The Third Victim Part 71

She got the door open. She threw her coat over her arm with more force than necessary. And she realized for the first time that she wasn't looking out into the night. For all her bold words, her attention was focused behind her, in the room, on Quincy, who still stood quiet and motionless in the middle of the floor.

So help me G.o.d, I'm interested in you .. . and some part of you is interested, too.

Call me back, she thought suddenly, wildly. That's what I needed to hear; I just didn't know it at the time. So call me back. One more time. I can't do it on my own. I've spent too long keeping everything under control. And I'm tired and there was this man on my back deck last night, in black, and you don't know what that did to me.

The yellow-flowered fields. The smooth-flowing streams.

She was crying. She felt the tears trickle down her cheeks, and it shamed her. She hated tears. Her mother had told her years ago there was no use in crying, and she'd been right. Tears didn't change a thing. Oh G.o.d, they didn't change a thing.

The yellow-flowered fields. The smooth-flowing streams.

Call me back ... Quincy remained silent. And then she realized she wasn't in the doorway anymore. She stood alone in the parking lot. Her coat was on and the hotel room door was shut. Once more her

subconscious was working faster than she was.The night was thick and cold around her. She looked up and counted the stars until the tears dried on her cheeks.

The vast night in the vast world. She was probably one of the only people on the planet who was comforted by feeling small.

Call me back .. .

Rainie crawled into her patrol car. She realized there was c.r.a.p all over her window. Someone had glued newspaper over the driver's side and written: We'll show you justis, bich!

Rainie got out of the car. She used her keys to tear the love letter from her windshield. Night still silent. No movement from Quincy's room.

She drove home.

2,8 Sat.u.r.day, May 19, 1:44 a.m.

The dirt driveway leading up to Rainie's house twisted darkly through a river of night. She'd forgotten to turn on the outside lights again and with her glue-smeared windshield she couldn't see a d.a.m.n thing.

Maybe she'd take a wrong turn and die in a fiery car crash twenty yards from her front door. Or hit a tree and wind up paralyzed. She could be the next Ironside. Christ, she needed sleep.

Finally pulling up to her home, she retrieved a flashlight from the glove compartment and used it to trek around in the overgrown weeds until she found her hose. Her lawn needed to be mowed. The edges could use some quality time with a weed whacker. Her kitchen still didn't contain any food. Someday soon she was going to have to return to the more mundane matters of life.

Now she stood outside at two in the morning and rinsed sticky glue and old newspaper from her patrol car, until it gleamed faintly beneath the scrutiny of her flashlight.

Once she was done, the weariness. .h.i.t her hard. She returned the hose slowly. She let the loose coil fall against the earth. She dragged herself to her front steps.

In the last few days she'd let post-traumatic stress syndrome get the better of her. She'd realized this during the drive home. She'd gone too long with too many nightmares and not enough sleep. She'd stopped eating well and started turning toward Quincy as if he could magically

make it all go away. Big mistake. But what was done was done.Tonight she had bottomed out. Tomorrow she would get back on her feet. She'd been here before and she knew how these cycles worked.

She mounted the front steps and, after a bit of fumbling with her keys, got the door open. She was struck all at once by the cross breeze that hit her face. What the She snapped on the hall light, her hand reaching automatically for her sidearm as she searched for other signs of danger. Her gun hand came up empty. She'd locked the 9 mm and her backup piece, a .22, in the trunk of her patrol car. Nothing she could do about that now. She flipped the light back off and waited for her eyes to adjust to the gloom. Still no sounds out of place. Just the breeze upon her face. She finally pinpointed its source her sliding gla.s.s door was wide open. She could peer straight through to her back deck. Shep?

He'd turn on a light and sit in plain sight. He would know better than to risk getting himself shot as an intruder.

Dave Duncan.

Rainie slid along the wall until she came to the open s.p.a.ce of her kitchen and adjoining family room. Two bedrooms and a bathroom to her left, one big s.p.a.ce to her right. No sign of life.

