Ted Dekker - The Bride Collector

He would go to the park. If she wasn’t there, he would pay the beauty salon a visit. Then he would find her, haul her out by her hair, and, rather than kill her with a bullet to her face as he’d fantasized, he would drill her full of holes and let her bleed all over the ground.

He stepped onto the sidewalk in front of the store and glanced up at the television over the counter inside. What he saw made him stop.

A news anchor was speaking silently over words that read: MISSING PERSON. And there, next to the words was a large photograph of a skinny, twentysomething girl with dark, stringy hair.

Paradise.

In the space of a single breath Quinton knew what this meant: The center had reported her missing, which meant that the authorities didn’t know her whereabouts, unless this was a ploy to draw him back to the park. That was unlikely-they wouldn’t go to such lengths to draw him to a location they already expected him at.

Paradise was likely still at the park, cowering beneath the tree. This was very good news.

The picture changed. The words now read, ARMED AND DANGEROUS. Beside the words was a photograph of a man named Quinton Gauld. An old picture of him from his employment file at CWI. He remembered having the picture taken when he was first hired.

This was alarming news. He’d worn a mustache and beard back then, and his hair was long. Black plastic-framed glasses were perched over his nose. He’d forgotten how homely he’d looked seven years ago. Once he’d learned about his important role in attracting the world’s most beautiful women, he’d changed his habits to reveal the true beauty in himself. The result had been a smashing success. He now looked nothing like the ugly toad in the photograph.

But the authorities knew his identity. How? His mind flipped through a dozen possibilities and settled on the 300M, which was indeed registered to him. It had always been his weakest link; some camera somewhere had likely snapped a picture of his vehicle coming out of the garage at Rain Man’s residence. Together with other bits and pieces, they’d deduced his identity.

This made his mission even more critical. He would have to swap the 300M out for the green Chevy pickup truck parked at his apartment. He’d rented the apartment and registered the vehicle under an alias-neither could be tracked to the man who had once been Quinton Gauld, now Ghost Gauld. But an astute observer might connect his face to the one on the screen.

To be sure he wasn’t overestimating his improved appearance, he walked into the mini-market and approached the cashier, who was counting the change in her drawer.

“Another freak,” he said, nodding at the television.

She followed his eyes. “Yeah, he’s been on for the last half hour. Can I help you?”

He caught her eye, then smiled. “What’s the world coming to? Pack of Marlboro.”

“Reds?”

“Yes, Reds. Gotta die sometime, right?”

She grinned sheepishly at his joke about the perils of smoking. “I guess.”

Quinton paid for the cigarettes, threw them in the trash on his way back to the car, and climbed behind the wheel.

His need to urinate had passed. Instead he felt a terrible urge to find the deceptively named Paradise before some other lucky soul found her.

ALLISON PUSHED THE door to Roudy’s office open and sighed a silent prayer of relief. Roudy was pacing in front of his desk, lecturing Casanova and Andrea about the finer points of police sketching, which he’d demonstrated in rather horrible fashion on the whiteboard behind him. Seeing Allison, he pushed his point with a burst of intensity.

“It’s in the details, I’m telling you, much finer than even most trained eyes can see. This is why they come to me.” He pointed to his eyes. “I have that sight. I can tell if a single hair is out of place.” He nodded at Allison. “Greetings.”

Andrea jumped up from her position on the couch next to Casanova. “Did you find her?”

Allison stared at Roudy. “I need your help, Sherlock.”

“I’ll have to check my schedule.”

“I need all of you again. Andrea and Cass, I need you to stay here and keep an eye on things for me in case Paradise returns on her own. She knows and trusts you, and I need you to be here when she comes back.”

“What about Roudy?”

“Roudy, I need you to come with me. I need those eyes of yours.”

“My eyes.”

“Yes, your eyes. We’re going out to look for Paradise. And for Quinton.”

The announcement caught them flat-footed. Roudy was still dressed in his pajamas and slippers. It would have to do.

“Out?” Roudy said.

“Out. Now.”

“I don’t drive.”

“I do,” she said.

“And you need me because the FBI is looking for the wrong person.”

“What do you mean?”

“This serial killer has demonstrated superior intelligence at every turn,” Roudy explained. “And no wonder, with his background. After all, you hired him, Allison. But anyone with those kind of smarts isn’t going to walk around looking like his old self. The photograph of Quinton Gauld won’t help them. I assume you’ve informed them of this?”

Bingo. This was on his mind already?

“That’s right, Roudy. And that’s why I need your eyes. You better than anyone may be able to recognize him. Or her, for that matter.”

“Where?”

“Hospitals.”

“You do realize that we won’t find them. He’s as smart as all that-he’s got her stashed somewhere already.”

Andrea dropped to her seat and began to bawl.

“Sorry, but it’s true,” Roudy said.

“That was uncalled for,” Allison snapped.

He looked away, fiddling with his hands.

“Will you help me?”

He caught her eye, then made a show of looking in his appointment book. “I’ll clear my calendar,” he announced.

“Let’s go, Roudy.”

“It’s a waste of-”

“Stop it!” Allison cried. Andrea’s sniffing swelled to a wail. “I don’t care if it is a waste of time! This is Paradise we’re talking about here, and I’m not sitting around a moment longer. She’s my child.”

They all understood her meaning.

“Now are you going to help me, or not?”

“I would do anything for Paradise!” His jowls shook as he emphasized his commitment. “Where to?”

“The Lutheran Medical Center. Quinton Gauld took his internship there. It’s also the closest major medical center with a psychiatric ward.”

Roudy nodded, then marched up and past her. “Follow me.”

IT TOOK QUINTON an hour to switch his 300M out for the truck and reach the park. With each passing minute his ire rose, resulting in a condition of constant buzzing and far worse, some twitching. Any physical reaction to the stakes at hand would have been beneath him twelve hours ago. He would have refused to give in to any such cliché, but the discovery of his true identity had sent him over a cliff and he had no choice but to accept the truth: that he had hated Paradise all along.

He loathed her with every synaptic firing in his brain. He would rather cut and crush her than take even one more breath. He would rather vomit down her throat than make her beautiful for God.

But then, forcing her to make herself beautiful was his way of vomiting down her throat. He could have made her beautiful himself. He’d perfected the skill of applying makeup and manicures and all of the pampering most women paid dearly for. So then why had he really demanded she take herself into the salon?

Because even then, deep inside, he’d known how humiliating the experience would be. His true desire had been to mock her because he hated her.

He let the image from his crushed cell phone linger in his mind-the red blouse, the sexy jean shorts, the flowing dark hair, the long lashes-as he studied the park for a glimpse of her.