Bound by Moonlight (28 page)

“A working girl?”

“Yes. She came on to him, promising him things his sweet, simple mind wanted to believe, if he’d get her drugs from the clinic. They had sex. Sex like wild, rutting animals.” She shuddered, her eyes going glassy. “She demanded money from me, saying she’d tell the police he raped her. So I had to take care of her. I underestimated Donald’s fondness for her. He was inconsolable, went absolutely out of control. The only thing that would calm him was bringing her back. But that was a bit of a problem.”

“Because you’d killed her.”

She nodded at Cee Cee’s conclusion. “Yes. The greedy little whore.” That was when the detectives saw the pure madness in her eyes.

She explained with a terrible logic how they’d moved from city to city. How she would select from her patients a girl who fit the general description of Donald’s lost love. She’d offer the girl money to play out the fantasy that she was the poor deceased Frankie Bell, and for a week or so, the masquerade worked.
Donald was a functioning person and Judith wasn’t eaten away by guilt and shame. And then, he’d figure out the deception. And his punishment upon the poor girl was terrible.

“I’d tell him how sorry I was, that I’d made a mistake. That I would find the real Frankie for him.”

“So you pimped women for him to kill.”

Her glare slashed through Cee Cee. “They had a chance. About as much chance as they had on the streets. They were warned. I warned them over and over to go home, to be safe. But they wouldn’t listen.”

“Like your sister wouldn’t listen when she was told it was too dangerous to remain in a war-torn country?” Cee Cee asked softly. “The way you wouldn’t listen when you were told to go home?”

She nodded vigorously, almost gratefully. “Yes, just like that. Too much pride to listen. Too much self-importance to think bad things can and do happen. They do happen, Detective. They do.”

“Yes,” Cee Cee agreed quietly. “They do.”

“So you took him the girls,” Babineau interjected. “What was with the moon cycle?”

“I don’t know. Some nonsense he picked up from one of his many wardmates. It calmed him—the ritual, the cycle. It gave him a beginning and an end, so his frustration never got a chance to spike. He could function in the world as long as he had the safety of that ritual.”

“As long as he had an innocent young girl to torture and rape. Didn’t that bother you just a little bit, putting those girls in the same position you’d been in?” Cee Cee couldn’t keep the disgust from her tone.

“So, Dr. Farraday,” Babineau cut in to keep things
civil and moving forward, “you returned each month, bringing in the new, carrying out the old.”

“Yes. Ritual. Routine.”

“Here in New Orleans, and before that in Las Vegas, in St. Louis, in Boston.”

“You did your homework. Yes.”

“But they were still alive when you picked them up.”

“Yes.”

“Then you killed them. Why?”

“Donald would have been very upset to think they’d died. I told him I took them home.”

Babineau and Cee Cee exchanged an astonished blink. Cee Cee had to say it.

“He would torture, starve, and rape them for weeks, but just didn’t have the heart to put them out of their misery?”

“That was punishment, Detectives, learned at one of those pricey institutions I placed him in. You can see the physical scars on him, if not the mental. But as far as killing, Donald couldn’t bring himself to step on a bug, let along protect himself.”

“So you cleaned up after him.”

“He was my son. My problem. It was the least I could do for him. I’d tell the girls I’d come to take them home, and they were all too willing to cooperate. I’d take them someplace isolated and inject them first, so they’d feel no pain, no fear.”

“And kill them.”

“What else could I do? He was my son.” That was said like it was only a biological fact, with no trace of emotion behind it. She regarded them then with interest. “What gave me away? I was so careful.”

“Your fish tank.”

“Fish tank?”

“The aquarium chemicals were on Marjorie Cole.”

The doctor laughed. “I’d just changed the water before I went to pick her up. Such a small, insignificant thing. I never gave it a thought.”

“And your perfume. We thought it was men’s cologne. That threw me for a while because you don’t wear it at the clinic.”

“It is cologne. It was my husband’s. I only wear it when I go out. It comforts me to think he’s with me.”

“And you think he’d want to be with you, with the things you were doing?”

No reply.

Cee Cee rolled out of her chair and paced to the far wall, unable to maintain a stoic front. She squeezed her eyes shut and concentrated on slow, even breaths as her partner continued.

