She closed her eyes and tried to imagine this spot as it would have looked in the dark. Tried to dredge up some memory of being here. Of holding a knife and plunging it, again and again, into flesh.
The snap of a twig made her eyes fly open. She turned and saw, a few dozen yards away, a man standing among the trees. Had he been there all along? In her single-minded pursuit of the death location, had she simply missed seeing him? All at once she noticed how silent it was on this isolated stretch of the riverwalk. No joggers, no strolling couples. Only her and this man, who was now gazing at her through the trees.
He started toward her, and as he passed from shadow into sunlight, she saw that his hair was gray, and he had the gait of someone with a bad hip. No longer fearful, she remained where she was as the man slowly made his way toward her.
“Are you with the police?” he called out.
“No. No, I just came to see …”
“You heard about it, then. A man was killed here Saturday night. It’s been all over the news.” He came to a stop beside her, his gaze on the river below. “To think it happened right down there.”
She studied him, and suddenly realized why he looked familiar. “You’re Harry O’Brien,” she said.
Startled, he looked straight at her, and she thought she saw a similar flash of recognition in his eyes. But that was impossible; they had never met.
“How do you know my name?” he asked.
“I know your daughter was one of his victims.” She gestured down the riverbank, where Scanlon’s body had been found. “I read the article in the Globe. How you threatened him, after she …” Her voice trailed off.
He finished the painful thought for her. “After she killed herself.”
“I’m so sorry, Mr. O’Brien. I can’t imagine how horrible it is to lose a child.”
“No one can. Until it happens. Then it’s all you think about, all you feel.” He stared down at the river. “I came here to spit on his grave. Does that make me evil?”
“It makes you a grieving father.”
He nodded, and his thin shoulders slumped. “It doesn’t feel as good as I thought it would, knowing he’s dead. All I feel is … relief.” He looked at her, and once again she felt that strange shock of recognition. Somehow I know this man. And I think he knows me. “Why are you here?” he asked.
“I wanted to see where he died.”
“Did you know him?” He paused. Asked, quietly: “Did the bastard hurt you, too?”
She didn’t respond, but she felt certain he could see the answer in her face. Yes, he hurt me. The question is: Did I hurt him?
“Savor this moment,” he said. “The death of monsters should always be celebrated. I was afraid I wouldn’t live to see it, but here I am. While he burns in hell.”
Those last three words jolted a nerve of recognition. Not just the words, but the voice, deep with rage. She had heard it before.
“Excuse me,” she murmured, backing away.
He looked straight at her, his eyes fixed on her face. Seeing too much.
A pair of joggers came around the bend, huffing toward them. That’s when Maura made her escape. Swiftly she walked away, heading back to Leverett Pond. Toward other people. Only once did she pause to look back, and she saw he was standing where she’d left him, but his eyes were still on her.
She drove straight home, hands shaking as she clutched the wheel. Only when she was in her garage, the door safely closed, did her breathing begin to steady, her heart to slow.
Inside the house, the first thing she did was call Jane.
“Harry O’Brien,” she said. “Did you question him?”
“Of course we did,” said Jane. “How do you even know about O’Brien?”
“I know he once threatened Scanlon. It made the newspapers, after Kitty O’Brien’s suicide. Jane, I think he’s involved. I recognized his voice.”
“You spoke to him? What the hell are you doing, getting in the middle of an investigation?”
“We met by accident, in Olmsted Park. I went to the death scene, to see if I remembered anything, and O’Brien was there. We had a few words, and I had this—this sudden flash of recognition. I’ve heard his voice before, Jane. Maybe it was that night.”
“Saturday?”
“It’s possible, isn’t it? Even though there’s so much I don’t remember, there could be bits and pieces that I did retain. A face, a voice.”
“It couldn’t have been O’Brien that night. He had an alibi.”
“You’re absolutely sure it’s real?”
