Charade (32 page)

"I think she loves her son very much. But she lives in fear of Cyclops." "When he smacked her--" "I wish you'd pulverized him." He took his eyes off the road long enough to give her a surprised glance. "This coming from you, who accused me of shooting first and asking questions later. Which way do you prefer it? Make up your mind." "Don't start, Alex. I've had my share of unpleasant encounters this afternoon. I need some time in my corner before going another round with you." "You must be tired. I've never known you to give in so easily." Kismet and Cyclops lived in a community southeast of San Antonio. It was a half-hour drive, most of which Cat spent staring sightlessly through the windshield. By the time they reached the city, dusk had fallen. Lights were coming on in homes and commercial buildings. Neon signs beckoned customers into restaurants and movie theaters. "I wish I had no bigger problem than deciding which movie I wanted to see tonight," she said. "You're in a funk." "I have a right to be, don't I? We tracked down Cyclops but aren't any closer to finding my stalker." "You don't think it's George Baby?" "Do you?" "I want it to be, but I don't think it is." "Why do you want it to be, and why don't you think it is?" "I want it to be because I'd love to nail that bastard's ass. He's a felony waiting to happen. Sooner or later he's going to wind up in Huntsville prison for a long stay. I'd rather it be before he hurts someone, particularly Michael. "Second, I want this to be over for your sake. I want you to be able to sleep nights without worrying about whether you'll live to see tomorrow." "Gee, thanks for cheering me up and boosting my morale." After a moment she asked again, "Why don't you think it's Cyclops?" "He's too stupid, for one thing. This is a complex scheme, well

plotted and well executed by someone with brains and patience. Cyclops has neither." "You're probably right, but let's play devil's advocate and pretend that it's a distinct possibility. Cyclops lives hand-to-mouth, so taking to the road for unspecified periods of time wouldn't pose any problems for him." "With Kismet and Michael in tow?" he asked. "I suppose not. Besides, we've determined that my stalker gets close to his victims. No one in his right mind would let Cyclops get close." "What about the woman? Maybe she acts as a lure to draw the victims in. Wins their confidence, perhaps their pity. Cyclops ices them." Cat shot down that hypothesis with a firm shake of her head. "I don't think her self-effacement is a pose. She didn't strike me as conniving. Besides, Petey told us she was in love with Sparky. What reason would she have to want to stop his heart? I got the impression she's still in love with him, didn't you?" "Yeah. And Cyc doesn't like it." "So if he was jealous of Sparky when he was alive--" "He could still be jealous. Kismet is carrying a torch even this long after Sparky's death," Alex said, completing her thought. "He's not yet rid of his competitor." "His old lady's still hung up on the short little guy who bested him not only in bed but in a knife fight. So he's out for revenge, bumping off anybody who might have gotten Sparky's heart." She looked at him expectantly, as if they'd just discovered the cure for cancer. But her bubble of excitement burst quickly. "That brings us back to how he weaseled his way into the lives of those three victims. Cyclops isn't exactly the type to blend in. If someone close to him dies mysteriously, he's going to come under suspicion." She gave a defeated sigh. "God, who could have dreamed that because I received a donor heart, I'd have a psychopath on my tail? And you want to know something really funny? Funny in the ironic sense, that is." She flattened her hand over her chest. "I never wanted to be treated in any special way because I was a heart transplantee."

"It does make you somewhat unique," he reminded her gently. "But I don't ask for preferential treatment because of it. I want people to forget that I don't have the heart I was born with. Instead, that seems to be the only thing anyone thinks about when they're with me." The guard at the WWSA employee parking lot recognized Alex's car this time and waved at them as they drove through the gate. He was smiling cagily, as if he were a key player in a romantic intrigue. Alex cut the engine and turned to her. "That's not all I think about when I'm with you, Cat. Not by a long shot." She resisted the allure of his closeness by cracking a joke. "You aren't going to rhapsodize on my hair and eyes and lips, are you?" "If you like. Or I could get more carnal and wax poetic about the erogenous zones of your body, which on you include everything covered by skin. I know from experience." It was an arrogant boast, yet it coaxed a purling response deep inside her. She strove to ignore it. "Save the lurid lingo for your novels. I'd hate you to waste all that soft-core dialogue on me." He grinned. "I think you like it." "What?" "The soft-core dialogue." She had vivid recollections of his whispers in her ear a few nights ago. Before she could be seduced by it again, she opened the car door. "Thank you for finding Cyclops." "I plan to do some more investigating before we write him off." "Let me know if anything turns up. Good night, Alex." "Cat?" She looked at him over her shoulder. He seemed to be at odds with himself over whether to voice his thoughts. Finally he said simply, "Good night." They went their separate ways. She drove home, her emotions conflicted. He could have tried a little harder to wear down her defenses. She still would have said no, but he could have put forth more effort to persuade her to spend the night with him. Her mind continued to grumble about it as she prepared for bed. She had just stepped out of the shower when her doorbell rang. He had followed her home after all!

