Nick continued to shake for a few more seconds, more and more violently. His eyes closed and he squeezed his fists hard against his temples until, after a minute, the shaking subsided and his body went still. Marty walked over and sat next to him on the floor. He felt for his pulse. It was still high and erratic. ‘What just happened?’
The patient opened his eyes and stared at Marty. His stare was cold and intense. ‘He tries to stop me, Doctor. He tries all the time. I know what he wants. He wants me to leave the girls alone.’
‘What are you talking about, Nick? What girls?’
He turned his head sideways and his eyes rested on Marty’s. ‘They used to call it demonic possession, Doctor.’
Marty got up from the floor and moved back. ‘You seem all right now, Nick. Speak to me. You went into a fit. Are you okay? Is this how the DID comes on? Should I call emergency?’
He smiled. ‘ My name is Legion, for we are many. Isn’t that how the old book goes?’
‘Yeah, I’m sure it is. Listen, I’d like to be able to help you, Nick, but I’m not sure I can. You got to explain to me what just happened.’ Marty Fox was at his desk. He wanted to be close to the phone in case anything else erupted. He imagined living with this man, this poor broken specimen, torn apart by his own demons. He imagined what the man’s wife must be going through. He suddenly thought of his own wife and felt a pang of guilt.
‘Can I have another drink of water?’
Fox moved across to the water cooler. ‘Sure, sure. So what just happened? Can you go through it?’
Suddenly, Nick pulled his legs close together and rested his forehead on his knees. ‘I don’t know if I can tell you.’
Marty Fox handed him a glass of ice-cold mineral water. Nick sipped slowly and stared up at him.
‘Sure you can tell me, why not? Come on, Nick, that was some weird shit.’
‘I think I hurt people,’ he said.
Marty sat down, feeling the power of his patient’s gaze. ‘How do you know?’
‘I was trying to explain it to you in the last session. It’s not my fault, I can’t control it. I wake up sometimes and I find blood on my hands. I can’t say any more.’
‘I won’t tell anyone else, you know. Physician-patient privilege, Nick. I can’t tell anyone. We’ve got a confidentiality and liability clause.’ Marty was trying to figure out if Nick was just deluded or whether something serious had happened. It was difficult to tell.
‘I’m afraid, you know that? I’m afraid of what I’m going to do. I’m afraid of what I’ve done.’
‘What do you mean?’
‘That girl I told you about. You remember her?’
‘Yes, I do.’
There was an awkward silence. Nick started to push his cuticles back. ‘The girl in the dell,’ he said, ‘the one I loved, Chloe.’
‘Yes?’
‘Her name was Chloe Mestella. She was found dead.’
‘Dead?’
‘Yes. A week after I saw her in the dell.’
‘What was it? Automobile accident?’
‘No, Marty, she was cut to pieces in her own bed.’
Marty’s face went pale.
‘Someone got into her house after dark and raped her and killed her.’
Marty was trying to work out what was going on. His arm twitched. He put it on his desk to steady himself.
‘Her heart was missing. It was a gruesome thing to happen to a young girl.’
‘I don’t know the case-’
‘When someone dies, Doctor,’ Nick went on, putting his arms tight around his own waist, ‘you truly miss them. You truly miss them. It’s like nothing else, the way you miss them.’
‘It’s okay. You’re safe here,’ said Marty. The beeper on his desk went off and Nick looked up automatically.
‘I want to know if you can stop it,’ said Nick. ‘Is it possible?’
‘What?’
‘That I killed her? That I killed Chloe?’
‘No, Nick, that’s just the guilt. You feel responsible. It doesn’t mean you did it.’
‘I can’t take much more.’
‘I can’t stop the delusions, Nick, but maybe I can help to find their source. We have to find out what you’re feeling so guilty about.’
‘I think he’s after someone else,’ Nick said. ‘I want to stop him before he hurts her.’
‘Who is he? What’s he after?’
‘I don’t know. But on my phone there’re photographs. Lots of photographs. She’s blonde. I don’t know who she is.’ Nick pulled out his phone and pressed a couple of buttons. He held up a picture of a beautiful, rich-looking girl outside a shop.
‘It doesn’t mean anything,’ said Marty. ‘It’s just a photograph. ’
‘Why did he take it?’
‘I don’t know, Nick. I don’t know.’
Nick stood up. ‘I’ll tell you why. I’ll damn well tell you why. She looks like Chloe, that’s why. She’s looks the spitting image of Chloe.’
Chapter Forty-Four
Madison Avenue
November 23, 12.42 p.m.
Since 3 p.m. the previous day, Harper had been busting everyone’s gut trying to get the operation up and running. There were many upscale stores on Madison Avenue on the Upper East Side, but the victims had made purchases at only four of the stores. They were all big, fancy names — shops where a handbag would set you back near enough a thousand dollars.
Harper made contact with the department chief of the Technical Assistance Response Unit. They needed the best support for a covert operation of this size and TARU had the capabilities. It was a difficult set-up. First, they didn’t know who they were looking for, and second they didn’t know if the killer would show up. Pattern killers worked in heat cycles. The American Devil had killed five women in quick succession, but he might have been stalking them for weeks or even longer. No one knew his range or the duration of his stalking.
There were two composite images of the killer. Both agreed that he was in his thirties or early forties and had a good smile and grey hair. The killer might be disguised, but the one thing in their favour was that he was a man and not many men visited Prada, Versace, Christian Louboutin or Jimmy Choo.
Harper set up seven teams with three mobile units sited between the stores around Madison Avenue and Park Avenue. Each team consisted of a female undercover cop and a support officer. Harper put Mark Garcia in charge of the other stakeout. Garcia set up three teams around Arrivals at LaGuardia and headed the operation at the airport. TARU’s mobile trucks could beam any video images right back to HQ.
In the precinct, there was plenty of interest in spending time pretending to shop on Madison Avenue, but Harper didn’t want a bunch of low-salaried cops scaring the killer away, so he brought in some advisers. They worked with the cops on the kind of look they needed and the kind of attitude that would help them not to stand out.
Up in the main investigation room, at eleven o’clock the previous evening, Harper had stood looking at his teams. Seven cops looking severely out of place in designer outfits and heels. He was pleased. The advisers had done a great job. Kasper stood at the side and nodded his cynical approval.
The operation was ready to get going at 12.30 p.m., and Harper and Kasper drove to where a white van was parked in the heart of the Upper East Side. Inside, Ali Maakam, the technical supervisor, nodded a hello and showed