“He was visiting a friend in Swampscott. Frost and I interviewed her, and she swears O’Brien was at her house till midnight.”
“Is she reliable?”
“She’s an architect. Her mother was there that night, too. Apparently the evening was some sort of matchmaking plot to pair Mom off with Harry. It’s rock-solid, Maura.”
But even as she hung up, Maura could not shake off the certainty that she’d heard Harry O’Brien’s voice that night.
She sat on her living room sofa and stretched out on the cushions, trying to call up another memory. Here was where she’d awakened Sunday morning. The night before, someone had laid her on this sofa. Had words been spoken, words that she might still remember? She closed her eyes.
The doorbell rang.
She snapped straight, heart slamming against her chest. She forced herself to rise from the sofa and peeked through the glass panel.
A dark-haired young woman, pretty and petite, stood on the porch.
Maura took a deep breath and felt the tension go out of her. She opened the door. “Yes?”
“I’m sorry to bother you,” the woman said, “but I’m trying to find David Chatworth’s house. I know he lives around here somewhere, but my cell phone just died. Could I borrow your phone book?”
“Of course. Hold on,” said Maura. She turned toward the kitchen, where she kept the phone directory. Made it only halfway up the hall when she heard the front door suddenly slam shut.
Footsteps closed in behind her.
CHAPTER FIVE
Jane sat at her desk, troubled by her conversation with Maura. Flash of recognition was how Maura had described her reaction to O’Brien, a certainty that she’d met him. But it couldn’t have happened on Saturday night, because O’Brien was at his friend’s house in Swampscott.
She pulled out her file on their interview with Monica Vargas, the woman whom O’Brien had been visiting. Thirty-five years old and an architect, she lived alone in an impressive house with a view of the sea. She had been definite about O’Brien’s visit, had told Jane and Frost that O’Brien arrived around six PM, dined with Monica and her mother, and the three of them had watched Woody Allen DVDs. Around midnight, O’Brien left her house. Monica had offered the police her mother’s phone number, should they need further corroboration.
Yes, a rock-solid alibi.
But now, thinking back to that interview, Jane recalled details about Monica that suddenly seemed significant. Her poise, her beauty. An attractive female professional, confident and accomplished.
Like Sarah Shapiro and Kitty O’Brien. Like Maura Isles.
She spun around to her computer and was just about to do a background check on Monica Vargas when her phone rang.
“We finally got into Scanlon’s TracFone,” said Frost.
“We have access to his calls?”
“We have everything. And you won’t believe what’s here.”
She saw the excitement on Frost’s face when she walked into the crime lab. He sat in front of a computer screen as a printer churned out pages of documents.
“He hardly made any calls on this phone,” he said. “But he did use it to send text messages.” He pointed to the computer screen. “We’ve got them all here, dating back four years. About a dozen of them. And they were all sent to the same recipient.”
Jane frowned at the date of the most recent text. “Scanlon sent one Saturday night. Eight thir
ty PM.”
“Look at what he wrote.” Frost clicked on the body of the text, and one sentence appeared. It was an address in Brookline. Maura’s.
“This is how Scanlon told his partner where to find the next catch,” she said, and she gave Frost an excited slap on the back. “We’ve got the second perp!”
“Wait. You need to see something else. The other texts.” He scrolled down the list. “See the dates? This one here, eighteen months ago, corresponds to the attack on Sarah Shapiro. And this one, just before it, was Kitty O’Brien.”
“So we have a record of every attack. Every victim’s address.”
“Right. Now look at this one.” He clicked on a text from nine months earlier.
Jane stared at the address. Swampscott. “It’s Monica Vargas! She was a victim, too?”
“Only she never reported it,” said Frost. “And Julia Chan, the woman who gave Sarah Shapiro her alibi? Her address is in here as well. Somehow, these women managed to connect. They found each other. We’ve got a whole nest of victims here, and they’re covering for each other. We can’t trust anyone’s alibi.”
