Snakes and ladders

‘Novak?’ Striker said. He thought of the name for a brief moment, then brought out his iPhone. ‘I don’t know a whole lot of Czech names, but I do recognize Novak.’ He punched the name into the Google search engine, then nodded when he saw the result. ‘Big surprise. Smith is the most popular name in Canada, Novak is the most common name in the Czech Republic. Where did she emigrate from?’

‘Berlin,’ Felicia said.

‘Yet the receptionist back at Mapleview said Lexa was from Prague.’

‘And Lexa was none-too-happy about her knowing.’

Striker Googled Charles University, and got the number. He looked at his watch and saw it was slowly approaching noon in Vancouver. It would be around 8 p.m. there.

He called up the Information and Advisory section of Charles University and was relieved to find a person who was fluent in English. Less than ten minutes later, he got off the phone and gave Felicia a hard stare.

‘She went there all right, under the name Novak – and for eight years.’

‘Why so long? Did she change her programme?’

Striker offered a grave stare. ‘She didn’t go there for a nursing degree, she’s a friggin’ doctor. She minored in psychology.’

Felicia’s face took on a stu

‘But not all her courses are transferable,’ Striker pointed out.

‘So she finds a man who’s also a forensic psychiatrist.’

‘Erich Osterma

‘Where she’ll have access to all the patients she wants.’

‘Not patients,’ Striker said. ‘Victims.’

Felicia thought this over for a long moment, then shook her head. ‘There’s one small problem here. Why not just take the extra courses required to make her degree recognized over here? I mean, think of it, she put in eight years towards it. Why downgrade to nursing after all that?’

‘I can think of two reasons,’ Striker said. ‘One, it’s easier to hide in the background when the police come knocking – everyone thinks of the doctor, not the nurse.’

‘And two?’

‘Because she couldn’t. Lexa Novak was already on the run.’

Eighty-Five

It was a blur, really. A muddled white haze that slowly pushed away the darkness. And William was there, calling for him to Get up, Gabriel! Get up! You must get up! And then William was shaking him. Shaking him fiercely. Shaking him so hard his entire body shook like a child’s rag doll.

‘Get up, Gabriel.’

And the clouds slowly thi

‘Get up!’

Slowly lifted.

‘GABRIEL!’

And he could see blue sky once more.

The Adder lifted his head off the cold, hard earth and it felt like it weighed a million pounds. As he awoke, so did the pain – a cold sharp stabbing sensation. Like a trillion needles poking the skin all over his body, from his head to his feet.

But his legs, they were the worst.

Sharp, biting pain, and yet they were also numb. Strangely, achingly numb.

It made no sense.

With all the strength he could muster, the Adder sat up and looked at his legs. They were half submerged in the icy waters of the lake, and they were whiter than the ice.

‘Get up, Gabriel!’ he heard from behind him.

Whispers.

Desperate panicked whispers.

And he knew that it was Dalia. Somewhere behind him. Up above. Her bedroom window perhaps.

He was too weak to turn around and look.

‘Gabriel, you must get inside!’

Without thought, without real intention, the Adder tried to bend his knees. Tried to remove his legs from the icy cold waters of the lake. But his muscles refused to obey the commands of his mind. They were like dead chunks of flesh attached to his body. Useless pieces of meat.

He rolled over, on to his belly, and felt the cold sharpness of the rocks against his skin. To his left, less than an arm’s reach away, were his clothes. But he could not reach for them. His mind was slowly clearing now. Ever so slowly. And his rationale was coming back in blips.

The cabin . . .

The cabin was the only chance for survival.

And so inch by inch, arm pull by arm pull, the Adder dragged his body from the lake. Dragged himself up the gravelly beach. Across the frozen lawn. Even up the slippery wood of the porch steps. The back door was still wide open, and he wondered why.

A test from the Doctor? A goal?

Or one of her many taunts?

In the end, it did not matter. He pulled himself inside, his useless legs dragging behind him. When he reached the kitchen, he saw the Doctor.

She was seated at the table, a steaming cup in one hand, her newspaper in the other. She sipped her drink, placed the cup carefully back on the saucer, and then looked down to face him. ‘Welcome home, Gabriel,’ she said. ‘I trust you have learned yet another lesson today.’

He said nothing back. He could not. And after a moment, the Doctor stood and walked away. Out of the front door of the cabin.

As he lay there, waking, returning to life, the heat from the furnace vents blasted on his torso and legs. His skin went from that strange numbness to a cold piercing fire. He ground his teeth and wanted to scream. Wanted to wail with every ounce of strength his lungs had left.

But the Adder did not.

Instead, he lay there, his mind number than his body, and he thought of the only thing left in this world that brought him any true pleasure. The final doorway. The moment of release. The only exit from this world.

The Beautiful Escape.

It was coming once more, and this time for Jacob Striker. The thought almost made the Adder smile.

It was going to be a truly wonderful moment.

Eighty-Six

Striker wanted to run Lexa Osterma

They headed back for Homicide.

When they got there, Striker was surprised to find the office busy, and upon speaking to fellow detective Jana Aiken, learned that there’d been another gang shooting on the Granville Strip.

Nothing interesting.

He found his way to his cubicle and sat down. The computer was still ru

As far as Striker knew, Lexa had no criminal record, not that it mattered. The database listed everything from wanted criminals to missing children to stolen property. Striker was hoping Lexa would be there, in some form or another; how, he didn’t much care. All he wanted was a lead.

Instead of starting with Osterma

Lexa Novak.

For a date of birth, he typed in an age range of thirty-five to forty-eight.

The query came back within thirty seconds to a positive hit, low score, meaning that the details provided matched perfectly but the details provided were few and vague. There were over thirty hits.

Striker sorted through them all until he found one that matched:

Lexa Novak. Forty-six years of age

167 cm. 59 kgs. Caucasian

Hair: blonde. Eyes: blue. Build: medium