Kiss the Girls (Alex Cross #2)(72)

Wick Sachs seemed to be waiting for something or somebody. “Who the hell is he going to meet here in Chapel Hill?” I muttered.

“Will Rudolph,” Kate said without missing a beat. “His old school chum. His best friend.”

I’d thought about Rudolph coming back to North Carolina, actually. Twinning could be an almost physical addiction. In its negative form, it was based on codependency or enabling behavior. The two of them abducted beautiful women, and then tortured or killed them. Was that their shared secret? Or was there even more to it than that?

“He looks like Casanova would look without the mask,” Kate said. We had slipped inside a small cutesie-pie shop called School Kids. “He has the same color hair. But why wouldn’t he disguise his hair?” she muttered. “Why only a mask?”

“Maybe the mask isn’t a disguise at all? It might mean something different in his private fantasy world,” I suggested. “It’s possible that Casanova is his real persona. The mask, the whole human-sacrifice aura, the symbolism all of that would be very important for him.”

Sachs was still waiting in front of the community billboard. Waiting for what? I had a gut feeling that something wasn’t right with this picture. I sneaked a peek at him through the binoculars.

His face was unconcerned, almost serene. A day in the park for the vampire Lestat. I wondered if he might be high on some kind of drug. He certainly knew about sophisticated tranquilizers.

Behind him on the community board were all sorts of messages. I could read them with the binoculars.

Missing Carolyn Eileen Devito

Missing Robin Schwartz

Missing Susan Pyle

Women for Jim Hunt for Governor

Women for Lt. Governor Laurie Garnier

The Mind Sirens at the Cave

All of a sudden, I had a possible answer. Messages!

Casanova was sending out a cruel message for us for anyone who was watching him, anyone who dared to follow him.

I slammed my hand down hard against the dusty windowsill inside the small store.

“The son of a bitch is playing mind games!” I nearly shouted in the crowded shop where we were watching Wick Sachs. The elderly shopkeeper eyed me as if I were dangerous. I was dangerous.

“What’s wrong?” Kate was suddenly peering over my shoulder, leaning her body against me, trying to see whatever it was that I saw up the street.

“It’s the poster behind him. He’s been standing under it for the past ten minutes. That’s his message, Kate, to whoever’s following him. That bright orange-and-yellow poster says it all.”

I handed her the binoculars. One poster on the bulletin board was larger and more prominent than the others. Kate read it out loud.

“Women and children are starving… as you walk by with loose change in your pocket. Please change your behavior now! You can actually save lives.”





Chapter 83


O H, JESUS, Alex.” Kate spoke in a tense whisper. “If he can’t go out to the house, they’ll starve, and if he’s followed he won’t go out to the house. That’s what he’s telling us! Women are starving… change your behavior now.”

I wanted to take out Wick Sachs right there. I knew there was nothing we could do to him. Nothing legal, anyway. Nothing sane.

“Alex, look.” Kate sounded an alarm. She handed me the glasses.

A woman had come up to Sachs. I squinted through the binoculars. The noonday sun was bright off shiny glass-and-metal surfaces up and down Franklin Street.

The woman was slender and attractive, but she was older than the women who had been abducted. She had on a black silky blouse, tight black leather slacks, black shoes. She was carrying a briefcase loaded with books and papers.

“She doesn’t seem to fit his mold, his pattern,” I said to Kate. “She looks in her late thirties.”

“I know her. I know who she is, Alex,” Kate whispered.

I looked at her. “Who, for God’s sake, Kate?”

“She’s a professor in the English Department. Her name is Suzanne Wellsley. Some of the students call her ‘Runaround Sue.’ There’s a joke about Suzanne Wellsley throwing her underwear against the wall, and it sticks.”

“They could tell the same joke about Dr. Sachs,” I said. He had a nasty reputation as a rake on campus. He’d had the bad rep for years, but no disciplinary action was ever taken. More perfect crimes?

He and Ms. Suzanne Wellsley kissed in front of the “hunger” billboard. A tongue kiss, I could see as I watched through the binoculars. A very hot embrace, too, with no apparent concern about the public venue.

I had second thoughts about the “message.” Maybe it was just a coincidence, only I didn’t believe in coincidences anymore. Maybe Suzanne Wellsley was involved with the “house” that Sachs kept. There could be others, too. Maybe this whole thing involved some kind of adult sex cult. I knew they existed; even in our nation’s capital they existed and flourished.

The two of them walked casually a short way down crowded Franklin Street. In no apparent hurry. They were headed in our direction. Then they at the Varsity Theatre ticket booth. They were holding hands. Cute as could be.

“Damn him. He knows he’s being watched,” I said. “What is his game?”

“She’s looking this way. Maybe she knows, too. Hello, Suzanne. What the hell are you up to, dragon lady?”