Michael Prescott - Stealing Faces

The smoker, who’d been listening to this, tossed his cigarette away with an impatient flick of his wrist. “So why’re we here, earning overtime,” he asked, “when some of us would rather be at home getting a hot meal?”

Wheelihan shrugged. “Because I could be wrong, Mel. I have been before. And I know the sheriff would dearly like to close the book on the McMillan case. He comes up for reelection next year, you know.”

“Sheriff don’t have to explain to my wife why he missed her pot roast,” the smoker groused.

“Pot roast makes good leftovers,” commented the man who’d relieved himself, contributing this thought for no particular reason.

“Just get comfortable, boys.” Wheelihan smiled at the high canopy of the sky. “It’s a nice night, and we’re getting paid to do this, and who knows? We just might get lucky. Like I said, it’s one in three. She might be on the run. She might be hunkered down. But if she’s here — if she’s staking out the place like this man Shepherd thinks — then we’ll get her.”

He surveyed the gravel road visible through the scrim of mesquite trees that concealed the three department vehicles, the road that John Cray soon would travel in his Lexus sport-utility, the road Kaylie McMillan would have to take if she meant to follow Cray from his house. He nodded.

“Heck, yeah,” Chuck Wheelihan said. “We’ll get the crazy little bitch.”

On her belly, hidden on a ridge of the Pinaleno foothills, Elizabeth watched Cray’s house.

The evening was balmy, with a light breeze. The dry air had a velvet texture, soothing on her skin. There were no clouds anywhere, and the stars were sharp and brilliant, and in the far distance a coyote sang its lonely refrain, to be answered by echoes from deep canyons.

Strangely, she liked this spot, her special hiding place. She knew it well. It was home to her, really — more like home than any motel room she could remember. She’d spent a great deal of time here on this ridge, under the open sky.

On every evening of the past twenty-seven days, she’d come here, steering her Chevette partway up a twisting fire road, then leaving the car to traverse a trail on foot. By five o’clock she was always settled near the rim, lying on a blanket she carried in her car, waiting to see what Cray would do.

Sometimes he would go out, and she would follow in her Chevette. On other occasions he would stay home, but even then she would keep her vigil until after midnight, returning to her motel only when she was certain Cray would not prowl the streets.

His house lay at the rear of the hospital compound, served by a private, gated driveway. The foothills, all scrub and stunted trees and windblown confusions of cactus, rose up instantly beyond the road.

Elizabeth’s perch on the slanted ridge placed her at eye level with the upper story of Cray’s home, about two hundred feet away.

The curtains of his bedroom windows were rarely closed. With the aid of binoculars — one of the few possessions she had left, and only because she had forgotten to remove them from the Chevette’s glove compartment — Elizabeth could see him clearly whenever he entered the room.

He was there right now.

She watched him in the wobbly oval of the binoculars’ field of view. He was removing his suit jacket, his shoes.

Normally he arrived home earlier than this. Tonight some business at the hospital must have delayed him. She hadn’t seen any lights in the windows of the house until twilight was settling over the mountains.

Although he was late, he appeared to be following his usual routine in other respects. Invariably he changed out of his business attire after a day’s work.

If he meant to stay in, he would don a charcoal dressing gown and slippers, then pass the night reading or perhaps jotting notes in a pad while music, faintly audible even at this distance, would spill from the window of his downstairs study.

But if he meant to go out…

Then it was always the same outfit, the black pants and shirt, nighttime camouflage for a creature of the shadows, a creature on the hunt.

She waited, holding Cray fixed in the twin lenses of the binoculars.

He was naked now. She had seen him this way many times. It scared her, repulsed her, to be voyeuristically acquainted with his body.

He stretched, and she saw the play of his muscles, the rippling strength in his long, corded arms and crosshatched abdomen. Like a yawning tiger he seemed to luxuriate in his own boundless vitality.

She thought of Sharon Andrews, numb and dead, and she hated him so much.

Abruptly Cray turned away from the window, disappearing into another part of the bedroom. From prior observations, she knew he had gone to his closet to select his outfit for the evening.

She waited.

When she saw him again, he was all dressed in black, sleek as a panther.

Going out.

She wasn’t really surprised. After all, she was still on the loose, and she doubted he could rest until he found her. He had sent poor Walter to hunt her down, but Walter hadn’t finished the job, and now Cray meant to do it himself.

How he expected to find her, she couldn’t imagine. Perhaps he would search aimlessly. Perhaps he had some better plan.

Or perhaps he wouldn’t look for her at all. He might go in quest of some new victim, fresh prey. Another Sharon Andrews to abduct at random and chase in the cold moonlight.

She gritted her teeth against a new wave of anger. Trembling, she stood.

He would leave shortly. She knew what she had to do.

Moving fast, Elizabeth scrambled off the ridge and headed down the trail toward the fire road, where her Chevette was parked.

Cray knew she was watching him.

Naked in his bedroom window, he had sensed the pressure of her gaze. It had required all his willpower not to turn and stare into the night, seeking some sign of her.

She must have watched him on many previous evenings, but he had not been attuned to her presence. Now he was, and her proximity to him was as real and immediate as an electric shock.

Kaylie had come. Brave girl.

He’d never needed to send Walter after her. He could have waited, secure in his home, until she arrived, drawn to him like a mouse to a baited trap.

Smiling, Cray picked up his medical bag and looked inside to ascertain that its contents included two vials of sedative and several syringes. He might need the sedative to restrain Kaylie, if she became hysterical — or if she threatened to say too much.

His equipment in order, he descended the stairs to his living room, then paused before a mirror for a final check of his appearance.

He was again a man in black, just as she would expect him to be.

Throughout the day he had been fatigued. Coffee and a handful of amphetamines pilfered from the hospital supply room had kept him alert enough, but an undertow of exhaustion had threatened continually to drag him away.

Now his lethargy was gone. He was exhilarated.

The snare had been laid, the quarry was in sight, and the best part of it all was that the plan was not even his. He had Detective Shepherd to thank for it.

Shepherd — perfect name, a palatable irony. He was a poor shepherd indeed, to lead the choicest member of his flock straight into the wolf’s ravenous embrace.

Cray had met with Shepherd this evening, at the hospital. The conference had lasted thirty minutes. Shepherd had told Cray what was expected of him, the performance he was to deliver. What was particularly important, Shepherd had said, was that Cray must not leave the house until after dark.

It was dark now. Night, Cray’s friend, had visited him again.

He found it amusing that both he and the police needed the darkness. And poor Kaylie — she needed it as well, didn’t she? She needed the shadows, the concealment of the night.