“They didn’t follow any evidence,” he says. “They just asked me if I knew those women. They asked me twelve different ways, but in the end, that’s all they asked me. They were fishing. They didn’t have anything on me. Why would they pluck me out of the blue and bring me in? There’s only one reason. That reason is you, Jason. You told them about me.”
“We’re going in circles, James. Should I assume you no longer want to retain my services?”
“Do you think I killed those women, Jason? Do you think I’m a. . psychopath?”
Sociopath, actually, but why split hairs?
“Do you?” A taunt to his voice, a dare. “Do you think I like to cut women up with a knife? Do you think I like to torture them? Watch them suffer? Listen to them beg for their lives, smell their blood as the life drains from their eyes? Do you?”
The shadows framing my vision seem to darken and thicken, narrowing my sight line. My hand begins to itch. I’m not going to give this asshole the satisfaction of thinking he’s getting inside my head-which, of course, is the first step in letting him do that very thing.
Silence, save for his labored breathing. Alexa is pretending not to listen, picking up clothes off the floor, but keeping one ear to my conversation.
“Because if that’s what you think about me, Jason, I have one more question for you.”
“I’m all ears.”
“Am I really someone you want to piss off?”
I bounce off the bed, adrenaline surging through me. I may not be a hundred percent these days, but there are still a few things that can light my fire.
“You know where I work, James. Stop by anytime. I’ll even give you my home address if you like.”
“Oh, I already have it, Jason, but thanks. It’s a nice town house, by the way.”
“Are you threatening me, James? Because that’s a bad idea.”
He clucks his tongue, tsk-tsk-ing me, scolding me.
“Relax, my friend,” he says. “I didn’t kill anybody and I’m not going to kill anybody. You believe me, don’t you, Jason?”
“Whether you did or not,” I respond, “you better watch yourself now. You’re now officially on the cops’ radar.”
“Boyyy, it sure didn’t seem that way,” he hums. “I have to tell you, by the end of the interview, they sure seemed like they felt this was a waste of their time. They even apologized to me for the trouble. No, I think I’ve been crossed off their list.”
“Oh, go ahead and believe that, James. You think the cops are going to tell you what they really think? They lie to suspects all the time. As easily as taking a breath.”
“Oh, now you tell me.”
I don’t know what that means, but I do know this: He’s probably right. If James Drinker has no obvious connection to these women, which apparently is the case, then my anonymous note will go into the loony-tune bin at Area Three headquarters. Now that a serial killer has been acknowledged, and even branded with a catchy name like the North Side Slasher, the crazies will be out in full force. The tip hotline is probably overflowing with calls identifying the real killer as Osama bin Laden, Donald Trump, Martha Stewart, or one of the Kardashian sisters, the one without talent.
So my note was enough to send some junior detectives over to Drinker’s apartment, enough to haul him to headquarters for a brief inquiry, but then quickly dismissed as yet another frivolous tip.
Which means James Drinker is probably as free and clear as he says.
“I’m done with you,” I say, trying to regain the upper hand.
He laughs. Now he’s the one enjoying this call. Needless to say, this conversation did not go the way I planned.
“I decide when you’re done,” he says, and then the line goes dead.
35
Jason
Friday, June 28
I’m groggy and moody on Friday morning. I slept alone last night, after spending the last six nights with Alexa. It was her idea that we take a break-“We wouldn’t want to see each other seven whole days in a row, now would we? I mean, that’s practically marriage!”-and I didn’t disagree. That’s become a pattern with her, making a serious point-giving me space, not rushing things-but delivering it with feather-soft sarcasm.
I couldn’t sleep, the remnants of the conversation with James Drinker in my head, texting Lightner at all hours to confirm with his surveillance team that Drinker was still in his apartment. This guy has officially invaded my brain. I don’t have a lot of options or recourse, but I have to figure out something. The problem is that my brain isn’t working at one hundred percent speed lately. The world is moving in slow motion these days, my legs heavy, white noise drowning out the cries around me.
I stop for Starbucks and make it into the office just past nine. Not bad for me, on a non-court day like this one.
“So how was your big night alone?” Alexa asks me when she calls me at the office, ten minutes after I hit my chair. “Did you go to strip clubs and eat steak burritos?”
That sounds a lot more fun than what I did. I stayed home by myself, reading some case law for a motion to suppress I’m filing next week, then giving up and watching half of season two of Arrested Development on DVD, popping Altoids every two hours along the way.
“Is that what you think guys do when women aren’t around?” I ask.
“Yes, it is. What do they really do?”
“Masturbate, eat pizza, and watch sports.”
“All at the same time?”
“Sometimes,” I say. “God didn’t give us two hands for nothing.”
“Did you masturbate last night?”
“That’s a very personal question, Ms. Himmel.”
“Did you?”
“Are you kidding me? After a week with you, I’m sore as hell, woman. I had an ice pack down my pants all night.”
She laughs hard at that comment, but I’m not kidding about the soreness. I’ve never met someone with this much energy in bed. This old-fashioned girl is going to break me in half.
“By the way, since we’re being personal,” I say, “I’m out of protection.”
“Condoms?” There is tapping in the background. Putting a transcript into final form, I assume. I don’t really understand what court reporters do. I should probably ask her.
“Yeah. I’m out. Remind me to buy some more.”
“I told you, I’m covered,” she says. “I have birth control.”
“You sure?”
“Either that or I’m planning on trapping you into marriage by getting pregnant.”
I give a good and awkward laugh, heh-heh-heh.
“Take a breath, for God’s sake,” she says. “I’m covered. You’re not going to get me pregnant. But if it will make you feel better, by all means go buy some-oh-oh, no-oh, Jason-”
“What? What’s wrong?”
“Oh, no.”
“What?”
And then, somehow, I realize it before she says it. She isn’t working on a transcript. She’s tapping her computer. She’s on the Internet.
“Don’t tell me,” I say, waking up my laptop and heading to the Herald website.
“Oh, Jason.”
And there it is, the garish headline:
NORTH SIDE SLASHER CLAIMS FIFTH VICTIM
A fifth woman, Samantha Drury, age twenty-five, was stabbed in her car as she was arriving home on the city’s northwest side last night. Ambushed inside her garage, stabbed multiple times.
“Oh, baby, I’m so sorry,” Alexa says.
The bitter venom rushes to my throat. I grab my garbage can just in time as I retch liquids, my stomach in revolt. I take a couple of panting breaths and wait for my pulse to settle. This guy is just having fun now. Toying with me. Killing women as part of a game with me.
“What. . what are you going to do?” Alexa asks.
Dim the lights, mute the sound: A calm sweeps over me, sudden and vivid, like I’d lost my breath but recovered it. Calm, not because I’m feeling peaceful or serene, but because finally I’m making a decision that, in the back of my mind, I always knew I might have to make.