Total pages in book: 114
Estimated words: 114820 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 574(@200wpm)___ 459(@250wpm)___ 383(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 114820 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 574(@200wpm)___ 459(@250wpm)___ 383(@300wpm)
In other words, Ezra Corbin was very dead.
More bad news, since Ezra was dead, Rus couldn’t punch that fucker in the face.
But more good news, it had been reported to Rus that Madden didn’t see Richard putting Ezra down, just witnessed the takedown, and she thought he was there to save her.
It was going to suck, trying to figure out how to explain that wasn’t the case.
The last was more good news.
Ezra had been in that cave for a while. From how it appeared and the state of his person, he’d been there likely since he first took off. He might have changed clothes, but he hadn’t had a shower for days, and, probably scared to come out of it, he’d used that cave to relieve himself and he didn’t know enough about outdoorsmanship to bury it. A week’s worth of a man’s urine and feces in that small six-by-twelve niche did not make the place smell good.
How he knew of the cave, Rus would never know. Paddy Tremayne knew of it, but Moran, the Bohannans, nor a single deputy had been there. It wasn’t on a trail. It wasn’t large.
But it was the perfect hiding place.
And the prissy little boy-man who never grew up spent his final days on this earth in that cold, musty, fetid space with only a camp light, a sleeping bag, a portable radio and a small generator he used to charge his electronics. He’d been eating chips, cookies, candy bars and sandwiches, along with some pop and bottles of water, the only things he’d thought to buy before he went into hiding. And what probably drove him to make his move was because he was running out of food.
The man hadn’t even brought a book with him.
It had to have been a lonely, terrifying week up there out in the elements knowing life as he knew it was over and having only that to dwell on.
Rus knowing all of that and seeing Ezra lying in a pool of his own blood, wearing a sweat-stained Lacoste shirt and filthy dockers, it wasn’t the justice he deserved.
But at least Rus had that to hold on to.
He prowled to the interview rooms at the station and knew he had an audience observing when he opened the door to room one and let himself in.
Richard was in there alone, cuffed to the table, legs shackled.
Rus ignored the surge of feeling, both historical and current, that coursed through him and sat down across from Richard.
He didn’t bother with pleasantries.
“Did you get her to talk while you were torturing her?”
“Haven’t cracked her laptop yet?” Richard asked back. “Or was she smart and wiped her search history?”
Rus didn’t answer.
Something that would bump your shit straight to a tech?
A kidnapping.
Carrie Molnar had been smart.
She’d wiped her search history.
There were traces they could follow, but it’d take more effort, something they could do at their leisure since the case was very closed.
Though, in a folder titled Work Receipts in her inbox, the invoice for the plastic tarp and other items was found.
“You…we were fortunate she picked me first,” Richard continued. “She found her helper in that cretin in the cave. She had a plan. A whole list of acts she wished to follow. She wasn’t getting what she needed out of that repugnant lifestyle she lived. But she kept trying. Searching. When she found Ezra Corbin, she knew it was time. He was the missing link. So it began. If she’d never found him,”—he shrugged—“it wouldn’t have happened. She told me that. In the end, she was wishing she’d never met him.”
Undoubtedly.
Undoubtedly Ezra died with much the same thought.
“Too much access to true crime these days,” Richard went on, shaking his head in a I know exactly what’s wrong with this world way. “Documentaries. Reddit. Podcasts. People are fascinated by it. I understand. It’s fascinating. But you can learn anything. You know the whole story. It’s like a how to. Fortunately, most of the human race is stupid. So they might know the how, but not how not to get caught.”
In other words, Richard Sandusky was smart because he never got caught.
He gave himself away.
“Save me some time here,” Rus requested. “Is that how you figured out how to do the things you do?”
“Zachariah.” He tsked. “You know better than that.”
He did.
“You were a cop.”
He beamed. “Yes, in another life.”
“That’s how Dad met you. You recruited him. You knew about his accident.”
He looked like a proud father. “Yes. He wouldn’t meet me until later. I’d just started collecting then. People at their lowest. It was too easy. But I was at the scene of his accident. I knew his story. He was a perfect candidate.”
God, he hated this guy.
“It might be easy, but too easy, though, yeah?” Rus asked. “You needed a challenge. You needed more.”