Dead Famous Read online

  This was clearly not an offer on Mallory’s part, but a hard statement of fact and no great favor to the doctor. Johanna Apollo was not smiling anymore.

  Mallory stood by the spice rack, absently rearranging the bottles so that every label faced forward in perfect alignment, and the older woman watched with great interest. What would Dr. Apollo make of this show of compulsive neatness? Charles felt suddenly protective of Mallory, as though she stood naked, her vulnerability publicly exposed. He wondered what else had been observed and how close the psychiatrist might have come to a dangerous truth. And, if the doctor should guess right, how might she make use of that information?

  Riker entered the kitchen wearing a happy glow that did not come from the wine. His glass was still full. “I’m hungry,” he said.

  Dinner was served quietly and without any more ceremony than the lighting of a single candle at the center of the table. Riker seemed unaware of any tension between the two women as he took his seat opposite Johanna Apollo, who might as well be the only occupant of the kitchen. He seemed—content. And this went deeper than his standard laid-back countenance; he was happy for the first time in many months. The cause could only be Johanna, and Charles’s gratitude was boundless.

  When the candle had melted halfway down and they were nearing the last course of dinner, the conversation turned to the subject of lawyers.

  “It’s a fascinating dilemma for the ACLU,” said Charles.

  Johanna nodded. “They always seem to pick the causes that paint them in a bad light, but this one is just too bizarre. The justice system is their raison d’être, and here they are helping Ian Zachary to dismantle it.”

  “One could almost feel sorry for them,” said Charles.

  “Hey,” said Riker, “they’re lawyers.” In his economy of words, this meant that, whatever their predicament, the civil-rights attorneys had it coming to them.

  While Charles busied himself with setting fire to the bananas flambé, he wondered why Mallory was the only one not on a first-name basis with Johanna Apollo. As he set down the flaming desserts in front of his guests, in one frightened corner of his mind, he theorized that she was keeping a professional distance from this woman. Perhaps Mallory did not expect the doctor to survive. However, there was an alternate and equally good explanation, and now he chose to believe that Mallory simply did not like sharing friends with other people.

  A beeping noise interrupted his thoughts, and only Charles, the confirmed Luddite, sat perfectly still as the others checked their cell phones. It was Mallory’s, and she rose from the table to take her phone call in the privacy of the next room.

  Upon returning to the kitchen, she said, “That was Ian Zachary. He’s out on bail, and he wants to see me tonight.”

  This did not sit well with Riker, who checked his watch. “They’re gonna let him go back on the air?”

  “Not tonight,” said Mallory. “He’s suspended pending a hearing tomorrow. That should minimize the damage. Even if he gets a lead on the missing juror, he won’t expose the man till he’s back on the air. We’ve got twenty-four hours to find the Reaper or his next victim.” She stood behind Johanna’s chair, leaning down to ask, “Any ideas about where we should start looking?”

  Johanna lowered her head and remained silent.

  “Never mind, Doctor. We can talk about that later.” Mallory turned her back on the woman and walked toward the kitchen door, saying, “Charles will drive you back to your hotel.” Her hand was on the doorknob when she added, with just the suggestion of a threat, “I’ll catch up to you later.”

  “I’ll go with you,” said Riker.

  Slightly annoyed, Mallory turned around, obviously preparing to tell Riker that he was not invited. And now she discovered that he had not spoken to her; his eyes were on Johanna Apollo. Only Charles took note of Mallory’s expression, for it was quick to surface but more quickly hidden, and he put a name to it—abandonment.

  “Needleman’s using an alias.” Mallory inspected the door to the producer’s booth and its premium lock hyped as pickproof. But this was nothing approaching the advanced technology for the door to the studio. “The address you gave me is bogus and so is the social security number.” In anticipation of Ian Zachary’s next question, she said, “Your producer’s contract is still legal as long as there’s no attempt to defraud. You can report the fake number to IRS on suspicion of tax fraud, but I promise you—ten Treasury agents will not show up to break down this door.”

