Part 15 (1/2)
”What about him?”
”You have anyone to stay with him tonight?”
”My guys are pulling double duty as it is. I can't be asking-”
”I'll stay with him tonight,” Maggie said, surprising herself with the offer almost as much as she surprised the two men.
CHAPTER 46.
Agents did it all the time-looked out for one another, covered one another's backs. Oftentimes that extended to one another's families. But Detective Julia Racine was with the District Police Department, not the FBI. And although she and Maggie had worked a couple of cases together, they were far from friends, tolerating each other as colleagues. Detective Racine had climbed the career ladder by breaking rules that stood in her way. She could be reckless at times, ruthless at others. But last year in a park rest room in Cleveland, Ohio, Julia Racine had stopped Maggie's mother from slitting her own wrists. Maggie didn't like owing favors. She owed Julia Racine. It seemed appropriate that she pay her back by protecting her father from a killer. Besides, Maggie sort of liked the old guy. He was nothing like his daughter.
She brought a tray out to him where he continued to sit and stare despite the fact that the landscape he seemed so interested in was disappearing into the night shadows. He had refused to go back into the house until the skull was removed and the smell of boiled human flesh could no longer be detected. Maggie had left the stove's ventilation fan on High and opened all the windows that weren't painted shut. She honestly couldn't smell it anymore, but Luc said he could.
”I made us sandwiches,” she told him as she set the tray on the bench between them. Other than milk and juice, the cold cuts, mayonnaise and bread were all there had been in the refrigerator.
”I'm not hungry,” he said with barely a glance at the food. Then he went back to what looked like a vigil, sitting straight-backed as if on alert and listening for something out of the ordinary. Instead there were only crickets chirping and nocturnal birds calling out to one another. Sc.r.a.pple sat on Luc's lap, previously content but now interested in the tray of food, wiggling enough to get his owner's attention. Luc reached over and pulled off the edge of some ham for the dog, instructing him, ”Chew it. Don't just swallow.” But the dog gulped and waited for more.
”So I wasn't imagining things. He was in my house,” he said without looking at Maggie.
”Yes.”
It seemed a relief to him. Had he honestly believed he had imagined it? He even took a bite of the sandwich for himself and then pulled off another piece for Sc.r.a.pple.
”But why? Why's he picking on me?”
”You and Calvin Vargus intruded on his private hiding place. He might simply be doing the same to you.”
”Do you think he wants to hurt me? You know, like those others?”
Maggie looked for signs of fear, but now he seemed more interested in eating.
”He might just want to scare you,” she told him, but she wasn't convinced. She wasn't convinced the killer wasn't still hiding in the shadows, watching despite Sheriff Watermeier's men having checked the premises.
”I think I saw him,” Luc said matter-of-factly, but it made Maggie sit up.
”Where? When?”
”Yesterday. Maybe the day before. Just his reflection in a store window as I pa.s.sed. I kept hearing footsteps...you know, following me, slowing when I slowed. Stopping when I stopped.”
Maggie tried to contain her excitement, letting him tell at his own pace, but she was impatient. He had already put the half-eaten sandwich back down and was staring into the dark again.
”What did the reflection look like?” she asked.
Luc was quiet and she thought he might be trying to remember, to conjure up the image. After a while, she asked again, ”Luc, what did the reflection look like?”
He turned to her, his eyes darting back and forth before meeting hers when he said, ”I'm sorry, who did you say you were?”
CHAPTER 47.
Tully couldn't be sure what her reaction would be, but he knew Dr. Patterson might be easier on him than O'Dell would be. Or at least that was his excuse for calling her, asking if he could run something by her. He could have told her about it over the phone or shown her by forwarding it to her e-mail, yet when she suggested that he stop by her brownstone again, he didn't hesitate.
She opened the door to greet him with bare feet, but still wearing her skirt and silk blouse, her usual business attire, only without the jacket and with the blouse untucked, as if she had just gotten home.
”Come on in.” She left him and headed back to the kitchen where a pot was on the stove, emitting wonderful aromas of garlic and tomato. ”Have you eaten? Because I haven't and I'm starved for the first time in days.”
”Smells great,” he said, not wanting to admit that he had filled up on pizza with Emma and Aleesha.
”It's nothing fancy. Just some spaghetti and marinara sauce.”
Tully checked her expression, wondering if perhaps this was some gesture, some reminder. Last year in Boston he had taken her to a small Italian restaurant, where she had shown him how to twirl his spaghetti correctly onto his fork in what he remembered to be an almost erotic experience. Or at least it had been for him.
While he looked for signs that she might also be remembering that evening, Gwen Patterson gave the sauce a quick stir, then starting slathering b.u.t.ter on a loaf of what looked like fresh bread. She wasn't even paying attention to him. No, he must be wrong about her wanting to remind him of Boston. What an idiot he was. She had said she wanted to forget about it. She meant it. Why was he still thinking about it?
”Can I help?” he asked, taking off his jacket and putting the briefcase with his laptop computer on the kitchen counter.
”There're some romaine hearts in the colander.” She pointed to the sink. ”Would you mind pulling them apart for our salad?”
”Sure, I can do that,” he said, rolling up his s.h.i.+rtsleeves. Pulling apart hearts for a salad? Sure, he could do that, feeling relieved to recognize romaine hearts as lettuce. Why didn't he pay more attention to these kinds of things and what they were called-romaine hearts and Pica.s.so...Pablo Pica.s.so? Maybe it was time that he did. If he could figure out who Britney was, what raves were and that the ingredients of wet included PCP and embalming fluid-which by the way, he had told Emma if he discovered her doing any drugs she would be grounded until she was thirty-five-then certainly he could figure out what made up the world of Gwen Patterson. Although Emma had already informed him that Britney was so like yesterday.
”Nice job, Agent Tully.” She came up beside him with bottles of vinegar and oil. ”I have the bread in the oven and the sauce on simmer.”
She sprinkled the lettuce with the oil and vinegar, gently tossing it, then topping it with some freshly grated parmesan and black pepper. It smelled wonderful, and Tully felt proud for having had a bit part in its creation. How did she make this all look so effortless? Lately it seemed an effort for him to put his takeout on regular plates rather than eat it right out of its plastic containers.
”Let's put this in the fridge,” she told him. ”And while we wait for the spaghetti, you can show me what you've got.”
Tully took out the laptop computer, opened it and turned it on.
”If the killer and this Sonny is one and the same person, then I'm almost certain he's the one who has Joan. He says some weird stuff in a couple of his e-mails to her.”
He kept an eye on her, wondering if it was such a good idea to talk about her patient and what this killer may have in mind for her. She looked pale, maybe just tired.
”You sure you want to talk about this?” he asked.
”Of course. It's a case. I offered to help. And it might help us find Joan.” She pointed to the wine rack at the end of the counter. ”Would you mind opening a bottle?”
He checked for a red wine, pulled one out and showed her the label for approval, but she was handing him the corkscrew and reaching for winegla.s.ses. What kind seemed of little consequence.
”Let's go back a step. Maggie said he's been taking parts from his victims,” she said, looking as if she was trying very hard to be her normal professional self, though the color hadn't yet returned to her face. ”But why? This doesn't seem like the regular sort of trophies that serial killers take.”
”Yes,” he said, ”this is different.”
”Is he on a mission to rid the world of those with deformities or imperfections?”