William Bernhardt - Deadly Justice

Another three feet and he would have been dead.

PART TWO

Pennies and Butterflies

17

THE MAN TOSSED HIS van keys on the dresser beside the room key. It was one of those modern hotel keys, a flat card with punched holes like Swiss cheese. All the best places used them now. He hated them; he could never make them work without cramming them into the door scanner twenty or thirty times. Why did the world have to change? Why were people always looking for something better, tossing away the old, embracing the new? Why couldn’t everything remain simple, tidy, constant?

He saw the girl’s reflection in the mirror over the dresser. She was in the bathroom. The water in the tub was running, and she was sliding out of her skintight fluorescent green pants. It must be winter, he mused; the snake was shedding her skin.

The girl pulled off her halter top and removed a blue butterfly clip from her hair. She saw him watching her. “What are you doing?”

He smiled—a brilliant, friendly smile. “Watching you.”

“Oh yeah?” She crossed her arms over her breasts in mock modesty. “What do you think?”

“I think you’re beautiful.” He walked slowly into the bathroom. His black boots clickety-clacked against the tile floor. “You’re making me hard.”

“Hey now, don’t start getting all excited. You have to wait.”

His smile faded, just a touch. “I’m not very good at waiting. I want what I want—now.”

“Look, Romeo, you promised I could have a bath.”

“And you shall,” he said, spreading his arms wide. “You may bathe all night. You may bathe forever.”

“There you go again.” Giggling, she dropped her underclothes and jumped into the steamy tub. “What are you, some kind of poet?”

“I like to think so.”

“Wow. Way cool.” She stretched out in the tub. “I never had a poet before. Most of my Johns are suit-and-tie types. You know, bankers, accountants, architects, lawyers.”

The man’s head jerked. “You’ve had…lawyers?”

“Oh, man. Like you wouldn’t believe. What a nightmare.” She laid a hot washcloth across her forehead. “Believe me, everything people say about lawyers is true, only more so. But never mind—I don’t want to talk about it. I don’t even want to think about it.”

“Have you…talked to anyone else about it?”

“Why do you ask?”

“Oh, no reason. It’s just that—sometimes it helps to talk about what troubles you.”

“Forget it, Romeo. You aren’t paying me that much.”

“How much would I…”

“Would you forget it already? Look, why don’t you get in here with me?” She winked at him, fluttering her long false eyelashes. “It’s a big tub.”

The man thought for a moment. “Perhaps I will. Let me get something first.” He walked out of the bathroom.

While he was out, she took a bar of soap from the dish and began lathering herself. “So what is it you do, anyhow? I figure it must be important, whatever it is. That van you drive looks customized, and I bet it wouldn’t be cheap even without the extras. Then there’s that wad of cash you flash around, and what you offered to pay me for a couple of hours’ work—way over market value, I must admit. Not to mention the way you dress, the way you look. No, I figure you’ve got to be someone at the top, like maybe a car salesman or a politician. Something like that.”

She heard him reenter the bathroom. Clickety-clack, clickety-clack. “So what is it? What do you do—”

Her sentence ended abruptly as his hands clutched her throat. He pulled the black garbage bag over her head, plunging her into darkness. He tied the silken cord around her neck, fastening the bag to her head and constricting her windpipe. She sputtered and gasped, desperately trying to catch her breath, finding none.

She began to struggle. She flailed in the tub, splashing water onto the tile floor. She reached back and grabbed at his arms. Raising himself up, he pressed down on her shoulders, pushing her head, bag and all, down under the water. She tried to fight back, but it was impossible. She couldn’t get a grip on anything. She just kept slipping and sliding, down, down, down, beneath the water.

He had exactly what he wanted, what he needed. She was powerless, totally subject to his control. He pulled the ends of the cord, drawing it even tighter around her throat, causing blood to trickle out. Sweet Jesus!— she made him feel so good! He pulled even tighter, savoring the sweet constriction in his groin.

And then—it was over, in one final magnificent climax. He felt a sudden surge, then release. He dropped the silken cord; her body slid lifelessly into the water. The man fell back against the bathroom counter, utterly and deliriously drained.

He picked up her butterfly clip. A dainty thing; it would make a lovely souvenir.

After he had rested, after the afterglow faded and his strength returned, he began picking up the clothes she had carelessly thrown on the floor. He hated people who made a mess.

18

MIKE THREW HIS DIRTY overcoat onto one of Ben’s overstuffed office chairs. “Christ, Ben, you’re turning into a goddamn homicide magnet!”

“Attempted homicide,” Ben corrected. “Crichton survived the attempt.”

“Just barely.”

“Barely means his heart is beating. Ergo, no homicide.”

“Only because you were in the right place at the right time and decided to play Superman off the giant’s ladder. By the way, I’m impressed. What’s next for you, bungee jumping?”

Ben waved his bandaged hands in the air. The rope burns on his hands were deep and slow to heal. “I just did the first thing that occurred to me. I didn’t have time to think about it.”

“Don’t soft soap me, Ben. I think it was a damn gutsy move for a guy who used to get woozy sitting in his high chair.”

“Who told you that?”

“My ex. Your sister. So don’t bother denying it.”

“Yeah, well, those high chairs are damn high when you’re only two feet tall.” He closed the thick evidence treatise he’d been reading to prepare for the discovery motion he was arguing that afternoon. “So how’s the murder investigation coming?”

“Which one? The teenagers? Or Howard Hamel?”

“Let’s start with the teenagers. I saw in the paper that the killer claimed another victim.”

“Right. His fourth.” Mike slammed his fist into his hand. “Goddamn it, I’d like to catch that bastard. Four victims now, and we’re still virtually clueless.”

“There must be some leads. Some pattern.”

“Other than the obvious—all his victims are teenage girls—no. Or at least, none that we’ve detected.”

“What about the mutilation?”

“Repeated on this victim as well. No head, no hands.”

“I don’t want to hear about it.”

“I don’t blame you.”

“What’ve you got on the Hamel murder?”

“What’ve I got? You’re the one who’s supposed to be cracking that case wide open. What’ve you got?”

“Well, I think I flushed out the killer. From sixty feet in the air.”

“Quite possible.” Mike paced agitatedly across Ben’s office. “The lab finished its microscopic analysis of Crichton’s belay line. No doubt about it—it was cut. We searched the area, as you know, and searched everyone on the site. We didn’t find anything. And unfortunately, you didn’t see who did it.”

“No, but I’ve got an office building full of suspects. Man, you wouldn’t believe this Apollo crew. What a collection of back-stabbing, butt-licking—”

“Hey, don’t complain to me. You’re the one who thought this job would solve all your problems.”