CUTTING ROOM -THE- (23 page)

As much as she'd tried to tell herself over the past week that Bill Bantling was just another defendant, that this was just another interview, she knew now she'd been fooling herself. Her knees had never before shaken when a subject simply entered the room. Her heart had never pounded so hard in her chest, her skin gone clammy. Maybe it was his reputation that chilled the air — knowing what those chained hands had done to his victims before they'd finally, mercifully, died — but the creepy feeling that raised the hairs on the back of her neck was almost supernatural. She was surely in the presence of evil.

‘Normally we unlock them if they're gonna be meeting with their attorneys, but considering who this guy is, we don't ever take off the restraints outside his cell, 'cept for the shower, of course,' Tru Zeffers announced, looking purposely over at Daria when he did. ‘Call me when you're done. Or sooner, if ya need to.'

‘Detective Alvarez,' Bantling began pleasantly enough after the cell door had shut. ‘It's been a real long time.' Although he was addressing Manny, his eyes had not yet left Daria.

‘Yes, it has. I'm over here, Bill,' Manny answered, waving a paw in Bantling's direction.

‘Who's your new friend?' Bantling asked.

‘My name is Daria DeBianchi. I'm a prosecutor with the Miami-Dade State Attorney's Office.'

Bantling's blue eyes crackled to life. ‘DeBianchi, hmmm? I don't think I've heard your name before. But then again, you're so … young.'

‘Let me tell you why we're here,' Manny started.

‘Please do. As you can see, I'm glued to my seat, waiting on your every word, Detective Alvarez. Nowhere to go, so don't be boring.'

‘Do you remember the last time we spoke?'

‘It's been some time.'

‘It has. Several years. You told me about a club you were once a member of. A snuff club, you called it. Do you remember that conversation, Bill?'

‘Perhaps.'

‘I want to talk to you about that club.'

‘Really?'

‘Yes.'

‘Well, I guess you can talk to me about anything you want, Detective Alvarez. But that doesn't mean I'll tell you anything. As for club memberships, I will say that I'm not much of a joiner nowadays. I don't get out too often. About once a year I take a mini-vacation down to the basement of this facility for a week or so. They call that Death Watch, Detective. It's a larger cell, better food. The view …' Bantling shook his head. ‘Not so good. Then my attorneys pull off what they like to call another miracle and I move back upstairs. “Dodged another bullet, Bill,” those attorneys always say. “More like a needle,” I always reply.'

‘You said this club was headed up, or run by, Gregory Chambers.'

‘Ooh … a name I really don't like to hear. Hope he's finding hell hot enough.'

‘What was your relationship with Dr Chambers, Bill?'

‘Initially? Therapeutic. He was supposed to cure me of my nasty thoughts. Instead, he gave me some great ideas.'

‘How long were you a patient of his?'

‘Long enough to figure out he was sicker than me.'

‘When did the relationship change? When did Dr Chambers bring this club he was a member of to your attention?'

Bantling didn't respond.

‘How did he tell you about it? How did it operate? Did you ever see the other members?'

‘That's a million-dollar question.' His eyes were still glued on Daria. His chained hands were in his lap. She saw that they were moving. She shifted in her seat and looked away.

‘I need to know if it's still operating,' Manny asked.

‘You mean is it still up and running without the real Cupid there to hold down the fort? Now that Greg Chambers is among the not-so-dearly departed, did the group he loved to show off his illustrious talents to disband? There is a point to your questions, right? You know, you had an opportunity a few years ago to find out all you wanted to know, but you chose not to listen. You chose to walk away. And I haven't heard from you since. Not a note, not a visit. Nothing. What's it been, Detective? Five years? Six? No, I'll tell you, it's been
seven
years.
Seven
years. That's how long ago I was shipped back to this hellhole to die for crimes I did not commit. You walked out on me because you didn't want to hear it. Because it was
inconvenient
for you to know such things, because then you'd have no choice but to see the ugly truths about your special agent friend Falconetti and his not-so lovely bride, Chloe. Or is it C.J.? What alias is the little minx using nowadays? Or should I say, hiding behind? I hear that she's no longer with the office. No longer putting innocent men on death row. That's a relief.'

