Shield of Justice (20 page)

Rebecca glanced down at the hand between her legs, saw a flash of bare thigh as Sandy leaned close. “Information. That’s all I want from you. Anybody hassles you—for any reason—you call me. Now move your hand.”

Sandy sighed and flounced back into her seat. “Had to ask.”

“Right.” Rebecca pulled the car to the curb. “Go home, Sandy. You’re not gonna retire on what you’ll make the rest of the night.” As she pulled away, she watched the woman in her rearview mirror slowly wander off into the cheerless dawn.

Shortly before five a.m., Rebecca returned to her apartment. The first thing to greet her, besides the customary stale air of a space left too long undisturbed, was a pile of junk mail that had been pushed under her door, which she kicked aside. She went straight for the kitchen, emptied the grounds from the basket of her coffeemaker, and poured water into the appliance. She found half a pound of espresso in the freezer and measured out enough for four cups, but only poured in water for two. She needed the extra jolt of caffeine after the nearly sleepless night. Leaving the coffee brewing, she headed for the bathroom.

Her jacket and slacks would have to go to the cleaners. They looked like they’d been slept in. Come to think of it, they had been. She laid her gun on the toilet tank, threw her underwear at the overflowing hamper, and turned on the shower. She stood under the pulsing stream for a long time before she lifted her arms to lather some shampoo into her hair.

With her eyes closed against the frothing suds, her mind replayed random images—the dead girl in the hotel room; Jeff lying so quietly on his side, just a trickle of blood behind his ear; Janet Ryan, eyes pain-filled and terrified, enclosed by sterile white walls and cold white covers. And then she thought of Catherine—calm and determined when caring for a patient; soothingly gentle when Rebecca came to her exhausted in body and soul; vibrant in the throes of passion. Nightmares and deliverances, all tumbling through her restless, fevered mind. One thought, though, kept haunting her.
He knows Catherine’s name.

She twisted the knobs viciously and stepped from the shower, gasping at the chill in the room. The face looking back from the mirror above the sink was haggard and lined with fatigue, but the eyes were clear and hard with determination. Dark, furious eyes. He had made a mistake killing that hooker. He’d changed his pattern; he’d gotten eager; he’d gotten sloppy. The desk clerk had seen him, and if one person had seen him, there would be others. She had a tiny thread to grasp now, and she would follow it wherever it led until she could get a bigger piece and then another piece until all the pieces came together.

He had made an even bigger mistake calling Catherine Rawlings. Rebecca wanted him now—wanted him not just because he was terrorizing women on her turf—she wanted him because he had come into her world and touched someone who mattered to her. She wanted him now…no matter what it cost. “I’m coming for you,” she whispered into the stillness of the room. “Oh, yes, you fucker, I’m coming.”

Invigorated by her shower, she pulled on a clean navy summer-weight suit over a pressed white shirt and poured the coffee into a large plastic-topped travel mug. She maneuvered quickly through the empty streets just ahead of the morning rush hour traffic. The area around the medical center, as always, was alive with activity, and she was forced to circle several times before she found a parking space near Catherine’s office. She hurried through the deserted hallways, anxious now to reach her. Her knock was answered immediately.

Catherine, looking rumpled and weary, greeted her with a smile. “You have no business looking so damn good when I know you haven’t slept all night,” she said, relieved to see that Rebecca, although obviously tired, seemed clear-eyed and fresh. She reached for Rebecca’s hand and pulled her into the room. Impulsively, she slipped her arms around her waist and kissed her.

“Everything all right?”

“Yes. I’m just glad you’re here,” Catherine sighed, not adding that she was also relieved that the detective was safe.

Rebecca held her gently for a moment, savoring the closeness. After so long, she supposed that it should have felt strange to hold a woman, but holding Catherine was anything but strange. What
was
strange was how right it felt. Standing there with Catherine in her arms, she felt anchored, as if in this one place, the world made sense. In Catherine’s embrace, she felt at home. “Are
you
all right?” she said at length, not loosening her hold, not wanting the moment to pass.