  “You have to do something.”

  “Why are you whispering?”

  Zachary turned his back on her and paced the floor in front of the producer’s booth, occasionally glancing at the locked door.

  Mallory sighed. This was going to be a long night. “Needleman never threatened you, right? So what’s the real problem?”

  “He watches me. I know he does.” Zachary’s voice was more normal now that he had been shamed out of the whispering mode. “The bastard gives me the creeps.”

  “Needleman. A man you’ve never met.” Could she make it more clear that he was wasting her time?

  “His window is always dark,” said Zachary, “but I can feel his eyes on me. I’m telling you this man is insane. Now, normally that’s a prerequisite for my staff, but I’m not the one who hired him. He’s under contract to the network.”

  “But your station manager knows Needleman, right?”

  “Yes, but they only met once for the interview. My lawyer got me a copy of Needleman’s contract. There’s a clause that says he never has to personally deal with me.”

  “So that’s the problem. He’s outside of your control. Smart man.” If not for the wine drunk tonight, she might have dialed back the sarcasm. No, probably not. “You think Needleman knows you killed the last producer? You only mention that murder every night on the radio.”

  Zachary faced the door to the booth. “You see this lock? It’s relatively new. I didn’t have it installed, and my contract’s supposed to give me complete control of security. Needleman put that lock on his door, and he has the only key. How paranoid is that? He’s the only producer at the station who locks the damn booth while we’re on the air.”

  His jitters increased when Mallory rested her hand on the knob. She smiled. “He might be a fan. That’s what you’re thinking, isn’t it? Judging by the calls you get, I’d say most of them are a little disturbed.”

  “What if he’s the missing juror? You were supposed to find that man for me, remember? Well, suppose, after all this time and money, he was right here, hiding in this booth all along?”

  Mallory decided to give Zachary a little thrill by pulling out a velvet pouch of lock picks and allowing him to watch her in the act of breaking and entering, thus giving him some value for the very large check that Highland Security would never be able to cash.

  “It’s illegal to carry burglar tools,” she said. “If you ever rat me out, I’ll have to hurt you. Understood?”

  Perverse bastard, he seemed to like that idea.

  The lock yielded, and the knob turned easily under her hand. And now, to give him his full money’s worth, she pulled her gun from the shoulder holster, then opened the door—to an empty booth. She flicked on the light to see the same meager floor space as the sound booth on the other side of the hall. It also had a window spanning the length of one short wall and looking in on the larger area of the studio. The console of this small room had one pair of speakers, a headset and little else in the way of technical equipment. Clipboards with schedules hung from hooks on the rear wall, and the wastebasket held more than one man’s debris. “How many people use this room during the day?”

  “Two producers for morning shows. The rest of the jocks don’t rate a staff, but sometimes sponsors come by and look in on their shows.”

  Mallory ran one finger over the surface of the built-in console. There was no dust. Evidently, the cleaning staff had no trouble getting inside.

  “Well, this is progress,” sai
d Zachary. “You can dust this place for fingerprints.”

  “But I won’t. There’s no point.” She did not plan to waste much time exploding the civilians’ television mythology of fingerprints. “The prints can only be matched by cops, and they need a good reason to use the national database. Too many people have access to this booth. Some of these prints have been here since the last time the room was painted, a hundred sets, maybe more. Now—if you die—the cops might run all those prints, but otherwise—”

  “So what’s the problem? Not money. Just bribe a cop and run them all.”

  “No cop can run a hundred prints without attracting attention and losing his job. Half the prints won’t even be in the database.” Baby-sitting Ian Zachary was tedious, and now one hand went to her hip, sign language to tell him that this discussion was over. “Why not do it the easy way?”

  She led him through the door to his studio. When they stood before the dark window of the producer’s booth, she pulled out a camera the size of a cigarette lighter. “Tomorrow night, palm this in one hand, then jam it up against the glass. It’s small but the flash is bright. He’ll never see it coming. When you’ve got his picture, I can tail him for you. Satisfied?” She gave him the camera. “I’ll put that on your bill.”

