Cross

Chapter 46

" ALEX! HEY, YOU! How you been? Long time no see, big guy. You're looking good."

I waved to a petite, pretty woman named Malina Freeman and kept on running. Malina was a fixture in the neighborhood, kind of like me. She was around the same age as I was and owned the newspaper store where the two of us used to spend our allowances on candy and soda when we were kids. Rumor had it that she liked me. Hey, I liked Malina too, always had.

My flapping feet kept me headed north on Fifth Street like they knew the way, and the neighborhood scrolled by. Toward Seward Square, I hung a right and took the long way around. It didn't make logical sense to go that way, but I didn't do it for logical reasons.

The news about Maria's murderer was the one thing holding me back these days. Now I was avoiding the block where it had happened and, at the same time, working hard to remember Maria as I had known her, not as I had lost her. I was also spending time every day trying to track down her killer – now that I suspected he was still out there somewhere.

I turned right on Seventh, then headed toward the National Mall, pushing a little harder. When I got to my building at Indiana Avenue, I eked out just enough wind to take the four flights up, two steps at a time.

My new office was a converted studio apartment, one large room with a small bath and an alcove kitchen off to the side. Lots of natural light streamed in through a semicircle of windows in the turreted corner.

That's where I'd set up two comfortable chairs and a small couch for therapy sessions.

Just being here got me pretty excited. I'd put out my shingle, and I was ready to see my first patient.

Three stacks of case files were waiting on my desk, two from the Bureau and another sent over from DCPD. Most of the files represented possible consulting jobs. A few crimes to solve? An occasional dead body? I guess that was realistic.

The first file I looked at was a serial case in Georgia, someone the media had dubbed "the Midnight Caller." Three black men were dead already, with a successively shorter interval between each homicide. It was a decent case for me, except for the six hundred miles between DC and Atlanta.

I set the file aside.

The next case was closer to home. Two history professors at the University of Maryland, perhaps intimately involved, had been found dead in a classroom. The bodies had been hung from ceiling beams. Local police had a suspect but wanted to work up a profile before they went any further.

I put that file back on my desk with a yellow sticker attached.

Yellow, for maybe.

There was a knock on my door.

"It's open," I called out, and immediately became suspicious, paranoid, whatever it is that I am most of the time.

What had Nana said when I'd left the house earlier? Try not to get shot at.

Chapter 47

OLD HABITS DIE HARD. But it wasn't Kyle Craig, or some other psychotic nutcase from my past come to visit.

It was my first patient.

The visitor took up most of the doorway where she now paused, as if scared to come in. Her face was turned down at the mouth, and her hand gripped the jamb while she tried to catch her breath, while keeping some dignity.

"You putting in an elevator anytime soon?" she asked between gasps.

"Sorry about all the stairs," I said. "You must be Kim Stafford. I'm Alex Cross. Please, come in. There's coffee, or I can get you water."

The very first patient of my new practice finally lumbered into my office. She was a heavyset woman, in her late twenties, I guessed, though she could have passed for forty. She was dressed very formally, in a dark skirt and white blouse that looked old but well made. A blue-and-lavender silk scarf was carefully tied under her chin.

"You said on the machine that Robert Hatfield referred you?" I asked. "I used to work with Robert on the police force. Is he a friend of yours?"

"Not really."

Okay, not a friend of Hatfield's. I waited for her to say more, but nothing came. She just stood in the middle of the office, seeming to quietly appraise everything in the room.

"We can sit over here," I prompted. She waited for me to sit first, so I did.

Kim finally sat down herself, perched tentatively on the forward edge of the chair. One of her hands fluttered nervously around the knot in her scarf. The other was clenched into a fist.

"I just need some help trying to understand someone," she began. "Someone who gets angry sometimes."

"Is this someone close to you?"

She stiffened. "I'm not giving you his name."

"No," I said. "The name isn't important. But is this a family member?"

"Fiance."

I nodded. "How long have you two been engaged? Is that all right to ask?"

"Four years," she said. "He wants me to lose some weight before we get married."

Maybe it was force of habit, but I was already working up a profile on the fiance. Everything was her fault in the relationship; he took no responsibility for his own actions; her weight was his escape hatch.

"Kim, when you say he gets angry a lot – can you tell me a little more about that?"

"Well, it's just…" She stopped to think, although I'm sure it was embarrassment and not a lack of clarity that held her back. Then tears pearled at the corners of her eyes.

"Has he been physically violent with you?" I asked.

" No," she said, a little too quickly. "Not violent. It's just… Well, yes. I guess so."

With one shaky breath, she seemed to give up on words. Instead, she untied the scarf around her neck and let it float down into her lap.

I hated what I saw. The welts were easy enough to make out. They ran like blurred stripes around her throat.

I'd seen those kinds of striated markings before. Usually they were on dead bodies.

Chapter 48

I HAD TO REMIND MYSELF – the murders are behind you now; this is just a therapy session.

"Kim, how did you get those marks on your neck? Tell me whatever you can."

She winced as she tied the scarf back on. "If my cell phone rings, I have to answer it. He thinks I'm at my mother's house," she said.

A terrible look crossed her face, and I realized it was too early to ask her about specific incidences of abuse.

Still not looking at me, she unbuttoned the sleeve of her blouse. I wasn't sure what she was doing until I saw the angry red sore above the wrist on her forearm. It was just beginning to heal.

"Is that a burn mark?" I asked.

"He smokes cigars," she said.

I breathed in. She'd answered so matter-of-factly. "Have you called the police?"

She laughed bitterly. "No. I haven't."

Her hand went up to her mouth, and she looked away again. This man had obviously scared her into protecting him, no matter what.

A cell phone chirped inside her purse.

Without a word to me, she took out the phone, looked at the number, and answered.

"Hey, baby. What's up?" Her voice was soft and easygoing, and totally convincing. "No," she said. "Mom went out to get some milk. Of course I'm sure. I'll tell her you said hi."

It was fascinating to watch Kim's face as she spoke. She wasn't just acting for him. She was playing this part for herself. That's how she was getting by, wasn't it?

When she finally hung up, she looked at me with the most incongruous smile, as though no conversation had taken place at all. It lasted less than a few seconds. Then she broke up, all at once. A low moan turned into a sob that racked her body; she rocked forward, clutching herself around the middle.

"Th- this is too hard," she choked out. "I'm sorry. I can't do it. I can't… be here."

When the cell phone rang a second time, she jumped in her seat. These surveillance calls were the thing that made it hardest for her to be here – trying to juggle awareness and denial at the same time.

She wiped at her face as though her appearance mattered, then answered in the same soft voice as before.

"Hey, baby No, I was washing my hands. Sorry, baby. It took me a second to get to the phone."

I could hear him shouting about something as Kim nodded patiently and listened.

Eventually, she held up a finger to me and let herself out into the hall.

I used the time to go through a few of my provider directories and to calm down my own anger. When Kim came back in, I tried to give her the names of some shelters in the area, but she refused them.

"I've got to go," she said suddenly. The second call had sealed her up tight. "How much do I owe you?"

"Let's call this an initial consult. Pay me for the second appointment."

"I don't want charity. I don't think I can come back anyway. How much?"

I answered reluctantly. "It's one hundred an hour on a sliding scale. Fifty would be good."

She counted it out for me, mostly fives and singles that she had probably stashed away over time. Then she left the office. My first session had ended.

Chapter 49

MISTAKE. BAD ONE.

A New Jersey mob boss and former contract killer named Benny "Goodman" Fontana was whistling a bouncy Sinatra tune as he strolled around to the passenger side of his dark-blue Lincoln; then he opened the door with a flourish and a one-hundred-kilowatt smile that would have made Ol' Blue Eyes proud.

A bosomy blond woman got out of the sedan, stretching her long legs like she was auditioning for the Rockettes. She was a former Miss Universe contestant, twenty-six years old, with some of the best moving parts money could buy. She was also a little too classy and hot for the mobster to have snagged without some cash having changed hands. Benny was a tough little weasel, but he wasn't exactly a movie star, unless maybe you counted the guy who played Tony Soprano as one.

The Butcher watched, mildly amused, from his own car parked half a block down the street. He guessed that the blonde was setting Benny back five hundred or so an hour, maybe two grand for the night if Mrs. Fontana happened to be out of town visiting their daughter, who was tucked away in school at Marymount Manhattan.

Michael Sullivan checked his watch.

Seven fifty-two. This was payback for Venice. The beginning of payback anyway. The first of several messages he was planning to send.

At eight fifteen, he took his briefcase from the backseat, got out, and crossed the street, staying in the soft shadows of maple and elm trees. It didn't take much waiting time for a blue-haired woman wrapped in a fur coat to come out of the apartment building. Sullivan held the door for her with a friendly smile and then let himself inside.

Everything was more or less the way he remembered it. Apartment 4C had been in the Family for years, ever since opportunities had started opening up in Washington for the mob. The place was a perk for anyone in town who needed some extra privacy, for whatever reason. The Butcher had used it himself once or twice when he was doing jobs for Benny Fontana. This was before John Maggione took over from his father, though, and began to shut the Butcher out.

Even the cheap Korean dead bolt on the front door was the same, or close enough. Another mistake. Sullivan jimmied it with a three-dollar awl from his workshop at home. He put the tool back into the briefcase and took out his gun and a surgical blade, a very special one.

The living room was mostly dark. Cones of light spilled in from two directions – the kitchen on his left, a bedroom on his right. Benny's insistent grunting told Sullivan it was somewhere past halftime. He swiftly padded across the living room rug to the bedroom door and looked inside. Miss Universe was on top – no surprise – with her slender back to him.

"That's it, baby. That's what I like," Benny said, and then, "I'm gonna put my finger -"

Sullivan's silencer popped softly, and just once. He shot the former Miss Universe contestant in the back of her hairdo, and the woman's blood and brains splattered all over Benny Fontana's chest and face. The mobster yelled out like he'd been shot himself.

He managed to roll himself out from under the dead girl and then off the bed, away from the nightstand, also away from his own gun. The Butcher started to laugh. He didn't mean to disrespect the mob boss, or disrespect the dead, but Fontana had done just about everything wrong tonight. He was getting soft, which was why Sullivan had come after him first.

"Hi there, Benny. How you been?" the Butcher said as he flipped on the overhead light. "We need to talk about Venice."

He took out a scalpel that had a special edge for cutting muscle. "Actually, I need you to send a message to Mr. Maggione for me. Could you do that, Benny? Be a messenger boy? By the way, you ever hear of Syme's operation, Ben? It's a foot amputation."

Chapter 50

MICHAEL SULLIVAN COULDN'T go right home to his family in Maryland, not after what he'd just done to Benny Fontana and his girlfriend. He was too riled up inside, his blood boiling. He was hot-flashing scenes from his old man's shop in Brooklyn again – sawdust stored in a big cardboard barrel, the terra-cotta tile floor with white grout, handsaws, boning knives, meat hooks in the freezer room.

So he wandered around Georgetown for a while, looking for trouble if he could find the right kind. The thing of it was, he liked his ladies tucked in a little. He especially liked lawyers, MBAs, professor-librarian types – loved their glasses, the buttoned-down clothes, the conservative hairstyles. Always so in control of themselves.

He liked helping them lose some of that control, while blowing off a little steam of his own, relieving his stress, breaking all the rules of this dumbass society.

Georgetown was a good pickup place for him. Every other chippie he spotted on the street was a little too tightly wound. Not that there were so many to choose from, not at this time of night. But he didn't need that many choices, just one good one. And maybe he'd already spotted her. He thought so anyway.

She looked like she could be a trial attorney, dressed to impress in that smart tweed outfit of hers. The heels ticktocked a steady rhythm on the sidewalk – this way, that way, this way, that way.

In contrast, Sullivan's Nikes didn't make much noise at all. With a hooded sweatshirt, he was just another Bobo jogger out for a late-night run in the neighborhood. If someone peeked from their window, that's what they'd see.

But no one was looking, least of all Miss Tweedy. Tweedy Bird, he thought with a grin. Mistake. Hers.

She kept her stride city-fast, her leather purse and briefcase tucked like the key to the Da Vinci Code under one arm, and she stayed to the outside edge of the sidewalk – all smart moves for a woman alone on the street late at night. Her one mistake was not looking around enough, not taking in the surroundings. Not spotting the jogger who was walking behind her.

And mistakes could kill you, couldn't they?

Sullivan hung back in the shade as Tweedy passed under a streetlamp. Nice pipes and a great ass, he noted. No ring on the left hand.

The high heels kept their rhythm steady on the sidewalk for another half block; then she slowed in front of a redbrick townhouse. Nice place. Nineteenth-century. From the look of it, though, one of those buildings that had been butchered into condos on the inside.

She pulled a set of keys from her purse before she even got to the front door, and Sullivan began to time his approach. He reached into his own pocket and took out a slip of paper. A dry-cleaning ticket? It didn't really matter what it was.

As she put her key into the door, and before she pushed it open, he called out in a friendly voice. "Excuse me, miss? Excuse me? Did you drop this?"

Chapter 51

NO DUMMY, THAT TWEEDY BIRD – her mama didn't raise any foolish daughters. She knew she was in trouble immediately, but there was nothing much she could do about it in the next few seconds.

