Fear the Night

56

Meg looked up from the sofa, where she’d been sitting watching but not seeing television with the sound off.

There was Amelia, back in the living room. Pretty college girl, showing some fear in her eyes. Meg thought it might be because the reality of the situation was catching up with her. Meg thought Amelia was that dangerous combination of young and nuts, not brave. In her place, Meg would have gotten as far away from New York and the Night Sniper as possible.

Amelia still looked a bit rumpled and disheveled from sleep, but this time she’d left the ice pack behind. She was wearing fluffy white slippers that made her feet look gigantic.

“Headache better?” Meg asked.

“Not much, and it’s constant. But I’m tired of lying around in the dark and waiting for it to go away.” Amelia’s gaze went to the silent TV. “Anything new?”

“New?”

“About the Night Sniper. You’re watching the news.”

“Oh! So I am. Not really, though. I was just sitting here thinking. Anyway, when there’s news on the Sniper, we should hear it before they do.” Meg nodded toward the anchorwoman mouthing silently on-screen.

“What were you thinking?” Amelia asked, wandering to the window and parting the drapes slightly so she could peer out.

“How best to keep you safe. Uh, stay away from the window, please.”

Amelia let the drape fall back in place. “I just wanted to peek outside, to reassure myself there still was an outside.” She smiled. “I know I’m a pain in the ass. It’s just that I’m not the type to hole up and wait for something to blow over.”

“I understand,” Meg assured her. “Neither am I, but sometimes people like us have no choice. You’d rather be going about your business as usual, and I’d rather be clamping the cuffs on the sicko who’s causing all our problems.”

“Most of our problems, anyway.”

Meg wondered what she meant by that. What kind of problems could a beautiful twenty-one-year-old woman have, other than being stalked by a serial killer? “It’s gotta be tough for you. We all know that. Your dad sure knows it.”

“He worries too much about me. So does my mom.”

Meg looked closely at her. She didn’t appear to be kidding. Only because a stone-cold killer’s vowed to take your life. “That’s because they both know the danger. So do I. It’s real, Amelia, believe me.”

Amelia hesitated, then nodded. “Oh, I know it’s real, but … well, I guess I’m a fatalist.”

Or a dramatist. Or twenty-one years old. “You’re not afraid?”

“I’m terrified. That’s why the headache, I suspect. That’s why I close my eyes but can’t sleep. But at the same time, it’s all on a certain level, almost like a bad dream. There’s no way I can get my mind around the idea that somebody really wants me dead so much that he’d risk his own life in an attempt to kill me. And if he does, what are the chances of him actually getting through my assigned bodyguards like you?”

“On the level? There’s some possibility. You’re a cop’s daughter. You understand that there’s at least some chance he can bring it off.”

Meg almost instantly regretted her candidness. Whether she was a dramatist or not, for an instant terror shone through Amelia’s pale features; she was an inch away from losing her composure and becoming a sobbing, terrified victim.

“I’m plenty afraid,” Amelia said, “but I refuse to give in to panic.” She took a deep breath and her entire body trembled. “The truth is, I just want it to end. To be over.”

“That’s what he wants,” Meg said. There had been something disturbing in Amelia’s voice. And it struck Meg that maybe that was how it worked-the intended victim’s fear finally manifested itself in a perverse cooperation with the killer. “I guess I’m a fatalist.”

The Sniper would know that and how to use it.

She decided not to mention this disturbing insight to Amelia. But it could be a problem, this condition of fear and impatience, resulting in an eager kind of resignation that made the victim complicit in victimization. It could lead to a sort of deliberate, inviting carelessness.

“What I mean is, I want the tension to end, no matter how.”

Meg stared at her. No, you don’t. Not really.

Or do you?

She watched as Amelia began to pace.

Now that she was here, Weaver was even more impressed by Dante Vanya’s address. His apartment was in the Elliott Arms, a soaring structure of glass and steel rooted in three stories of pale stone, with a tinted glass front and a maroon-awninged entrance flanked by twisted green topiary in huge ceramic planters. It took a lot to intimidate Weaver, but as she crossed the street from her unmarked and gained the attention of a rigid, brightly uniformed doorman, she felt like saluting.

The man was well over six feet, with the body of a weight lifter even though he was graying and probably in his fifties. He smiled at Weaver, but surveyed her suspiciously with steel-blue eyes as he held open one of the tall, tinted doors for her.

The lobby was gray marble veined in red, the elevators discreetly hiding out of sight around a corner. Another uniformed man, this one not so grandly clad, sat in the recess of an angle of marble that was a reception desk. A tiny, decorative shaded lamp sat on one corner of the desk, looking out of place in such a vast, cool area.

This guy was also in his fifties, gray and paunchy, and resembled everybody’s kind uncle. Weaver relaxed and gained confidence, telling herself she wasn’t so crazy coming here.

The man smiled from behind the slab of marble that looked as if it had been lifted from a mausoleum one dark night and finely polished. “Help you?”

Weaver decided not to identify herself as police. Not yet.

“I’m here for Mr. Vanya.”

She was sure the man would ask her name, but he didn’t. He merely consulted a logbook on a lower shelf behind the marble.

He looked up at Weaver over half-lens reading glasses. “Not in, I’m afraid.”

“Is he expected back soon?”

“That I couldn’t say. He left about an hour ago.”

“I don’t suppose he mentioned where he was going?”

“No, ma’am. And we don’t ask.”

Weaver had her choice. She could identify herself as police and push the issue, but she still couldn’t get into Vanya’s apartment without a warrant. Or she could play it low profile, leave, and wait across the street in the car for Vanya to return. He might not choose tonight to try for Amelia Repetto, and when he returned home and Weaver tried again to see him, there was no reason he shouldn’t invite her up. Especially if she identified herself as on old friend of Adam Strong.

She chose the latter option. With a smile, she said, “It wasn’t important, anyway. I’ll drop by later.”

Back across the street, behind the wheel of the unmarked, she settled down to wait for men to enter who might be Dante Vanya. A photograph sure would have helped, but there hadn’t been any in the records, and she didn’t want to take time for a broader search.

She tried to get more comfortable, sitting there with her impatience and ambition and hunter’s blood. Probably Vanya had gone out to get a bite to eat, or meet someone for drinks. Maybe he’d even return home with a woman. That would sure make things interesting.

She gazed diagonally across the street at the Elliott Arms. The glass and steel entrance gleamed. The doorman stood at parade rest near one of the corkscrew yews.

Some digs, she thought again. There was no doubt Vanya was wealthy enough to be the rare weapons collector, or was at least able to obtain such rifles for his use. There was less and less doubt in Weaver’s mind that he was the Night Sniper.

Her way to a brighter future.

Her prey.

The car seemed to be closing in on her and smelled faintly of oil and musty upholstery. Weaver started the engine and turned on the air conditioner, even though the night was cooling down.

Across the street, a man in a tan raincoat and wearing a black beret nodded to the doorman and entered the Elliott Arms.

Not Vanya. Too old. She could tell not only by the fringe of white hair showing beneath the beret, but by the weary set of his narrow shoulders and unsteadiness of his stride.

A while later a woman and a small child entered. Then a man who was also too old to be Vanya.

Weaver yawned, but it wasn’t because she was tired. It was nerves.

Surely he’d be back within the next few hours. She could wait, but it wouldn’t be pleasant.

Waiting wasn’t her game. She was more the type to make something happen.