Night Victims n-3

by John Lutz

  He felt a warm trickle down the arm and watched blood drip from his fingertips. It twisted and plunged in a thin scarlet thread parallel to the slender line that no longer led to escape.

  At the window of the building directly across the street, Newsy Winthrop was almost jumping up and down, using all the self-control he had to keep from pounding his cameraman on the back. Mustn’t do that! Mustn’t jiggle the frame!

  “Getting it?” Newsy kept asking, staring at the Night

  Spider snagged like an insect in a net, pinned to the building by converging brilliant spotlights, dangling like the unwilling specimen of a bug collector. “Jesus! Are you friggin’ getting this?”

  “I’m getting it,” the cameraman kept answering, trying to ignore Newsy while concentrating as intently on his work as if he were alone.

  “We’re the only ones getting it, my man! The only ones who’ll have it!”

  “Take it easy, I’m getting it all. Don’t distract me, man, okay?”

  But Newsy wasn’t listening.

  He was thinking Pulitzer.

  35

  When finally he’d fallen into bed at 7:00 A.M. Horn went over it in his mind, how everything had almost gone terribly wrong.

  Almost.

  Aaron Mandle was in custody and under high-alert guard at Kincaid Memorial Hospital. The Night Spider murders had ended, finally and forever. If Nina hadn’t ignored Horn’s instructions and sneaked that gun into bed, then fired that shot. .

  Horn tried not to think about it but his mind kept returning to the night before like a dog returning to something buried not quite deep enough.

  Mandle had almost won. He’d almost killed Nina and almost made his escape. Only the crack of the gunshot in the early morning hours had made the difference.

  The hard fact was, Mandle had outsmarted them. Lying in his hospital bed, waiting for the courts to decide his fate, he’d be thinking about that and it would mean a lot to him. He had that satisfaction, and Horn didn’t like it.

  The sick bastard had surprised them.

  “You didn’t expect that,” Marla said the next afternoon at the Home Away.

  Bickerstaff and Paula were sitting with Horn. They were in their usual booth, drinking coffee. All three looked tired after their long night at the precinct house and only getting a few hours of restless sleep that morning. A plate containing only a pat of margarine and dusting of toasted corn muffin crumbs was in front of Horn. He’d drunk half his coffee before switching to ice water with a twist of lemon, still trying to chase the taste of last night.

  “No,” Horn said, “we didn’t expect him to go in through the door. We anticipated him lowering himself from the roof toward Nina’s window. That’s when we were going to drop the net on him.”

  “The net,” Paula said, lowering her coffee cup, “was one hell of an idea.”

  Horn had first gone to the FDNY for a net, but they didn’t have anything large or heavy enough. Instead, he got several cargo nets from a shipping company on the docks, and had them bound together to form one long, rolled net that could be dropped from the roof as soon as the Night Spider began his descent. Fortunately, the net had been large enough to reach well below Nina’s window.

  “When we removed Mandle’s jacket,” Paula said to Marla, “he was wearing what looked like a doorman’s uniform. Gold braid, epaulets, and all. Even had a pretty good representation of a doorman’s cap wadded in a pocket. Guy was a hell of a seamstress.”

  “That politically correct?” Bickerstaff asked.

  Paula frosted him with a look.

  “Mandle figured we’d expect him to drop from the roof,” Horn said, “so he got into the building sometime during the day and hid there. After he’d killed Nina, he was going to make sure there was a big hullabaloo in the building, then simply walk out. There are three regular doormen. The one on duty was replaced with an undercover cop. If he’d seen Mandle he’d have thought he was one of the regular doormen. If a regular doorman had noticed him, he’d have assumed he was an undercover cop.”

  “He only had to fool them for a minute or so,” Bickerstaff said, “then he’d have been outside, and it woulda been gone no forwarding.”

  “Think it would have worked?” Marla asked, switching the heavy glass coffeepot to her other hand.

  “He’d have made it work,” Horn said.

  “You see Nina Count’s network TV interview this morning?” Paula asked. “She had her skirt hiked way up so the bandage on her leg was visible.”

