by J. D. Robb
Brian sucked air through his nose. “Were you diddling with them, on the side, like?”
“No. He’d be older than we are, that’s how they’re profiling him. At least a decade older if not more. He’s very skilled. He travels. He must have enough of the ready to afford a place, a private place, to do this work. If he’s a professional, he takes this busman’s holiday every year or two. There’s no sex involved. No rape. He takes, binds, tortures, kills, cleanses. And he times how long each lasts under it.”
“I haven’t heard of anyone like this. Nasty business.” Brian pulled on his ear. “I can make some inquiries, tap a few shoulders.”
“I’d be grateful if you would.”
“I’ll be in touch if and when,” Brian told him. “Meanwhile, give Lieutenant Darling a sweet kiss from me, and tell her I’m only waiting for her to throw your worthless ass aside and come into my waiting embrace.”
“I’ll be sure to do that.”
After he’d ended the transmission, Roarke took the discs he’d generated and, with the machines still humming, left the office.
He found Eve where he’d expected to. Her head was on her desk, pillowed on her forearm. He noted the murder boards, the pair of them, the discs, the handwritten notes, the comp-generated ones.
The half cup of coffee, not quite cold—and the cat curled in her sleep chair.
He moved to Eve, lifted her out of the chair. She muttered some complaint, stirred, and shifted.
“What?”
“Bed,” he said as he carried her toward the elevator.
“Time is it? Jeez.” She rubbed at her eyes. “I must’ve conked.”
“Not for long, your coffee was still warm. We need to shut down, both of us.”
“Briefing at eight.” Her voice slurred with fatigue. “Need to be up by six. Need to organize first. I didn’t—”
“Fine, fine.” He stepped out of the elevator into the bedroom. “Go back to sleep, six will come soon enough.”
“You get anything?”
“Still running.” He set her on the bed, seeing no reason she couldn’t sleep in her sweats. Apparently neither did she as she crawled under the duvet as she was.
“Is there any data I can use? Anything I can work in?”
“We’ll see in the morning.” He stripped off his shirt, his pants, slid into bed with her.
“If there’s any—”
“Quiet.” He drew her against him, brushed her lips with his. “Sleep.”
He heard her sigh once—it might’ve been annoyance. But by the time the sigh was done, she was under.
7
IT WAS SO UNUSUAL FOR HIM NOT TO BE UP before her that Eve just stared into the Celtic blue eyes when he woke her by stroking her hair.
“You think of something?”
“Apparently, I inevitably think of something when I’m in bed with my wife.”
“Being a man—and you—you probably think of sex when you’re crossing the street.”
“And aren’t you lucky that’s true?” He kissed the tip of her nose. “But thinking’s as far as we’ll get this morning. You wanted to be up at six.”
“Oh, yeah. Shit. Okay.” She rolled onto her back and willed her body clock to accept morning. “Can’t you invent something that pours coffee into the system just by the power of mind?”
“I’ll get right on that.”
She climbed out of bed, stumbled her way over to the AutoChef. “I’m going to go down, swim a few laps. I think that’ll wake me up and work out the kinks.”
“Good idea. I’ll do the same. Give me some of that.”
She thought, crankily, he could easily get his own damn coffee, but she passed the mug to him, along with a scowl. “No water polo.”
“If that’s a euphemism for pool sex, you’re safe. All I want’s a swim.” He passed her back the coffee.
They rode down together, she bleary-eyed, him thoughtful.
The pool house was lush with plants, sparkling with blue water. Tropical blooms scented the warm, moist air. She would have liked to indulge herself with a strong twenty-minute swim, followed by more coffee and a soak in the bubbling curve of the hot tub.
And hell, since he was there, maybe just one quick match of water polo.
But it wasn’t the time for indulgence. She dove in, surfaced, then pushed off in a full-out freestyle. The dullness in her brain and body began to fade with the effort, the cool water, the simple repetition.
