Suddenly, there was an outburst below. The three men leaned over the banister and saw Detective Mangin running up the stairs behind a man in a dark suit that barely contained his huge body.
“Stop! Now! It’s an order!” Mangin kept repeating.
“Are you completely fucking stupid? I need to see the chief. And I’m going to see him right now!”
The man got to the third-floor landing and planted himself in front of the three stunned officers. He was at least a head taller than any of them. He had heavy features that looked chiseled, a dark complexion, and a crooked nose, which was probably the result of an old fracture. His deep black eyes looked feverish.
“I’m looking for Chief O,” he said. “It’s very important.”
Detective Mangin spread his arms in a gesture of helplessness.
“I’m sorry, boss! There’s no reasoning with the guy. He wouldn’t even wait to get his visitor’s badge.”
“I don’t have time for this bullshit!” the man exclaimed. “I told you I’m a fucking cop already.”
O took a step forward, running a hand over his mouth. He knew who the man was. He had seen his picture plenty of times in the paper.
“I know you are, Inspector Vauvert, but that doesn’t exempt you from procedures. I am Rudy O. Now what the hell are you doing here?”
38
In his office, O listened to Vauvert without interrupting him. This is going to be one hell of a long day, he thought, massaging his temples.
“Good. So you left Toulouse and flew all the way up here, just like that?”
“No, I didn’t leave just like that. I’m working a case. I tried to call your department, but a dickhead hung up on me. Some Devout guy.”
“Deveraux.”
“Yes, whatever. A year ago, you sent Inspector Svarta down to help us, and she’s the one who put us on the Salaville lead. It stands to reason that I would want to do everything for her now.”
O, inscrutable, stared at the giant as though trying to decipher his thoughts. Vauvert knew the man was trying to probe his mind, but he did not blink.
“With all due respect, sir, we are wasting precious time here. You and I both know what happens in cases like these. Past the first twenty-four hours…”
“I know,” O said. He hesitated, then he added, “She might already be dead. You are aware of that, aren’t you? If it is revenge the psychopath wanted.”
“So let me help you!” Vauvert interrupted. “What’s the problem? We’re on the same team, aren’t we?”
He leaned forward, towering over the unit chief, and looked him in the eye.
“I’m begging you,” he said.
“Very well then,” the chief answered.
The look on his face was heavy with worry.
39
Eva clenches her teeth.
The pain is unbearable.
Beyond anything she has ever experienced. It’s as if hundreds of hooks are digging into the flesh of her thigh.
She is not sure what is worse, though. That pain or the thought of what will follow-what will inevitably follow.
The ropes are hurting her wrists. Her outstretched arms are cramping. She does not dare pull on the bonds, for fear of constricting her circulation even more.
Her eyes misty with tears, she utters a faint small-animal whimper.
What could she do now? How could she possibly endure this a second time without going insane? She can’t, right? Nobody could. Panic floods her mind. She can’t think straight anymore, and she grits her teeth even harder.
“Please,” she begs.
The masked woman produces an oddly soft laugh.
“Struggling won’t help,” she says. Her voice, just like her laughter, is deep and velvety. It’s the laughter of a mature woman who knows what she wants. “You are completely mine, my little tiger that needs to be tamed. Oh, yes.”
Eva whips her head to one side, then the other. No. No. NO.
But the woman is drawing closer, her black satin dress flowing over her shapely figure. Her black curly hair cascades over her shoulders and down to her buttocks. It frames the white mask on her face. But when she tilts her head, the hair moves in an odd way, like a movie playing at the wrong speed. Eva realizes that the hair is fake. The fucking psycho is wearing a wig.
The eyes in the porcelain mask are fixed on her. They are bright flames searing the darkness. The woman brings her hand to her mouth and runs her tongue over her red fingers, wet with Eva’s blood.
“Do you have any idea of the trouble you’ve given me? No, of course you don’t. You can’t understand the importance of what you’ve tried to interfere with.”
Eva has no clue what she is talking about, this woman, this insane bitch, this monster dressed up like a human being. Her thoughts have gone wild. They’re spinning faster and faster in her head, and she is six years old again.
Like it or not, Eva has always been six deep inside. All the nonsense she said during therapy is forgotten, vanished. Any trace of self-confidence she might have had has been swept away, like a fragile sand drawing erased by the tide, nothing more. She is six years old, and she never was a woman, never knew the reassuring joy of controlling every detail of her life. She is six and, yes, she is still trapped in that basement, still in the clutches of a monster dressed up like a human being.
She always knew that this moment would come, sooner or later.
The first time, the monster only took Justyna.
Now it has come back for her.
The monster is leaning over her.
Its mouth is huge, its eyes two chasms filled with stars behind the marble-like mask.
“So? You’re not screaming? You’re not crying?” the monster asks.
Eva shuts her eyes. Tremors run through her body. Her biceps tense like cables. But her wrists and feet remain trapped. There’s nothing she can do. Her body remains laid out like a cross, offered for its own destruction. Even so, she has to keep resisting if she intends to live a bit longer. Gain a few hours, maybe.
“You will have to cry. You will have to beg. That’s how the ritual goes. It is the pain that calls them. The pain and the tears.”
Eva gulps, and it is like she’s swallowing razors. The pounding of her heart is deafening.
“No,” she manages to utter as an ultimate defiance.
“You will come to it. There are no options for you.”
She raises the scalpel, and again Eva pulls at her ties, even though she knows she cannot avoid the inevitable.
She clenches her jaw. As hard as possible.
The blade presses against her abdomen.
