The Sketcher's Mark (Lara McBride Thrillers Book 1) (8 page)

“Can I ask what happened?”

“She was misdiagnosed.  The doctors gave her the wrong medication.  She had a reaction.  Slipped into a coma one day and never woke up.  Long time ago but I remember holding her hand in the hospital every night and sometimes she would squeeze me.  Even though she was asleep I like to think she knew I was there.  Reaching out for me.”

“I’m sure she did.”

Lara saw his eyes flick briefly to the picture of the girl and felt she was going to get further with Brouchard than she had with Derek Shaye.

“And what ransom did this man demand?”

“He didn’t demand a ransom.”

“Not much of a kidnapper, is he?” Brouchard mused.  “Seems to defeat the purpose.”

“Only if the purpose is for monetary gain.  He didn’t take her for money- which rules out a sex trafficking ring or a shakedown.”

“It is unusual for those people- I use the word ‘people’ loosely, you understand- to prey on tourists. Especially Americans.  It brings unwanted attention, so they tend to ply their trade with women from Eastern Europe with few family ties, people who will not be missed.  Most of those girls are here illegally, no official papers, which makes it even harder for us to know if they’ve gone missing. I must say I’m very impressed how you can speak so objectively about these events.  That must be difficult for you.”

“I can’t afford to be emotional.  I could miss something if I’m not thinking straight.  So where do we go from here, Inspector?”

“We will need to fill out forms and get her picture to every Police station in Paris.  I will see to it personally. And I will call Interpol in case he’s tried to take her out of the country.

“Can we expedite that?”

“There is a process.”

“I see how well your process works from those faces on the wall.”

“Another low blow, Detective.”

“Why are you the only person in the unit?”

“Because the rest of my squad are out trying to find those people on the wall.”

“Touche.  I know you don’t make the rules.  But could you bend them a little?  I’ll sign your books for you.” She smiled, trying to lighten the mood.  Brouchard laughed.  She’d won him over.

“Where are you staying?”

“In the same room of the same hotel where she was.”

“You have to admit there is little even for somebody with your experience and skill sets to go on. I do not think your missing persons posters will do anything except perhaps alert this man you seek that you are here to find him.”

“I figure there’s an outside chance if he was cocky enough to answer her phone, he might just call me.  There’s something impulsive about him and right now that’s the only way I can hope to get to him.  If I can establish a dialogue with him, that puts me in the game and gives Janelle a chance.”

“Yes, but you may also have people call you who are…how do you say it in America..?”

“Maniacs.  Yes, they’re always out there.”

Brouchard considered. 

“Allow me to take you back to the hotel.”

Chapter Fourteen

Lara woke the next morning and grabbed a sandwich for her breakfast at the Patisserie across the street from the hotel.  First she would check the areas she had already canvassed and see what remained of the flyers she had posted.  Once she had replaced the ones that had been torn down, she would move on to other areas and broaden the search. She took a mental step back to appraise what she had done so far, trying to think of something she may have missed.  Something was itching in the back of her mind.  She had been focusing on Janelle instead of the man himself.  He was clean and professional.  Looking back at other missing persons cases with similar victims might produce clues.  If she could learn his methods, that would put her closer to him.

A half hour later, she found herself in a large public library trying to explain to the young girl at the front desk that she was looking for newspaper articles.  Did they have microfilm or would she have to find the resources online?  If so, did they have a computer suite where she could get online?  What she really needed was someone who could translate for her, help her find articles about missing girls, missing backpackers specifically.  The mousy girl behind the desk was getting irritated and called over a thin young man in a crisp white shirt tucked in to very tight slacks from the back office.

“Bonjour, Madame,” he said to Lara, ignoring the mousy girl, his eyes feasting on Lara.

“Hi.  Do you speak English?”  she asked, hoping he was as fluent as Brouchard had been, but less slick than Derek Shaye.

“Yes, I do.  You speak no French?” he responded in a light accent.

“No, I don’t speak French at all.  Can you help me?  I might have to take a couple of hours of your time. I can pay you.”

The man shook his head in refusal at the offer and introduced himself as Philippe.  He led her to a large room upstairs that overlooked the back of the Pompidou and held a suite of computers.  They were primarily being used by students doing research.  Philippe led her to a terminal and sat with her.  She could smell his cologne, strong and powerful and he seemed to exude his own natural scent that, despite herself, she found alluring.

He was good and he knew what he was doing.  It took longer than he probably would have liked but he stayed anyway, ignoring the mousy girl when she walked by to make her presence known and remind him there were other duties to be carried out in the library today.  Going through newspaper and local media reports over the last two years of anything related to young women being hurt, abducted or found dead, she discovered that there had been many incidents.  Most, however, had been locals, usually prostitutes or junkies, the collateral damage of most big cities.  But, every once in a while, a story appeared about a missing foreign female backpacker.  American.  Canadian.  British.  Spanish.  Danish.  They had been traveling alone or in small groups.  In several cases, the girls had been with young men, who had been found dead, wallets missing perhaps in an attempt to make it look like the robbery the Police had assumed it was.  The girls, however, had never been found- at least in the sense that she couldn’t find a single follow up report to confirm otherwise.  If this was her man, then she knew now that he had no qualms about killing.  He had not harmed the girls, it seemed, but he was brutal in dispatching their male companions. 

