Last Breath

by Michael Prescott

  Syringe filled with succinylcholine, a paralytic drug—in case the chloroform failed to subdue her.

  Roll of tape to pinion her wrists and ankles.

  Eyeless hood to cover her head during transit.

  And gloves, of course—black leather gloves for his strangling hands.

  Finished, he zipped up the tote bag. He checked the computer screen again. Caitlin was stowing the exercise rig under her bed. He watched as she took off her workout clothes and tossed them into a laundry basket, then toweled herself dry in the bathroom. She spent a few moments selecting an outfit to wear, and during that time she was naked on the screen of his computer—and, no doubt, on other screens as well. There were others who liked to watch.

  But only one who was not content with mere watching.

  She chose a yellow blouse and beige cargo shorts. Treat studied her as she dressed. He did not turn away even when she sat on the edge of her bed and laced up her sneakers. It gave him a peculiar feeling of intimacy with her to know that he was preparing for his evening just as she made preparations for hers. Almost like a real couple.

  Soon they would share an intimacy purer and more intense than any lovers’ tryst. They would know the closeness of predator and prey, of torturer and victim. They would share the wordless language of suffering, and together they would experience the final delicious frisson of death.

  Treat shook his head, dispelling the vision his imagination had conjured. He looked around him. No more daylight filtered through his shuttered windows. Darkness had come.

  He entered his walk-in closet and began to select his attire for the evening’s entertainment. A formal affair, so he would wear black.

  For Miss Osborn, on the other hand, the event was strictly come-as-you-are.

  17

  C.J. was making dinner when the phone rang. She glanced at the clock on the stove. Ten minutes to six. Salesperson, probably. She almost didn’t answer, but on the third ring she picked up the cordless unit mounted by the fridge. “Hello?”

  “It’s me. Rick Tanner.”

  Tanner had never called her. “Hey, Rick. What’s up?”

  “I wanted to see how you were doing.”

  “How I’m doing?” Carrying the phone, she returned to the stove and used a wooden spoon to push around some stir-fry vegetables in her frying pan. “We just talked at the station a couple hours ago.”

  “Yeah, but at the time I didn’t know what had gone down in that hostage situation. How you climbed in through the rear window and took away the guy’s piece.”

  She turned down the flame under the saucepan. The broccoli was starting to scorch. “Where’d you hear that?”

  “Pedro’s. I’m finishing up a Code Seven right now.” Completing his dinner break, he meant.

  Pedro’s was a Tex-Mex diner frequented by Newton cops and Sheriff’s deputies who worked the Florence area. “Some guys from your division have been talking. I think you impressed them, Killer.”

  “You’re not supposed to call me that, remember?”

  “It was a slip.”

  “Anyway”—she ladled the cooked vegetables onto a plate—“I wasn’t trying to impress anybody. I just didn’t want ... well, you know ...”

  “Another SWAT screw-up? Like the warehouse in Long Beach?”

  She took a long moment before answering. Sometimes Tanner really could surprise her. “How’d you know I was thinking of that?”

  “I didn’t. My partner did. He had to walk me through it real slow. I caught on eventually.”

  “I’ll bet you caught on sooner than you’ll admit. You’re not so dumb, Tanner.”

  “That’s what I keep telling everybody. But do they listen? Nah.”

  There was an uncomfortable pause when both of them realized they had temporarily run out of conversation.

  “Look,” Tanner said, “that’s all I called to say. And, uh, I wanted to ask you a question.”

  “Ask away.”

  “Is it a problem for you—me being SWAT? I mean, is that why ... well, you know?”

  “Why I’ve been sort of unfriendly?”

  “Right. Not that I don’t deserve it. I probably do. I’m an asshole. Even my best friends tell me so.”

  “They might be underestimating you.” She looked out the kitchen window, into the darkness. The sun was long gone. Again she found herself wishing night didn’t come so early in the winter. “Look, you SWAT guys have a job to do, and most of the time you do it well. Anyway, you had nothing to do with the warehouse. That was LAPD Metro’s deal.”

