Finally, he seizes the black coffee mug and slips out of the kitchen.
He pauses beside the easy chair, a shiv sliding without thought into his hand. Heart pounding, he forces himself away from her. Forces himself to the door. Forces himself to open it. Outside. Ease the door shut. Run like a motherfucker.
E smiled and opened his eyes. He pulled his keepsake out of his pocket. The magazine for a Colt .38 gleamed in his palm.
***
DANTE KNELT BESIDE TREY’S recliner. Computer light and images flickered across the web-head’s composed face, danced across the cables connected to his neck and to the tips of his fingers.
“Can you get into the morgue’s system?” Dante asked.
Images and pages winked across the monitor’s screen. Trey’s fingers blurred in the air. Dante listened to the electronic crackle and hum. He wondered if data burned like fire through Trey’s veins, ever-changing and molten.
A page locked onto the monitor. MORGUE—INTAKE.
Dante squeezed Trey’s biceps. “Très bien, mon ami.”
A smile flickered at the corners of Trey’s mouth, then vanished. Dante tugged affectionately on one of his dreads.
Scanning through the intake photos, Trey stopped on the most recent—a young man, throat slit. Dante leaned forward, studying the photo. The hair might’ve been blond, but wet, it was hard to tell. Eyes closed. Face and lips drained of all color. A gaping bloodless wound stretched across the throat.
Dante sat back on his heels, relief flooding through him like hot, fresh blood. Whoever the cops had pulled from the Mississippi, it wasn’t Jay.
That meant whoever murdered Gina still had him.
“Who IDed this body as Jay’s?”
Trey sent. His eyelids shuttered to half mast.
Dante felt it, too, spiraling through his veins. Sleep.
“Ferret out his evidence, his connections, mon ami,” Dante said. Reaching into his back pocket, he pulled out Elroy the Perv’s driver’s license. He flipped it onto the desk, in front of the monitor.
Trey glanced at it, then nodded.
Trey yanked the cables from his body, unplugged from the web.
Simone walked into the room, half-asleep, to guide her brother to his bed. Bending over, she kissed Dante’s cheek, her soft lips cool against his skin.
“Sweet dreams,” she whispered.
“Et toi.” He trailed a finger along one fragrant lock of hair.
Simone straightened, and her hair slipped from his grasp. She eased Trey to his feet. Arms around each other, they half walked, half staggered out of the room.
Sleep swept through Dante, slowing his heart. Gripping the arm of Trey’s recliner, he fought the drowsiness claiming him.
Jay was still out there, waiting for rescue. Dante hoped with all his heart that Jay wasn’t waiting in pain, cut and sliced like Gina. Fury blasted through him and, for a second, Sleep receded. Dante rose to his feet.
Gina’s voice whispered, her words reverberating through him, mind and heart: Tomorrow night?
Pain prickled behind Dante’s eyes. Stabbed his temples. But Sleep crept back in, leaving him as drugged and drowsy as a hype of morphine. He swayed.
Hands touched his temples, cooling the pain in his head. He stumbled back against Lucien. Lucien seemed to fold himself around Dante, solid and protective. A voiceless, wordless song vibrated up from the core of Lucien into Dante. And something within him sang in wordless response.
Dante half dreamed of wings. Of flying.
Shaking himself, Dante wrapped a hand around Lucien’s muscled wrist. Something Dante couldn’t name clenched around his heart. His breath caught in his throat at its intensity; an inner hurt that felt strangely familiar.
Pushing at Lucien’s hands, Dante stepped away from him. But all the rage and hurt in the world couldn’t keep him awake.
He felt Lucien’s arms wrap around him as he fell.
***
THE CAB DROVE AWAY, exhaust puffing up white smoke into the gray predawn sky. Stearns stepped carefully onto the snow-shoveled sidewalk. Overnight ice glimmered on its concrete surface. He shifted his briefcase from one hand to the other.
From Seattle rain to D.C. snow and ice. How come a black bag job never led to Hawaii or Florida?