“I’ve had better nights,” Catherine said, her head resting on Rebecca’s shoulder, “but the morning looks pretty damn good right now.”

Rebecca grinned at the woman’s resiliency, hugged her briefly, and stepped back. “I’d better get you home.”

“Yes, duty calls.” Catherine sighed resolutely and moved away to gather her briefcase and papers.

Once she was back in the car, Rebecca’s mind returned to the case. She was desperately trying to weave a tapestry from an assortment of disconnected threads. Somewhere there was a pattern, some detail she had overlooked or failed to recognize that would begin to make a whole of the scattered pieces. She knew that she’d need to sit down with the murder book, the voluminous file that contained every piece of evidence related to the case—every police form, witness statement, and ME’s report—and reread it all again. Maybe something there would jog her memory.

Catherine recognized the distant look in Rebecca’s eyes and left her alone with her thoughts. She was startled when Rebecca’s voice broke the stillness.

“How is Janet Ryan doing?”

“Oh, physically she’s making good progress. She would actually be ready for discharge if it weren’t for her psychological state. I’m just fine-tuning her medication now, and then she should be ready to go home. Unfortunately, the assault has triggered flashbacks which are difficult for her to deal with under the best of circumstances.”

“Flashbacks?” Rebecca queried.

“Traumatic events will often provoke memories of similar occurrences in an individual’s past,” Catherine answered, intentionally avoiding making direct reference to Janet’s specific case.

“Similar occurrences,” Rebecca echoed. “Like rape?”

“Sometimes,” Catherine said.

Rebecca’s jaw tightened, a sign Catherine was coming to recognize when Rebecca was angry or, more often, frustrated. She waited, knowing that Rebecca would continue when her feelings were once again manageable.

“No wonder Janet can’t remember what she witnessed out there,” Rebecca said, her voice carefully concealing the rage she felt at the brutality visited upon so many women by this maniac. Her fingers tightened on the wheel, the only sign of her anger. She reminded herself that she would somehow have to view this as just another case.

“Would she be able to look at a police sketch of a possible suspect?” Rebecca asked at length. “With you present, of course.”

Catherine considered her answer carefully. “I’m not sure,” she answered truthfully. “Janet feels a tremendous responsibility to remember what she saw. She wants to be helpful and feels like she’s failing because she can’t give you any details. Any added pressure—like trying to sort through a photo array—could actually make it more difficult for her to remember the event. I’d like to reserve judgment on that until I can speak with her again. Can you give me until tonight?”

“Do I have a choice?” Rebecca asked, her frustration now evident.

“Rebecca,” Catherine responded cautiously, “your responsibilities and mine don’t have to be at odds here. I know you need Janet’s statement, and, please believe me, I want to see this man caught as much as you do. But I simply can’t place her in psychological jeopardy to do that.”

“Even if it means another woman is raped and murdered?”

“Even then,” Catherine answered quietly.

Rebecca couldn’t miss the pain in Catherine’s voice and knew suddenly how agonizing that decision was for her. “I’m sorry,” she said, reaching across the seat to grasp Catherine’s hand. “I’m sorry. I know you’re doing what you think is best.”

“Don’t be sorry. You have to use everything you can to put an end to this madness. And I have to take care of the people who put their trust in me.”

And now those people include me
. Rebecca held her hand until she pulled the car to the curb in front of the brownstone, then followed Catherine silently to the steps of her building, searching the streets for any sign of someone who seemed out of place. The sidewalks were crowded with people hurrying to work, but no one took particular notice of them.

“Let me have your key,” she said at the top of the steps, her eyes scanning the heavy oak door for signs of tampering. She opened it and led the way inside, making a quick search of the rooms, checking the windows and patio as she went. Satisfied that everything was in order, she turned to face Catherine. “You can go ahead and change; I’ll wait.”

