{"id":3184,"date":"2026-01-03T23:11:38","date_gmt":"2026-01-03T23:11:38","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/epub-book.com\/download\/scarpetta-16-cornwell-patricia\/"},"modified":"2026-01-03T23:11:38","modified_gmt":"2026-01-03T23:11:38","slug":"scarpetta-16-cornwell-patricia","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/epub-book.com\/download\/scarpetta-16-cornwell-patricia\/","title":{"rendered":"Scarpetta 16 – Cornwell, Patricia"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Book Preview<\/h3>\n
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Scarpetta<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

Kay Scarpetta (16)<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

by Patricia Cornwell<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

Chapter 1<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>Brain tissue clung like wet, gray lint to the sleeves of Dr. Kay Scarpetta\u2019s surgical gown, and the front of it was splashed with blood. Stryker saws whined, running water drummed, and bone dust sifted through the air like flour. Three tables were full. More bodies were on the way. It was Tuesday, January 1, New Year\u2019s Day.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>She didn\u2019t need to rush toxicology to know her patient had been drinking before he pulled the shotgun\u2019s trigger with his toe. The instant she\u2019d opened him up, she detected the putrid, pungent smell of booze as it breaks down in the body. When she was a forensic pathology resident long years ago, she used to wonder if giving substance abusers a tour of the morgue might shock them into sobriety. If she showed them a head opened up like an egg cup, let them catch the stench of postmortem champagne, maybe they\u2019d switch to Perrier. If only it worked that way.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>She watched her deputy chief, Jack Fielding, lift the shimmering block of organs from the chest cavity of a university student robbed and shot at an ATM, and waited for his outburst. During this morning\u2019s staff conference, he\u2019d made the incensed comment that the victim was the same age as his daughter, both of them track stars and pre-med. Nothing good happened when Fielding personalized a case.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cWe not sharpening knives anymore?\u201d he yelled.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>The oscillating blade of a Stryker saw screamed, the morgue assistant opening a skull and yelling back, \u201cDo I look busy?\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>Fielding tossed the surgical knife back on his cart with a loud clatter. \u201cHow am I supposed to get anything fucking done around here?\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cGood God, somebody get him a Xanax or something.\u201d The morgue assistant pried off the skull cap with a chisel.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>Scarpetta placed a lung on a scale, using a smartpen to jot down the weight on a smart notepad. There wasn\u2019t a ballpoint pen, clipboard, or paper form in sight. When she got upstairs, all she\u2019d have to do is download what she wrote or sketched into her computer, but technology had no remedy for her fluent thoughts, and she still dictated them after she was done and her gloves were off. Hers was a modern medical examiner\u2019s office, upgraded with what she considered essential in a world she no longer recognized, where the public believed everything \u201cforensic\u201d it saw on TV, and violence wasn\u2019t a societal problem but a war.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>She began sectioning the lung, making a mental note that it was typically formed with smooth, glistening visceral pleurae, and an atelectatic dusky red parenchyma. Minimal quantity of pink froth. Otherwise lacked discrete gross lesion, and the pulmonary vasculature was without note. She paused when her administrative assistant, Bryce, walked in, a look of disdain and avoidance on his youthful face. He wasn\u2019t squeamish about what went on in here, just offended for every reason one might be, and he snatched several paper towels from a dispenser. Covering his hand, he picked up the receiver of the black wall phone, where line one was lit up.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cBenton, you still with me?\u201d he said into the phone. \u201cShe\u2019s right here holding a very big knife. I\u2019m sure she told you today\u2019s specials? The Tufts student is the worst, her life worth two hundred bucks. The Bloods or the Crips, some gang piece of shit, you should see him on video surveillance. All over the news. Jack shouldn\u2019t be doing that case. Does anybody ask me? About to blow an aneurysm. And the suicide, yup. Comes home from Iraq without a scratch. He\u2019s fine. Have a happy holiday and a nice life.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>Scarpetta pushed back her face shield. She pulled off her bloody gloves and dropped them in a bright red biohazard can. She scrubbed her hands in a deep steel sink.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cBad weather inside and out,\u201d Bryce chatted to Benton, who wasn\u2019t fond of chatting. \u201cA full house and Jack\u2019s irritable depression, did I mention that? Maybe we should do an intervention. Maybe a weekend getaway at that Harvard hospital of yours? We probably could qualify for a family plan . . . ?\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>Scarpetta took the receiver from him, removed the paper towels, and dropped them into the trash.