Warren Murphy - Death Therapy

Remo had found his and Chiun's files. Nothing. Test results; Dr. Forrester's observations about Remo who had aggressive fantasies. Zero. No file on Dorfwill or Porter or Barrett or Bannon.

There must be a private file, Remo thought. The secretary should know where it is.

He stood up from the desk and walked over to the couch, the secretary's frightened green eyes blinking with every one of his steps. It would have been impossible for Lithia Forrester to find a woman who could outshine her, but she had tried. The secretary was a statuesque redhead and as Remo stood over her and looked into those deep green eyes, he could tell that she was a woman, a real woman, unlike the dead excuse for one on Lithia Forrester's bed.

The secretary's arms were tied behind her back, wrapped around and around with Scotch tape Remo had found on the desk, and her arms, pulled back, swelled her rich breasts out in front through the thin green sweater she wore.

Remo sat on the edge of the couch and thrust his hand under her sweater, resting it on her bare abdomen. He could feel her skin tingle under his touch. It would be easy, if only she knew something.

"Do you know who I am?" he asked.

She nodded.

"Do you know why I'm here?"

She shook her head.

"I'm a murderer," he said, enjoying the shock in her eyes. "Haven't you ever seen my files? You should know that."

She shook her head.

"Where is my file?" he asked.

She pointed her eyes toward the filing cabinets behind the desk, then looked back at Remo.

"It's not in there," he lied. "Where else does Dr. Forrester keep her files."

The secretary shrugged and shook her head.

Remo snaked his hand up under her sweater and fixed it on one of her pendulous breasts. The breast was overrated as an erogenous zone, but there were nerves that worked. He began to press with his fingers against the nerves of her breast and he leaned his face over close to hers.

"Think again. Where does she keep the rest of her files?"

With his free hand, Remo flipped loose the gag around the girl's mouth and then covered her lips with his own before she could scream. His other hand worked her breast. Despite herself, she became aroused.

If she had had any inclination to scream, it was lost in her return of Memo's kiss and in the workings of his meandering hand. Finally, he pulled his face away slightly: "It's important," he said. "Where are Dr. Forrester's other files?"

"Some patient files are confidential," the girl said. "I'll be fired if I tell you."

Remo kissed her again, gently. "Not by Dr. Forrester," he said. "She's dead."

"Dead?"

"I killed her," Remo said and again covered the redhead's lips with his own. His right hand now traced spirals around her breast, pausing to pinch nerves. He freed her mouth again and looked at her hard:

"I need those files. Nothing can stop me.'"

The warming fires of her own passion had weakened her and the harsh cruelty of Remo's words crushed her.

"In the bedroom closet," she said, "A safe built into the wall. But I don't have a key."

"That's okay," Remo said and kissed her again. As he kissed her, he transferred his hand from her breast to her neck and squeezed slightly on a major blood vessel. The girl passed out, smiling.

Remo refastened the gag and went into the bedroom, ignoring the dead body of Lithia Forrester sprawled on the bed, the blood now hardening along its courses down the sides of her body, her eyes still open wide with shock and fear. The scissors had stopped quivering.

It wasn't much of a safe. Remo worked the lock until it snapped off under the side of his hand. He inserted a finger through the opening, popped the latch from the inside. The heavy door swung free and Remo pulled it open,

There were three racks of red cardboard folders and Remo made three trips to carry them all back out into Lithia Forrester's sun-bright office, where he stacked them neatly on the floor against a file cabinet

They were numbered in order, starting with number one. Remo placed the first folder carefully in front of him on the now clear desk, unsure of what he was looking for, not knowing what he might find.

He found nothing. It was another patient file, just like the hundreds of others in the file cabinets Remo had rifled, this time on an assistant secretary of defense. A pile of test papers from the psychological battery that all new patients underwent. Then a page of notes handwritten on a yellow sheet in pencil in the small handwriting of a woman. Remo read the notes. Psychological drivel. Repressed feelings of aggression. Unhappy childhood. Resentment of authority. He grimaced to himself. Why did everybody's problems sound alike in the hands of a shrink?

The file numbered two was the same. A Treasury Department official. More psychological problems,

Remo began to go through the folders more quickly. Number three, number four, number five. All the same. Government officials. Test results. Lithia Forrester's impressions. Remo began grabbing them by the handful now, placing the hard red folders on the desk before him, flipping quickly through the sheets they contained.

Mountains of information—yet nothing Remo could use.

He stood up, exhaling almost in a sigh and walked from behind the desk, padding softly back and forth across the deep pile rug.

The folders must have the answer. But where was it? Now Remo knew what government officials she had under her control. That was something. But how did she do it? Who was her partner—that person she had talked to last night as Remo lay on her couch?

Keep looking.

Remo sat down again behind the desk and pulled another batch of red folders off the floor. More names. More government officials. More test results. More written analyses.

A who's who of American government. Top policy makers. Cabinet officers. Security people. Nothing to help Remo.

Folder number 71. Number 72. Number 73.

And then there was one more folder.

It was the last one and it was not numbered. Remo opened it. No test results this time. Six pages in Lithia Forrester's crabbed handwriting, six pages listing names of government officials. Remo skimmed the first page and groaned to himself—they were the same names he had gone just through.

Read carefully.

Each name was numbered and next to each name was the man's government title, his telephone numbers, and a column labelled "fee schedule."

Remo whistled to himself. Some paid $200, a day which included $100 for 50 minutes of private time. And the government was picking up a lot of the tabs. No wonder the nation was $400 billion in debt.

But under each entry was another line. It read "Potential." The number one name was the assistant secretary of defence. "Potential: leak of secrets; falsification of documents."

Number 2 was the Treasury officer. "Potential: security problems on Fort Knox gold."

Remo read the list rapidly. All the names were there. All the things that Lithia Forrester could get them to do. Things to cripple America.

Burton Barrett, Potential: exposure of CIA agents.

Bannon: Potential: investigation; force if needed.

Dorfwill. Potential: bombing incident.

That was it. Down through all the names, through. all six sheets of paper, Lithia Forrester had marked what they could be counted on to do.

From Number one through Number. 72.

Remo sighed, then carefully folded the sheets and put them in his right hip pocket. Smith could use that. Seventy-two officials who had been compromised by Lithia Forrester. There might be more than that, but at least Remo had seventy-two.

Seventy-two?

Remo glanced at the red file folders near him on the desk, then shuffled through them quickly with his hand. He found the one he was looking for. It was number 73. The folders had gone up to 73, but the list had only 72 names.