“You mean you’ll come up with a theory, then discount mine and tell me I’m just inventing it to get a paycheck?”
“It was a rotten thing to say. I’m sorry.”
“You said I’m like Bernstein.”
“You said I have bed-wetting issues.”
A glimmer of a smile. Slowly and carefully, she collected all the images, put them back into the folder, and put it in her bag. The barman sent him a grateful look.
“Give her another . . . whatever it is she’s having.”
Zoe shook her head, pushing her empty glass away. “That was soda. I’ll have a pint of beer now, please. Do you have Guinness?”
The barman nodded and turned to the beer taps.
Tatum raised his mug to his lips, enjoying his small victory. He used to be really good with people once, before . . . well, before Paige had left him bitter and confused. It was nice to see he could still make a woman smile.
“So,” he said. “Where do you live? I mean back in Virginia.”
“Dale City.”
“Really? I just moved there.”
She nodded. She didn’t seem to be blown away by the coincidence.
“Do you have anyone waiting for you in Dale City?” Tatum asked.
“Why do you care?”
“Just making conversation.” Tatum shrugged. “You don’t have to play along. We can sit here and drink in silence.”
Zoe seemed to be weighing the options. “My sister,” she finally said.
“You told me about her. I mean besides her.”
“Oh, like a boyfriend? No.”
The barman put a tall glass full of foamy brown beer in front of Zoe, and she took a healthy swig from it.
“How about you?” she asked.
“Just my grandfather and my cat. Oh, and my fish. I completely forgot I have a fish now.”
“But no wife or girlfriend?”
“Not anymore.”
She sipped from her beer, looking at him.
He exhaled loudly. “There was a girl. Back in LA. We nearly got married.”
“What happened?”
“She left. Halfway through planning the wedding, she packed up and left.”
“I’m sorry.”
“Thanks.”
“Your grandfather moved with you when you transferred to Quantico?”
“Yeah.” Tatum tried to figure out how to explain Marvin. “My grandma died last year, and he took it pretty hard, so he moved in with me back in LA. Just a week after Paige left me. Then when I told him I was going to Dale City, he informed me that he was doing the same.”
“Sounds nice to have a grandfather you’re so close with.”
“That’s one way to put it,” Tatum said. “He’s difficult to handle.”
“Yeah, aging people often are,” Zoe said, nodding. “They’re often entrenched in their own routine, so any diversion from it is very challenging for them.”
Tatum blinked, trying to think how well Marvin matched that depiction. Aside from the word challenging, probably not too much.
“Yeah, well, he and my grandma raised me as a child, so the least I can do is help him with his . . .”—Tatum cleared his throat—“routine.”
The background music changed, Nick Cave’s voice filling the bar. Tatum was really happy with this place.
CHAPTER 23
Tears rolled down the woman’s cheeks as he took a step back to look at his handiwork. He had tied her hands behind her back and then to a hook he had drilled into the wall. No more chairs that could be knocked over and broken. She sat on a thick blanket; he didn’t want her to scrape her skin on the rough cement floor. Her body shivered, probably a mix of fear and cold. She had taken off her shirt and skirt just before he had put the knife against her throat. He wondered if he should get her something to wear, then decided she’d be fine. It wasn’t chilly enough to give her actual frostbite, and the cold would probably make her weaker and more lethargic, which would only help when he had everything prepared.
He had discarded her handbag and clothing on the floor. Once he was done with her, he would burn them, as he always did. He now picked up her handbag and rummaged in it, until his fingers brushed against her phone. He took it out and turned it off. In one of the previous attempts, the woman’s phone had rung just as he had been about to start the embalming process. It had scared him half to death. He slid her turned-off phone into his pocket and tossed the handbag on the floor by the clothing.
He walked away and shut the door behind him, ignoring her muffled protests. He had work to do, and the sooner he was done, the sooner she’d be quiet.
He felt giddy with excitement. She was absolutely perfect. A dream girl, one he’d never thought he’d be able to find on the streets. It almost felt like fate.
This made him hesitate before mixing the embalming fluid. He had very little formaldehyde left after the last one. It was enough for what he had originally intended . . . but was it enough for her?
It was a delicate balance. Too much formaldehyde and her body would become rigid, impossible to handle. But too little and she’d begin to decay in a few years.
He wanted to spend the rest of his days with her. Could he really afford to skimp on formaldehyde? Wouldn’t a little rigidity be worth ten more years in her company?
He smiled to himself, imagining getting old with her by his side. Spending the cold winters cuddled on the couch, covered in a blanket, watching TV together. Lying in bed, her head leaning against his chest, a book in her hand as he hugged her waist. Sitting by the dinner table, telling her about his day as she listened with adoring affection. He was surprised to realize that he had a tear in his eye. He was so happy.
He definitely needed to get some more formaldehyde.
He glanced at his watch. Too late to do it this evening. He would have to get some tomorrow.
A twinge of impatience nearly made him change his mind. He glanced at the noose on the table, imagined it tightening around her throat. The final spasm as life fled her body. He felt the tightening in his pants as he thought of her inert body, at his mercy. He turned back to the formaldehyde bottle. Surely it was enough. He picked up the bottle, his hand trembling with excitement.
No. He would spend the next few decades with this woman. He could wait another day. He put the bottle down, taking a deep breath. Tomorrow. He would do it tomorrow.
He thought of opening the door and apologizing for the delay, but he doubted she’d be very understanding. None of them were, before the procedure.
Instead, he left the workshop, locking the door behind him. He was glad to notice that her faint screams couldn’t be heard at all beyond the walls.
CHAPTER 24
Maynard, Massachusetts, Sunday, December 14, 1997
Zoe stared at the open coffin, trying to feel what she was probably supposed to. Grief, horror, fear.
All she felt was emptiness and regret for not going to the bathroom earlier.
When the principal had walked into class two days before, informing them that Nora’s big sister, Clara, had been killed, Zoe heard the kids around her sobbing, screaming, whispering in shock. She could only gaze at the principal’s red eyes, thinking she had never seen him cry before.
Nora was her age, was in most of her classes. Zoe had been to her house three times when she was much younger. They had been friends when they were six years old. She had hazy memories of Clara, then a beautiful ten-year-old girl whom Nora had idolized.
Zoe was worried about her own reaction. She had been borrowing books about serial killers lately and reading a lot about psychopaths. People who had no empathy for other human beings. There were a surprising number of psychopaths. One percent of the general population. Was she a psychopath? Was that why she couldn’t feel anything for Clara? Was that why she hadn’t shed a tear for Nora’s suffering? Her mother cried by her side, and she didn’t know Nora or Clara as well as Zoe did. The chapel was full of people crying, their sobs echoing in the spacious hall. Zoe tried to make herself cry, tried to think how Nora felt right then. Clara, her only sister, taken by the Maynard serial killer. Raped and killed, discarded like trash in the Assabet River.