all his energy and strength to suppress. He read the opening.
HARLEM KILLER DEAD KILLER OF TWO YOUNG WOMEN DROWNS AFTER POLICE CHASE
After an intense and dramatic chase, the serial kidnapper and murderer known as ‘Redtop’ was hunted down to a pig farm in upstate New York in the early hours of this morning.
Detective Tom Harper of the NYPD, working with the FBI, located the killer as he attempted to dispose of the body of recent victim Lucy James.
As the killer fled, Detective Harper chased him through dense woodland before cornering him and watching him jump to his death in a holding pond of slurry.
Sebastian’s heart was beating ten times per second. Sweat formed on his brow. He wanted to scream, to run, to kill. His body was caught in a crossfire of emotion — pain and anger in a cauldron of fire.
He wanted to cry. He never cried. He hadn’t known what grief felt like and now the unfamiliar feeling was drowning him. He reached out for the table to steady himself.
‘Is Sir all right?’ asked Henry.
‘Would Sir like a glass of water?’ asked Graham.
No. He didn’t want water. He wanted one thing only — to kill. Tom Harper had taken the only thing he loved in the world. Harper had killed his brother. His little brother Mo. His simple little brother who’d done nobody any real harm.
All Sebastian wanted was to kill. To kill Tom Harper.
No. Better than that. To give Tom Harper more pain than he had ever imagined.
PART FOUR
‘How much more grievous are the consequences of anger than the causes of it.’
Chapter Eighty-Four
Downtown Bar
December 2, 7.40 p.m.
Denise Levene was still unable to speak to anyone about her father’s death. Whenever she got to that point in a relationship when two people open each other up and peer inside, Denise Levene would freeze. Speaking about him made it seem too casual, too everyday — it put him in the same category as gossip. She wanted to feel it close and hard inside her, like pain. She’d dated in earnest throughout college, swinging from one guy to another like a girl on the monkey bars, always clever enough to leave before anyone was able to claim that she hurt them. She had hated emotional ties as much as she hated white shoes, fast food and television advertising. She liked things sincere. Then came Daniel. She could see why he was in politics. Gift of the gab. He’d convinced her to try something more substantial. She’d found that she liked it.
The tall guy with the salesman smile was already approaching her with a little swagger in his hips. Denise tried to avoid eye contact, but it wasn’t going to work with this guy. He thought she was cute, liked her business- like hairdo, her long legs — and the sniffy attitude just turned him on even more. He liked a challenge — chased skirt tasted so much better than skirt on a plate.
‘Hey, there, sweetheart, you look a little lost.’
‘Not at all. I’m waiting for someone.’
‘Well, I’ve got some directions here you might find helpful. ’ His large hand pressed flat on the bar and he leaned in close, his cologne suffocating her. ‘If you want to know where to go, just follow the arrow,’ he said and rolled his forefinger down his tie to the arrowhead at the end. Denise felt his arm curl around her shoulders. ‘I’m always happy to take you there, sweetheart.’
Denise pushed his arm away from her. ‘If I want to visit a sewer, I’ll call Environmental Protection.’
The man smiled, showing his bright white teeth. ‘Come on, baby, we can go the scenic route if you want, but I always like to go as the crow flies, if you know what I mean.’ His hand slipped round her waist.
‘Get your hands off me or you’ll regret it,’ said Denise, low and calm.
‘I can feel you’re warming towards me,’ he said, still holding her waist.
Tom Harper was at the door of the bar, looking for Denise. His eyes narrowed. The guy quickly let go of Denise’s waist. ‘Maybe later,’ he said, and walked away.
‘Was that guy giving you trouble, Denise?’ said Harper, approaching.
‘Nothing I can’t handle,’ she said.
‘I bet that’s true.’
‘Yeah, well, thanks anyway. I don’t have any scruples about a guy helping me out.’
‘Pleased to hear it. Now let’s get us both a beer.’
They sat close to each other at the bar, huddled over their drinks.
‘Any news yet?’
‘Not a thing. I’ve been working flat out, but we’ve found nothing to go on. It’s been a bad couple of days. Chasing shadows and dead ends. And he’s still out there somewhere. Don’t understand it, either. He’s gone quiet. No new kills, no communications. I don’t like it.’
‘You got your badge back,’ said Denise with a smile. ‘That’s good news, at least.’
‘Yeah,’ said Tom. ‘They had no choice. Either admit that some suspended cop had caught Redtop or put me back on the team. But it’s good to be officially back on Homicide. We got a lot of working out to do. A lot of good men got hurt.’
‘It sounded like a hell of a mess out there,’ Denise said.
‘Two FBI special agents were seriously injured. Asa Shelton and Isaac Spencer were burned pretty badly. Two guys from our team were hit bad. Garcia was dragged across the field after a pig caught on his webbing. Half his clothes burned into his skin. Mason’s face is a mess. Plenty of broken bones too.’
‘It’s lucky they’re alive,’ said Denise, her eyes caught on Harper’s all the way.
‘Yeah,’ said Tom. ‘They’ve all got families, you know. Me and Eddie don’t and we missed the stampede. Is that called irony?’
‘No,’ said Denise. ‘It’s called luck.’
Eddie Kasper had some minor burns from trying to help the others, but Mason was still in intensive care after the showdown at the hog farm. He wouldn’t ever be known for his looks again; the skin grafts wouldn’t disguise the fact that half his face had been burned away.
‘Do you know anything more yet?’ asked Denise. ‘Anything on who this guy Redtop is? Who was he?’
‘His name’s Maurice Macy. He jumped in the holding pond and it’s pretty difficult to drain. They only just got his body out, but they got his prints from Benny Marconi’s truck and he’s on file. He has history. And we found a link with Lottie. He was carrying Lucy James in a sheet. They found a match between fibres in Lottie’s hair and the sheet. Looks like Mo killed them both. Maybe he took more.’
‘Is there any link to Sebastian?’
‘This is where it gets interesting. Until two weeks ago, Mo Macy was being held in Manhattan Psychiatric Center. He’d taken girls before. Years ago. He never killed them, just kidnapped them and kept them captive, but he wasn’t sophisticated. They both escaped and went to the cops.’