“Which means Harry O’Brien could have killed Scanlon. He could have been … oh Jesus.” Jane snatched up her cell phone.
“What?”
“Maura spoke to Harry O’Brien this evening. She recognized him.”
“Does he know that?”
Jane hung up. “She’s not answering her phone.”
It was dark when they arrived at Maura’s house. There were no lights on inside, and the front door was unlocked. Jane and Frost glanced at each other, a grim acknowledgment of what could very well await them. They both drew their weapons, and Jane gave the door a nudge. She slipped through first, moved into the living room.
Suddenly a lamp came on. Jane froze.
Harry O’Brien stood clutching Maura as a shield in front of him, his gun pressed to her temple.
“Drop it, O’Brien!” Jane ordered, her weapon raised. She heard Frost move beside her, caught a peripheral view of his gun, clutched in both hands.
“We don’t want violence, Detective,” another voice said, and Jane glanced in surprise at Sarah Shapiro, who rose to her feet from the armchair. “Harry just wants to settle things, once and for all.”
“By killing a witness?” said Jane. “The one person who remembers he was here that night?” She looked at O’Brien. “You were stalking Scanlon. Oh, it was in the name of justice, I get that. The scum deserved to die, and any jury will sympathize.”
“I don’t want to go to jail,” he said.
“You should’ve thought of that before you stabbed him.”
“Did I?” He shook his head. “I told you, I was with a friend that night.”
“She’s covering for you. That alibi will fall apart.”
“No, it won’t. We built a fortress, Detective. You just haven’t realized it yet, because you haven’t finished your job.”
“I know you’re all in this together. And I know this is not helping your case.” She tightened her grip on the Glock. “Drop the gun.”
“Why? I have nothing to lose.”
“Your life?”
O’Brien’s laugh was bitter. “My life is over. It ended when Kitty died. I’m just tying up loose ends.”
“Like Scanlon?”
“And his partner.”
He knows there’s a second man. “We will find that partner, Harry. I swear we will. And he’ll pay.”
“Oh, I know you’ll find him.”
“Drop the gun and we’ll talk. We’ll work on finding him together. We’ll see justice done.”
He seemed to weigh her words, and she saw the struggle in his eyes. The indecision. “It never comes soon enough,” he said softly.
“What doesn’t?”
“Justice. Sometimes, you have to give it a nudge.” With that, he pushed Maura so hard that she went sprawling against the sofa. He raised his gun, and the barrel was aimed directly at Jane.
Gunfire exploded as both Jane and Frost opened fire. The bullets punched into O’Brien’s chest, sent him slamming backward against the bookcase. He leaned there staring at them for a moment, an odd smile on his lips, the gun already falling from his hand. Slowly he slid down to the floor, and Sarah dropped to her knees beside him, sobbing, screaming.
He had not fired a single shot.
Maura crouched over the body, felt for a pulse, and began CPR. But staring into O’Brien’s eyes, Jane saw the light fade away. And she knew there was nothing left to save.
A day later, they found the body.
They tracked down the recipient of Scanlon’s text messages, and it led them to the handsome Newton residence of William Heathcote, age forty-two. There they found Mr. Heathcote slumped in the driver’s seat of his silver Mercedes, which was parked inside his garage. He had been dead for several days, which meant he could well have died the same night as Scanlon. The cause of death was immediately apparent: a single gunshot to the right temple. A Smith & Wesson nine-millimeter pistol, reportedly stolen in Miami a year before, was in his hand.
In the Mercedes trunk was a plastic bag containing two chefs’ knives, both covered in dried blood.
It was almost certainly Scanlon’s blood, thought Jane as she watched the CSU team tag the evidence. No case could come more prettily tied up with a bow. The evidence was all there to help the police draw the obvious conclusion: Heathcote stabbed Scanlon to death in Olmsted Park, then drove home and committed suicide. In a single bloody evening, two predators met their end.
Jane didn’t believe it for a second; neither did Maura.