After ten minutes, she felt loose again, reasonably alert. She might have thought wistfully about lounging for just a couple of minutes in the hot, jetting water of the hot tub, but acknowledged the comfort of it might put her back to sleep.
Instead, she pulled on a robe. “Do you want to go downtown with me, or work from here?”
He considered as he scooped back his dripping hair. “I think I’ll stick with the unregistered, at least for the time being. If I manage to finish or find anything, I’ll contact you or just come down on my own.”
“Works.” She crossed to the elevator with him. “Any progress?”
“Considerable, but as of four a.m., nothing really useful.”
“Is that when we finished up?”
“A bit later, actually. And darling Eve, you haven’t had enough rest.” He touched her cheek. “You get so pale.”
“I’m okay.”
“And did you find anything useful?”
“I’m not sure yet.”
She told him about Summerset’s observation while they readied for the day.
“So you think it’s possible he was in one of the medical centers, in some capacity, during the Urbans.”
“It’s a thought. I did some research,” she added as she strapped on her weapon harness. “Not a whole lot of detail about it, that I’ve found so far anyway. But there were other facilities that used that same basic method. A handful here in New York.”
“Where he started this.”
“I’m thinking,” she agreed with a nod. “Something here in particular that matters. He starts here, he comes back here. There’s a wide, wide world out there and he’s used some of it. But now he repeats location.”
“Not just location. You and Feeney. Morris, Whitney, Mira. There are others as well.”
“Yeah, and I’m mulling on that. More usually if a repeat killer has a thing about cops, he likes to thumb his nose at us. Send us messages, leave cryptic clues so he can feel superior. We’re not getting that. But I’m mulling it.”
She took one last, life-affirming glug of coffee. “I’ve got to get started, or I won’t have myself lined up for the briefing.”
“Oh, I’m to tell you Brian’s waiting for you with open arms when you’re done with me.”
“Huh? Brian? Irish Brian?”
“That would be the one. I contacted him, asked him to look for torturers. He has connections,” Roarke continued. “And knows how to ferret out information.”
“Huh.” It struck her she’d married a man with a lot of unusual associates. Came in handy now and then. “Okay. I’ll see you later.”
He moved to her, ran a hand over her hair again. “Take care of my cop.”
“That’s the plan.” She met his lips with hers, stepped back. “I’ll be in touch.”
In briefing the team, Eve had everyone give their own orals on progress or lack of same. She listened to theories, arguments for or against, ideas for approaching different angles, or for pursuing old ones from a new perspective.
“If the Urbans are an angle,” Baxter put in, “and we look at it like this fucker was a medical, or he got his torture training back then, we could be looking for a guy pushing eighty, or better. That gives him a half-century or more on his vics. How’s a guy starting to creak pull this off?”
“Horny Dog’s missing the fact that a lot of guys past middle age keep up.” Jenkinson pointed a finger at Baxter. “Eighty’s the new sixty.”
“Sick Bastard has a point,” Baxter acknowledged. “And
as a borderline creaker himself, he’s got some insight on it. But I’m saying it takes some muscle and agility to bag a thirty-year-old woman—especially since he goes for the physically tuned ones—off the street.”
“He could’ve been a kid during the Urbans.” As if in apology for speaking out, Trueheart cleared his throat. “Not that eighty’s old, but—”
“You shave yet, Baby Face?” Jenkinson asked.
“While it’s sad and true that Officer Baby Face doesn’t have as much hair on his chin as Sick Bastard does in his ears, there were a lot of kids kicked around, orphaned, beat to shit during the Urbans. Or so I hear,” Baxter added with a wide grin for Jenkinson. “Before my time.”
She accepted the bullshit and insults cops tossed around with other cops. She let it go for another few minutes. And when she deemed all current data had been relayed, all ideas explored and the stress relieved, she handed out the day’s assignments and dismissed.
“Peabody, locate York’s ex. We need to have a word. I’m taking Mira into my office for a few minutes. Doctor?”