“Dr. Farraday, you can do one final thing for your son and to help yourself. The last girl, Kelly Schoenbaum or Kikki Valentine, is still alive. Where does he take them?”

“I don’t know.”

“You don’t have to protect him anymore. Save this one life, Doctor. Let her live to make better choices.”

“I’m sorry, Detective. I really don’t know. I dropped them off and picked them up at the cabin in the park. He wouldn’t tell me where he took them. He said that was private.”

S
TAN
S
CHOENBAUM WAS
holding a cup of cold coffee in unsteady hands with Joey Boucher babysitting him,
while MacCreedy handled the paperwork. His gaze lifted, and when he saw their faces, his features fell. They didn’t have to tell him the news.

“What am I going to tell Marilyn? That because of me our daughter is going to die?”

The other three exchanged uncomfortable looks, not knowing what to say. Boucher took a deep breath and got out of his chair, crossing over to Cee Cee. He kept his voice very low, for her and Babineau alone.

“You know there’s hardly any chance of them finding her. Maybe there’s another way. He brought back Babineau’s little boy. Maybe there’s something he could do—considering what he is and all.”

M
AX SAT ON
the porch, rocking slowly in the glider, dressed in slouchy jeans, a black tee shirt, and his red high-tops. He couldn’t rest until he knew she was safe.

Giles came up the steps, back from dropping Oscar off at school and Tina at her home to take care of some household matters. He took a look at the figure slumped on the glider, then settled against the porch rail to light a cigarette.

“Playing hooky today, boss man?”

“I don’t know what that means.”

“Taking the day off.”

“Yes. That’s what I’m doing.” He closed his eyes, rocking.

“Want company?”

“No.”

“Want my opinion?”

He slit on eye open. “No.”

He waited, but Giles just smoked in silence. Max brooded, unhappy, dissatisfied, not knowing what to do.

“What do you see when you look at me?”

“Whaddaya mean?”

Max waved his hand to encompass himself from head to toe. “What am I?”

“The fella who pays me damned good not to answer questions like that.” At Max’s scowl, he sighed. “At one time, that would have been an easy one. A seriously scary bogeyman creeping around at Jimmy’s back, threatening to eat my eyes for breakfast.”

Max didn’t smile at the reminder. “And now?”

“Someone I trust enough to march up to the doors of hell and knock if you sent me.”

“Why? I don’t understand. Why would you do that for me?” He shut out the sound of his mother’s voice.
You’re special. Blessed.

No hesitation. “Because you care, Max.”

He blinked. “About what?”

“Everything.” Giles made an expansive gesture. “Every damned thing, like it’s your responsibility, your problem. Jimmy, now Jimmy was a good man to work for, fair and generous. But there was no soul to Jimmy Legere. He didn’t trust nobody. He wouldn’t have gone out of his way for the needs of another living being unless there was something in it for him.” He waited for Max to nod in reluctant agreement before going on, his tone a bit tougher.

“You could learn something from that, Max. You need to take a step back and ask what’s in it for you before you go giving everything away, a chunk of you at a
time, to all them that’s got their hands out. You have to save something for yourself or you’ll be no good to any of them. You need to prioritize, to learn to say no.”

“I have responsibilities. I want to do what’s right. How do I choose? How do I pick one and let the others fall away?”

“What’s closest to your heart?” A chuckle. “Don’t answer. I can see her in your eyes. And that’s the problem, isn’t it: Why isn’t she here? Why aren’t you asking her these questions instead of listening to some dumb wiseguy?”

“I’m not what she needs right now.”

Giles laughed then, a big insulting laugh that had Max thinking about eating eyes on toast again.

“You wouldn’t say that if you’d seen her come plowing in here after that business with your daddy, ready to cut me off at the knees if I tried to keep her away. She may not know what she needs, but it’s you she wants.”

Max’s posture straightened. His head came up, his eyes grew bright. The very air about him seemed to vibrate.

Giles flicked the remains of his cigarette onto the lawn and came away from the rail with a grin. “Why don’t you ask her?” he drawled, then went inside.

Max waited for the orange and black vehicle to skid to a stop at the bottom of the steps. His initial anticipation took a plunge when he saw she wasn’t alone. Another unmarked cop car pulled in behind hers.

