Alex Cross 5 - Pop Goes the Weasel

CHAPTER Eighty-Six

Act Two of the evening's performance. She stared at him with huge dark-brown eyes that looked like amber beads, the kind she bought at her swanky shops. She'd lost weight, but that made her sexier to him, more desperate. She wore navy walking shorts and an elegant pink silk T-shirt - but she also wore her pain.

'You hurt me like no one ever has before,' she whispered.

He held himself under control, play-acting, a truly award-winning performance. I'm fighting for my life. I swear, all I think about is killing myself. Haven't you heard anything I've said? Besides, do you want your picture all over the tabloids again? Don't you see? That's why I've been staying away from you.'

She laughed, bitterly, haughtily. 'It's going to happen anyway, when I testify. The photographers will be everywhere I go.'

Shafer shut his eyes. 'Well, that will be your chance to hurt me back, darling.'

She shook her head and frowned. 'You know I wouldn't do that. Oh, Geoff, why didn't you at least call? You're such a bastard.'

Shafer hung his head, the repentant bad boy. 'You know how close I was to the edge before all this happened. Now it's worse. Do you expect me to act like a responsible adult?'

She gave a wry smile. He saw a book on the hallway table behind her, Man and His Symbols. Carl Jung. How fitting. 'No, I suppose not, Geoff. What do you want? Drugs?'

'I need you. I want to hold you, Boo. That's all.'

That night, she gave him what he wanted. They made love like animals on the gray velvet loveseat she used for her clients, then on the JFK-style rocking chair, where she always sat for her sessions. He took her body, and her soul.

Then she gave him drugs - antidepressants, painkillers, most of her samples. Boo was still able to get the samples from her ex, a psychiatrist. Shafer didn't know what their relationship was, and frankly, he didn't care. He took some Librium and shot up Vicodin at her place.

Then he took Boo again, both of them naked and swearing and frenzied on the kitchen counter. The butcher's block, he thought.

He left her place around eleven. He realized he was feeling worse than before he'd gone there. But he knew what he was going to do. He'd known before he went to Boo's. It would explode their little minds. Everyone's. The press. The jury. Now for Act Three.