  “I doubt anyone was looking at the bandage,” Bickerstaff said. He added cream to his coffee and stirred. “What a dumb fuck Mandle turned out to be. Why didn’t he just lay off Nina and keep killing his victims at random?”

  “Ask Marla,” Horn suggested.

  Bickerstaff stared up at her expectantly.

  Instead of explaining, Marla said, “Ever do any mountain climbing, Bickerstaff?”

  “Never had the urge. Never wanted to fall a long way and get hurt or killed.”

  “You ever jaywalk?”

  “Jesus, Marla! I’m a cop!”

  “Uh-huh. Anybody want more coffee?”

  Paula came all the way awake immediately and sat up, the way it happens sometimes when you’ve slept well and late in a strange bed.

  It hadn’t taken long, she thought. Just till the night after Mandle was arrested. Technically, that might not mean the case was closed. After all, Mandle hadn’t even been arraigned yet. Still, it had been close enough. Obviously.

  Paula was in Harry Linnert’s bedroom, in Linnert’s bed. He was already up and dressed and standing at the foot of the bed with an oversized cup of hot chocolate in each hand. Paula usually drank coffee in the morning, but she could switch to chocolate. She knew a lot of her habits might change, being in love with Harry.

  “This kind of service gonna continue?” she asked, accepting one of the steaming cups.

  “Probably not,” he said. “Enjoy it while you can.”

  “You’re a depressingly honest man, Harry Linnert.”

  “Uh-huh. And look where it’s got me.”

  She glanced at the clock on the nightstand. “Jesus! Ten o’clock. I never sleep this late.” She climbed out of bed, careful not to spill hot chocolate. “You’re spoiling me. Ruining me.”

  “You mind?”

  “Not terribly.”

  Naked-she never slept naked-she pecked him on the cheek and padded barefoot into the living room. He’d opened the drapes. She hoped no neighbor with a telescope had been lucky enough to choose their window.

  The TV was tuned to Fox News. One of the anchormen, along with the terribly concerned anchorwoman Linda Vester and a former New York judge who’d beome something of a celebrity, were avidly discussing the Night Spider case.

  A conviction was almost a foregone conclusion, the judge barked knowledgeably. The anchorman appeared absolutely giddy as he described the tape of Mandle’s capture showing on a split screen. Gorgeous Linda Vester pursed her lips and looked unbearably pained and sympathetic toward everyone everywhere who might be suffering any sort of trouble beyond a hangnail.

  Paula became aware of Linnert standing near her, off to the side, paying no attention whatsoever to what was happening on television.

  She became suddenly ill at ease in her nakedness. She took a sip of hot chocolate. “I usually don’t sleep past eight o’clock. It’s uncoplike.”

  “You don’t have to be at work till this afternoon,” Linnert reminded her, “which makes it okay that you’re out of uniform.”

  “That’s true.”

  “So what do you want to do with the rest of the morning?”

  She placed her cup on the glass-topped coffee table and smiled as she moved toward him. “Go back to bed.” She wrapped her arms around him. Finding herself kind of hoping a neighbor with a telescope was out there.

  “This how you celebrate when a killer gets arrested?” Linnert asked, when she’d pulled away from their long kiss.r />
  “Yeah. And there’s almost always a killer getting arrested somewhere.”

  Part Two

  36

  New York, 2004

  Aaron Mandle had been found guilty on four counts of murder and one of breaking and entering. It took the jury less than two hours to reach a verdict.

  When the verdict was read, he didn’t blink.

  The authorities decided to wait until late at night, when the city would be quiet and the streets what passed in New York for deserted, before transporting Mandle back to Rikers Island where he’d be imprisoned while awaiting sentencing.

  The Department of Corrections prisoner transport van, locks reinforced, steel mesh over the windows, rode roughly over pavement seams and potholes and stayed on side streets as much as possible. In front sat two uniformed, armed officers. In back, safely separated from them, sat Aaron Mandle and a hulking black wife-killer named Hugo Ward. Ward and Mandle sat facing each other on side benches, handcuffed and wearing leg manacles.

  The huge, muscular Ward was bouncing around awkwardly on the hard bench, having difficulty keeping his balance. Now and then he’d glance over at Mandle, who rode smoothly and easily with the motion. Mandle looked calmly back at him.