‘No matter what you tell me today, innocent is not a word that is any way associated with the likes of you, Bill. You want to put your hands back on the table for me, please?'

Bantling smiled and complied. The chains landed on the metal with a loud bang. ‘I thought perhaps you'd brought Chloe by today for a visit. Nothing against the company you're keeping, Detective Alvarez,' he said nodding at Daria. ‘See, if you'd listened to me back then, you'd have seen the scheme the two of them, Agent Falconetti and his bride, concocted to pump me full of poison and put me in the ground. And of course, then you'd have
known
that they were both guilty of multiple felonies. Felonies that would've sent the pair of them to prison for the rest of their lives. But you knew you'd have to slap the cuffs on your very own pals if you asked all the right questions, so you didn't. You didn't ask any. Not back then.'

Manny tapped a finger on the table. ‘Two juries convicted you on two separate occasions. Both voted unanimously for death. The appellate courts have listened to your arguments, and still, here you sit on death row.'

‘Well, there's an interesting twist to that, too, Detective. But the years have flown by and now, here you are with your very pretty companion as a distraction, asking me for information while I stare at her lovely face and get lost in those beautiful eyes, thinking of all the things I would love to do to her if only someone would take these chains off of me and put them on her.'

Daria looked away again.

‘I'm a smart man, Detective,' Bantling continued. ‘Using those smarts that I've been genetically blessed with, I'll venture a guess and say that you and your lovely, distracting assistant are here on
another
case. One that you fear may be related to what I told you a long time ago.'

There was no sense lying. Manny nodded. ‘We are investigating another murder. Murders, actually. They all look connected, but the perpetrators may be different.'

Bantling slapped his palms on the chair arms. ‘Hot damn! I knew it!'

‘Now I am listening, Bill. If you have information you'd like to share. No matter what that information is or who it might implicate.'

Bantling put a finger to his lips. ‘You know in here there's a saying, Detective. “Everything for a price.” Cigarettes, dope, sex, favors … That applies to this situation as well.'

‘What are you proposing? What do you want?' Daria interjected.

Manny looked over at her.

‘She speaks,' Bantling said, grinning. ‘I've been unjustly entombed in this concrete and steel coffin for the past decade, biding my time, waiting to be lowered into the ground, Miss Prosecutor; I'm in no mood to be charitable. So be prepared to take out the prosecutorial checkbook. I know what you want, Detective Alvarez. I'm also aware that you would not be coming to me, groveling for information, if you had any other source. I am the absolute last resort. And
that
tells me that you two really, really need to know what it is I know. It tells me you're desperate. It tells me that there are more than a couple of murders. So, go check out your nasty crime-scene photos and look at all those dead, pretty faces snuffed out years before their time, and think what it is
you're
willing to do for
me
. Then come back and we'll talk. But don't bother if you're not going to make me a really good offer. I want out. In exchange for that, I'll give you names. Lots and lots of names. Enough names to keep both your offices busy for years to come.'

‘Out?' Manny scoffed. ‘Never happening.'

‘So it exists, this club. Still?' Daria asked excitedly.

Bantling smiled and motioned his hand across his lips, as if zipping them shut.

Like Talbot Lunders, Bantling was a good-looking man, even in middle age — chiseled face, strong jaw, defined cheekbones. He still had all his hair, although the blond had mostly turned to gray. His smooth skin was sallow from being indoors for so many years, deprived of sunlight, and he was definitely thinner than how she remembered him from TV coverage of the trial, but he was still in great shape. His bulging forearms, thick neck, and tapered waist were not hidden by his prison-issue garb. Daria found his good looks, his tight body, his charming grin, frightening — just as she had with Talbot Lunders. Probably because, in and of itself, good looks were disarming. Both men had used their comeliness as an efficient, deadly weapon, luring women to their side, right out of busy clubs and bars, right into their cars and lairs without a backward glance. It wasn't that Daria thought good-looking people couldn't commit crimes, it was more the fact that not one but
two
better-than-averagely handsome men had been charged with atypically brutal, misogynistic crimes that was troubling. It went against her own ultra-suspicious instincts. Either man could have almost any woman he wanted. Both men had money in the bank. If either of them had tried to pick her up in a bar or a library she'd have gone willingly, too. In addition to frightening the shit out of her, that fact totally pissed her off.

