“Yeah, but it might have been an insult,” Zochi said. “Like, okay, here’s what everyone else called you, and now I’m no different to you than everyone else.”
“Wow, that’s good,” Mimi said, her voice rising on the last syllable. “I can use that.”
“There’s one other thing.” Zochi told her about finding Wilomena again and hearing about how Lois was braless on the night of her murder.
“I’m okay with the idea that he planted the bra with her body,” Mimi said. She sounded confident, as if she’d thought it through already. “We knew the size was way off. It seems like he was leaving a message with it. That’s what the inscription on the bra was about, just like the letters he left over Holly’s bed.”
“Right. So it was rage, but—”
“Controlled rage,” Mimi said. “Remember, whatever state he was in, he had to make an effort for each woman. He had to find Lois on the beach or arrange to meet her. He had to make his way over to Holly’s place. There would have been planning no matter what. That could happen even if he was in some Jekyll-and-Hyde blackout state and doesn’t remember doing it. I need to be careful with that, though, because it’s a possible defense.”
“Oh. Insanity or something, right?”
“Yeah, but that’s a tough sell to a jury. Personally, I don’t think DeSantos is crazy. I think he’s deeply angry. Alcohol doesn’t make us anything we’re not already. It just lets things out that were there in the first place.”
“Good point,” Zochi said. She was feeling better about it. “Where’s the DNA, anyway?”
“In process. We put a rush on it after Holly Rossi. I should know something early next week. Keep eyes on him until then, okay?”
“Like a hawk,” Zochi said and winked at a dark-skinned little boy peeking at her from behind a desk. He was there with his mother, talking to another detective about a missing person’s case. “Like a hawk.”
CHAPTER 40
Saturday, August 5, 2017
St. Lawrence Psychiatric Center Ogdensburg, New York
Midnight
A thrashing thunderstorm had passed over the hospital, but the night was cool and breezy in its wake. Hathorne was lying in bed, a stack of books next to him and the iPod Touch in his hands. He had opened the messaging program on his end, which he knew opened it up on the other end—Reaper’s end.
A few minutes had passed, though, before he’d gotten a response. His first message to Reaper was just: So close.
Finally, the response:
What is?
Everything. How does he look, now that the walls are closing in?
Cornered. Like a rat. They know he did her, the ex-girlfriend . . .
Don’t say her name, Hathorne punched out. Don’t use names, ever. There is no need. There is only you, and me. And our work is almost done.
Whatever. He looks like he saw a ghost, haha. They’re all over him.
It will get much worse for him, Hathorne wrote. The time to collect is very near. In all respects.
My money?
Yes, your money. You’ll be paid. Handsomely.
Yeah, what about the guy who brought me the computer? Who is he? Is he getting paid?
Hathorne stared at the screen. What a churlish little prick Reaper was being tonight! No matter—it was all but finished. He wouldn’t need Reaper much longer. Hathorne was not a man of honor, but he would arrange to have Reaper paid, just as promised. There was little satisfaction in this, as Reaper was too pathetic to know that Hathorne could disappear at any moment, utterly untraceable, and Reaper would get nothing. Still, sometimes it was best to keep one’s promises and just move on. He would placate the dumb, single-minded Reaper, and he would move on.
None of that is your concern. You’ll likely never see him again.
Why? I know how to contact him. Is he the person who will get the money to me?
The money will arrive in the manner I choose. Do not be troubled. You should know by now, I will do what I say I will do. Hasn’t every single thing I told you come true so far?
Yeah, so? I want my money. Anyway, what’s your name?
Soon.
Then, before some boorish reply could appear, Hathorne shut the program down and turned in bed to sleep.
CHAPTER 41
Monday, August 7, 2017
Tappan, New York
7:45 p.m.
She wasn’t supposed to, but Zochi took Joe’s worn-out box of memorabilia home with her. She was distrustful of working from home; home and work had to be rigidly separate in a job like hers. Still, she could concentrate better in the basement while her daughter, Lupe, sat with her abuelita upstairs, the fat tabby in between them, watching Beat Bobby Flay. Her town house was on a quiet street in a darling town about an hour northwest of the city. The choice of where to live was purposeful. It was the opposite of South Brooklyn.