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Authors: Eileen Dreyer

Head Games (19 page)

BOOK: Head Games
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“You must understand why we—” Even that sounded suspicious and patronizing at once.
Molly squeezed her eyes shut against the blinding rage she couldn't seem to control anymore. “Give me the goddamn secretary,” she ground out.
“Ms. Burke—” he objected.
“You asshole,” she all but whispered, so terrible was her need to destroy something, “I'm giving you your wish. Check the records. Impound every goddamn check I've written in my fifty-two years on this earth. And then get the fuck out of my life.”
He handed over the phone. Sheila took Molly's permission and then bid her good-bye in hushed tones, leaving Molly just standing there, the phone to her ear, the dial tone buzzing like a faulty circuit, her whole body shaking.
“If you really need to break something,” Sasha said quietly behind her, “may I suggest that blanket warmer? It's nice and big, and it isn't working anyway.”
Molly couldn't even face her friend. There were tears of rage in her eyes, and her hands still shook. She couldn't even seem to put the phone down, no matter how crazy that damn buzzing was making her.
“I'm all right,” she managed through clenched teeth.
“Uh-huh. While you're waiting for your temper to catch up with the rest of that all right, you want me to give your little friend from the morgue
his chart so he doesn't come over and ask in person? I don't want to be the one to explain to Dr. Harrison why we sent her transport tech back to her inside out.”
Molly nodded. Sasha gathered the chart up and departed, somehow keeping other humans out of the little cubicle until Molly managed to get the phone safely back into its cradle and her temper under marginal control.
“Now,” Sasha said, her self-preservational sense of distance perfect. “Who can we have castrated for you?”
Molly's laugh was a surprised bark of frustration. But she didn't answer her friend just yet. She put in a call to Rhett.
Who didn't answer, just like Sergeant Davidson said he wouldn't.
And Molly had thought finding Donna Kirkland on her lawn had felt bad. She couldn't stop shaking.
“I have a bad feeling,” she said, eyeing the phone as if it were at fault.
This time Sasha laughed. “
Now?
” she demanded. “You just have a bad feeling
now
? Where have you been the last week or so?”
Molly turned on her, her own brain awash in white noise. “I don't suppose you know any good psychiatrists.”
Even Sasha was sometimes surprised. “Does this mean I can't count on you for the rest of the shift?”
“It means that if I'm going to make it through this without racking up my own body count, I need to get some help. I'm feeling awfully out of control all of a sudden, and this thing's just beginning to heat up.”
Sasha tossed a small wave at the phone. “What was that all about that it sent you into hyperspace?”
Molly sucked in a very deep breath. God, she wanted some vodka. She was suddenly so scared. “Davidson has taken over the investigation,” she said. “And I have the feeling that he doesn't want me in the loop anymore.”
“Because?”
“Because somebody thinks I might be involved?”
“Ridiculous.”
Molly just shrugged.
“What are you going to do?” Sasha asked drily.
Molly faced the wall, the blank, worn wall with old tape marks where outdated lifesaving posters had once resided. She fought to control the hot
rush of outrage and desperation that still threatened to swamp her. She tried like hell to convince herself that confronting the problem was better than having it force her back into darker and darker alleys. She promised herself, standing in the shadowless lights of the ED, that she wouldn't let the shadows bother her.
“I think,” she said anyway, “that I have to start doing what I should have from the beginning.”
Was Sasha smiling? “Yeah?”
“Take control of my part of the investigation.” She closed her eyes, hating this. Hating what had happened on that phone worse. “I have to go back over the same ground I just slogged with Rhett.”
“Uh-huh.”
“I have to make that goddamn list, and include every goddamn man I know.”
“Uh-huh.”
Molly's sudden scowl was so ferocious that one of the techs scuttled all the way to the other side of the hall. “And then I have to learn how to use those goddamn computers so I can check on everybody I know who might have been treated or worked in any of the hospitals in this system.”
Sasha actually smiled. “I may weep with joy.”
Molly laughed. “I really can do that with just my ID number, right?”
“You would have known that if you'd been to the class … well, you would have known about getting medical records. I know about getting work records.”
Molly's eyes popped open to see Sasha grinning like a Cheshire cat.
“You're going to help?”
She shrugged. “Nothing like a little larceny to brighten a boring day.”
“This isn't like you, Sash.”
“I know. I amaze myself.”
The bubble of panic began to deflate a little. Molly nodded.
