She shook her head.
“Or that our grandparents raised us, me and my sister? That they used to bring us here for the summer? God, I hated it.” He got up and began to pace. “A toney boarding school during the school year, then in the summer, they brought me here. You can imagine how well I fit in with all the fishermen’s kids. To say they weren’t very kind to a boy like me would be an understatement.”
“Then why did you move back here?”
He shrugged. “I inherited the big house, the land along the waterfront. I built the marina, the showroom.” His smile was pure satisfaction. “I got to be a very big fish in a very small pond. Even the townies who’d made my life a living hell when I was a kid came around.”
“Even while you were thinking about ways of getting even with them.”
“I’d thought of that a long time ago.”
“Lisa…”
“Lisa should have stayed home with her children where she belonged,” he snapped.
“What happened to the grieving husband?”
“What better way for a grieving husband to get through the pain of losing his beloved wife than to have a handy replacement.” He reached over and drew a delicate circle around her right breast with his index finger. “Sort of like getting back on the bike after falling off, if you know what I mean. So we’re going to play a little house. I’m going to be the daddy, and you’re going to be the mommy…”
“You stupid son of a bitch, the FBI is going to be all over you before you can blink.” She struggled against the bindings.
“Oh?” He blinked several times, then looked around. “I don’t see anyone.”
“Duncan told me what he’d found. I told Garland to send the techs here to process…”
“Process all they want. I’ll be long gone by the time they get here. And so will you, pretty Mia.”
“It won’t take Beck long to figure out what you’ve done, Todd.”
“Beck’s a fool. He’s got Mickey Forbes locked up and he’s not looking beyond him. Besides, he’s too busy mourning my wife.” He stared at Mia, then asked, “Do you think they were lovers?”
“Beck and Lisa? Are you crazy?” Well, duh. What a stupid question. “They were friends. He liked and respected her. And she adored you.”
Mia almost choked on her words. “She told me you were her dream man.”
“Yes, well. Of course I was.” He looked away from her face. “Don’t think killing her was easy for me. She was a very good mother to my children.”
“Is that all you can say about her? That she was a good mother to your children?”
“That was all she had to be. That was her function. She did it well. I was sorry to have to kill her, for their sakes. They’ll be very unhappy when they find out she’s dead.”
“They’ll be even more unhappy when they find out who killed her.”
“You talk too much, you know that?” He took a white cloth out of his pocket, then forced it into her mouth. “There. That’s better. Now you truly are the perfect woman.”
She cursed behind the gag and he laughed.
“Do you like the water, Mia? I hope so.” He ran a hand over her bare arm and her stomach roiled. “I have it all worked out. There’s a boat down at the marina all stocked and ready to go. We’ll be living and loving on the high seas, won’t that be romantic? We can sail to the ends of the earth together. I have it all planned.”
She struggled against the restraints and he laughed again.
“Eager to get started, are you?” He glanced at his watch. “It won’t be long now. As soon as it gets dark, my sweet. As soon as it gets dark…”
He started whistling a tune it took her a few minutes to place. The chorus from Pink Floyd’s “Southern Cross.”
Todd rose from the chair and stood over her.
“You really are quite beautiful, you know that?”
He ran his fingers through her hair and fanned it out around her head, and she cringed at his touch. He smiled, then lowered his head, and licked her stomach. She drew away from him, drew into herself, and in spite of the heat, she chilled to the bone.
This cannot be happening to me. This cannot be happening…
She thought of all the many victims she’d seen in the past, all of the rape victims and the murder victims whose stories she’d heard and then forgotten, as their stories were replaced by those of other victims. They’d been women just like her, just as vulnerable, just as frightened. Their lives just as important as hers, their loves as deep, their dreams just as real. And surely they all had been just as surprised as she was to find themselves a victim.
And soon, she’d be just as dead.
She thought of Colleen Preston’s sad good-bye to her parents, Holly Sheridan’s sobbing declaration of love, and wondered if she’d be given the chance to leave something for her father, her brothers.
There were so many people she loved, so many who loved her.
The thought occurred to her then that there were those who would go after Todd with a vengeance, who would not rest until he was utterly destroyed. Andy-her brother would go to the ends of the earth to find Todd. Connor-he knew people in every dark corner of the world. There’d be no place on the planet where Todd would be safe, no place Connor could not track him.
And Beck…? She wondered. Would Beck join in the hunt? And if so, would it be revenge or justice he’d be seeking?
It gave her some small measure of comfort-her one small bit of consolation-to know that, in the end, there would not be enough of Todd left to make a positive identification.
27
Beck was beat, hot, and angry by the time he got back to the station. There were circles under his eyes and an air of sadness about him.
“You hear from Duncan yet?” He asked Garland, who held up a hand in gesture to Beck to indicate he was on the phone.
“I’m sorry, but the department has no comment at this time,” Garland was telling the caller. “I will tell Chief Beck that, I certainly will. That won’t be necessary. I think he knows how to contact your station…”
Garland disconnected the call. “Unbelievable. I can’t understand how the word got out so fast.” He held up a handful of slips of paper. “Here. It isn’t that I don’t trust voice mail…”
“I’d rather have it written down anyway,” Beck told him as he scanned the messages.
“Chief, I can’t believe that Lisa…”
“Neither can I.” Beck started toward his office, then turned back and asked, “Where is everyone? Has Duncan turned up yet?”
“He called in a little while ago. He wanted to talk to you or to Agent Shields. She took the call. He said he was over at…”
The phone rang and he reached for it.
“Let it go. Duncan was where? We’ve been looking for him all day.” Beck walked back toward him.
“Duncan told her he was over at the old bank building on Locust and he wanted her to meet him there. She said he found something, she thought it might be the place where the killer kept his victims but the connection was bad so she wasn’t sure.” He shook his head. “Geez, Chief, I still can’t believe Mickey…”
“What time did she leave?”
“Oh, it couldn’t even be a half-hour yet.”
“Has she called in?”
“No.”
An uneasy feeling clawed at him. If Duncan had found something and Mia was with him, why hadn’t one of them called to let him know what they had?
“Get Susan, tell her to meet me there. And Hal. Get Hal over there.”
Beck went out the door and started across the parking lot. No car. He’d have to walk. With every step, his anxiety grew. Why hadn’t Mia called him?
Why hadn’t one of them called in?
He broke into a run. A few short blocks to the corner, one down Charles, a few more to the bank building. He was out of breath by the time he reached Locust Lane.