“I'll show you! I'll show you! Angie!” he barked, swinging toward the girl. “Come here! Come here, now!”
He didn't wait. He rushed around the end of the table, grabbed the girl by the arm, and dragged her back to Kate.
“Do it!” he said in her ear. “For Michele. You want to do this for Michele. You want Michele to love you, don't you, Angie?”
Michele? Wild card, Kate thought, a fresh wave of terror flashing through her. Who the hell was Michele, and what did she mean to Angie? How could she fight an enemy she'd never seen?
Tears ran down Angie's face. Her lower lip was quivering. She clutched the butcher knife with both trembling hands.
“Don't do it, Angie,” Kate said, her voice vibrating with fear. “Don't let him use you this way.”
She couldn't know if the girl even heard her. She thought of what Angie had told her about the Zone, and wondered if she was going into that place now, to escape this nightmare. And what then? Would she act on autopilot? Was the Zone a dissociative state? Had it allowed her to participate in Rob's kills before?
She jerked again at the restraints, stretching the plastic another fraction of an inch.
“Do it!” Rob shouted against the side of Angie's face. “Do it, you stupid cunt! Do it for your sister. Do it for Michele. You want Michele to love you.”
Sister. The headline went through Kate's mind like a comet: Sisters Exonerated in Burning Death of Parents.
Pig eyes popping from his ugly round head, Rob screamed with frustration and raised the knife he held. “Do it!!”
Light hit a blinding starburst off the blade as it plunged through the air and into the hollow of Kate's shoulder just as she managed to twist her body a crucial few inches. The tip of the blade hit bone and glanced off, and the pain was like lightning striking her.
“Do it!” Rob screamed at Angie, striking her in the back of the head with the handle of the bloody knife. “You worthless whore!”
“No!” the girl cried.
“Do it!!”
Sobbing, Angie brought the knife up.
“WE GOT A hit on Fine's prints in Wisconsin,” Yurek said, stepping into the bedroom doorway.
The crime scene unit was removing the tattoo fetishes from the window, carefully folding tissue paper around each and sliding each into its own small paper sack.
“Her real name is Michele Finlow. She's got a handful of misdemeanors and a sealed juvenile record.”
Kovac arched a brow. “Is skinning people a misdemeanor in Wisconsin?”
“The state that brought us Ed Gein and Jeffrey Dahmer,” Tippen remarked.
“Hey, aren't you from Wisconsin, Tip?” one of the crime scene guys asked.
“Yeah. Menomonie. Wanna come to my house for Thanksgiving?”
Quinn stuck a finger in his free ear and listened to Kate's home number ring unanswered for the third time in twenty minutes. Her machine should have picked up. He disconnected and tried her cell phone. It rang four times, then passed him on to her message service. Her clients called her on the cell phone. Angie DiMarco had the number. Kate wouldn't let it go unanswered. Not as responsible as she felt for Angie.
He rubbed a hand against the fire in his belly.
Mary Moss joined the group. “One of the neighbors down the hall says she sometimes saw Michele with a stubby, balding guy with glasses. She didn't get a name, but she says he drives a black SUV that once rear-ended the car of the guy in 3F.”
“Yes!” Kovac said, pumping one arm. “Smokey Joe, you're toast.”
“Hamill is talking right now with Mr. 3F to get the insurance info.”
“We can bust the Cremator in time for the six o'clock news and still make Patrick's for happy hour,” Kovac said, grinning. “This is turning into my kind of day.”
Hamill hustled into the apartment, dodging crime scene people. “You won't believe this,” he said to the task force at large. “Michele Fine's boyfriend was Rob Marshall.”
“Holy shit.”
Quinn grabbed Kovac by the shoulder and shoved him toward the door. “I have to get to Kate. Give me the keys. I'm driving.”
“DO IT! DO IT!”
Angie let out a long, distorted scream that sounded very far away in her own ears, like a wail coming down a long, long tunnel. The Zone loomed up beside her, a yawning black mouth. And on the other side, the Voice had come to life.
You stupid little slut! Do what I tell you!
“I can't!” she cried.
“DO IT!”
The fear was like a softball in her throat, closing off her air, gagging her, choking her.
No one loves you, crazy little bitch.
“You love me, Michele,” she mewed, not sure if she had spoken the words aloud or if they existed only in her head.
“DO IT!”
DO IT!
She stared down at Kate.
The Zone moved over her. She could feel the hot breath of it. She could fall into it and never come out. She would be safe.
She would be alone. Forever.
“DO IT!”
You know what to do, Angel. Do what you're told, Angel.
Her whole body was shaking.
Coward.
“You can save Michele, Angie. Do this for Michele.”
She looked down at Kate, at the place on her chest where she was supposed to stick the knife. Just as Michele had. She'd seen her sister do it. He had made her watch as they stood on either side of the dead woman, one stabbing and then the other, making their pact, sealing their bond, pledging their love. It had frightened her and made her sick. Michele had laughed at her, then given her to him for sex.
He hurt her. She hated him. Michele loved him. She loved Michele.
Nobody loves you, crazy little bitch.
That was all she'd ever wanted, someone to care about her, someone to keep her from being alone. All she'd ever gotten was use and abuse. Even from Michele, who had kept her from being alone. But Michele loved her. Love and hate. Love and hate. Lovehate, lovehate, lovehate. There was no line between them for her. She loved Michele, wanted to save her. Michele was all she had.
“DO IT! KILL HER! KILL HER!”
She looked down at Kate, straining against the ties, terror in her face.
“Why do you care what happens to me?”
“Because no one else does.”
“I'm sorry,” she whimpered.
“Angie, don't!”
“Stab her. Now!”
The pressure inside her was tremendous. The pressure from outside was more. She felt as if her bones would collapse and the weight of it would crush her, and the Zone would suck up the mess and she would be gone forever.
Maybe that would be just as well. At least then she wouldn't hurt anymore.
“Do it or I let your fucking cunt sister die!” he shouted. “Do it or I'll finish Michele in front of you! DO IT!”
She loved her sister. She could save her sister. She raised the knife.
“NO!”
Kate sucked in a breath and braced herself, never taking her eyes off Angie.
The girl let out an unearthly shriek as she raised the butcher knife with both hands above her head, then twisted her body and plunged the knife into Rob Marshall's neck.
Blood sprayed in a geyser as she jerked the blade out. Blood on the wall, on the bed, on Kate, spraying like a loose fire hose. Rob jerked back, astonished, grabbing at the wound, blood gushing through his fingers.
Angie went on screaming, plunging the knife again, stabbing his hand, stabbing his chest. She followed him as he staggered backward, trying to escape. He tried to call out for help or for mercy and choked on his own blood, the sound gurgling in his throat. His knees buckled, and he fell against the clothes drier, knocking the candelabrum to the floor.