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“Do you know why they no longer ... Oh, never mind.” She hung up. So Johns Hopkins was no longer part of the scene. It took her another half-hour on the phone to learn that Barnes in St. Louis did them. Two other hospitals. Just making random calls to whatever toll-free numbers she could think of to try. She wondered if there had been malpractice suits. If the surgery had proven unsafe. Or was it public relations—that kind of thing? Probably none of the above.

Would getting her outside plumbing whacked off make her feel more womanly? Would trading a cock and balls for a vagina—complete with ersatz clit, no doubt—make her able to satisfy her man better. Hell, no. It would be an unnecessary and stupid risk. Just something she toyed with—her little ace in the hole, so to speak. An option. She was still in love with him. He was everything. Her life. Without his desire she would be dead. He wanted her this way.

“From-a Lick Pier, Sanna Monnica Bitch Californium, Itsa Larry Welg anna Champagna Muzik Makers,” she could hear him screaming over some taped dance band. “An now hereza Norma-um Enema to singa an play the accordiona-enema, Lady of Spain-enema!” Crazy fool, she smiled.

She would keep him with her hot mouth and kinky mind and beautiful eyes and long legs and great ass and Beverly Hills and cosmetic trickery. He liked it when she'd savaged the one with the low-cut blouses, Princess Di with her smug-ass mouth, telling her, “I'll do it,” when Nicki started packing her things. Saying to her later, “No, I need all of these,” when they packed her cosmetics. “I have to keep my peaches-and-cream complexion, you know.” Yeah. Nicki knew. She had sliced off the bitch's fat tits the moment Daddy had finished with her. The knife blade was sharp and she felt surprisingly good about it, not squeamish in the least, and Daddy really got off watching her work out. She could remember how he laughed like a little kid when Nicki had sliced the toes off, “This little piggie went to market,” slicing her fucking toes off like little white stubs. Blood all over everything. Daddy turning on and them playing in the blood.

She went into him naked but for a pair of heels, standing and posing for him naturally, a beautiful woman in profile, as he played his ricky-tick music, “Thang hugh Norma-enema. Anna loog whoze here now, itsa Myron Florn-enema, to play his latest tits for us. Let it all hang out, Myron-enema."

“Every chance I get, baby."

“Did you call Bonnie like I wanted you to do, enema?"

“I will. Promise,” she said sweetly, still coming to him, but he turned away from her and said in a cold icebox voice, “Go do it."

Buckhead Medical Park

“Doctor Lishness, I don't understand why you're being so unresponsive to me,” Eichord said, working to keep control of his temper. They had finally located Schumway's psychotherapist.

“I'm not being unresponsive."

“What would you call it, then?"

“What?” Unruffled. One of those icicle types. A face that reminded you of the younger Teddy in his senatorial bifocals. Was it a poseur's face?

“What would you call failing to respond to an official inquiry in a Homicide investigation?"

“I would call your manner irresponsible, for starters."

“Irresponsible. Do you realize this crazy son of a bitch has killed eight or ten victims—just that we KNOW about? Driven his own sister insane? Do you—"

“I've just told you that I cannot violate my code of ethics. The relationship one has with one's patients—and you should certainly be aware of this—is a highly confidential and privileged one. Unless people can rely on that total confidentiality, the system of health care collapses. Trust is an inviolable aspect of our ethical standards,” the psychotherapist said imperiously.

Eichord wanted to throttle him.

It had been a long day for Eichord. Yesterday's rocket from the deputy director of MCTF's crime lab on the DNA-matchup with the sperm traces from Heather Lennon had, in effect, cleared both Dennen-mueller and Freidrichs.

Jack was crushed by the circuit attorney's reluctance to immediately indict Alan Schumway, but the man had told him, “You don't understand the law, here. Look: the complexities of our statutes are unique to the state and, in fact, are in the process of being revised as we speak. But this is a new technology, and until it has survived some court battles, somebody's refusal to comply with a test doesn't begin to provide us with sufficient grounds to indict."

“So we'll trick our suspect. There are a dozen ways we could get blood, saliva, tissue—"

“Jesus! Jack, that's the last thing you want to do. Hey. Put a solid, concrete case against the scumwad together and lock down all the edges. That's what you need to do. Don't be counting on some lab magic to nail him. Not under these circumstances, with the current statutes and a relatively revolutionary—for us—technological breakthrough."

“The data I've seen on it is rock-solid. It's widely accepted by people in law enforcement, MIT, the—"

“You're in Buckhead County, Jack. Forget about what some egghead at the Massachussetts Institute of Technology says. Make a solid case against your man. You get some iffy DNA shit to go to trial with and the case stands a real fat chance of getting thrown out of court. Then you really will have messed in your mess kit, eh?"

Keeeerist, Eichord thought, forcing himself to breathe deeply. “Iffy DNA shit?” He thanked the C.A., por nada, and put his nose back to the grindstone.

The following day started out even worse. The composite of the suspects’ mug shots had drawn a total blank in Nevada. And Eichord had his morning ruined by a call from the Amarillo PD. They'd run the sheet by the old gentleman in Vega, and “he just couldn't be sure.” Did he even seem halfway about it? “Waffled” was the word they used in response. He waffled.

It was one of those times when as a law-enforcement peon you felt so much frustration. Schumway looked so good for it. Any why was he having so much trouble getting this Nicki Dodd interviewed? He had full-time surveillance on the house in North Buckhead and she hadn't come in or out for three days, for sure. Unless that prick Schumway had him some kind of secret tunnel. He wouldn't discount anything. One of the guys thought they might have seen a shadow at the window. Not sure.

If the woman was hiding in there, he had to find out. First—why? He could eliminate a lot of possibles with a face-to-face. He had to interview her and get it done NOW. Probable cause was the first thing. He didn't really have much, but he could throw something together, put her in a lineup, jack her around a little. See what fell into place. Main thing—he needed the house empty. He wanted in there when the place was empty. He'd get a search warrant first. No. He'd, uh, wing it.

Schumway as Spoda. It sure looked good. Especially the tie-in to Diane Taluvera in the Moss Grove bank. To reach out for somebody on probable cause was one thing; to apply for an arrest warrant from the circuit attorney's office, and to be able to give them an indictable package for trial—that was another smoke. This legal genius, Eichord, he knew all about such shit. He fumed, driving back to the station.

He'd go home and read his old depositions. Listen to the kid scream—the cartoons had stopped working, for no apparent reason. Just so he didn't dream about the trailer in Blytheville, Arkansas, and the silver platter of mean cuisine.

The night went just about the same way the day had. He went home and tried to work, trying to decide what to do, wondering which was the angle he'd missed, which was the one that was going to come back to haunt him, and all of this in one of Jonathan's loudest, ongoing tantrums. Then he and Donna got pissed with each other and he went to bed with that terrible sinking feeling in his chest, that sinking feeling that something was going to fuck him up once again, and then he'd see another page of The Journal of Retribution.