The Red Hot Fix Read online

  The Red Hot Fix is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are the products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

  An Alibi eBook Original

  Copyright © 2014 by T. E. Woods

  Excerpt from The Unforgivable Fix by T. E. Woods © 2014 by T. E. Woods

  All rights reserved.

  Published in the United States of America by Alibi, an imprint of Random House, a division of Random House LLC, a Penguin Random House Company, New York.

  ALIBI is a registered trademark and the ALIBI colophon is a trademark of Random House LLC.

  eBook ISBN 978-0-345-54927-3

  This book contains an excerpt from the forthcoming book The Unforgivable Fix by T. E. Woods. This excerpt has been set for this edition only and may not reflect the final content of the forthcoming edition.

  www.readalibi.com

  Cover Design: © Caroline Teagle

  Cover image: © Shutterstock

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  Contents

  Cover

  Title Page

  Copyright

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Chapter Nineteen

  Chapter Twenty

  Chapter Twenty-One

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  Chapter Twenty-Seven

  Chapter Twenty-Eight

  Chapter Twenty-Nine

  Chapter Thirty

  Chapter Thirty-One

  Chapter Thirty-Two

  Chapter Thirty-Three

  Chapter Thirty-Four

  Chapter Thirty-Five

  Chapter Thirty-Six

  Chapter Thirty-Seven

  Chapter Thirty-Eight

  Chapter Thirty-Nine

  Chapter Forty

  Chapter Forty-One

  Chapter Forty-Two

  Chapter Forty-Three

  Chapter Forty-Four

  Chapter Forty-Five

  Chapter Forty-Six

  Chapter Forty-Seven

  Chapter Forty-Eight

  Chapter Forty-Nine

  Chapter Fifty

  Chapter Fifty-One

  Chapter Fifty-Two

  Chapter Fifty-Three

  Chapter Fifty-Four

  Chapter Fifty-Five

  Other Books by This Author

  About the Author

  Excerpt from The Unforgivable Fix

  Chapter One

  Mort Grant looked down at the naked man and tried to estimate how many corpses he’d stood over. Did this guy with the rose tattoo put him over the century mark? Hell yeah, he did. Closing in on thirty years with the Seattle Police Department, more than twenty of them in homicide. He made a mental note to run an actual tally one day. He scanned the kneeling and bound body, saw the ligature marks on the throat, and didn’t need a lab analysis to identify the jagged white crystals scattered around the dead man’s knees.

  “Mothball crystals?” Mort asked anyone listening.

  “Yes indeed.” Jimmy DeVilla, chief of forensics, tossed a ziplock pouch into the evidence bag.

  “We got a name?” Mort asked.

  DeVilla walked over. “Wallet says Tony Wagner. Address in Bothell. Squad car’s been dispatched.” Jimmy looked down to read the name inscribed on the tattoo. “I got twenty bucks says the lady who answers the door isn’t Donetta.”

  “We got a time?” Mort stepped aside for the men with the body bag.

  Jimmy glanced at his notebook. “He checked in around twelve thirty this afternoon. Paid cash.”

  “Of course he did.” Mort looked at the bed pillows. “Desk clerk see who was with him?”

  “Look around, buddy,” Jimmy said. “This is the kind of place recalling details gets you canned. Or worse.”

  “Get anything off the pillow? Strand of hair? Smear of makeup?”

  Jimmy slid his notebook back in his pocket. “Stuff’s on its way to the lab. If she left anything, we’ll find it.”

  Mort watched the body being loaded onto the gurney. He waited until the officers wheeled it out and he was alone with his friend.

  “Damn it, Jimmy.” Mort kicked the air. “This is seven now. In what? Three months?”

  “Just over. First body was thirteen weeks ago.”