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cStop picking on Jack,\u201d she said to Bryce.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cI think he\u2019s on steroids again, and that\u2019s why he\u2019s so cranky.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>She turned her back to him and everything else.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cWhat\u2019s happened?\u201d she said to Benton.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>They had talked at dawn. For him to call again several hours later while she was in the autopsy suite didn\u2019t bode anything good.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cI\u2019m afraid we\u2019ve got a situation,\u201d he said.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>It was the same way he\u2019d phrased it last night when she\u2019d just gotten home from the ATM homicide scene and found him putting on his coat, headed to Logan to catch the shuttle. NYPD had a situation and needed him immediately.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cJaime Berger\u2019s asking if you can get here,\u201d he added.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>Hearing her name always unnerved Scarpetta, gave her a tightness in her chest that had nothing to do with the New York prosecutor personally. Berger would always be linked to a past that Scarpetta preferred to forget.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>Benton said, \u201cThe sooner the better. Maybe the one-o\u2019clock shuttle?\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>The wall clock said it was almost ten. She\u2019d have to finish her case, shower, change, and she\u2019d want to stop by the house first. Food, she thought. Homemade mozzarella, chickpea soup, meat-balls, bread. What else? The ricotta with fresh basil that Benton loved on homemade pizza. She\u2019d prepared all that and more yesterday, having no idea she was about to spend New Year\u2019s Eve alone. There would be nothing to eat in their New York apartment. When Benton was by himself, he usually got take-out.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cCome straight to Bellevue,\u201d he said. \u201cYou can leave your bags in my office. I have your crime scene case ready and waiting.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>She could barely hear over the rhythmic rasping of a knife being sharpened in long, aggressive sweeps. The buzzer from the bay blared, and on the closed-circuit video screen on the countertop, a dark-sleeved arm emerged from the driver\u2019s window of a white van as attendants from a delivery service buzzed.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cCan someone please get that?\u201d Scarpetta said at the top of her voice.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>On the prison-ward floor of the modern Bellevue Hospital Center, the thin wire of Benton\u2019s headset connected him to his wife some hundred and fifty miles away.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>He explained that late last night a man was admitted to the forensic psychiatric unit, making the point, \u201cBerger wants you to examine his injuries.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cWhat\u2019s he been charged with?\u201d Scarpetta asked.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>In the background, he could hear the indistinguishable voices, the noise of the morgue\u2014or what he wryly called her \u201cdeconstruction site.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cNothing yet,\u201d he said. \u201cThere was a murder last night. An unusual one.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>He tapped the down arrow on his keyboard, scrolling through what was on his computer screen.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cYou mean there\u2019s no court order for the examination?\u201d Scarpetta\u2019s voice moved at the speed of sound.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cNot yet. But he needs to be looked at now.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cHe should have been looked at already. The minute he was admitted. If there was any trace evidence, by now it\u2019s likely been contaminated or lost.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>Benton kept tapping the down arrow, re-reading what was on the screen, wondering how he was going to approach her about it. He could tell by her tone she didn\u2019t know, and he hoped like hell she didn\u2019t hear it from someone else first. Lucy Farinelli, her niece, had damn well better abide by his wish to let him handle it. Not that he was doing a good job so far.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>Jaime Berger had seemed all business when she\u2019d called him a few minutes earlier, and from that he\u2019d inferred she wasn\u2019t aware of the trashy gossip on the Internet. Why he didn\u2019t say something to her while he\u2019d had the chance, he wasn\u2019t sure. But he hadn\u2019t, and he should have. He should have been honest with Berger long before now. He should have explained everything to her almost half a year ago.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cHis injuries are superficial,\u201d Benton said to Scarpetta. \u201cHe\u2019s in isolation, won\u2019t talk, won\u2019t cooperate unless you come. Berger doesn\u2019t want anyone coercing him into anything and decided the exam could wait until you got here. Since that\u2019s what he wants . . .\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cSince when is it about what the inmate wants?