Four Scarpetta Novels (109 page)

L
UCY SPRINTS THROUGH
the dark, her aching chest not due to physical exertion.

The Mercedes is quiet on the side of the street, and she can't see Rudy through the tinted windows. The locks click free and she opens the driver's door.

“Mission accomplished?” he grimly asks in the dark. “Don't start the car yet.”

She tells him about her encounter with the drunk and the hotel staff and explains the way she handled it. He says nothing. She feels his disapproval and irritation with her.

“Give me some credit. I think we're fine.”

“As fine as you could be under the circumstances,” he has to admit.

“There's no reason for anyone to connect me with Rocco's room, with his death,” she goes on. “I guarantee that hotel staff won't touch his room with that
Do Not Disturb
sign on the door. More flies will come in through the opening in the window. Say he's found in three or four days, maggots will have devoured him to the point he won't be recognizable. And in case you didn't know it, blow flies are attracted to shit, too.

“And his blood alcohol will be high, no reason in the world for
anyone to think anything but suicide, and the hotel will want his rotting body and maggots out of there as quickly as possible. And the medical examiner will think he's been dead longer than room service says—assuming there is an exact time associated with Rocco's dinner order, and there probably won't be. Orders aren't handled by computer. I know that for a fact.”

“For a fact?” Rudy asks. “How the hell can you know that for a fact?”

“What do you think I am, fucking stupid? I called. Days ago. Said I was a Hewlett-Packard rep checking on their computers and that the one the kitchen used for room service needed a software upgrade. And they didn't know what I was talking about, said they didn't use computers for room service, only for inventory. Then I talked about the advantages of using an hp pavilion 753n with an Intel Pentium processor and eighty-gigabyte hard drive and CD-ROM and all the rest for room service orders. .  . . Point is, there is no computer record of what time Rocco ordered dinner, okay?”

Rudy was silent, then said, “They use Hewlett-Packards at that hotel?”

“Easy enough to find out by calling the business office. Yes,” she replied.

“Okay. Good job on that one. So even if the drunk or anyone else paid any attention to you, the way we've staged Rocco's crime scene will make it appear he was dead long before you went off to party with the drunk.”

“That's right, Rudy. We're fine. We're fine. Rocco's already being infested. Masses of maggots will produce heat and speed up decomposition, and it looks like a suicide, anyway—one committed earlier—much earlier—than anyone will imagine.”

She starts the car, laying a hand on his arm. “Now, can we get the hell out of here?”

“We can't make any more mistakes, Lucy,” he says in a defeated way. “We just can't.”

She pulls away from the sidewalk, angry.

“The fact is, at least two people in that hotel think you might be a
drunk conventiongoer or maybe even a prostitute, and you aren't easy to forget, no matter what they think you are. It probably doesn't matter one goddamn bit, but . . .” He doesn't finish.

“But it could have.” Lucy drives carefully, checking her mirrors and the sidewalks, dark with shadows.

“Right. It could have.”

She feels his eyes and the shifting of his moods. He is softening toward her, sorry he was so rough.

“Hey, you-Rudy-you.” She reaches out and affectionately touches his cheek, his stubble reminding her of a cat's tongue. “We're on the go and we're okay.”

She reaches for his hand and holds it tightly.

“This went down bad, Rudy, really bad, but it's going to turn out fine. We're fine,” she says again.

When one or the other or both of them are scared, they never admit it, but they know because they need each other. Each becomes desperate for the other's warm flesh. Lucy lifts his hand to her mouth, resting his arm against her.

“Don't,” he says. “We're both tired, strung-out. Not a good time to . . . to not have both hands on the wheel. Lucy, don't,” he mutters as she deeply kisses his fingers, his knuckles, his palm.

She makes love to one hand and slides the other inside her black linen blouse.

“Lucy, stop . . . oh, Jesus . . . it's not fair.” He unfastens his seat belt. “I don't want to feel this way about you, goddamn it.”

Lucy drives.

“You do feel it for me. At least sometimes, don't you?”

Lucy pets his hair, his neck, slips her hand into his collar and traces the muscles of his upper back. She doesn't look at him as she drives fast.

