Jonathan Kellerman - Twisted

We’re all adults here.

She wasn’t at her desk.

“Sick,” said Mary Zoltan.

“Nothing serious, I hope.”

“When she called in this morning, she sounded pretty bad.”

“A cold?” said Isaac.

“No, more like…” Mary stared at him and Isaac felt his face catch fire. He’d showered for a long time but if Isaiah, half-asleep, could smell it…

“Whatever,” said Mary. “Is there something I can help you with?”

“No, thanks.”

She smirked.

Sick. More than a cold.

A woman on the edge and he’d driven her over.

Bad enough on its own, but there goes June 28.

As he made his way down to the third subbasement, nightmare scenes tumbled out of his brain like a payoff of slot-machine quarters.

Klara, having convinced herself she’d been sexually exploited- by a young, ambitious man- had plunged into a deep, dark depression.

And dealt with it by self-medicating.

Overdosing.

Or, she’d drowned her sorrows in pills and alcohol- pills and white wine.

Yes, that fit: tranqs and chardonnay. Besotted, she staggers to her minivan. Another car heads her way but it’s too late.

Two gifted children left orphaned.

A police investigation ensues: What had led a middle-aged librarian to engage in such rash behavior?

Who was the last person she’d been with?

Mary knew. From the way she’d looked at him, Mary knew.

He stopped midway down the second flight. What if the two of them hadn’t been as discreet as they’d believed and someone, some botany scholar, some damned chlorophiliac, lured to Isaac’s quiet, dark corner by a crumbling, antiquarian text on molds or marigolds or whatever, had seen everything?

Career-killing publicity.

Bye bye med school.

Bye-bye Ph.D., for that matter. He’d be standing with Isaiah at five-thirty A.M., waiting for roofing jobs.

The shame. His parents… the Doctors Lattimore. Everyone at Burton Academy. The university.

Councilman Gilbert Reyes.

By the time he reached his corner, he’d conjured a vivid image of Reyes calling a press conference in order to distance himself from his prodigal project.

He looked around. No one in the Botany section. As usual. But what did that mean? During the whole thing- the entire damned orgiastic fifteen minutes or however long it had taken- his eyes had been shut.

He shut them now, as if to bring back the moment. Opened and saw high library stacks. Dim, empty corridors.

But everything felt wrong; the air smelled reproachful.

He turned face and ran back to the stairs. Tripped and nearly tumbled but managed to maintain balance.

Or something that passed for it.

He couldn’t be here today. Back to the beach, the beach had been good. He’d return, stuff his face with junk food, play video games like an everyday bonehead, numb his feet, and whatever else demanded numbing, in the vast, relentless Pacific.

He did it. But by noon, he craved the police station.

The second meeting was worse for Petra.

Five minutes after it started a Valley Gang Unit rep arrived, a uniformed three-striper, a huge man with a shaved bullet-head, ice eyes, and all the charm of a virus. He kept inspecting his nails as Hotshot I gave more speeches about gang behavior.

The search for Omar Selden and associates was now an official task force.

Schoelkopf had decided to sit in.

Not that the captain said much. For the most part he looked sleepy and small, and Petra, knowing about his third wife, felt sorry for him. She started nodding off as Honcho droned on. Finally, the guy slapped his notepad shut and motioned for his buddy to collapse the easel.

“So,” he said, tightening the knot of his tie, “we’re all on the same page.”

Petra looked at the big gang sergeant and said, “One thing you might want to check out: Our boy Omar took college courses in photography and when I saw him in Venice he had camera equipment with him. He listed a phony address in NoHo, so maybe he’s got some kind of connection there.”

“It was a phony address,” Schoelkopf cut in. “That was the point of lying, Detective Connor. To throw you off.”

Which was utter nonsense. Criminals lacked imagination, made stupid mistakes all the time. If they didn’t, police work would be an exercise in futility.

No one backed her up.

She said, “Still, sir- ”

The gang guy stood to his full six-four and broke in: “Never seen any bangers in NoHo, except for a few straggling in when there’s a street fair. No street fairs till next month.”

He left the room.

The head Downtown guy said, “Onward.”

When Petra returned to the detectives’ room, Isaac was waiting for her. Now she did need to walk and she told him so. They left the station and headed south on Wilcox. Isaac was smart enough not to talk as she stomped her way toward Santa Monica. Eventually, she cooled down and noticed that he was keeping his distance from her. She was probably scaring him. Time to force a smile.

“So,” she said. “June 28. The date has to mean something- a birthday, an anniversary, something personal to the bad guy. Or some historical event that turns him on. I checked DMV stats on all the principals in the files. None of the vics were born that day. So maybe our boy is a history freak.”

She waited for him to comment. He didn’t.

“Any ideas?”

“Everything you’re saying sounds reasonable.”

Was he losing interest? Distracted by his other life?

“What keeps coming to me,” she said, “is an extremely seductive killer. Someone subtle, really careful about the way he sets things up. Marta Doebbler being called out of the theater, Geraldo Solis possibly being conned by a phony cable appointment. If the cable guy is our suspect, he was canny enough to case the house and come back later. Maybe he was also canny enough to use a dog as a lure.”

She told him about the two kinds of canine hair found on Coral Langdon, recounted her friendly neighborhood dog-walker scenario.

“The setups,” she said, “could be as much a turn-on as the kill.”

“A choreographer,” he said.

“That’s a good way to put it. So what do you think?”

“You’re right about the subtlety.”

“Until he blitz-attacks the victims from behind and bashes their brains out. That’s anything but subtle, Isaac. To me that says (a) cowardice- he’s afraid to look them in the eye so he avoids the usual sex-psycho strangulation thing- and (b) he’s got lots of rage beneath the surface that he’s able to control in everyday life. More than control. He functions well until he’s triggered. We know the date is one trigger, but there has to be something about the victims.”

They walked for a while before she said, “Anything you want to add is okay.”

He shook his head.

“You okay?”

He startled. She’d shaken him out of some sort of reverie. “Sure.”

“You seem a bit spacey.”

“Sorry,” he said.

“No apology necessary. I just want to make sure you’re okay.” She smiled. “As your mentor- not that I’ve mented much. Is that a verb?”

Isaac smiled back. “Nope. Mentored.”

“Feel free to speculate about what I just said.”

“Everything you’re saying makes sense. I wish I had something to add, but I don’t.”

A half-block later, he said, “One thing does occur to me. There’s a discrepancy between Marta Doebbler and the others. If the killer was able to disguise himself as a cable repairman to get into Mr. Solis’s place, Mr. Solis obviously didn’t know him. If the dog theory’s true, the same could go for Coral Langdon: She met a man walking his dog in her neighborhood, chatted, turned to go, and got bludgeoned. The killer could’ve rehearsed the scene by dog-walking previously in order to familiarize himself with the surroundings. But he still could’ve been a relative stranger. That can’t be true of Marta Doebbler. She wouldn’t have left the theater in the middle of the show unless she knew who had called her. Plus, a stranger wouldn’t have known Marta was going to the theater.”