Suspect (17 page)

“It was a Wednesday night.”

“My wife teaches a Spanish class. Normal y, I’m home looking after Charlie.”

“So you were at home?”

“I assume so.”

Ruiz flips open his marbled notebook and writes something down. “Don’t look so worried, Professor. Actions speak louder than words.” Bitterness and rancor hang in the air like the smel of smokeless coal. Ruiz is putting on his coat and walking toward the front door. My left arm is trembling. It’s now or never. Make a decision.

“When you searched Catherine’s flat— did she have a red dress?”

Ruiz reacts as though struck. He spins and takes a step toward me. “How did you know that?”

“Is the dress missing?”

“Yes.”

“Do you think she might have been wearing it when she disappeared?”

He doesn’t answer. He is framed in the open doorway. His eyes are bloodshot, but his stare fixed. Fingers open and close into fists. He wants to rip me apart.

“Come to my office tomorrow afternoon,” I tel him. “There’s a file. You can’t take it away. I don’t even know if it wil help but I have to show it to someone.”

“I could have you arrested right now,” he snarls.

“I know. But you won’t.”

16

The blue manila folder is on the desk in front of me. It has a ribbon that twists around a flat circular wheel to seal it shut. I keep undoing it and doing it up again.

Meena glances nervously behind her as she enters the office. She walks al the way across to my desk before whispering, “There is a very scary-looking man in the waiting room. He’s asking for you.”

“That’s OK, Meena. He’s a detective.”

Her eyes widen in surprise. “Oh! He didn’t say. He just sort of…”

“Growled.”

“Yes.”

“You can show him in.” I motion her closer. “In about five minutes I want you to buzz me and remind me of an important meeting outside the office.”

“What meeting?”

“Just an important meeting.”

She frowns at me and nods.

With a face like an anvil, Ruiz ignores my outstretched hand and leaves it hanging in the air as though I’m directing traffic. He sits down and leans back in the chair, spreading his legs and letting his coat flare out.

“So this is where you work, Prof? Very nice.” He glances around the room in what appears to be a cursory way, but I know he’s taking in the details. “How much does it cost to rent an office like this?”

“I don’t know. I’m just one of the partners.”

Ruiz scratches his chin and then fumbles in his coat pocket for a stick of chewing gum. He unwraps it slowly.

“What exactly does a psychologist
do
?”

“We help people who are damaged by events in their lives. People with personality disorders, or sexual problems, or phobias.”

“Do you know what I think? A man gets attacked and he’s lying bleeding on the road. Two psychologists pass by and one says to the other, ‘Let’s go and find the person who did this—

he needs help.’ ”

His smile doesn’t reach his eyes.

“I help more victims than I do perpetrators.”

Ruiz shrugs and tosses the gum wrapper into the wastebasket.

“Start talking. How did you know about the red dress?”

I glance down at the file and undo the ribbon. “In a few minutes from now, I’m going to get a phone cal . I wil have to leave the office, but you are quite welcome to stay. I think you’l find my chair is more comfortable than yours.” I open Bobby’s file.

“When you’re finished, if you wish to talk about anything, I’l be across the road having a drink. I can’t talk about any specific patient or case.” I tap Bobby’s folder to stress the point. “I can only talk in general terms about personality disorders and how psychotics and psychopaths function. It wil be much easier if you remember this.” Ruiz presses the palms of his hands together as if in prayer and taps his forefingers against his lips. “I don’t like playing games.”

“This isn’t a game. We do it this way, or I can’t help you.”

The phone rings. Meena starts her spiel but doesn’t finish. I’m already on my way.

The sun is shining and the sky is blue. It feels more like May than mid-December. London does this occasional y— puts on a glorious day to remind people that it isn’t such a bad place to live.

This is why the English are among the world’s greatest optimists. We get one magnificent hot dry week and the memory wil give us succor for an entire summer. It happens every time.

Come spring we buy shorts, T-shirts, bikinis and sarongs in glorious expectation of a season that never arrives.

Ruiz finds me standing at the bar nursing a mineral water.

“It’s your round,” he says. “I’l have a pint of bitter.”

The place is busy with a lunchtime crowd. Ruiz wanders over to four men sitting in the corner by the front window. They look like office boys but are wearing wel -cut suits and silk ties.

Ruiz flashes his police badge under the level of the table.

“Sorry to trouble you, gents, but I need to commandeer this table for a surveil ance operation on that bank over there.” He motions out the window and they al turn in unison to look.

“Try to make it a little less obvious!”

They quickly turn back.

“We have reason to believe it is being targeted for an armed hold-up. You see that guy on the corner, wearing the orange vest?”

“The street sweeper?” one of them asks.

“Yeah. Wel he’s one of my best. So is the shopgirl in that lingerie shop, next door to the bank. I need this table.”

“Of course.”

“Absolutely.”

“Is there anything else we can do?”

I see a twinkle in Ruiz’s eye. “Wel , I don’t normal y do this— use civilians undercover— but I am short of manpower. You could split up and take a corner each. Try to blend in. Look for a group of men traveling four-up in a car.”

“How do we contact you?”

“You tel the street sweeper.”

“Is there some sort of password?” one of them asks.

Ruiz rol s his eyes. “It’s a police operation not a fucking Bond movie.”

Once they’ve gone, he takes the chair nearest the window and sets his glass on a coaster. I sit opposite him and leave my glass untouched.

“They would have given you the table anyway,” I say, unable to decide if he likes practical jokes or dislikes people.

“Did this Bobby Moran kil Catherine McBride?” He wipes foam from his top lip with the back of his hand.

The question has al the subtlety of a wel -thrown brick.

“I can’t talk about individual patients.”