  “Sure but, you know, once we put on our vests and goggles, we pretty much all look alike.”

  She laughed. “I don’t have anything against you. Rick. I’ve just been ... cautious since my divorce.”

  “Yeah, I can understand that. And, uh, I’m sorry if I’ve been, you know, coming on too strong.”

  She was touched. He had never apologized to her before, for anything. “Is this your sensitive side coming out?” she asked with a smile.

  “Could be. I wouldn’t know. I’m not too familiar with my sensitive side. But if I’ve been, well ... acting like a jerk ...”

  “Maybe a little. But I goad you into it, I think.”

  “I guess I just need to, you know, chill out a little. Around you, I mean.”

  “Maybe we could both play it that way. You don’t go for any three-point shots, and I won’t try so hard to block.”

  “Basketball metaphors. I like that.”

  “First rakish, now metaphors. I’m starting to think there’s more to you than you let on.”

  “That’s what I’ve been trying to tell you. Uh, sorry—that was the old Rick Tanner.”

  “The old Rick Tanner’s not all bad. Actually, I kind of like talking to him.” This was true, though she hadn’t realized it until right now.

  “You’ll like the new guy even better.”

  “I just might.”

  “So we’re cool?”

  She smiled. “We’re cool.” Absurdly she wondered if he was wearing his sunglasses right now, in the dark.

  “Glad to hear it. Guess I’d better be going. Me and my partner are officially back on duty.”

  C.J. surprised herself by holding him on the phone a minute longer. “Can I ask you something?”

  “Sure.”

  “You ever hear anything about the Four-H Club?”

  “Bunch of farm kids trying to raise the world’s biggest tomato?”

  “No, I mean—well, it’s sort of crazy, but I got this e-mail message welcoming me to the Four-H Club. Unsolicited and unsigned. I wondered if it meant anything.”

  “Like a threat?”

  “It’s probably nothing. But on my way home, I could’ve sworn there was somebody tailing me.”

  “Description?”

  “White van, cargo style, California plates. That’s all I got.”

  “When did you receive the e-mail?”

  “Today.”

  “So first you’re followed, then you get this message?”

  “It might not mean anything.”

  “I’ll ask around. See if it rings any bells.”

  “No, don’t bother.” She was sorry she had mentioned it. “It’s nothing. I’m being paranoid.”

  “In this city, with the work we do, paranoid is a good way to be.”

  “Don’t go to any trouble. I’m sure it’s a joke or something.”

  “I’ll ask anyway. If I find out anything, I’ll call.”

  “I think I’m just going crazy, that’s all.”

  “I’ve been crazy for years. I can relate. Hey, Chang’s telling me we’re taking a one-eighty-seven in gangland. Gotta roll, Killer.”

  “Don’t call me that,” she said, smiling, but Tanner had already hung up.

  She replaced the cordless handset in its charger, then carried her meal into the dining area. Picking at her veggies, sipping ice water, she thought about Rick Tanner. It seemed his playful come-ons weren’t so pla
yful, after all. He really did care about her. Underneath the macho facade, there could be a person worth getting to know.

  Or maybe not. It could be just another act, a subtler come-on. She wasn’t sure what to think. The divorce had left her wary, hypervigilant.

  Still, calling had been a nice gesture on his part.

  To be honest—she smiled sadly—it was more than Adam would have done.

  18

  Treat kept his white van in the underground parking garage of his apartment complex. The van, a Ford Econoline, was parked neatly between the stripes, flanked by a snazzy black Miata and a dented Honda Civic, a mix of vehicles that reflected the egalitarian mix of tenants in his building—rising corporate stars and showbiz types waiting for a break, recent college grads still living off their parents and senior citizens surviving on fixed incomes.

  When he signed his lease six months ago, the landlord had boasted that the building represented a rich diversity of people. Treat remembered thinking that his own particular skills would no doubt broaden the spectrum of this diversity by more than a few degrees.

