John Lutz - Urge to Kill

“Detective Quinn?” she asked.

He’d been staring. “Yes, and you’re Dr. Manders?”

“The introductions are out of the way,” she said, still smiling, and stood aside so he could enter her office.

Simply being there made Quinn feel better, and he’d felt okay when he arrived. Gray and green in here, too, but with lighter tan leather. There were some heavy, shaded lamps with oversized bases on darkly grained wood tables, floor-to-ceiling bookshelves in matching wood, the books neatly arranged. The carpet was a plush beige two shades darker than the leather chairs. The heavy drapes that muffled the sounds of Park Avenue traffic nine stories below were the deep, velvety green of old moss. On two of the walls were framed prints of Monet garden paintings, containing almost every color but in a muted harmony that made them relaxing to gaze on.

Dr. Manders was wearing loose-fitting charcoal-gray slacks, a silky pale gray blouse with a white pattern that made it look almost lacy, and low-heeled shoes of a gray that matched the blouse. She led Quinn to one of the comfortable-looking leather chairs and motioned for him to sit down, then she sat behind a polished wood desk that had delicately carved legs and looked more like a table. The effect of the room with her in it was strangely soothing. It was all calculated, Quinn told himself, but it certainly worked.

“You came about George,” she said. Her voice was unexpectedly low, also soothing.

At first Quinn didn’t understand, then realized he’d been thinking of the victim, her brother, by only his last name. “I did.”

“You’re not the first.”

“I know that, Dr. Manders. I mean I really came about George.”

She appeared puzzled.

“As opposed to his killer,” he said.

“You need to explain.”

“You know who I am? I mean, beyond my name and NYPD identity?”

She nodded. “I read the papers, watch TV news. When I heard the city had put you in charge of the investigation, I was glad. Not just because of George, but for the other victims. A serial killer…”

“The way we search for them,” Quinn said, “is figure out how they think, what passes for logic in their damaged minds. The more we can learn about them the better, even if it’s not directly related to the murders.”

“You mean you want my input as a psychoanalyst? I’m afraid you-”

“No, no,” he interrupted, leaning forward, realizing for the first time she was wearing perfume, something subtle that carried the scent of lilacs. “What I mean is that, the next best thing to knowing the killer is to know the victim. It might seem that these are random killings, but to the murderer, they’re not. Even if the killer thinks they are, they still might not be. The more I know about George, the more I can surmise about his killer. It’s even possible that I’ll be able to discern some sort of motive, even if your brother and his killer never crossed paths until the time of the murder.” He studied her impassive features. “Does that make sense, Dr. Manders?”

She locked gazes with him and nodded. “Very much sense. And it’s Zoe. We might as well be informal if I’m going to talk about George. It will make it easier for me.” Her dark eyes remained trained on his, searching, maybe imploring. He didn’t quite understand that. It came to him that there might be a lot about this woman that was beyond his understanding.

“All right, Zoe. If it’s okay with you, I’ll just sit back and you can tell me about your brother. Even the things that don’t seem important. I need to have some idea of him.”

She smiled. “Shouldn’t we change places?”

“No,” Quinn said seriously, “you’re in control here.”

“I sometimes wonder,” she said, and leaned back in her chair. Her eyes fixed on some point above Quinn’s head and behind him.

“I am-was-three years older than George,” she began. “We grew up in a middle-class neighborhood, but a kind of tough one. For a while, I was his protector. Not that he wouldn’t fight, but he was small for his age.”

“Was he a magnet for bullies?”

“No more than any kid small for his age. And bullies didn’t taunt him once they learned he was my little brother.”

“So you were pretty tough.”

She laughed. “No, just pretty. The boys wanted to stay on my good side.”

“Easy to see why.”

She ignored the compliment. “When I was sixteen and George was thirteen, our father died in an industrial accident.”

“What kind of accident?”

“Chemical,” she said. “He was a chemist, and someone at the plant where he worked for Montrose Insecticide and Feed used a wrong compound in a weed-killer, and it…killed my father. Our father.” She looked at Quinn, then back at the point above his head. What does she see there?

“Poisoned him?”

“The fumes destroyed his lungs. It was a terrible way to die.”

Tears glistened in her eyes. Quinn sat quietly, giving her time.

“When Dad died, it was as if a bomb had exploded in the family. Our mother raised us, never remarried. She had to work two jobs to keep the family going. Things changed between George and me. He became the protector. I became more of a…victim.”

Quinn listened patiently for well over an hour while she went on to describe their home life, the pets they’d had, the arguments, how she and her brother had attended the same college, how George had an inborn skill with numbers, which carried him through business school. After working at a brokerage house he managed to attract investors and started a growth mutual fund, which evolved into a hedge fund, Prudent Power. Zoe meanwhile had gone on to postgraduate studies and earned her degree. She interned and worked for a while in a clinic, then as a corporate psychologist. Eight years ago she began her own practice.

“Obviously, you and George were both highly motivated.”

“I suppose so.” She smiled sadly. “To escape grief, perhaps.”

“Sounds as if things were hard for you.”

“Only to a degree. We were both good students, and we must have inherited ambition.”

“Strange thing for a psychoanalyst to say.”

“I suppose it is. But I think we both felt that things would work out okay for us.”

“Is your mother-”

“She died twelve years ago. A heart attack.”

“George never married?”

“He almost did, once. But the girl changed her mind.”

“What about his sister?”

She looked startled. Then she smiled, understanding he was talking about her. “I almost did once, too. Only I changed my mind.”

“George and you turned out to be overachievers.”

“That’d be my diagnosis,” she said.

“Because of your father’s death?”

“Maybe. He was an overachiever, too, as was his father.”

“In your genes.”

“Yeah, maybe. So much is genetic. Do you think murder is genetic, that it’s in your killer’s genes?”

“I honestly don’t know. That’d be your field.”

“Well, Detective Quinn-” She seemed suddenly surprised at herself. “I forgot to get your first name.”

“Just Quinn’ll work.”

“I thought we were on a first-name basis.”

“We are, Zoe. My given name’s Frank, but everyone calls me Quinn.”

“Well, Quinn, I don’t know, either. About the killer gene.”

She sat farther back. He sat back. They regarded each other.

“Life’s so goddamned short,” she said.

“For some of us. Usually the wrong ones.”

“Has this conversation been a help?” she asked.

“Has it helped you?”

She swallowed. “I suppose it has. It hasn’t brought George back, though.”

“It might help to catch his killer,” Quinn said. “There’s no way to know for sure at this point.”