The Society

The effort to alert all of the managed-care CEOs in the state seemed akin to trying to stop an elephant with a pop gun, but at least they would have done what they could do. The best they could hope for was that the killer’s dramatic proclamation about the piper being on the loose and needing to be paid was his way of keeping the police off balance-one of the I’m Smarter Than You Are ego games that ultimately led to the capture or death of so many like him.

Now there was nothing more to do but sit down and analyze the tape that had been made of the killer’s call. Not surprisingly, Brasco had again managed to maneuver her out of the loop by suggesting that he and Court meet with the new profiler to pore over the recording. Patty was assigned to contact the cryptographer and, even though there were no new alphabet clues, to go over the letters they did have in light of the new information on the tape. She had a different idea, but it wasn’t one she wanted to discuss with her CO.

She wasn’t surprised when she called Will to find him at home and anxious for company. He was openly relieved to hear that, in her mind at least, any lingering doubt about his not being connected to the killings was gone. What she didn’t share with him, but grudgingly acknowledged to herself, was that for days she had been looking for the opportunity to see him again.

It was almost seven by the time she pulled into a parking space marked GUEST, not far from Will’s condo. On the drive over, she listened to Yo-Yo Ma’s contemplative score from Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon. Spurred on by the horrible events of Will’s week, she found herself trying to rank some of the worst things that had ever happened to her. Certainly, her mother’s illness and death headed the list, and there were some tragedies over the years that had befallen her friends. But most of the rest, dating back to middle school, it seemed, centered about bad choices she had made in men, including last year’s follies with Jerry Parkhurst, a wildly attractive and successful mergers-and-acquisitions attorney, who lived in a stunning waterfront apartment in Charlestown.

Parkhurst seemed like a potential keeper-a match for a lifetime-until after they had finally slept together following their fourth or fifth date, when he almost casually mentioned that in addition to his penthouse bachelor pad, he also had a sixteen-room mansion in Newton, where he lived “unhappily” with his wife and two children. That was a bad one, and would have been even more painful if she had actually fallen in love with him. But with images of the vivid imprint of her hand on the side of his face, and some tincture of time, the sleaze had become a relatively distant memory. In terms of pain, it was certainly nothing compared to what Will was going through now.

With Jerry Parkhurst strutting through her brain like Harold Hill in The Music Man, Patty rang Will’s bell.

“Be right down,” Will called from the window above.

Dressed in rumpled chinos, a light-blue button-down, white socks, and slightly worn Nikes, he looked every bit like a man who had lost his medical license, was facing criminal drug and manslaughter charges, and was being harassed by a serial killer.

“You okay?” she asked.

Will made no attempt to mask his discouragement.

“I can handle everything that’s happening to me,” he said, “but people aren’t being kind to my kids. That I can’t handle. Forgive me for saying it, but I really want to kill some of them.”

“I don’t think I’d do very well at dealing with that, either.”

Patty accepted the offer of a Diet Coke, set her tape recorder on the coffee table, and motioned that it was okay for Will to sit on the couch where they both could have access to the control buttons. The distance between them was the same as when he was on the recliner, but she knew there was something more to the sensation of having him sitting there. In her head, Jerry Parkhurst and Jack Court were engaged in some sort of heated discussion that she decided not to try to overhear.

“Let’s start by listening to the whole conversation with no interruptions,” she suggested. “Then we’ll play it again and again if necessary until we both feel we’ve squeezed every ounce of juice from it.”

It was the fifth time Patty had listened to the eerie exchange. While the gender of the caller was electronically obscured, the cadence and choice of words made her almost certain it was a man.

“Do you think he’s going to kill someone tonight?” Will asked as she clicked off the tape and rewound it for another pass.

“I’m hoping, praying, he’s just jerking our chain,” she replied. “Toying with us.”

“He doesn’t seem like the toying type to me.”

“Why do you say that?”

“I don’t know-maybe because this is a vendetta-anger but with a point to be made, and maybe a demand somewhere down the road. This person-these people if you believe all those references to we-is avenging the loss of someone they loved.”

“I see your point, but what about the letters? Aren’t they some sort of game?”

“I don’t know. Dramatic effect, maybe. Maybe the killer expected the press would glom on to the letter thing right away, and the publicity and speculation would go through the roof. People, the National Enquirer, Larry King-the works.”

“You think they’re going to spell the mother’s name?”

“That would be my first guess if it didn’t seem so obvious and didn’t point directly at the killer.”

“Well, I hope you’re wrong about him being totally serious, Will. Because if this guy kills again, he gets two for one.”

“Explain.”

“My CO has made it clear that unless we produce a break, and soon, the team on this case is going to be revamped. He neglected to say, ‘Starting with Moriarity,’ but he didn’t have to.”

“In that case, let’s listen to that tape again,” Will said. “The guy keeps saying ‘us.’ Let’s see if we can convince ourselves once and for all that there are more than one of them. Then maybe we can get a pen and some paper and see if we can come up with any other hints.”

“I really appreciate your help with this,” Patty said, “especially with all you’re going through yourself.”

“I need to get my mind off my own stuff.”

Without either of them orchestrating things, Patty slid a few inches closer, and Will gently lowered his arm down around her waist. She hesitated, then set her head on his shoulder. For a time, neither of them moved.

“Do you think we’re just making our bad situations worse?” she asked.

Will stroked her hair.

“Not from where I’m sitting,” he said.

CHAPTER 16

“Careful there, Jennifer. Handle that suction with care and never, ever forget, that’s brain you’re suckin’ on.”

“Yes, sir,” the med student said grimly.

To keep the nervous tremor in her hands at bay, she braced them against the patient’s skull.

Standing across the table in OR 4 of Boston’s prestigious White Memorial Hospital, Richard Leaf noted the protective maneuver and smiled beneath his mask. The kid, a Harvard senior, was bright and witty and had a better than decent body. Now he could see that she was resourceful, as well. The potential for something interesting was very much there. He could tell from the way she had been looking at him on morning rounds since she started her neurosurgical rotation. He had Tuesday free next week and his wife had a board meeting scheduled at some society foundation or other. Maybe something could be set up for then. Tonight, though, he had another fish to fry-a fish by the name of Kristin O’Neill. His mouth grew dry at the prospect.

“Be gentle, there, Jen. That’s it. That’s it. You’re doing great. We’re almost done.”

It had been a tricky piece of surgery, but the patient’s cancer, a low-grade malignant astrocytoma, was gone. In all likelihood it would be cured after a course of radiation and chemo.

The legend grows, Leaf was thinking. The legend grows.