Lara thought about the profile, the man’s motivation to kill.  It wasn’t jealousy or rage, if he had killed the young men in question, it was simply to get to the girls and take his ‘Angels’.  He was a true psychopath, disconnected from right and wrong, the lives of others meaning nothing to him.  She felt the ribbon flutter around her a little tighter and pull her closer to him.  She took copies of the articles that interested her, thanked the young man and, after politely turning him down for lunch, went back to the hotel, stopping en route to buy a large tourist map of Paris.

In the little hotel room, Lara tacked the map to the wall and Paris was hers.  She was delicate in pinning the pictures she had printed of the girls’ faces and the related articles to the map, placing them where the girls had last been seen.  She finished by attaching the missing poster of Janelle to the area around the Pompidou. When she was done, she took a few steps back and looked at the city stained by the wreckage this man had left in his wake. Now she could clearly see the girls’ pictures placed directly over specific areas.   The Pompidou.  The Louvre.  Montmartre.  Notre Dame Cathedral. 

“He’s stalking the tourist spots...” 

That meant a huge amount of foot traffic, so many people and faces that it would be almost impossible, if not miraculous, for her to find him there.  Somehow, he was hiding in plain sight, watching, searching, and hunting for his prey. 

She packed up her bag with the flyers Brouchard had printed for her and hurried back out to canvass the area right across the street, the last place where Janelle had been seen. Her phone buzzed in her pocket as she walked to the square outside the Pompidou.  It was a foreign number, perhaps somebody responding to the flyers.  She set her bag down and answered, her heart beating faster in anticipation this could be the call she had hope for- and dreaded.

“You’re looking for me.”  It was the same voice she had heard over the phone on the plane.  She recognized it instantly and chills raced down her spine. Her heart blasted past its normal speed.  She tried to remain calm, keep her focus and keep him talking.  The more he talked, the more information he would give away and the closer she could get to Janelle.

“Who are you?”

“You know the answer to that.  I’m the man who has your sister.”

“Prove it.”

“We spoke before when you called her phone.”

“Where is she?”

“She’s with me. “

“Alive?”

“For now.”

“Her name is Janelle.  She’s a very sweet girl. She’s graduating college soon and she’s gonna go out there in the world and try to make something of herself.”

“You’re trying to make it harder for me to hurt her by eliciting sympathy.  Making a connection.  Good try, Lara, but it’s wasted on me. I have no plans to hurt her. She’s my Angel.”

The personal appeal had failed.  She had to try a different angle.

“I can get you money.”

“I’m not interested in money.  I’m almost insulted you even brought it up.”

He had confirmed this wasn’t a kidnap for ransom angle.  Lara felt worse because at least in those cases the kidnapper was easier to deal with, his goal was simple- money.  With people like this, it was always harder because when the grand plan they had was personal and ultimately much harder to get them to part with their abductees. That meant his ego was obsessed with control and power.  She had to play on his sadism.  Getting her to deliver a ransom to him could be seen as a power play, getting to pull Lara’s strings like a puppet. That might appeal to him.

“I can go to the bank right now and get you everything I have.  Cash exchange, the money for Janelle and you just walk away and it’s over.”

“That’s not up to you.”

“You’re right.  It’s up to you.  You have the power to let that happen.  I will bring the money to you and you can allow her to go free.”

“I’ve read all the same books you have and I’ve been here before, so I know what you’re doing.  Tell me, Lara, are you a cop or a psychiatrist?”

“I’m a Detective with the LAPD.”

“Ah. I understand.  That explains so much.  You think you can negotiate with me and win.  Let me tell you, there were others who came looking for their sisters and daughters before.  I didn’t make deals with them back then, what makes you think I’ll make a deal with you now?”

“Because they weren’t
me
.”

Lara stopped, considering the profile she was building on him while he spoke. He was right- she had tried appeals to his vanity and ego, attempted to offer money and trade for her sister and she had encountered psyches as simple as those before and knew how to work them, but he was different.  He was interested in being pursued. Attention.  He wanted attention.

“Do you want me to call the press?  I already talked to the US Embassy and the Police.”

“Useless, aren’t they?  No, let’s keep this between us.”

“Why did you take her- and the others?”

“I have work to do and they’re part of it.  They’re so blessed and they don’t even know how special they are.”

“Nobody knows.  You haven’t shared what you’re doing with anyone.”

“Of course not.”

“Do you want to share it with me?  Tell me where to meet you and you can show me what it is you’re doing.”

A long pause.  She knew she had hit a nerve in him.  There was something he desperately wanted to share- they all had a thirst for recognition and a validation of power that was usually born from years of abuse and neglect.  This wasn’t true for all of them, but there were many like this, the pathetically desperate and incredibly dangerous attention seekers.  This one seemed more sophisticated than the ones she had encountered, but they all shared the same kind of raw nerves that, when she figured out what they were, allowed her to manipulate them while making them think they were still in control. 

“How much money can you get?” he asked, surprising her.

Lara took a breath, feeling she had him on the hook and went in for the kill.

“I have about thirty thousand dollars.  I can go to a bank and get it today.  You tell me where you want me to meet you.” 

“Your sister is a centerpiece.  I don’t know that I want to lose her.”

Centerpiece.  Perhaps he was arranging them.  Displaying them. A “centerpiece”.

“Where do you want to meet?” she urged.

“You’re persistent, Lara, I will give you that.”  He sounded amused.

“You’re intrigued.  You want to get a look at me.”

“I’m watching you right now.”