  Guy likes pussy so much he had to kill it, Ward thought. Fucked up in the head. Ward had done a stretch behind walls and figured a sex maniac sicko like Mandle would wind up somebody’s wife. See how he’d like pussy when he became it.

  “The fuck’s your problem?” Ward asked. The Night Spider guy, staring at him with those creepy dark eyes, was getting to him.

  Now the guy was bending over like he was tying his shoe, only there were no laces on these shoes.

  Ward thought he might chip a tooth, the way the goddamn armored van or whatever it was kept bouncing around. Night Spider guy kept working with his shoe. Ward was getting curious. And angrier. He might go over there and kick the shit outta the Night Spider guy, handcuffs, leg chains, and all. Maybe become a goddamn hero. “Fuck’s your problem? You hear me?”

  Mandle was having a little problem working off the shoe without cutting his foot on the long steel screw he’d worked from the underside of the courtroom table where he sat during the course of his trial. It had taken him two days to loosen the screw, and another three days to work it back and forth and twist it and twist it until it was out and belonged to him. He’d sneaked it back to his holding cell, then sharpened its point and gradually honed its threads on hard concrete.

  At the time the verdict was read, the screw was tightly concealed beneath his right toe, where it joined his foot. He’d changed clothes for his trip back to Rikers, leaving behind his suit and dress shoes, and again wearing his convict’s jumpsuit and prison shoes. Prison shoes in which the long steel screw was more easily concealed.

  “I ast you a question!” Ward said. “You fuckin’ deaf?” Now the guy was taking off his shoe, peeling off his sock and putting it inside, and stuffing shoe and sock inside his jumpsuit. Ward was getting bummed out.

  Weird-looking damn foot! Enough of this shit! Get the fucker!

  Ward had risen from the bench and was halfway across the van when he realized the Night Spider guy had gotten up a second before he had and was coming at him. Punched him in the stomach. No power. No fuckin’problem!

  No, not a punch!

  Ward had been knifed before and knew he was cut. He looked down and saw a glint of silver clutched in the guy’s right hand. The silver flashed and Ward’s jumpsuit material parted, revealing soft dark flesh and scarlet blood. The pointed silver thing drew back, popped flesh again, and Ward felt himself being sliced open from pubis to sternum. It had all happened so fast he was stunned and hadn’t had time to react. Now the Night Spider guy was. .

  Oh, Jesus, he’s reaching inside me!

  Ward went into shock and couldn’t make a sound, so Mandle screamed. He jumped to the front of the passenger end of the van and hammered on the wire-enforced rear window that provided a view from the cab.

  The penal cop in the passenger seat, middle-aged man with a handlebar mustache, twisted around to see what was happening and could make out only Mandle’s distorted face. The thick glass divider muffled enough sound that he couldn’t make out what Mandle was screaming.

  Mandle saw the driver’s eyes flit to the rearview mirror every few seconds. Mustache twisted around farther and worked the sliding panel so he could hear what Mandle was saying.

  “Bleeding to death!” Mandle screamed. “He got a razor blade and cut himself! He’s gonna fucking die if you don’t do something!” As he screamed he moved aside so Mustache would see the carnage in the rear of the van, Ward gutted like a hog, gray intestines spilling out, and all the blood in the world.

  Mustache screamed himself. “Oh, Christ! Stop the van! Pull over! Stop the fucking van!”

  “Help this poor bastard!” Mandle shouted. “Please help him!”

  “You shut the fuck up!” Mustache yelled, as the van swerved and lurched to a stop. Mandle had a chance to check through the windshield as the van’s doors opened and the two cops piled out. A fraction of a second was all he needed. Dark street, no traffic, brick walk-ups, and small, closed businesses. Careful not to slip in the blood, he shuffled to the rear of the van.

  When the doors flew open he was ready.

  He held on to the grip bar and swiveled his body to lift both legs and kick the one who’d been driving, catching him under the chin with his bare foot. Kicked again even as the man’s head was snapping back and felt his big toe find the Adam’s apple. Saw at the same time the ring of keys on the man’s black leather belt.

