James Patterson - Double Cross

She sat down beside me and lifted her glass high. “Here’s to a really shitty couple of days. I’d have gone home, but I know Mr. Ramirez would still be in my dreams. And his dead daughter too-and her three sisters. And Mrs. Olsen.”

“There’s a madman running around out there. Couple of them, maybe. It happens,” Sampson said. “Not your fault, Bree. I feel for the man, but Ramirez was out of line.”

“Listen,” Kitz said, “here’s an idea. Maybe a little crazy. So it must be good, right? Have you guys ever heard of the Unhinged Tour?”

I lowered my beer. “I’ve seen a few mentions online. What about it? Speaking of crazies…”

“It’s one of the touring shows about serial killers. But the point is it’s in Baltimore in a couple of days.”

“Show?” Sampson asked. “Like onstage?”

“More like a convention,” Kitz said. “They call it a ‘gathering for people with an interest in forensic psychology.’ ”

“Meaning serial-killer freaks . And, let me guess, comic-book geeks too?” Sampson said.

Kitz nodded, smiled, sipped his beer. “You got it right. That’s the demo.” He went on, “We’d have to scramble a little, but I don’t think they’d say no to a groundbreaking lecture on an open serial case, especially this one. Dr. Alex Cross could probably headline if he wanted to. At a minimum, it would draw a roomful of ideal field witnesses. That alone would get us a broader-based investigation. Maybe open up a few new channels.”

Bree started to laugh. “You are crazy, Kitz. Couldn’t hurt, though. And if we’re lucky, really fortunate, we’ll draw in DCAK himself. He says he likes to watch us, after all.”

Kitz nodded, then grinned mischievously. “Who the hell knows how his mind works? Something like this could be irresistible to someone like him. Or his copycat. So what do you say?”

We looked at one another, trying to think of a good reason why we shouldn’t go ahead with Kitz’s idea.

“This isn’t really a Cyber thing, is it?” Bree finally said. “How do you know so much?”

“Oh, you know. Word gets around.” Kitz sounded almost breezy.

Sampson’s face lit up. He slapped the table and pointed at Kitzmiller. “You go to these freaky things, don’t you? On your own time .”

“No, no.” Kitz picked up his drink again, then added quietly, “Not anymore.”

The three of us started to laugh, which was a good thing, real good, a necessary release.

Bree leaned into him and purred, “Ohh, Kitzy, you’re a full-blown geek, aren’t you?”

“And he cleans up so nice,” I said.

“What about you guys?” Kitz asked. “Anyone remind you lately what you do for a living? Just because you don’t go to the public shows doesn’t mean you aren’t cut from the same cloth as the people who do.”

We gave him about five seconds of respectful silence before we laughed in his face again.

But then I added, “Folks, I do believe we have an op to run.”

“But not tonight,” Bree said, hooking her arm into mine, then escorting me out of Zinny’s. “All this freaking talk,” she whispered to me, “it’s got me going. Besides, like I said- I owe you .”

“And I plan to collect.”

“With interest, I hope.”

We lasted all the way over to her place, but just barely, and not to the bedroom.

INCOMING! AGAIN. I got the shock of my relatively new private-practice life early the next morning, and I hadn’t even made it to my first appointment before it happened. An earlier cancellation had me at the office a little later than usual, just after seven thirty, sipping coffee from Starbucks as I came in through the front door, still thinking about Bree and last night, and what I hoped would be many nights to come.

I’d be starting my sessions with Sandy Quinlan at eight; then the Desert Storm vet Anthony Demao; followed by Pentagon worker Tanya Pitts, who was having recurring suicidal thoughts and who needed to see me five days a week, maybe seven, but could only afford one, so I comped her an extra session each week.

As I turned into the waiting area from the outside hallway, I was surprised to see that Sandy Quinlan was already there.

So was Anthony. He wore a black muscle-T undershirt and had another long-sleeved shirt draped over his lap.

What the hell was going on here?

For the few seconds before they realized I was standing there in the room with them, Sandy ’s hand was playing underneath the shirt on Anthony’s lap.

She was giving him a hand job in the waiting room!

“Hey.” I interrupted the action. “Hey, hey. That’s enough of that. What do you think you’re doing?”

“Oh, my God.” Sandy jumped up and shielded her eyes with both hands. “I’m so sorry. I’m so embarrassed. I have to go. I have to go now, Dr. Cross.”

“No. Just stay right there,” I told her. “You too, Anthony. Nobody goes anywhere. We need to talk.”

Anthony’s expression was somewhere between neutral and, for lack of a better word, interrupted. But he wouldn’t actually look at me. “Sorry about that,” he mumbled into his goatee.

“ Sandy, would you come on into my office?” I said. “Anthony, I’ll see you when I’m finished with Sandy.”

“Yeah, yeah,” he answered. “I get it.”

Once I had her in my office, it took a while for the two of us to recover somewhat.

“ Sandy, I don’t even know what to say to you,” I finally said. “You knew I’d come in and catch the two of you, didn’t you?”

“I know. Of course. I’m so sorry, Dr. Cross.” Her voice shook as she squeezed out the words. I almost felt sorry for her, but not quite.

“Why do you think that happened in there?” I continued. “It’s not like you, is it?”

“It is totally unlike me.” Sandy rolled her eyes at herself. “I know how this will sound, Dr. Cross, but he’s… cute. I told you I was sexually frustrated. Oh God.” Her eyes welled up. “I am such an idiot. This is my pattern. Acting out for attention. Here we go again.”

I decided to try another tack and got up to top off my coffee from the second cup in my bag. “Let me ask you this. What was in it for you?”

“‘In it’?” Sandy asked.

“I think I know what Anthony was getting out of what was happening.” I sat down again. “What were you getting?”

Sandy lowered her eyes and looked away all at the same time. Maybe the question was too intimate for her. It was kind of interesting that she could give Anthony a hand job in the waiting room but was embarrassed to talk about it now.

“You don’t have to answer the question, but you also don’t have to be embarrassed,” I told her.

“No,” she said, “it’s fine. I’ll talk. It’s just that you’ve given me something to think about. It seems so obvious when you say it, but… I guess I hadn’t thought about it that way.” She sat up a little straighter and actually smiled at me. Strange , I thought. Not very much like the Sandy I knew.

My larger concern was about where things would go from here with the two of them. I had the feeling that Sandy and Anthony were all wrong for each other, but that didn’t mean I could stop something from happening.

Eight ten in the morning, and already it was a bad day.

Which got a little worse at nine.

Anthony wasn’t in the waiting room. He’d bolted on me. And I wondered if I’d ever see him again.

AT A LITTLE PAST NINE, Sandy Quinlan and Anthony Demao met at a coffee shop on Sixth. The rendezvous had been arranged earlier. They had known that Dr. Cross was going to catch them, because they had planned the whole thing.