Shield of Justice (17 page)

Rebecca and Watts went upstairs to view the crime scene, but they didn’t expect to find much. CSI had already been there, and the charcoal residue of fingerprint powder lay like a pall over everything. An iron bedstead tilted on uneven legs in the center of a dingy room that had once been white. The mattress was thin and stained. There were no rugs on the worn wood floor and only a curtain remnant to block the view of a deserted building across the alley. A single bulb hung from a central ceiling fixture, its globe long broken. It was an empty, abandoned place, much like the people who used it for their hasty couplings. The oppressiveness of the room permeated their consciousness quickly, and they left after a rapid survey, neither of them speaking.

Once outside, Rebecca turned to Watts as he stood back against the building out of the wind, attempting to light a cigarette. His match kept blowing out. “That was a nice piece of work with Bailey, Watts,” she said. His questioning had been sharp, and they had worked well together.

His cigarette finally caught, and he took a deep drag. He didn’t acknowledge her remark as he started toward the car. “Guess we’ll have to start questioning all the hookers down here,” he commented, pulling open the door to his battered green Dodge sedan. “See if there’s a john around who likes girls in gym shorts.”

Rebecca nodded, her thoughts in tune with his. “It might be a coincidence, but it’s the only lead we’ve got. It wouldn’t be the first time a perp hit on the prostitutes when he couldn’t score elsewhere. It’s certainly better than cooling our heels, waiting for him to strike again.”

“Yeah. Beats doing callbacks on parking ticket violations, too. We’re not gonna catch this guy that easy.”

“I’ve got some contacts here. Let me chase this a while,” she proposed. “You can check with the Homicide guy who took the call and review the uniform’s first on-scene report. Maybe they talked to someone who saw something.”

Watts shrugged. “Suits me. I’m going to grab some lunch first.”

He didn’t invite her along, and Rebecca didn’t suggest they go together. She agreed to meet him at the station later to see what Bailey and the police artist had come up with. Maybe, finally, they had a break.

It was after eight p.m. and Catherine was exhausted. She had spent the afternoon at her office seeing private patients—five fifty-minute sessions with a scant ten minutes between to jot notes and clear her head before the next one arrived. Each patient expected her undivided attention and appropriately so. She loved her work, but there were times when it took all of her effort to stay connected and focused during a session.

Her workdays seemed to be getting longer despite her frequent resolutions to reduce her evening office hours. Since her teaching responsibilities at the medical school now included directing the psychiatric resident training program, as well as supervising the outpatient clinic
and
the inpatient service on a rotating basis with other staff psychiatrists, she had less time for private patients. Even as her personal time steadily disappeared, she constantly found herself making one more exception and adding yet another patient to her already crowded schedule. On days like today, though, she was glad to see the last patient leave.

As she pushed the stack of patient files into her brief case, the phone rang. She had told Joyce to leave a half an hour ago, so she was alone in the office. She stared at it as it rang again and decided to ignore it. The switchboard would pick it up in a few more rings, and if it was anything urgent, they would page her. Then it occurred to her that it might be Rebecca, and she snatched up the receiver.

“Hello,” she said, a hopeful anticipation in her voice.

“Dr. Rawlings?” a soft male voice inquired.

“Yes?” Catherine was disappointed and worked to hide it in her response.

“Is she feeling better now?” the voice continued.

Catherine frowned, annoyed and confused. “I’m sorry. Who is this?”

“I understand that she will be going home soon.”

“I don’t know to whom you’re referring,” Catherine said carefully. Something in the caller’s oddly uninflected tone made her wary. “What did you say your name was? Are you a patient?”

“Of course you know her, Dr. Rawlings,” he said, a harsh note creeping into his voice. “The girl who saw me in the park. The one who watched me fucking that other one.”

Catherine took a slow deep breath, pulling her briefcase closer and scrambling inside with one hand for her cell phone. Maybe she could call Rebecca while he was still on the line.

“I’m glad you called,” Catherine said, working to keep her voice steady despite the sudden racing of her heart. “I was hoping that we could talk. What shall I call you?”

“Don’t try to be clever.” There was a soft chuckle through the line. “You understand I can’t tell you that. They’re looking for me, you know. But they’re too stupid to find me.”

“Who do you mean?”

“The police. They have no imagination.” Another soft laugh, dismissive, arrogant. “Do
you
, Dr. Rawlings?”

“I think so,” she answered. She’d found her cell phone, and she held it, forgotten, in her hand. His voice was mesmerizing, the tone of voice she’d heard from hypnotized subjects—distant, disembodied. Fascinating in a viscerally disturbing way. “What is it you want me to know?”

“Can you imagine lying on the ground, your face in the grass, with my big hard cock up your ass?”

He might have been asking her if she would like to take a stroll in the park. His tone was casual, almost relaxed.

“Is that what you’re imagining right now?” she asked him in the same conversational tone, trying not to push too hard. Meanwhile, her mind worked frantically, searching for the right words to engage him, draw him out, make him reveal himself, while allowing him to believe that
he
was in control. “Is that what happens with the women?”

“I won’t tell you
that
, Doctor,” he responded, an edge of anger in his voice for the first time. “Did you really think I’d tell you what I do to them? You insult me if you think I’d be that easy. But you’ll see, won’t you? Believe me—the next time…you’ll see.”

“What are you going to do?” Catherine questioned, allowing a bit of her eagerness to show. She wanted him to keep talking, because eventually he would slip. He’d mention his plans or give her a clue to who he was. “I’d like to hear—”

The click of the line being disconnected was the only response.

“Damn,” she muttered in frustration as she sagged back in her chair. “Damn, damn, damn.”

