Tess Gerritsen - Body Double

Everybody dies. But I don’t want to die buried in this box, where no one will ever find my bones.

Save the light, save the light as long as you can. She flicked off the switch and lay in the darkness as fear closed in and wrapped its tentacles tighter. No one knows, she thought. No one knows I’m here.

Stop it, Mattie. Keep it together. You’re the only one who can save yourself.

She turned onto her side and hugged herself. Heard something roll across the floor. One of the spent batteries, useless now.

What if no one knows I’ve been kidnapped? What if no one knows I’m still alive?

She wrapped her arms around her belly and thought about every conversation she’d had with her captor. How are you feeling? That’s what he always asked, how was she feeling? As if he cared. As if anyone who stuck a pregnant woman in a box gave a damn how she was feeling. But he always asked the question, and she always pleaded with him to let her out.

He’s waiting for a different answer.

She drew her knees closer and her foot hit something that went rolling away. She sat up and turned on the flashlight. Began scrambling around for all the loose batteries. She had four old ones, plus two fresh ones still in the package. Plus the two in the flashlight. She flicked off the switch again. Save the light, save the light.

In darkness, she began to untie her shoe.

DR. JOYCE P. O’DONNELL WALKED into the homicide unit’s conference room looking as though she owned the place. Her sleek St. John’s suit had probably cost more than Rizzoli’s entire clothing budget for a year. Three-inch heels emphasized her already statuesque height. Although three cops were watching her as she sat down at the table, she revealed not a flicker of discomfort. She knew how to take control of a room, a skill that Rizzoli could not help envying, even though she despised the woman.

The dislike was clearly mutual. O’Donnell cast one icy glance at Rizzoli, then her gaze moved on past Barry Frost, before she finally turned her full attention on Lieutenant Marquette, the homicide unit’s ranking officer. Of course she would focus on Marquette; O’Donnell didn’t waste her time with underlings.

“This is an unexpected invitation, Lieutenant,” she said. “I don’t often get asked to Schroeder Plaza.”

“Detective Rizzoli was the one who suggested it.”

“Even more unexpected, then. Considering.”

Considering we play for opposite teams, thought Rizzoli. I catch the monsters; you defend them.

“But as I told Detective Rizzoli on the phone,” O’Donnell continued, “I can’t help you unless you help me. If you want me to help you find the Beast, you have to share what information you have.”

In answer, Rizzoli slid a folder to O’Donnell. “That’s what we know about Elijah Lank so far.” She saw the eager gleam in the psychiatrist’s eyes as she reached for the folder. This was what O’Donnell lived for: a glimpse of a monster. A chance to get close to the beating heart of evil.

O’Donnell opened the file. “His high school record.”

“From Fox Harbor.”

“An IQ of 136. But only average grades.”

“Your classic underachiever.” Capable of great things if he applies himself, one teacher had written, not realizing where Elijah Lank’s achievements would take him. “After his mother died, he was raised by his father, Hugo. The father never held down a job for long. Apparently spent most of his days with a bottle, and died of pancreatitis when Elijah was eighteen.”

“And this is the same household Amalthea grew up in.”

“Yeah. She came to live with her uncle when she was nine, after her mother died. No one even knows who her father was. So there you have the Lank family of Fox Harbor. A drunk uncle, a sociopathic cousin, and a girl who grows up schizophrenic. Just your nice wholesome American family.”

“You called Elijah sociopathic.”

“What else would you call a boy who buries his classmate alive, just for the fun of it?”

O’Donnell turned to the next page. Anyone else reading that file would wear an expression of horror, but the look on her face was one of fascination.

“The girl he buried was only fourteen,” said Rizzoli. “Alice Rose was the new kid in school. She was also hearing impaired, which is why the other kids tormented her. And probably why Elijah chose her. She was vulnerable, easy prey. He invited her up to his house, then led her through the woods to a pit he’d dug. He threw her inside, covered the hole with boards, and piled rocks on top. When questioned about it later, he said the whole thing was a prank. But I think he honestly meant to kill her.”

“According to this report, the girl came out of it unharmed.”

“Unharmed? Not exactly.”

O’Donnell looked up. “But she did survive it.”

“Alice Rose spent the next five years of her life being treated for severe depression and anxiety attacks. When she was nineteen, she climbed into a bathtub and slit her wrists. As far as I’m concerned, Elijah Lank is responsible for her death. She was his first victim.”

“Can you prove there are others?”

“Forty-five years ago, a married couple named Karen and Robert Sadler vanished from Kennebunkport. Karen Sadler was eight months pregnant at the time. Their remains were found just last week, in that same plot of land where Elijah buried Alice Rose alive. I think the Sadlers were Elijah’s kills. His and Amalthea’s.”

O’Donnell had gone very still, as though she was holding her breath.

“You’re the one who first suggested it, Dr. O’Donnell,” said Lieutenant Marquette. “You said Amalthea had a partner, someone she’d called the Beast. Someone who helped her kill Nikki and Theresa Wells. That’s what you told Dr. Isles, isn’t it?”

“No one else believed my theory.”

“Well, now we do,” said Rizzoli. “We think the Beast is her cousin, Elijah.”

O’Donnell’s eyebrow lifted in amusement. “A case of killing cousins ?”

“It wouldn’t be the first time that cousins have killed together,” pointed out Marquette.

“True,” O’Donnell said. “Kenneth Bianchi and Angelo Buono-the Hillside Stranglers-they were cousins.”

“So there’s a precedent,” said Marquette. “Cousins as killing partners.”

“You didn’t need me to tell you that.”

“You knew about the Beast before anyone else did,” said Rizzoli. “You’ve been trying to find him, to contact him through Amalthea.”

“But I haven’t succeeded. So I don’t see how I can help you find him. I don’t even know why you asked me here, Detective, since you have so little regard for my research.”

“I know Amalthea talks to you. She wouldn’t say a word to me when I saw her yesterday. But the guards told me she does talk to you. ”

“Our sessions are confidential. She’s my patient.”

“Her cousin isn’t. He’s the one we want to find.”

“Well, where was his last known location? You must have some information you can start with.”

“We have almost none. Nothing on his whereabouts in decades.”

“Do you even know that he’s alive?”

Rizzoli sighed. Admitted: “No.”

“He’d be nearly seventy years old now, wouldn’t he? That’s getting a little geriatric for a serial killer.”

“Amalthea is sixty-five,” said Rizzoli. “Yet no one ever doubted that she killed Theresa and Nikki Wells. That she crushed their skulls, soaked their bodies in gasoline, and lit them on fire.”

O’Donnell leaned back in her chair and regarded Rizzoli for a moment. “Tell me why Boston PD is even pursuing Elijah Lank. These are old murders-not even your jurisdiction. What’s your interest in this?”