Patterson, James: Alex Cross 11 - Mary, Mary

"Do you think Antonia's driver was incidental? In the e-mail it seems like he was just . . .

in the way."

Griner was obviously hungry for information, both personally and professionally He was a reporter, after all, and already reasonably powerful in Hollywood circles. So I gave him my stock reporter's response.

“Ifs too early to say What about Patsy Bennett?” I asked. “Do you remember the last time you wrote about one of her films? Something she produced? She still produced films occasionally, right?”

Griner nodded; then he sighed loudly almost eatricahiy “Do you think I should discontinue my column for now? I should, shouldn't I? Maybe I better.”

The interview was like a Ping-Pong match against a kid with ADD. I eventually managed to get through all my questions, but it took almost twice as long as I thought it would when I had arrived at the Times. Griner constantly needed reassurance, and I tried to give it to him without being completely dishonest. He was in danger, after all.

“One last thing,” Griner said just before I left him. “Do you think I should write a book about this? Is that a little sick?”

I didn't bother to answer either question. He went to Yale - he should be able to figure it out.

Mary, Mary

Chapter 1 6

AFTER THE INTERVIEW I slouched out to Arnold Griner's desk to touch base with Paul Lebleau, the LAPD tech in charge of tracing Mary Smith's e-mails.

He tapped away on the keyboard of Griner's computer while he spoke to me in a rapid-fire patter. "Two e-mails came through two different proxy servers. First one originated from a cybercafe in Santa Monica. That means Mary Smith could be one of a few hundred people. She's got two different addresses. So far.

Both just generic Hotmail accounts, which tells us nothing really, except we do know that she signed up for the first one from the library at USC. Day before the first message."

I had to concentrate just to follow Lebleau. Did everybody out here have ADD? “What about the second e-mail?” I asked him.

“Transmission didn't originate in the same place as the first one. That much I can tell you.”

“Did it come from the L.A. area? Can you tell me that?”

“Don't know yet.”

“When will you know?”

“Probably end of the day, not that it's going to be much help.” He leaned forward and squinted at several lines of code on the screen. “Mary Smith knows what she's doing.”

There it was again - she. I understood why everyone was using the pronoun. I was doing it, too - but only for the sake of convenience.

That didn't mean I was convinced the killer was a woman, though. Not yet, anyway. The letters to Griner could repre sent some kind of persona. But whose?

Mary, Mary

Chapter 1 7

___________________ HOW DO YOU LIKE YOUR VACATION sofai Alex? Having a lot of fun?

I took copies of both bizarre e-mails and headed out for a meeting with the LAPD. The detective bureau on North Los Angeles Street was only a quarter mile from the Times offices - a Los Angeles miracle, given the cliché that it takes forty-five minutes to get anywhere in the city.

Oh, the vacation's great. I'm seeing all the sights. The kids are loving it, too. Nana is over the moon.

I walked slowly, rereading the two e-mails on my way to LAPD. Even if the writing was persona-based, it had come from the mind of the killet I started with the first one, which described the last mo ments of Patsy Bennett's life. It was definitely chilling, this diary of a psychopath.

To: agriner(c)latimes .com From: Mary Smith To: Patrice Bennett: I am the one who killed you.

Isn't that some sentence? I think so. Here's another one that I like quite a lot.

Somebody, a total stranger, will find your body in the balcony at the Westwood Village Theater. You, Patrice Bennett.

Because that's where you died today, watching your last movie, and not a very good one at that. The Village? What were you thinking? What could have brought you to the theater on this day, the day of your death, to see The Village?

You should have been home, Patsy. With your darling little children. That's where a good mom belongs. Don't you think so? Even if you spend much of your home time reading scripts and on the phone playing studio politics.

It took me a long time to get so close to you. You are a Big Somebody at your Studio, and I am just one of the nobodies who watches movies on video and Entertainment Tonight and Access Hollywood. I couldn't even get inside the big arched entrance at your Studio. No sirree.

All I could do was watch your dark-blue Aston Martin going in and out, day after day.

But I'm a really patient person. I've learned how to wait for what I want.

Speaking of waiting, that incredible house of yours is hard to see from the street. I did spot your lovely children-a couple of times, actually And I know with some time I could have found a way into the house. But then today, you changed everything.

You went to a movie, in the middle of the afternoon, just like you say you do in some of your interviews. Maybe you missed the smell of popcorn. Do you ever take your little girls to the movies, Patsy? You should have, you know. As they say, it all goes by in a blink.

It didn't make sense to me at first. You're such a busy little Big Shot. But then I figured it out. Movies are what you do. You must see them all the time, but you also have a family waiting for you every night. You're supposed to be home for dinner with little Lynne and Laurie. How old are they now? Twelve and thirteen? They want you there, and you want to be there. That's good, I suppose. Except that tonight, dinner is going to come and go without you. Kind of sad when you think about it, which is what I'm doing right now.

Anyway, you sat in the balcony in the ninth row. i sat in the twelfth. I waited, and watched the back of your head, your brunette-from-abottle hair. That's where the bullet was going to go. Or so I fantasized. Isn't that what one is supposed to do at the movies?

Escape? Get away from it all? Except that most movies are so dismal these days- dismally dumb or dismally dreary.

I didn't actually pull out my gun until after the film started. I didn't like how scared I felt.

That was how scared you were supposed to be, Big Shot. But you didn't know what was happening, not even that I was there. You were out of the loop.

I sat like that, holding the gun in my lap, pointing it at you for the longest time. Then I decided I wanted to be closer-right on top of you.

I needed to look in your eyes after you knew you'd been shot, knew that you would never see Lynne and Laurie again, never see another movie either, never green-light one, never again be a Big Shot.

But then seeing you wide-eyed and dead was a surprise. A shock to my nervous system, actually. What happened to that famed aristocratic bearing of yours? That's why I had to leave the theater so quickly, and why I had to leave you undone.

Not that you really care anymore. How's the weather where you are now, Patsy? Hot, I hope. Hot as Hades-isn't that an expression?

Do you miss your children terribly? Have some regrets? I'll bet you do. I would if I were you. But I'm no Big Shot, just one of the little people.

Mary, Mary

Chapter 1 8

NINE O'CLOCK, and all was not well, to put it mildly. LAPD detective Jeanne Galletta's handshake was surprisingly soft. She looked as though she could give out bone-crushers if she wanted to. Her orange short-sleeved turtleneck showed off her biceps. She was slim, though, with a strikingly angular face and the kind of piercing brown eyes that could make you stare.

I caught myself midstare, and glanced away “Agent Cross. Have I kept you waiting?” she asked. “Not very long,” I told her. I'd been in Galletta's position before. When you're a lead investigator on a high-profile case, everyone wants a piece of your time. Besides, my day was almost over. Detective Galletta would probably be up all night. This case warranted it.