“Did he admit to kil ing her?”

“I can’t talk about what he may or may not have told me.”

Ruiz’s eyes disappear into a narrow maze of wrinkles and his body tenses. Just as suddenly he exhales and gives me what I suspect is a smile. He’s out of practice.

“Tel me about the man who kil ed Catherine McBride.”

The message seems to have reached him. Pushing Bobby out of my head, I try to reflect on Catherine’s kil er, based on what I know of the crime. I’ve had a week of sleepless nights thinking of little else.

“You are dealing with a sexual psychopath,” I begin, unable to recognize my own voice. “Catherine’s murder was a manifestation of corrupt lust.”

“But there were no signs of sexual assault.”

“You can’t think in terms of normal rape or sex crime. This is a far more extreme example of deviant sexuality. This man is consumed by a desire to dominate and inflict pain. He fantasizes about taking, restraining, dominating, torturing and kil ing. At least some of these fantasies wil mirror almost exactly what happened.

“Think about what he did to her. He took her off the street or enticed her to go with him. He didn’t seek a quick and violent sexual coupling in a dark al ey and then silence his victim so she couldn’t identify him. Instead he aimed to break her— to systematical y destroy her wil power until she became a compliant, terrified plaything. Even that wasn’t enough for him. He wanted the ultimate in control, to bend someone so completely to
his
wil that she would torture herself…” I’m watching Ruiz— waiting to lose him. “He almost succeeded, but in the end Catherine wasn’t entirely broken. She stil had a spark of defiance left. She was a nurse. Even with a short blade she knew where to cut if she wanted to die quickly. When she could take no more she cut the carotid artery in her neck. That’s what caused the embolism. She was dead within minutes.”

“How do you know that?”

“Three years at medical school.”

Ruiz is staring at his pint glass, as though checking to see if it is centered properly on the coaster. The chimes of a church bel are ringing in the distance.

“The man you’re looking for is lonely, social y inept and sexual y immature.”

“Sounds like your basic teenager.”

“No. He isn’t a teenager. He’s older. A lot of young men start out like this, but every so often one emerges who blames someone else for his loneliness and his sexual frustration. This bitterness and anger grow with each rejection. Sometimes he’l blame a particular person. Other times he wil hate an entire group of people.”

“He hates al women.”

“Possibly, but I think it’s more likely he hates a particular sort of woman. He wants to punish her. He fantasizes about it and it gives him pleasure.”

“Why did he choose Catherine McBride?”

“I don’t know. Perhaps she looked like someone he wanted to punish. He may have been driven by opportunity. Catherine was available so he changed his fantasy to incorporate her looks and the clothes she wore.”

“The red dress.”

“Perhaps.”

“Could he have known her?”

“Quite possibly.”

“Motivation?”

“Revenge. Control. Sexual gratification.”

“I take my pick?”

“No, it’s al three.”

Ruiz stiffens slightly. Clearing his throat he takes out his marbled notebook.

“So who am I looking for?”

“Someone in his thirties or forties. He lives alone, somewhere private, but surrounded by people who come and go— a boarding house perhaps or a trailer park.

“He may have a wife or a girlfriend. He is of above average intel igence. He is physical y strong, but mental y even stronger. He hasn’t been consumed by sexual desire or anger to the point of losing control. He can keep his emotions in check. He is forensical y aware. He doesn’t want to be caught.

“This is someone who has managed to successful y separate areas of his life and isolate them completely from each other. His friends, family and col eagues have no inkling of what goes on inside his head.

“I think he has sadomasochistic interests. It’s not the sort of thing that springs out of nowhere. Someone must have introduced him to it— although probably only a mild version. His mind has taken it to a level that far outstrips any harmless fun. His self-assurance is what amazes me. There were no signs of anxiety or first-time nerves…” I stop talking. My mouth has gone slack and sour. I take a sip of water. Ruiz is gazing at me dul y, sitting up straighter and occasional y writing notes. My voice rises above the noise again.

“A person doesn’t suddenly become a ful y fledged sadist overnight— not one this skil ful. Organizations like the KGB spend years training their interrogators to be this good. The degree of control and sophistication were remarkable. These things come from experience. I don’t think he started here.” Ruiz turns and stares out of the window, making up his mind. He doesn’t believe me.

“This is bul shit!” he rumbles.

“Why?”

“None of it sounds like your Bobby Moran.”

He’s right. It doesn’t make sense. Bobby is too young to have this degree of familiarity with sadism. He is too erratic and changeable. I seriously doubt that he has the mental skil s and malevolence to dominate and control a person like Catherine so completely— the physical size, yes, but not the psychological strength. Then again, Bobby has constantly surprised me and I have only scratched the surface of his psyche. He has held details back from me or dropped them like a trail of bread crumbs on a fairy-tale journey.

Fairy tales? That’s what it sounds like to Ruiz. He’s on his feet threading his way to the bar. People hurriedly step out of his way. He has an aura like a flashing light that warns people to give him space.

I’m already beginning to regret this. I should have stayed out of it. Sometimes I wish I could turn my mind off instead of always looking and analyzing. I wish I could just focus on a tiny square of the world, instead of watching how people communicate and the clothes they wear, what they put in their shopping carts, the cars they drive, the pets they choose, the magazines they read and the TV shows they watch. I wish I could stop looking.

Ruiz is back again with another pint and a whiskey chaser. He rol s the liquid fire around in his mouth as if washing away a bad taste.

“You real y think this guy did it?”

“I don’t know.”

He wraps his fingers around the pint glass and leans back.

“You want me to look at him?”

“That’s up to you.”

Ruiz exhales with a rustle of dissatisfaction. He stil doesn’t trust me.