Stearns moved around to the back of the elegant and, no doubt, expensive townhouse. Each step onto the ice-encrusted snow crunched, the sound sharp in the dying night. Stearns gritted his teeth and hoped the neighbors were either heavy sleepers or thought it was only the paperboy making his rounds.
Stearns paused, glanced around the small yard, his gaze skipping from the townhouse behind and the ones to either side. Yellow light glowed from a few windows as people began to waken. He listened, his breath pluming white, his fingers tingling within his gloves.
He’d called the Bureau to check on Johanna’s whereabouts. In the past, she’d taken specially designed pills that kept her awake during the day, effectively neutralizing the narcotic effect of Sleep. Of course, she could only do that for so long before she paid a price. Stearns had gambled that she was downing the pills so she could keep on top of things in New Orleans. He’d learned that Johanna had pulled an all-nighter—not uncommon for her—and had yet shown no inclination of calling it a day.
Crunching across the yard to the steps leading to the back door, Stearns could only hope that Johanna hadn’t yet reached her limit for the pills. Even so, she might get caught in traffic, buying him a little more time.
Setting his briefcase down on the top step, Stearns studied the door’s lock. A red telltale gleamed in the fading darkness. It scrolled sideways, reading LOCKED. Stearns nodded. Pretty much what he’d expected. The tricky part would be any security or secondary systems.
Stearns knelt and flipped open the briefcase latches. Picking up the goggles, he slid them on. He palmed the em-pulse mini-bomb from the papers lining the briefcase. Using wire cutters, he stripped the insulation from the mini’s wires. He pried the case from the lock’s keypad and scanned the wires looped within the box. The goggles revealed blue lines criss-crossing the wires. Secondary system.
A sniper is climbing to the roof behind you and as soon as he scopes you in, you’re dead. Get busy and get inside. Move! Move! Move!
No longer feeling the cold, no longer pondering the best move, Stearns let his adrenaline-fueled instincts kick in. His hands, steady and quick, picked the wires to nick with the cutters. He twisted the mini’s exposed wires to the lock system’s. That was for the secondary system.
He imagined the sniper going belly down on the roof. He snipped the primary system’s lead wire and, turning his face away, set off the mini at the same time.
When Stearns looked again a heartbeat later—sniper’s lining you up—the LOCKED readout was gone, the screen black and blank. No frantic electronic bleating from the secondary system. Stearns turned the knob. The door opened. Scooping up his briefcase, Stearns dove in through the door.
He imagined the high-velocity bullet whinging into the brick where his head had been a split second before.
Stearns closed the door. Locked it the old-fashioned way, pushing down the button in the center of the knob.
He was in.
* * *
14
Lost in the System
« ^ »
HEATHER GLANCED AT THE Clock. One fifteen p.m. Sucking in an irritated breath, she walked to the glassed-in records area where two busy clerks ignored her. She rapped on the glass shield with one knuckle.
The rapid clacking of fingers across a keyboard stopped. The male clerk looked at Heather, one eyebrow raised, expression unhappy.
“You positive Doctor Anzalone knows I’m here?” Heather asked. “I’ve been waiting nearly two hours.”
/>
Heather noted the clerk’s bedhead-gelled hair and the übergeek short-sleeved white shirt he wore paired with a skinny black tie. Retro. And wishing I’d give up or vanish or wither and die.
“Yes, ma’am, she knows,” he said, his voice muffled by the thick shield. “But she’s very busy.”
“So am I. Check with her again.”
Heather returned to the ass-numbing bench she’d been sitting on and perched on the edge. Let’s see if Collins is faring any better. Pulling her cell from her purse, she punched in the detective’s number. He answered on the second ring.
“Hey, Wallace,” he said, his voice tight.
“Hey, Collins. Is that police report ready yet?”
“Get this. It’s lost in the system. They can’t fucking find it.”
Warning prickled along Heather’s spine. She lowered her voice. “Lost…I see. And the officer’s handwritten report?”
“Funny you should ask. Misplaced. They’re looking, but…”
“Ah. And the officer himself?”