He hit the stoop fast, before she could close the glass door between them and let it lock her safely inside.

A faux gaslight on the foyer wall showed off the panic in her very pretty blue eyes.

It also illuminated the blade of the scalpel in his hand, extended out toward her face.

The Butcher wanted her to see the sharp edge so she'd be thinking about it, even more than about him. That's how it worked, and he knew it. Nearly 90 percent of people who were attacked remembered details about the weapon rather than the person wielding it.

An awkward stumble was about all Tweedy managed before he was inside the foyer door with her. Michael Sullivan positioned his back to the street, shielding her from view in case somebody happened to walk by outside. He kept the scalpel visible in one hand and snatched away her keys with the other.

" Not one word," he said, with the blade up near his lips. "And try to remember – I don't administer anesthesia with this. Don't even use topical Betadine. I just cut."

She stood on her tiptoes as she backed up against an ornately carved newel post. "Here." She thrust her small designer purse at him. "Please. It's yours. Go now."

"Not going to happen. I don't want your money. Now, listen to me. Are you listening?"

"Yes."

"You live alone?" he asked. It had the effect he wanted. Her pause gave him his answer.

"No." She tried to cover herself too late.

There were three mailboxes on the wall. Only number two had a single name: L. Brandt.

"Let's go upstairs, Miss Brandt."

"I'm not -"

"Yes, you are. No reason to lie. Now move it, before you lose it."

In less than twenty seconds, they were inside her second-floor condo. The living room, like L. Brandt herself, was neat and organized. Black-and-white photos of kissing scenes were up on the walls. Movie posters – Sleepless in Seattle, An Officer and a Gentleman. The girl was a romantic at heart. But in some ways, so was Sullivan – at least he thought so.

Her body went stiff as a two-by-four as he picked her up. She was a tiny thing; it took all of one arm to get her into the bedroom, then down on her bed, where she lay without moving.

"You're a very beautiful girl," he said. "Just lovely. Like an exquisite doll. Now, if you don't mind, I'd like to see the rest of the package."

He used the scalpel to cut the buttons off that pricey tweed suit of hers. L. Brandt came undone right along with her clothes; she went from paralyzed to limp, but at least he didn't have to remind her to keep quiet.

He used his hands on her bra and panties, which were black and lacy. On a weekday, too. She didn't wear pantyhose, and her legs were just great, slender and lightly tanned. Toenails painted bright red. When she tried to squeeze her eyes shut, he slapped her just enough to get her full attention.

"Stay with me, L. Brandt."

Something on her dresser caught his eye. Lipstick. "You know what, put some of that on. And a nice perfume. You pick something out." L. Brandt did as she was told. She knew she had no choice.

He held his cock in one hand, the scalpel in the other – a visual she would never, ever forget. Then he forced himself inside her. "I want you to play along," he said. "Fake it if you have to. I'm sure you've done that before." She did her best, arching her pelvis, moaning once or twice, just not looking at him.

"Now, look at me," he commanded. "Look at me. Look at me. Look at me. That's better." Then it was over for him. For both of them.

"A quick chat before I go," he said. "And, believe it or not, I am planning to leave. I'm not going to hurt you. No more than I already have."

He found her purse on the floor. Inside was what he was looking for – a driver's license and a black address book. He held the license under the bedside lamp.

"So it's Lisa. Very nice picture for government-issue. Of course, you're even prettier in real life. Now let me show you a few pictures of my own."

He hadn't brought many, just four of them, but some of his personal favorites. He fanned them out in the palm of one hand. Lisa was back to frozen again. It was almost funny, like if she was still enough, he might not notice her there.

He held up the photos for her to see – one at a time. "These are all people I've met twice. You and I, of course, have only met once. Whether or not we meet again is entirely up to you. Do you follow? Am I making myself clear?"

"Yes."

He stood up and walked around to her side of the bed, gave her a few seconds to process what he was saying. She covered herself with a sheet. "Do you understand me, Lisa? Truly? I know it can be a little hard to concentrate right now. I imagine it would be."

"I won't say – anything," she whispered. "I promise."

"Good, I believe you," he said. "Just in case, though, I'm going to take this, too."

He held up the address book. Flipped it open to B. "Here we go. Tom and Lois Brandt. Is that Mom and Dad? Vero Beach, Florida. Supposed to be very nice down there. The Treasure Coast."

"Oh, God, please," she said.

"Entirely up to you, Lisa," he said. "Of course, if you ask me, it would be a shame after all this for you to end up like those others in the photographs. You know – in parts, sewn up. Whatever I was in the mood to do."

He lifted up the sheet and looked her over one more time. "They'd be pretty parts in your case, but parts all the same."

And with those last words, he left Lisa Brandt alone with her memories of him.

Chapter 52

" THIS IS WHY I DON'T WEAR TIES."

John Sampson pulled at the constricting knot around his neck and ripped the damn thing off. He tossed it and what remained of his coffee into the trash. Immediately he wished he hadn't thrown away the coffee. He and Billie had been up half the night with little Djakata and her flu. A truckload of caffeine was exactly what he needed right now.

When the phone on his desk rang, he was in no mood to talk to anybody about anything. "Yeah, what?"

A woman's voice came on the other end. "Is this Detective Sampson's line?"

"Sampson here. What?"

"This is Detective Angela Susan Anton. I'm with the Sex Assault Unit, assigned to the Second District."

"Okay." He waited for her to connect some dots for him.

"I was hoping to pull you in on a disturbing case, Detective. We're running into some serious dead ends over here."

Sampson fished in the wastebasket for the coffee container. All right! It had landed right-side up.

"What's the case?"

"A rape. Happened in Georgetown last night. The woman was treated at GUH, but all she'll say is that she was attacked. She won't ID the guy. Won't describe him at all. I was with her all morning and got nowhere. I've never seen anything quite like it, Detective. The level of fear the woman is exhibiting."

Sampson crooked the phone to his ear and scribbled some notes on a tablet that said "Dad Pad" at the top, a Father's Day knickknack from Billie. "Okay so far. But I'm curious why you're calling me, Detective."

He sipped the bad coffee again, and suddenly it seemed not so bad.

Anton took a beat before answering. "I understand that Alex Cross is a friend of yours."

Sampson set down his pen and leaned back in his desk chair. "Now I see."

"I was hoping you could -"

"I hear you loud and clear, Detective Anton. You want me to pimp the deal for you?"

"No," she said quickly. "Rakeem Powell tells me you two are seriously good when you work serials together. I'd like to have you both in on this. Hey, I'm just being honest."

Sampson stayed quiet, waiting to see if she'd get out of this one or hang herself some more.

"We left messages for Dr. Cross last night and this morning, but I have to imagine everyone and their uncle want a piece of his time. Now that he's freelancing."

"Well, you're right about that, everybody wants a piece of him," he said. "But Alex is a big boy He can take care of himself and make his own decisions. Why don't you keep trying his phone?"

"Detective Sampson, this perp is a particularly sick bastard. I don't have the luxury of wasting anyone's time on this case, including my own. So if I've stepped on your toes in any way, maybe you can get the hell over it, cut through the bullshit, and tell me if you'll help me or not."

Sampson recognized the tone, and it made him smile. "Well, since you put it that way – yeah, okay. I can't make any commitments for Alex. But I'll see what I can do."

"Great. Thank you. I'll send over the files now. Unless you want to pick them up here."

"Hold on. Files? Plural?"

"Am I going too fast for you, Detective Sampson? The whole reason I'm calling is your and Dr. Cross's experience with serial cases."

Sampson rubbed the telephone receiver against his temple. "Yeah, I guess you are going too fast for me. Are we talking homicide here, too?"

"Not serial murder," Anton said tightly. "Serial rape."

Chapter 53

"THIS ISN'T A CONSULT," I told Sampson. "It's a favor. To you, personally, John."

Sampson raised his eyebrows knowingly. "In other words, you promised Nana and the kids no more fieldwork."

I waved him off. "No, I didn't promise anybody anything. Just drive and try not to hit anyone on the way. At least no one that we like."

We were in McLean, Virginia, to interview Lisa Brandt, who had left her Georgetown apartment to go stay with a friend in the country. I had her case file on my lap, along with three others, women who had been raped but wouldn't say anything to help the investigation and possibly stop the rapist. The serial rapist.

This was my first chance to look the papers over, but it hadn't taken me long to agree with the originating detective's conclusion. These attacks were all committed by one man, and the perp was definitely a psycho. The known survivors were of a type: white women in their twenties or early thirties, single, living alone in the Georgetown area. Each of them was a successful professional of some kind – a lawyer, an account executive. Lisa Brandt was an architect. These were all smart, ambitious women.

And not one of them was willing to say a word against or about the man who had attacked her.

Our perp was clearly a discerning and self-controlled animal who knew how to put the fear of God into his victims and then make it stick. And not just once, but four times. Or maybe more than four. Because chances were very good he had other victims, women too afraid to even report they had been attacked.

"Here we are," Sampson said. "This is where Lisa Brandt is hiding herself."

Chapter 54

I LOOKED UP from the heap of detective files on my lap as we pulled in through a giant hedgerow onto a long crescent-shaped driveway paved with broken seashells. The house was a stately Greek revival, with two-story white columns in front, and looked like a suburban fortress. I could see why Lisa Brandt might come here for refuge and safety.

Her friend Nancy Goodes answered the door and then stepped outside the house to speak with us in private. She was a slight blonde and looked to be about Ms. Brandt's age, which the file put at twenty-nine.

"I don't have to tell you that Lisa has been through hell," she said in a whisper that really wasn't necessary out here on the porch. "Can you please keep this interview as brief as possible? I wish you could just leave. I don't understand why she has to talk to more police. Can either of you explain that to me?"

Lisa's friend clutched her elbows across her chest, obviously uncomfortable but also pushing herself to be a good advocate. Sampson and I respected that, but there were other considerations.

"We'll be as brief as we possibly can," he said. "But this rapist is still out there."

"Don't you dare lay a guilt trip on her. Don't you dare."

We followed Ms. Goodes inside through a marble-tiled foyer. A sweeping staircase to our right echoed the curve of the chandelier dangling overhead. When I heard the chatter of children's voices off to the left, they seemed somewhat incongruous with the formality of the house. I began to wonder where these people kept their messes.

Ms. Goodes sighed, then showed us into a side parlor where Lisa Brandt sat alone. She was tiny but pretty, even now, under these unfortunate circumstances. I had the sense that she was dressed for normality, in jeans and a striped oxford shirt, but it was her bent-over posture – and her eyes – that told more of the story. She obviously didn't know if the pain she was feeling now would ever go away.

Sampson and I introduced ourselves and were invited to sit down. Lisa even forced a polite smile before looking away again.

"Those are beautiful," I said, pointing at a vase of fresh-cut rhododendron on the coffee table between us. It was easy enough to say because it was true, and I honestly didn't know where else to start.

"Oh." She looked at them absently. "Nancy is amazing with all that. She's a real country girl now, a mom. She always wanted to be a mother."

Sampson began gently. "Lisa, I want you to know how sorry we are that this happened to you. I know you've spoken with a lot of people already. We'll try not to repeat the background detail too much. Okay so far?"

Lisa kept her eyes fixed on the corner of the room. "Yes. Thank you."

"Now, we understand you received the necessary prophylaxis but preferred not to provide any physical evidence in your exam at the hospital. Also, that you're choosing for the time being not to give any description of the man who committed the crime against you. Is that correct?"

"Not now, and not ever," she said. Her head shook slightly back and forth, like a tiny no repeated over and over.

"You're not under any obligation to talk," I assured her. "And we're not here to get any information that you don't want to give."

"With all that in mind," Sampson went on, "we have some assumptions that we're working with. First, that your attacker was not someone you knew. And second, that he threatened you in some way, to keep you from identifying him or talking about him. Lisa, are you comfortable telling us whether or not that's accurate?"

She went very still. I tried to gauge her face and body language but saw nothing. She didn't respond to Sampson's question, so I tried a different angle.

"Is there anything you've thought about since you spoke with the detectives earlier? Anything you'd like to add?"

"Even a small detail might aid in the investigation," Sampson said, "and catch this rapist."

"I don't want any investigation of what happened to me," she blurted. "Isn't that my choice?"

"I'm afraid it's not," Sampson said in the softest voice I'd ever heard out of him.

"Why not?" It came out of Lisa more as a desperate plea than a question.

I tried to choose my words carefully. "We're fairly certain that what happened to you wasn't an isolated incident, Lisa. There have been other women -"

At that, she came undone. A choking sob escaped her, letting loose everything behind it. Then Lisa Brandt doubled over onto her lap, sobbing with her hands clutched tightly over her mouth.

"I'm sorry," she said in a moan. "I can't do this. I can't. I'm sorry, I'm sorry."

Ms. Goodes rushed back into the room then. She must have been listening just outside the door. She knelt in front of Lisa and put her arms around her friend, whispering reassurances.

"I'm sorry," Lisa Brandt got out again.

"Nothing to be sorry for, sweetheart. Nothing at all. Just let it out, that's it," said Nancy Goodes.

Sampson put a card on the coffee table. "We'll show ourselves out," he said.

Ms. Goodes answered without turning away from her sobbing friend.

