floor.
“Cuff him!”
But Visconti had already sprung into action, slapping the cuffs on one wrist and then, with the help of O’Connor, wrestling the other flailing arm down and cuffing it as well.
He screamed and bucked maniacally.
“Do his ankles!” Hayward ordered.
A minute later, the perp lay on his stomach, still pinned, writhing and shrieking in a voice so high it cut the air like a scalpel.
“Get the EMTs in here,” Hayward said. “We need a sedative.”
Most suspects, when cuffed hand and foot and pinned to the floor, settled down. Not this one. He continued to writhe and scream, twisting, rolling, thrashing about, and, small as he was, it was all that Hayward and the cops could do to hold him down.
“Must be on angel dust,” said one of the cops.
“I’ve never seen angel dust do this.”
A minute later, an EMT arrived and plunged a needle into the shrieking man’s buttock. A few moments later, he began to quiet down. Hayward got up and dusted herself off.
“Jesus,” said O’Connor. “Looks like he’s taken a shower in gore.”
“Yeah, and it’s gone off in this heat. He stinks.”
“Fucker’s naked, too.”
Hayward stepped back. The perp was still lying on his stomach, face pressed to the floor by Visconti, whimpering and quivering in an unsuccessful attempt to fight off the sedative.
She bent down. “Where’s Lipper?” she asked him. “What did you do to him?”
More whimpering.
“Turn him over, I want to see his face.”
Visconti complied. The man’s face and hair were caked with dried blood and offal. He was grimacing strangely, his face seized by tics.
“Clean him up.”
The EMT broke out a pack of sterile gauze wipes and cleaned up his face.
“Oh, Christ,” Visconti said involuntarily.
Hayward merely stared. She could barely believe her eyes.
The killer was Jay Lipper.
Chapter 27
Spencer Coffey settled himself in a chair in Warden Imhof’s office, impatiently flicking his trouser crease. Imhof sat behind his desk, looking much as he had during the first meeting: cool and neat, with the same blow-dried helmet of light brown hair on his head. Nevertheless, Coffey could see the uneasy, perhaps even defensive look in his eye. Special Agent Rabiner remained standing, arms crossed, leaning against the wall.
Coffey let a strained silence build in the office before speaking.
“Mr. Imhof,” he began, “you promised you would take care of this personally.”
“As I have,” said Imhof in a coldly neutral voice.
Coffey leaned back. “S.A. Rabiner and I have just come from an interview with the prisoner. I’m sorry to say there’s been no progress-none-in teaching him the value of respect. Now, I told you earlier I wasn’t really interested in how you accomplished the task we set for you, that I was only interested in results. Whatever you’re doing, it isn’t working. The prisoner’s the same cocky, arrogant bastard who first walked in here. Refused to answer questions. Insolent as well. When I asked him how he was enjoying solitary confinement, he said, ‘I rather prefer it.’”
“Prefer it to what?”
“Being mixed in with ‘former clients’ is how he put it, the sarcastic bastard. Really emphasizing the point that he didn’t want to be mixed with the general prison population. He’s as unrepentant and combative as ever.”
“Agent Coffey, sometimes these things take time.”
“Which is exactly what we don’t have, Mr. Imhof. We’ve got a second bail hearing coming up, and Pendergast’s going to have a day in court. We can keep him from his lawyer only so long. I need him broken by then; I need a confession.” What he didn’t add were the growing problems they were having nailing down some of the evidence. That would make the bail hearing very tricky-whereas a confession would make it all so nice and clean.
“As I said, it takes time.”
Coffey took a breath, remembering Imhof’s particular buttons. A little carrot, a little stick.
“Meanwhile, our man is down there bad-mouthing you and Herkmoor to all who will listen: guards, staff, everyone. And he’s an eloquent bastard, Imhof.”
The warden remained silent, but Coffey noticed-with satisfaction-a slight twitching at one corner of his mouth. And yet the man made no move to suggest stronger measures. Maybe there weren’t any stronger measures…
And that’s when the idea came to him-the masterstroke. It was the “former clients” phrase that did it. So Pendergast was afraid of being mixed up with “former clients”?
“Mr. Imhof,” he said-but quietly, as if to disguise the freshness of his brainstorm-“is that computer on your desk linked to the Department of Justice database?”
“Naturally.”
“Well, then. Let’s check up on some of these ‘former clients.’”
“I don’t understand.”
“Access Pendergast’s arrest records. Run them against your current prison population, see if you can find any matches.”
“You mean, see if any of the perps Pendergast arrested are currently in Herkmoor?”
“That’s the idea, yes.”
Coffey glanced over his shoulder at Rabiner. The agent had a wolfish smirk on his face.
“Boss, I like the way you think,” he said.
Imhof pulled the keyboard toward him and began typing. Then he stared at the screen for a long moment while Coffey waited in growing impatience.
“Strange,” Imhof said. “Pendergast’s collars seem to have suffered a rather high mortality rate. Most never made it to trial.”
“Surely, there have to be some live ones who made it through the legal system and ended up in prison.”
More typing. Then Imhof leaned back from the monitor. “There are two currently residing in Herkmoor.”
Coffey looked at him sharply. “Tell me about them.”
“One is named Albert Chichester.”
“Go on.”
“He’s a serial killer.”
Coffey rubbed his hands together, glanced again at Rabiner.
“Poisoned twelve people in the nursing home where he was employed,” Imhof went on. “Male nurse. Seventy- three years old.”
As quickly as it had come, Coffey’s exhilaration fell away. “Oh,” he said.
There was a brief silence.
“What about the other one?” S.A. Rabiner asked.
“A serious felon named Carlos Lacarra. They call him El Pocho.”
“Lacarra,” Coffey repeated.