  Mustache had his 9mm out of its holster and was raising it when Mandle swung himself out of the van. The guard got off a wild shot just before Mandle landed almost up against him and head-butted him. Mandle bent low and slit Mustache’s throat with the sharp screw. Picked up the dropped 9mm with his right foot, transferred it to his hand, and shot the driver. The driver didn’t want to die quite yet, so Mandle hopped over and pummeled his head and face with the handgun. Yanked his gun from its holster to match the one he had.

  It took him seconds to get the driver’s keys, maybe another thirty seconds to find the one that unlocked the cuffs and leg manacles.

  Mandle stole a glance around. No sign of anyone behind him. The van’s headlights illuminated the street ahead. No one. A car passed at the cross street, barely slowing down to obey a stop sign. The van’s lights would have blinded the driver even if he had bothered to look all the way up the street.

  Mandle worked the dead van driver’s wallet from his hip pocket and flipped it open. Bills. Maybe fifty dollars’ worth. He didn’t bother with Mustache’s wallet; he had to get out of there.

  He sprinted halfway down the block and felt a pain in his right side. Maybe Mustache had aimed well after all, but the wound didn’t feel serious. He cut into a dark passageway. He felt good now despite the throbbing pain beneath his ribs. Exhilarated. His approach startled something behind a trash bag. A dark cat flashed out and streaked through the night to disappear down the alleyway.

  The Night Spider grinned. You and me, baby! You and me! On the run. The small and the crawl.

  There were hours of darkness left. More than he needed. Resourcefulness was his training and his life, his survival. He knew he could find clothes somewhere somehow, ditch the Rikers jumpsuit, and fade into the city the way the cat had blended with the night. He had supreme confidence in himself and his destiny. Soon he’d have his wound tended and healing. He’d have food, shelter, cover. A new identity.

  Revenge.

  37

  They were back at the Home Away.

  After Mandle’s escape was discovered at 3:16 A.M., Rollie Larkin had phoned Horn, who’d already left in a charter boat for a rich fishing area twenty miles out in the Gulf. Bickerstaff, who hadn’t been able to sleep, had caught the news on his TV in Minnesota-watching Nina Count in the anchor job she’d landed at CNN in Atlanta-and phoned Paula,
who was working a double shift. He left a disbelieving and agitated message on her machine. Harry Linnert, lying alone in Paula’s bed listening to it, decided it would do no good to bother her with it till morning.

  But Paula learned of the escape when she was paged just after dawn and phoned into the precinct on her cell phone. After cutting the connection, she’d gone into a hotel rest room and been sick.

  Afterward, she’d called Horn at the Florida resort and was told he was fishing, and that Bickerstaff had also called Horn. She called Bickerstaff and got his answering machine, because he’d gone out to paddle his canoe in the lake to work off stress. She called her machine and listened to Bickerstaff’s message. Then Linnert got on the phone and unsuccessfully tried to make her feel better.

  When she hung up, she thought if Aaron Mandle could know all this he’d be delighted.

  When Horn got back to shore at two o’clock the next afternoon after not catching a marlin, he returned Larkin’s call.

  Three hours later, in the air over the Carolinas, he called Paula and Bickerstaff. He told Bickerstaff he should stay retired. Bickerstaff told Horn what he could do with the entire notion of retirement while Mandle was again at large. Horn didn’t mind. He found out when Bickerstaff and Paula could make it, then set up the meeting at the Home Away.

  Paula didn’t know how the others felt, but she couldn’t shake the eerie feeling they’d been moved like chess pieces back into the past to relive it, as if destiny wanted to change what had happened last time around. Destiny was always fucking with people.

  “There’s still no word on Mandle’s whereabouts,” Horn was saying, seated in the same booth toward the back of the diner. “He disappeared like smoke after killing the other prisoner and the two guards.”

  “Disappeared with their guns,” Bickerstaff pointed out. He’d lost some weight and grown a scraggly beard. He looked healthier. But right now, not happier.

  “Looks like what he used on the prisoner and one of the guards was a wood screw about four inches long,” Horn said, “honed so the point and threads were sharpened. There was flesh from the prisoner and the dead guard lodged between the screw’s threads.”