  He had moved often in his life—from one apartment to another, from one city to another, from one state to another. A man like him could not afford to stay rooted in one spot. Before long, no doubt, he would be on the move again. He had learned not to press his luck. One more killing after tonight—he had already selected a delectable Miss February, and a hidden camera was installed, the feed ready to be sent to the Web site whenever he wished.

  After February, his contribution to the site would end, and the Hourglass Killer would be no more.

  Another persona discarded. Another performance completed.

  He boarded his van and switched on the engine and headlights. The vehicle rumbled under him as he guided it out of the garage, into the street.

  Caitlin’s home, which he had observed on many reconnaissance missions over the past month, was twenty miles from his apartment building. He put on a little speed, aware that he had to catch her before she left for her community service program.

  Oh, yes, he knew all about that. He had watched her closely, learned the ins and outs of her schedule. It had been the same with Nikki Carter and Martha Eversol. When the time had come for their abductions, he had known their weekly routines intimately.

  This was the thing that people—average people, simpleminded people, the people who surrounded him every day, who had been part of his world for all the forty-one years of his life—this was the thing that such people never understood. Because his approach to murder was random, they assumed it must be impersonal, a faceless stranger killing an equally faceless victim.

  But there was nothing impersonal about it. He knew his victims. He remembered each one in exquisite, sensual detail. He even cherished them, in his way. Not that he would ever be so stupidly sentimental as to visit their graves or mail a consoling note to their bereaved. Such gestures were pointless—worse, they were dangerous. He thought of himself as a professional, and as such, he maintained an appropriate distance from the subjects of his work.

  Still, he did care for them. This was, in fact, the only way he had ever learned to care for anybody. He had never understood what movies and songs were all about when they addressed the topic of love. He could not imagine wanting to share his life with another human being or even with a pet, except perhaps for his arachnids, who required nothing from him save the occasional cricket to feed on. The idea of devoting himself to another person, diluting the purity of his self-contained consciousness in the tepid waters of another soul, was revolting to him.

  And yet ...

  He did not seek to be entirely alone in the world. He sought a connection with others, a way to relate to fellow members of his species.

  He had found that way, in the intimacy of homicide.

  To select his victim ... to learn her name, study her movements, observe her friends and family, live her life vicariously for days or weeks ... then move in for the kill and take her, take her in the full meaning of the word, possess her more completely than any lover, force her submission to his will, his power, subjugate her utterly, then extinguish her life and leave only the rag doll of her body ...

  This was the only closeness he knew, and all he ever wanted to know.

  Treat smiled, aware that he would know that intimacy with Caitlin very soon. He would enter her house via the back door, where he was least likely to be observed. Render her unconscious with a whiff of chloroform—marvelous stuff, delightfully aromatic, safe in moderate doses, even used as an anesthetic in an earlier century. Of course he would remove his Webcam and other incriminating gear before leaving with Caitlin in his van.

  Then the ride to a condemned house in Silver Lake, a musty old place shrouded by trees, offering a fine basement, where he could hold her for the requisite four hours.

  At the appointed time would come the strangulation, slow and sensual like lovemaking, and then the tattoo and his calling card, and the disposal of the body in a place where it was unlikely to be found for weeks.

  Pulling onto the Pomona Freeway, speeding west, Treat breathed the heady wine of his intentions and found them sweet.

  It was the last night of the month, the last night of Caitlin Jean Osborn’s life.

  19

  Steven Gader’s house lay on a tree-shaded street a few blocks from the University of Baltimore. Rawls guided his bureau-issue sedan to a stop at the curb.

  “This is it,” Brand said unnecessarily from the passenger seat.

  They got out of the car, stepping over piles of slush, and walked up the slate path. Snow lay half-melted on a brown lawn. Lamplight glowed through windows protected by iron security bars. Rawls wondered fleetingly if the bars were hinged from the inside to allow escape in case of fire.