“Thanks, Sash,” she said with a weary grin. “I needed that.”
“Yes,” Sasha agreed. “You did. Between Christmas and all this hooplah, you've been no damn fun at all. By the way, the next class is at nine A.M. tomorrow.”
Molly sighed. “Can't be worse than talking to Davidson.”
“That's the spirit.”
Molly shook her head, exhausted before she ever sat down at a keyboard. She wished she could have said she was happy. She was at least calmer. She was, for better or worse, girding for battle.
She felt better right up until the moment she arrived home four hours later to find a policeman perched on her front porch looking for Patrick.
 
 
Kenny held his breath. It was so quiet in the room. So dark and silent and warm. He shouldn't be here yet. It wasn't time. He needed to get to know her better before he began his ritual. This time when he took her brain, it had to be already his.
Just like she was now. Tucked into bed, safe in the shadows, her breath breaking like waves on the beach. Kenny opened the door just enough so the light from the hall spilled across the floor, but it didn't reach her feet. He tiptoed in, just to hear her. Just to smell the sleep on her. Just to imagine what it would feel like when her life ebbed away beneath his hands. God, he was ready to come just thinking about it.
This time, he thought with such anxiety he had to put his hand over his mouth to keep silent. This time would be perfect. This time, now that he had her in his place, he would own her and keep her in the dark where all his dreams lived.
His feet quieter than her breath, he stepped up to the bed where she lay, silent under the weight of the sedatives. He saw that she wasn't perfectly covered. Her foot had escaped, pale white flesh at the edge of the light like a fish on the beach. Calling to him. Wanting him to touch it. To claim it.
Kenny whimpered with desire. His head pounded with urgency. His hand reached out, almost by itself, to find her foot. Her ankle, where it peeked from the cover. And there, in the silent hours of the night when he could do anything, he touched her.
He claimed her.
He felt her skin beneath his, warm, warm skin. Smooth skin, soft skin. He grew bold with his touch and moved to her head.
Her head.
Oh, her head.
He reached out, his fingers as white as her skin in the night, and he touched
her hair, her dark, thick hair that felt like cotton wool. Her hair that was warm from the scalp beneath it, that shone as if her dreams had painted it.
Her head.
Oh, Kenny could hardly hold still. He wanted her now. He wanted her head in his hands where it belonged. Where she would belong to him.
But he knew it wasn't time, no matter what he wanted. Kenny moaned, trying to hold in his laughter, and she stirred.
Sighed.
Kenny froze. She wasn't supposed to see him yet. Not his face. It would ruin it. He had to be no more than a whisper in her dreams.
As she settled back to sleep, not even knowing he'd been there, Kenny crept out of the room and thought about exactly what would happen next. Especially now that Miss Burke would know
.
“I'm just making inquiries, ma'am,” the officer assured her as he stood there on her porch at one in the morning.
Short, thin, and blond, his posture stiff enough for the Marines, he bore his pressed and polished uniform like sacred vestments. He wore the earnest eyes of the young.
Molly's insides clutched up as she imagined the worst.
“Is there something wrong?” she asked.
It was cold outside, and he held his hat in his hand. “Well, uh, if I could talk to the boy …”
Molly looked around, as if expecting to see Patrick materialize. “He's, uh … at work. Or Sam's. My neighbor. He goes there after work.”
Opening the door, she let the officer in while she called Sam. Who was playing chess with Patrick, just as Molly had hoped.
“Now,” she said, as Patrick came clattering in the front door at a dead run a few minutes later. “What's the problem?”
“You've been at your neighbor's all evening?” Officer Matthews asked Patrick.
Patrick, chapped by the cold and rubbing his hands, nodded. “Got off work early. Why?”
The poor cop actually looked relieved. “We've had reports of someone peeking in windows in the neighborhood. It was mentioned that you were new to the area. Just checking.”
Somebody standing in the shadows. Molly shivered.
Patrick didn't seem to notice. He just kept bouncing and rubbing. “Can I go back now? I'm about to checkmate Mr. Spiegel.”
Officer Matthews nodded, then paused. “You, uh, know somebody named … um, Little Allen?”
Patrick did a credible double-take. Molly just nodded. “He's a delivery boy from Straub's, why?”
“Another name mentioned. What can you tell me about him?”
“He's weird,” Patrick offered.
“He's in the neighborhood a lot because he delivers to Sam, and Sam makes his shopping list in five-item increments,” Molly amended.
“He knows the area, though?”