For a moment she wasn’t certain what to do. The call had shaken her, disoriented her. The professional part of her mind was intrigued by the interaction, but, personally, she was repulsed by the soft, cool voice that had reached out to her like an unwanted caress. She almost felt his hands on her and couldn’t help but imagine what his victims had experienced. Trembling suddenly, emotionally raw, she realized that there was only one voice she wanted to hear.

*

“Hey, Frye,” the night sergeant shouted across the squad room. “There’s a call for you.”

Rebecca frowned and gestured no with her hand. She and Watts were expecting Bailey to finish with the police artist any second, and she was eager to get a look at her suspect’s face.

The desk sergeant shrugged. “The lady says it’s an emergency.”

Annoyed, Rebecca considered telling him to take a message, and then thought that it might be one of her contacts. She’d spent several hours late in the afternoon talking to prostitutes and street hustlers, hoping for a lead. No one knew anything, but it was too early in the day for many of the working girls to be around. Maybe this was one of them now. “Put it through over here, Riley.” She grabbed up the handset. “Frye.”

“It’s Catherine, Rebecca. I’m sorry, I wouldn’t have called, but—”

“It’s okay,” Rebecca interrupted immediately, detecting a difference in Catherine’s usually calm voice. “What is it?”

“I just got a call from a man…your suspect…Janet’s attacker…At least, I think it was him,” Catherine replied, her voice curiously flat. The stress was taking its toll, and she felt somewhat detached from everything at the moment.

Rebecca caught her breath and was on her feet in an instant, grabbing for her jacket with her free hand. She shrugged it on, the phone clamped under her chin. “Where are you?”

Watts glanced up at her from the opposite desk, his expression curious.

“At my office.”

“I want you to lock your office door and turn down the lights, then move away from the window and wait for me. Do
not
open the door for anyone. Anyone. Even if they say they are a police officer. Do you understand?”

“Yes, I’ve already locked the door.”

“Good. I’ll be there in ten minutes.”

“I’m fine, Rebecca,” Catherine said, some of her usual control evident in her tone. “Really.”

“I know that. Just do as I say.”

“Of course I will.”

Rebecca slammed the receiver into the phone cradle and cursed viciously under her breath; she was so furious she couldn’t quite see clearly.
This sick bastard has gone too far. He just made it personal.
She turned toward the door and almost ran into Watts.

“Where’re you going?” Watts was standing nonchalantly between her and the exit.

Rebecca stared at him, blinked once to clear the angry haze from her mind, and forced herself to think. She should tell him about a possible contact from the suspect, but all she wanted was to see Catherine, to be sure she was all right.
I don’t want to have to be a cop for just a couple of minutes.
She remained wordless, and he watched her, no expression on his face. Taking a deep breath, she made a decision and replied, “We may have a phone contact from our boy. He may have just called Dr. Catherine Rawlings. I’m going there now.”

Watts raised both eyebrows and whistled softly. “Things are heating up, aren’t they? Guess I’d better tag along.”

“Let’s go, then,” she said resolutely. She couldn’t prevent him from accompanying her, as much as she wanted to go alone.
Damn the job
.

She made it from the station house to the university in less than eight minutes. Watts looked a bit green when he climbed from the front seat of the Vette. When she knocked on the office door, calling to Catherine, she unconsciously held her breath until she heard the lock being turned. The door swung open and Catherine stepped forward, looking pale but composed. She stopped short when she saw Watts behind Rebecca.

“Thank you for coming, Detective,” she said quietly.

“Dr. Rawlings,” Rebecca said just as quietly, wanting desperately to enfold her in her arms, if only for just a second. Aching to touch her, she instead followed the doctor through the waiting room into her private office, Watts trailing behind.

She took one of the chairs in front of Catherine’s desk, and Watts sat beside her in the second one. “This is Detective Watts,” Rebecca said, pulling her notebook from inside her jacket. “Can you tell us what happened?”

Catherine relayed in detail the brief conversation. Her memory was excellent, honed from years of retaining an entire hour’s session with a patient. Rebecca and Watts each took notes, interrupting now and then to be certain they got the conversation verbatim.

Rebecca stiffened when Catherine clinically stated the caller’s sexual intimations. Despite all her encounters with brutality and perversions, she’d rarely experienced such swift fury, and her focus wavered. When Catherine finished, Rebecca was momentarily wordless, struggling to set her personal reactions aside. She started slightly as Watts asked a question; she had forgotten he was there.

“Did you recognize the voice, Doctor?”

Catherine shook her head, a look of faint surprise on her face. “No,” she said, “of course not.”

“Never can tell.” Watts gave a noncommittal shrug. “Could be someone you know…or maybe someone you treated?”

Catherine regarded the blank face of the man seated beside Rebecca contemplatively. She sensed a clever mind behind the facade of apparent disinterest. Her curiosity was piqued, and she wondered where his train of thought was leading. Without consciously realizing it, she resorted to professional objectivity and began to review the events dispassionately, as if they had happened to someone else. The familiarity of the process was just what she needed, and, immediately, she began to feel more comfortable and in control.

“I would recognize the voice if I’d heard it before, I’m sure of that. He was casual, and yet…so intimate.” She didn’t notice Rebecca flinch at her choice of words. Watts gave no sign of noticing it either.

“Why do you think that he called you?” Watts probed.

“He wanted to make contact…to boast a little. He wants someone with whom to share his experience,” she mused aloud.

“What do you mean?” Rebecca asked, trying to keep her voice even. She didn’t want her own reactions to interfere with Catherine’s assessment of the events. She forced down the rage that threatened her detachment and struggled to view the psychiatrist as the critical component she had become in this case. Nevertheless, she was aware of a faint nausea that made it difficult for her to swallow.
God damn him to hell for involving Catherine in this.