  Mort ran his hand over his face and imagined tomorrow’s headlines. Seven men murdered in four months. All in by-the-hour motels. Each strangled before being trussed with twine like a Thanksgiving turkey. Hands bound behind their back and tied to their ankles. Kneeling on mothball crystals. The press speculated this was the work of a prostitute and had taken to calling her Trixie: the killer who turned tricks into corpses.

  “You’d think johns would be more careful, wouldn’t you?” Jimmy slung his evidence bag over his shoulder and headed for the door. “Sumbitches keep right on shopping where their mamas told them not to.”

  Two hours later Mort stood in his office and added Tony Wagner, 47, to the whiteboard list of Trixie’s victims.

  “Do we see a pattern?” he asked. “Anything. Consider me officially desperate.”

  Jimmy slumped in a worn leather chair and scratched the head of the oversized German shepherd sitting next to him. “All dead.”

  Mort turned to the woman seated at a small conference table. “Mick, what do you see?”

  Micki Petty shook her head. “Not much. Seven guys. Four white, two black, one Hispanic.”

  “Trixie’s equal opportunity.” Jimmy pulled his hand away and ignored the giant paw Bruiser swiped against his shoulder. “Our dead johns range in age from thirty-eight to forty-seven. What’s that tell us?”

  “Nothing,” Micki replied. “Typical for this sort of thing.” She flipped a few pages in her notebook. “We’re finding no connection between the victims. Five married. Professions range from unemployed to patent attorney. No shared school or church. Six of them had kids, but there’s no indication the kids know one another.”

  “How about location?” Mort asked. “Anything there?”

  Jimmy went to the whiteboard. “Russell and Valdez used the same fleabag hotel. The other five were in different dumps. Each rented by the hour. Desk clerks remember them checking in, but no one recalls seeing the hooker.”

  “So we got nothing.” The muscles in the back of Mort’s neck warmed up for a long game of squeeze-a-cop.

  “Not exactly,” Micki said. “We got hair from three scenes. We got skin from five. DNA analysis shows they’re from the same white woman.”

  “Which gives us nothing.” Mort glanced at the clock. “The DNA we found doesn’t hit in any data bank. And we’ve tried ’em all.”

  “Relax, buddy,” Jimmy said. “If she’s not in any database, we won’t hit. We’ll get her. The good news is we got solid physicals when we do.”

  “Hair and skin from some scenes doesn’t put her at all seven.” Mort needed a break. Maybe the road trip and ferry ride would help.

  “But fingerprints and fibers do,” Micki said. “Trixie uses a silk and mohair blend in the ropes she uses to strangle these guys. Colors are different, but all from Loywo
od Mills, a California manufacturer. Stuff’s expensive. Only two yarn shops in King County carry the line. She probably takes the noose home after each kill, but we’ve got fibers from the victim’s necks. And her M.O.’s the same, not to mention the lipstick. Trixie plants an Avignon Studio’s Red Hot Number Seven kiss on every man’s forehead and every john’s tox screen tests positive for Rohypnol. We’re talking one killer. One Trixie.”

  “Mothballs the same on this latest guy?” Mort asked.

  Micki nodded. “Old Standard Kloset-Kontrol granulated mothballs. Two wholesalers in western Washington distribute them to over eight hundred retail outlets. Nearly a hundred in King County.”

  “The press knows about the strangling and trussing.” Jimmy signaled Bruiser to stand. “But the lipstick and the moth crystals are strictly between us crime fighters.”

  Mort rubbed the pain in his neck with his left hand as he reached for his car keys with his right.

  “I got other places to be. Call me if anything new comes up.”

  I really do need to get that kitchen rug taped down. Almost spilled my tea. And nothing soothes me more than a strong cup of chamomile.

  I settle into my chair by the fire and replay the moment his eyes signaled understanding. He knew my face and those cheap motel walls would be his last impression of his pathetic little life. His terror gave way to sadness. I suppose I should have felt sorry for him. I tightened the noose and his expression changed to resignation.

  Then his light went out.

