Nora Roberts - Sacred Sins

“I was restraining a prisoner.”

“Yeah? Well, things like this happen in the midst of all that tension and excitement.”

“I’m going to my locker,” he muttered. “Make sure the doctor hasn’t hurt herself laughing.” He sloshed, a little spread-legged, down the hall.

Ed took the empty carton and plastic spoon from Tess. “Want some coffee?”

“No,” she managed, strangling a bit on the word. “No, I think I’ve had enough.”

“Give me just a minute, and I’ll take you in to Captain Harris.”

They met in the conference room. Though the heater sent out a hopeful mechanical buzz, the floors remained chilly. Harris had lost his annual campaign for carpet. The blinds were closed in a fruitless attempt to insulate the windows. Someone had tacked up a poster urging America to conserve energy.

Tess sat at a table, with Ed lounging beside her. The light scent of jasmine steamed out of his tea. Lowenstein balanced on the edge of a small desk, idly swinging one leg. Bigsby hunched in a chair, an economy-sized box of Kleenex on his lap. Every few minutes he blew his already red nose. Roderick’s flu had him in bed.

Harris stood beside a green chalkboard on which the names and other pertinent information on the victims had been aligned in neat columns. A map of the city stretched over the wall, pierced with four blue flags. There was a corkboard beside that. Black-and-white glossies of the murdered women were tacked to it.

“We all have transcripts of the phone calls Dr. Court received.”

It sounded so cold, so businesslike, she thought. Transcripts. They couldn’t hear the pain or the sickness in transcripts. “Captain Harris.” Tess shifted her own notes in front of her. “I’ve brought you an updated report, with my own opinions and diagnosis. But I feel it might be helpful if I explained these phone calls to you and your officers.”

Harris, with his hands linked behind his back, only nodded. The mayor, the media, and the commissioner were snapping at his ankles. He wanted it over, long over, so he could spend some time doting on his new granddaughter. Seeing her behind the nursery window had almost made him believe that life had its points.

“The man who contacted me called because he was frightened, of himself. He is no longer controlling his life, but is being controlled by his illness. The last…” Her gaze was drawn to the photograph of Anne Reasoner. “The last murder was not part of the plan.” She moistened her lips, glancing over only briefly as Ben walked in. “He was waiting for me-me specifically. We can’t be certain how he focused in on the other victims. In the case of Barbara Clayton we can be all but certain it was coincidence. Her car broke down. He was there. In my case it’s much more fine-tuned. He’s seen my name and picture in the paper.”

She paused a moment, expecting Ben to slip into the chair beside her. Instead he stayed back, leaning against the closed door, separated from her by the table.

“The rational part of his mind, the part that keeps him functioning on a daily basis, was drawn. Here was help, someone who hasn’t condemned him out of hand. Someone who claims to understand at least some of the pain. Someone who looks enough like his Laura to trigger feelings of love and complete despair.

“I think it’s accurate to say that he waited for me the night of Anne Reasoner’s murder because he wanted to talk to me, to explain why before he… before he did what he’s being driven to do. From your own investigations I think it’s also accurate to say that he didn’t feel this need to explain with any of the others. In your transcripts you’ll see that time and time again he asks me to understand.

I’m a hinge at this point. His door is swinging both ways.“ She put her palms together, moving them back and forth to demonstrate. ”He’s asking for help, then his illness takes over and he only wants to finish what he’s started. Two more victims,“ she said calmly. ”Or in his mind, two more souls to be saved. Me, then himself.“

Ed made small, neat notes in the margin of his transcripts. “What’s to stop him from going off, taking someone else down because he can’t get to you?”

“He needs me. At this point he’s contacted me three times. He’s seen me in church. He deals in signs and symbols. I was in church- his church. I resemble his Laura. I’ve told him I want to help. The closer he feels to me, the more necessary it would be for him to complete his mission with me.”

“You still think he’ll target for December eighth?” Lowenstein had the transcript in her hands, but she wasn’t looking at it.

“Yes. I don’t think he could break pattern again. Anne Reasoner took too much out of him. The wrong woman, the wrong night.” Tess’s stomach shuddered once before she drew herself straight and controlled it.

“Isn’t it possible,” Ed began, “that because he’s homed in on you this way, that he could go for you sooner?”

“It’s always possible. Mental illness has few absolutes.”

“We’ll be continuing our twenty-four hour protection,” Harris put in. “You’ll have the wire on your phone and the guards until he’s caught. In the meantime, we want you to continue your office and personal routine. He’s been watching you, so he’ll know what they are. If you look accessible, we might draw him out.”

“Why don’t you give her the bottom line?” From the door Ben spoke quietly. His hands were in his pockets, his voice relaxed. Tess only had to look in his eyes to see what was going on inside. “You want her for bait.”

Harris stared back. His voice didn’t change in volume or tone when he spoke again. “Dr. Court has been singled out. What I want doesn’t matter as much as what the killer wants. That’s why she’s going to have people on her at home, in her office, and at the damn grocery store.”

“She should be in the safe house for the next two weeks.”

“That’s been considered and rejected.”

“Rejected?” Ben pushed himself away from the door. “Who rejected it?”

“I did.” Tess folded her hands on her file, then sat very still.

Ben barely glanced at her before he poured his rage on Harris. “Since when do we use civilians? As long as she’s in the open, she’s in jeopardy.”

“She’s being guarded.”

“Yeah. And we all know how easily something can go wrong. One misstep and you’ll be tacking her picture up there.”

“Ben.” Lowenstein reached out for his arm, but he shook her off.

“We’ve got no business taking chances with her when we know he’s going to go for her. She goes in the safe house.”

“No.” Tess gripped her hands together so tight the knuckles whitened. “I can’t treat my patients unless I go to my office and the clinic.”

“You can’t treat them if you’re dead either.” He spun to her, slamming both palms flat on the table. “So take a vacation. Buy yourself a ticket to Martinique or Cancun. I want you out of this.”

“I can’t, Ben. Even if I could walk away from my patients for a few weeks, I can’t walk away from the rest.”

“Paris-Ben,” Harris amended in a quieter tone. “Dr. Court is aware of her options. As long as she’s here, she’ll be protected. It’s Dr. Courts own opinion that he’ll seek her out. Since she’s decided to cooperate with the department, we’ll be able to keep her under tight surveillance and cut him off when he makes his move.”

“We get her out, and we plant a policewoman in her place.”

“No.” This time Tess rose, slowly. “I’m not going to have someone die in my place again. Not again.”

“And I’m not going to find you in some alley with a scarf around your neck.” He turned his back on her. “You’re using her because the investigation’s stalled, because we’ve got one jerky witness, a religious outlet in Boston, and a ream of psychiatric guesswork.”