‘Don't think, Mr Bantling, that I'm going to walk in here next week with the keys to your cage simply because a convicted serial murderer tells me to trust him. You may think I'm stupid because I'm a woman, but let me assure you, I'm not. Tell me how it works, this club, or we're not coming back at all. And then you can tell all the nasty stories you want about your former fellow clubbies to your neighbors on the block. Maybe they'll give a shit. Maybe they'll be smart enough to give me a call so I can work with them on their own sentences.'

Bantling's eyes narrowed. ‘Feisty. Detective Alvarez, do you let her speak to you this way?'

‘You heard me,' she said.

‘They're the fun ones.'

‘Not in the mood to chat?' She reached for her briefcase and stood up, hoping he would not see her knees shake when she did. She had to get out of this place. ‘I'm not going to stand here while you size me up for lunch. I know who you are and I know exactly what you're capable of.'

Bantling's pallid face turned beet red. ‘You have no idea what I am fucking capable of, lady,' he hissed. ‘Not a clue.' He pulled at his cuffs as he leaned toward her in the chair. ‘Or else you'd know that I've been railroaded into this hell by a manipulative, pretty little bitch just like yourself. Another woman who thought she was so damn smart. That she could play me and this system you call justice. But I'm still here, aren't I, Detective Alvarez? Alive and kicking.' He pulled at his leg irons and they jangled menacingly. ‘I'm not going away, either.'

Daria backed up and stumbled over her chair. It fell to the concrete floor with a hair-raising screech.

Manny stood up and moved to help her.

‘In your seat, Bantling!' squawked Tru Zeffers over the intercom. His scratchy, drawl filled the small space. He was obviously monitoring the room via one of the surveillance cameras.

Bantling leaned back in his chair. ‘Karma's a bitch, Ms Prosecutor. It takes a while to come around sometimes, but personally I've found that it always does. Always. So you better watch yourself.'

Daria brushed Manny's offer of help away and picked up the chair. She waved at the camera in the corner to indicate she was okay.

‘Let's not beat around the bush,' Manny barked. ‘Answer the questions and we'll be gone. Maybe get you some more channels on your TV if you play nice. Maybe more if you have some decent information. What I want to know is how does this snuff club work? How do the members get in touch with one another? How do they find victims? Are the victims consenting in some way?'

‘Subtlety was never your style, Detective Alvarez,' Bantling answered, shaking his head. ‘It's all just a game.'

‘Game? This is a
game
?'

‘Every game needs players,' Bantling continued, cryptically. ‘Einstein once said, “First you have to learn the rules of the game. Then you have to play better than anyone else.” He was such a smart man, that Einstein. Split the atom, right? Helped develop the first nuclear bomb, right? The mother-bomb that brought about peace by killing hundreds of thousands of people. But a game is nothing if no one wants to watch it, right? The coliseum was built because thousands of Romans wanted to see the lions gut those Christians. And you don't fill stadium seats with scabs. It's the Derek Jeters and Michael Jordans that people want to spend their hard-earned money to come watch. Of course, finding talent worthy of competing with the Jeters and Jordans is very hard to find. Sometime scouts have to search through literally hundreds of faces to find that one perfect face.' He turned to Daria. ‘Here's your bone, Miss DeBianchi, to show you that I am, indeed, someone you can trust. The word of the day is Lepidus.'

‘Lepidus?' Manny repeated. ‘What's that?'

‘Lepidus?' Daria echoed. ‘I know that name from somewhere.'

Bantling nodded. ‘You should.'

‘Wait — Lepidus. Reinaldo Lepidus? Is that who you're talking about?' she asked.

Bantling smiled. ‘Quick.'