CHAPTER THREE
Paige sat down opposite Christopher, feeling both glad to see him and relieved that this almost certainly wouldn’t be about cutting her from the FBI academy. They didn’t have to call in full FBI agents to do that, after all. This was something else. The only question now was what.
She looked around the conference room, at the screens set there and the large, leather-backed chairs. All of this for her? Whatever this was, it had to be something important. Why was Christopher here, though? Paige could see a file set on the table. Was it to do with her?
“It’s good to see you,” Paige said, and it was; it really was. A part of her had hoped that the intervening months would have done something to dull the way her body reacted every time she saw him, the attraction that was always there under the surface. Not for the first time, she had to remind herself that Christopher had a wife.
They’d kept in touch a little, after everything that had happened with Adam Riker, but all of that had been polite and professional, certainly on Christopher’s side. Paige had forced herself to do the same, knowing that it wouldn’t be right to do anything else.
“You too, Paige,” he said. “I was glad to hear you actually did it and enrolled at the academy.”
“Ms. King here is acing the more academic components of the course,” the administrative head said. “Once we get her up to speed on the more physical aspects of the job, I’m sure that she’ll be a fine agent.”
He looked across to Christopher, and there was a message in that look that Paige couldn’t decipher. It seemed obvious to her that they’d been having some kind of conversation about her before she came in, and that this was a continuation of it, but she didn’t have enough details to work out more. She was more worried about the implied rebuke of the administrative head’s words. She really needed to get better at the physical side of becoming an agent.
“Unfortunately, I can’t wait that long,” Christopher replied, in a tone that made it clear that this had been settled before Paige walked into the room.
“What’s going on here?” Paige asked. “I’m pretty sure that this isn’t a social call, or I wouldn’t have been summoned to the administration building.”
Christopher looked suddenly serious, as if remembering the real reason for his visit.
“You’re right. I wish I could say that this was just because I wanted to check up on how you’re doing, but I’m here because of what you can do, Paige.”
He pushed the file across the table towards her, his hand just brushing hers as Paige took it.
“What’s this?” Paige asked. Before, she’d assumed that it was a file on her. Now, though, Christopher had caught her interest.
Paige opened the file and found herself looking at a picture of a young woman.
“That is Marta Huarez, personal assistant and caretaker to Mrs. Eugenie Estrom. Marta was murdered last night in her employer’s house, taken by surprise and stabbed repeatedly.”
Paige frowned at that, a spark of memory flickering within her at the mention of the word ‘caretaker.’ She thought then that she understood what all of this was about, except that it couldn’t be, could it?
“Wait, you aren’t talking about-”
“Lars Ingram.”
He dropped those words into the conversation like lead weights. They certainly made Paige stare at the file in front of her more intently. She saw more pictures of the crime scene, with the body face down on bloodstained carpets, evidence markers pointing out the blood spatters but very little else.
“The caretaker killer?” Paige said. She’d studied his work, the way she’d studied that of so many other serial killers. But there was an obvious problem with the idea that it might be Lars Ingram. “But they caught him.”
“Caught, tried, and sentenced,” Christopher agreed. “He’s currently on death row awaiting his imminent execution after being convicted of nine counts of murder. From your expression, I guess you remember the details?”
Paige saw the academy’s administrative head looking at her as if waiting to be impressed by his star student. Christopher gave her a similar look. It was obvious that this was about making some kind of point to Agent Podovski. Paige nodded. She could definitely remember the details.
“Nine murders that were identified as his, starting maybe three or four years ago, all of women aged 18 to 30, all engaged in taking care of someone. Overnight caretakers, au pairs, family members looking after a dying relative. All of them stabbed seven times and left to die in places that should have been secure.”
She checked the file, looking for the coroner’s report.
“Yes,” Christopher said. “Marta Huarez was stabbed seven times, the same as all the others. So was another young woman two days ago.”
And that was impossible. Paige had read through the case, and the evidence against Ingram was conclusive. After a tip off, DNA that had been found at his last crime scene was linked to him, and he’d barely even bothered to conceal what he’d done when he was caught. He’d been proud of it. This wasn’t a case of mistaken identity, with the real killer still out there somewhere. The jury had no difficulty at all in convicting him, or in recommending the death sentence.
He'd entered a plea of insanity, of course, or at least, his lawyers had done it on his behalf. From what Paige understood of the case, Ingram hadn’t liked that. Psychopaths sometimes didn’t. Their condition made them feel like gods, superior to other people, not mentally ill. They sometimes thought that they were the only ones who were truly sane.
The plea hadn’t worked, in any case. Psychopath or not, Ingram had been deemed responsible for his crimes. Now Ingram was waiting for execution.
“So it’s some kind of copycat?” Paige said. That was the only plausible explanation.