S
EVERAL TIMES, NIC SENT MEMOS
to the Baton Rouge Task Force, reminding the men and women—mostly men—that a Wal-Mart or other huge store like it would be a very good place for a killer to stalk his victims.

No one would pay any attention to a vehicle in the parking lot, no matter the hour, and based on charge-card receipts, every one of the missing women shopped at Wal-Mart, if not the one closest to the Louisiana State University campus, then at others in Baton Rouge and New Orleans. Ivy Ford did. The Saturday before she disappeared, she drove from Zachary and shopped at this very Wal-Mart, the one near LSU.

The task force never responded directly to Nic, but someone associated with it must have called her chief because he found her in the break-room before she took off to Knoxville and said, out of nowhere, “Most everybody in the world shops at Wal-Marts, Sam's Clubs, Kmarts, Costcos and so on, Nic.”

“Yes, sir,” she replied. “Most everybody does.”

Baton Rouge isn't her jurisdiction, and the only way she might change that fact would be for the attorney general to say the hell with boundaries. She has no good reason to request this, and he would have no good
reason to grant it. Nic has never been the sort to ask permission unless the subject rises before her like a drawbridge, giving her no choice but to put on the brakes or turn around. These days, she works undercover wherever her instincts take her, which frequently is the Wal-Mart near LSU, close to where her father lives in the Old Garden District. It isn't difficult to intuit which area of the store a killer might frequent if he is looking for prey. Women's lingerie would excite him, especially if a potential victim was holding up bras and panties, checking out styles and sizes, as that fleshy woman with short graying hair was doing moments earlier before leaving the store with stolen merchandise tucked up the sleeve of her raincoat. The petty thievery will go unreported because Nic has a much bigger agenda. She leaves her shopping cart in the aisle and walks out of the store, aware of every man she spots, aware of his awareness and activity, and acutely conscious of the pistol in her fanny pack.

Outside, the parking lot is fairly well lit by tall lamps. What few cars there are—less than a hundred—are parked close together, as if to keep one another company. She spots the heavyset petty thief walking swiftly toward a dark blue Chevrolet with Louisiana tags. Nic memorizes the plate number as she heads in the woman's general direction without appearing to notice her. In fact, Nic doesn't notice anyone in the area who might be a potential serial killer. If the woman is being stalked, and of course that was a long shot to begin with, there is no hint of it.

Once again, Nic is prodded by guilt because she is disappointed. The idea that she could possibly feel regret that a woman is not about to become another victim is so abhorrent that Nic will not acknowledge her sinful hopes to anyone and scarcely to herself. She represses that truth so completely that she would probably pass a polygraph test if the examiner asked her, “Do you feel disappointed when you tail a potential victim and the killer doesn't try to abduct her or succeed in abducting her?” Nic wouldn't get tense or hesitate. Her pulse rate would stay the same as she replied, “No.” The shorter the answer, the less chance of her nervous system betraying her.

She does not walk anywhere near her own car, a five-year-old forest green Ford Explorer that is clandestinely equipped with a portable dash-mounted flashing beacon, a shotgun, a first-aid kit, jumper cables, flares, a fire extinguisher, a jump-out bag containing Battle Dress Uniforms, boots, extra magazines and other tactical gear, a handheld scanner tucked under the dash and a charger for her international cell phone, which also works as a two-way radio. A lot of her equipment she bought with her own money. In life, she is always overprepared for the worst.

The woman digs inside a dirty canvas beach bag, maybe ten feet from the Chevrolet. Certainly she doesn't fit the victimology, not in the least. But Nic doesn't trust so-called patterns or MOs. She remembers Scarpetta emphasizing that profiles are dangerous, because they're fraught with errors. Not everybody does everything the same way every time, and, if nothing else, the woman is a loner in a dark, relatively deserted parking lot at the edge of a major university campus, and that makes her vulnerable to predators.

The woman fumbles with keys and drops them. Stooping to pick them up, she loses her balance and falls, suddenly crying out and clutching her left knee.

She casts about helplessly, spots Nic and begs, “Help me!”

Nic sprints and squats by the woman.

“Don't move,” she tells her. “What hurts?”

She smells insect repellent and body odor. It vaguely brushes against her thoughts that the car keys on the pavement don't look as if they belong to a relatively new Chevrolet.

