Simon selected the needle nose pliers for reasons obvious to him. The pliers were more industrial, unlike his dental tools designed for specific applications. The pliers were easier to grip with the rubber handles and fit comfortably in his hand. Crude but highly effective, needle nose pliers served his objective without regard for a certain technique or developed skill required to effectively use them. Most of all, they inflicted more pain.

Each victim presented a different challenge. Some passed out at the thought of tooth extraction. Others fought furiously to the end, kicking and flailing and screaming. None of which changed their final outcome. Some victims died on the table, presumably from shock and not blood loss, although at times the volume of blood seemed disproportionate to the level of trauma inflicted.

For the most part, he enjoyed the process more than the final result, which always concluded in death by one means or another. Disposal of the human body proved the hardest problem, but one he successfully resolved with a liquid solution of pellet lye and highly concentrated muriatic acid, the product from which required discrete long-term storage or a modified septic system to leech the biological waste into his yard. Both disposal methods had their merits and shortcomings. Long-term storage in plastic drums required transportation to a burial location or large body of water. The modified septic system killed the grass.

He set the pliers down and jotted lyrics on a notepad while he waited for the judge to regain consciousness. He could hear the melody in his head, but he couldn’t compose the right note sequence.

He looked away when the music stopped, and Judge Francis Totten opened her eyes. “Glad you could join the party. Traffic was a bitch on I-40 out of Memphis. I was beginning to think I might have killed you by mistake. It happens.”

The judge glared at Simon from a dental exam chair across the room, her wrists and ankles bound with duct tape. “What do you want from me?”

Simon hurled the notepad at his victim, hitting her square in the forehead. “I want the years you stole from me.”

The judge cried out for help.

“Save your breath.” Simon reached for the pliers. “You think you know who I am? What I’m capable of? The truth is, you don’t know shit about me. I’m writing a book about my life, or at least I’ve enlisted someone to write it for me. Soon the world will know the real Simon Hollis. The man behind the mask.”

“You’re a murderer!”

“And you’re a hypocrite. Perched on your bench, espousing justice from recited excerpts of legal statutes while you instruct attorneys behind closed doors to disregard key evidence.”

“You murdered three people!”

“Allegedly.”

“You were convicted by a jury of your peers.”

“You suppressed evidence at my trial. You were prejudiced against me the moment my attorney made his opening statement. You stole my freedom!”

“This has nothing to do with me. You’re angry because you got caught. Every bone in my body told me you were guilty. The jury made the right decision. I don’t understand how you cheated your way out. You belong behind bars like the animal you are. Nothing you do to me will ever change that.”

“I’m not a bad person.”

“You’re not a person at all.”

“Tell me how you really feel, Your Honor.”

“I feel the death penalty isn’t harsh enough for you.”

“Pipe down.”

“I was elected to the bench to uphold law and order. To rid this city from people like you. You’re a disgrace to the human race. You can’t touch me!”

“I’ve heard enough.”

“I’m just getting started.”

“You’re not the one in charge here.”

“You’re not in charge of anything but your own demise. You don’t scare me, Mr. Hollis. I’ve seen your kind more times than I can count. Weak. Frightened. Impotent.”

“I said pipe down!”

“You can’t control me. And you can’t keep me here against my will. I am a circuit court judge.”

“You’re a disgrace to the robe.”

“And you’re nothing but a shit stain on the human race. You have no concept of right or wrong. No value for human life.”

“You think you know me?”

“I’m not the victim here. You are. But you’re not smart enough to see it.”

Simon let the anger swell inside him, verbally blasted by the judge who’d banished him to life in prison. The more she spoke, the tighter she wound his rage like an airplane rubber band all twisted and knotted beyond its maximum elasticity before it snapped.

“Are you deaf as well as dumb?”

Simon grabbed the judge by the neck and squeezed. Then he let go and turned away to retrieve a pair of long-handle, spring-assisted sheet metal shears from the bench beside him. He jammed the curved serrated blades in the judge’s mouth and squeezed the plastic-coated handles together, crunching down on her tongue to shear it in half like a thick strip of raw beef jerky.

* * *

Confined in his room on his laptop computer with a stack of notes and Simon’s high school yearbook, Stu searched through county records in the online Nashville database while dusk descended beyond the window view. The property Simon owned had changed hands at various times since the house was first built shortly after the Civil War. According to archive records, the original house burned down in the early 1900s and was rebuilt on the same foundation. Lots of history about previous owners, but no mention of tunnel permits or additional construction before or after the main residence was originally completed. He questioned the likelihood of anyone informing the county of an underground project, given the subterranean addition was obviously not built to code. He also failed to find records of the detached four-car garage.

He searched Tennessee newspaper archives for information on Simon’s trial. A front-page story from a local gazette reported the jury deliberated for less than an hour before returning a guilty verdict. Articles from other sources with bias toward the prosecution had Simon Hollis tried and convicted in the media a month before the trial started. Others took a more objective view and focused on inconsistencies in the prosecution’s case, noting the lack of credible witness testimony to corroborate the circumstantial evidence. No confession. No murder weapon.

