Game of Death (47 page)

She rolls over and kisses me, trailing her fingers across my chest, down my stomach, between my legs. I close my eyes and let out a satisfied sigh as she kisses my chest, nipping softly at my
nipples and moving her hands teasingly between my legs.

She kisses her way down my body, dwelling for a few moments on the more interesting topography, then slides back up so that she is straddling me, her hands on my chest.

She lowers herself onto me, and I watch as she closes her eyes, her face straining in exquisite pleasure. I want to hold her. I want to take her in my arms and bring her into me, but I can see
that she wants to be the one in control at the moment, and that’s okay. It’s a game we enjoy that hints at the darkness, without diving in too deep. She is rocking slowly, sitting up so
that I see her entire beautiful body, and the sight drives my need to take her in my arms. It is becoming a yearning that must be satisfied.

‘Please,’ I say softly, breathlessly.

She opens her eyes and looks down at me, smiling. ‘You want permission for something?’ she asks, the sexiest lilt in her voice I’ve ever heard.

‘Please,’ I say, again.

She is still rocking slowly on top of me, and I’ve never felt so alive. ‘Yes?’ she asks. ‘What is it?’

‘I want to hold you,’ I say. ‘Please?’

She gives me a mischievous smile. ‘Do you think you deserve it?’ she queries. ‘Have you been good?’

‘Yes,’ I say, looking deeply into her eyes. ‘I’ve been good. We both deserve it.’

Without breaking rhythm, she reaches down and takes my hands, bringing them up to her. I wrap them around her body, pulling her to me, holding her as tightly as I can, kissing her hard as our
bodies meld into one, the frantic passion gathering desperate speed until neither one of us can hold off anymore.

The meeting at the police station should be a mere formality at this point, but I am still nervous. The past few weeks have reinforced the lesson I should have learned long
ago: nothing is as it seems.

Finn, my lawyer, is with me. I wonder who is paying him at this point; his agreement to represent me was with Tom Jackson – Tom needed a top lawyer to get me out, so that he could try to
take care of me, Josh and Yvette at the same time. I’m sure Tom agreed to pay a pretty pile for that to happen, but Tom’s dead now. Maybe Finn plans on collecting from Jackson’s
estate. That would be satisfyingly ironic. If not, I’ll pay the fees; I need a good lawyer right now, and from what I understand, Finn is the best. A good guy, too, if most in Charlestown are
to be believed.

Killkenny’s there, too. He’s the one who found us that night. After I’d left him on the street in Charlestown, he looked up Pinkerton’s address and headed up, in the hope
that that was where all the action was going down. The action had already played out by the time he got there, but it was still helpful to have someone familiar with the back story leading the
Marblehead cops through the investigation. I’m sure they’re good men, but the swanky neighborhood doesn’t see too many double homicides. Throw in the S&M angles, and I have a
feeling the Marblehead Police Department would have been overwhelmed if Killkenny wasn’t there.

Sitting next to Killkenny in the interrogation room in the Back Bay station is Detective Sergeant Tom Welker. I still haven’t heard him speak, but at least he’s regarding me with
less hostility than in the past. I suppose that’s something.

Standing behind Killkenny and Welker are three men. One of them I recognize as the Suffolk County District Attorney. The other one has been introduced to me as the Police Commissioner.
Apparently this matter has garnered the attention of all the VIPs in local law enforcement. Every one of them wants a piece of the glory, now that it looks as though it’s been solved.

‘I just want to be clear,’ Finn says, taking control of the gathering. ‘My client is being granted immunity from prosecution for anything he tells you about, with respect to
the investigation he conducted into these matters, is that correct?’

‘For anything excluding murder,’ Killkenny says. He means it as a joke, but it’s not to me. I’ve posed the hypothetical to my lawyer: I participated in the kidnapping and
assault on NetMaster, and he died as a result. That makes me guilty of felony murder. The fact that I wasn’t the one who turned the dial on the battery up, and flipped the switch, is
irrelevant. So is the fact that NetMaster was a pederast scumbag who deserved to die. I’m just going to have to leave that part out of my answers to any questions, and rely on the competence
of Cormack’s men in disposing of the body. If I have some sleepless nights over it, I suppose that’s a mild penance.

