“Of course you did; it’s the obvious question.”
“So is my reply. No offense, Dr. Moore, but you don’t know the right questions.”
“So what are they?”
“The questions I’d ask.”
“Such as?”
“Will I ever again look forward to getting out of bed when I wake up? Am I ever going to be able to develop a loving relationship with a man? Will I ever have to live on the streets because my parents’ money and my insurance have run out? Will any of these shitty medicinal cocktails you dream up actually cure me? Is it possible I’m imagining being stalked by the same man?”
“What was that last one again?”
Linda smiled, pleased to have piqued Dr. Moore’s interest.
“He’s average height, built like a young Frank Sinatra, wears a baseball cap sometimes, like he thinks it’s some kinda disguise. But I see him. I know him. I recognize him. You think he’s a hallucination, but he’s not.”
“Frank Sinatra… I would have thought you’d say Mick Jagger, or somebody more to the musical tastes of people your age.”
“Okay, Mick Jagger. Even though he’s older than both of us.”
“This man who’s following-”
“Stalking.”
“What’s the difference?”
“Where he appears, how he moves, how he looks at me. Have you ever gone to the zoo and tried to outstare one of the big cats?”
“Believe it or not, yes,” Dr. Moore said. “A long time ago. A panther. I found it impossible.”
“Because if the bars hadn’t been there, the panther would have consumed you. Both of you knew that. And now one is stalking me. There are no bars.”
Dr. Moore felt a chill of fear, and pity, for what Linda must be going through. “Where do you see this man, Linda?”
“The street, subway, park, my apartment…”
“ Inside your apartment?”
“Once, for just an instant, when he was leaving out through the kitchen window. There’s a fire escape out there.” Linda opened her eyes all the way to match stares with Grace. Like the panther, Grace thought. “He wasn’t a hallucination.”
“Was the kitchen window closed and locked?”
“Of course.”
“Okay. How could he get in?”
“Key. I leave my spare key under my doormat out in the hall.”
“That’s the first place anyone would look, Linda.”
“Right. And when I get home I always look to make sure the key’s still there. If it is, that means nobody’s used it to get inside. Then I’m not afraid to go in.”
Grace wasn’t going to cross swords over that one. “Was the key under the mat the day you saw the man in your apartment?”
“Of course not. So I used my key and went in. I was going to see him, talk to him, make sure he was real. But he was already halfway out the window.”
Something with countless legs crawled up Grace Moore’s spine. “Did he say anything before he left?”
“No. He was more interested in getting out of there. He left the key, though. I found it on the corner of the kitchen table. I put it back under the mat.” Linda laced her fingers behind her head and regarded the doctor. “Now you’re wondering, was there really a man? Might he even have followed Linda here? Or is this simply more of Linda’s usual paranoiac bullshit?”
Grace smiled. “Of course you’re right.”
“I get so tired of not being believed.”
“I didn’t say I disbelieved you.”
“Word games. I bet you’re good at Scrabble.”
“I’m unbeatable,” Grace said.
“Well, you’ve never played anyone crazy.”
“But I have. Maybe someday you and I can-”
“No. You probably know too many seven-letter words.”
“You know you do sometimes hallucinate. And you don’t always take your meds as prescribed. It’s easy to forget. And you do hear voices. So what makes you think-”
“If he hadn’t been real, don’t you think I would have given him a voice?”
Grace was a bit startled by that observation, because it was a reasonable question. “Let’s make him this real,” she said. “I think you should find a better place for your spare key.”
“Then I wouldn’t know if it was dangerous to go inside the apartment. I’d no longer have my key-nary in the mine shaft, if you know what I mean.”
“I do. And it’s good you still have your sense of humor.”
“If I didn’t have that I’d go cra-hey, wait a minute!”
Grace had to laugh. Linda was, in her own way, often the brightest person in the room.
“The son of a bitch is real,” Linda said. “Believe it.”
Dr. Moore knew better.
56
I t was cool and dim in the lounge off the Lumineux Hotel’s lobby. The lounge featured lots of black leather, tinted glass, and brushed aluminum. A few business types sat here and there, talking deals, making excuses, their drinks before them like ceremonial potions on square white coasters. Futures could be made or lost here in ways profound but barely noticeable.
The killer sat at the bar and periodically checked his watch. Linda Brooks hadn’t suspected he was following her. At first he’d thought she might enter the hotel, which could have provided some interesting aspects. Each quarry was, after all, an adventure.
Instead, she’d walked past the hotel and entered the Cartling Towers, a glass and steel monstrosity adjacent to the Lumineux. He’d managed to squeeze into the crowded elevator she’d ridden to a high floor, and exited after she did, turning the other way in the hall and then stopping and watching which door she entered. He could perform that maneuver adroitly and without attracting attention. He’d had practice.
A psychiatrist’s office. Wonderful!
He glanced at his watch. It was a few minutes before the hour, so it was likely she had an appointment.
Linda had entered the office of a Dr. Grace Moore, according to the brass lettering on the door. So probably she was under analysis, learning to cope with her problems. She hadn’t realized her primary problem was close behind her, watching the play of her nylon-clad calf muscles as she strode in her high heels, the pendulum sway of her hips, the graceful elbows-in swing of her lissome arms.
He made a study of her, as he did with all of them.
The killer considered entering the doctor’s office, perhaps taking a seat in the waiting room, if there was one. Pretending, if necessary, that he’d accidentally entered the wrong office. Linda wouldn’t recognize him. Not for sure. She’d only seen him from a distance, and then only briefly. He’d never moved in close without being positive he wasn’t spotted. And she’d never imagine he could pop up here, of all places.
He would artfully make his exit while her mind was still working and wondering, leaving her frightened and unknowing. Oh, he was tempted. It would be daring and fun and productive. And it would certainly confuse, and maybe rattle, her analyst. But he had second thoughts about that idea. It might be a mistake for her to see him in such close quarters.
This wasn’t the time to take risks. There was no reason to prod the increasingly muddled mind he was
