The judge took off her glasses and rubbed her eyes, as if ruining a life was a tiresome part of her day. She then continued, “Given the geographic disparity, I am, however, encouraging creative solutions, and I am ruling that Dr. Cross will be entitled to the equivalent of at least forty-five days visitation per year. That’s all.”
And just like that, she rose and left the room.
Ben put a hand on my shoulder. “Alex, I don’t know what to say. I’m stunned. I haven’t seen a ruling from the bench in five years. I’m so sorry.”
I barely heard him, and I was hardly conscious of my family swarming around me. I looked up to see Christine and Anne Billingsley squeezing past to leave.
“What happened to you?” I asked, the words just coming. It was as if every muscle of control I had been exercising for the past couple of days gave out at once. “Is this what you wanted? To punish me? To punish my family? Why, Christine?”
Then Nana Mama spoke. “You’re cruel, and you’re selfish, Christine. I feel sorry for you.”
Christine turned from us and started to walk away very quickly, without saying a word. When she reached the courtroom doors, her shoulders hunched forward. Suddenly, she put a hand to her mouth. I couldn’t tell for sure, but I thought that she began to sob. Ms. Billingsley took her by the arm and ushered her out into the hallway.
I didn’t understand. Christine had just won, but she was weeping as if she had lost. Had she? Was that it? What had just happened inside her head?
A moment later I entered the hallway in a daze. Nana was holding one of my hands, Jannie the other. Christine was already gone, but someone else I didn’t want to see was waiting there.
James Truscott had somehow gotten inside the courthouse. And his photographer, too. What the hell was with him? Coming here. Now. What kind of story was he writing?
“Tough day in court, Dr. Cross,” he called up the corridor. “Care to comment on the ruling?”
I pushed past him with my family, but the photographer snapped off several invasive pictures, including single shots of Damon and Jannie.
“Don’t print a single picture of my family.” I turned to Truscott.
“Or what?” he asked, standing defiantly with his hands on his hips.
“Do not put my family’s pictures in your magazine. Do not.”
Then I yanked away the photographer’s camera and took it with me.
Chapter 37
LATE THAT SAME DAY, the Storyteller was driving north on the 405, the San Diego Freeway, which was moving okay at about forty or so, and he was working over his “hate list” in his mind. Who did he want to do next, or if not next, before this thing wound down and he had to stop killing or be caught?
Stop! Just as suddenly as it had begun. The end. Finished. Story over.
He made a scribbly note in a small pad he always carried in the front-door pocket. It was difficult to write as he drove, and his car edged a little out of its lane.
Suddenly some moke to the right sat on his horn, and stayed on it for several seconds.
He glanced over at a black Lexus convertible, and there was this total moron screaming at him—“Fuck you, asshole, fuck you, fuck you”—and giving him the finger.
The Storyteller couldn’t help himself—he just laughed at the red-faced idiot in the other car.
The jerk was so out of it. If he only knew who he was going postal at. This was hilarious! He even leaned over toward the window on the passenger side. And his laughter apparently made the nutcase even angrier. “You think it’s funny, asshole? You think it’s funny?” the guy screamed.
So the Storyteller just kept laughing, ignoring the irate bastard as if he didn’t exist and wasn’t worth coyote piss if he did. But this guy did exist, and actually, he’d gotten under the Storyteller’s skin, which really wasn’t advisable, was it?
Eventually, he drifted behind the Lexus, as if chastened and remorseful, and then he followed. The moke’s black convertible got off two exits later. So did he.
And this wasn’t in the story. He was improvising now.
He continued to trail the convertible’s taillights up into the Hollywood Hills, onto a side road, and then up another steep hill.
He wondered if the driver of the Lexus had spotted him by now. Just to be sure he did, he started honking and didn’t stop for the next half mile or so. Figured the other guy might be getting a little spooked by now. He sure would if it were him, especially if he knew who he had hassled down on the freeway.
Then he pulled out and started to pass the convertible. This was the coolest goddamn scene yet—he had all the windows open in his car, wind whipping through.
