“What if no one got a lead on it? What if he doesn’t draw attention?”
There was a moment of silence.
“Jesus Christ. You might as well give up on that idea.” Higgins slapped at the ball and scored a point. He grinned and looked back. “Take that, you sonofabitch.”
He felt his blood pressure rising, felt his face flush. Nobody saw it.
“How do you think he could do it without drawing attention to himself?” Higgins questioned, sweat soaking through his sweats.
He served. “Maybe our guy’s a gentleman caller. Maybe he doesn’t stand out in a crowd. What do you think?”
“Pisses me off, that’s what I think.”
“Huh?”
“If he’s such a gentleman caller, what’s he doing carving up pretty girls?”
“You wouldn’t understand,” he said, his voice muffled by the ball’s ricochet against polished wood.
Game point. Match.
Higgins was pissed because he was wet and his opponent was dry and smug. “Dammit if you don’t always end up kicking my butt. You want the forty now?” Higgins said, looking at him.
He was used to Higgins showboating, used to his inability to deliver on the goods when the time came. “Don’t worry about it. Next week, it’s double or nothing.”
He got home about 3 p.m. to La Blanca, the house he had built for himself. It stood obscured from view of the Pacific Coast Highway, at the end of a gravel driveway that ran past cactus, succulants, and stone. He fancied the landscaping but did not know why. The starkness of it perhaps, against the blue ocean. Now, in late July, the prickly pear was in bloom. Its yellow-red flower casting no scent, yet magnificent against the sky. The house itself blended seamlessly into the costal chaparral. That is what made it so wonderful. In one instant it was there. In the next it was not.
Turning off the silent alarm, he nevertheless made an inspection tour of the house. There had been an aborted robbery attempt just last year. He flicked on the lights in each room and looked around. A visitor would not think he lived alone. He kept a full line of dresses in a guest bedroom closet. Maria did not question it when he mentioned they belonged to his girlfriend.
“Sí.” She had simply nodded and kept on cleaning.
He made sure the collection of clothing changed periodically to reflect the particular style of the season. Keeping two toothbrushes by the sink furthered the illusion. Regardless, Maria understood. He was not like other men. He did not like questions. But he paid her well, and she kept her comments to herself.
Satisfied he was alone in the house, he went upstairs, took a long shower, washed his hair. Dressed in a light blue cotton bathrobe that felt heavy on his tired muscles, he stood looking out over the Pacific and the gardens. Like the house’s front, no demarcation line separated the wild country from the garden below. The two landscapes blended seamlessly. That is what he wanted. The site, a triangular chaparral that plunged to the sea, first attracted him for its ruggedness, its connection to nature. He wanted an innocuous garden, a garden that celebrated the surrounding natural beauty.
He remembered his grandmother and her carefully pruned roses. Each one a mere token of what it could be if allowed to grow wild. Instead she had pruned each plant, clipped and directed the limbs to the point they looked cajoled, contrived.
It was much the way he felt around her.
Instead of that, here he had hired a landscape designer who understood the beauty of low-maintenance California natives, such as artemisia and toyon. The melding of his garden and native plants and costal scrub provided him a oneness with nature, as this house did with the ocean. Below him, the slate patio’s arched surface seemed to vanish, especially when viewed from the second-story window where he stood.
His human imprint below was slight.
It was as if nature could regain the upper hand at any moment, if it only wanted to. It was as if the sea was lapping at his floor.
This was the view he woke to each morning and savored each evening.
Towel drying his hair, he sat in the red chair and switched the automatic floor-to-ceiling blinds so they covered the windows. Light turned to pitch blackness with a mechanical whir.
He felt excited. Behind him, he turned on a metal reading lamp that cast a halo around him. With another button, a five-foot screen descended out of the ceiling. He turned on the projection television and the DVD. Sitting back comfortably in the red chair, he felt the air conditioning cool and dry his hair. He threw the towel on the floor. Stretching out further, he turned out the light behind him.
