What about the older brother, who still lived in North Carolina?
Did he think of me as a younger brother? Did Kyle see Blake in me? He was competing with me, and he'd tried to control me from the start. The women in my life might have represented a threat to him, an extreme variant of sibling rivalry. Was that why he had killed Betsey Cavalierre? What about Maureen Cooke in New Orleans? And Jamilla?
I made a note to carefully think and plot out one particular angle, a dysfunctional family triangle with both Kyle and me in it.
So far, anyway.
If he went after his parents or his brother we would have him. They were being closely protected in Charlotte. The FBI was all over them.
That seemed to be the key to Kyle's fantasy life, at least as I understood it so far. He wouldn't make the obvious move. He would go at least one move, maybe two, beyond that. But how did he stay a step ahead — especially now? A very bad thought had been running through my head lately. Maybe there was someone else in the FBI helping him — maybe Kyle had a partner.
I had finally drifted off to sleep when the phone in my bedroom woke me. It was three in the morning.
I picked it up, clicked it off, then unplugged the phone from the wall.
I was setting the rules now. This was my game, not his.
Chapter 107
In the morning, I drank too much black coffee and thought about our last case together: Daniel and Charles, Peter Westin, the Alexander brothers. What did it mean in Kyle's fantasy? The macabre story he was plotting out involved both of us. He had asked me into the investigation, then used it to control me. Was that where it ended for him, and me?
I kept trying to piece together the
Around noon, I called Kyle's older brother, Martin, a radiologist living outside Charlotte — where we had once believed that Daniel and Charles had begun their murder spree. Did Kyle have a previous connection with them? Was that a possibility too?
Martin Craig tried to help, but he finally admitted that he and his brother hadn't spoken during the past ten years. 'We saw each other at my brother Blake's funeral,' Martin said. 'That was the last time. I don't like my brother, Detective Cross. He doesn't like me. I don't know if he likes anybody.'
'Was your father especially rough on Kyle?' I asked Martin.
'Kyle always said so, but to tell the truth, I never saw much of it. Neither did my mother. Kyle liked to make up stories. He was always the big hero or the pathetic victim in them. My mother used to say that Kyle had an ego only second to God's.'
'What did you think about that? Your mother's assessment of your brother?'
'Detective Cross, my brother didn't believe in God, and he wasn't second to anyone.'
The continuing theme throughout the three brothers' relationship had been competition, and Kyle had always believed that Martin and Blake won in the eyes of his parents. Kyle had been a starter on the high school basketball team, but Martin had been the clever all-county point guard who also played bass guitar in a local band and had an enviable social life. There had once been a feature story in the local paper about the basketball-playing brothers, but most of the article dealt with Blake and Martin. They had all attended Duke undergraduate, but Martin and Blake went on to medical school. Kyle became a lawyer, a career choice his father deplored. Kyle had talked to me about sibling rivalry, and maybe I was beginning to understand a little of the origins of his fantasy world.
'Martin,' I finally asked, 'is it possible that Kyle murdered your younger brother Blake?'
'Blake died in a hunting accident — supposedly,' Martin Craig said. 'Detective Cross, my brother Blake was an incredibly responsible and careful man,
Chapter 108
I had one decent idea about what to do next, something proactive that might bother Kyle. I contacted the FBI and discussed it with Director Burns. He liked it too.
At four o'clock that afternoon, a press conference was called in the lobby of the FBI building. Director Burns was there to speak briefly and then to introduce me. Burns stated in no uncertain terms that I would be involved in the manhunt until Kyle Craig was brought to justice, and that Kyle would definitely be caught.
I was wearing a black leather car coat and I buttoned it up as I stepped to the mikes. I was playing this for all it was worth. I wanted to look self-important. I wanted to look like the star. Not Kyle. This was my manhunt. Not his. He was the prey.
There was the usual mechanical buzz and hum of cameras, the incessant flashes, and all those inquiring minds of the press, those mostly cynical eyes staring up at me, waiting for answers that I couldn't give them now. It set my nerves on edge.
My voice was as grave and important sounding as I could make it. 'My name is Alex Cross. I'm a homicide detective in D.C. I've worked closely with Special Agent in Charge Kyle Craig over the past five years. I know him extremely well.' I went into some detail on our past together. I tried to sound like a pompous know-it-all. The doctor-detective.
'Kyle has been helpful in solving a few murders. He was a competent number two, excellent support for me. He was an overachiever type but a tireless worker.
'We will capture him soon, but Kyle, if you can hear me, wherever you are, I urge you to listen closely. Give yourself up. I can help you. I've always been able to help. Give yourself up to me. It's the only chance you have.'
I paused and stared into the TV cameras, then I slowly stepped back from the microphones. The camera flashes were everywhere. They were treating me like the star now. Just as I had hoped they would.
