Fear the Night

“True,” Zoe said. “Men over fifty usually aren’t serial killers. But there are exceptions.”

“The other two former military snipers are Middle East vets, and both have tight alibis for at least one of the Night Sniper murders. We can get around to the exceptions over fifty later, if it’s necessary.”

She gave him a look, and Repetto knew he’d been short with her again. He wondered why that kind of impatience had crept into his tone. He started to apologize, but she interrupted:

“You said most of the SWAT snipers.”

He found himself intrigued by the way she arched one eyebrow when she asked a question. It made her seem maybe more intelligent than she was. He nodded. “There are two former NYPD snipers, Sergeants Lou Mackey and Alex Reyals. In 1978 Mackey was shot in the side and had to have one of his kidneys removed. He’s in his fifties now, but may be one of those exceptions. Reyals is thirty-seven. He left the NYPD with disability pay three years ago. I haven’t been able to get a straight answer as to why.”

“I know both of them. I interviewed Mackey once, and I was one of the consulting psychiatrists in the Reyals matter.”

It was Repetto’s turn to raise an eyebrow. “Reyals matter?”

“Four years ago a fleeing holdup man was crossing the Queensboro Bridge in a stolen car. It got in a minor accident that caused a bigger accident that closed the bridge in both directions. The holdup man, a teenager named Joe Mustang-his real name-took an elderly woman hostage, held a gun to her head, and tried to walk with her off the bridge.”

“Not much chance of that,” Repetto said, knowing how quickly the police would converge in that part of town.

“Alex Reyals was one of three SWAT snipers who scoped in on Mustang and Iris Beadier, the hostage. Iris was a squeeze of the trigger away from dying from a bullet fired by Mustang’s gun, and the snipers had orders to fire if they got a clear shot at Mustang. If the aim of his gun momentarily strayed from Iris.”

“And Reyals got the clear shot.” Repetto remembered the incident now, though not all the details.

“He thought it was clear,” Zoe said. “He was in a window, near the ramp to Second Avenue. Something caught Mustang’s attention and he turned away from Iris for a moment, and the gun wasn’t pointed at her head. Reyals took the shot, as he’d been instructed. The bullet didn’t hit Mustang. It struck Iris in the ear and entered her brain. When she dropped, Mustang threw his hands up and surrendered without a struggle.”

Repetto looked at Zoe. She’d told the story without emotion. He wondered what she thought of it. What she thought of Reyals. “Those guys almost always hit what they shoot at,” he said. “What made Reyals miss?”

Zoe smiled sadly. “He doesn’t know. That’s his problem.”

“He has a problem?”

“He doesn’t think he should have missed. He thinks it’s his fault Iris Beecher is dead. So does Iris Beecher’s family. They let him know it. Then there were rumors that Reyals had been drinking when the call came in for him to go the bridge.”

“Had he been drinking?”

Zoe shrugged. “He says no. What happened is, he missed his shot. If it had happened on the target range, he would have walked away from it not knowing why he missed and not needing to know.”

“This was a different kind of shot.”

“That’s what Alex Reyals thinks. It’s why his nerve went. He was pensioned off with a mental disability. Last I heard he was in private analysis.” She sighed and ran her hands over her thighs. “It wasn’t, you know.”

“Wasn’t what?”

“A different kind of shot. It was simply one he missed. Maybe his eyelid twitched, or a gust of breeze altered the course of the bullet, or Iris moved in front of his target. He simply aimed at something and missed. It happens all the time, but he can’t think of it that way. He can’t forgive himself.”

“Maybe he shouldn’t. A woman is dead.”

Zoe stared at Repetto, her blue eyes amazingly steady. What a poker player she must be.

“You think it’s a male thing,” he said.

She smiled. “I know it is.”

“What happened to Mustang?”

“He went to prison and was killed a year later, in a fight with another inmate.”

“Justice,” Repetto said.

“I knew you were thinking that. You might be interested to know that so was I. Because of him a good woman was killed and a good man is living in agony.”

“The kind of agony that could make him a serial killer?”

Zoe stood up. She paced to the window and peeked out between two vertical blinds. Repetto still couldn’t see what was out there.

When she turned around and faced him, she said, “It doesn’t add up. Reyals hates himself more than he could hate other people.”

“You don’t know what else went on in his life.”

“Some of it I do. From the hearing. From my interviews with him.”

“Is this where you claim doctor-patient privilege?”

“Don’t be such an asshole, Repetto. We’ve got a serial killer in this city. If there were anything in our sessions, or in Reyals’s past, that might have the slightest bearing on that, I’d tell you in a second. There isn’t. So I don’t have to worry about doctor-client privilege.”

“This means you’ll tell me all about him?”

“Means I can’t, because it has nothing to do with the Night Sniper. I can give you general information. Reyals grew up in rural Illinois where he hunted and became a crack shot. He went to college on a football scholarship but hurt his knee after his second year and dropped out, worked at a series of jobs, went back to school, and got his degree. He worked for a financial firm in Chicago, was transferred to New York, then got downsized. That’s when he joined the NYPD. He had a great record until the incident on the bridge.” She crossed the office and stood near Repetto. “You could find out all that in his personnel file.”

“I already have.” He stood up and, comparing his height to Zoe’s, was surprised to find that she was taller than she appeared seated behind her desk or stalking around the office. “Did you like Reyals?” he asked.

“That didn’t enter into it.”

“Yeah, but did you like him?”

“Yes, I did. He struck me as a good and kind young man who had something terrible happen to him.”

“Nothing happened to him. He did something to someone else. He acted and there was a consequence. He squeezed the trigger, and now he has to live with the result.”

“For God’s sake, he made a simple mistake! His skill and his luck deserted him when he needed them most. It could happen to anyone.”

“No argument there. Can you tell me for sure that Alex Reyals isn’t the Night Sniper?”

“I can’t.”

“Because you don’t want to wind up with the same kind of agony Reyals is suffering.”

She glared at him, then relaxed and gave him her thin, irritating smile. “You’re right. Once I tell you he’s not a suspect, whoever else he kills, if he is the Night Sniper, the murders are partly my responsibility.”

Repetto nodded somberly and walked to the office door. “See?” he said, as he opened the door. “It isn’t a male thing.”

Zoe almost shot back an answer before the door closed behind him, but she realized she didn’t have a good one. At least not one she should utter. Not yet.

She knew Repetto was right, and she knew why he thought as he did. He felt he was partly responsible for what had happened to Dal Bricker, for someone else’s death.

He and Alex Reyals had something in common.

17