"Just go. Please don't come back here. Leave Lisa alone. Go."

Chapter 55

THE BUTCHER WAS ON A JOB – a hit, a six-figure one. Among other things, he was trying to keep his mind off of John Maggione and the pain he wanted to cause him. He was observing an older well-dressed man with a young girl draped on his arm. A "bird," as they had called them here in London at one time.

He was probably sixty; she could be twenty-five at most. Curious couple. Eye-catching, which could be a problem for him.

The Butcher watched them as they stood in front of the tony Claridges Hotel waiting for the man's private car to pull up. It did so, just as it had the previous evening and then again around ten o'clock that morning.

No serious mistakes so far by the couple. Nothing for him to pounce on.

The driver of the private car was a bodyguard, and he was carrying. He was also decent enough at what he did.

There was only one problem for the bodyguard – the girl obviously didn't want him around. She'd tried, unsuccessfully, to have the older man ditch the driver the night before, when they had attended some kind of formal affair at the Saatchi Gallery.

Well, he would just have to see what developed today. The Butcher pulled out a few cars behind the gleaming black Mercedes CL65. The Merc was fast, more than six hundred horsepower, but a hell of a lot of good that would do them on the crowded streets of London.

He was a little paranoid about working again, and with pretty good reason, but he'd gotten the job through a solid contact in the Boston area. He trusted the guy, at least as far as he could throw him. And he needed the six-figure payday.

A possible break finally came on Long Acre near the Covent Garden underground station. The girl jumped out of the car at a stoplight, started to walk off – and the older man got out as well.

Michael Sullivan pulled over to the curb immediately, and he simply abandoned his car. The rental could never be traced back to him anyway. The move was a classic in that most people wouldn't even think of doing it, but he couldn't have cared less about just leaving the car in the middle of London. The car was of no consequence.

He figured the driver-bodyguard wouldn't do the same with the two-hundred-thousand-dollar Mercedes, and that he had several minutes before the guy caught up with them again.

The streets around the Covent Garden Piazza were densely packed with pedestrians, and he could see the couple, their heads bobbing, laughing, probably about their "escape" from the bodyguard. He followed them down James Street. They continued to laugh and talk, with not a care in the world.

Big, big mistake.

He could see a glass-roof-covered market up ahead. And a crowd gathered around street performers dressed as white marble statues that only moved when someone threw them a coin.

Then, suddenly, he was on top of the couple, and it felt right, so he fired the silenced Beretta – two heart shots.

The girl went down like a throw rug had been pulled out from under her two feet.

He had no idea who she was, who had wanted her dead or why, and he didn't care one way or the other.

"Heart attack! Someone had a heart attack!" he called out as he let the gun drop from his fingertips, turned, and disappeared into the thickening crowd. He headed up Neal Street past a couple of pubs with Victorian exteriors and found his abandoned car right where he left it. What a nice surprise.

It was safer to stay in London overnight, but then he was on a morning flight back to Washington.

Easy money – like always, or at least how it had been for him before the cock-up in Venice, which he still had to deal with in a major way.

Chapter 56

JOHN AND I MET that night for a little light sparring at the Roxy Gym after my last therapy session. The practice was building steadily, and my days there made me happy and satisfied for the first time in a few years.

The quaint idea of normality was in my head a lot now, though I'm not sure what the word really meant.

"Get your elbows in," Sampson said, "before I knock your damn head off."

I pulled them in. It didn't help much, though.

The big man caught me with a good right jab that stung like only a solid punch can. I swung and connected solidly with his open side, which seemed to hurt my hand more than it hurt him.

It went on like that for a while, but my mind never really got into the ring. After less than twenty minutes, I held up my gloves, feeling an ache in both shoulders.

"TKO," I said through my mouthpiece. "Let's go get a drink."

Our "drink" turned out to be bottles of red Gatorade on the sidewalk in front of the Roxy. Not what I'd had in mind, but it was just fine.

"So," Sampson said, "either I'm getting a whole lot better in there or you were out of it tonight. Which is it?"

"You aren't getting better," I deadpanned.

"Still thinking about yesterday? What? Talk to me."

We both had felt lousy about the tough interview with Lisa Brandt. It's one thing to push a witness like that and get somewhere; it's another to probe hard and get nothing out of it.

I nodded. "Yesterday, yeah."

Sampson slid down the wall to sit next to me on the sidewalk. "Alex, you've got to get off the worry train."

"Nice bumper sticker," I told him.

"I thought things were going pretty good for you," he said. "Lately anyway."

"They are," I said. "The work is good, even better than I thought it would be."

"So what's the problem then? Too much of a good thing? What ails you, man?"

In my mind, there was the long answer and the short answer. I went for the short answer. "Maria."

He knew what I meant, knew why too. "Yesterday reminded you of her?"

"Yeah. In a weird way, it did," I said. "I was thinking. You remember back around the time when she was killed? There was a serial rape going on then, too. Remember that?"

Sampson squinted into the air. "Right, now that you mention it."

I rubbed my sore knuckles together. "Anyway, that's what I mean. It's all like two degrees of separation these days. Everything I think about reminds me of Maria. Everything I do brings me back to her murder case. I kind of feel like I'm living in purgatory, and I don't know what I'm supposed to do with that."

Sampson waited for me to finish. He usually knows when his point has been made and when to shut up. He had nothing more to say at the moment. Finally, I took a deep breath, and we rose and started up the sidewalk.

"What do you hear about Maria's killer? Anything new?" I asked him. "Or was Giametti just playing with us?"

"Alex, why don't you move on?"

"John, if I could move on, I would. Okay? Maybe this is how I do it."

He stared at his shoes for half a block. When he finally answered, it was begrudgingly. "If I find out something about her killer, you'll be the first to know."

Chapter 57

MICHAEL SULLIVAN HAD STOPPED taking shit from anybody when he was fourteen or fifteen years old. Everybody in his family knew that his grandpa James had a gun and that he kept it in the bottom drawer of the dresser in his bedroom. One afternoon in June, the week that school got out for him, Sullivan broke in and stole the gun from his grandfather's apartment.

For the rest of the day, he moseyed around the neighborhood with the pistola stuck in his pants, concealed under a loose shirt. He didn't feel the need to show off the weapon to anybody, but he found that he liked having it, liked it a lot. The handgun changed everything for him. He went from a tough kid to an invincible one.

Sullivan hung out until around eight; then he made his way along Quentin Road to his father's shop. He got there when he knew that the old man would be closing up.

A song he hated, Elton John's "Crocodile Rock," was on somebody's car radio down the block, and he was tempted to shoot whoever was playing that shit.

The butcher shop's front door was open, and when he waltzed in, his father didn't even look up – but he must have seen his son pass the window outside.

The usual stack of Irish Echo newspapers was by the door. Everything always in its goddamn place. Neat, tidy, and completely messed-up.

"Whattaya want?" his father growled. The broom he was using had a scraper blade to dislodge fat from the grout on the floor. It was the kind of scut work Sullivan hated.

"Have a talk with you?" he said to his father.

"Fuck off. I'm busy earning a living."

"Oh. Is that right? Busy cleaning floors?" Then his arm swung out fast.

And that was the first time Sullivan hit his father – with the gun – in the temple over his right eye. He hit him again, in the nose, and the large man went down into the sawdust and meat shavings. He began to moan and spit out sawdust and gristle.

" You know how badly I can hurt you?" Michael Sullivan bent low to the floor and asked his father. "Remember that line, Kevin? I do. Never forget it as long as I live."

"Don't call me Kevin, you punk."

He hit his father again with the gun handle. Then he kicked him in the testicles, and his father groaned in pain.

Sullivan looked around the store with total contempt. Kicked over a stand of McNamara's soda bread, just to kick something. Then he put the gun to his old man's head and cocked it.

"Please," his father gasped, and his eyes went wide with shock and fear and some kind of bizarre realization about who his son was. "No. Don't do this. Don't, Michael."

Sullivan pulled the trigger – and there was a loud snap of metal against metal.

But no deafening explosion. No brain-splattering gunshot. Then there was powerful silence, like in a church.

"Someday," he told his father. "Not today, but when you least expect it. One day when you don't want to die, I'm going to kill you. You're gonna have a hard death, too, Kevin. And not with a pop gun like this one."

Then he walked out of the butcher shop, and he became the Butcher of Sligo. Three days before Christmas of his eighteenth year, he came back and killed his father. As he'd promised, not with a gun. He used one of the old man's boning knives, and he took several Polaroid shots as a keepsake.

Chapter 58

OUT IN MARYLAND, where he lived nowadays, Michael Sullivan shouldered a baseball bat. Not just any bat, either, a vintage Louisville Slugger, a 1986 Yankees game bat, to be exact. Screw collector's items, though, this solid piece of ash was meant to be used.

"All right," Sullivan called out to the pitcher's mound. "Let's see what you can do, big man. I'm shaking in my boots here. Let's see what you got."

It was hard to believe that Mike Junior was old enough to have a windup this fluid and good, but he did. And his changeup was a small masterpiece. Sullivan only recognized it coming because he'd taught the pitch to the boy himself.

Still, he wasn't handing his eldest son any charity. That would be an insult to the boy. He gave the pitch the extra fraction of a second it needed, then swung hard and connected with a satisfying crack of the bat. He pretended the ball was the head of John Maggione.

"And she's out of here!" he crowed. He ran the bases for show while Seamus, his youngest, scrambled over the ballpark's chain-link fence to retrieve the home-run ball. "Good one, Dad!" he screamed, holding up the scuffed ball where it had landed.

"Dad, we should go." His middle son, Jimmy, already had his catcher's mitt and face mask off. "We've got to leave the house by six thirty. Remember, Dad?"

After Sullivan himself, Jimmy was the most excited about tonight. Sullivan had gotten them tickets to see U2's Vertigo tour at the 1st Mariner Arena in Baltimore. It was going to be a fine night, the kind of family activity he could tolerate.

On the ride to the concert, Sullivan sang along with the car stereo until his boys started to groan and make jokes in the backseat.

"You see, boys," Caitlin said, "your father thinks he's another Bono. But he sounds more like… Ringo Starr?"

"Your mother's just jealous," Sullivan said, laughing. "You kids and I have rich Irish blood running in our veins. She's got nothing but Sicilian."

"Oh, right. One question: Which would you rather eat – Italian or Irish? Case closed."

The boys howled and high-fived one for their mom.

"Hey, what's this, Mom?" Seamus asked.

Caitlin looked; then she pulled a small silver flip phone from under the front seat. Sullivan saw it, and his stomach heaved.

It was Benny Fontana's cell phone. Sullivan had taken it with him the night he'd visited Benny and had been looking for it ever since. Talk about mistakes.

And mistakes will kill you.

He kept his face in perfect control. "I'll bet that's Steve Bowen's phone," he lied.

"Who?" Caitlin asked.

"Steve Bowen. My client? I gave him a ride to the airport when he was in town."

Caitlin looked puzzled. "Why hasn't he tried to get it back?"

Because he doesn't exist.

"Probably because he's in London." Sullivan kept improvising. "Just stick it in the glove compartment."

Now that he had the cell phone, though, he knew what he wanted to do with it. In fact, he couldn't wait. He drove the family as close to the arena as he could get, then pulled over to the curb.

"Here you go – door-to-door service. Can't beat it. I'll park this buggy and meet you inside."

It didn't take him long to find a parking garage with vacancies. He drove all the way to the top for some added privacy and a good signal. The number he wanted was right there in the phone's address book. He punched it in. This should be good. Now just let the bastard scum be there.

And let him have caller ID.

John Maggione answered himself. "Who's this?" he asked, and sounded bent out of shape already.

Bingo! The man himself. They'd hated each other since Maggione's father had let Sullivan do some jobs for him.

"Take a guess, Junior."

"I have no fucking idea. How'd you get this number? Whoever you are, you're a dead man."

"Then I guess we've got something in common."

Adrenaline raced through Sullivan's system. He felt unstoppable right now. He was the best around at this kind of thing: setting up a target, playing with a mark.

"That's right, Junior. The hunter becomes the hunted. It's Michael Sullivan. Remember me? And you know what? I'm coming for you next."

"The Butcher? Is that you, punk? I was going to kill you anyway, but now I'm going to make you pay for what you did to Benny. You piece of shit, I'm gonna hurt you so bad."

"What I did to Benny is nothing compared to what I'm going to do to you. I'm going to cut you in two with a butcher saw, and send half to your mother, and the other half to your wife. I'll let Connie see it just before I fuck her in front of your kids. What do you think of that?"

Maggione exploded. "You are dead! You are so dead! Everything you ever cared about is… dead. I'm coming after you, Sullivan."

"Yeah, well, take a number."

He flipped the phone closed, then looked at his watch. That felt good – talking to Maggione like that. Seven fifty. He wouldn't even miss U2's opening number.

Chapter 59

I HAD JUST FINISHED UP with the day's final session and was looking through the old files on Maria's case again, when an unexpected hard knock came against the office door. What now?

I opened it to find Sampson standing out in the hallway.

He had a twelve-pack of Corona stuffed under one arm, and the carton of beer looked ridiculously small in relation to his body. Something was up.

"Sorry," I said. "I don't allow drinking during sessions."