“Left this morning on vacation. Accrual. Had to use it up—”
“Or lose it,” Heather finished. The warning prickles intensified. “Things aren’t much better here. I’ve been on physical hold ever since I arrived.”
“I’ll keep poking around with a sharp stick. See what turns up.”
“Ditto.” Heather thumbed the off button, then slid the cell back into her purse.
What the hell is going on? Heather rubbed her forehead. She scrolled her thoughts back, trying to pick out other off-kilter details, to discern a pattern.
Denial of access to the CCK files; ViCAP and NCAVC.
Blood messages left at two crime scenes. The anarchy symbol.
A dead perp—supposedly the CCK himself, and caught in the act.
Missing reports, misplaced evidence, a vacationing cop.
Her inability to connect with her SAC. Her calls unreturned.
But the puzzle kept shifting every time she tried to put a piece in place. Face in hands, Heather closed her eyes. She needed sleep. The few hours caught in a chair at Dante’s house hadn’t been enough. Her thoughts lagged and her reflexes were sluggish.
“Agent Wallace?”
Heather dropped her hands and straightened. The übergeek clerk stood before her. A nervous smile twitched across his lips.
“Doctor Anzalone asked that you wait in her office,” he said.
Heather stood. “Great.”
The clerk led her down a hall, past the metal double doors leading to the autopsy theater, to an office marked CORONER. Opening the door, the clerk stepped aside as Heather walked into the office.
“Thanks,” Heather said smiling. With a quick nod, the clerk hurried away.
Ignoring the chairs positioned in front of the desk, Heather returned to the doorway. Looked down the quiet hall to the autopsy theater.
Given that Anzalone doesn’t seem to be real big on courtesy or protocol…Heather walked out of the office and down the hall, her stride brisk and, she hoped, silent. I’ll return the favor.
She shoved through the autopsy theater’s doors. A startled, lab-coated assistant looked up from the body he was suturing.
“Hey!” he exclaimed, disbelief on his face. “You can’t be in here!”
Heather smiled. “I’m the lead investigator in the Cross-Country Killer case,” she said, pulling her badge from her purse and flipping it open. “Doctor Anzalone expects me.”
“She didn’t say anything to me,” the assistant said. “Really, you can’t be in here.” Placing the suture needle on the corpse’s belly, he hurried across the room. He stopped in front of Heather, his gaze on her badge. He frowned. “I don’t think—”
“That the vic? Rosa Baker?” Heather nodded at the body.
“Yeah, it is. But seriously—”
“Where’s the perp’s body?” Heather stepped past the assistant, walking to the body-laden table. She paused beside a tray of bloody instruments positioned near the head of the table.
“The perp’s body?” the assistant repeated, voice unsure. “Uh…you’d have to ask Doctor Anzalone for sure, but I think it was sent to the funeral home.”
Heather froze. No way she’d heard right. No way. She whirled around to face the assistant. She met his gaze, took in his tight-muscled stance, the anxious way he rubbed his hands together.
“Did you say funeral home?”
“Uh…yeah. The body might’ve been sent there. Accidentally.”
Lost. Misplaced. Missing. The assistant shifted his weight from one hip to the other. Glanced away. Heather felt a tight smile curve her lips. Holy hell, there’s more.
“Don’t tell me,” Heather said, voice flat. “He was cremated. Accidentally.”
Without looking at her, the assistant nodded. “Might’ve been.”
“You’d better fetch Doctor Anzalone.”
Swallowing hard, the assistant turned, the soles of his sneakers squeaking against the tile floor. He pushed through the double doors.
Heather breathed in deep and slow. Rage knotted her muscles, but blurred her thoughts. Deep and slow. After a few moments, she looked the body over: middle-aged woman, a little heavy, ash-blonde hair, her eyes half-open and reflecting nothing. Stab wounds, bruises at throat and thighs.
Heather’s gaze dropped to the threaded suture needle. Given the Y-incision the assistant was closing, the autopsy had already been performed. The interrupted sutures stopped just below the belly button.