  Poor schmuck woke up this morning like any other. If anybody’d asked him, he would have sworn he’d live forever.

  We’re all wrong sometimes, I guess.

  I try to remember the others. Their faces nearly form before they drift away to the land of forgotten dreams.

  This is just way too easy.

  I inhale the sweet aroma of my tea before setting the cup down. I pull the knitted noose from my sweater pocket and roll it into a tight ball. I used a simple stitch for this one. A simple stitch for a simple plan. A simple plan for a simple man.

  I open the old tin box she gave me, drop the brightly colored ball of yarn in with the newspaper clippings, and see that scowling face again … looking so frustrated in the inky tones of gray. I run my finger over his brow and read the paper’s identification of the befuddled subject.

  What do you say, Morton Grant, chief of detectives? You got what it takes to find me?

  Chapter Two

  Mort parked his car on the ferry and climbed steep metal stairs to the observation room. The April chill kept most passengers inside, sipping coffee and focused on their electronics, but he needed air. He walked onto the open deck, leaned against the railing, and let the salty breeze invigorate him. Three stories below, the churning engines roiled the waters of Puget Sound. The lowering sun painted Mount Rainier pink. He remembered how Edie loved riding this ferry. When they were first married, they’d pack a picnic lunch, sit in the biggest booth they could find, make up stories about the passengers, and call it a date. After the kids were born, the whole family would ride. Robbie was fascinated with the masterful gesturing of the deckhands directing the cars for maximum load. Allie was only four when she stood on one of the tables and entertained the commuters with her off-key rendition of “It’s Not Easy Being Green.”

  As the Mukilteo terminal receded into the distance, Mort mourned the passing of days. Edie dead nearly three years. Robbie in Denver raising twin daughters with his knockout French wife. Allie lost to them all, probably not knowing her mother had dropped dead of an aneurysm while cooking spaghetti sauce.

  He closed his eyes, breathed deep, and sent his love across the water and sky to wherever Edie was. He wondered if what the priests said was true. Did the dead look down on the living? If so, what did Edie think? She’d spent their marriage proud of her detective husband. How deep was her disappointment about the criminal he’d become?

  Mort watched Whidbey Island grow closer. In a few minutes he’d head back to his car, turn the volume high on his Springsteen CD, head north up Highway 525, and be in Langley in plenty of time to make his appointment with his partner in damnation.

  “Liddy.” Mort motioned for her to stand. “Let me look at you.”

  She rose for his inspection.

  “You look good,” he said. She’d gained a few much-needed pounds. “Healthier, I mean.” Ten seconds later, awkwardness forced them to sit.

  Lydia Corriger pushed a lock of auburn hair behind her ear. “I see you on the news. That prostitute-slash-murderer. How’s that going?”

  “Don’t ask.” Mort looked around the bistro she’d selected. “Tell me about you.”

  “Ten months in rehab. But you know about that. Now I’m here.”

  “How are the headaches?”

  “Haven’t had one in months.” Lydia sounded tired. “All this serenity up here. How’s your arm?”

  Mort rubbed the spot where the bullet meant to kill him had entered. “Nothing left but a dimple.” She didn’t need to know the physical therapy it had taken to regain his strength. “And your eyesight?”

  Her smile was rusty. “My eyesight is fine. As is my balance and my strength. You can stop worrying.”

  The waiter interrupted them. Mort ordered Scotch neat and Lydia asked for a glass of merlot. He waited until the young man was out of earshot.

  “Liddy, you took a bullet to the back of the head. I was the one sitting bedside in ICU for three weeks while you were in your coma.”

  Lydia looked out the window, then down at her lap. “I remember,” she whispered. “I’m trying to make sense of it.”

  “Yeah, me too.” Mort regretted his bark and softened his tone. “Like I said, you look good.”

  The waiter returned. They were silent as he placed drinks in front of them. Mort nodded his thanks while Lydia stared into her glass.

  “You happy up here?” he asked.