  He looked down at the small object in his hand, smiling at this elegant solution. “Great. So what about Dr. Apollo? Did you get me some good dirt?”

  “Suppose I find something that forces her into an interview? Wouldn’t that spoil the Reaper’s game? She doesn’t fit his criteria of too stupid to live.”

  “What if she’s the Reaper? Think about it,” he said. “A shrink is good at mind games. Didn’t you ever wonder why Dr. Apollo voted not guilty with the rest of them? She could’ve hung that jury all by herself. And here’s another thing. She’s a hunchback, a cripple. She could walk up to those people and slit their throats before they even got suspicious.”

  “But why?”

  He splayed his hands in a gesture of frustration. “That’s what I need from you. A motive. It could be the other juror, too, but I’m betting on the doctor. If I could get her on the air for ten minutes—”

  “You think she’d expose herself—to you.”

  “Yes. I’m that good.”

  “What if she didn’t do it?”

  “Well, I’d hardly be inclined to let that get in the way of a good show. And I’ve still got one more juror if the lady flops on the air. That’s assuming that you can find him for me.”

  Mallory turned to the dark glass of the producer’s booth.

  “You’re not coming with us.” Johanna Apollo gently pushed Riker away from the car. “You can hardly keep your eyes open. Go inside and get some sleep.”

  Riker had no comeback for that. He was cold sober, yet his feet were dragging and so was his mind. He could only stand there and watch the Mercedes pull away from the curb.

  When the car had reached the end of the street, a concerned Charles Butler looked back to see the man still standing there, as if he might have forgotten the way home—a door three steps to his left. “He’s so tired. I hope he doesn’t fall asleep on the sidewalk.”

  “It’s my fault,” said Johanna. “I’m guessing he never closed his eyes last night.” She faced the windshield, and her voice was softer, lower now, in the range of conspirators. “All through dinner, I had this feeling that you wanted to talk to me in private.”

  “About Mallory,” said Charles. “She tends to be a bit—Oh, how shall I put this?”

  “Utterly ruthless?”

  “I wouldn’t have said that.”

  “No, you wouldn’t. You’re her friend, but that’s her nature.”

  He began again. “There’s a kind of purity in Mallory’s character.”

  “And of course she’s a sociopath,” said Johanna, “but you already knew that.”

  They drove on in strained silence for a few blocks while Charles cast about in his great reservoir of words for exactly the right ones. “Mallory’s foster parents were very sheltering people.”

  “And good people. That’s what Riker tells me. He talks about the Markowitzes all the time. It’s a pity they didn’t get to that child sooner. I believe Mallory was ten or eleven when they took her into foster care.”

  He understood her meaning. Louis Markowitz had missed the wonder years when his foster daughter should have formed her socialization skills—but never did.

  “I’ll tell you where Mallory departs from the sociopaths I’ve treated,” said Johanna. “She doesn’t make any effort to be charming.”

  “She wouldn’t even know how.” Charles had intended this as a defense, but the words had come out all wrong.

  “However, she lies true to form,” said the doctor, “and much better than most.”

  “That’s a skill that goes with her job.” Did that sound egregiously defensive on his part? He kept his eyes on the road and softened his next remark. “The lying, well, that’s to a good purpose.” Indeed, that was sometimes the case. “Here’s another departure you may not have noticed. She never lies to increase herself in someone else’s eyes.” And that much was certainly true. “She doesn’t care what the world thinks.”

  “But the world should care what Mallory thinks,” said Johanna Apollo, and her voice was tinged with a sadness. “That young woman lives large, edgy, risky—and she’s dangerous.”

  “Dangerous,” said Charles. “Well, of course she is. She’s the police.” And she was so much more than that. “Mallory’s also gifted. High aptitude for mathematics and computers. My job is career placement for very bright people with unusual gifts, so I can assure you she’d make a fortune if she quit her job with Special Crimes.”