"All right. I hear you. I guess me and my imaginary friends will just be on our way."

"But seeing how much you obviously need therapy, I'll make an exception this one time."

He handed me a cold beer as I let him in. Something was definitely going on. Sampson had never been to my office before.

"Looking good around here already," he said. "I still owe you a hanging plant or something."

"Don't pick out any art for me. Spare me that."

Thirty seconds later, the Commodores were on the CD player – Sampson's choice – and Sampson was flopped down on my couch. It looked like a love seat under him.

But before I could even begin to unwind, he blindsided me. "Do you know Kim Stafford?"

I took a swill of beer to cover my reaction. Kim had been my last patient of the day. It made sense that Sampson might have seen her leaving, but how he knew who she was, I had no idea.

"Why do you ask that?"

"Uh, I'm a police detective… I just saw her outside. The lady is kind of hard to miss. She's Jason Stemple's girlfriend."

"Jason Stemple?" Sampson had said it like I should know who that was. And in a strange way, I did, just not by his name.

I was glad Kim had come back for more sessions, but she was firm about not identifying her fiance, even as the abuse at home seemed to have gotten worse.

"He works Sixth District," Sampson said. "I guess he came on the force after you left."

"Sixth District? As in, he's a cop?"

"Yeah. I don't envy him that beat though. It's rough over there these days."

My mind was reeling, and I felt a little sick to my stomach. Jason Stemple was a cop?

"How's the Georgetown case going?" I asked, probably to get Sampson off the track he was going down.

"Nothing new," he said, sliding right over to the new subject. "I've covered three out of the four known victims, and I'm still not out of the gate."

"So no one's talking at all? After what happened to them? That's hard to believe. Don't you think so, John?"

"I do. A woman I spoke with today, army captain, she admitted the rapist made some kind of bad threat against her family. Even that was more than she wanted to say."

We finished our beers in silence. My mind alternated between Sampson's case and Kim Stafford and her policeman fiance.

Sampson downed the last of his Corona; then he sat up and handed me another. "So listen," he said. "I've got one more interview to do – lawyer who was raped. One more chance to maybe crack this thing open."

Uh- oh, here it comes.

"Monday afternoon?"

I swiveled in my chair to look at the appointment book on my desk. Wide open. "Damn, I'm all booked up."

I opened my second beer. A long slat of light came in through the wooden blinds, and I traced it with my eyes back over to where Sampson sat, looking at me with that heavy glare of his. Man Mountain, that was one of the names I had for him. Two-John was another.

"What time on Monday?" I finally asked.

"Three o'clock. I'll pick you up, sugar." He reached over and clinked his beer bottle against mine. "You know, you just cost me seven bucks."

"How's that?"

"The twelve-pack," he said. "I would have gotten a six if I'd known you'd be this easy."

Chapter 60

MONDAY, THREE O'CLOCK. I shouldn't be here, but here I am anyway.

From what I could tell so far, the firm of Smith, Curtis and Brennan's legal specialty was old money. The expensive-looking wood-paneled reception area, with its issues of Golf Digest, Town Country, and Forbes on the side tables, seemed to speak for itself: The clients of this firm sure didn't come from my neighborhood.

Mena Sunderland was a junior partner and also our third known rape victim, chronologically. She seemed to blend in to the office, with a gray designer business suit and the kind of gracious reserve that sometimes comes from Southern breeding. She led us back to a small conference room and closed the vertical blinds on the glass wall before letting the conversation begin.

"I'm afraid this is a waste of your time," she told us. "I don't have anything new to say. I told that to the other detective. Several times."

Sampson slid a piece of paper over to her. "We were wondering if this might help."

"What is it?"

"A draft press statement. If any information goes public, this will be it."

She scanned the statement while he explained. "It puts this investigation on an aggressive path and says that none of the known victims have been willing to identify the attacker or testify against him."

"Is that actually true?" she asked, looking up from the paper.

Sampson started to respond, but a sudden gut reaction flashed through me, and I cut him off. I started to cough. It was kind of a sloppy move, but it worked fine.

"Could I trouble you for a glass of water?" I asked Mena Sunderland. "I'm sorry."

When she left the room, I turned to Sampson. "I don't think she should know it's all down to her."

"Okay. I guess I agree." Sampson nodded and said, "But if she asks -"

"Let me take this," I said. "I've got a feeling about her." My famous "feelings" were part of my reputation, but that didn't mean Sampson had to go along. If there had been more time for discussion, I would have worried about it, but Mena Sunderland came back a second later. She had two bottles of Fiji water and two glasses. She even braved a smile.

As I drank the water she gave me, I noticed Sampson sit back in his chair. That was my cue to take over.

"Mena," I said, "we'd like to try to find some kind of common ground with you. Between what you're comfortable talking about and what we need to know."

"Meaning what?" she asked.

"Meaning, we don't necessarily need a description of this man to catch him."

I took her silence as a green flag, however tentative.

"I'd like to ask you some questions. They're all yes or no. You can answer with one word or even just shake your head if you like. And if any question is too uncomfortable for you, it's fine to pass."

A smile threatened the corners of her mouth. My technique was facile, and she knew it. But I wanted to keep this as non-threatening as possible.

She tucked a long strand of blond hair behind her ear. "Go ahead. For the moment."

"On the night of the attack, did this man make specific threats to keep you from talking after he was gone?"

She nodded first, then verbalized her answer. "Yes."

Suddenly, I was hopeful. "Did he make threats against other people you know? Family, friends, that sort of thing?"

"Yes."

"Has he contacted you since that night? Or made his presence known in any other way?"

"No. I thought I saw him again on my street one time. It probably wasn't him."

"Were his threats more than verbal? Was there anything else he did to make sure you wouldn't talk?"

"Yes."

I'd hit on something, I could tell. Mena Sunderland looked down at her lap for a few seconds and then back up at me again. The tension on her face had given way to something more like resolve.

"Please, Mena. This is important."

"He took my BlackBerry," she said. She paused for a few seconds, then went on. "It had all my personal information. Addresses, everything. My friends, my family back home in Westchester."

"I see."

And I did. It fit right in with my preliminary profile of this monster.

I started a silent ten count in my head. When I got to eight, Mena spoke again.

"There were pictures," she said.

"I'm sorry? Pictures?"

"Photographs. Of people he killed. Or at least, said he killed. And" – she took a moment to muster the next part – " mutilated. He talked about using butcher saws, surgical scalpels."

"Mena, can you tell me anything else about those photos he showed you?"

"He made me look at several, but I only really remember the first one. It was the worst thing I've ever seen in my life." The sudden memory of it came into her eyes, and I saw it take hold. Pure horror. Her focus went soft.

After several seconds, she collected herself and spoke again. "Her hands," she said, then stopped herself.

"What about her hands, Mena?"

"He'd cut off both her hands. And in the picture – she was still alive. She was obviously screaming." Her voice closed down to barely a whisper. We were at the danger line; I felt it right away. "He called her Beverly. Like they were old friends."

"Okay," I said gently. "We can stop here if you want."

"I want to stop," she said. "But."

"Go ahead, Mena."

"That night… he had a scalpel. There was already somebody's blood on it."

Chapter 61

THIS WAS HUGE, but it was also bad news. It could be anyway.

If Mena Sunderland's description was accurate – and why wouldn't it be? – we weren't just talking about serial rape anymore. It was a serial murder case. Suddenly, my mind flipped over to Maria's murder, the serial rape case back then. I tried to put Maria out of my mind for the moment. One case at a time.

I wrote down as much as I could remember right after the meeting with Mena, while Sampson gave me a ride home. He had taken his own notes during the interview, but getting these things from my mind onto paper helps me piece a case together sometimes.

My preliminary profile of the rapist was making more and more sense. Trusting first impressions, wasn't that what the bestseller Blink was all about? The photos that Mena described – keepsakes of whatever kind – were fairly common in serial cases, of course. The photographs would help tide him over during his downtime. And in a grisly new twist, he had used the souvenirs to keep his living victims right where he wanted them – paralyzed with fear.

As we drove through Southeast, Sampson finally broke the silence in the car. "Alex, I want you to come onto this case. Officially," he said. "Work with us. Work with me on this one. Consult. Whatever you want to call it."

I looked over at him. "I thought you might be ticked off at me about taking over a little back there."

He shrugged. "No way. I don't argue with results. Besides, you're already in this, right? You might as well be getting paid for it. You couldn't walk away from the case now if you tried."

I shook my head and frowned, but only because he was right. I could feel a familiar buzz starting in my mind – my thoughts involuntarily locking on to the case. It's one of the things that makes me good at the job, but also the reason I find it impossible to be kind of involved in an investigation.

"What am I supposed to tell Nana?" I asked him, which I guess was my way of saying yes.

"Tell her the case needs you. Tell her Sampson needs you." He took a right onto Fifth Street, and my house came into view. "Better think of something fast, though. She'll smell it on you for sure. She'll see it in your eyes."

"You want to come in?"

"Nice try." He left the car running when he stopped at the curb.

"Here I go," I said. "Wish me luck with Nana."

"Hey, man, no one said police work wasn't dangerous."

Chapter 62

I WORKED ON THE CASE that night in the attic office. It was late when I decided I'd had enough.

I went downstairs and grabbed my keys – I was in the habit most nights of taking a spin in the new Mercedes, my crossover car. It drove like an absolute dream, and the seats were as comfy as anything in our living room. Just turn on the CD player, sit back, and relax. This was good stuff.

When I finally got to bed that night, my thoughts took me back to a place I still needed to visit now and then. A sanctuary. My honeymoon with Maria. Maybe the best ten days of my life. Everything was still vivid in my mind.

The sun drops just below the palms as it sinks toward a horizontal line of blue out beyond the balcony of our hotel. The empty spot in the bed next to me is still warm where Maria was until a minute ago.

Now she's standing at the mirror.

Beautiful.

She's wearing nothing but one of my dress shirts, open down the front, and getting ready for dinner.

She always says her legs are too skinny, but I find them long and lovely and get turned on just looking at them – at her in the mirror.

I watch as Maria sweeps her shiny black hair back into a clip. It shows off the long line of her neck. God, I adore her.

"Do that again," I say.

She indulges me without a word.

When she tilts her head to put on an earring, her eye catches mine in the mirror.

"I love you, Alex." She turns to face me. "No one will ever love you the way I do."

Her eyes hold mine, and I believe that I can see what she's feeling inside. The way we think is so unbelievably close. J stretch my hand out from the bed for her, and say -

Chapter 63

SOMETHING HEARTFELT.

But I couldn't remember what it was now.

I sat up – all alone in my bed – jarred from the half-awake, half-asleep place I'd just been. My memory had stumbled onto a blank spot, like a hole in the ground that wasn't there before.

The details of our honeymoon in Barbados had always been so crystal clear in my mind. Why couldn't I remember what I'd said to Maria?

The clock next to me glowed: 2:15.

I was wide awake, though.

Please, God, I thought, these memories are what I have left. All I have. Don't take them away too.

I switched on the light.

Staying in bed now wasn't an option. I wandered out into the hall, thinking maybe I'd go down and play the piano.

At the top of the stairs, I stopped with my hand on the banister. The soft, rasping sound of Ali's breath held me where I was.

I stepped into his room and watched my little boy from the doorway.

He was just a small lump under the covers, and a bare foot sticking out; his breath sounded like a miniature snore.

The Blue's Clues nightlight on the wall was just enough to show his face. Little Alex's eyebrows were knitted tightly, as though he was deep in thought, just the way I look sometimes.

When I crawled under the covers, he nuzzled up to my chest and pressed his head into the crook of my arm.

"Hi, Daddy," he said, half-awake.

"Hey, pup," I whispered. "Go back to sleep."

"Did you have a bad dream?"

I smiled. It was a question I'd asked him countless times in the past. Now the words came back to me like a piece of myself I'd let go.

He'd given me my words. I gave him Maria's. "I love you, Ali. No one will ever love you the way I do."

The boy was perfectly still, probably asleep already. I lay there with my hand on his shoulder until his breathing went back to that same soft rhythm as before. And then somewhere in there, I went back to be with Maria.

Chapter 64

THE MEMORIES OF HIS FATHER were always the strongest when Michael Sullivan was with his sons. The bright-white butcher shop, the freezer in the back, the Bone Man who came once a week to pack up meat carcasses, the smells of Irish Carrigaline cheese, and of black-and-white pudding.

"Hey, batta, batta, batta," Sullivan heard, and it brought him hurtling back to the present – to the ballfield near where he lived in Maryland.

Then he heard, "This guy can't hit worth spit! This guy's nothin'! You own this mutt!"

Seamus and Jimmy were the trash-talkers for the family baseball games. Michael Jr. was as focused as ever. Sullivan saw it in his oldest son's bright-blue eyes – a need to strike out the old man once and for all.

His son wound up and let fly. A sharp-breaking curveball, or maybe a hard slider. Sullivan exhaled as he swung – then heard the smack of the ball as it hit Jimmy's catcher's mitt behind him. Son of a bitch had brought some heat!

Something like pandemonium broke out on the otherwise deserted American Legion field where they practiced. Jimmy, the catcher, ran a circle around his father, holding the ball in the air.

