P Tracy - Play To Kill aka Shoot To Thrill

Tommy consulted a handwritten piece of scrap paper that looked like it was written in Aramaic. 'Elmore Sweet in Cleveland – and by the way, you guys were right about him being the same weasel from Ely. Justice is finally served.'

'Awesome,' Gino said, pumping his fist.

Tommy continued deciphering his notes. 'Then your North Shore guy, Austin, Chicago, and L.A. Your river bride is the sixth Minnesota link, but he-she-whatever didn't have a record, just a lifetime resident of our fair state.'

'All men.'

Yep. The two women have no records and no Minnesota connection.'

'So what kind of crimes are we looking at?' Gino asked.

'Well, basically, you've got a Greatest Hits list of dirty deeds: the two pedophiles – Elmore Sweet and your North Shore hole in one; vehicular manslaughter, a nasty domestic, and a drive-by that popped a five-year-old girl asleep in her bed.'

Gino had that gleam in his eye that always terrified Magozzi, because it was usually the precursor to some spectacularly whacked theory. 'Bad men,' he pointed out. 'Bad, dead men, specifically targeted, who all had their own victims at one point. I know what this is. Couldn't be more clear.'

Magozzi and Tommy didn't even bother to ask, because they knew Gino would march out his latest and greatest without encouragement.

'We're looking at a bunch of vigilante killings, guys. It's the only thing that makes sense. And let's face it. We've been getting more and more of those lately.'

Tommy thought about that, tipping his head back and forth to shake the memories out of his brain. 'All those old people killing each other.'

'Exactly. And let's not forget our little snowman fiasco just last winter…'

'All right, all right,' Magozzi said irritably. 'So we've had some vigilante killings. They've always been around, just like any other motive for murder. But that's not what's happening here.'

Gino folded his arms over his chest. 'I got two words for you. Charles Bronson.'

'Who's Charles Bronson?' Tommy asked.

'Are you kidding me? Mr. Vigilante is who he is, or was. He might be dead, I'm not sure. Anyway, it's an old movie. Thugs kill his family, he loads up and off he goes, popping people right and left. That was a seriously popular movie, and you know why? Because sometimes the justice system lets people down, and until we stop letting pedophiles and murderers walk, we're going to have Charles Bronsons out there.'

Magozzi rolled his eyes. 'Damnit, Gino, I don't care how many vigilantes are out there, these are not revenge killings.'

'Why not?'

'First off, it's too risky, because there's a past personal connection. Second, revenge killers are focused on eliminating whoever they're pissed at, not in showing off trophies.'

'Maybe they all found each other on the Web and egged each other on, like Chelsea said.'

Magozzi shook his head. 'If you're out to avenge the death of a loved one, you're not going to pre-advertise on the Web. You want the guy dead. Why take the chance that someone can find out ahead of time and stop you? Vigilantes are on a holy mission; what's happening here is some kind of sick game-playing.'

Gino thought about that for a minute, then stuck his lips out as far as they would go. 'Well, gee, Leo, thanks a whole hell of a lot. There you go, popping a real pretty fantasy bubble once again, trashing one of my more brilliant theories. So if it's not pissed-off survivors, and it's not a single killer, then the victims aren't going to have anything in common. So what the hell are we looking for?'

'Damned if I know. But we're going to keep looking until we find it.'

Gino turned his attention back to Tommy. 'Did you print out complete files on all the victims?'

'Hey, I'm your man, of course I did. Everything's in there.' He pointed to an enormous box sitting by his door.

Gino's jaw went slack. 'You've gotta be kidding me. That box is bigger than my first house.'

Chief Elias Frost had been sitting in the corner of the tiny ICU cubicle since Marian had gotten out of surgery. The nurses had tried to kick him out; even a couple of well- intentioned doctors; but he was having none of that.

'She won't be able to talk,' the doctors told him.

You said she moved her hands.'

'That's correct. There's no paralysis.'

'Then maybe she can write.'

'Chief Frost, if she wakes up at all within the next forty- eight hours, it's going to be a miracle.'

'Then I'll wait for a miracle.'

He'd seen a few of those in ICU rooms just like this one over his twenty-odd years on the force. No reason he couldn't see another one. Especially this one.

Her last name was Brandemeyer, on loan from the useless piece of crap she'd married when marijuana and motorcycles were more of a magnet than a skinny kid who wanted to be a cop. She'd dumped the garbage when he started hitting her, but kept the name because there was a daughter. But he never did think of her with a last name. Just Marian. A single-name person, like Elvis or Cher.

No way in the world he could have recognized her face. It was all swollen and mottled from the surgery. But they had her hands outside the sheet, and he would have known them anywhere. Lord knows he should have; he'd held them often enough when they were an item in high school. Going steady is what they called it then, back when Medford only had one high school and everybody knew everybody else.

He looked at his watch and marked the thirteenth hour of his vigil. When he looked up again he had one of those horror-movie moments when the eyes of the dead person in the coffin suddenly open, and you think you'll have a heart attack right there in your seat with popcorn all over your lap.

Get a grip, Frost. You're so tired you can hardly see straight, and you've been looking at her too long, that's all. Willing her to live and waiting for her to die, and now your eyes are playing tricks. Look away, slow down the heart, take some deep breaths.

He did all that, but when he looked at her again, Marian's eyes were still open and staring.

Oh, Jesus, please, no…

He tiptoed over to her bedside, which was really stupid, after all the loud talking he'd done in the past hours, trying to wake her up. Why do you try to wake up people who are unconscious and try not to wake up people who were dead?

And then she blinked.

The doctor and nurses shooed him out while they did whatever it was you did when someone who was supposed to die decides to give it another shot. 'Two minutes for you, two minutes for the daughter,' the doctor told him when they were finished.

Frost went back to her bedside and touched her hand for the first time in over twenty years. 'You're in the hospital and you're going to be okay' – he told her the things he knew she would want to know immediately. 'Alissa is doing all right, but she was exhausted. I made her stretch out on a sofa in the waiting room for a while. I'll go get her.'

Marian winced when she tried to move her head, then raised her right forefinger.

It broke his heart watching her struggle to lift that single finger as if it weighed a million pounds. You don't want me to get her?'

Frost's heart skipped a beat when she moved the finger a little more. He pulled out his notebook, laid it at her side, and put a pen in her hand.

In any hospital he'd ever been in, the Intensive Care Unit waiting room made the rest of the place look like a sci-fi bus stop, and this one was no different. No dinky cubicles with plastic chairs here. Soft furniture in gentle colors, carpet underfoot, lamps on real wood tables instead of that crappy fluorescent lighting that made everyone look half- dead. They had food and drinks on a long table with a cloth, televisions and computers, books and magazines, and a lot of plants. The plants always made him feel good, until he started thinking that they might live a lot longer than anybody in ICU. Families in crisis mode had long, agonizing waits in places like this, and someone had put a lot of thought into making it easier.