Michael Morley - Spider

Jack stood up to stretch his legs. Blood pumped to his head and a burst of white-hot pain scorched through his temples.

'You okay?' said Howie, frowning up at him.

'Sure. Just stood up too quickly,' lied Jack. He looked down on the mess of maps and added, 'We've got to go for the more isolated houses, the ones with big garages, doubles not singles. He'll have picked a street that he can get away from quickly and that he can have good surveillance from, so he won't be in the heart of the estates, he'll be on an outer wing.'

'We'll pull together the sweep teams, right now. I'll brief them right after we're done.'

Jack was worried about that. Filling the area with squad cars or even Crown Vics could spook the perp. 'They're going to have to be careful. We know he's got cameras in the house, so he sure as hell is going to have them outside too. If he's in there, he'll probably see us coming.'

Howie climbed to his feet, his knees cracking. 'Do you think he owns the property or rents it?'

'Good point. This guy has to be forty-plus so let's do voting register and housing searches on people thirty-five or over. Get someone to sift mortgage and bank accounts too, focusing on that demographic. He's certain to be using a false identity and showing himself younger or older than he actually is.'

'And renting?' asked Howie.

'Unlikely,' said Jack 'He'd never want to risk a landlord coming in and finding all his toys.'

Howie wasn't sure it was as simple as that. 'I just don't see him doing this kind of whacko stuff in his own crib. Like you always say, this guy is cautious. Surely he wants to make sure he's able to leave at a moment's notice and that, if the house gets busted, it cannot lead to him?'

Another explosion went off in Jack's head, but this time he poker-faced the pain. Concentrate, he told himself, get your shit together, there's time to rest up later, just get your head in gear.

Howie fiddled with some maps and it gave Jack the breather he needed. 'You're right. Of course you're right,' said Jack. 'Get a team on to the letting agencies. I'm willing to bet that he does own this house, but what he has done is put it in the hands of a letting agent and leased it back to himself under a false identity. In other words, he's both landlord and tenant.'

'He probably used a false name even when he approached the agent, purporting to be the owner,' said Howie.

'Exactly,' agreed Jack, feeling his eye twitch again. 'Letting the house back to himself is a really clever trick. The first thing it does is generate false paperwork. From false tenancy agreements and household bills you can set up bank accounts, apply for credit cards and start to build up a series of false identities for yourself.'

'I'm on to it,' said Howie, heading off for a phone.

'Another thing,' called Jack. 'You'll also probably find the tenancy has changed names a few times. Those name changes will roughly coincide with the dates of our victims' deaths. He'll shed an old identity, and adopt an entirely new one, after each of our known murders.'

'Back in a minute,' said Howie, leaving the room to brief Fernandez.

Jack was glad to be alone.

He felt himself break into an oily sweat. The strength in his legs seemed to run into a puddle around his feet and his vision blurred.

Breathe slow, breathe deep, he told himself, and then grabbed for a chair just before a tide of blackness and nausea washed over him.

San Quirico D'Orcia, Tuscany Nancy ran to the edge of the terrace where Zack's trike lay abandoned and the garden fell away by more than twelve feet.

She could see nothing.

Panic set in.

Without even thinking about her own safety, she scrambled down the loose soil and into the deep crater. Surely to God he hadn't come down here on his own? And then she remembered how she'd once found him dancing on top of her dressing table after she'd left him in the bedroom for just a moment while she went to the toilet in the en-suite bathroom.

With three-year-olds, anything was possible.

'Zack! Zack, are you down here, honey?' she shouted.

Nancy peered into the darkness of the old workings that they'd discovered beneath the garden, the narrow opening to the cave-like area that she had hoped might contain an underground well or spa, the area she now hoped was shallow and bereft of anything that might endanger her son.

'Zack!' she shouted again.

Nancy squeezed her way into the narrow opening. She squinted and stared as hard as she could.

Finally, in the fetid darkness, she could see him. She could just distinguish the outline of her child's face.

He looked terrified.

She moved slowly towards him. 'It's all right, darling, Mommy's here,' she said. But, as she inched forward, the blood froze in her veins.

Zack's hands were bound in front of him. Around his neck was a noose.

Brooklyn, New York By the time Howie returned, Jack had managed something of a recovery.

'You look white as a sheet, buddy, you okay?' asked Howie.

'Maybe a bit too warm in here, place lacks fresh air,' said Jack, keen to brush away the moment and get on with things. 'You got some keys for me?'

Howie fished in his jacket and threw over his car keys. 'Take it easy, eh?'

Jack nodded and headed out to the parking lot.

The clock was ticking.

They both knew they were in a critical race against time, in which the prize was a young woman's life.

Forty-eight hours max – that's what the doctor who'd seen the tapes had said that she had.

Just forty-eight hours.

Jack had no status in the Bureau any more, no shield and no gun; Howie would have to pull together the briefings and assemble the teams on his own. He would be updating Marsh, and they'd be making a call to the NYPD to bring their top brass up to speed. They in turn would assign officers from the ESU, their equivalent of a SWAT team, and ultimately there'd be an FBI-led joint Strike Team. Jack had also suggested bringing in Josh Benson and Lou Chester, two instructors who ran Rodman's Neck, the force's specialist training base in the Bronx. Chester was about the best sniper in the world and Benson ran the most gruelling of urban-training scenarios; when it came to storming buildings and saving hostages he didn't just have the T-shirt, he was the T-shirt. Officers would be canvassing all the areas that Jack and Howie had pinpointed as likely to afford BRK the kind of cover he needed. Jack, meanwhile, was on his way to Marine Park. It was a vast area that lay between Mill Basin and Gerritsen Beach, straddling NYPD's 61st and 63rd Precincts, and was pretty low on the crime stats. The place had originally been a Dutch settlement and was home to the first tidal mill in America. Since then, the huge tract of marshland, parkland, bog, swamp and agricultural fields had been shaped beyond recognition. The area had also become home for many of New York's Italians and Jews, who lived in housing that had been mainly built sixty or seventy years ago.

Jack headed north up Gerritsen, cruising around the corners of Cyrus, Florence and Channel. At the bottom he turned right on to Fillmore and snaked his way around East 33rd and 34th. He lost his way a little and found himself out towards the Kings Plaza Shopping Mall. He cursed a couple of times and then doubled back and went up and down Hendrickson and Coleman from where he could see golf carts trundling over the velvet greens of Marine Park's vast golf course. Jack was frustrated. He got out of the car and looked around. Despite the warmth of the day a strong breeze blew in from somewhere out towards Jamaica Bay, and he hoped the fresh air would do him good, would prevent that nauseous feeling creeping up on him again.

The area was civilized and decent, respectable and well groomed. It wasn't rolling in money, but it certainly wasn't dog-rough poor either. In short, it was the kind of neighbourhood where people minded their own business and kept themselves to themselves. He's not here, thought Jack, it's too open, too many houses, and too many windows to be seen from.