The Killing Hour

He switches off his cellular phone. The last thing he needs is to be disturbed. Christ, there are so many detectives on the case nobody should miss him. He glances at his watch. It’s three o’clock. At least it’s stopped raining. He hates this city when it rains. The car windows are down slightly and the muggy air outside replaces the dry air inside. He hasn’t been on a stakeout for years and sitting here he remembers just how boring they are. Jesus, it would be easier to go and get a goddamn search warrant.

But what if Feldman makes his way home only to find a dozen patrol cars parked outside his house? The bastard will turn around and keep on driving. What Landry needs to do is find and arrest him, bring him into the station by himself, end his career with the people in this country loving him. And why the hell not? He deserves something other than the cancer for all his years of protecting the innocent, doesn’t he?

He’ll give it another day. Two at the most, but no longer. He can’t assume Feldman’s lust for blood and death has been quenched and that he won’t be out looking for new prey this week.

He adjusts his seat, opens a packet of peanuts and waits.





10


The motel smells of depraved acts she doesn’t want to think about. The air is sticky and warm. The bathroom looks like it gets cleaned about as often as the place gets painted. She’s desperate to get away from here, away from Charlie.

This side of Charlie is something she’s never seen, a side she didn’t know existed. She knows he isn’t going to let her go even if he doesn’t. She wants to believe him or, more importantly, believe in him, but his actions have made that impossible. How much he had to do with the two dead women she doesn’t know. The only thing she knows for sure is that she has to find a way to escape.

Convincing Charlie she wants to help was easier than she’d hoped, and she guesses that’s because of his need to believe her and no longer be alone. To keep his trust she must take baby steps, she must build up his belief that they can be a team. It’s hard to think how she ever loved him. Does she still love him? No. Nobody can love a killer.



Is that what he is? A killer?

Some of what he said makes sense but most of it doesn’t. Two women died and that part is true because it’s been on the news, but who killed them hasn’t been. Was Charlie really there? She hopes not. She really hopes not.

If he wasn’t there, then all he’s doing now makes even less sense. Maybe he’s the Cyris he keeps mentioning. Whoever he is, he’s definitely not the Charlie she knew.

She’s curious about how much of what he’s telling her he even believes. At first she thought he was telling the truth. One woman waved him down and he ended up saving them both. It sounded good, but if he really stabbed Cyris in the stomach then something still had to have happened to the two women. Did Charlie kill them?

At the moment he’s working on the letter. She doesn’t care whether he posts it – she suggested it in the hope that if he begins putting words on paper about what happened he may begin to realise what he’s doing. If some of the old Charlie is still in there then maybe he’ll see the decisions he’s making are insane. Hopefully he’ll take responsibility for his actions and turn himself in. Charlie’s a smart guy, and she’s hoping for some of that intelligence to come back.

So far the plan hasn’t progressed beyond watching Charlie’s house. He tied her up again at one point so he could head out and buy some stationery. Now she’s resting on the bed, not tied to it, finishing off the muffins and a chicken sandwich that he bought for her earlier. The horror movie is still on TV and she wonders if there was one on yesterday morning too because it might suggest where Charlie got some of his ideas from.

The news said the two women died violently. It mentioned ritualistic killings. Did they really die by being staked through the heart as Charlie said? If so, did Charlie do the staking? It depends. It depends on how guilty she thinks he is. The idea of betraying Charlie hurts, but hell, it isn’t as if she owes him anything. Her loyalties now lie with two dead women she’s never met. She needs to get out of here. Needs to get the police.





11


‘Stakes,’ Jo says.