Darkness enveloped him. Lying back in it, he could have been anywhere. The video tape images cast a bluish, then red shadow over him. He closed his eyes, imagining he was with the first one. Nancy Marsh. The one he had waited for.
He opened his eyes and she was there on the screen. Closing them again, he let her sheer image wash over him. He could hear her laughing.
Cut to an image of her father’s house. A chocolate Labrador name Hershey jumped at her, ears flopping, a playful bark. He closed his eyes, cementing the image in his eyes, his mind. There was no up or down now. No left or right, no backwards, forwards.
Only Nancy Marsh, only now.
He remembered.
The video jumps as he approaches the young woman, her slim frame hunched over a white and pink iced birthday cake with nineteen candles. She blows them out. Camera catching a glimpse of her breasts. The video image blurs, sharpens to a close-up. His naked body lifting weight, muscles bathed in sweat. He can see the veins and sinews pulsing, can feel his blood surging like a cobra. He spits and writhes as he struggles with the weight. He knows it is training for what he must do.
Even closer, his eyes fill the screen, fluttering, then rolling up into white balls. They engulf the lens.
He is plunged into darkness. Into Nancy.
She died in this house.
This next part he loves.
A white blank blur becomes a white ceiling. Fading back, adjusting the focus, it is the ceiling. The camera drops down abruptly. Nancy Marsh is there. She is thrashing, crying, turning to him as he stands over her. He says nothing, smoothing her hair as she tries to rise. The camera jerks back and there is a room. White tiled walls and floors. A stainless-steel table. He walks to the camera, his naked body obscuring the shot, blackness. Then he walks back to the screaming girl.
He notices now in the scene he is firm, excited.
He feels it here too.
Injecting her, the girl’s body goes limp, although she is still screaming. Shrill screams.
Nancy Marsh is wet with perspiration, gleaming in the light he has installed overhead. Her neck rising up, wildly. Eyes roll, then focus on him. He walks to the camera. The screen goes black.
Darkness hides many sins.
Light again. It is focused more clearly now. The tripod has been moved closer so he can tape her face. Remembering the first time he decided to tape her face, he realizes only now the reason he did so. It was to relive his grandmother.
He closes his eyes and remembers the first time.
“Santa,” he says. It was what he had always called her.
Opening them, he is hovering over Nancy. Cutting. His hand coming into the picture from the right, holding a long stylized knife, its blade gleaming. First there are the numerous small incisions, each one a release for him. He can hear his breath, lumbering and heavy from the camera.
He licks his thick lips as the images play out.
As he approaches the last wound, the one to the abdomen, his hand is shaking. Knitting his brows, he holds it still. He can cut the life right out of her with one blow. Yet she is alive. A dark spot below her buttocks spreading, arms and hands doing nothing, the drug having taken its toll. The screams are there.
Darkness like a sea around him, transporting him. In this room, he is covered in sweat, although the air conditioning continues to purr. Tongue running against small teeth.
She is dead now. P
ropped against a sycamore bush, her head dangling. A brown blur turns into a black blur as he curses, moving to the tripod; he steadies it and returns to her. Carefully, he arranges her, head facing toward the sea, to Newport. That way she can see La Blanca forever. Share it with him.
He puts his hand on wet skin, taking himself in his palm.
She is with him. Here. Now.
Arranged, her body resembles a scarecrow. Nancy Marsh under a sycamore bush, splayed out for all the world to see.
He comes into the picture from the right, moving slowly, effortlessly, as if on air. He wears a coat now, blood-smeared. With gloved hands, he takes her limp, lifeless arm, putting it around his neck. Lifting the lobbed head, he grins in the direction of the camera, holding the pose for a good ten seconds.
He wants to make sure this is captured on video.
He watches himself and Nancy in an embrace.
Forever.
SEVENTEEN
Which way I fly is Hell; myself am Hell;
And in the lowest deep a lower deep
Still threat’ning to devour me opens wide,
To which the Hell I suffer seems a Heav’n.