Catherine smiled at her, appreciating once again the presence of this intense, driven woman in her life, wishing she could somehow reach into that barricaded soul and comfort her. Instead, she contented herself with a soft kiss, rewarded by the instant melding of Rebecca’s lean body against her own. In this way at least, Catherine knew she could reach her, and she accepted that; for now, that was all she could do.

*

Rebecca arrived at the station just after nine a.m. and was surprised to find Watts already at his desk, nursing a hot cup of coffee and a danish. He looked up when Rebecca sat down across from him with her own caffeine infusion.

His eyes scanned her face, giving no indication that he noticed the dark circles under her eyes or the fatigue lines etched in her naturally chiseled features. Nor did he comment on the slight tremor in the long fingers that held the paper cup of coffee. “Everything okay with the shrink?”

“She’s fine.” Rebecca looked for some hidden meaning behind his words but could make out nothing in his usual blank stare. She turned to the pile of papers on her desk in an effort to avoid conversation.

He wasn’t dissuaded. “I think it’s about time we went over what we got and figure out where to go from here before this creep bangs another broad.”

Rebecca stared at him, so astonished by his comment that she forgot that she had been considering the same thing not an hour before. She leaned forward on her elbows and said softly, “Watts, you are a crude bastard, and I don’t give a good goddamn what you think. I’m in charge here, and we’ll do things my way.”

Watts simply shrugged. “Don’t think the captain’s as patient as I am. He wants a status report so he can meet with the media this morning.”

“Shit, just what we need. More media people nosing around.” She looked at Watts and had the feeling they finally agreed on something. “Did the artist get anything out of Bailey’s description?”

Watts grimaced. “It’s pretty general, but I’m having copies run off and distributed to all the precincts.”

Rebecca was taken aback, as she had been several times lately, when she discovered that Watts was actually thinking about his work. She stood abruptly. “Come on, let’s get out of here.”

Watts raised an eyebrow. “What about the captain?”

“We can’t give him a status report if we’re not here. And then the media won’t have anything to write about, so they won’t be able to tip off our boy. Who knows what little tidbit might send him running for cover?”

Watts grunted noncommittally, but he rose to his feet to follow, grabbing a stack of photocopied sketches as he went. He handed the police sketch to Rebecca as they pulled away from the station. She glanced at it quickly and felt her hopes plummet when she saw how nonspecific the rendering was.

“Just what we need,” she sighed. “Everyman.”

“Yeah,” Watts agreed. “Ain’t life a bitch?”

Rebecca ignored him as she drove aimlessly, her mind sifting through possible courses of action, trying to come up with something they had failed to do. “Have the Homicide guys had any recent assaults or murders of prostitutes that might tie in with this case? Maybe that kid at the Viceroy Hotel wasn’t his first.”

Watts pulled out his tattered notebook and made an entry. “I don’t know. We should check it out. I suppose we ought to start interviewing all the hookers, too, and find out if anybody knows anything.”

“I’m working on that. Leave a bunch of those fliers in the back. For what it’s worth, I’ll hand them around.”

“Yeah, and tell them about his bag of tricks.”

“What did you say?” Rebecca asked quickly as she pulled into a drive through at a fast food restaurant. “You want another coffee?”

“Yeah, black,” Watts answered absently. “You know, his gym bag or whatever the hell it was that Bailey saw him carry in. Maybe if they can’t remember his face, they’ll remember the bag.”

“Or what he brings in the bag,” Rebecca mused, passing him his coffee and balancing hers on the seat between her legs. “Watts, all three victims on River Drive have been joggers, all wearing running shorts. The dead prostitute was found with running shorts that she wasn’t wearing when she went upstairs with him. Maybe he needs them to get turned on.”

“Yeah, well, I’ve heard of weirder stuff, but so what? You want we should put out a bulletin that no broads wear shorts outside the house?”

Rebecca sighed, deciding for once to ignore his crass mannerism, since he had a point. “No, but at least I can get the word out on the streets. Maybe one of the girls will have run into some john with that particular kink.”