  “But would she have a gun and all that power? Don’t you think she’d miss frightening people?”

  The Mercedes came to a gentle stop at a red light, and he turned his face to Johanna Apollo’s. Her eyes held nothing but compassion, but this would not weaken his adversarial resolve, for friendship was everything to him, and his precious logic was sometimes warped to the best intentions. “Mallory frightens people when she has a reason to do so. You, for example. She thinks you’re holding back something important. Her instincts are remarkable—and very rarely wrong. And I’ve never found any false notes in her basic code. She’s a cop, and a good one. She is the law.”

  “I’m sure she knows exactly what she is.”

  Charles nodded, understanding these words on every intended level. “But don’t be too sure that you have an easy diagnosis for Mallory. Even if you were right about her, I’d never have her trade places with someone—”

  “Someone normal? Less dangerous perhaps? You do understand her, and you wanted to warn me about her. Thank you. I’d be honored to have Mallory for an enemy. But I think she looks at me like a broken piece of machinery that won’t cooperate in her scheme.”

  “If you know who the Reaper is—”

  “I’d never tell Mallory. Why ruin her game? She’s beautifully equipped to work it out on her own. Oddly enough, I admire her. She makes no apologies, takes no prisoners.”

  “Actually, she does,” said Charles as the Mercedes rolled forward again. “That’s not just a figure of speech. She takes hostages. That was . . . the warning.”

  Riker watched the taillights of the Mercedes until they winked out with the turn onto Houston. He sat down on the front steps, preferring this to falling down. The cold air was doing him no good. Had he ever been this tired before? Jo was right. Tonight he would be useless to her. But he had no worries about the Reaper while the giant Charles was in her company, though Mallory would actually make a more formidable opponent, and she was the one he counted upon to keep Jo alive through the night. With any luck, the lady would sleep through the changing of the guard when her second watcher arrived at the hotel. And he could only hope that Jo had the presence of mind to lock up Mugs before the cat could annoy Mallory and die.

  It was at times like this, when he was
at his weakest, that unbidden memories flooded his mind. He covered his eyes, as if that would help him block out an image of the wild-eyed teenager sitting on his bloody chest. The young psycho had been so disappointed that there was not one bullet left so that he might shoot out Riker’s eye. In the mornings, in that small space of time when dreams were not yet shaken off, he could feel the cold metal pressed to his eyeball and hear the click.

  His head tilted back, and he stared at the sky where the stars ought to be. There were none. Chains of thought on the subject of heaven led him back to Mexico and starry nights in Cholla Bay. If he could only make it back to that place, that summer. He had finally found a way to kill his waking nightmare, replacing it with a picture of his younger self standing on the beach under a Mexican sun. This boy was waiting for the man to wise up, to come back to the only place where he had been truly happy. If Jo would go with him, he might save himself. A cop’s pension would buy a life for two.

  He shook his head.

  No, you damn jerk. That’s a pipe dream.

  The boy with the guitar had had his chance and blown it, thrown it all away and gone home to New York. And the man, full grown and going gray, would surely die in this town. Falling short of salvation tonight, Riker thought he might settle for a drink or ten. He rose to his feet and headed down the street to a bar.

  Hours later, closing time, he was home again and entering the apartment building, feeling insufficiently smashed and counting on a quart of bourbon in his kitchen cupboard to finish the job. Riker was off to his bottle and his bed, and, with any luck, a blackout night with no dreams.

  When he stepped out of the elevator, the hall was pin-drop quiet. Pausing at the door, he fumbled with a ring of keys. Unlike most New Yorkers who only bothered with one lock out of three, he had lately picked up the habit of locking them all. The process of opening them took longer when he was drunk. Finally, after all combinations of keys and locks had been exhausted, he opened the door and felt along the wall till he found the switch and flicked it.