‘Do you have the written agreement?’ Finn asks.

Killkenny slides a sheet of paper over to Finn. He reads it, nods to me.

‘What do you want to know?’ I ask.

‘We’ve dug through the computer files at NextLife, and we think we have a good handle on how all this went down, but we want to make sure it lines up with your
understanding.’

‘Okay,’ I say. ‘Where do you want to start?’

Killkenny shrugs. ‘How about the beginning? How did this all start?’

‘Some of this I’m guessing at,’ I say. ‘I obviously wasn’t there at the beginning.’

‘I understand. Anything you can tell us would be helpful.’

I take a deep breath. ‘Tom Jackson was a friend,’ I say. ‘There was a time when he was a good guy, and he was always a brilliant mind. He was tasked with raising revenue for
the company while not upsetting the “organic” nature of the services we provide. It’s not an easy task. I’m guessing he started out thinking that if he could break the
algorithms that protect people’s identity in the system, he could use that information to generate research on how people were spending their time and money on the site. That would help him
drive revenue.’ I’m thinking about those first days at MIT when I met Tom. ‘I don’t think he started out planning anything illegal.’

‘So, how did that turn?’

‘I don’t know. But I would guess that it’s such a huge amount of information that, in the aggregate, he probably wasn’t even able to break it down. On the other hand, he
would have noticed certain people engaging in unethical – maybe even illegal – activities on the site. He could have thought that those people deserved to be targeted, and he probably
started by dabbling in identity theft and online extortion. It’s fairly easy and low-risk. And he used that money to prop up the company’s revenue.’

‘And then?’

‘Well, he would have realized pretty quickly that there’s a huge revenue opportunity, if that kind of behavior could be regularized. He wouldn’t have had the resources or
knowhow to do that, though.’

‘So he convinced Pinkerton to hire NetMaster?’

‘He admitted that much to me,’ I say. ‘But then Josh started seeing Kendra. And when Josh started getting too aggressive, she started looking for something to keep him at bay.
Apparently she managed to get a look at the company’s finances, and she realized there were things going on that weren’t quite kosher. She thought Josh was behind the whole thing, so
she went to Tom Jackson and told him. Of course she had no idea that Tom was behind it. At that point, he realized that he had to find a way to make her disappear.’

‘So he got Michael François involved?’

I shake my head. ‘François didn’t have anything to do with Tom. He was just a psychopath who was using the system to practice murders. He was one of the subjects in the pilot
programs that Gunta was running. I’m guessing he seduced the good doctor and convinced him to tell the parole board that François was cured – that he was not likely to repeat the
sexual assaults that landed him in jail in the first place. Once out, though, François picked up where he left off, but this time he escalated the violence and started killing people. When I
started investigating, Tom found out about François. I’m sure he went onto the system and figured out that Kendra was one of the likely victims.’

‘So he killed her.’

‘Not right away. I think at that point he just hoped that François would get around to her, and his problems would be solved without him ever having to lift a finger. I think
that’s why he set NetMaster on us, to keep us from being too quick to solve the murders.’

‘The car that almost ran you down in front of Yvette’s house?’

I nod. ‘And then breaking my car windows. I think that was all intended just to scare us – convince us that we didn’t want to be looking into these murders. As long as there
was no connection to the company, François would have been able to continue his killing spree and it was just a matter of time before he killed Kendra.’

‘They were right about that,’ Killkenny says. ‘If you hadn’t been stalking her, she would have been killed that night you found her at her house.’

‘I wasn’t stalking her.’

‘Right.’

Finn puts a hand on my arm to tamp down my anger. ‘Let’s just get this over with,’ he says.

‘Anyway, things got more serious when they realized that Kendra was starting to talk to me about NextLife. That presented a much greater danger to them. Just scaring me wasn’t enough
anymore. They couldn’t afford to have her giving me any more information.’

‘So NetMaster beat the hell out of you,’ Killkenny says.

‘Yeah. And he showed up at my house with a knife.’

‘Do you think he would have killed you?’

‘I don’t know. All I know is that he’s lucky Ma didn’t kill him.’

Killkenny smiles. He has genuine admiration for Ma. ‘He was lucky about that. Though maybe she caught up with him.’

I look at him uneasily. ‘What do you mean?’