—John Milton, “Paradise Lost”
That same day, Cat got word from the FBI in Chicago. Boston, Miami, New York, and San Francisco had come up dry on this guy’s MO. But Chicago, well, that was a different story.
Cat immediately decided to fly into O’Hare. Richmond disagreed. “Cat, you’re needed here. Without you who’ll oversee the forensics work, photo analysis, the evidence handling?”
“Agent Gray is well versed in FBI procedures. And anything he can’t handle, Sanchez can. From there, anything that needs further decision can be handled by me.” She lifted her cell phone in the air. “I’ll be reachable.”
“But what can you hope to gain from going to Chicago now?”
“I don’t exactly know, but I mean to find out,” she said. She was supremely cool yet anxious to be on her way. “Will you drive me to the hotel, to pack some clothes? Then the airport? I’ve got a six o’clock flight on United.” Cat cursed herself again for not renting a car yet. What kind of life was this, begging rides here and there?
“I see no reason why not.”
“Good,” she responded in a knee-jerk fashion.
“You sure Gray and McGregor can handle it? What if we get another body?”
“James is as competent a medical examiner as I have seen. You get anything major, you call me.”
Within five minutes they were in Richmond’s car, a Mercedes 500 SEL. Cat surveyed the car. “Police work must pay well.”
“Just appearances. It’s a lease. I don’t own one of these, probably never will.”
“Oh, I don’t know about that. I see big things in your future.” Cat knew it sounded like polite small talk, but she was telling the truth. “You’ve got a good way with the media, and your men respect you. That’s more than I can say for a lot of chiefs I’ve worked with.”
They headed toward the Hyatt, Cat tucking her black doctor’s bag firmly between her ankles. “Any aspirations of higher office?”
“To be honest with you, I haven’t thought about it since my wife’s death.”
Cat wondered if she should ask then decided on it anyway. “How did Emily die?”
He took a gulp. “She was killed at night coming back from a fundraiser in Brea. Hit by a drunk driver on Brea Canyon Road. Guy fell asleep at the wheel.” His words were shaky, quick, as if by speaking of it he relived each second. “His pickup truck crested a hill, already over the center line. Hit my Emily straight on, doing seventy-three miles an hour. She didn’t have a chance.”
“That’s horrible. I’m sorry.” It was one thing to deal with death daily, strangers’ deaths, innocuous bodies on a slab. It was another to listen to a personal account.
“She was beautiful, my Emily. Always giving of herself, even till the day she died.” His face reddened. She could see he was fighting tears.
They sat in silence till they reached the Hyatt. Cat ran in and five minutes later reappeared with an overnight bag. In the time she was gone, Richmond gathered enough strength to continue the conversation.
“What about you? You must have someone special in your life.”
Cat wondered about his intent; he probably meant nothing. “I have a son, Joey. He is six, almost seven. And an ex-husband who I’d rather not talk about.”
“Difficult divorce?”
“No, actually we get along pretty well as far as my son is involved. It’s just that Mark isn’t part of my life. I don’t need him anymore.” Cat watched the sun setting.
“Do you need anyone?” Richmond asked.
“That’s a strange question.”
“No, it’s an honest one,” he said as they turned onto MacArthur Boulevard, left toward John Wayne Airport.
“I don’t know, Robert.” It was the first time she had called him by his first name.
Pulling up to United’s departure terminal, he asked, “Do you think you ever could?”
“I don’t know. Never thought of it.”
“Well, think of it while you’re gone, Catherine. And keep yourself safe.”
She grabbed her bags and was gone.
News of the Burning Man Task Force made the Orange County Register’s front page. He settled down with a Blue Mountain coffee in his favorite overstuffed chair.
From his Laguna Beach house overlooking the midnight blue Pacific, he could see the water outside swelling, waves growing larger and more prolific. In keeping with the island’s secluded aura, Catalina appeared to emerge naturally from its surroundings in the distance.
Night was just giving rise to day.