“Sam's not his only customer.”
Matthews nodded, jotting in his notebook. “If you don't mind, I'd like to go over and talk to the neighbor. Just to check.”
“Uh, before you go,” Molly said, wishing with all her heart that her friend Dee had been on tonight instead. “I've been receiving some … uh, unpleasant gifts. Rhett Butler down in homicide knows about them. Just in case this is related, would you mind letting Rhett know?”
“Gifts, ma'am?”
Screw Davidson. Let him play catch-up this time.
“Detective Butler will fill you in.”
Officer Matthews just nodded, jotted, and buttoned his notebook away in his shirt pocket. Then, with no more than regulation pleasantries, he headed back out the door.
Patrick was about to follow, when Molly made a mistake.
“Patrick …”
It must have been in the tone of her voice. A question. A request for reassurance. Patrick, having the sonar every teen possesses for distrust, picked up on it and spun around.
“I've been with Sam,” he snapped. “You can ask him.”
Molly sighed, heartily wishing for that brief camaraderie they'd shared over pancakes. Wishing she had the time or energy to explain right now how much her life had changed, just since the report had come back on those body parts. “Let's talk later, okay?”
She saw his eyes shutter. Saw him slacken with rebellious indifference. “Sure. Whatever.”
And then Molly was left alone in the hallway with the cold ghost of his resentment and the mounting acid of her own unease.
 
 
“So,” Molly greeted Winnie the next afternoon as she stalked into the mask-decorated office. “Can you talk to me, or do I have to reach you through Davidson, too?”
What she wanted to say was,
Do you know a good psychiatrist? Hell, a half-decent psychiatrist? A psychologist with experience in PTSD and teenagers? A voodoo priestess with a good line in protection against psychopaths?
No, Molly thought. After the morning she'd spent at the hospital education department, what she needed was an exorcist who could ward off computers. But that wasn't going to happen either.
Poised behind her desk like a queen considering a recalcitrant subject, Winnie lifted an eyebrow. “You seem to have made the point moot, haven't you?”
Molly slid her rump into one of the hardback chairs and sighed. “I'm sorry. Did you know that there's a new gunslinger in town and he's doing more than a victimology on me?”
“Of course. The major puts a lot of faith in Davidson's investigational skills.”
“Let's hope they're better than his interpersonal communication skills. He might have let me know what's going on.”
“And have Donna Kirkland find out that this investigation hasn't been thorough and unbiased? She would spread that information like an evangelist.”
So she wasn't just concerned. She was trapped like a rat in a cupboard. Definitely time for Molly to take her initiative back.
“I've also been talking to Billy Armistead,” Winnie continued, “and we've decided that for the present you shouldn't be put into a position to worry about facing the media.”
Molly straightened. “Which means I'm on suspension.”
“Which means you will work out of this office on the problem at hand.” Winnie's eyebrow was up again. “The effects of having that teenager in your house are beginning to show, aren't they?”
Molly didn't bother to be pleasant. “You mean I'm short-tempered and
surly? Yeah, I guess I am. But don't blame it on Patrick. Blame it on my shy suitor. Better yet, blame it on the fact I'm beginning to feel like a big beach ball at a Dead concert all of a sudden.”
“I told you—”
Molly's smile was as grim as Winnie's had ever been. “Yeah. Everybody told me, Winnie. Well, I'm here to tell you that if you want my cooperation, you'll have to cooperate back. All of you. Bureaucratic games aren't going to help us on this one.”
“You seem to have changed your mind” was all Winnie said. “It wasn't that long ago I couldn't even get a list out of you.”
“If you think this is easy, I invite you to change houses for a while. I'll even throw in all the support I've received from everybody else as an added bonus.”
A simple tantrum shouldn't have caused fresh shakes. It did, though. Molly stood, needing to get finished and then get away.
“Everyone is doing their job.”
“Everyone's forgetting that I'm the one getting the body parts. I'm the one who has all the answers to the big questions.”
I'm the one who needs the answers most and wants them least.
“Trust me. I want this over faster than anybody, and I'll do everything I can to help that. But I can't do it blindfolded and isolated. So either Rhett starts answering his phone, or from now on, I stop answering mine.”
She'd almost made it to the door when Winnie pulled her up sharp.
“Clear your cases with this office,” she said. “Then get to work on whatever it is you plan to do.”
Molly turned on her. “You mean what I plan to do once I know what the police are doing?”