‘NetMaster has disappeared,’ he says. ‘We’re looking for him, but it’s like he’s vanished into thin air.’

‘Really?’ I work to keep my face neutral, my voice calm.

He nods. ‘NetMaster’s not his real name, either.’

‘You don’t say.’

‘Dieter Schlosser. That’s his proper name. He was a real scumbag over in Europe before he became a real scumbag over here. We’re assuming he was involved in the murder of the
whore.’

I hate that word. It punctures me like a spear through my chest. ‘She wasn’t a whore,’ I say with quiet ferocity. I can feel everyone in the room looking at me, as the room
goes silent for a moment. ‘She was a girl.’

Killkenny looks around at the other faces, gauging their level of offense. He looks back at me and shrugs, making clear that he doesn’t really care how I’m feeling. ‘Fine.
We’re assuming that NetMaster had something to do with the Madison girl’s murder. Does that make sense to you?’

I have in my mind the image of NetMaster strapped to the chair in that warehouse, his eyes burning into me, convinced that I had killed Kendra. Unfortunately it’s a visual that will likely
never leave me. I’ve thought about it a lot, and I’ve come to the conclusion that Cormack was right. NetMaster wasn’t lying; he genuinely believed that I had killed Kendra. I
shake my head. ‘I think Tom did that on his own. I think it was a crime of opportunity. He may not even have told NetMaster.’

Killkenny looks surprised. ‘What makes you say that?’

‘I don’t know. It’s just a hunch.’

He shakes his head. ‘I don’t buy it.’

I’m staring at him. ‘You don’t buy what?’ I’m trying to figure out whether I’ve said too much.

‘I don’t buy your hunch,’ he says. ‘I think NetMaster must have been involved.’

I shrug. ‘You may be right. You’ll have to ask him when you find him.’

‘You don’t have any idea where he is, do you?’

‘How would I know where he is?’ I’m trying not to sound defensive, but I suspect I’ve failed.

‘I don’t know. You weren’t close, but you worked at the same company. Maybe you heard about where he goes, that sort of thing.’

I shake my head. ‘Like you say, we weren’t close.’

Killkenny drags the silence out for a few more moments. ‘I think that’s all we’ve got,’ he says. ‘You’ll let us know if you think of anything else you forgot
to tell us?’

‘Of course.’

Finn stands up. ‘I’ll expect to see the dismissal of all charges against my client filed today, correct?’

‘It’ll be filed,’ the DA says. He and the others file out of the room. No one thanks me or shakes my hand or offers an apology. In their eyes, I’m still guilty of
something. Maybe they’re right.

Finn and I make our way through the station house and out onto the street. My Corolla is parked there. The windows are still broken, but they can be fixed. It’s a reliable car, and
there’s nothing quite as comforting in this world as a dependable car.

‘I’ll give you a shout when the papers are filed,’ Finn says. ‘Congratulations.’

I get into my car. ‘Thanks.’

‘You celebrating tonight?’

‘Not really. Just a dinner.’

‘A few close friends?’

I nod. ‘Something like that.’

The little brick patio out the back of Ma’s house is large enough only for a barbecue grill, a cooler and an old wooden table big enough for six or seven people.
That’s bigger than we need for tonight. Cormack is standing over the grill, looking like he’s in control of a supertanker as it heads out to sea. Ma and I are sitting at the table,
sipping beers. It’s cooled off a little bit, but the patio traps heat and keeps it like a warming tray, so I’ve got a layer of perspiration over my forehead. That’s fine with me,
though; it’s a healthy sweat. Not a drop of anxiety.

The screen door slams and Yvette steps out with a tray of steaks and marinated chicken breasts. She’s wearing a short skirt and a tight white shirt that looks perfect on her, and she
catches me staring at her. ‘Thanks,’ she says with a smile.

‘For what?’

‘For noticing.’

‘Hard not to.’

‘Over here, lass!’ Cormack bellows. ‘The coals are ready and waiting, and I’m starved like a man coming home to shore!’

She squeezes past the table and puts the tray down next to the grill, grabs a beer and comes to sit next to me. ‘Nice day,’ she says, kissing me on the cheek.

‘Best day,’ I say.

‘I like what you’ve done with your hair,’ Ma says, looking over at Yvette.