For several seconds all Gurney heard was the sound of his questioner’s breathing-followed by a question so softly uttered it was barely louder than the breathing itself. “What other thoughts do you have?”
“My only thought right now is, are you going to shoot me?”
“Of course. But the more truth you tell me, the longer you live. Simple. You understand?”
“Yes.”
“Good. Now tell me all your thoughts about the killings. Your true thoughts.”
“My thoughts are mostly questions.”
“What questions?”
Gurney wondered if the hoarse whisper was a vocal impairment or a way of concealing the Good Shepherd’s real voice. He suspected the latter. The implications of that were interesting, but he had to focus now on the immediate need to stay alive.
“I wonder how many other people you’ve killed, besides the ones we know about. Possibly quite a few. Am I right about that?”
“Of course.”
Gurney was startled by the frankness of the answer and felt a fleeting moment of hope that the man could be engaged in a kind of dialogue-that his pride might drive him to boast of things he’d done. After all, sociopaths did have egos and enjoyed living in the echo chamber of their own narratives of power and ruthlessness. Perhaps he could get the man talking about himself, and thus stretch the window of opportunity for outside intervention.
But then the coin of hope flipped to its opposite side, and Gurney saw the clear implication of the man’s willingness to speak: It carried no risk, because Gurney would soon be dead.
The whisper became a parody of gentleness. “What else do you wonder about?”
“I wonder about Robby Meese and your relationship with him. I wonder how much he did on his own and how much you encouraged him to do. I wonder why you killed him when you did. I wonder if you thought his so-called suicide would be believed.”
“What else?”
“I wonder if you were really trying to put Max Clinter in the frame for Ruth Blum’s murder or if you were just playing a silly game.”
“What else?”
“I wonder if you thought your message on Ruth’s Facebook page would be believed.”
“What else?”
“I wonder about my barn.” Gurney was trying to string out the interchange as long as he could, with as many pauses as he could insert. The longer it lasted, the better-in every way.
“Keep talking, Detective.”
“I wonder about the GPS locators on the cars. I wonder if the one on Kim’s car was your idea or Robby’s. Robby the stalker.”
“What else?”
“Some of the things you’ve done are very clever, and some are very stupid. I wonder if you know which is which.”
“Provocation is pointless, Detective. Have you come to the end of your thoughts?”
“I wonder about the White Mountain Strangler. Such an odd case. Are you familiar with it? It has certain interesting features.”
There was a long silence. Time equaled hope. Time gave Gurney the space to think, perhaps even a chance to get to his gun on the table behind him.
When the Shepherd spoke again, the purr was syrupy. “Any final thoughts?”
“Just one more. How could someone so smart make such a colossal mistake at Lakeside Collision?”
There was a long silence. An alarming silence that could mean anything. Perhaps the Good Shepherd had finally been jarred off balance. Or perhaps his finger was tightening on the trigger. A tremor ran through Gurney’s stomach.
“What are you talking about?”
“You’ll find out soon enough.”
“I want to know now.” There was a new intensity in the whisper, along with the glint of something moving in the shaft of moonlight.
Gurney caught his first glimpse of the barrel of a huge silver-plated pistol, no more than six feet away.
“Now,” the man repeated. “Tell me about Lakeside Collision.”
“You left some identification there.”
“I don’t carry identification.”
“That night you did.”
“Tell me exactly what it was. Tell me right now.”
The way Gurney saw the situation, there was no good answer, no answer likely to save him. There was certainly no way that revealing the tire-track discovery would result in a reprieve. And begging for his life would be worse than useless. There was only one option that offered him even a glimmer of staying alive for as much as another minute: stonewalling, refusing to divulge anything more.
Gurney tried to keep his voice from shaking as he spoke. “You left the solution to the puzzle in the parking lot of Lakeside Collision.”
“I don’t like riddles. You have three seconds to answer my question.”
“One.” He raised his pistol slowly toward Gurney’s face.
“Two.” The barrel glinted in the shaft of moonlight.
“Three.” He pulled the trigger.
Chapter 50
Gurney’s reflexive jerk away from the flash and the deafening blast would have sent his chair toppling over backward if it weren’t for the edge of the table. For a minute he couldn’t see anything, and all he could hear was the harsh, ringing echo of the gunshot.
He felt some wetness on the left side of his neck, a slight trickle. He put his hand to the side of his face, felt more wetness on his earlobe. As he moved his fingers higher, he discovered a searing, stinging spot at the very top of the ear-the source of the blood.
“Put your hands back on top of your head. Now.” The whispery voice seemed far away, lost in the reverberation in his ears.
But he did his best to comply.
“You hear me, yes?” said the distant, muffled voice.
“Yes,” said Gurney.
“Good. Listen carefully. I will ask you my question again. You must answer it. I am a good judge of what is true and what is not. If I hear truth, we go on, harmlessly. Just a nice conversation, you know? But if I hear a lie, I pull the trigger again. Clear?”
“Yes.”
“Each time I hear a lie, you lose something. Next time not just a little nick from your ear. You lose more important things. You understand?”
“I understand.” Gurney’s eyesight was starting to recover from the muzzle flash, and he could again make out a dim swath of moonlight across the middle of the room.
“Good. I want to know everything about this so-called mistake at Lakeside Collision. No riddles. Pure truth.” In the moonlight the silver-plated pistol barrel gradually descended until it was aligned with Gurney’s right ankle.
He gritted his teeth to keep from trembling at the thought of what a Desert Eagle slug would do to that joint. The immediate loss of his foot would be bad enough. But the arterial bleeding would be the real problem. And telling the truth or not, in response to this or any subsequent question, was not the lever that would control the