He’d witnessed Simon’s temper firsthand. He’d also heard a gifted musician demonstrate his mastery on guitar with a velvet-smooth voice as soulful as the lyrics he wrote. For the man who lost everything, Simon Hollis seemed at peace with himself and his idiosyncrasies; hardly the persona of a violent killer with a penchant for extracting teeth, none of which were ever found near the victims or on Simon or his private property, including the million-dollar tour bus he rode from coast to coast.

The underground tunnel lingered in Stu’s mind like a bad dream. What was Simon hiding and why?

From hunting bear to hunting humans seemed like a giant leap, unless the former became a precursor to the latter. Murder was one thing, but mutilating a victim’s mouth by extracting their teeth was inhumane and downright evil. Simon’s DNA overturned his verdict, but it didn’t tell the whole story, one Stu felt obligated to uncover.

“Door’s open!” he called out when he heard a knock and looked up to see Simon with his shirt sleeves rolled up and his hair combed back.

“You ever have one of those days,” Simon started, “where everything you do goes to shit despite all your efforts to the contrary?”

“I’ve had my share.”

“I need a beer.”

“I’ll pass,” Stu replied, sensing the overt invitation to join his host at a time when he’d rather work alone.

“Just one?”

Stu locked his laptop screen and followed Simon to the kitchen, resigned to learn more from the man himself and save the online research for later. He straddled a stool at the breakfast bar and said, “I’d like to interview some of your band members to get their perspective.”

“On what?”

“The early years. Before you were famous.”

Simon reared back as if to expel a hearty laugh but didn’t. “My band bailed on me years ago. For the most part, I play exclusively with studio musicians who can sing background vocals.”

“Do you keep in touch with your band members at all?”

“They disavowed our relationship when I was convicted. Put as much distance between themselves and me as they could. Can’t say I blame them. My drummer overdosed. My bass player moved to California to open a winery. The rest scattered to the winds. Haven’t seen or heard from them in twenty years.”

Stu sipped his beer and noticed the fresh perspiration stains on Simon’s shirt. “Have you ever considered suing the city?”

“What’s the point? I can’t buy back lost time.”

“Some people would argue you deserve compensation.”

“Cash?”

“What else?”

Simon finished his beer and snagged another longneck bottle from the fridge, twisting the top free in his palm. “I find compensation in my music.”

“If it were me, I’d be mad as hell.”

“Who says I’m not?”

“If you are, you do an excellent job of hiding it.”

“I’ve had a lot of time to think.”

“About what?”

“Life. Death. Music. Family.”

“You said you were an only child. Was that difficult growing up?”

“Not really. I had food on the table and clothes on my back. Eventually, I graduated high school and set out on my own.”

“I’m sure your father’s proud of you.”

“A convicted felon?”

“I meant in terms of your professional success.”

“I know what you meant. My father always had a different definition of success.”

“Was he tough on you?”

“In some ways.”

“And your mom?”

“I inherited my singing voice from her. She believed in me. Probably more than I deserved.”

Stu raked his thumbnail at the label on his Rocky Mountain bottle. He had tough questions that begged for answers, but the timing didn’t feel right. “Do you ever talk to your ex-wife?”

“On occasion.”

Stu watched Simon set his beer down and stare out the window toward the backyard garden. He sipped his own beer, concerned he violated Simon’s trust with a question Simon deemed offensive. “Did I say something wrong?”

Simon left the kitchen and disappeared into another room. He returned with the Browning rifle and raised the barrel to shoulder height.

“Jesus!” Stu shouted, nearly pissing himself with the muzzle facing in his direction. “I didn’t mean anything—”

“Shhh,” Simon hissed between tight lips, his head cocked toward his shoulder, elbow down, right eye squinting at the rifle scope. He slipped past Stu and gently pressed the muzzle to the window overlooking the garden before he squeezed the trigger.

Stu put his hands to his ears and winced from the loud report.

“I got him!” Simon crowed triumphantly and charged outside, marching toward the garden with Stu on his heels. “Damn raccoon has been tearing up this place since I moved back. I grow broccoli, cauliflower, and carrots in there. Bastard thinks he can root around and eat everything I plant. Not anymore.”

Stu looked away when Simon retrieved a chunk of exploded flesh. “He probably won’t be the last one.”

Simon threw the portion of dead carcass at the ground and strolled through the garden, pointing at four-inch cone-shaped holes dug through the soil surrounded by half-eaten vegetables. “Maybe. But I have more bullets than brains.”

“I see gopher holes,” Stu said. He rooted around the vegetable garden and inspected the ravaged remains of huge cauliflower heads and carrot stalks. “How do you grow these so big?”

Simon walked the garden perimeter. “Good fertilizer.”

Stu used his phone to shine light on a hole carved out between two giant broccoli heads. He examined a mound of dirt behind an indentation in the soil surrounded by claw mark impressions. Then he poked at a buried object and brushed the soil away to reveal the eye socket from a human skull.