BoneMan's Daughters (15 page)

“Ryan…”

What could she say? She stood and crossed to him. Gently rubbed his shoulder and lowered her voice. “Ryan, please, it’s okay.”
A knot filled her throat.

She had come to interrogate a sailor who might be able to shed a glimmer of light on a killer who’d broken bones and instead
she found a father with a broken heart.

Someone pounded on the door.

Ricki stepped around the bed and walked to the door. A maid stood in the hall. “Will you be checking out today?”

“We’ll call the front desk,” Ricki said. “Give us a minute?”

“Take your time.”

“Thank you.”

When she shut the door and turned around, she saw that Ryan was lying on the bed, face buried in the pillow. The bottoms of
his white socks were dirty, and his right pant leg was hitched up so that she could see his calf. What was she to do, sit
by him and comfort him?

She had to bring this scene back to earth so that she could do what she’d come to do. If that meant helping him make a little
more sense of his world, so be it.

Ricki slid one of the chairs closer to the bed and sat facing him. “I’m really sorry for all of this, Ryan. But you have to
get a hold of yourself and make some decisions. You can’t keep yourself cooped up in this dingy motel forever. It all looks
bad now, I know, but bad times have a way of passing. Right?”

He lay still, back slowly rising and falling with each breath.

“I’m sure your daughter loves you very much. Teenagers are terrible at knowing how to express themselves.”

Her mind bounced back to her own youth, a time when her father, then a cop, had been killed in a motorcycle accident. He’d
never been one for words of encouragement and he’d recorded his regret in a journal that her mother had found after his death.

The memory of reading those two pages from his computer had been seared into her mind for all time. She’d sat there in silence,
alone in the house a full month after his funeral, and wept uncontrollably for the first time since his death.

I swear I’d kill the man who laid a hand on Ricki. And at times I feel like I deserve no more. I’ve been such a bad father.
Dear God, I hate myself
.

The pain had haunted her for years, and sitting here next to another broken father, the memory threatened to tear her apart
again.

She spoke very softly. “Listen to me, Ryan. I know what it’s like. She loves you. She has to; every daughter loves her father.
It’s hard at times, but in the end they feel different.”

He didn’t react.

“I spoke to your wife and daughter this morning. She seems like a reasonable woman. And your daughter’s angry; none of this
makes any sense to her. You have to admit, your reactions have been a bit erratic. But she’s only sixteen; in time she’ll
forgive whatever stands between you.”

Captain Ryan Evans suddenly rolled off the bed and stood on the far side, looking disoriented for a moment before fixing her
in his sight. His behavior was strange, she thought, even for a distraught man. She didn’t know much about him, but his commanding
officer had made one thing very clear: Captain Evans had a unique and very intelligent mind. What she would give to know what
was going through that mind now.

“BoneMan?” he asked, crossing to the room to the television and flipping it off. “BoneMan, or whatever you would like to call
him, was only doing what he felt needed to be done, Agent Valentine. He followed his instincts, just like we did when we bombed
Iraq to smithereens. That’s what I learned in the desert from BoneMan’s work. Beyond that, I’m afraid it’s all classified.”

He stood calm and thoughtful, as if the father in him had flipped a switch and become the captain.

“I’m sorry, there’s nothing I can tell you that will help you.”

“Seven girls lost their lives to a sadistic killer who may be out there right now, stalking an eighth. And you say you can’t
help me?”

“I’m saying that nothing I have to say will help you stop the man, assuming he’s still active.”

“You of all people should know what it means to make sure BoneMan never kills again.”

For a moment she thought he might yell at her. But if the impulse tempted him, he covered it well.

“Unless you don’t realize that Muslim fundamentalists think of us as no better than the BoneMan, I have nothing to add to
your profile of the man,” he said.

“What happened to you in the desert, Captain Ryan?”

