at least a foot. He looked near to retirement, with gray, thinning hair combed over his bald spot. He smelled of stale cigarette smoke. They both looked tired, and together, they made an odd-looking pair, like a hot dog and hamburger.
‘Hi, Chloe. I’m Detective Amy Harrison. I’m with the Queens County Special Victims’ Unit. This is my partner, Detective Benny Sears. I know this is a tough time for you, but we need to ask you a few questions about what happened to you last night while everything is still fresh in your mind.’
Detective Harrison looked over at Michael, still standing by the window. There was a waiting pause.
Michael walked over and extended his hand. ‘I’m Mike Decker. I’m Chloe’s boyfriend.’
Detective Harrison took his hand and nodded. She addressed Chloe. ‘Chloe, if it will make it easier on you, Mike can stay with you during this, but only if you want him to.’
‘Of course I’m staying with her.’ Michael’s voice had a sharp edge.
Chloe nodded slowly.
Detective Sears smiled at her and nodded in Michael’s direction, acknowledging him, then he sniffled, cracked his gum, and pulled out a notepad and a Bic pen. He stood at the foot of the bed while Detective Harrison pulled up a chair next to Chloe’s bedside, which now made him tower a full two feet over his partner.