Business first.

Babineau and Boucher he could understand, but the sight of the third man getting out of the second car
with the young officer had him bristling with outrage. He snarled, “What are you doing on my property?”

Cee Cee motioned the others to stay put while she climbed up onto the porch.

At first Joey’s suggestion had shocked her, but then she thought perhaps it was exactly the bridge needed to bring these two sides of her world closer. She knew from experience that working together to right a wrong was the quickest way to erase differences. Teamwork. Loyalty. Trust. Things all of them understood and respected. So she’d brought her side to Max’s door.

She’d known it was a risky idea bringing Schoenbaum, but he refused to be left behind. The others thought the sight of a father’s grief would overcome Max’s objections, but as his eyes narrowed into glittering slits, Cee Cee feared they were wrong.

“Max, I need to talk to you.”

When she touched his arm he took a denying step back, bumping the glider, sending it banging against the house. His breathing was fast, his tension palpable.

“Max, I don’t know what’s between you and Schoenbaum, and right now I can’t afford to care. I need you to do something for me. For
me,
Max. Not for him.”

“What might that be?” So wary.

“Donald Lamb, the killer we’ve been after, is dead. His latest victim is still hidden away. We don’t know where she is.”

“She’s in the swamps, Mr. Savoie.” Joey Boucher spoke up. “I—we thought maybe you could help find her.”

“You thought wrong.” He started to turn away, but Cee Cee gripped his elbow and put herself in his path.

“Max, she doesn’t have much time.”

“She’s seventeen years old.” Schoenbaum’s voice quavered. “He’s had her for twenty-five days. I can’t even begin to imagine . . .”

“I can.” Max flung off Cee Cee’s hand. “Would you like me to tell you? Would you like me to tell you about the cold that burns into the bones, and the hunger that cuts like knife blades until you’d eat anything you thought you could keep down? About fear so huge it’s a suffocating hand around your throat, so tight you can’t even pray to die? Imagine that, you son of a bitch. Imagine that while she’s out there and you can’t do a damned thing about it.”

“Max!” Cee Cee’s tone reflected her dismay. “Stop it.”

But all the impotent horror and fear of that child who’d once crawled underneath the glider was too excruciating to bear.

“Imagine what it’s like to be young and helpless in the hands of monsters. To suffer for their hatred, their drunken viciousness, to beg and cry and plead while they cut you, kick you, and hurt you until your mind goes blank from the shock.”

“Max, please.” Charlotte pressed her palms against his chest. His heart pounded with an explosive force. “Stop.”

“That’s what I said to them. To
him
”—Max glared down at Schoenbaum—“and his two partners.” He caught her wrists and yanked her hands down as he
looked past her into a man’s eyes that had been cold and merciless then.

“Then put yourself in the place of the man who has to look at what’s been done to a child he loves, to a child who never did anything to deserve such cruel abuse. To have that child look up through no-longer-innocent eyes and ask why, and you have no answer. Then you’ll know what Jimmy Legere was thinking while he watched the pieces of your friend, Detective Peyton, bleed out onto the ground. Get the fuck off my property.”

Shocked speechless, Cee Cee put up a staying hand to her colleagues and followed Max into the house as he stalked into Jimmy’s study.

“Max!”

He stopped at Jimmy’s desk, his hands gripping the edge of it. “Go away, Charlotte. Don’t ask me to help that man.”

“You can’t blame a child for the deeds of the father.”

“Can’t I? He didn’t have a problem doing it. He didn’t have any problem stomping on my hands, breaking my bones because he couldn’t get to Jimmy. He and Peyton and another of their pals didn’t have any problem smashing my nose and mouth with a Jim Beam bottle, then forcing me to swallow the whiskey along with chips of glass and teeth.

“They used a Taser. It scrambled me somehow so I couldn’t shift, couldn’t protect myself. I couldn’t stop them. When they were done, I had to crawl home. I was eight years old.”

His breathing was raw. “Now he knows how
Jimmy felt when he couldn’t find me in town. He’ll know how Jimmy felt when he finally came home to find me curled up and whining like an animal under the porch glider, so beaten and broken all I could do was lay my face on his shoes.”