“A group of insurgents tried to take out my convoy in retaliation for the coalition forces bombing Iraqi women and children.
Before I escaped they made it clear that I was no better than BoneMan. So while there is a very loose connection between your
investigation and myself, it will hardly deliver you new evidence to solve the case. I’m sorry for your frustration, Agent
Valentine, but I’m useless to you. Really.”

He was probably right, but the ease with which the man righted himself and faced her with such a reasoned conclusion struck
her as uncanny.

She studied him for a moment, then rose, withdrew her card from her purse, and set in on the table.

“I’m sorry for your troubles, Captain Evans. It sounds like you’ve had a rough few weeks. If I think we need it, we’ll get
a subpoena that will allow you to tell me what happened in the desert. In the meantime, if you wouldn’t mind keeping me apprised
of your movements?”

He nodded once.

“Are you headed back any time soon?”

“No. I’ll be stateside for a while.”

“End of tour?”

“Something like that.”

She wondered about that.

“Word of advice, Ryan. I really would steer clear of Burton Welsh. He can be an animal if he gets backed into a corner. You
picked the wrong guy to drop your knee into.”

“I understand.”

“I was serious when I said you might want to get out of town.”

“Yes.”

She picked up her heels. “You have my card. Call me.”

“Yes,” he said.

But she doubted he would.

Two Months Later

HE WENT BY the name Alvin Finch, not because that was his real name, although it was, but because he went by the name Alvin
Finch.

Some called him BoneMan.

Some called him by other names, depending on where he was or what he was doing, none of which he found interesting enough
to think about when he was alone in the place of complete peace and fear, as he was now. That wonderful, terrible state when
heaven and hell collided here, in his mind.

After almost two years of peaceful nights, resting in the full knowledge that he’d executed and survived his crusade without
so much as one scratch to his lily-white skin, Alvin had begun to grow restless.

His mission had always been painfully clear. On the one hand he was punishing fathers, all fathers, because all fathers were
the fathers of lies. None knew how to truly love their daughters the way he could.

On the other hand, Alvin was looking for the perfect daughter who would love him with complete devotion, the way he loved
himself. Unable to find such a daughter, he’d killed all of the girls, satisfied that he was at least punishing the fathers.

Then the authorities had blamed another man for his mission and he’d taken a sabbatical, always knowing that he would resume
his quest at the right time.

But his growing restlessness had turned to the place of complete peace and fear three weeks ago when he’d made the one discovery
that would now haunt him until he either possessed a daughter or died.

Alvin Finch opened the red robe he’d been wearing all morning and watched it fall around his feet in a heap. The new him,
thinner by twenty pounds as a result of rigorous exercise, prompted by the incessant news of how the country was growing fatter
by the day, stood naked in the full-length bathroom mirror. His brilliant blue eyes stared lovingly at himself, beautiful
next to his white skin. They were his window into heaven itself, reminding him often of his angelic nature. Short-cropped
blond hair hugged his skull, easier to keep clean that way.

He trimmed his hair every morning. Included in his routine were a shave of his neck, chin, and cheeks, as well as the plucking
of any stray hairs from his nostrils, ears, and eyebrows. Above the neck he was as neatly groomed as was humanly possible.

Below the neck, he was perfect. Absolutely exquisite.

The FBI’s physical profile published in the papers had been nearly perfect, but he’d expected nothing less. He’d run the full
stats on white men who weighed roughly a hundred and ninety pounds, stood six feet, wore size-thirteen shoes, and drove pickups,
and found similar redneck males to be numerous.

Satan
.

BoneMan, Alvin Finch, and Satan—these were the three names that awakened the place of peace and fear in his mind. His names.

The odd thing about hell was that it contained a piece of heaven, or at the very least what felt like heaven. Peace was there,
in the place of perfect fear. Or to be more precise, his peace was found in their perfect fear. This alone was Alvin Finch’s
piece of heaven on earth.

Alvin Finch had milky white skin, nearly perfect in every conceivable way. Soft and subtle like a young woman’s, but smoother
because he allowed no hair growth, preferring to shave and wax regularly, and because he’d always applied lotion, ever since
his mother had given him his first jar of the white Noxzema skin lotion over thirty years earlier.

