The envelope contained pictures, lots of them. Polaroids, amateur stuff, obviously taken by Edgar himself. They all had the same subject. Me.
They must have been taken while I was under the influence of his drugs. My eyes were open, but there was no one home. I could tell. There was no me in there. Only my body. My naked body.
I had been posed, over and over again, different for each picture. He had… made me do stuff. He had me playing with myself. Touching myself. Sexual poses, me on all fours, me with my legs spread, me dry-humping the furniture. One nasty pose after another. In some of them, he’d given me props. A broomstick. A Coke bottle. A dildo stuck in my mouth. A dazed, zoned expression on my face, like I liked it. Like I was drunk and I liked it.
I fell forward on my hands, heaving. He must not have fed me, because nothing came up, much as I tried. I hurled so hard I expected the lining of my stomach to spew out. I felt sick. Betrayed. Abused. Raped.
I wanted to throw the pictures away, to lose them, to forget they ever existed. And then I saw the sheet of paper in the bottom of the box. It was a mailing list. All the places he had sent copies of the pictures. All the local television stations. National news agencies. Local radio shows. Police headquarters. The FBI. Chief O’Bannon.
He’d sent the pictures to Chief O’Bannon’s home.
Darcy.
I fell forward, scraping my breasts against the gravel, wanting to hurt myself, wanting to die, wanting this to all be over, just please, please let it be over. I pounded the box with all the force my fists could muster, which wasn’t enough to dent cardboard. Look what he’s done to me, David. Look what I let him do to me.
Of course it was just a matter of time before I opened the second box. It had been labeled, too: TO HELP YOU FORGET.
Only one thing inside that one. A quart bottle of scotch whiskey.
I ripped the lid off the bottle and pressed it to my lips. I was hungry, starved, thirsty, desperate to forget. I opened my mouth and let the liquor course down my throat.
I gagged. The booze spilled everywhere, all over me. I bathed in it. As soon as I’d stopped choking, I tried again. I would use more restraint this time, I told myself. Just take a sip. A little sip, then another. Sip myself into oblivion. I raised the liquid salvation to my lips.
This is what he wants you to do.
I stopped. Where had that come from?
This is what he wants you to do. Why do you think he gave it to you?
I pulled the bottle away and stared at it, as if I had never seen such a thing in my life. He was manipulating me, just as he had done from the start. As I had allowed him to do. This is why he let me live. This is why he gave me the bottle. Because he knows I won’t be able to resist.
And he was so right. So bloody goddamn right.
He was trying to break me, to destroy what little was left so he could scoop up the pieces and reshape me into whatever he wanted me to be.
I pushed up to my feet, amazed that I could do it, and walked toward the noise. I stood naked before the god of the waters, staring down from the precipice. It had to be a hundred feet down to the basin, maybe more. I didn’t even have to climb over a barrier. Just one simple step. That’s all it would take to end it, to find peace. Hell of a lot simpler than slashing my wrists with a shard of glass. No one would care. Not after they saw those pictures. And everyone would see those pictures.
The thundering crash of the water crescendoed in my ears.
That’s what he wants you to do.
I stared down into the maelstrom. And saw something I had never seen before.
That’s when I made up my mind.
First, I got the goddamn pictures and tossed them in. The next bit was harder, a lot harder. But I did it. I turned the bottle upside down and let it pour out into the abyss. It would’ve been simpler to just toss in the bottle, but this was more satisfying. It occurred to me that I might be spiking the Vegas water supply. Well, tough.
The booze was gone. The photos were gone. The need to destroy myself was gone, at least for the moment. I was naked, and I didn’t know where I was, and I had no idea how to get back to civilization. Or even if I should.
I fell back onto the gravel as if I were a bag of boneless meat. And stayed there. In time, I fell asleep. Not unconsciousness, not druginduced stupor, but the real thing.
And I even dreamed. Or something like it.
23
Patrick marched into headquarters, his face taut and lined. He threw his coat at the nearest hook on the rack. It missed, fell in a crumpled heap on the floor. He didn’t notice. He slid behind Susan’s desk and started reviewing all the reports on Susan’s disappearance. Just as he had every day this week. Over and over again.
“You’ve got messages,” Madeline shouted from the lower floor, waving pink slips in the air.
“Give them to someone else,” he said, his face buried.
“They want you.”
“I don’t have time for crackpots and false confessions.”
“Some of them say-” She paused, lowered her voice. “They’ve seen Susan.”
“I’ve followed up on twenty-two Susan sightings. Granger has done more than that. Not a damn one has led to anything.”
“You got a problem?”
Patrick whipped his head up. Somehow, O’Bannon was right in front of him. “Sorry. I’ve been… immersed.”
“So I hear. Obsessed, some say.”
Patrick craned his neck. “Sir, when an officer is down-”
He waved it away. “You don’t have to tell me, Chaffee. I’ve known Susan all my life. I used to diaper the girl’s bare bottom.” O’Bannon’s eyes briefly closed. He looked tired, aged. “Madeline says you were making a stink about the files.”
“I was trying to find out everything I could about Susan. Her background, personnel file, police record.”
“You think the key to finding her is in her past?”
“I don’t know. But profilers are supposed to absorb all the data, collect every scrap of evidence, then come up with some brilliant conclusion. And I’ve read everything else.” He paused. “Except one file. It was logged into the computer index. But I couldn’t find it. Madeline thought maybe you had it.”
“She was right. It’s restricted.”
“I don’t know why you pulled it, but if there’s any possibility that it could help us find her-”