And if the police had emptied every fucking item from the cupboards and the medicine cabinet, how could they miss this picture? Or had Phillip returned, and left it for her to find? To taunt her!
She moved slowly across the living room, thinking, If I scream, those cops will come.
But her scream might summon the intruder, only... she was the intruder. She was in his home. And on his turf. Where her cry for help might send him not scurrying away but toward her, and she might be dead, and he might be gone, before help could come.
She crept forward as she had coming down the stairs, taking a step, listening, taking a step, listening, taking a step, listening.
And when she reached the open space leading from living room to hall, she moved fast and low, in a crouch, knife poised to defend or attack as need be, the flashlight slashing the darkness...
...and revealing nothing but an empty hall and a similarly empty stairway nearby.
On her way back to the kitchen, she found the door to the basement, but by now she was rattled enough to think, Fuck that shit, and she just got the hell out of there. She wanted this bastard, but she was not going down into the dark, dank basement of the madman’s house looking for him.
As she rode on the Vespa back to her apartment, the framed photo in one pocket of her jeans, the switchblade in the other, she argued with herself, logic and emotion rolling around inside her like a couple of sumo wrestlers, each too strong to do the other any damage.
Should she call the cops and tell them about the photo? If she did, she would be abdicating her role as avenger, and admitting that the police were better qualified and more likely to find and stop this bastard, and soon. Being alone in that psychopath’s house, skirting the black, dried blood that had been inside Mark, had scared the shit out of her.
But today she had promised Mark, as she had promised herself long ago, that she would kill this evil creature, and she still wanted that, very much. She also wanted to stay alive and to start over with Mark. Yet just as much she wanted to see Phillip Traynor, or whoever the fuck he really was, stopped, and stop him herself. Finally, though, she had a responsibility, to other potential victims out there, to put aside her thirst for revenge, and make do with justice.
When she rolled past the police car parked in front of her apartment house — these two were at least awake, and one noticed her and gave her a tip-of-the-cap salute — she considered stopping to talk to them. Giving them the framed photo she’d found. That she gave this consideration represented the considerable journey she’d taken from Phillip’s house to her place — when she’d left, she’d not even considered dealing with this with the two cops on watch outside there.
Inside her apartment, she tossed the framed photo with a clunk onto the black-topped table. She got out of her sweatshirt and jeans and panties, tossing them near the mattress, and went in the bathroom and took a shower, a long warm one, soaping every square inch of her body and trying to let the steamy warmth relieve the tenseness of her muscles. She didn’t think about anything except how good it felt, but when she toweled off, her warring thoughts kicked back in, and then, finally, she knew what she needed to do.
She slipped into some gray sweats and got her cell from her wadded jeans. She sat on the edge of the floor-bound mattress, her knees high. Captain Kelley had given her his cell number and she called it.
She asked, “Anything new on Mark’s condition?”
“Nothing’s changed. Early yet.”
She told him about going to Phillip’s and of the photo she’d found.
“You got any idea,” he said, his voice cold, “how stupid that was, going over there, entering a crime scene like that, this asshole on the loose?”
“Pretty stupid, I guess. Goddamn stupid?”
“Goddamn stupid is right. How the hell did you get in?”
“The back door was open.”
“...No, they locked up. There’s no way in hell they didn’t lock up.”
Her voice was as calm as a grade school teacher telling her class it was time for recess. “Okay. So Phillip’s still around. He went in, left that photo for me to find, and left the door unlocked to make sure I could find it.”
“Why did he want you to find it?”
“He’s fucking with me. What do you think? Captain, he’s fucking with all of us.”
“I want that photo.”
“You can have it.”
“I’ll have one of the officers keeping watch come gather it. I’m going to circulate it immediately and see who recognizes him.”
“You’ll come up with several names, and one of them will be Bradley Slavens.”
There was a nod in his voice. “The gymnastics coach who dropped off the grid. Man, Mark really did crack this thing.”
“He did. Do me one favor?”
“Yeah?”
“Tell him you’re proud of him, when he wakes up.”
She ended the call.
She was opening the refrigerator to get herself a can of apple juice when the buzzer downstairs sounded. She returned the buzz, then went to the door, and had a sudden thought — who the hell had she just buzzed in?
This was no time to let her guard down, but when her doorbell rang, she looked out the peephole and saw the cap of a uniformed officer. She opened the door, just as her father had once opened the door for a cop, and Phillip Traynor looked up at her from under the black bill of the blue cap and his lipless smile was at its hideous worst.
He shoved her back, and she almost lost her balance as he slammed the door behind him. Then, in that way of his that inserted ragged breaths here and there, he asked, “Do you like my picture? I left it there for you.”
He tossed the cap away. He wore a police uniform, though its blouse had a splotchy look, like a garment that had been hastily cleaned in a restaurant restroom after food had been spilled.
He saw her frowning, trying to put it together, and said, “I appropriated this from one of the officers in front of my house. They were already disposed of when you arrived, which you’d have noticed had you taken a closer look... but of course I knew you wouldn’t. The officers out front, here? Those gentlemen I just took care of.”
“You’re a monster.”
“I perform monstrous deeds at times, but I have a good heart. I think you sensed that, didn’t you? In Phillip? You and Phillip hit it off well, I thought.”
“What’s your real name?”
“I’m known by many names. I am one of God’s avenging angels.”
“You’re fucking nuts is what you are.”
She backed off farther, as he made himself at home, strolling around, taking the place in. That he was dressed as a cop made it seem like he was looking for evidence.
“Simple, unpretentious,” he said. “I like that. God’s servants don’t require worldly things... You drew my picture!” He had paused at the refrigerator. “I knew you cared. I knew beneath the hurt and rage... that you cared.”
“I care.”
He gestured toward the pencil portrait, his smile a terrible rip in the ravaged face. “I was handsome, wasn’t I? As handsome as you are beautiful. But you know what they say about beauty.”
She took a quick step toward him, planted and pivoted, left leg coming around to deliver a solid blow, but Phillip was ready. He grabbed her by the ankle and knee and flipped her to the floor, hard, on her stomach, a belly flop without a swimming pool. She rolled, then swung her leg around and took his feet out from under him, and now he hit hard, on his back. She landed with an elbow in his stomach that sent air whooshing from him, his face contorting as best as its tight skin would allow.