“So many avenues,” Mira commented as they started out.
“One of them will lead us to him.” Eventually, Eve thought.
“His consistency is both his advantage and disadvantage. It’ll be a step on the avenue that leads you to him. His inflexibility is going to undermine him at some point.”
“Inflexibility.”
“His refusal to deviate,” Mira confirmed. “Or his inability to deviate from a set pattern allows you to know a great deal about him. So you can anticipate.”
“I anticipated he’d have taken number two. That isn’t helping Gia Rossi.”
Mira shook her head. “That’s not relevant. You couldn’t have helped Rossi as she was already taken before you knew, or could know, he was back in business.”
“That’s what it is?” Eve led the way to her office, gestured toward the visitor’s chair while she sat on the corner of her desk. “Business.”
“His pattern is businesslike, a kind of perfected routine. Or ritual, as I said before. He’s very proud of his work, which is why he shares it. Displays it, but only when it’s completed.”
“When he’s finished with them, he wants to show them off, wants to claim them. That’s why he arranges them on a white sheet. That’s the ring he puts on them. I get that. During the Urbans—if we head down that avenue—bodies were laid out, piled up, stacked up, depending on the facilities. And covered. Sheet, drop cloth, plastic, whatever was available. Usually, their clothes, shoes, personal effects were taken. Mostly these were recycled to other people. It’s ‘waste not and want not’ in wartime. So he takes their clothes, their personal effects, but he reverses, leaving them uncovered.”
“Pride. I believe, to him, they’re beautiful. In death, they’re beautiful to him.” Mira shifted, crossed her legs. She’d pinned her hair up into a soft roll at the nape of her neck, and wore a pale, pale yellow suit that seemed to whisper a promise of spring. “His choice of victim type indicates, as I said in the briefing, some prior connection with a woman of this basic age and coloring. She symbolizes something to him. Mother, lover, sister, unattained love.”
“Unattained.”
“He couldn’t control this person, couldn’t make her see him as he wanted to be seen, not in her life or in her death. Now he does, again and again.”
“He doesn’t rape or molest them sexually. If it was a lover, wouldn’t he see her as sexual?”
“Love, not lover. Women are Madonnas or whores to him, so he fears and respects them.”
“Punishes and kills the whore,” Eve considered, “and creates the Madonna, who he cleanses and displays.”
“Yes. It’s their womanhood, not their sexuality, he’s obsessed with. He may be impotent. In fact, I believe we’ll find this to be the case when you catch him. But sex isn’t important to him. It doesn’t drive him or, again if impotent, he would mutilate the genitals or sexually abuse them with objects. This hasn’t been the case in any of the victims.
“It’s possible he gains sexual release or satisfaction from their pain,” Mira added. “But it’s secondary, we could say a by-product. It’s the pain that drives him, and the endurance of the subject, and the result. The death.”
Eve pushed up, wandered to the AutoChef, absently programmed coffee for both of them. “You said ‘businesslike,’ and I don’t disagree. But it seems like a kind of science to me. Regular and specific experiments. Artful science, I guess.”
“We don’t disagree.” Mira accepted the coffee. “He’s focused and he’s dedicated. Control—his own, and his ability to control others—is vital to him. His ability to step away, to step outside of the active work for long periods, indicates great control and willpower. I don’t believe, even with this, it’s possible for him to maintain personal or intimate relationships for any length of time. Most certainly not with women. Business relationships? I believe he could maintain those to some extent. He must have income. He invests in his victims.”
“The high-end products, the silver rings. The travel to select them from different locations. The cost of obtaining or maintaining the place where he works on them.”
“Yes, and given the nature of the products, he’s used to a certain level of lifestyle. Cleansing them is part of the ritual, yes, but he could do so with more ordinary means. More mainstream products.”
“Nothing but the best,” Eve agreed. “But it also leads me down the avenue that he may be a competitor of Roarke’s, or an employee in a top-level position.”