There were two things that Alvin loved; three that he cherished. He loved unblemished skin because it made all things perfect
on the outside. He loved butterflies because they had perfect skin.

He loved soap, lots and lots of soap.

Alvin stepped into the shower, took his time, using six liquid ounces of unscented soap to lather his entire body four times
between rinses. He washed his hair three times, as was his custom when he was in the place of peace and fear, as he was now.
When the hot water in his one-hundred-gallon tank ran lukewarm, he shut it off and dried himself before stepping onto the
tile floor.

Steam had blanketed the mirrors and he wanted to see his clean, smooth skin again, so he wiped the glass with a fresh towel
and then used a hair dryer to clear the mirror of all moisture.

He studied his image again, paying special attention to his white belly, which, no matter how many sit-ups he did, persisted
in showing a small roll of fat. So-called love handles. But otherwise he was quite pleased.

He took one of the blue jars of Noxzema from the vanity, dipped four fingers deep into the cream, and smeared the luxurious
balm over both hands as he watched himself in the mirror. His skin bristled with excitement as he smoothed it on, starting
at his chest, working down until he softened his ankles and the soles of his feet.

Fully moisturized, he next clipped his toenails as he did every day, taking his time to clear the slightest trace of toe jam
from under each nail. Using a tissue, he swept up the clippings, rolled them into a ball, and flushed them down the toilet.

Satisfied that he was clean, he dressed in a pair of loose cargo pants and slipped into a brown plaid button-down shirt. In
El Paso and other parts west, he’d worn a hat, but here in the city he found that whatever impression the community had of
itself, very few people actually wore hats. They wore work boots and cargo pants and brown plaid, buttoned shirts.

Alvin stepped into his bedroom and stopped next to the bed. He never opened the blinds, preferring table lamps to the bright
sun, which damaged the skin. Now both bedside lamps were off, but he could still see the faces on the wall peering, and he
paused to let them stare at him.

The photographs on his wall numbered well over a hundred now, all faces of younger girls and teenagers, all staring at the
camera lens, all without a single pimple or blemish.

All had all been candidates at one time or another. Potential daughters. Alvin required a daughter, this was his one obsession.
A perfect daughter who could love him the way he deserved to be loved. Not sexually, of course. Only sick men stooped so low.
They, more than flies and mosquitoes, deserved to be crushed.

His method was simple: upon searching the world for the candidates who might make him a perfect daughter, he selected only
the very best.

From the very best candidates, he had taken those very few who, after considerable clandestine examination, appeared both
accessible and worthy of his standards. Seven. He’d taken seven, and under pressure none had measured up.

Confronted by their failure, he’d killed all seven. Once having been exposed to him, they simply could not live. But more
than this, he knew that he deserved at least some pleasure for all of his hassle.

Their bones had to be broken, one by one, until their internal bleeding eventually forced them to give up the ghost.

He’d marked the photographs of the seven he’d killed with a small red dot in the upper right-hand corner. Although none was
qualified any longer, he enjoyed their stares and he now considered removing his shirt.

The new daughter’s face filled his mind, and he turned from the wall of fakes. Alvin was a reasonable man, fully able to control
his needs, even the need for a daughter, and when the police had pinned his victims on another man, he’d decided to take an
extended break.

But three weeks ago his hiatus had been dramatically interrupted by a single photograph, like a flash grenade that had been
dropped into his world. Welsh, that pretender of the worst sort, had reopened the case after they’d released Phil Switzer.

Naturally, Alvin had taken a new interest in their every move. He’d learned a great deal, not the least regarding a man who’d
claimed to have tangled with a killer tied to the BoneMan in Iraq. A Captain Ryan Evans, who seemed to have lost his head
in the incident. A father.

But that was only a fraction of what Alvin had learned. Ryan Evans was no ordinary father. He was the father of a most extraordinary
daughter who no more belonged in Ryan’s heart, mind, or house than did a devil.