The driver of the Lexus stared over at him, and he wasn’t cursing or flipping him the bird anymore. Now who was showing a little remorse? A little r-e-s-p-e-c-t.
The Storyteller’s right hand came up, aimed, and he fired four times into the other driver’s face, and then he watched the convertible veer into the rocky wall on the side of the road, carom off, swerve back onto the road, then hit the rocks again.
Then nothing—the annoying bastard was dead, wasn’t he? Deserved it, too, the asshole. The shame of it, the pity, was that sooner or later this killing had to stop. At least that was the grand plan, that was the story.
Chapter 38
DETECTIVE JEANNE GALLETTA floored her two-year-old Thunderbird. She had driven faster than this before but never on L.A. city streets. The storefronts on Van Nuys blurred past while her siren droned a steady rhythm overhead.
Two black-and-whites were parked in front of the café when she got there. An unruly crowd had already begun to clot the sidewalk across the street. She was sure that TV cameras wouldn’t be far behind, and news helicopters, too.
“What’s the situation?” she barked at the first officer she saw, who was halfheartedly doing crowd control.
“All contained,” he said. “We did a silent approach, front and back. There’s a few of our guys up on the roof, too. You’ve got about two-dozen customers and staff inside. If she was here when we pulled up, then she’s still in there.”
That was a big if, but it was something to go on, Galletta thought to herself. Mary Smith might still be inside. This thing could end right here. Please, dear God.
“All right, two more units inside as soon as you can get them here, two more on crowd control, and keep that guard front, back, and top.”
“Ma’am, this isn’t my crew—”
“I don’t care whose crew it is. Just get it done.” She stopped and stared into the officer’s eyes. “Am I clear? Do you follow?”
“Perfectly, ma’am.”
Galletta headed inside. The café was one big rectangle, with a coffee bar in front and rows of computer carrels in the back. Each electronic terminal was its own little booth, with shoulder-high privacy walls.
Everyone in the place had been corralled at the mismatched tables, chairs, and couches. Galletta quickly surveyed their faces.
Students, Yuppies, senior citizens, and a few Venice Beach hippie-freak types. An officer reported to her that they had all been searched and no weapons were found. Not that it meant anything. For now, they were all suspects by default.
The manager was a very nervous young guy in horn-rims who didn’t look old enough to drink, and who had the worst case of acne Galletta had seen since her high school days in the Valley. A mini CD-ROM pinned to his chest said BRETT in red Magic Marker. He showed Galletta to one of the computer carrels near the back.
“This is where we found it,” he said.
“Is there an exit that way?” Galletta asked, pointing down a narrow hallway to her left.
The manager nodded. “The police are already back there. They sealed it off.”
“And do you keep some record of who uses the machines?”
He pointed to a credit-card swiping device. “They had to use that. I don’t really know how to get the info out, but I can find out for you.”
“We’ll take care
of it,” Galletta told him. “Here’s what I want you to do, though. Keep everyone in here as comfortable as you can. To be honest, it’s going to be a while. And if anyone wants anything, make it a decaf.”
She gave him a wink and a grin that she didn’t feel, but it seemed to calm the poor guy down some.
“And ask Officer Hatfield over there to come see me.” She had met Officer Bobby Hatfield briefly once before, and she always remembered his name because it was the same as one of the Righteous Brothers.
She sat at the computer and pulled on a pair of latex gloves. “What do you know so far?” she asked when Hatfield came over.
“Same kind of message, written to the same guy at the Times. Arnold Griner. It’s possible someone got hold of those other e-mails, but this feels like her to me. You’ve heard of Carmen D’Abruzzi, right?”
“The chef? Of course. She’s got her own show. I watch it occasionally; I just don’t cook.”
Trattoria D’Abruzzi was a flavor-of-the-month restaurant in Hollywood, an A-list dinner and after-hours place. More important, Galletta knew, Carmen D’Abruzzi had a very popular syndicated show in which she cooked for her beautiful husband and her two perfect children. Everything was a little too perfect for Galletta’s taste, but she did watch the show sometimes.