“I think I pulled something in my knee,” the woman says, her eyes fixed on Nic's. “It's my bad knee.”

Her accent is Southern with a distinct lilt. She is not native to the area, and her hands are rough and raw as if she is accustomed to hard, physical work such as cleaning or shucking shellfish. Nic notices no jewelry, not even a watch. The woman pulls up her pant leg and looks at an angry purple bruise centered on her kneecap. The bruise isn't fresh. Instinctively,
Nic is repulsed by the woman's unpleasant odor, her bad breath and something about her demeanor that she can't pinpoint but finds disturbing. She gets to her feet and steps back.

“I can call an ambulance,” Nic says. “Not much else I can do, ma'am. I'm not a doctor.”

A look takes over the woman's face, making it harsher in the glow of the parking lot lamps.

“No, I don't need an ambulance. Like I said, I have this happen all the time.” She tries to get up.

“Then why do you have just one bruise?”

“I always fall the same way.”

Nic keeps her distance. She has no intention of offering further assistance. The woman is dirty, maybe mentally ill, and Nic knows better than to tangle with that type. They can be contagious, unpredictable, even violent if one has physical contact with them. The woman is on her feet now, favoring her left leg.

“Believe I'll get me a coffee and rest for a bit,” she says. “I'll be fine, just fine.”

Slowly, she limps away from the Chevrolet, back toward the store.

Nic softens. She digs in a pocket of her jeans as she trots after the woman.

“Here.” She hands her a five-dollar bill.

The woman smiles, her quick dark eyes hot on Nic's.

“God bless you.” She clutches the money. “You're a lamb,” she says.

T
HE DOOR ACROSS THE HALLWAY
opens and an older man in an undershirt and sweatpants studies Marino suspiciously. “What's all the racket about?” he inquires, his gray hair sticking up like the bristles of a hedgehog, his wrinkled face patchy with stubble, his eyes puffy and bloodshot.

Marino knows the look all too well. The man's been drinking, probably since he got up and downed his first eye-opener.

“You seen Tom?” Marino asks, sweating and struggling for air.

“Can't say I really know him. Don't have a heart attack. I can't do CPR, although I am familiar with the Heimlich maneuver.”

“He promised to meet me”—Marino catches a breath—“and I came all the friggin' way from California.”

“You did?” The man is very curious now and steps out into the hallway. “What for?”

“What do you mean, what for?” Marino recovers enough to snap at him, as if it is any of the man's business. “ 'Cause the friggin' gold rush's over. 'Cause I'm tired of sittin' on the friggin' dock of the bay. 'Cause I got bored being a friggin' movie star.”

“If you were in the movies, I've never seen you, and I rent movies all the time. What else is there to do around here?”

“Have you seen Tom?” Marino persists, trying in vain to force the knob by turning it hard and shaking the door.

“I was asleep when you started all the racket,” says the man, who looks at least sixty and a bit deranged. “I haven't seen Tom and don't care for the likes of him, if you get my drift.”

He scrutinizes Marino.

“What do you mean,
the likes of him
?”

“Homo.”

“That's news to me, not that I give a shit what people do, as long as I ain't around to see it. He bringing men to his apartment or something? 'Cause I'm not sure I want to get in if . . .”

“Oh, no. Never saw him bring anybody to his apartment. But another homo in the building who wears leather and earrings told me he's seen Tom in some of those bars where homos go and pick each other up for a quick visit to the bathroom.”

“Listen, jerkface, I'm supposed to be subletting this dump from the son of a bitch,” Marino heatedly informs the man. “Already paid him the first three months' rent, and drove from California to get the key and move in. All my stuff's down there in my damn truck.”

“That would really piss me off.”

“No joke, Sherlock.”

“I mean, really piss me off. Who's Sherlock? Oh, yes. That detective with the hat and pipe. I don't read violent books.”

“So if you hear any noise coming from this apartment, ignore it. If I have to use dynamite, I'm getting in.”

“You don't really mean that,” the old man worries.

“Right,” Marino says sarcastically. “I walk around with dynamite in my pockets. I'm a suicide bomber with a New Jersey accent. Know how to fly planes, just can't take off or land.”

The old man disappears inside his apartment, and a burglar chain rattles.