\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cPR, political reasons, and he\u2019s not an inmate, not that anybody on the ward\u2019s considered an inmate once they\u2019ve been admitted. They\u2019re patients.\u201d His nervous ramblings didn\u2019t sound like him as he heard himself talk. \u201cAs I\u2019ve said, he\u2019s not been charged with any crime. There\u2019s no warrant. There\u2019s nothing. He\u2019s basically a civil admission. We can\u2019t make him stay the minimum seventy-two hours because he didn\u2019t sign a consent form, and as I said, he\u2019s not been charged with a crime, at least not yet. Maybe that will change after you\u2019ve seen him. But at this moment, he can leave whenever he wants.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cYou\u2019re expecting me to find something that will give the police probable cause to charge him with murder? And what do you mean he didn\u2019t sign . . . ? Back up. This patient signed himself into a prison ward with the proviso he can walk out the door whenever he pleases?\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cI\u2019ll explain more when I see you. I\u2019m not expecting you to find anything. No expectations, Kay. I\u2019m just asking you to come because it\u2019s a very complicated situation. And Berger really wants you here.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cEven though he might be gone by the time I get there.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>He detected the question she wasn\u2019t going to ask. He wasn\u2019t acting like the cool, unflappable forensic psychologist she had known for twenty years, but she wasn\u2019t going to point that out. She was in the morgue and she wasn\u2019t alone. She wasn\u2019t going to ask him what the hell was wrong with him.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>Benton said, \u201cHe definitely won\u2019t leave before you get here.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cI don\u2019t understand why he\u2019s there.\u201d She wasn\u2019t going to let that go.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cWe\u2019re not entirely sure. But in a nutshell? When the cops arrived at the scene, he insisted on being transported to Bellevue. . . .\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cHis name?\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cOscar Bane. He said the only person he\u2019d allow to conduct the psychological evaluation was me. So I was called, and as you know, I left immediately for New York. He\u2019s afraid of doctors. Gets panic attacks.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cHow did he know who you are?\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cBecause he knows who you are.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cHe knows who I am?\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cThe cops have his clothes, but he says if they want any evidence collected from him physically\u2014and there\u2019s no warrant, as I keep emphasizing\u2014it will have to be you who does it. We hoped he\u2019d calm down, agree to let a local ME take care of him. Never going to happen. He\u2019s more adamant than ever. Says he\u2019s terrified of doctors. Has odynephobia, dishabiliophobia.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cHe\u2019s afraid of pain and taking his clothes off?\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cAnd caligynephobia. Fear of beautiful women.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cI see. So that\u2019s why he\u2019d feel safe with me.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cThat part was supposed to be funny. He thinks you\u2019re beautiful, and he\u2019s definitely not afraid of you. I\u2019m the one who should be afraid.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>That was the truth of the matter. Benton didn\u2019t want her here. He didn\u2019t even want her in New York right now.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cLet me make sure I understand. Jaime Berger wants me to fly there in a snowstorm, examine a patient on a prison ward who hasn\u2019t been charged with a crime\u2014\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cIf you can get out of Boston, the weather\u2019s fine here. Just cold.\u201d Benton looked out his window and saw nothing but gray.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cLet me finish up with my Army Reservist sergeant who was a casualty in Iraq but didn\u2019t know it until he got home. And I\u2019ll see you mid-afternoon,\u201d she said.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cFly safe. I love you.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>Benton hung up, started tapping the down arrow again, then the up arrow, reading and re-reading, as though if he read the anonymous gossip column often enough, it wouldn\u2019t seem so offensive, so ugly, so hateful. \u201cSticks and stones,\u201d Scarpetta always said. Maybe that was true in grammar school, but not in their adult lives. Words could hurt. They could hurt badly. What kind of monster would write something like this? How did the monster find out?<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>He reached for the phone.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>Scarpetta paid scant attention to Bryce as he drove her to Logan International Airport. He\u2019d been talking nonstop about one thing or another ever since picking her up at her house.