Galletta shook her head. “Goddammit. D’Abruzzi’s just this killer’s type. Have you found her yet?”
“That’s the kicker,” Hatfield told her. “She’s fine, no problem. A little freaked out maybe, but okay. Same with her family. We’ve got a unit at her house already. Check it out—whoever wrote that e-mail never sent it or even finished it.”
Jeanne Galletta’s head bobbed again. “What the hell? She didn’t send it?”
“Maybe she got spooked for whatever reason, wasn’t thinking clearly, and just left. Maybe she didn’t like the coffee here. I sure don’t.”
Galletta stood up and looked over the assembled customers and staff again. “Or maybe she’s still here.”
“You really think so?”
“Actually, no fucking way. She’s not dumb. Still, I want to talk to every one of these dinks. This place is a closed box until further notice. Do some initial screening, but no one leaves without going through me personally. Understand? No one. Not for any reason. Not even if they have a note from their mom.”
“Yeah, yeah, okay,” Hatfield answered. “I got it.”
As Hatfield walked away, Jeanne Galletta heard him mutter something like “calm down” under his breath. Typical. Male cops tended to respond one way to a man’s orders and another to a woman’s. She shrugged it off and turned her attention to the half-finished e-mail on the screen.
Half-finished? What the hell was that all about?
Chapter 39
To:
[email protected] From: Mary Smith
To: Carmen D’Abruzzi:
You worked at your restaurant until three in the morning last night, didn’t you? Busy, busy girl! Then you walked two long blocks by yourself to your car. That’s what you thought, isn’t it? That you were all alone?
But you weren’t, Carmen. I was right there on the sidewalk with you. I didn’t even try to be careful. You made it easy for me. Not too bright. So into yourself. Me, me, me, me.
Maybe you don’t watch the news. Or maybe you just ignore it. Maybe you don’t care that someone is out there looking for people just like you. It was almost like you wanted me to kill you. Which is good, I guess. Because that’s what I wanted, too.
Watching you, trying to be you, I had to wonder if you ever told your two darling children to look both ways when they cross the street. You sure didn’t set a good example for Anthony and Martina last night. You never looked around, not once.
Which is too bad for all of you, the whole damn pretty-as-a-picture family as seen on your cooking show.
There’s no telling when your children might end up alone on the curb without you, is there? Now they’ll have to learn that important safety lesson from someone else.
After you got
Chapter 40
IT ENDED JUST LIKE THAT—in midsentence.
Even if it hadn’t, this was a whole new wrinkle in the case. Carmen D’Abruzzi wasn’t dead, and they had the death-threat note. That was something positive, right?
Jeanne Galletta squeezed her eyes shut, trying to process the new information quickly and correctly. Maybe Mary Smith drafted her messages ahead of time and then finalized them posthomicide.
But why leave this one here? Would she do it on purpose? Was this even her at all? Might not be.
Jesus Christ, the questions never ended on this one. So where the hell were the answers? How about just one answer for starters?
She thought about Alex Cross—something he’d said in that book of his. “Keep asking until you find the keystone, the one question at the heart of it all. Then you can start working your way back out again. That’s when you start finding answers.”
The one question. The keystone. What the hell was it?
Well, six hours later it was still a mystery for Galletta. Just after dark, she finally let the last of the morning’s customers go home. Five people had given five different eyewitness accounts about who was sitting at the computer in question; the rest of them had no clue.
No one Detective Galletta spoke to struck her as remotely suspicious, but all twenty-six would require follow-up. The paperwork alone was more than she wanted to think about, now or ever.
To no one’s surprise, Mary Smith’s credit card turned out to be hot. It belonged to an eighty-year-old woman in Sherman Oaks who didn’t even realize it was gone, a Mrs. Debbie Green. Nothing else had been charged on the card; there was no paper trail, no anything. She’s careful, and she’s organized—for such an obvious nutcase.
