And during all this time, her assailant never said a word, which was in some way more frightening than if he had been screaming at her. It was as if there was no emotion involved on his part.
Lungs aching, Lisbeth lowered herself to the ground, feeling too weak to remain on her hands and knees, let alone get up and try to escape. She was totally at his mercy.
Off to her left, something groaned. Not a person, she thought. It groaned again. An animal. Then a loud hissing sound.
Oh, my God.
Alligator.
Lisbeth pushed herself onto her hands and knees again and started scrambling, but she couldn’t see, couldn’t know which way was safe or if she would be running into worse danger.
The panic seized her again. “Oh, my God. Oh, my God!”
Then, like a marionette, she was plucked off her feet. Her kidnapper crushed a forearm across her rib cage, trapping her against his body. The tip of a knife blade caught hold of the bag, pierced it, nicked her cheek, and split the cloth open on the right side.
The harsh glare of headlights was blinding. Then he swung her around so she could see where that light fell- on a section of paved road that ended with a striped road-block sign; on the bank of a marsh; on three alligators spread over that terrain, two on the bank and one on the road, hissing at the car. Empty ham cans littered the bank, and Lisbeth remembered the loud splashing sound she had heard while she was lying in the trunk. Bait.
Her attacker grabbed a handful of the sack and her hair and pulled her head back as he started moving toward the alligator on the road. Lisbeth began to struggle, frantic to get free of him. He pulled harder on her hair and kept advancing on the reptile.
“No! No! No! No!” she screamed.
The alligator opened its jaws and hissed.
Her captor stopped within ten feet of it and spoke for the very first time, whispering into her ear, “This is what happens to girls who talk too much.”
Chapter 36
“Do you know why you’re in here?”
Landry didn’t bite.
Weiss smirked. “Are we getting a commendation?”
Lt. William Dugan stared at him. Tall, tan, gray-haired, he cut a figure of authority. The boss of Robbery/Homicide stood behind his desk with his hands jammed at his waist, his shoulders set.
Weiss glanced at Landry. “I guess not.”
“So far this morning,” Dugan went on, “I’ve had the sheriff and half the politicos of Palm Beach County crawling up my ass. Plus the state’s attorney and half a dozen designer-suit defense attorneys, not the least of which are Bert Shapiro and Edward Estes.”
“Estes?” Weiss cocked a brow at Landry.
“Shut up, Weiss,” Landry growled.
“What the hell are you doing out there?” Dugan asked. “Why are you messing around with these people?”
“They’re suspects,” Landry said. “What are we supposed to do? Send them engraved invitations to come down here and talk to us?
Maybe we could make finger sandwiches and have tea. Maybe if we ask pretty please one of them will make a confession.“
“I’ll tell you what you can’t do,” Dugan said. “You can’t barge into a private club and demand these people give you DNA samples. What the hell were you thinking?”
“Demand?” Landry asked. He glanced at Weiss. “Did you demand anything from those pricks last night?”
“Not me. Did you?”
Landry looked at his lieutenant. “Stop beating around the fucking bush. Who exactly are we talking about here? Bennett Walker?”
“Among others.”
“‘Cause I’ll tell you right now, he’s a punk,” Landry said. “He’s a spoiled rich-boy prick, who thinks he can do any goddamn thing he wants to, including beating and raping women.”
“He walked on those charges,” Dugan said.
Landry rolled his eyes. “Oh, well, he must be innocent, then, ”cause Christ knows the justice system never fucks up.“
“Can the sarcasm,” Dugan snapped.
“This is bullshit,” Landry said. “You’re going to tell us to tiptoe around these assholes because they have money to buy big-prick lawyers? That’s bullshit.”
“Do you know what those big-prick lawyers can do to your case?” Dugan asked. “If Bennett Walker had given you a DNA sample last night and it matched DNA in the victim, you could kiss that evidence good-bye. Edward Estes is going to get that thrown out of court so fast it’ll give you whiplash.”
“Well, what do you want us to do?” Weiss asked. “Call central casting and ask for a fresh crop of suspects? Maybe some drug dealers?”
“Are you looking beyond these men?”
“I followed up on a lead on a guy named Brad Garland,” Weiss said. “He saw the vie that night, she rejected him, he was pissed off.”
“And?”
“And he wrapped his car around a light pole on his way from one club to another. He was in the ER for eight hours and admitted for observation with a head injury.”
“Irina Markova spent the last hours anyone admits to seeing her with Jim Brody and Bennett Walker and that pack of dogs,” Landry said. “It’s a waste of time to look elsewhere. You want to make it look like we’re going through those motions, assign someone else to do that. We’ve got real leads.”
Dugan frowned. “You’re serious about Walker?”
“Dead,” Landry said. “In private these guys call themselves the Alibi Club. They think they can get away with anything.”
“Murder is a stretch,” Dugan said.
“Why? A sociopath is a sociopath. It doesn’t matter how big his bank account is.”
“And they all cover for a killer?”
Landry shrugged. “Maybe they all had a hand in it. We know she had oral sex with multiple partners. Maybe that’s why no one rats out anyone-because they’re all guilty.”
“Jesus,” Dugan muttered. “This is going to be a media freak show. Just the idea something like that could be going on…”
He turned and looked out his window, as if expecting to see reporters and news vans crowding the parking lot.
“Nobody hears it from you,” he ordered. “One thing leaks from this office, you’re both out. You’ll be working security at Wal-Mart.”
“My dream job,” Weiss cracked.
“I’m serious. Not one word. Have you talked about this Alibi Club with anyone else? Where did you hear it?”
“Lisbeth Perkins,” Landry said, resurrecting the lie he’d told Weiss the night before. “She’s a groom at Brody’s place-and one of the sweet young things running with that crowd. She was best friends with the dead girl. I doubt she’s the only one who knows about it. Gossip is a full-contact sport with the money crowd. It’s only a matter of time before that shit hits the fan.”
“So far you can’t put the dead girl with any of these guys once they left Players?”
Landry shook his head. “I went to talk to one of the valets last night, but the kid split before I got there. Maybe he can put her in a car with somebody. Weiss is tracking him down today.”
