Gader was trying hard not to look flustered. “I think so.”
“I’m a persistent man,” Rawls said. “Especially when it comes to privacy violations of this particular kind. When I look at that woman undressing and taking a shower on your Web site for the benefit of masturbating voyeurs, it strikes home to me in a rather personal way. It makes me think of my daughter. Now do you honestly believe I’m going to let this case go?”
“Maybe not.”
“Definitely not. So don’t play games. Don’t use delaying tactics. Don’t be clever. Just tell us what we need to know.”
Gader seemed very small inside his bathrobe. His chin was down, his eyes half-closed, his hands gripping the armrests, fingertips squeezed white with pressure. Down the street a dog started to bark. It was the only sound for a while.
“I’ll cooperate,” Gader said finally. “No problem.”
Rawls smiled. “That’s what we like to hear. Is the computer here in the house?”
“Yeah.” Gader rose, tightening the belt of his robe. “It’s upstairs.”
He led them to the second floor. Climbing the staircase, Brand hung back a few steps with Rawls.
“Great story,” Brand whispered.
“Thanks.”
“Funny thing, though. I’ve met your family. And you haven’t got a daughter.”
Rawls smiled. “Well, let’s keep that between ourselves.”
20
C.J. was putting her dinner dishes in the sink when something drew her gaze to the kitchen window. She looked past her pale reflection in the glass, studying the darkness of her backyard.
Amid the shadows of the jacaranda trees, she saw a light.
For a moment she just stood there, transfixed by an emotion too deeply rooted to be immediately identified. Then she understood that what she felt was fear-not an adult’s fear, but the stark, uncomplicated terror of a child.
It was him. The boogeyman.
She remembered how she had glimpsed his flashlight in the darkness outside her parents’ house, and now he was back.
The light wavered, drifting like a will-o’-the-wisp, then winked out, and she returned to herself.
This was no monster from her childhood. It was a prowler, hardly unheard of in this neighborhood or in any part of this city. And she wasn’t some terrorized schoolgirl, she was a cop. She could take care of herself. She could A noise.
Very soft, almost inaudible. Halfway between a creak and a squeal.
It might have been nothing, just the old house settling.
Or a door, opening. The back door.
Her gun. She needed her off-duty Smith. She looked around the kitchen before remembering that the gun was in her handbag, and her handbag, damn it, was in her bedroom at the rear of the bungalow.
The prudent course of action was to leave the house, drive to Wilshire Station, come back with a patrol unit.
But she wasn’t going to do that. Wasn’t going to be chased out of her home by a glimpse of light and a barely audible creak.
No gun? Then make do with another weapon.
She opened the cutlery drawer and pulled out a carving knife. Part of her recalled the knife she’d grabbed from another kitchen before descending into the crawl space. But she refused to think about that.
She studied the knife. It was long and wickedly sharp and felt heavy in her hand. She liked its weight, the gleam of its blade. But she would have liked her. 38 Smith better.
Knife in hand, she advanced toward the rear of the house.
No lights burned in this part of the bungalow. She had turned off the light on her nightstand before leaving the bedroom. Now she wished she hadn’t.
She reached the rear hall. It was empty.
Drawing back against the wall, she scanned the hallway. The back door appeared closed, but possibly the intruder had shut it behind him.
She looked for footprint impressions or tracks of dirt on the carpet. None were visible in the dim glow from the living room, but she could see only halfway down the hall.
The hallway opened onto three rooms. On the left were the guest lavatory and the laundry room. On the right, farthest down, was her bedroom.
If someone had gotten inside, he could have concealed himself in any one of those rooms. She would have to check each one in turn.
She advanced, the knife’s wooden hasp cold against her palm.
The door to the guest lavatory stood open. She didn’t think the intruder could have progressed that far without leaving some marks on the carpet. Even so, she took the precaution of pivoting into the bathroom doorway, knife raised.
No one there.
Emerging into the hall, she looked to her right, then left, then right again, like a child looking both ways before crossing the street.
The laundry room was next. That door was closed. She wasn’t looking forward to opening it, so she did it fast, throwing the door wide and darting in.
This room, too, was unoccupied. Maybe there was no intruder. Maybe she had imagined the whole thing.
This thought, dangerously seductive, was instantly dismissed. With one room still to go, she couldn’t afford to drop her guard.
She stepped to the laundry-room doorway, peering to her right, her left Sudden pressure on her face.
Gloved hand, wet cloth.
Couldn’t see him in the darkness, could only lash out blindly with the knife.
Her thrust missed, and then his other hand clamped on her wrist, holding the knife at bay.
He pressed the cloth harder against her nose and mouth. Instinctively she knew she must not take a breath.
She flailed at him with her left hand. If she could find his throat, pinch the carotid artery He sensed her strategy and jammed himself closer to her, wedging her against the door frame of the laundry room, restricting her range of movement.
She struggled against him. His face was masked, invisible. His body was pure darkness.
Her lungs demanded air. With a last effort she drew up one knee and pistoned out her leg, connecting with his gut. He loosened his grip on her face. The cloth came away. She sucked in a deep draft of oxygen, and then the cloth was over her nose again, and before she could stop herself she had breathed its fumes.
Cold.
A shiver of cold in her nasal passages, in her throat.
The fumes were sweet-swelling, intoxicating. They made her head spin. The world blurred, everything going double, no clarity anywhere, and she was tired, sleepy. Her fingers losing purchase on the knife, letting it fall, and though she knew that she was defenseless, she didn’t care.
Far away, his chuckle of triumph. Then his words, low, spoken close to her ear.
“Got you now, C.J.”
That voice.
She knew that voice.
Her last thought was a question, echoing unanswered.
… Adam?
21
Something nagged at Rawls. He knew there was more here than a voyeuristic Web site.
That name, Bluebeard… three women under surveillance… one for each month…
The connection was close but continued to elude him.
He and Brand followed Gader into the guest bedroom on the second floor. The room had been made into a work space cluttered with computers, printers, cables, surge suppressors, and battery backup units. The shades were down, the room lit only by a pair of gooseneck lamps, bulbs angled away from the equipment to minimize screen glare. The cold wind beat against the windowpanes.
It occurred to Rawls that computer people, himself and Brand included, spent far too much time behind closed windows in rooms like this.
The machine they wanted was easy to find. Rawls spotted it even before Gader led them to it. It was a Compaq Proliant server with a twenty-inch monitor and a standard keyboard. Superficially the setup resembled any other personal computer with a tower design, but because it was a server, it had capabilities that an ordinary PC did not.