The Prey

“How dare you! It’s blood money. I will have no part in it!” She pushed her chair back and stormed past Michael, down the hall to her den.

The door slamming sounded final.

“Aw, shit.” Qui

“Why don’t you give her some time?” Michael said. Damn if he was going to let Qui

Qui

Michael blocked Qui

They stared at each other for a full minute, Michael firm in his resolve to refuse Qui

Qui

“She’s been doing that here,” Michael said.

“We’ve pulled out a few that merit further attention. Her insight and familiarity with these crimes is important.”

“I’ll bring her over.”

“Thanks,” Qui

Rowan listened to the front door shut, relieved that Qui

But in the real world, none of that was true. Sometimes victims received justice. Sometimes villains were punished. Sometimes good defeated evil.

But just as often, evil won.

She heard footsteps approach the door and stop. She didn’t want to talk to Michael. He meant well, but he couldn’t possibly understand. Fortunately, he continued on, his steps fading away on the tiled floor.

She released a breath she didn’t know she’d been holding and eyed the gun in her hand. All her pain could disappear now with one well-placed bullet.

She was a coward. She couldn’t take her own life. She only hoped the bastard came after her before anyone else died.

Assistant Director Roger Collins had taken the earliest flight to Portland to see the latest crime scene of the “Copycat Killer”-the name the media had attached to America’s newest serial killer. Three hours later he was heading east again, but not for Dulles.

“What’s the ETA to Logan?” he asked a passing flight attendant.

“We expect to land at 4:10 P.M. Eastern time.”

Taking out his wallet, he extracted a card from underneath his driver’s license. He stared at it for a long time before pulling out the phone from the back of the seat in front of him, typing in his credit card information, and dialing the number. He identified himself, then asked to speak to the director.

“Roger.”

Dr. Milton Christopher’s voice was deep and gravelly, and hadn’t changed in the twenty-some years Roger had known him.

“Milt, wish I were calling to chat.”

“What’s wrong?”

“I’m on a flight to Boston right now and need to see MacIntosh.”

There was a long pause. “There’s been no change.”

“I know, but I need to see him. It’ll be after visiting hours.”

“Does this have something to do with that serial killer on the West Coast?”

It was Roger’s turn to pause. “Could be.”

The doctor sighed. “I’ll be here.”

“Thanks.”

Roger hung up and looked out the window. He had one more call to make. He dialed the number.

“Shreveport Penitentiary.”

“I need to speak to the warden about an inmate.”

When Roger parked his rental sedan in front of Bellevue Hospital for the Criminally Insane, he’d just gotten off the phone with the Texas Prison Authority. He glanced in the rearview mirror and wasn’t surprised to see dark circles under his eyes. The gray hair Gracie always called “distinguished” today made him look older than his fifty-nine years.

Heads were going to roll for transferring that spawn of Satan without informing him. But after four and a half hours of calls, transfers, and threats, Roger had found out where he was and spoken to the warden of Beaumont, a high-security federal prison in Texas. Warden James Cullen had answers to all his questions and was overnighting a copy of all pertinent records.

Roger was getting out of the car at Bellevue when his cell rang. He almost didn’t answer it; it was well after six and he didn’t want Milt to wait much longer. But he glanced at the number anyway and immediately recognized it as Rowan’s.

His gut clenched, knowing if the truth ever came out she’d never forgive him. The fact that everything he did was to protect her wouldn’t help his case.

“Collins,” he answered.

“Did Qui

“Yes.” That was the reason he was in Boston, but he couldn’t tell her that.

“You have protection for Peter, right? If he knows about Dani, he might know about-”

“Peter’s safe, Rowan.”

“I’ll hire a guard if I have to. If money’s a problem, I have plenty.”

“It’s already done.”

“Thanks.” She paused, and Roger felt the urge to tell her everything.

He didn’t. “Anything else?”

“No, nothing.”

She sounded defeated. He wished he could be there for her, be the father she needed but had never had. Even when she’d lived with him and Gracie, he’d worked twelve, fourteen-hour days. Especially in the begi

“We’re going to catch this asshole.”

“I know.” She didn’t sound like she believed it. “Goodbye.”

“Wait-” But she’d already hung up.

He snapped the phone closed and hit the roof of his car with his fist. Damn, damn, damn!

“Anything I can do to help?”

Roger swung around. Milt Christopher had gotten the drop on him. He really was too tired to be effective. He shook his head. “Just show me MacIntosh.”

They walked in silence through the grounds. The wide, lush lawns were supposed to calm the insanity that lurked within the walls.

Milt used his security pass to open a door at the far end of the courtyard. Both he and Roger had to sign in with the guard, and then they proceeded down a wide, white hallway, through two more secure doors, until they reached the entrance to Robert MacIntosh’s room.

“Are you sure you don’t trust me on this?”

“I trust you, Milt, but I have to see him myself.”

Milt nodded, then unlocked the door with a key.

Robert MacIntosh sat in a chair facing a wide, barred window that looked out at the courtyard they had just walked through. It was nearly dark, but by the vacant look in his blue eyes, Roger didn’t think MacIntosh knew or cared. He pulled a chair in front of MacIntosh and stared at him, wanting to see something, anything other than the vacuous expression he remembered.

Roger didn’t believe most people were insane when they committed heinous crimes; by all public accounts Robert MacIntosh had been normal twenty-three years ago. What had caused him to break? What had severed the thin thread of sanity? Had he been insane when he killed his wife, or had her brutal murder emptied his mind to join his hollow soul?

It wasn’t fair. He’d wanted to prosecute this bastard more than any other murderer he’d faced in his thirty-five years with the FBI. And MacIntosh had not spoken one word since he was found, sitting next to the shredded body of his dead wife, her blood coating him and the kitchen where she died.

“You bastard,” he whispered.

Milt, the doctor, cleared his throat.

Roger searched Robert MacIntosh’s unseeing eyes, finding nothing human, nothing alive in their depths. Living on the public dole at the cost of more than a hundred thousand a year, this hollow shell of a man should have been shot on sight when the first police officer arrived at the Boston death house.