For a split second, Riley was furious. But her fury gave way to a sinking feeling that he might be right. It wasn’t fair, but he really did know how to push her buttons that way.
Riley took a long, deep breath and said, “Look, I’m leaving town for a few days. I’ve got a case in Upstate New York. April has got to stay here, and she’s got to stay put. Please explain the situation to Gabriela.”
“You explain the situation to Gabriela,” Ryan snapped. “I’ve got a client to meet. Right now.”
“And I’ve got a plane to catch. Right now.”
They stood staring at each other for a moment. Their argument had reached a stalemate. As she looked into his eyes, Riley reminded herself that she’d once loved him. And he’d seemed to love her just as much. That had been back when both of them were young and poor, before he had become a successful lawyer and she had become an FBI agent.
She couldn’t help noting that he was still a very good-looking man. He went to a lot of trouble to look that way and spent many hours at the gym. Riley also knew perfectly well that he had lots of women in his life. That was part of the problem – he was enjoying his freedom as a bachelor too much to worry about parenting.
Not that I’m doing all that much better, she thought.
Then Ryan said, “It’s always about your job.”
Riley choked back her anger. They’d gone around and around about this. Her job was somehow both too dangerous and too trivial. His job was all that mattered, because he was making a lot more money, and because he claimed to be making a real difference in the world. As if handling lawsuits for wealthy clients amounted to more than Riley’s never-ending war against evil.
But she couldn’t let herself get dragged into this tired old argument right now. Neither of them ever won it anyway.
“We’ll talk when I get back,” she said.
She turned and walked out of the house. She heard Ryan shut the door behind her.
Riley got into her car and drove. She had less than an hour to get back to Quantico. Her head was reeling. So much was happening so fast. Just a little while ago she had decided to take a new case. Now she wondered if it was the right thing to do. Not only was April having trouble coping, but she was sure that Peterson was back in her life.
But in a way, it made good sense. As long as April stayed with her father, she’d be safe from Peterson’s clutches. And Peterson wasn’t going to take any other victims during Riley’s absence. As puzzled as she was by him, Riley knew one thing for certain. She alone was his target for revenge. She, and no one else, was his intended next victim. And it would feel good to be far away from him for a while.
She also reminded herself of a hard lesson she had learned during her last case – not to take on all the evil in the world, all at the same time. It boiled down to a simple motto: One monster at a time.
And right now, she was going after an especially vicious brute. A man she just knew would strike again soon.
Chapter 7
The man began to spread lengths of chains out on the long worktable in his basement. It was dark outside, but all those links of stainless steel were bright and shiny under the glare of a bare light bulb.
He pulled one of the chains out to its full length. The rattling sound stirred terrible memories of being shackled, caged, and tormented with chains like these. But it was like he kept telling himself: I’ve got to face my fears.
And to do that he had to prove his mastery over the chains themselves. Too often in the past, chains had held mastery over him.
It was a shame that anyone had to suffer on account of this. For five years, he’d thought he’d put the whole matter behind him. It had helped so much when the church hired him to be a night watchman. He’d liked that job, proud of the authority that came with it. He’d liked feeling strong and useful.
But last month, they’d taken that job away from him. They needed someone with security skills, they’d said, and better credentials – someone bigger and stronger. They promised to keep him working in the garden. He’d still be making enough money to pay the rent on this tiny little house.
Even so, the loss of that job, the loss of the authority it gave him, had shaken him, made him feel helpless. That urge broke loose again – that desperation not to be helpless, that frantic need to assert mastery over the chains so they couldn’t take him again. He’d tried before to outrun the urge, as if he could leave his inner darkness right here in his basement. This last time, he’d driven all the way down to Reedsport, hoping to escape it. But he couldn’t.
He didn’t know why he couldn’t. He was a good man, with a good heart, and he liked to do favors. But sooner or later, his kindness always turned against him. When he’d helped that woman, that nurse, carry groceries to her car in Reedsport, she’d smiled and said, “What a good boy!”
He winced at the memory of the smile and those words.
“What a good boy!”
His mother had smiled and said such things, even while she kept the chain on his leg too short for him to reach any food or even see outside. And the nuns, too, had smiled and said things like that when they peered at him through the little square opening in the door to his small prison.
“What a good boy!”
Not everyone was cruel, he knew that. Most people really meant well toward him, especially in this little town where he’d long since settled. They even liked him. But why did everyone seem to think of him as a child – and a handicapped child at that? He was twenty-seven years old, and he knew that he was exceptionally bright. His mind was full of brilliant thoughts, and he scarcely ever encountered a problem he couldn’t solve.
But of course he knew why people saw him the way they did. It was because he could barely speak at all. He’d stammered hopelessly all his life, and he hardly ever tried to talk, although he understood everything that other people said.
And he was small, and weak, and his features were stubby and childish, like those of someone who had been born with some congenital defect. Caged in that slightly misshapen skull was a remarkable mind, thwarted in its desire to do brilliant things in the world. But nobody knew that. Nobody at all. Not even the doctors at the psychiatric hospital had known it.
It was ironic.
People didn’t think he knew words like ironic. But he did.
Now he found himself nervously fingering a button in his hand. He’d plucked it off the nurse’s blouse when he hung her up. Reminded of her, he looked around at the cot where he’d kept her chained up for more than a week. He’d wished he could talk to her, explain that he didn’t mean to be cruel, and it was just that she was so much like his mother and the nuns, especially in that nurse’s uniform of hers.
The sight of her in that uniform had confused him. It was the same with the woman five years ago, the prison guard. Somehow both women had merged in his mind with his mother and the nuns and the hospital workers. He’d fought a losing battle simply to tell them apart.
It was a relief to be through with her. It was a terrible responsibility, keeping her bound like that, giving her water, listening to her moaning through the chain he’d used to gag her. He only undid the gag to put a straw in her mouth for water now and again. Then she’d try to scream.
If only he could have explained to her that she mustn’t scream, that there were neighbors across the street who mustn’t hear. If he could only have told her, maybe she’d have understood. But he couldn’t explain, not with his hopeless stammer. Instead, he’d mutely threatened her with a straight-edged razor. In the long run, even the threat hadn’t worked. That was when he’d had to slit her throat.
Then he’d taken her back to Reedsport and hung her up like that, for everyone to see. He wasn’t sure just why. Perhaps it was a warning. If only people could understand. If they did, he wouldn’t have to be so cruel.