Only Michael Jr. stayed calm and cool. He allowed himself a slight grin but didn't leave the pitching mound, didn't celebrate with his brothers.

He just bad-eyed his old man, whom he had never struck out before.

He ducked his chin, ready to go into the windup – but then stopped.

"What's that?" he asked, looking at his father.

Sullivan looked down and saw something move onto his chest. The red pinpoint of a laser sight.

He dropped to the dirt beside home plate.

Chapter 65

THE VINTAGE LOUISVILLE SLUGGER, still in his hand, splintered apart before it hit the ground. A loud metal ping sounded as a bullet ricocheted off the backstop. Someone was shooting at him! Maggione's people? Who else?

"Boys! Dugout – now! Run! Run!" he yelled.

The boys didn't have to be told twice. Michael Jr. grabbed his youngest brother's arm. All three of them sprinted for cover, fast little bastards, running like they just stole somebody's wallet.

The Butcher ran for all he was worth in the opposite direction; he wanted to draw fire off of his boys.

And he needed the gun in his car!

The Humvee was parked at least sixty yards away, and he ran as straight a line as he dared to get there. Another shot came so close that he heard it whiz by his chin.

The gunshots were coming from the woods to the left of the ballfield, away from the road. That much he knew. He didn't bother looking around though. Not yet.

When he got to the Humvee, he threw open the passenger-side door and dove inside. An explosion of glass followed.

The Butcher stayed low, face pressed against the floor mat, and reached under the driver's seat.

The Beretta clipped there represented a broken promise to Caitlin. He pulled the loaded weapon loose and finally took a look up top.

There were two of them, coming out of the woods now – two of Maggione's wiseguys for sure. They were here to put him down, weren't they? And maybe his kids too.

He unlatched the driver's door, then rolled outside onto gravel and dirt. Chancing a look under the car, he saw a pair of legs headed his way in a shuffling run.

No time for deep thought or any kind of planning. He fired twice under the chassis. Maggione's man yelped as a blossom of red opened above his ankle.

He went down hard, and the Butcher fired again, right into the hood's twice-shocked face. The bastard never got off another shot, word, or thought. But that was the least of his worries now.

"Dad! Dad! Dad, help!"

It was Mike's voice – coming from all the way across the park, and it was hoarse with panic.

Sullivan jumped up and saw the other hit man headed for the dugout, maybe seventy-five yards away. He raised his gun but knew he'd be firing toward his boys, too.

He jumped in and slammed the Humvee into Drive.

Chapter 66

HE FLOORED IT, as if his boys' lives depended on it. Probably they did. Maggione was the kind of coward who would kill your family. Then he held the Beretta out the window, looking for one clear shot. This was going to be close. No way to tell the outcome, either. Suspense city!

The hit man was sprinting across the infield, really moving now. Sullivan guessed the guy had been a decent athlete when he'd been younger. Not too long ago, either.

Michael Jr. watched from the dugout steps. The kid was a cool head, but that wasn't necessarily helpful now. Sullivan screamed at him. "Get down! Michael, down! Right now!"

The hit man knew Sullivan was coming up behind him. Finally, he stopped and turned to make a shot of his own.

Mistake!

Possibly fatal.

His eyes went wide just before the Humvee's grille caught him in the chest, moving at fifty miles an hour plus. The vehicle didn't slow down until it had given the hitter a swift ride, then rammed him into the chain link of the backstop.

"You boys all right?" Sullivan yelled, keeping his eyes on the hit man, who wasn't moving and looked like he'd have to be peeled off the fence.

"We're okay," Michael Jr. said, sounding shaky but still in control of his emotions.

Sullivan walked around to look at the punk, what was left of him anyway. The only thing keeping him on his feet was the steel sandwich he was trapped in. His head lolled lazily to one side. He seemed to be looking around through the one eye not totally obscured with blood.

Sullivan went and picked up the remains of the Louisville Slugger from the dirt.

He swung once, twice, again, and again, punctuating each blow with a shout.

"Don't.

"Fuck.

"With.

"My.

"Family!

"Ever!

"Ever!

"Ever!"

The last swing went wild and missed; Sullivan put a huge crater in his hood. But it helped him remember where he was.

He got in the car and backed up to where his boys were watching like a crowd of zombies at somebody's funeral. When they climbed inside, none of them spoke, but nobody cried, either.

"It's okay now," he told them. "It's over, boys. I'm going to take care of this. Do you hear me? I promise. I promise you on my dead mother's eyes!"

And he would keep his word. They had come after him and his family, and the Butcher would come after them.

The mob.

John Maggione.

Chapter 67

I HAD ANOTHER SESSION with Kim Stafford, and when she came in, she was wearing dark sunglasses and looked like someone on the run. My stomach just about dropped to the ground floor of the brownstone. It struck me that my professional worlds were colliding on this case.

Now that I knew who Kim's fiance was, it was harder for me to respect her wish to keep him out of this. I wanted to confront this piece of crap in the worst way.

"Kim," I said at one point, not too far into the session, "does Sam keep any weapons in the apartment?" Sam was the name we had agreed to use in our sessions; Sam was also the name of a bulldog that had bitten Kim when she was a little girl.

"A pistol in the nightstand," she said.

I tried not to show the concern I was feeling, the alarm sounding loudly inside my head. "Has he ever pointed the gun at you? Threatened to use it?"

"Just once," she said, and picked at the fabric of her skirt. "It was a while ago. If I'd thought he was serious, I would have left him."

"Kim, I'd like to talk to you about a safety plan."

"What do you mean?"

"Identifying some precautionary measures," I said. "Setting aside money; keeping a packed suitcase somewhere; finding somewhere you could go – if you needed to leave quickly."

I'm not sure why she took off her sunglasses at that moment, but this is when she chose to show me her black eye. "I can't, Dr. Cross," she said. "If I make a plan, I'll use it. And then I think he truly would kill me."

After my last session that day, I dialed into my voice mail before heading out. There was only one message. It was from Kayla.

"Hey, it's me. Well, hang on to your hat because Nana is letting me cook dinner for all of us tonight. In her kitchen! If I weren't scared silly, I'd say I can't wait. So, I've got a couple of house calls to make, and then I'm stopping at the store. Then I might shoot myself in the parking lot. If not, I'll see you at home around six. That's your house."

It was already six when I got the message. I tried to put the troubling session with Kim Stafford out of my mind, but only partly succeeded. I hoped she was going to be okay, and I wasn't sure if I should try to interfere just yet. By the time I got to Fifth Street and hurried inside, Kayla was ensconced in the kitchen. She was wearing Nana's favorite apron and sliding a rib roast into the oven.

Nana sat erect at the kitchen table with an untouched glass of white wine in front of her. Now this was interesting stuff.

The kids were flitting around in the kitchen too, probably waiting to see how long Nana could sit still.

"How was your day, Daddy?" Jannie asked. "What's the best thing that happened?" she said.

That brought a big smile from both of us. It was a question we liked to throw around the dinner table sometimes. We'd been doing it for years.

I thought about Kim Stafford, and then I thought about the Georgetown rape case and Nana's reaction to my working on it. Thinking about Nana brought me right back to the present, to my answer to Jannie's question.

"So far?" I said. "This is it. Being here with you guys is the best thing."

Chapter 68

THINGS WERE HEATING UP NOW.

The Butcher hated the beach; he hated the sand, the smell of briny water, the bottlenecked traffic, everything about a visit to the crummy seashore. Caitlin and the boys, with their summertime trips to Cape May – they could have it, keep it, shove it.

So it was business, and business only, that brought him to the shore, much less all the way to South Jersey. It was revenge against John Maggione. The two of them had hated each other since Maggione's father had permitted this "Irish crazy" to become his killer of choice. Then Sullivan had been ordered to take out one of Junior's buddies, and the Butcher had done the job with his usual enthusiasm. He'd cut Rico Marinacci into pieces.

John Maggione had been making himself scarce lately – no surprise there – so the Butcher's plan had changed a little, for now. If he couldn't cut off the head just yet, he'd start with some other body part.

The part, in this case, was named Dante Ricci. Dante was the youngest made man in the Maggione syndicate, a personal favorite of the don's. Like a son to him. The inside joke was that John Maggione didn't let an associate wipe his ass without checking with Dante.

Sullivan got to the shore town of Mantoloking, New Jersey, just before dusk. As he drove across Barnegat Bay, the ocean in the distance looked almost purple – beautiful, if you liked that kind of picture-postcard, Kodak-moment thing. Sullivan rolled up his windows against the salt air. He couldn't wait to do his business, then get the hell out of here.

The town itself lay on an expensive strip of land less than a mile across. Ricci's house, on Ocean Avenue, wasn't real hard to find. He drove past the front gate, parked up the road, and walked back about a fifth of a mile.

It looked like Ricci was doing pretty well for himself. The main house was a big honking Colonial: three stories, brown cedar shakes, all perfectly maintained, and right on the water. Four-bay garage, a guesthouse, hot tub up on the dune. Six million, easy. Just the kind of shiny object modern-day wiseguys dangled in front of their wives to distract them from the day-to-day stealing and killing they did for a living.

And Dante Ricci was a killer; that was what he did best. Hell, he was the new-and-improved Butcher.

Sullivan couldn't see too much of the layout from the front. He imagined most of the house was oriented to the water view in back. But the beach would offer no good cover for him. He'd have to settle in where he was, and take his time.

That wasn't a problem for him. He had whatever it took to do the job, including patience. A snatch of Gaelic ran through his head, something his grandfather James used to say. Coimhead fearg fhear na foighde, or some shit like that. Beware the anger of a patient man.

Just so, Michael Sullivan thought as he waited, perfectly still in the gathering dusk. Just so.

Chapter 69

IT TOOK A WHILE for him to get a sense of the beach house and its immediate surroundings. There wasn't much movement inside, but enough to see that the family was home: Dante, two small kids, and – at least from this distance – what looked to be the hot young wife, a nice Italian blonde.

But no visitors, and no bodyguards out in plain sight. Specifically, no capital F: Family. That meant any firepower in the house would be limited to whatever Dante Ricci kept on hand. Whatever he had, it probably wasn't going to stack up against the 9mm machine gun pistol Sullivan had holstered at his side. Or his scalpel.

Despite the chill in the air, he was perspiring under his jacket, and a patch of sweat had soaked through his T-shirt where the piece hugged his body. The ocean breeze did nothing to cool him down, either. Only his patience held him in check. His professionalism, he liked to think. Traits he had no doubt inherited from his father, the original Butcher, who, if nothing else, had been a patient bastard.

Finally, he moved in toward the beach house. He walked past a shiny black Jaguar sitting on the blond brick parking pad and entered into one of the open garage bays, where a white Jag made bookends with the black one.

Gee, Dante, ostentatious much?

It didn't take long to find something useful in the garage. The Butcher picked up a short-handled sledgehammer from the workbench in the back. He hoisted it and felt its weight. Just about right. Very nice. Jeez, he liked tools. Just like his old man.

He'd have to swing lefty if he wanted to stay gun-ready, but his strike zone was as big as, well, a Jaguar's windshield.

He shouldered the hammer, paralleled his feet, and went all Mark McGwire on the glass.

A high- pitched car alarm started screaming at the first impact, just like he wanted it to.

Sullivan immediately hoofed it out to the front yard, about halfway back to the main road. He stepped just out of sight behind a mature red oak that seemed out of place here – like him. His finger was at the pistol's trigger, but no. No shooting yet. Let Dante think he was some shitbag Jersey Shore burglar. That should bring him running and cursing.

The front screen door flew open seconds later, smacked hard against the wall of the house. Two sets of floodlights flared.

Sullivan squinted against the light. But he could see ol' Dante on the porch – with a pistol in his hand. In swim shorts no less – and flip-flops. Well muscled and in good shape, but so what. What a cocky bastard this guy was.

Mistake.

"Who the hell's there?" the tough guy shouted into the darkness. "I said, who's out there? You better start running!"

Sullivan smiled. This was Junior's enforcer? The new Butcher? This buffed punk at his beach house? In bathing trunks and plastic shoes?

"Hey, it's just Mike Sullivan!" he called back.

The Butcher stepped into plain view, took a little bow, then sprayed the front porch before Dante saw it coming. In truth, why would he? Who would have the balls to come after a made man at his house? Who could be that crazy?

"That's just for starters!" the Butcher roared as half a dozen shots struck Dante Ricci in the stomach and chest. The mobster dropped to his knees, glared out at Sullivan, then fell over face-first.

Sullivan kept his finger on the trigger and swept the two Jaguars in the garage and driveway. More glass shattered. Neat lines of holes opened along the expensive chassis. That felt pretty good.

When he stopped shooting, he could hear screams coming from inside the beach house. Women, children. He took out the porch floodlights with two quick, controlled bursts.

Then he approached the house, fingering the scalpel. As soon as he got to the body he knew that Dante Ricci was dead as some bloated mackerel washed up on the beach. Still, he rolled the body and slashed the dead man's face a dozen times or so with the sharp blade. "Nothing personal, Dante. But you're not the new me."

Then he turned to go. Dante Ricci had gotten the message, and very, very soon, so would Junior Maggione.

Then he heard a voice coming from outside the house. A female.

"You killed him! You bastard! You killed my Dante!"