And then her gaze fell on her sofa, and everything inside her plummeted.

It couldn't be. Definitely not. And just after that conversation with Quincy .. .

Who would know how to reach inside her deepest, darkest nightmare and rip out her heart?

She scrambled for the light. Sc.r.a.ped the plaster wall with her fingernails and still couldn't find the d.a.m.n little switch. Light, light, she had to see. Had to know. It couldn't be ... And then she had it. The single overhead light flooded the family room. Her old round kitchen table with the pedestal base. Her overstuffed chair. Her faded, comfy blue sofa. And the shotgun. Propped up against the back cushions of the sofa. Five long scratches still scarring the old wooden stock.

Time slipped backward. She couldn't stop it. She ran into the kitchen, fumbling with knives, but in her mind she was seventeen and had just come home from school.

Stop it stop it stop it. Couldn't be. The gun had gone to evidence storage in Portland. She knew. She'd looked into it. She'd consoled herself with the knowledge that she'd never have to see the d.a.m.n thing again.

She grabbed the first knife she came to, a small paring knife, and yelled wildly, "Come out, come out, you b.a.s.t.a.r.d!"

But no one answered. Even the owls were silent, while her mother was a headless corpse in the family room and, oh G.o.d, what was that on the ceiling? Oh G.o.d, what is this, dripping down on me?

"Who are you? Who the f.u.c.k are you? Come out where I can see you!"

She tore down the hallway to the two bedrooms. No one. She ripped open the bathroom door. Empty. She raced onto her deck, trying hard not to notice the shotgun but of course staring at it, while time grabbed her by the throat and dragged her down viciously.

Her mother screaming, "You liked it, didn't you? You no-good wh.o.r.e!"

Herself whimpering, "I just wanted him to stop." Shut up, shut up. She was not seventeen anymore. She was not helpless. She was a police officer. She was strong. She squared off against the towering pine trees, threw back her shoulders, and roared, "I know you're out there.

I know you're watching, Mr. Dave Duncan or whatever the f.u.c.k your name is! You want me? Face me like a man, you miserable piece of s.h.i.t!"

Her mother: "Liar. I should've known a daughter of mine wouldn't turn out any better."

"He raped me!"

"You're pregnant, aren't you? Well, don't look at me to help. I'm not paying for your mistakes."

"I just want him to stop.. .."

"Then rub his b.a.l.l.s, honey. That always works for me." He had to be

out there. She could feel him. The G.o.dd.a.m.nman from her deck, the big-mouthed stranger reviving old rumors in the bar. The stupid man in black who'd gone from manipulating mere schoolchildren to thinking he could mess with the likes of her.

Rainie ran inside. She grabbed the barrel of the shotgun with both hands, like it was a serpent ready to strike. But she was ready now.

Prepared. Back outside. She hefted the gun overhead. She lofted it against the black velvet sky.

"Is this your idea of a joke? You think you can rattle me! f.u.c.k you!

I'm on to you, you son of a b.i.t.c.h. I'm on to you, so f.u.c.k you!"

She heaved the shotgun into the air. She watched it whip around and around. Heard it smack hard against a tree trunk. Her breathing was labored. She could hear faint ringing in her ears. Nothing good ever happened when she heard that ringing in her ears.

A moment pa.s.sed. Then another moment. No sound in the trees, though she knew he had to be there. He'd driven a troubled little boy to murder, and now apparently he was looking for a new source of fun. What was it Quincy had said? The UNSUB would try to manipulate law enforcement for sport. He prided himself on clever acts.

Rainie would show him. h.e.l.l, she'd just thrown a shotgun at him and now stood with only her fists and her rage for protection. Oh, and a small paring knife.

She started to laugh. She didn't know how it happened. She was standing with her legs apart and her hands balled into fists, ready for a fight, and then she was laughing and thinking of what her mother had yelled at her fourteen years ago.