They stood together in Heathcote’s driveway, watching as the Boston PD tow truck pulled away with the Mercedes, bound for the crime lab. It was late afternoon, dark clouds were moving in, and the air felt prickly with impending thunder.
But for Maura, the storm had already passed. “Harry was a hero, Jane,” she said. “He never meant to hurt me. He came to my house without a single bullet in that gun.”
“We didn’t know that. We had no choice.”
“Of course you had no choice. It was supposed to happen this way. He wanted to go out with a blaze of publicity, so his daughter would be remembered. And he wouldn’t have to face any questions.” Maura paused. “He had cancer.”
“Harry told you that?”
“No. Dr. Bristol did the autopsy this morning. Harry’s body was riddled with tumors. I think he knew he was dying, and he chose this way to end it.”
Leaving me with the nightmares, thought Jane, looking up at the darkening sky. Taking a man’s life leaves a stain on your soul, even if you’re forced to do it. Even if the man you kill wants you to pull that trigger.
“We both know it was a conspiracy,” said Jane. “Harry and those victims, they planned this together. They covered for each other. For all I know, they each took their turn stabbing Christopher Scanlon. Fifteen stab wounds, two different knives? And not a single fingerprint.” Jane sighed in frustration. “I know what happened, I just can’t prove it.”
“Do you really want to?”
“You’re the one who’s always hung up on the facts, the truth. But you’re willing to ignore the truth of this case?”
“I could have been a victim, too. I was like a staked goat, drugged and laid out on my sofa, where anything could have been done to me. But it never happened because they stopped it. I don’t know which of them was there in my house, or how many. All I know is that this time, the victims fought back. They caught and killed two monsters.” Maura looked straight at her. “And they saved me.”
Maybe that’s worth more than any truth, thought Jane as she watched Maura climb into her Lexus and drive away. And she remembered what Harry O’Brien had said: Justice. Sometimes you have to give it a nudge.
That you did, Mr. O’Brien. That you did.
Read on for an excerpt from
Last to Die
by Tess Gerritsen
Published by Ballantine Bo
oks
We called him Icarus.
It was not his real name, of course. My childhood on the farm taught me that you must never give a name to an animal marked for slaughter. Instead you refer to it as Pig Number One or Pig Number Two, and you always avoided looking it in the eye, to shield yourself from any glimpse of self-awareness or personality or affection. When a beast trusts you, it takes far more resolve to slit his throat.
We had no such issue with Icarus, who neither trusted us nor had any inkling of who we were. But we knew a great deal about him. We knew that he lived behind high walls in a hilltop villa on the outskirts of Rome. That he and his wife Lucia had two sons, ages eight and ten. That despite his immense wealth, he had simple tastes in food, and a favorite local restaurant, La Nonna, at which he dined almost every Thursday.
And that he was a monster. Which was the reason we came to be in Italy that summer.
The hunting of monsters is not for the faint of heart. Nor is it for those who feel bound by such trivial doctrines as law or national borders. Monsters, after all, do not play by the rules, so neither can we. Not if we hope to defeat them.
But when you abandon civilized standards of conduct, you run the risk of becoming a monster yourself. And that is what happened that summer in Rome. I did not recognize it at the time; none of us did.
Until it was too late.
CHAPTER ONE
Ithaca, New York
On the night that thirteen-year-old Claire Ward should have died, she stood on the window ledge of her third-floor bedroom, trying to decide whether to jump. Twenty feet below were scraggly forsythia bushes, long past their spring bloom. They would cushion her fall, but most likely there’d be broken bones involved. She glanced across at the maple tree, eyeing the sturdy branch that arched only a few feet away. She’d never attempted this leap before, because she’d never been forced to. Until tonight she’d managed to sneak out the front door without being noticed. But those nights of easy escapes were over, because Boring Bob was on to her. From now on young lady, you are staying home! No more running around town after dark like a wildcat.
John Doe Page 4