Sullivan turned back and saw Dante's wife standing there with a gun in her hand. The woman was petite, a pretty bleached blonde, no more than five feet tall.

The wife fired blindly into the dark. She didn't know how to shoot, couldn't even hold a gun right. But she had some hot Maggione blood in her.

"Get back in the house, Cecilia!" Sullivan shouted. "Or I'll blow your head off!"

"You killed him! You scumbag! You dirty son of a bitch!" She stepped off the porch, moving into the yard.

The woman was crying, blubbering, but coming to get him, the dumb bunny. "I'm going to kill you, you fucker." Her next shot exploded a concrete birdbath, only a yard or so to Sullivan's right.

Her crying had turned to a high-pitched wail. It sounded more like an injured animal than anything human.

Then something inside her snapped, and she charged across the driveway. She fired off one more shot before Sullivan put two into her chest. She dropped like she'd run into a wall, then lay there quivering pathetically. He cut her up too.

Once he got inside his car, he felt better, satisfied with himself. He even welcomed the long drive back. Riding along the turnpike, he opened the windows and cranked up the music, singing Bono's words at the top of his lungs as if they were his own.

Chapter 70

THE NEXT DAY would get filed under What the Hell Was I Thinking? I showed up at the Sixth District station house, where Jason Stemple was based, and I started asking around about him. I wasn't sure what I would do if I found him, but I was nervous enough for Kim Stafford that I had to try something, or thought I did.

I didn't carry creds or a badge anymore, but lots of DC cops knew who I was, who I am. Apparently not the desk sergeant, though.

He kept me waiting on the civilian side of the glass longer than I would have liked. That was okay, I guess, no big deal. I stood around, glancing over the Annual Crime Reduction Awards on the wall until he finally informed me that he had checked me out with his captain; then he buzzed me through.

Another uniformed officer was there waiting for me.

"Pulaski, take Mister" – the sergeant glanced down at the sign-in sheet- "Cross back to the locker room please. He's looking for Stemple. I thought he'd be out by now."

I followed him down a busy hallway, picking up strands of cop talk along the way. Pulaski pushed open a heavy swinging door into the locker room. The smell was familiar, sweat and various antiseptics.

"Stemple! You got a visitor."

A young guy, late twenties, about my height but heavier, looked over. He was alone at a row of beat-up army-green lockers, and he was just pulling on a Washington Nationals road jersey. Another half-dozen or so off-duty cops were standing around, grousing and laughing about the state of the court system, which definitely was a joke these days.

I walked over to where Stemple was putting his watch on and still basically ignoring me.

"Could I talk to you for a minute?" I asked. I was trying to be polite, but it took an effort with this guy who liked to beat up on his girlfriend.

"About?" Stemple barely looked my way.

I lowered my voice. "I want to talk to you… about Kim Stafford."

All at once, the less-than-friendly welcome downgraded to pure animosity. Stemple rocked back on his heels and looked me up and down like I was a street person who'd just broken into his house.

"What are you doing in here anyway? You a cop?"

"I used to be a cop, but now I'm a therapist. I work with Kim."

Stemple's eyes beaded and burned. He was getting the picture now, and he didn't like what he saw. Neither did I, because I was looking at a powerfully built male who beat up on women and sometimes burned them with lit objects.

"Yeah, well, I just pulled a double, and I'm out of here. You stay away from Kim, if you know what's good for you. You hear me?"

Now that we'd met, I had a professional opinion of Stemple: He was a piece of shit. As he walked away, I said, "You're beating her up, Stemple. You burned her with a cigar."

The locker room got still, but I noticed that no one hurried to get in my face on Stemple's behalf. The others just watched. A couple of them nodded, as though maybe they knew about Stemple and Kim already.

He slowly turned back to me and puffed himself up. "What are you trying to start with me, asshole? Who the hell are you? She screwing you?"

"It's nothing like that. I told you, I just came here to talk. If you know what's good for you, you should listen."

That's when Stemple threw the first punch. I stepped back, and he missed, but not by much. He was definitely hot-tempered, and strong.

It was all I needed, though, maybe all I wanted. I feinted to the left, then countered with an uppercut into his gut. Some of the air rushed out of him.

But then his powerful arms latched around my middle. Stemple drove me hard against a row of lockers. The metal boomed with the impact. Pain radiated through my upper and lower back. I hoped nothing was broken already

As soon as I could get my footing again, I bulldozed him back, and he stumbled, losing his grip. He swung again. This time, he connected hard with my jaw.

I returned the favor – a solid right to the chin – followed with a looping left hook that landed just over his eyebrow. One for me, one for Kim Stafford. Then I hit him with a right to the cheekbone.

Stemple spun halfway around; then he surprised me and went down to the locker room floor. His right eye was already starting to close.

My arms pulsed. I was ready for more of this punk, this coward. The fight never should have started, but it had, and I was disappointed when he didn't get up again.

"Is that how it is with Kim? She pisses you off, you take a swing?"

He groaned but didn't say anything to me.

I said, "Listen, Stemple. You want me to keep what I know to myself, not go any higher with this? Make sure it doesn't happen again. Ever. Keep your hands off her. And your cigars. Are we clear?"

He stayed where he was, and that told me what I needed to know. I was halfway to the door when one of the other cops caught my eye. "Good for you," he said.

Chapter 71

IF NANA HAD BEEN WORKING the Georgetown case, in her own inimitable style, she'd have said it was "simmering" about now. Sampson and I had tossed a bunch of interesting ingredients into the mix, and we'd turned the heat up high. Now it was time for some results.

I looked at the big man across a table full of crime reports spread out between us. "I've never seen so much information lead to so little," I said grumpily.

"Now you know what I've been dealing with on this," he said, and squeezed and unsqueezed a rubber stress ball in his fist. I was surprised the thing hadn't burst into a million pieces by now.

"This guy is careful, seems smart enough, and he's cruel. Got a powerful angle too – using his souvenirs to threaten these women. Making it personal. In case you hadn't figured that out already," I said. I was just talking it through out loud. Sometimes that helps.

My thing lately, my habit, was pacing. I'd probably covered about six miles of carpet in the past fourteen hours, all in the same Second District station conference room where we were holed up. My feet hurt some, but that's how I kept my brain going. That and sour-apple Altoids.

We'd started that morning by cross-referencing the last four years of Uniform Crime Reports, looking for potentially related cases – reaching for anything that could start to tie this thing together. Given what we now knew about our perp, we had looked at female missing persons, rape cases, and especially murder where mutilation was involved. First for Georgetown and then for the whole DC metro area.

To keep our mood as light as possible, we'd listened to "Elliot in the Morning" on the radio, but even Elliot and Diane couldn't brighten our moods that day, good as they are at mood-brightening.

In order to cover all our bases, we made a second pass, checking unsolved murders in general. The result was a list of potential follow-ups that was just as large as it was unpromising.

One good thing had happened today. Mena Sunderland had granted us another interview, where she went so far as to give a few descriptive details on her rapist. He was a white man, in his forties, she guessed. And from what we could glean from Mena, he was good-looking, which was difficult for her to admit. "You know," she'd told us, "the way Kevin Costner is good-looking for an older guy?"

It was an important part of the profile for us to pin down though. Attractive attackers had an edge that made them even more dangerous. My hope was that with a little time and the promise of a lot of protection, Mena would be willing to keep talking to us. What we had so far wasn't enough for a useful police sketch. As soon as we had a likeness that didn't match about twelve thousand other faces on the streets of Georgetown, Sampson and I wanted to go wide with it.

Sampson tilted his chair back and stretched his long legs. "What do you think about getting some sleep and starting in on the rest of these in the morning? I'm cooked."

Just then, Betsey Hall came whizzing in, looking a lot more awake than either of us did. Betsey was a newbie detective, eager, but the kind who knew how to be helpful without getting underfoot.

"You only looked at female victims in your cross-refs?" she said. "That's right, isn't it?"

"Why?" Sampson asked.

"Ever heard of Benny Fontana?"

Neither of us had.

"Midlevel mob soldier, underboss, I guess is the term. Was, anyway," Betsey said. "He was killed two weeks ago. In an apartment in Kalorama Park. Actually, on the night that Lisa Brandt was raped in Georgetown."

"And?" Sampson asked. I could hear the same tired impatience in his voice that I felt. "So?"

"And so, this."

Betsey flipped open a file and spread half a dozen black-and-white photographs out on the table. They showed a white man, maybe fifty years old, dead on his back in a living room somewhere. Both of his feet were completely – and freshly – severed at the ankle.

All of a sudden, I wasn't so tired anymore. Adrenaline was pumping through my system.

"Jesus," Sampson muttered. We were both on our feet now, scanning from one grisly photo to the other, repeating the process a couple of times.

"The ME's report says all the cutting on Mr. Fontana was done antemortem," Betsey added. "Possibly with surgical tools. Maybe a scalpel and saw." Her expression was hopeful, kind of sweetly naive. "So you think this is the same perp?"

I answered, "I think I want to know more. Can we get the keys to that apartment?"

She fished a set out of her pocket, jangling them proudly. "Thought you might ask me that."

Chapter 72

"SHIT, ALEX. MULTIPLE RAPES, multiple murders. Now a mob connection?" Sampson punched the roof of the car. "It can't all be coincidental. Can't be! Cannot!"

"Could definitely be something – if it's the same guy," I reminded him. "Let's see what happens here. Try not to get too far ahead of ourselves."

Not that John was off base. Our suspect was looking more and more like a sadistic monster with a very bad, very distinctive habit. It wasn't that we'd been looking in the wrong place for him, just maybe not in enough places.

"But if this does pan out," Sampson went on, "no phone calls to your old pals tonight. All right? I want a little time with this before the Feds come on board."

The FBI would already know about the Fontana murder, assuming it was mob related. But the rapes were still DCPD. Local stuff.

"You don't know that they'll necessarily take over the case," I said.

"Oh, yeah." Sampson snapped his fingers and pointed at me. "I forgot. You had your memory wiped when you left the Bureau, like they do it in Men in Black. Well, let me remind you – they'll take over this case. They love cases like this one. We do all the work; the Feebies take all the credit."

I stole a glance at him. "When I was at the Bureau, you ever resent me coming in on a case? Did I do that?"

"If it happened, don't worry about it," he said. "If it was worth talking about then, I would have brought it up. Hell no, you never moved in on one of my cases!"

I pulled over in front of a tan brick apartment house across from Kalorama Park. It was a nice location; I'm sure the Fontana murder had rocked that building, if not the neighborhood. It was also less than two miles from the location where Lisa Brandt had been attacked not long after Benny Fontana died.

We spent the next hour inside, using crime-scene photos and the bloodstains still in the carpet to re-create what might have happened. It didn't give us any concrete connection to the other attacks, but it was a start.

When we left, we rode southwest into Georgetown, taking the most logical route to Lisa Brandt's neighborhood. By now, it was around midnight. Neither of us felt like stopping yet, so we did a full tour of the case, riding by each of the known rape sites in chronological order. They weren't that far apart.

At 2:30 a.m. we were in a booth at an all-night coffee shop. We had crime files spread out on the table and were reading them over, too revved up to stop, too tired to go home.

This was my first chance to really get into the Benny Fontana file. I had read the police and ME's reports several times. Now I was looking over the list of items taken from the apartment. On my fourth or fifth time through, my eyes stopped on one item in particular: a torn-off corner of a white foil-lined envelope. It had been found under the sofa, only a few feet from Fontana's body. Speaking of feet, or a lack of them.

I sat up. These are the moments you hope for in an unsolved case.

"We have to go somewhere."

"You're right. We have to go home," Sampson said.

I called to the waitress, who was half-asleep at the counter. "Is there a twenty-four-hour drugstore somewhere around here? It's important."

Sampson was too tired to argue. He followed me out of the coffee shop and around the corner, up a few blocks to a brightly lit Walgreens. A quick scan of the aisles inside and I found what I was looking for.

"Mena Sunderland said the pictures she saw were Polaroids." I ripped open a box of film.

"You have to pay for that first," a clerk called from the front. I ignored him.

Sampson was shaking his head. "Alex, what the hell are you doing?"

"The evidence list from the Fontana murder scene," I said. "There was a white foil-lined envelope. A piece of one anyway"

I pulled the new envelope out of the box, tore off a corner, and held it up. "Just like this."

Sampson started to smile.

"He took pictures of Benny Fontana after he cut him up. It's the same guy, John."

Chapter 73

I WORKED A LONG, LONG DAY, but the next night, I was grounded.

Nana had a weekly reading class she was teaching at the First Baptist-run shelter on Fourth Street, and I stayed home with the kids. When I'm with them, there's nowhere I'd rather be. The problem, sometimes, is just getting me there.

I played chef for the night. I made my and the kids' favorite, white-bean soup, along with a chopped Cobb salad, and I'd brought home some nice fresh cheddar bread from the bakery next to my office. The soup tasted almost as good as Nana's. Sometimes I think she has two versions of every recipe – the one in her head and the one she shares with me, minus some key secret ingredient. It's her mystique, and I doubt it has changed much in the last half century.

Then the kids and I had a long-overdue session with the punching bag downstairs. Jannie and Damon took turns pummeling leather, while Ali ran his trucks around and around the basement floor, which he declared was I-95!

