David Palmer’s youthful and handsome face swam onto the wall screen.
“Ms. Furst, or may I call you Nadine? So much more personal that way, and my work is very personal to me. I’ve admired your work, by the way. It’s one of the reasons I’m trusting you to get my story on air. You believe in what you do, don’t you, Nadine?”
His eyes were serious now, professional to professional, his face holding all the youth and innocence of a novitiate at the altar. “Those of us who reach for perfection believe in what we do,” he continued. “I’m aware that you have a friendly relationship with Lieutenant Dallas. The lieutenant and I also have a relationship, perhaps not so friendly, but we do connect, and I do admire her stamina. I hope you’ll share the contents of this disc with her as soon as possible. By this time she should already be heading the investigation into the death of Judge Wainger.”
His smile went bright now, and just a little mad at the edges. “Hello, Lieutenant. You’ll excuse me if I just c
onclude my business with Nadine. I want Dallas to be closely involved. It’s important to me. You will tell my story, won’t you, Nadine? Let the public themselves judge, not some narrow-minded fool in a black robe.”
The next scene slipped seamlessly into place, the audio high so that the woman’s screams seemed to rip the air in the room where Eve sat, watching.
Judge Wainger’s body was bound hand and foot and suspended several inches from a plain concrete floor. A basic pulley system this time, Eve mused. He’d taken time to set up some of the niceties, but it wasn’t yet the complex, and yes, ingenious, system of torture that he’d created before.
Still, he worked very well.
Wainger’s face was livid with agony, the muscles twitching as Palmer burned letters in his chest with a hand laser. He only moaned, his head lolling. Nearby, a system of monitors beeped and buzzed.
“He’s failing, you see,” Palmer said briskly in a voice-over. “His mind is moving beyond the pain, as it can no longer endure it. His system will attempt to shut down into unconsciousness. That can be reversed, as you’ll see here.” On screen, he flipped a switch. There was a high whine, then Wainger’s body jerked. This time he screamed.
Across the room a woman shrieked and sobbed. The cage she was in swung wildly on its cable and was only big enough to allow her to crouch on hands and knees. A dark fall of hair covered most of her face, but Eve knew her.
Stephanie Ring was Palmer’s.
When he turned, engaged another control, the cage sparked and shook. The woman let out a piercing wail, shuddered convulsively, then collapsed.
Palmer turned to the camera, smiled. “She’s distracting, but I have only so much time. It’s necessary to begin one subject before completing work on another. But her turn will come shortly. Subject Wainger’s heart is failing. The data on him are nearly complete.”
Using the ropes, he manually lowered Wainger to the floor. Eve noted the flex and bunch of muscles in Palmer’s arms. “Dave’s been pumping,” she murmured. “Getting in shape. He knew he’d have to work harder this round. He likes to prepare.”
Palmer slipped a perfectly knotted noose around Wainger’s neck and meticulously slid the trailing end through a metal ring in the ceiling. Leading it down, he threaded it through another ring in the floor, then pulled out the slack until Wainger rose to his knees, then his feet, and began gasping for air.
“Stop it, will you?” Nadine leapt to her feet. “I can’t watch this again. I thought I could. I can’t.”
“Stop disc.” Eve waited until the screen went blank, then went over to crouch in front of Nadine. “I’m sorry.”
“No. I’m sorry. I thought I was tough.”
“You are. Nobody’s this tough.”
Nadine shook her head and, finishing her brandy with one deep gulp, set the snifter aside. “You are. You don’t let it get to you.”
“It gets to me. But this is for me. I’m going to have a couple of uniforms come and take you home. They’re going to hang with you everywhere until Palmer’s down.”
“You think he’ll come after me?”
“No, but why take chances? Go home, Nadine. Put it away.”
But after she’d asked Roarke to take Nadine downstairs to wait for the escort, Eve finished watching the disc. And at the end her eyes met Palmer’s as he moved toward the camera.
“Subject Wainger died at midnight, December twenty-fourth. You’ll last longer, Dallas. We both know that. You’ll be my most fascinating subject. I have such wonders planned for you. You’ll find me. I know you will. I’m counting on it. Happy holidays.”
THREE
Stephanie Ring’s car was still in its permit slot in the garage. Her luggage was neatly stowed in the trunk. Eve circled the vehicle, searching for any sign of struggle, any evidence that might have been dropped and gone unnoticed during the snatch.
“He’s got two basic MOs,” she said, as much to herself as to the uniforms waiting nearby. “One is to gain entrance into the victims’ homes by a ruse—delivery, repair, or service con; the other is to come on them in an unpopulated area. He spends time getting to know their routines and habits, the usual routes and schedules. He keeps all that in a log—very organized, scientific, along with bio data on each of them.”
They weren’t lab rats to him, she mused. It was personal, individualized. That was what excited him.