Belting her terrycloth robe, she quickly made her way through the house to the front door. Anticipation coursed through her like a fizzy wine. Her nerve ends were tingling. But when she peered through the blinds, expecting to see Alex, she had a nasty shock.

Chapter forty-two

"What do you want, Mr. Murphy?" "I want to talk to you," Cyclops said. "Open the door." She forced a laugh. "I'm not opening my door to you." "If I want to come inside, there's not a fucking thing you can do to stop me. So why don't you save your door from getting trashed?" "If you don't leave immediately, I'll call the police." "You do, and the kid'll suffer for it." She pressed her forehead against the door. It would be lunacy to open her door to him in the middle of the night, but as he'd pointed out, if he wanted to come in, a locked door wouldn't stop him. Obviously he had followed her home from the TV station. How else would he know where she lived? Unless he'd been sending mail to her address for the past two months. Either way, why was she debating with herself over whether to let him in? Why didn't she race for the phone and dial 911 in the hope that help would arrive before he could inflict much damage? Michael, that's why. She didn't doubt for a second that Cyclops would make good his threat. Kismet might not be entirely innocent,

but the child certainly was. It might be too late to save her, but Michael was worth putting up a fight for. She unlocked the door and opened it. He was physically imposing. Alex had been either awfully brave or awfully stupid to fight him. She tried not to quail from his size and his body odor as he pushed her aside and stamped into the entry. He turned his head this way and that, taking in his surroundings. There was a crystal bowl filled with potpourri on the hall table. He lifted it to his nose and sniffed. "It's nothing you can smoke," Cat remarked. He flashed a reptilian grin. "That's funny." Still grinning, he returned the bowl to the table. "So this is how TV stars live. Classy. A lot better than the pigsty I share with my old lady and kid, huh?" Cat declined to agree with the obvious. "What are you doing here at this time of night, Mr. Murphy? What's so urgent that you have to see me now?" He strolled into the living room and threw himself onto her white sofa, planting his boots on the matching ottoman. "Hey, chill, okay? You came to see me first, remember? You started this, not me." "Started what?" "This shit about Sparky. I hadn't thought of that little runt in years, then you came along with your cop friend in his fancy car and stirred up a bunch of shit about him." He snickered as his good eye traveled up and down her body. "Sparky's asshole was no higher off the ground than yours." He made her skin crawl. She felt particularly vulnerable standing before him wearing only her bathrobe. Which of the house phones would be easiest to reach from this room? How quickly could she dial 911? Was there a sturdy lock on her bedroom door? She didn't know. She'd never needed it before. She called upon her acting skills to conceal her fear. "You're wrong about Mr. Pierce. He's not a cop." He guffawed. "Who do you think you're bullshitting, lady?" "I defer to your superior knowledge of policemen," she said beneath her breath, then left it alone. "Furthermore, why should it bother you that we asked a few questions about your friend Sparky?" "Wasn't no friend of mine."