Afterward we migrated upstairs for a swimming lesson with little brother. Yes, swimming. It was Jannie's concoction, inspired by Ali's reluctance to get into the bathtub. Never mind that it was even harder to get him out of the bath once he got started. That distinction was lost on him, and he fussed every single time, as if he were allergic to clean. I was skeptical about Jannie's idea until I saw how it worked.

"Breathe, Ali!" she coached him from the side. "Let's see you breathe, puppy."

Damon kept his hands under Ali's belly while Ali lay facedown on top of the water, mostly blowing bubbles and splashing around. It was hilarious, but I didn't dare laugh, for Jannie's sake. I sat at a safe – as in dry – distance, watching from the toilet seat.

"Pick him up for a second," Jannie said.

Damon stood the big boy up in the claw-foot tub.

Ali blinked and sprayed out a mouthful of water, his eyes gleaming from the game.

"I'm swimming!" he declared.

"Not yet you're not," Jannie said, all business. "But you're definitely getting there, little bro."

She and Damon were practically as soaked as he was, but no one seemed to care. It was a blast. Jannie was kneeling right in a puddle, while Damon stood up and gave me a conspiratorial oldest-child look that said, Aren't they crazy?

When the phone rang, they both sprang for the door. "I'll get it!" they chorused.

" I'll get it," I said, cutting them off at the pass. "You're both sopping wet. No swimming until I get back."

"Come on, Ali," I heard as I started out of the bathroom. "Let's wash your hair."

The girl was a genius.

I trotted down the hall to catch the phone before the machine picked up. "Cross family YMCA," I said, loud enough for the kids' benefit.

Chapter 74

"IS THIS ALEX CROSS?"

"Yes?" I said. I didn't recognize the voice on the line though. Just that it was a woman.

"It's Annie Falk."

"Annie," I said, embarrassed now. "Hi, how are you?"

We were acquaintances, not quite friends. Her son was one or maybe two grades ahead of Damon. Annie was an ER doc at St. Anthony's.

"Alex, I'm at the hospital -"

I suddenly made a connection, and my heart skipped the next beat. "Is Nana there?"

"It's not Nana," she said. "I didn't know who else to call. Kayla Coles was just admitted to St. Anthony's. She's here in the ER."

"Kayla?" I said, my voice rising. "What's going on? Is she okay?"

"I don't know, Alex. We don't know enough yet. It's not a good situation though."

That wasn't the answer I expected, or the one I wanted to hear.

"Annie, what happened? Can you tell me that much?"

"It's hard to know exactly. What's certain is that someone attacked Kayla."

"Who?" I practically shouted into the phone, feeling horrible, as though I already knew the answer to my own question.

Damon stepped halfway into the hall and stared at me, his eyes wide and scared. It was a look I'd seen far too many times in our house.

"All I can tell you is that she was stabbed with a knife. Twice, Alex. She's alive."

Stabbed? My mind screamed the word, but I held it in. I swallowed hard. But she's alive.

"Alex, I'm not supposed to talk about this over the phone. You should get down here to the hospital as soon as you can. Can you come right now?"

"I'm on my way."

Chapter 75

NANA WAS STILL AT HER CLASS, but it only took a couple of minutes for me to get Naomi Harris from next door over to stay with the kids. I jumped into my car and sped the whole way. A siren would have helped.

The drive to the hospital was fast; that's all I really remember about it, and that Kayla was on my mind the whole way. When I pulled up outside the emergency room, her car was parked under the canopy by the entrance.

The driver's door hung open, and as I ran past and looked inside, I saw blood on the front seat. Jesus, she drove herself here! Somehow, she got away from him.

The waiting room was crowded, as it always is at St. Anthony's. There was a line of forlorn, raggedy-looking people at the front desk. The walking wounded and their friends and relations. Maria had been pronounced dead here.

"Sir, you can't -"

But I was already sliding through the doors to the treatment area before they could close. Once inside, I saw it was another very busy night at St. Tony's. Paramedics were wheeling gurneys; doctors, nurses, and patients crisscrossed every which way around me.

A young male lay on a cot with a gash in his hairline, leaking blood onto his forehead. "Am I gonna die?" he kept asking everybody who passed.

"No, you'll be fine," I told him, since nobody else was stopping to talk to him. "You're all right, son."

Where was Kayla, though? Everything was moving way too fast. I couldn't find anyone to ask about her. Then I heard a voice call out my name.

"Alex, over here!"

Annie was waving to me from down the hall. When I reached her, she took my arm and ushered me into a trauma room – a bay with two beds partitioned by a green plastic curtain.

Several medical personnel stood in a horseshoe around the bed. Their hands were moving quickly, many of them in bloodstained gloves.

Other hospital people came and went, pushing past me as if I weren't even there.

That meant Kayla was alive. I assumed that the goal here would be to stabilize her if possible, then get her to the operating room.

I craned my neck to see as much as I could, and then I saw Kayla. She had a mask over her mouth and nose. Someone was just lifting a red-soaked compress from her belly where they had already cut her shirt away.

The head physician, a woman in her thirties, said, "Stab wound, abdomen, questionable spleen injury."

Other voices in the room blended together, and I tried to make sense of them as best I could, but everything was turning foggy on me.

"BP seventy, pulse one twenty. Respiration thirty-four."

"Give me some suction here, please."

"Is she okay?" I blurted out. I felt like I was in a nightmare where no one could hear me.

"Alex – " Annie's hand was on my shoulder. "You need to give them some room. We don't know very much yet. As soon as we do, I'll tell you."

I realized I'd been pushing forward to get closer to the bed, to Kayla. My God, I ached for her and was finding it hard to breathe.

"Call the seventh floor, tell them we're ready," said the woman doctor who seemed in charge of everyone else in the room. "She has a surgical belly."

Annie whispered to me, "That means the stomach's hard, no digestion going on."

"Let's go. Hurry up, people."

I was being pushed from behind, and not with any kindness. "Move, sir. You have to move out of the way. This patient is in trouble. She could die."

I stepped sideways to make room as they wheeled her gurney into the corridor. Kayla's eyes were still closed. Did she know I was there? Or who had done this to her? I followed the procession as near as I could get. Then just as quickly as they had done everything else, they loaded her onto an elevator, and the metal doors slid shut between us.

Annie was right there at my side. She gestured toward another elevator bank. "I can take you to the waiting room upstairs if you want. Believe me, everybody's doing the best they can. They know Kayla's a doctor. And everybody knows she's a saint."

Chapter 76

THIS PATIENT IS IN TROUBLE. She could die… Everybody knows she's a saint.

I spent the next three hours in the waiting room, alone and without any further word about Kayla. My head was filled with disturbing ironies: Two of my kids had been born at St. Anthony's. Maria had been pronounced dead here. And now Kayla.

Then Annie Falk was with me again, down on one knee, speaking in a quiet, respectful voice that scared me like nothing else could right then.

"Come with me, Alex. Come, please. Hurry. I'll take you to her. She's out of the OR."

At first, I thought Kayla was still asleep in the recovery room, but she stirred when I came near. Her eyes opened, and she saw me – recognized me an instant later.

"Alex?" she whispered.

"Hey there, you," I whispered back, and gently took her hand in both of mine.

She looked very confused and lost for a moment; then she squeezed her eyes shut. Tears rolled down her cheeks, and I almost started up myself, but I thought if Kayla saw me that way it might scare her.

"It's okay," I said. "It's over now. You're in recovery."

"I was… so scared," she said, sounding like a young girl, an endearing part of Kayla I had never seen before.

"I'll bet you were," I said, and I pulled over a chair without letting go of her hand. "Did you really drive yourself here?"

She actually smiled, though her eyes stayed slightly unfocused. "I know how long it can take to get an ambulance in this neighborhood."

"Who did this to you?" I asked then. "Do you know who it was, Kayla?"

In response to the question, she shut her eyes again. My free hand tightened into a fist. Did she know who attacked her, and was she afraid to say? Had Kayla been warned not to talk?

We sat quietly for a moment – until she felt ready to say more. I wouldn't push her on this, the way I had pushed poor Mena Sunderland.

"I was on a house call," she finally said, eyes still closed. "This guy's sister called. He's a junkie. He was trying to detox at home. When I got there, he was just about out of his mind. I don't know who he thought I was. He stabbed me…"

Her voice trailed off. I smoothed her hair and put the back of my hand against her cheek. I've seen how fragile life can be, but it's not something you ever get used to, and it's different when it's somebody you care for, when it sticks this close to home.

"Will you stay with me, Alex? Until I fall asleep? Don't go."

It was her young girl's voice again. Kayla had never seemed as vulnerable to me as she did right then, in that fleeting moment in the recovery room. My heart broke for her and what had happened when she was trying to do some good out there.

"Of course," I said. "I'll be right here. I'm not going anywhere."

Chapter 77

"I'VE BEEN DEPRESSED for a while, as you know. You of all people know this."

"More than ten years. That's a while, I guess, Alex."

I sat across from my favorite doctor, my personal shrink, Adele Finaly. Adele is also my mentor from time to time. She's the one who encouraged me to start up my practice again, and she even got me a couple of patients. "Guinea pigs," she likes to call them.

"I need to tell you a few things that are bothering me a lot, Adele. This may require several hours."

"No problem." She shrugged. Adele has light-brown hair and is in her early forties, but she doesn't seem to have aged since we met. She isn't married right now, and every so often I think about the two of us together, but then I push it out of my mind. Way too dumb, too crazy.

"As long as you can fit several hours of your bullshit into fifty minutes," she continued, ever the wise girl, which is exactly the right tone to take with me.

"I can do that."

She nodded. "Better get going, then. I have the clock on you. It's ticking."

I started by telling her what had happened to Kayla and how I felt about it, including the fact that she had gone to her parents' home in North Carolina to recuperate. "I don't think it's my fault. So I'm not feeling guilty about the attack on Kayla… not directly anyway."

Adele couldn't help it, good as she is – her eyebrows rose and betrayed her inner thoughts. "And indirectly?"

My head moved up and down. "I do feel this generalized guilt – like I could have done something to stop the attack from happening."

"For instance?"

I smiled. Then so did Adele.

"Just to use one example, eliminating all of the crime in the DC area," I said.

"You're hiding behind your sense of humor again."

"Sure I am, and here's the really bad part. Rational as I make myself out to be, I am feeling some guilt over the fact that I could have protected Kayla somehow. And yes, I know how ridiculous that is, Adele. To think. And to say it out loud. But there it is anyway."

"Tell me more about this 'protection' you could have afforded to Kayla Coles somehow. I need to hear this, Alex."

"Don't rub it in. And I don't think I used the word protection."

"Actually, you did. Anyway, talk it out for me, please. You said you wanted to tell me everything. This is probably more important than you think."

"I couldn't have done a damn thing to help Kayla. Happy now?"

"I'm getting there," Adele said – then she waited for more from me.

"It all goes back to that night with Maria, of course. I was there. I watched her die in my arms. I couldn't do anything to save the woman I loved. I didn't do anything. I never even caught the son of a bitch who killed her."

Adele still said nothing.

"You know the worst thing? I'll always wonder if that bullet was meant for me. Maria turned into my arms… then she was hit."

We sat in silence for a long time then, even for us, and we're pretty good at enduring silences. I had never admitted that last part to Adele until now, never said it out loud to anybody.

"Adele, I'm going to change my life somehow."

She didn't say anything to that, either. Smart and tough, the way I like my shrinks, and what I aspire to be myself someday, when I grow the hell up.

"Don't you believe me?" I asked.

She finally spoke. "I want to believe you, Alex. Of course I do." Then she added, "Do you believe yourself? Do you think any of us can really change? Can you?"

"Yes," I told Adele. "I do believe I can change. But I get fooled a lot."

She laughed. We both did.

"I can't believe I pay for this shit," I finally said.

"Me either," said Adele. "But your time is up."

Chapter 78

LATER THAT AFTERNOON I found myself in St. Anthony's Church – St. Tony's, as I've called it since I was a kid growing up nearby in Nana's equally revered house. The church is about a block from the hospital where Maria died. I'd moved my spiritual care from head doctor to head of the universe, and I hoped it was an upgrade but figured it might not be.

I knelt in front of the altar and let the overly sweet smell of incense and the familiar scenes of the nativity and the crucifixion wash over me and do their dirty work. The most striking thing about beautiful churches, to me, is that they were mostly designed by people who were inspired by a belief in something larger and more important than themselves, and this is how I try to lead my own life. I gazed up at the altar, and a sigh escaped my lips. As far as God goes, I believe. It's as simple as that and always has been. I guess I feel it's a little odd, or presumptuous, to imagine that God thinks as we do; or that God has a big, kind human face; or that God is white, brown, black, yellow, green, whatever; or that God listens to our prayers at all times of the day or night, or anytime at all.

But I said a few prayers for Kayla in the front row of St. Tony's – asking not just that she would survive her wounds but that she would mend in other important ways. People react differently to life-threatening attacks on their persons, on their family members, on their homes. I know about that firsthand. And now, unfortunately, so did Kayla.

While I was in a prayerful mood, I said some private words for Maria, who had been in my thoughts so much lately.