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>Mainly, he\u2019d been complaining about Dr. Jack Fielding, reminding her yet again that returning to the past was like a dog returning to its own vomit. Or Lot\u2019s wife looking back and turning into a pillar of salt. Bryce\u2019s biblical analogies were endless and irritating and had nothing to do with his religious beliefs, assuming he had any, but were leftover pearls from a college term paper he\u2019d done on the Bible as literature.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>Her administrative assistant\u2019s point was you don\u2019t hire people from your past. Fielding was from Scarpetta\u2019s past. He\u2019d had his problems, but then who hadn\u2019t? When she had accepted the position up here and had started looking for a deputy chief, she wondered what Fielding was doing, tracked him down, and found out he wasn\u2019t doing much.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>Benton\u2019s input had been unusually toothless, maybe even patronizing, which made more sense to her now. He\u2019d said she was looking for stability, and often people move backward instead of forward when they are overwhelmed by change. Feeling the desire to hire someone she\u2019d known since the early days of her career was understandable, Benton had said. But the danger in looking back was that we saw only what we wanted to see, he\u2019d added. We saw what made us feel safe.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>What Benton had chosen to avoid is why she didn\u2019t feel safe to begin with. He hadn\u2019t wanted to get within range of how she really felt about her domestic life with him, which was as chaotic and dissonant as it had ever been. Since their relationship began with an adulterous affair more than fifteen years ago, they\u2019d never lived in the same place, didn\u2019t know the meaning of day-to-day togetherness, until last summer. Theirs had been a very simple ceremony in the garden behind her carriage house in Charleston, South Carolina, where she\u2019d just set up a private practice that she then was forced to close.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>Afterward, they\u2019d moved to Belmont, Massachusetts, to be near his psychiatric hospital, McLean, and her new headquarters in Watertown, where she\u2019d accepted the position of chief medical examiner of the Commonwealth\u2019s Northeastern District. Because of their proximity to New York, she thought it a fine idea for them to accept John Jay College of Criminal Justice\u2019s invitation to serve as visiting lecturers there, which included offering pro bono consultation for the NYPD, the New York Medical Examiner\u2019s office, and forensic psychiatric units such as the one at Bellevue.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201c. . . I know it\u2019s not the sort of thing you\u2019d look at or maybe even be a big deal to you, but at the risk of pissing you off, I\u2019m going to point it out.\u201d Bryce\u2019s voice penetrated her preoccupations.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>She said, \u201cWhat big deal?\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cWell, hello? Don\u2019t mind me. I was just talking to myself.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cI\u2019m sorry. Rewind the tape.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cI didn\u2019t say anything after staff meeting because I didn\u2019t want to distract you from all the shit going on this morning. Thought I\u2019d wait until you were done and we could have a little heart-to-heart behind your closed door. And since nobody\u2019s said anything to me, I don\u2019t think they saw it. Which is good, right? As if Jack isn\u2019t pissy enough this morning. Of course, he\u2019s always pissy, which is why he has eczema and alopecia. And by the way, did you see the crusty lesion behind his right ear? Home for the holidays. Does wonders for the nerves.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cHow much coffee have you had today?\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cWhy is it always me? Kill the messenger. You zone out until what I\u2019m trying to convey reaches critical mass, and then kaboom, and I\u2019m the bad guy, and bye-bye messenger. If you\u2019re going to be in New York more than a night, please let me know a-sap so I can get coverage. Should I set up some sessions with that trainer you like so much? What\u2019s his name?\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>Bryce thought, touching a finger to his lips.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cKit,\u201d he answered himself. \u201cMaybe one of these days when you need me as your boy Friday in New York, he can have a go at me. Love handles.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>He pinched his waist.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cAlthough I hear liposuction\u2019s the only thing that works once you turn thirty,\u201d he said. \u201cTruth serum time?\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>He glanced over at her, his hands gesturing as if they were something alive and not part of him.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cI did look him up on the Internet,\u201d he confessed. \u201cI\u2019m surprised Benton lets him anywhere near you. Reminds me of, of what\u2019s-his-name on Queer as Folk ? The football star? Drove a Hummer and quite the homophobe until he hooked up with Emmett, who everyone says looks just like me, or the other way around, since he\u2019s the one who\u2019s famous. Well, you probably don\u2019t watch it.