He opened the paper, amused to see Dr. Catherine Powers on the front page. Thinking of her was quite common to him now.
Surrounded by his white-on-white Turkish rugs, paintings by Medved, he relished this sanctuary. This house. He’d called it La Blanca, “The White,” and outfitted it in all white. He sat in the one object in the house which was any other color, a blood-red-hued chair.
It was pleasing to let Catherine into his house. The only woman, other than Maria, the maid, who had shared this space with him for the past fifteen years. He beamed as he thought of her, his eyes studying her news photo once more.
“Catherine,” he whispered to her, his words barely a purr. “Catherine, welcome to my world.” He lifted his arms. “This is my world.”
He took the front page and splayed it out on the white carpeting. “My Catherine, beautiful Catherine,” he said, eyes dancing over her photograph, taking in a three-stranded pearl choker, cobalt blue suit, pearl earrings, elegant and understated. “Like the woman herself,” he added, his voice soft, controlled.
He felt the excitement rising in him, his pulse quickening.
It was so exhilarating to share himself with this woman. Finally, after all these years. He could see her here, walking casually among his McGuire furniture, towel drying her damp auburn hair after a brisk morning shower.
A shower they would share together.
He took scissors, carefully cutting out the photograph and the article. He studied the words they had written about her: “‘We intend to catch him, pure and simple.’ That’s the quote from Dr. Catherine Powers, 38, the FBI’s chief forensic pathologist out of Quantico, Virginia. Dr. Powers will head the Burning Man Task Force from Orange County, a statewide FBI dragnet. Calls have also been put out nationwide. The task force will call for the cooperation of over 100 law enforcement agencies working in unison. Dr. Powers, a doctor of psychology, brings her special talents in forensic medicine and criminal psychology to the investigation…”
Looking at the photograph, he noticed a lock of hair was pulled behind her right ear. A nervous habit? Right-handed, no doubt. Blue suit buttoned so high around her neck. The last time he had seen her, she had been wearing a gray sweat suit. Despite the informality, signs of Catherine’s clout were evident to him—the way
she commanded the media, the coterie of politicians who trailed in her wake, the diamond solitaire ring she wore.
“I wonder who gave that to you?” he mused.
More perceptible, even from this grainy color shot, was the way she held herself. Head high, back straight. Catherine had become a lightning rod of the public’s perception of problems with violent and uncontrolled crime. A Madonna for all that was wrong in the world. From the aggressive fire in her eyes, she relished this role.
“I like a woman with a little fire,” he murmured, remembering how Consuelo Vargas tried to scream. “But you are lagging behind. I expect so much from you. I know you will get there soon.”
He lay on the floor, seeming to be asleep, his head propped under one hand. The newspaper clipping lay on his chest. Almost imperceptible breathing. The only real betrayal of each breath was a slight rise in his chest. He could control it. Had many times before.
Opening his emerald eyes, sitting cross-legged on Berber carpeting, he returned his gaze to the photo, pressing supple fingers against the print. He kept reading. “When asked how long the investigation will take, Dr. Powers replied, ‘As long as it takes. What’s important is that the women and children of this community feel safe.’ Dr. Powers herself is the mother of a six-year-old boy.”
“Ah yes, my little friend, Joey,” he said smoothly, controlling each syllable. He let excitement wash over him. Anxiety tingling in his fingertips.
He would know the boy better before the day was over.
Without meaning to, he sucked in a deep breath.
What would the boy look like today? Those long eyelashes. His innocence. Laughter.
He laughed himself, small white teeth showing.
“I read all your stories, Catherine. Each is more interesting than the last. More…” He hesitated, then instantly found the right word. “Passionate.”
He looked up from the paper, watching dawn break. The real beauty of Laguna lay in the daily discovery of its hidden gems, he thought. Its roaring surf.
Small children playing in sand down below. He loved to watch them from this vantage point. Like a hawk watching his prey, from high above. Silent, unseen, deadly.
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