Galletta asked Brett the manager for a full-strength espresso. From here, it was back to the office, where she would sort through the day’s events while they were fresh in her memory. Her neighbor said he’d let the dog out. The Chinese place along the way to her office said twenty minutes for pickup. Life was good, no? No!
She wondered if she’d be home before midnight and, even then, if she’d be able to sleep.
Probably not—on both counts.
So what was the one question she needed to ask? Where was that keystone?
Or was Alex Cross just full of shit?
Chapter 41
“SHE NEVER KNEW what she wanted, Sugar, and maybe she still doesn’t. I liked Christine, but she was never the same after what happened in Jamaica. She has to move on, and so do you.”
Sampson and I were holed up at Zinny’s, a favorite neighborhood dive. B.B. King’s “I Done Got Wise” was wailing on the jukebox. Nothing but the blues would do tonight, not for me anyway.
What the place lacked in cheeriness, it made up for in Raphael, a bartender who knew us by name and had a heavy pour. I contemplated the Scotch in front of me. I was trying to recall if it was my third or fourth. Man, I was feeling tired. I remembered a line from one of the Indiana Jones movies: “It’s not the years, honey. It’s the mileage.”
“Christine’s not the point, though, is she, John?” I looked sideways at Sampson. “The point is Little Alex. Ali. That’s how he calls himself. He’s already his own person.”
He patted me on the top of my head. “The point is right here on your skull, Sugar. Now you listen to me.”
He waited until I sat up and gave him my full attention. Then his gaze slowly drifted up to the ceiling. He shut his eyes and grimaced. “Shit. I forgot what I was going to say. Too bad, too. I was going to make you feel a whole lot better.”
I laughed in spite of myself. Sampson always knew when to go light with me. It had been like that since we were ten years old and growing up in D.C. together.
“Well, next best thing then,” he said. He motioned to Raphael for two more.
“You never know what’s going to happen,” I said, partly to myself. “When you’re in love. There??
?s no guarantee.”
“Truth,” Sampson said. “If you’d told me I’d have a kid, ever, I would have laughed. Now here I am with a three-month-old. It’s crazy. And at the same time, it could all change again, just like that.” He snapped his fingers hard, the sound popping in my ears. Sampson has the biggest hands of anyone I know. I’m six-three, not exactly chiseled, but not too shabby, and he makes me look slight.
“Billie and I are good together, no question about it,” he went on, rambling but making sense in his way. “That doesn’t mean it can’t all go crazy someday. For all I know, ten years from now, she’ll be throwing my clothes out on the lawn. You never know. Nah—my girl wouldn’t do that to me. Not my Billie,” Sampson said, and we both laughed.
We sat and drank in silence for a few minutes. Even without conversation, the mood darkened.
“When are you going to see Little Alex again?” he asked, his voice softer. “Ali. I like that.”
“Next week, John. I’ll be out in Seattle. We’ve got to finalize the visitation agreement.”
I hated that word. Visitation. That’s what I had with my own son? Every time I talked about it out loud, I wanted to punch something. A lamp, a window, glass.
“How the hell am I going to do this?” I asked Sampson. “Seriously. How can I face Christine—face Alex—and act like everything’s okay? Every time I see him now, my heart’s going to be aching. Even if I can pull it off and seem okay, that’s no way to be with your kids.”
“He’s going to be fine,” Sampson said insistently. “Alex, no way you’re going to raise messed-up kids. Besides, look at us. You feel like you turned out okay? You feel like I turned out okay?”
I smiled at him. “You got a better example to use?”
Sampson ignored the joke. “You and I didn’t exactly have every advantage, and we’re just fine. Last I checked, you don’t shoot up, you don’t disappear, and you don’t lay a finger on your kids. I dealt with all that, and I ended up the second-finest cop on the D.C. force.” He stopped and smacked his head. “Oh, wait. You’re a lame-ass federal desk-humper now. I guess that makes me D.C.’s finest.”