It would have every law enforcement agent in the tristate and District area fixated on one thing and only one thing.
The killings. These killings. The dead women. Eventually, he’d know what he needed to know. Eventually, it would work out. This spate of serial killings would end as swiftly as it had begun. As swiftly as it had ended years before. Once again, the killer would disappear into the annals of crime history.
That was too bad. He realized he’d acquired a taste for what he did. Maybe Slash would remain active; the persona of Slash was so alive and so real now. Sometimes he woke up believing he was Slash McNeil. Sometimes it was difficult to pull back, to remember who he really was.
Last night hadn’t been easy. She’d been a fighter and a squirmer. He’d chosen her differently. But in the end, it didn’t matter. And in the end, the river would be his salvation, washing away any trace of what had happened.
None of the women mattered. They were nothing—nothing at all. The end result was everything.
Except of course...
The agents. He wanted them dead. But that would create a disruption that would cause an even more intense kind of manhunt, would change the dynamics, could ruin everything.
Perhaps, though...
He thought about the one he’d been ordered not to kill, at least not yet. Made no sense. A hole in the ground was a hole in the ground.
Maybe she was already dead. Maybe he could find the time to go and watch her beg and plead, let her know exactly who had done this to her, let her see his face before he watched her die. Maybe that would calm his soul, stop this terrible craving to find a way to kill the agents.
But killing a man wouldn’t fit Slash’s profile, he told himself.
Killing her, though...
He ached, longing to kill them, to see them die.
His phone rang. “Hey, up and at ’em—boss wants you!”
Slash silently gritted his teeth.
Some people—who weren’t women—deserved to die, too.
And Slash imagined a different kind of killing as he rose to face the day.
*
Meg stood at the autopsy in Dr. Wong’s OCME, trying not to shake. She knew that the victim wasn’t Lara. And yet she’d felt that terrible dread when she first heard the news. It was painful to stand where she was, completely still and listening, as stoically professional as possible.
When they’d driven here that morning, she’d tried to reassure herself that it wasn’t going to be Lara. Lara had been in Harpers Ferry; she’d left the note. She’d known something—about Hubbard, about Walker—and that was why she’d disappeared. Not because she was dead.
“The victim was killed early this morning, probably about 2:00 or 3:00 a.m.,” Wong said. “The throat is slashed, the body was ripped from throat to groin and stones were stuffed into the resulting cavity. We’ve rushed tests. She was drugged in exactly the same manner as the previous victims. She was found in the Potomac River. What I believe is different about this woman is that she’ll prove to be a prostitute. She was sexually active previous to her murder, but there’s no sign that it was forced.”
“That makes her a prostitute?” Matt asked, puzzled.
Wong shook his head. “She’s got a tattoo on her inner right wrist. A rose. It signifies a loosely organized group of working girls who keep tabs on one another. Kind of a sisterhood. I know that because a john went crazy and killed a member of the group about six months ago. He was familiar to some of the other girls. The victim was seen leaving him, he was identified and arrested and he confessed to the crime. But it was nothing like this. I believe this one has our serial killer’s signature.”
“The tongue is missing?” Meg heard herself ask.
“It is. I’m not an investigator on the case,” Wong said, “but I’d like to point out that I believe this to be a rush job. The cuts are more jagged. The body was poorly stuffed—she floated almost immediately. Unless, of course, the killer needs a faster kick—needs the body to be discovered more quickly.”
“Let me know when you get an ID,” Matt said.
“You bet. Jackson Crow had an artist in, one of your people, Jane Everett. We’ve got her sketch going out in the media.”
“You have any idea where we’ll find other girls belonging to this sisterhood?”
Wong gave them an address and the two of them thanked him and then left. Outside, Meg was startled when she felt Matt’s hands on her shoulders, turning her to face him. He pulled her gently into his arms.
“We’re going to find her alive,” he whispered.