“Don't sulk. After that tirade you just subjected me to, I assume you have some kind of plan.”
After a second, Molly nodded, surrendered. “I have a plan.”
“Good. As long as you understand that anything you learn is immediately shared with the homicide team. Including Sergeant Davidson.”
Molly nodded with less grace than Patrick agreeing to clean his room.
Winnie gave her gold Cross pen a couple of brisk clicks and consulted the neatly arranged folders on her desk. “Now, do you have any cases you want to hand over to Kevin?”
Molly took a second to change gears. “I'm pretty much behind the scenes on everything I have. I can keep up on those.”
“Even the Wilsons?”
Ah, the Wilsons. Mrs. Wilson had gotten the local chapter of the NAACP involved in the cry for justice for her murdered daughter, and Molly's name was still the most frequently invoked.
“I've already made my news there,” Molly said. “I promise to stay out of sight. Besides, Wilmetta Wilson is going to have something else to think about pretty soon. The lab called today. They have viable DNA from that skin we got from under her daughter's fingernails, and it isn't the girl's.”
Winnie's smile was sudden and terrible. “They getting a warrant for blood from the boyfriend?”
“That's what I hear.”
“Good. Very good. I want to see the report when it comes in. Anything else?”
Molly almost asked it.
Help me here, Winnie. I'm tap dancing ahead of the flood, and I don't think I can swim.
Instead she tossed off a weak grin. “You want a teenage boy?”
“Good God, no. I already have one.”
“Then timely advice would be appreciated.”
“Too late. My advice would have been never to let him in your front door.”
“That's what Frank says.”
“Patterson? The lawyer? I can imagine. If anybody would understand the machinations of a teenage boy, he'd be the one. Now, is there anything else you need to know from this office?”
Alphabetically or chronologically? “Do you have any more info on my body parts?”
Winnie betrayed her frustration. “Nothing. Whoever he is, this guy is using dime-store acrylic paint and glitter, dime-store letters, and easy-to-obtain chemicals. There aren't any saw marks on the bones, which might mean he's trained in anatomy.”
“Or he's already had a lot of practice.”
Winnie did not appear pleased. “Something I'm sure you'll consider as you make up your list.”
“I have made up my list.”
“Who do
you
think it is?”
Molly gaped at her boss like a landed fish. “Who do I think it is? Shit, Winnie,
I
don't know.”
“You just said you've been making up a list. Surely you have some kind of idea. What about a profile?”
“It's too soon for a profile. You know that.”
“No I don't. I don't waste my time with that nonsense. You're the one who sits at the feet of those Behavioral Science guys and laps all that mumbo jumbo up like chocolate mousse. So, what good is it if you don't even have an idea where we should look?”
Belatedly Molly realized that Winnie was serious. This wasn't one of Winnie's intellectual challenges. She was upset. Sincerely distressed. And she wasn't even getting the anat-o-grams.
Molly couldn't so much as move. This was what she got for sounding so damn sure of herself.
“A spider.” Just the word sent ripples of unease through her. Still, she held Winnie's gaze and took that big leap. “A trap-door spider who sits tucked away in his hole and only comes out to hunt.”
“Explain.”
Molly wrapped her fingers together, as if anchoring herself. “We have body parts from women we don't even know are missing. Carefully culled and presented. That's a Dahmer kind of thing. Bundy just tossed his women away like so much trash. Dahmer and Gacy hid their victims away like secrets.
“We have meticulous planning and excellent camouflage. The whole business is personal and private, and I think it's carried out within a specific comfort zone. This isn't the kind of guy who moves around. He's not the kind of guy who's into slash and trash. The kind of guy who likes to be in our faces and grandstands for the crowd. I think this guy only came out because he needed to get some message to me.”
“What message?”
Molly's temper flared. She battled the red haze for a second before managing an answer.
“I don't know.”
I don't want to know.
“Let the cops figure out why,” she told her boss. “I don't care.”
Liar
.
Winnie considered her a moment in silence and then pulled over a pad of paper. Without looking back at Molly, she began jotting her own notes, and Molly realized that for all her vaunted knowledge, the Medical Examiner had really needed Molly's information. But then, Winnie's brilliance lay in tangibles. Repeatable scientific truths measured in millimeters and liters and parts per million. The core of what they needed to stop this monster lay well beyond a measurable boundary of any kind. It lay in the mind and the heart and the soul, and Winnie was singularly unqualified to interpret any of those.
BOOK: Head Games
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