  “I have no right to happiness. You more than anyone should know that.”

  Mort couldn’t imagine how she managed the burden of living with what she’d done. “What’s past is past,” he whispered sharply. He took a sip of his Scotch and shifted gears. “What have you been up to on this island?”

  Lydia looked away. “How’s your son?”

  Mort allowed her the evasion. “Robbie’s fine. Working the book-tour circuit. It’s part of the gig, I suppose. The Fixer’s selling big.”

  Lydia’s face reflected a fear as constant as her heartbeat.

  “Relax, Liddy. The book’s about The Fixer’s exploits. Only you and I know who’s who.”

  She gave him a reluctant nod. “And that binds us till death, doesn’t it?”

  Mort tried to keep the conversation light during their meal. The salmon she recommended was source enough for polite table chatter. It wasn’t until the waiter brought them coffee and hazelnut mousse that he tried again.

  “My life’s simple.” Lydia focused on the candle’s glow. “I get up. I walk the beach. I prowl the village. I write.”

  “About what?” Mort didn’t need any record of what they’d done.

  Lydia looked out at the darkness over Saratoga Passage. “Journals mostly. Getting my thoughts down.”

  “Sounds like something you’d prescribe one of your patients. You keeping names out?” He hated the selfishness in his voice. He’d gotten himself into this and would have to deal with any fallout. “I’m glad it’s helping.”

  “I didn’t say it was.”

  “How about that guy who kept visiting while you were in your coma? Oliver, right? He been up to see you?”

  She traced an unseen design on the tablecloth. “No one but you knows I’m here.” Lydia stayed silent for a while. “It’s better that way.”

  He glanced over his shoulder and saw their waiter delivering strawberries and cream to an elderly couple across the room. Mort leaned close. “Maybe it’s time to see someone, Liddy. Get some help.”

  She blinked. “A psychologist
? Is that what you mean?”

  “Maybe the doctor could take her own medicine.” Mort hoped his voice conveyed the concern he felt.

  “And say what, Mort? ‘Can you help me, please? You see, while everyone thought I was a dedicated clinical psychologist, I actually spent six years as an assassin. What words of wisdom do you have to help me cope?’ Think that would work?”

  He looked again to make sure no one overheard them. “Liddy, it’s done. I’ve told you dozens of times: those people you took out …” He had a long drink of water and held his napkin to his lips. “The world’s better with them out of it.”

  “So I should explain to my shrink I was a force for justice? A righteous vigilante? Maybe I should fill them in on the details. Dates of kills. Methods.” Lydia’s voice was barely a whisper. “They’d diagnose me as psychotic. Deluded by your son’s bestseller into thinking The Fixer’s exploits were my own. They’d have me in a padded room before sundown.” She paused. “Maybe you think that’s where I belong.”

  Mort wished he could reach into her, pull out the torment, and cast it into the sea coursing around her island of exile. “That was then and this is now. And you’re not in this alone. I’m the one who covered it up. That makes me just as culpable.”

  Lydia returned her gaze to the inky void beyond the windows.

  “Maybe that’s my greatest sin,” she said.

  “The past is dead,” he whispered. “I remind myself every day why I made my choice. You’re a good woman.”

  “We both know that’s not true.” Lydia tilted her head and gave him a melancholy smile. “What I am, Mort, is a stone-cold killer.”

  Chapter Three

  Reinhart Vogel strode into the breakfast room of his Mercer Island mansion, took a seat at the head of the table, and focused his attention on the Seattle skyline glimmering on the opposite shore. He smiled at the rotund woman placing a mug of decaf and a glass of orange juice in front of him.

  “Thank you, Hildy.” He pulled a napkin across his lap. “Do you think you could strong-arm Scott into making me one of his special spinach-and-cheese omelets?” Reinhart knew how to use his deep green eyes. “And if he’s got any garlic hash browns, I’ll take those off his hands, too.”