  At the front door Rawls listened. He heard no sounds from inside. He rang the bell, holding his finger on the button for a long time. When there was no response, he rang again.

  “Not home,” Brand said, clapping his gloved hands against the cold.

  Rawls tried once more, and this time he heard a clatter of footsteps and a muffled male voice saying, “Hold on. Christ, I’m coming.”

  Rawls saw Brand unbutton his overcoat for easier access to his Glock 10.

  The door opened, and a man stood there in a terry-cloth bathrobe, his hair uncombed and dripping wet. He was short and pale, mid to late thirties, with a glaze of stubble on his cheeks and an earring in his left earlobe. He gazed at them with dark, suspicious eyes.

  “What’s this?” he snapped. “Jehovah’s Witnesses?”

  “No, Mr. Gader,” Rawls said politely. “FBI. Agents Rawls and Brand.” He allowed the man a glimpse of his FBI badge.

  There were two things to watch now—his eyes and his hands. The eyes might betray guilt. The hands might pose a threat.

  “FBI?” the man echoed. “Well ... what do you want with me?”

  “You are Mr. Steven Gader, correct?”

  “Yeah, that’s me.”

  “We’d like to speak with you, sir.”

  Gader realized he was being asked to invite the agents inside. “Can I have another look at that badge?”

  Rawls held out the badge and allowed him time to scrutinize it thoroughly.

  “I don’t have to let you in,” Gader said finally. “I don’t have to talk to you at all.”

  “That’s true, sir,” Rawls acknowledged, the words coming out in a jet of frosted breath.

  “I could say you have to talk to my lawyer. I’d be within my rights if I did that.”

  “Yes, you would. But we have only a few simple questions. Talking to us could help us out a lot.”

  “Help you out. Why should I help a couple of feds?” Gader ran a hand through his wet hair. “You got me out of the damn bathtub, you know.”

  “I’m sorry.”

  “Sure you are.” His gaze flicked to Brand’s face. “What are you smiling at? So I was taking a bath. It doesn’t make me some kind of
faggot. My radiator’s pumping out too much heat, and I can’t fix the damn thermostat, so I figured I would cool off in the tub. Okay?”

  Rawls let him ramble, then said quietly, “It’s just a few questions. We’d like to clear things up tonight.”

  “Shit.” Gader wavered in the doorway. “All right, I’m gonna catch goddamn pneumonia with the door open, so come the hell in. But I reserve the right to call a lawyer and order you out of my home at any time.”

  “Fair enough.”

  Gader led them into his living room, a small space with a low ceiling and dirty windows and a sooty fireplace that looked long unused. The carpet was worn, and there were soil marks on the sofa and armchairs. Gader hadn’t lied about the thermostat. The place felt like an oven.

  Gader plopped down in a chair and gestured to the sofa, where Rawls and Brand planted themselves, Brand positioning his body to have a view of the stairway in case there was anyone else in the house.

  “So what’s this all about?” Gader asked combatively.

  “Can I ask what’s your line of work?” Rawls began as he pulled off his gloves.

  “I design Web sites.”

  “Well, that’s what we’re here to ask you about.”

  “Go ahead, ask. I’ve created sites for lots of local businesses, mostly mom-and-pop operations that want to go online, expand their market. I can give you my brochure—”

  “We’re more interested in a noncommercial site.” Rawls recited the URL, pronouncing the string of slang terms with distaste. “What can you tell us about that one?”

  Gader showed no expression, but Rawls could see his tongue moving around in the hollow of his cheek as he thought of a way to answer.

  “You do maintain that site, don’t you?”

  “Yeah,” Gader said slowly.

  “A password-protected site. The password being Fatima, as in Bluebeard’s seventh wife.”

  “How do you know that?”

  Rawls smiled. “The password or the story?”

  “The password.”

  “We guessed.”

  “You guessed.” Gader looked from Rawls to Brand. “How about the name Bluebeard? You guess that too?”