A day ago, Rosa Baker had been a living, breathing woman: washing her face, folding her laundry, planning lunch. Now…Heather shifted her attention back to Rosa’s lax, pale face and empty eyes. Now nothing remained of Rosa Baker. And nothing remained to her but the grave or the fire.
Could I have prevented this death?
One killer would always replace another and she’d always stand beside a metal table bearing the slashed/shot/bludgeoned/strangled remains of yet another victim.
For some, their brutal death would be the most attention they’d ever receive. In dying, in being murdered, they were noticed for the first time, then just as quickly forgotten.
But she remembered. Each and every one. Carried their images in her mind: a mental photo album of the dead, a yearbook of ended lives.
Empty promises. Silent victims.
She yearned to be a finger pointed at a murderer; to be the mouth through which they could speak one last time: It was him. He killed me.
Heather looked up at the ceiling, at the bright overheads, the microphone dangling down. One victim wasn’t dead yet. He still breathed in New Orleans and—she glanced at her watch—slept. She could keep her promise to Dante. But first she needed to find out why the situation here reeked of cover-up.
Rolling back her shoulders and swiping stray wisps of hair from her forehead, Heather walked the room until she found the transcribing station that the microphone connected to, recording the M.E.’s comments and observations. Heather clicked it on, typed in MOST RECENT, then walked back to the table.
The medical examiner’s impassionate voice ended the silence.
“The victim is a well-nourished female Caucasian in her mid-to-late forties…”
Heather kept her gaze on Rosa’s face as Anzalone spelled out what Heather already suspected: wrong victim type, wrong M.O., wrong killing site. She grew colder with each word.
***
JOHANNA KEYED IN HER code and opened the door. Closing it, she reset the lock. The keypad beeped. UNAVAILABLE scrolled in red across its tiny window. She stared at the word, trying to make sense of it. She must’ve punched in the wrong numbers. Frowning, she carefully punched the code in again.
The keypad beeped. UNAVAILABLE.
Johanna went still. Listened. The refrigerator hummed in the kitchen. Water dripped from the bathroom faucet. Outside, car tires crunched on the snow and ice-layered street.
Nothing breathed in the house but her. No heart beat but her own.
br /> Still…delayed Sleep had stolen her edge, numbed her senses.
Johanna turned away from the door. She scanned the empty room: plush sofa, leather easy chairs, dark fireplace, photos and small treasures on the polished wood mantel; lamps on low. No footprints on the carpet.
Johanna set her purse down on the side table and withdrew her Glock 36. She kicked off her shoes and moved silently across the carpet, gun in a two-handed grip. Ghosting down the hall, she paused when she noticed footprints in the carpet. Too large to be her own.
A burglar? Expensive neighborhood. Fancy toys. Possible.
She swung into the bathroom, flicking on the light, and clearing right, then left. Empty. No shadows behind the beveled-glass shower door. The medicine cabinet was closed. No smudges. Untouched.
Not looking for drugs, then.
Leaving the light on, Johanna stepped back out into the hall and pressed her back up against the wall. The footprints trailed on down the hall.
What if E had come home? What if he’d brought S with him?
Johanna froze, heart hammering against her ribs. Blood rushed in a frenzy through her veins, yet she was cold, colder than the layers of ice outside on the concrete.
She stepped into the spare bedroom, flicking on the light. Nothing.
If E or S were here, bullets would help only where E was concerned. It would take more than bullets to keep her True Blood child down.
Whoever had broken into her home, violated it with their uninvited presence, was long gone. She felt nothing but her own panic.
Johanna strode out of the guest bedroom and into the hall, gun held at her side. She stepped into her office and flicked on the light. She crouched in front of the black file cabinet, pulled on the handle. The drawer slid open.
It had been locked when she’d left the house.
Rising to her feet, calmer despite the knot in her stomach, she circled around to her desk and opened the drawers. All had been locked—just like the file cabinet. She searched the contents of the deep bottom drawer—all files seemed to be in place, all disks and CDs accounted for. But that didn’t mean files hadn’t been photographed. Or disks copied.