"So what do you care?" "I don't. But it got me to thinking." That must have been a stretch. "About what?" she asked. He toyed with a silver button on his leather vest. "You think you got the little cocksucker's heart, right?" "It's a possibility. But unless you came here tonight to confess to three murders, and to making threats to me through the mail, I don't see what concern it is of yours. So why don't you take your filthy feet off my furniture and get the hell out of my house?" He winked at her with his good eye. "You're a regular chili pepper, aren't you, Red? You got a real smart mouth on you. Do you fuck as fiery as you talk?" If she allowed him to provoke her, she would be playing right into his dirty hands. Instead, she folded her arms at her waist and tried to appear bored. "It's late, Mr. Murphy. Please state your business and leave." He laid his head back on the pillows of the sofa, repositioned his feet on the ottoman, and nestled his butt deeper into the seat cushions. She would have to burn that furniture. "The little bastard's not mine." "Pardon?" Grinning in his mean, sinister way, he repeated, "Kismet's bastard's not my kid. Sparky knocked her up." Concern for her furniture vanished along with her fear. Mindlessly, she sat down on the arm of an overstuffed chair. "You're not Michael's father?" "Ain't that what I just said?" "Sparky was his father." "Yeah. It's a wonder Kismet didn't slip the kid after that accident, the way she was banged up and all. Been a hell of a lot better for me if she had, but the little sucker held on. Eight months after Sparky was wasted, his bastard was born." Cat's mind was racing ahead of him now. She didn't need him to tell her the significance of this, but he did anyway. "After you left, the kid jabbered 'bout seeing you at some picnic. He seemed real taken with you. Just like you are with him." His

earring swung away from his cheek as he cocked his head and pretended to ponder life's mysteries. "Now I wonder why that is?" Maybe he was more clever than she and Alex had given him credit for. It was frightening to think that his level of intelligence could equal that of his meanness. "I don't know what you're getting at," she lied. "The hell you don't," he said around a chuckle. "It ain't no accident that you and that spooky little dickweed hit it off. You got his daddy's heart. You . . . uh, what's a good word? You connected with the kid. Like kindred spirits. Karma and shit." Michael's picture in Sherry's files had indeed had an inexplicable impact on her. Or was it inexplicable? "I don't know for certain that I got Sparky's heart," she said huskily. "I'm saying you did." "Say whatever you like." She stood to signal that his visit had come to an end. "But say it someplace else. Now that you've imparted your message, I don't think there's anything left for us to talk about." "Well, that's where you're wrong, see? We got a lot to talk about." "Such as?" "Money." That was the last thing she'd expected him to say. "What money?" "The money you owe me." She plopped back down onto the chair arm and regarded him with incredulity. "I'm not following you." "Then let me spell it out for you. If Sparky had lived, he'd've had to put up with all the crap I've had to put up with. I took his kid and raised him--" "Out of the goodness of your heart," she inserted sarcastically. "Damn straight." This time it was she who guffawed. "You took Michael because he came with Kismet, and you wanted her back after Sparky died. Not because you loved her, but because you couldn't tolerate being passed over for another man. You've been punishing her for it ever since." He kicked aside the ottoman and surged to his feet. "The goddamn cunt begged me to take her back."

Cat forced herself not to recoil. He was a bully, and, like all bullies, he relished seeing fear in the eyes of his victims. He might slit her throat--or cut out her heart--with the knife sheathed in his belt, but she wouldn't give him the satisfaction of seeing her cowed. "I've put up with her and her whelp for four stinking years," he said. "The way I see it, I got something coming to me for that." "I don't think you really want what you've got coming to you." "Listen, bitch." He poked her in the chest with his index finger. "You'd have died if it weren't for me. I told that doctor he could take Sparky's heart. You'd be history if I'd said no." "That may or may not be true." "I say it is. I want something in return for saving your skinny ass." "Ah. Here's where the money part comes in." "Now you're catching on." "You want me to pay you for my heart?" His narrow lips parted in a slow, sly grin. He reached out and yanked hard on a strand of her hair. "Knew the minute I clapped eyes on you, you were a smart chick."

Chapter forty three

Alex was charged. His creative juices weren't just flowing, they were spurting. His fingers couldn't move as rapidly as his brain fired signals, but he could live with that frustration as long as the words kept coming. He'd finally shaken off the mind-numbing writer's block. He was back on track, better than before. As the clauses and phrases streaked through his mind, he transferred them to his computer screen. The telephone rang. "Son of a bitch." He tried to ignore the intrusive ringing and continued to type. At this time of night it would probably be a wrong number anyway. Or Arnie. Arnie called every day or so to ask if he was still seeing Cat. When he said yes--he couldn't lie to his agent--he got a lecture on borrowing trouble. The phone rang again. Don't stop, he ordered himself. Get this sentence down before it escapes you. If you stop now, it'II be gone forever. It'll disappear into that vast void that sucks in precise words and inspired phrases right after they