Blood is smeared across the walls with a paintbrush, just like the other four cases we’ve managed to link together. It’s one of the few things that remains consistent. The unsub always paints a wall red with the victim’s blood.
“How can you eat while seeing that?” Elise asks while wrinkling her nose and sitting down on the edge of my desk.
Ignoring her question, I ask, “What did they find out about Ben Harris?”
“The M.E. estimated that he was tortured for at least three days. He has parts of him that have been cut off, just like the others. Including the penis,” she sighs.
That has me cringing, just like any man would. One of these images is supposed to be a dismembered penis?
“His fingers were all cut off,” she goes on, pointing at one picture that was snapped of ten severed fingers lying on the ground. “His chest was slowly pulled off piece by piece. The unsub stopped the bleeding each time by using a barbaric method of cauterization. He wanted the victim alive for those three days specifically. His penis seems to be the last thing to have gone. Ligature marks were found again, and chains were hanging from his basement rafters. We think the unsub stayed true to his profile, leaving the victim strung up in their own home. So far, all the men have had isolated homes too far away for any neighbors to overhear or see anything.”
And he’s not devolving either. His strikes are controlled, well planned out, and meticulous in detail, even if we don’t understand the details.
“The unsub should be a female, considering the groin mutilation in all the kills,” Craig says, shuddering as he walks up on our conversation. “Only a woman could handle cutting off a man’s junk.”
“Women serial killers statistically don’t torture. They’re actually far more efficient and harder to track down because of that,” Elise says dismissively.
“Well, he has to be impotent. Most serial killers are,” Alan chimes in, joining us.
There’s a reason he and Craig are not profilers.
“I think he’s more of a sexual sadist,” Elise explains. “Impotence likely plays a part, but just calling them impotent isn’t a profile.”
“So an impotent sexual sadist?” Craig asks, confused.
“Sexual sadists are often impotent, and they seek out their sexual release through the torture. No signs of rape were found, but it’s likely the unsub hasn’t evolved and grown the confidence to rape the men yet.”
“So a gay sexual sadist?” Craig goes on, still lost.
“Yes,” Elise says, nodding.
“All of the male victims were straight, according to witnesses. If they were gay, that theory would make more sense,” I add. “All five men were from the same town, yet no one can think of any man who might want to kill all five. However, I know we’re missing something.”
“Footprints are a size twelve man’s shoe made in the dirt on the way to the house. The footprint is solid from heel to toe. Our field expert says that the unsub weighs between two-ten and two-fifteen,” Elise announces.
“He’d have to be physically fit to be able to overpower these men the way the unsub has. And very built, most likely. The unsub is overpowering them with sheer brute force. Originally he was only killing alphas, which led to the profile being an alpha serial. But Ben, although physically fit and strong, was very submissive in his line of work. It was why he was so successful, because he liked being in the background instead of in charge.”
“Sexual sadism is far more likely, since the last kill. There may be a sexually frustrated trigger, which should narrow down our search. We should also adjust the profile. What else do we know about the victims?”
“These guys were tops of their classes in college, but they were all different ages—from twenty-three to twenty-eight. Victimology only links them through the town and through their isolated homes. They haven’t kept in contact, even though they were all friendly when they still lived in town. It’s possible the unsub hates the whole town, but why? Is it part vengeance?”
“Possibly,” I say more to myself than to Elise.
One kill in Boston. One kill in Denver. One kill in Long Island. One kill in Maine. And now one kill in our own backyard in Virginia. This guy is all over the map, shitting all over a normal hunting ground pattern.
It would seem random if we hadn’t made the connection to the same home town. But not the same school. Three of them went to a private school two towns over. So obviously this isn’t an old grudge dated back to school ages, especially given the age gap in the victims that would put them in different grades too.
“No kills have been reported in town,” I groan. “If it was just two, I’d call it a coincidence. But it’s five from that town, yet no deaths within the town limits. What do we know about the town?”
“Small. Very small. Five hundred is the population. In the past three years, nothing of any real interest has made the news, other than a wolf that attacked a man in his cow pasture. Very religious town.”
“Small, religious towns are notorious for making it hard on gay males. Especially small farm towns. You and Leonard head out there and see what you can find out. Ask about a physically fit male over six feet tall, age twenty to thirty-five, who might have been gay or showed interest in men. Given the religious aspect, it’s doubtful he came out. Ask if anyone seemed to struggle or demonstrate a nervous tic frequently after having any sort of contact with an attractive male. All the males killed so far have been physically fit, single, attractive, and very promiscuous with women. It’s possible the unsub had feelings for them at some point in time, and retaliated for them not returning the same affections.”
I purse my lips, wondering what we’re missing. The profile appears solid, and the evidence lines up to support it, but something just feels off. We should have made the connection sooner, but with all the kills so spread out over state lines, we just got wind of this two weeks ago, which was two weeks after the fourth victim.
“Anything else I need to note to the profile before we deliver it to the town’s PD?”
“Yeah,” I say, sitting up as I study the photos. “The unsub managed to enter each home without it looking broken into. Either the victims know the unsub and trust him enough to let him in, or they didn’t lock their doors. Tell them this unsub would have had to be social with them in order to establish that rapport. Also, have we found out what trophy is being taken? The unsub has a personal attachment to these men, and has a sadistic fantasy he’s playing out with each kill, though rape doesn’t seem to be a part of the fantasy just yet. Obviously he’s getting off on the torture alone for now, but given the long gap between kills, he’d need something to hold him over. He’d definitely be taking a trophy.”