“Both would be logical.” Mira drank her coffee, quietly pleased Eve remembered how she preferred it. “He’s chosen to make this connection. Just as he chose to come back to New York to work at this time. But there was a connection for him to make, Eve.”
She set her cup aside now, and her gaze was sober when she looked at Eve. “There was you. These women are, in a sense, Roarke’s. You are his in every sense.”
Testing the idea, Eve frowned. “So he opts for this specific pattern because of me? I wasn’t primary on the initial investigation.”
“You were a female on the initial investigation, a brunette. Too young at that time to meet his requirements. You aren’t now.”
“You’re looking at me as a target?”
“I am. Yes, I am.”
“Huh.” Drinking coffee, Eve considered it more carefully. Mira’s theories weren’t to be casually dismissed. “Usually goes for long hair.”
“There have been exceptions.”
“Yeah, yeah, a couple of them. He’s been smart. This wouldn’t be smart.” Eve tipped the angle of it in her mind, shifted the pattern. “It’s a lot tougher to take down a cop than it is a civilian.”
“You would be a great prize, from his viewpoint. It would be a challenge, and a coup. And if he knows anything about you, which I promise you he does, he would be assured you would endure a long time.”
“Tough to stalk me. First, I’d click to it. Second, I don’t have regular routines, not like the others. They clocked in and out at fairly uniform times, had regular haunts. I don’t.”
“Which, again, would add to the challenge,” Mira argued, “and his ultimate satisfaction. You’re considering that he may have added Roarke as an element because he’s in competition with him. That may very well be true. But what he does isn’t payback, not on a conscious level. Everything he does is for a specific purpose. I believe, in this, you’re a specific purpose.”
“It’d be helpful.”
“Yes.” Mira sighed. “I imagined you’d see it that way.”
Eyes narrowed, Eve tipped the angle again, explored the fresh pattern. “If we go with this, and I could find a way to bait him in—to nudge him into making a move on me before he grabs another one—we could shut him down. Shut him down, take him out.”
“You won’t bait him.” Watching Eve, Mira picked up her coffee. “I can promise you he has his timetable already set. The only variable in it is
the length of time his victims last. He has the third selected. Unless he planned only three—which would be less than he’s ever taken before—the next won’t be you.”
“Then we have to find her first. Let’s keep your theory between us, just for now. I want to think about it.”
“I want you to think about it,” Mira said as she got to her feet. “As a member of this team, as a profiler, and as someone who cares a great deal about you, I want you to think about it very carefully.”
“I will.”
“This is a hard one for you, for Feeney. For me, the commander. We’ve been here before, and in a very real sense, we failed. Failing again—”
“Isn’t an option,” Eve finished. “Do me a favor. I know it’s a tough process, but take a look at the list Summerset generated. The female employees. Just see if any of them strike you as more his type. We can’t put eyes on all those women, but if there’s a way to whittle it down…”
“I’ll start on that right away.”
“I’ve got to get going.”
“Yes.” Mira passed her empty cup to Eve, brushed her fingers lightly over the back of Eve’s hand. “Don’t just think carefully. Be careful.”
Even as Mira left, Eve’s desk ’link beeped. Scanning the readout, she picked up. “Nadine.”
“Dallas. Any word on Rossi?”
“We’re looking. If you’re interrupting my day looking for an update—”
“Actually, I’m interrupting mine to give you one. One of my eager little researchers plucked out an interesting nugget. From Romania.”
Automatically Eve pulled up on her computer screen what she had on the Romanian investigation. “I should have the full case files from that investigation later today. What have you got?”
“Tessa Bolvak, a Romany—gypsy? Had her own show on screen. Psychic hour—or twenty minutes, to be accurate.”
“You’re interrupting both of our days with a psychic?”
“A renowned one in Romanian circles during the time in question. She was a regularly consulted sensitive, often consulting for the police.”
“Those wacky Romanians.”
“Other police authorities make use of sensitives,” Nadine reminded her. “You did, not that long ago.”