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>Scarpetta said, \u201cKill the messenger because of what? And please keep at least one hand on the wheel since we\u2019re driving in a blizzard. How many shots did you get in your Starbucks this morning? I saw two Venti cups on your desk. Hopefully not both of them from this morning. Remember our talk about caffeine? That it\u2019s a drug, and therefore addictive?\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cYou\u2019re the whole damn thing,\u201d Bryce went on. \u201cWhich I\u2019ve never seen before. It\u2019s really weird. Usually it\u2019s not just one famous person, you know? Because whoever the columnist is, he roams around the city like some undercover asshole, and shits on a lot of celebs at once. The other week, it was Bloomberg, and, oh, what\u2019s her name? That model always getting arrested for throwing things at people? Well, this time she was what got thrown \u2014out of Elaine\u2019s for saying something lewd to Charlie Rose. No, wait a minute. Barbara Walters? No. I\u2019m crossing over into something I saw on The View . Maybe what\u2019s-her-name the model went after that singer from American Idol. No, he was on Ellen, not in Elaine\u2019s. And not Clay Aiken or Kelly Clarkson. Who\u2019s the other one? TiVo\u2019s simply killing me. It\u2019s like the remote surfs through channels when you\u2019re not touching anything. You ever have that happen?\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>Snow was like a swarm of white gnats hitting the windshield, the wipers hypnotically useless. Traffic was slow but steady, Logan just a few minutes out.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cBryce?\u201d Scarpetta said in the tone she used when she was warning him to shut up and answer her question. \u201cWhat big deal?\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cThat disgusting online gossip column. Gotham Gotcha. \u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>She\u2019d seen ads for it on New York City buses and taxicab tops, the anonymous columnist notoriously vicious. The guessing game of who was behind it ranged from a nobody to a Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist who was having great fun making mean-spirited mischief and money.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cNas-ty,\u201d Bryce said. \u201cNow, I know it\u2019s supposed to be nasty, but this is nasty below the belt. Not that I read such tripe. But for obvious reasons, I have you as a Google alert. There\u2019s a photograph, which is the worst part. It\u2019s not flattering.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

Chapter 2<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>Benton leaned back in his desk chair, looking out at his view of ugly red brick in the flat wintry light.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cSounds like you got a cold,\u201d he said into the phone.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cI\u2019m slightly under the weather today. Which is why I didn\u2019t get back to you sooner. Don\u2019t ask me what we did last night to deserve it. Gerald won\u2019t get out of bed. And I don\u2019t mean it in a good way,\u201d Dr. Thomas said.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>She was a colleague at McLean. She was also Benton\u2019s psychiatrist. There was nothing unusual about it. As Dr. Thomas, who was born in the coal-mining hinterlands of western Virginia, liked to say, \u201cHospitals are more incestuous than hillbillies.\u201d Practitioners treated one another and their families and friends. They prescribed drugs for one another and their families and friends. They fucked one another, but hopefully not their families and friends. Occasionally, they got married. Dr. Thomas had married a McLean radiologist who scanned Scarpetta\u2019s niece, Lucy, in the neuroimaging lab where Benton had his office. Dr. Thomas knew Benton\u2019s business, pretty much all of it. She was the first person he\u2019d thought of some months back when he\u2019d realized he had to talk to someone.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cDid you open the link I e-mailed to you?\u201d Benton asked her.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cYes, and the real question is who are you more worried about? I think the answer might be you. What do you think?\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cI think that would make me incredibly selfish,\u201d Benton said.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cIt would be normal to feel cuckolded, humiliated,\u201d she said.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cI forgot you were a Shakespearean actor in an earlier life,\u201d he said. \u201cCan\u2019t remember the last time I heard someone refer to anyone as cuckolded, and it doesn\u2019t apply. Kay didn\u2019t wander out of the nest and into the arms of another man. She was grabbed. Were I to feel cuckolded, it should have been when it happened. But I didn\u2019t. I was too worried about her. Don\u2019t say \u2018the lady doth protest too much.\u2019 \u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cWhat I\u2019ll say is when it happened, there wasn\u2019t an audience,\u201d Dr. Thomas said. \u201cPerhaps it makes it more real when everybody knows? Did you tell her what\u2019s on the Internet? Or had she already seen it?\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cI didn\u2019t tell her, and I\u2019m sure she hasn\u2019t seen it. She would have called to warn me. Funny how she\u2019s like that.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cYes. Kay and her fragile heroes with their feet of clay. Why didn\u2019t you tell her?