Suzanne Brockmann - Tall, Dark And Deadly

“Sit,” Lucky ordered.

Rio sat, but only on the edge of his seat.

“Actually, Lieutenant,” Mike said evenly, “we’ve got a required class in five minutes. If we leave now, we’ll be on time.” He looked at Syd. “I assume you’ll be writing a memo about…this for the other members of the task force…?”

Syd nodded.

“There you go,” Rio said with relief. “We’ll read all about it in your memo.”

All three men stood up, and Lucky felt a surge of panic. They were going to go, leaving him alone with Syd, who wanted to discuss…Yikes. Still, what was he supposed to say, “no, you can’t go to class?”

“Go,” he said, and they all nearly ran out the door.

Syd laughed. “Well,” she said, “I sure know how to clear a room, don’t I?” She raised an eyebrow. “Are you sure you don’t want to follow them, Lieutenant? Read about this in my memo instead?”

Lucky stood up to pour himself a cup of coffee from the setup by the door. He had to search for a mug that was clean, and he was glad for the excuse to keep his back to her. “Nothing about this assignment has been pleasant. So if you think this is something I need to hear…”

“I do.”

Lucky poured himself a cup of coffee, then, taking a deep breath, he turned to face her. He carried it back to the table and sat down across from her. “Okay,” he said. “Shoot.”

“According to the medical reports, our man didn’t…shall we say, achieve sexual completion, unless the woman fought back,” Syd told him.

Oh, God.

“We need to keep in mind,” she continued, “the fact that rape isn’t about sex. It’s about violence and power. Domination. Truth is, many serial rapists never ejaculate at all. And in fact, out of these eleven cases of rape, we’ve got only four instances of sexual, um, completion. Like I said, all of them occurred when the victim fought back, or—and this is important—when the victim was forced to fight back.”

“But wait. You said a majority of the victims fought back.” Lucky leaned forward. “Couldn’t he have been wearing a condom the other times?”

“Not according to the victims’ statements.” Syd stood up and started to pace. “There’s more, Luke, listen to this. Gina said in her interview that she didn’t resist. She cowered, and he hit her, and she cowered some more. And then, she says he spent about ten minutes trashing her apartment. I went in there. The place looked like there’d been one hell of a fight. But she didn’t fight back .

“I’m wondering if this guy was trying to simulate the kind of environment in which the victim has fought back, in an attempt to achieve some kind of sexual release. When he went back to Gina after he tore the place up, he kicked the hell out of her, but she still didn’t do more than curl into a ball—and, if my theory’s right, she therefore didn’t give him what he wanted. So what does he do? He’s angry as hell and he tears at her clothes, but she still doesn’t resist. So he grabs her by the throat and starts squeezing. Bingo. Instant response. She can’t breathe—she starts struggling for air. She starts fighting. And that does the trick for him, maybe that plus the sheer terror he can see in her eyes, because now, you know, she thinks he’s going to kill her. He achieves sexual completion, inflicts his final moment of pain upon her by burning her, then leaves. The victim’s still alive—this time.”

Oh, God.

“It’s really just a matter of time before he squeezes someone’s throat too hard, or for too long, and she dies,” Syd continued grimly. “And if taking a life gives him the right kind of rush—and it’s hard to believe that it won’t—he’ll have transitioned. Serial rapist to serial killer. We already know he’s into fear. He likes terrorizing his victims. He likes the power that gives him. And letting someone know she’s going to die can generate an awful lot of terror for her and pleasure for him.”

Syd carried her half-empty mug to the sink and tossed the remnants of her coffee down the drain. “Fight or submit,” she said. “Fighting gives him what he wants, but gets you a severe beating. Still, submitting pisses him off. And it could enrage him enough to kill.”

Lucky threw his half-eaten doughnut into the trash can, feeling completely sick. “We’ve got to catch this guy.”

“That,” Syd agreed, “would be nice.”

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