Charles could see where this was going. "It might be a mistake to develop her as a suspect. Think about it. You say Riker hired her three months ago. Well, that's when he started shaving again. Oh, and his first haircut since the shooting – same time frame. Granted, that's not much to work with, but suppose he genuinely cares for this woman?"
Oh, Mallory, if a cat could smile. "What great satisfaction he saw in her eyes.
"So he does have feelings for her. And you knew that." Oh, of course she did. What was he thinking? Dr. Apollo was Mallory's hostage. "So that's how you got Riker to play the game. Tell me, Mallory, how did you set him up? Did you whisper something scary in his ear? What did you say? No, let me guess. Oh, incidentally, Riker, this woman, this one bright spot in your otherwise miserable existence, she's in deep trouble. Maybe she'll die. Something like that?" Suddenly very tired, he leaned back against the cork wall. "I know you didn't tell him that Dr. Apollo was your favorite suspect. Then he'd have to choose up sides, wouldn't he? And it might not be your side."
Annoyed, she turned her back on him, not liking his tone one bit.
Well, tough.
Disregarding two facts – that he loved his life and she carried a gun – he reached out, grabbed her by the shoulders and spun her around. Well, that opened her eyes a bit wider.
"So I'm right," he said. "You planted a threat in that poor man's mind. You might as well have put a gun to Johanna Apollo's head. What about the effect on Riker? Did you give that any thought at all?" He was angry, close to shouting. Oh, what the hell. He yelled at her, "Clearly, you don't know what you're doing!"
Though – actually – she did.
He could see that now. Her cat's smile came stealing back, forcing him to admit that he had also been sucked into the game. And his own fears for Riker, hostage number two, would bind him to Mallory until it was played out. His hands fell away from her shoulders. His two-minute experiment with insurrection was over.
Hostilities forgotten – as if she had ever taken him seriously – she leaned down to tap the keyboard of the nearest computer, saying, "If Riker's afraid of the psych evaluation, he can fake it." She brought up a file with a questionnaire. "The test is in two parts, written and oral."
Charles recognized the screen image as the cover page of a personality profile. Many other pages would follow. The lengthy test would repeat and reword questions as traps for false replies. Mallory split the screen to display another document with recommended responses.
"All he has to do," she said, "is memorize this one. The city's too cheap to order new tests. This is going to be so easy. After a little coaching from you on the oral evaluation, he'll be back at work."
"This won't help him, Mallory. It's not that simple." He could read the look on her face. This was desertion from the ranks. "Getting his job back and getting him back on the job – that's two separate problems."
"He's already on the job," said Mallory. "He took this stuff out of Apollo's place so we wouldn't lose it to the feds."
"No, he's protecting his friend, Johanna – " Charles lost his train of thought. He was staring at the computer monitor and a dateline that corresponded to Mallory's last psychiatric evaluation, a mandatory test following the shooting of a suspect. He had always wondered how she navigated these examinations, missing all the traps set to catch her own peculiar bent of mind. This electronic cheat sheet forever killed his idea of her as an innocent savage. She knew exactly what she was. And Mallory was now twice wounded in his eyes, for she must realize that she would never be quite -
"Do you ever listen to the radio, Charles?"
"If you mean Zachary's program, no." He preferred newspapers to television and radio accounts of the Reaper, and he believed his view was less biased for that.
Mallory had moved on to another computer in the row of three terminals. She tapped the keyboard again, and the speakers announced the Ian Zachary show. "I have them all in my audio file. This is shock radio."
Charles was left alone to listen to the archived programs, and soon he had the gist of the game and the man who ran it – another sociopath.
Johanna had returned from her last stint at cleaning up crime scenes, and Mugs was still drowsy from his long nap. He slowly followed her into the bathroom and sat down at her feet, not having the energy to rub up against her legs for a fresh spate of agony, love and slashes – a proper hello.
The blood of the last job had never touched her skin, yet she washed her hands. It was a fight not to wash them a second and third time, though the cat would be the only witness to her compulsive behavior. She could not say when this urge had begun. Perhaps when she had opened her mind to Timothy's paranoia, a second neurosis, a hitchhiker sickness, had also entered in. She looked at herself in the mirror, then looked beyond her image to the shower curtain surrounding the bathtub. Though there was not even the shadow of an interloper, she pulled the curtain aside.
No one there. Of course not. And no one in the closets. She checked them all.
After changing into a suit, she wrapped her shoulders in a stylish shawl, then pulled it over her head to form a hood. The bulk of material hid the line of her deformity quite well. Mugs was slow to react to this signal that she was going out again. Thanks to the drug, there was no sign of panic in his eyes. He padded alongside her as she walked to the door, and he did not cry this time. There was only mild curiosity in his eyes as he watched her leaving him once more.
Chapter 8
IT WOULD BE GENEROUS TO SAY THAT THE DINING AREA was eight feet wide and twelve deep. There were four tables, small as postage stamps, and Riker was the only patron who did not take his foil-wrapped food and run. He was hoping to avoid his meal for as long as possible. The counterman was back in the kitchen having a protracted discussion with the cook. The subject of their argument was the simulation of a cheeseburger from their store of strict vegetarian ingredients. Riker had no plans to eat their concoction. He had ordered lunch for the sole purpose of renting a view of the hotel across the street. Having given up any hope of coffee, he opened the beverage cabinet and passed over all the health food juices to select a bottle of water.
He kept one eye on the front wall, all glass and neatly framing the Chelsea Hotel. When Jo had returned home from her last crime-scene cleanup, she had been followed by two men in suits. Federal shadows? In plain sight? This was not Riker's idea of a covert surveillance detail. Neither would those two men fit the protocols for bodyguards, for they had followed Jo at the distance of half a block. And now Marvin Argus stepped out on the sidewalk. Nervous little bastard, his movements were jerky as his head snapped left and right. Finally the agent's gaze settled on the restaurant window.
Riker lifted his water bottle in a salute.
Special Agent Argus crossed the street in an unseemly hurry, and pushed through the glass door to greet Riker with all the suspicion this encounter deserved. Taking the only vacant chair at the table, the FBI man was forced to sit with his back to the window. "You just happened to be in the neighborhood?"
"I knew I'd find you here." And this was only half a lie. "I figured you'd stake out Jo's hotel."
Argus smiled, so willing to believe that this visit was on his own account. "So you've given my offer some more thought." He splayed both hands to say he was waiting for the decision. "And?"