I even talked to Maria, whatever that means. I hoped she liked the way I was raising the kids – a frequent subject between us. Then I said a prayer for Nana Mama and her fragile health; prayers for the kids; and even a few words for Rosie the Cat, who had been suffering from a severe cold, which I was afraid might be pneumonia. Don't let our cat die. Not now. Rosie is good people too.

Chapter 79

THE BUTCHER WAS in Georgetown to let off a little pent-up steam – otherwise things might not go so well when he got back to Caitlin and the kiddies, to his life on the straight and narrow. Actually, he had learned a long time ago that he enjoyed living a double life. Who the hell wouldn't?

Maybe another game of Red Light, Green Light was in order today. Why not? His war with Junior Maggione was creating a lot of stress for him.

The 3000 block of Q Street, where he walked briskly now, was nicely tree-lined and dominated by attractive town-houses and even larger manorlike homes. It was mostly an upscale residential area, and the parked cars spoke to the social status and tastes of those who lived here: several Mercedes, a Range Rover, a BMW, an Aston Martin, a shiny new Bentley or two.

For the most part, pedestrian traffic was limited to those entering and leaving their homes. Good deal for his purposes today. He had on earphones and was listening to a band from Scotland that he liked, Franz Ferdinand. Finally, though, he turned off the music and got serious.

At the redbrick home on the corner of Thirty-first and Q, some kind of elaborate dinner party was apparently being prepped for that evening. Assorted overpriced goodies were being transported from a stretch van marked "Georgetown Valet," and the faux gas lamps in front of the house were being tested by the yardmen. The lights seemed to work just fine. Twinkle, twinkle.

Then the Butcher heard the click-clack of a woman's high heels. The inviting, even intoxicating sound came from up ahead of him on the sidewalk, which was brick rather than pavement and wound through the neighborhood like a necklace laid out flat on a table.

Finally, he saw the woman from behind – a fine, shapely thing, with long black hair hanging halfway to her waist. An Irisher like himself? A pretty lassie? No way to tell for certain from the back view. But the chase was on. Soon he'd know as much as he wanted to about her. He felt he was already in control of her fate, that she belonged to him, to the Butcher, his powerful alter ego, or perhaps the real him. Who could say?

He was getting closer and closer to the raven-haired woman, checking out the narrow alleyways that ran behind some of the larger houses, the patches of woods, looking for a good spot – when he saw a store up ahead. What was this?

The only place of business he'd encountered for blocks. It almost seemed misplaced in the neighborhood.

Sarah's Market, said the sign out front.

And then the dark-haired beauty turned inside. "Curses – foiled," the Butcher whispered, and grinned and imagined twisting a villain's mustache. He loved this kind of game, this dangerous and provocative cat-and-mouse sort of thing in which he made up all the rules. But his smile instantly faded away – because he saw something else at this Sarah's Market, and that something else was not to his liking.

Newspapers were on display – copies of the Washington Post. And you know what? He suddenly remembered that Mr. Bob Woodward himself lived somewhere in the area – but that wasn't the sticky part.

His face was the problem, an approximation anyhow, a line drawing of the Butcher that wasn't half-bad. It was situated above the fold of the daily news, right where it shouldn't be.

"My God, I'm famous."

Chapter 80

THIS WAS NO LAUGHING MATTER, though, and Michael Sullivan quickly made his way back to where he'd parked on Q Street. Actually, what had happened was just about the worst development he could imagine. Nothing much seemed to be going his way lately.

He sat and calmly pondered the unfortunate situation in the front seat of his Cadillac.

He thought about the likely "suspects," about the woman who must have told tales out of school about him. Possibly given the police a description. He considered that he was being attacked from a couple of sides at once, by the Washington police and the Mafia. What to do, what to do?

When a partial solution came, it was satisfying and even exhilarating, because it felt like a new game to him. Another twist of the dial.

The DC police thought that they knew what he looked like, which could be serious trouble but might also make them sloppy and even overconfident.

Mistake.

Theirs.

Especially if he made the proper countermoves right now, which he definitely planned to do. But what, exactly, were those defensive actions he needed to take?

The first step took him to Wisconsin Avenue, near Blues Alley – right where he remembered the small shop to be. A barber named Rudy had a chair open for him in midafternoon, so Sullivan settled in for a haircut and shave.

It was relaxing and mildly enjoyable actually, wondering what he'd look like afterward, whether he'd like the new him.

Another ten to twelve minutes and the deed was done. Take off the bandages, Dr. Frankenstein. The smallish, rotund barber seemed pleased with himself.

If you messed up, you're dead. I'm not kidding, Rudy, the Butcher thought to himself. I'll cut you to ribbons with your own straight razor. See what the Washington Post has to say about that!

But, hey! "Not so bad. I sort of like it. Think I look a little like Bono."

"Sonny and Cher – that Bono?" asked Rudy the Dense. "I don't know about that, mister. I think you better lookin' than Sonny Bono. He's dead, you know?"

"Whatever," said Sullivan, and paid his tab, gave the barber a tip, and got the hell out of there.

Next, he drove over to the Capitol Hill neighborhood in DC.

He'd always liked the area, found it a turn-on. Most people's image of the Capitol was the graceful steps and terraces of the west facade. But on the east side, behind the Capitol and the Supreme Court and Library of Congress buildings, was a bustling residential neighborhood that he knew fairly well. I've passed this way before.

The Butcher walked through Lincoln Park, which had an exceptional view of the Capitol dome now that the leaves were falling away.

He smoked a cigarette and reviewed his plan in front of the somewhat bizarre Emancipation Memorial, which featured a slave breaking out of chains while Lincoln read the Emancipation Proclamation.

Lincoln, a good man by most accounts. Myself, a very bad man. Wonder how that happens? he wondered.

A few minutes later, he was breaking in to a house on C Street. He just knew this was the bitch who had talked about him. He felt it in his bones, in his blood. And soon, he'd know for sure.

He found Mena Sunderland tucked away in her adorable little kitchen. She was dressed in jeans, an immaculate white tee, scuffed-up clogs, making pasta for one while she sipped a glass of red wine. Cute as a button, he thought to himself.

"Did you miss me, Mena? I missed you. And you know what? I almost forgot how pretty you are."

But I won't forget you again, darling girl. I brought a camera to take your picture this time. You're going to he in my prize photo collection after all. Oh, yes you are!

And he gave her the first cut with his scalpel.

Chapter 81

I WAS STILL INSIDE the church when my cell phone went off, and it was trouble near the Capitol. I said a quick prayer for whoever was in jeopardy, and a prayer that we would catch the killer-rapist soon. Then I left St. Anthony's on the run.

Sampson and I rushed to the neighborhood behind the Capitol building in his car with the siren blaring, lights flashing on the rooftop. Yellow crime-scene tape was strung up everywhere by the time we arrived. The scene, the backdrop of important government buildings, couldn't have been more dramatic, I thought, as Sampson and I hurried up the four stone front steps of a brownstone.

Is he putting on a show for us? Is he doing it on purpose? Or did it just happen this way?

I heard a car alarm whining and glanced back toward the street. What a strange, curious sight: police, news reporters, a growing crowd of looky-loos.

Fear was plainly stamped on many of the faces, and I couldn't help thinking that this was a familiar tableau of the age, this look of fear, this terrible state of fear that the whole country seemed to be caught up in – maybe the entire world was afraid right now.

Unfortunately, it was even worse inside the brownstone. The crime scene was already being tightly controlled by somber-faced homicide detectives and techies, but Sampson was let inside. He overrode a sergeant's objections and brought me along.

Into the kitchen we went.

The unthinkable murder scene.

The killer's workshop.

I saw poor Mena Sunderland where she lay on the reddish-brown tile floor. Her eyes were rolled back to the whites, and they seemed pinned to a point on the ceiling. But Mena's eyes weren't the first thing I noticed. Oh, what a bastard this killer was.

A carving knife was stuck in her throat, poised like a deadly stake. There were multiple wounds on the face, deep, unnecessarily vicious cuts. Her top, a white tee, had been torn away. Her jeans and panties had been pulled down around the ankles but hadn't been stripped off. One of her shoes was on, one off, a pale-blue clog lying on its side in blood.

Sampson looked at me. "Alex, what are you getting? Tell me."

"Not much. Not so far. I don't think he bothered to rape her," I said.

"Why? He pulled down her pants."

I knelt over Mena's body. "Nature of the wounds. All this blood. The disfigurement. He was too angry at her. He told her not to talk to us, and she disobeyed him. That's what this is about. I think so. We might have gotten her killed, John."

Sampson reacted angrily. "Alex, we told her not to come back here yet. We offered her surveillance, protection. What more could we do?"

I shook my head. "Left her alone maybe. Caught the killer before he got to her. Something else, John – anything but this."

Chapter 82

SO NOW WE WERE INVESTIGATING the case for Mena Sunderland, too, in her memory – at least that was what I told myself, that was my rationalization. This was for Maria Cross, and Mena Sunderland, and all the others.

For the next three days I worked closely with Sampson during the day and then went out on the street with him at night. Our night shift usually took place from ten until around two. We were part of the task force patrolling Georgetown and Foggy Bottom, areas where the rapist-killer had struck before. Emotions were running high, but no one wanted him more than I did.

Still, I was trying my best to keep the very tense investigation in some kind of perspective and control. Almost every night, I managed to have dinner with Nana and the kids. I checked in with Kayla Coles in North Carolina, and she sounded better. I also conducted half a dozen sessions with my patients, including Kim Stafford, who was coming to see me twice a week and maybe even making some progress. Her fiance had never mentioned our "talk" to her.

My morning ritual included grabbing a coffee at the Starbucks, which was right in my building, or at the Au Bon Pain on the corner of Indiana and Sixth. The problem with Au Bon Pain was that I liked their pastries too much, so I had to stay clear of the place as much as I could.

Kim was my favorite patient. Therapists usually have favorites, no matter how much they rationalize that they don't. "Remember, I told you that Jason wasn't such a bad guy?" she said about fifteen minutes into our session one morning. I remembered, and I also recalled cleaning his clock pretty good at the station house where he worked.

"Well, he was pure, unadulterated garbage, Dr. Cross. I've figured that much out. Took me a lot longer than it should have."

I nodded and waited for more to come. I knew exactly what I wanted to hear from her next.

"I moved out on him. I waited until he went to work, then I left. The truth? I'm scared to death. But I did what I had to do."

She got up and went to the window, which looked out onto Judiciary Square. You could also see the US District Courthouse from my place.

"How long have you been married?" she asked, glancing at the ring I still wore on my left hand.

"I was married. I'm not anymore." I told her a little about Maria, about what had happened more than ten years before – the abridged version, the unsentimental one.

"I'm sorry," she said when I was through. There were tears in her eyes, the last thing I'd wanted. That morning, we got through a couple of rough patches, made some progress. Then a strange thing happened – she shook my hand before she left. "You're a good person," she said. "Good-bye, Dr. Cross."

And I thought that I might have just lost a patient – my first – because I'd done a good job.

Chapter 83

WHAT HAPPENED THAT NIGHT blew my mind. Actually, everything had been really good about the night, until it went bad. I had treated Nana and the kids to a special dinner at Kinkead's, near the White House on Pennsylvania Avenue, our favorite restaurant in Washington. The great jazzman Hilton Fenton came over to our table and told us a funny story about the actor Morgan Freeman. Back at home, I climbed the steep wooden stairs to my office in the attic, cursing the steps under my breath, one by one.

I put on some Sam Cooke, starting with a popular favorite, "You Send Me." Then I pored over old DC police files from the time of Maria's murder – hundreds of pages.

I was looking for unsolved rape cases from back then, particularly ones that had occurred in Southeast or nearby. I worked intently and listened to the music, and was surprised when I looked at my watch and saw that it was ten past three. Some interesting things had surfaced in the files from the serial case I'd remembered was going on around the same time Maria died.

In fact, the rapes had started a few weeks before Maria was shot and ended just after the murder. They never started up again. Which meant what – that the rapist might have been a visitor to Washington?

Even more interesting to me, there were no IDs of the rapist from any of the victimized women. They had received medical attention but refused to talk to the police about what had happened to them. It didn't substantiate anything, but it kept me flipping through more pages.

I went over several more transcripts and still found no IDs from the victims.

Could it be a coincidence? I doubted it. I kept reading.

Then I was stopped cold by a page in the police notes. A name and more information jumped out at me.

Maria Cross.

Social worker at Potomac Gardens.

A Detective Alvin Hightower, whom I had vaguely known back then – I was pretty sure he was dead now – had written a workup on the rape of a college girl from George Washington University. The attack took place inside a bar on M Street.

As I continued to read, I was having a hard time breathing. I was remembering a conversation that I'd had with Maria a couple of days before she died. It was about a case she was working on, about a girl who'd been raped.

According to the detective's report, the coed had given some kind of description of the rapist to a social worker – Maria Cross. He was a white male, a little over six foot, possibly from New York. When he had finished with the girl he had taken a little bow.

My fingers shaking, I turned the page and checked the date of the initial report. And there it was – the day before Maria was murdered.

And the rapist?

The Butcher. The mob killer we'd been tracking. I remembered his rooftop bow, his unexplainable visit to my house.

The Butcher.

I would bet my life on it.