John Lutz - Night kills

Now it was ten minutes past that time, and here was Shellie still waiting to share conversation and perhaps another egg cream with the first date she'd had since moving to New York. (She didn't count the scuzzy guy who'd stuck out his tongue at her and tried to pick her up outside Starbucks last week.)

On the other side of the atrium, pretending now and then to look into the show window of a luggage shop, David Adams watched her. Shellie Marston. From Nebraska, no less. He smiled. Maybe he'd been expecting too much. She wasn't perfect, but she'd do.

Adams was wearing neatly pressed khakis, a blue pullover shirt with a collar, white jogging shoes. Even from this distance he could see that Shellie was also wearing white joggers. His smile widened. Already they had something in common. Maybe this would really work.

He was a handsome man with regular features not easily remembered from a glance. It took a while for his bland but masculine visage to register as attractive. His hair was dark brown, wavy, and worn a bit long to disguise the fact that his ears stuck out. He was slightly under six feet tall and moved with athletic ease. His body was compact and muscular, his waist narrow. His was the sort of physique that wore clothes well. He was all in all nonthreatening, and there was certainly nothing not to like about him. Easy manner, nice smile, clean, and well groomed. He was the sort who'd fit well in most women's romantic fantasies. And of course when he did finally bed them, they saw him as the ideal from the desires and dreams they'd carried since their first kiss.

He took another longer and bolder look at Shellie Marston and decided she was a go. He moved toward her with an easy grace, gaze fixed on her.

She'd spotted him now. These first few minutes were important. He watched her face.

It was, as usual, good strategy to be late. For an instant, relief that he'd shown up at all flooded her features. Then she had her mask on again.

He smiled at her and she managed to smile back.

Shellie made herself smile at the man she was now sure was approaching her table. He must be David Adams. She didn't know why she'd had to make herself smile. There was nothing wrong with this guy. Not that she could see, anyway. He didn't look like the type who'd need a matchmaking service. But then Shellie didn't see herself as that type, either.

She told herself again that there was nothing disreputable or dangerous about Internet hookups. Not anymore. This was a competitive and busy world, especially here in the largest and busiest of cities. People didn't have time to move tentatively in finding and developing relationships, as they often still did in Nebraska. She'd even known a girl in high school whose prospective suitors had to ask her parents' permission to date her.

Quaint, Shellie thought. And even if someone wanted to ask Shellie's father for her hand, she didn't have a father. She had only herself. And she could make up her own mind.

The closer David Adams got to her table, the more sure she was that she'd made the right decision in contacting E-Bliss.org.

"Shellie?" he asked when he was within a few feet of her. Even that one word-her name-was smooth and softly modulated. This was a gentle man, obviously. A bit hesitant and shy, like herself. A gentle man, but not at all effeminate.

"Shellie," she confirmed, then smiled and stood up. She felt the sole of one New Balance slide over the toe of the other. Not noticeable. "You must be David."

They shook hands. Gentle again.

Flesh upon flesh. Shellie hoped there might be some electricity there. Some arc of emotion that suggested a future truly meaningful. Physical attraction wasn't everything, except at first.

She wasn't disappointed.

The present

Cindy Sellers sat alone at a corner table in P.J. Clarke's on Third Avenue and Fifty-fifth Street. Around her were muted voices, the occasional clink of flatware on china, and laughter from the adjoining bar. The mingled scents of spices hung in the air.

The restaurant part of the venerable tavern was dim, with dark wood paneling, and there was something about the young woman seated in isolation before her bowl of stew and a Guinness that discouraged any of the rogues and business types at the bar or some of the other tables from approaching her. She was reasonably attractive, with inquisitive large brown eyes, short brown hair, and a trim figure, but there was an intensity about her that sometimes drove people away. She was very good at going after those people, overcoming their reluctance, and getting them to talk about matters they wouldn't have dreamed of telling anyone else.

It was still too early for the dinner crowd, and the place was quiet enough for her to think, which was why she'd come here. Before her on the table were her notes on what she'd chosen to call the Torso Murders, as well as a revised draft of what would be her story.

And a hell of a story it was. The time was near when she'd no longer feel obligated to keep it all off the record, as she'd promised Renz.

In fact, maybe the time was here.

Cindy took a sip of Guinness and allowed that the public had a right to know if a sadistic killer was in its midst and might kill again. It was, in fact, her professional obligation to inform the people, as long as it would sell papers and advance her journalism career. But Renz was police commissioner now, not just another workaday cop with rank, and he was riding a political high. Of course, he didn't know that he wasn't her only source, and that she was aware he'd called in retired homicide captain Frank Quinn, along with his detective team, that pushy bitch Pearl and the hapless but occasionally shrewd Fedderman, to work the case. There were people in the NYPD hierarchy who didn't like the prospect of semioutsiders covering themselves and Renz with glory so Renz could advance to an even higher office. These dissatisfied cops were people Cindy Sellers could and did use.

Certainly Renz wouldn't like it if the quasi-official presence of Quinn and his team was revealed too soon. On the other hand, he knew they'd be media subjects sooner or later-that was even the idea. They were, after all, part of Renz's team-working for him in particular as well as for the city. And Renz wouldn't be shocked by the fact that the NYPD had more than one leak.

Still, he was the commissioner. Cindy understood and respected power. She would give it its due, up to a point.

She took a long pull of Guinness and fished her cell phone from her purse on the chair beside her. Renz's direct number was on her speed dial.

No answer.

She tried his cell phone.

Apparently it was turned off.

Cindy dialed the general number of the Puzzle Palace, her term for One Police Plaza, and was politely put on ignore. She sighed and drummed her fingers. Waiting patiently for anything wasn't in Cindy's nature.

Hell with him, she thought, cutting the connection. She'd tried to give him a heads-up before releasing the story every other media outlet in the city probably knew about anyway but couldn't confirm. The clock was ticking and she'd done what she could.

Cindy had been here before and knew how it worked. When City Beat hit the newsstands and vending machines tomorrow morning, the hounds would be loosed. Renz as well as the killer would have to play the fox. Quinn and his detectives would occupy the area between hounds and foxes, perilous ground.

Keyed up as she was with anticipation, Cindy wasn't hungry. She took another long sip of Guinness and pushed aside her barely touched bowl of stew. Placing her half-rim reading glasses low on the bridge of her nose, she arranged the draft of her story-which was jotted down in her own custom shorthand that only she could read-before her on the table. Then she flicked down the menu on her cell phone and pressed the button that dialed her editor at City Beat.