\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cTiming,\u201d Benton said.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cYours or hers?\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cShe was in the morgue,\u201d he said. \u201cI wanted to wait and do it in person.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cLet\u2019s retrace our steps, Benton. You talked to her at the crack of dawn, let me guess. Isn\u2019t that what you always do when you\u2019re away from each other?\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cWe talked early this morning.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cSo when you talked to her early this morning, you already knew what was on the Internet, because Lucy called you when?\u201d Dr. Thomas said. \u201cAt one a.m. to tell you, since your hypomanic niece by marriage has audible alarms programmed into her computer to wake her up like a fireman if one of her search engines finds something important in cyberspace?\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>Dr. Thomas wasn\u2019t joking. Lucy did have alarms that signaled her when one of her search engines found something she needed to know about.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>He said, \u201cActually, she called me at midnight. When the damn thing was posted.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cBut she didn\u2019t call Kay.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cTo her credit, she didn\u2019t, and she let it go when I said I would handle it.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cWhich you didn\u2019t do,\u201d Dr. Thomas said. \u201cSo we\u2019re back to that. You talked to Kay early this morning, by which time you\u2019d known for many hours what\u2019s on the Internet? Yet you said nothing. You\u2019ve still said nothing. I don\u2019t believe it\u2019s about telling her in person. Unfortunately, there\u2019s a good chance she might find out from someone other than you\u2014if she hasn\u2019t already.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>Benton took a deep, quiet breath. He pressed his lips together and wondered when it was, exactly, that he\u2019d begun to lose faith in himself and his ability to read his environment and react accordingly. For as far back as he could remember, he had possessed the uncanny ability to size up people at a glance or a quick listen. Scarpetta called it his party trick. He\u2019d meet someone or overhear a snippet of a conversation, and that was it. Rarely was he wrong.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>But he\u2019d completely missed the danger at the door this time, and still didn\u2019t fully comprehend how he could have been so devastatingly obtuse. He\u2019d watched Pete Marino\u2019s anger and frustration build over the years. He knew damn well it was a matter of time before Marino\u2019s self-loathing and rage reached flashover. But Benton didn\u2019t fear it. He didn\u2019t give Marino enough credit to be feared like that. He wasn\u2019t sure he\u2019d ever imagined Marino having a dick prior to its becoming a weapon.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>It made no sense, in retrospect. For virtually everybody else, it was impossible to get past Marino\u2019s rough-hewn machismo and volatility, and that particular recipe was Benton\u2019s bread and butter. Sexual violence, no matter its catalyst, was what kept forensic psychologists in business.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cI\u2019m having homicidal thoughts about him,\u201d Benton said to Dr. Thomas. \u201cOf course, I wouldn\u2019t do it. Just thoughts. I\u2019m having a lot of thoughts. I believed I\u2019d forgiven him and felt proud of myself, really proud of myself, because of the way I handled it. Where would he be without me? All I\u2019ve done for him, and now I want to kill him. Lucy wants to kill him. The reminder this morning didn\u2019t help, and now everyone knows. It\u2019s made it happen all over again.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cOr maybe happen for the first time. It feels real to you now.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cOh, it feels real. It always felt real,\u201d Benton said.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cBut it\u2019s different when you read it on the Internet and know a million other people are, too. That\u2019s a different level of real. You\u2019re finally having an emotional response. Before, it was intellectual. Out of self-defense, you processed it in your head. I think this is a breakthrough, Benton. A very unpleasant one. I\u2019m sorry for that.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cHe doesn\u2019t know Lucy\u2019s in New York, and if she sees him\u2014\u201d Benton intercepted his thought. \u201cWell, not true. She wouldn\u2019t really think about killing him, because she\u2019s been through that. She\u2019s long past that. She wouldn\u2019t kill him, just so you know.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>Benton watched the gray sky subtly change the redness of the old bricks beyond his window, and when he shifted in his chair and rubbed his chin, he caught his own male scent and felt stubble that Scarpetta always said looked exactly like sand. He\u2019d been up all night, had never left the hospital. He needed a shower. He needed a shave. He needed food and sleep.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cSometimes I catch myself by surprise,\u201d he said. \u201cWhen I say things like that about Lucy? It\u2019s literally a consideration and a reminder of what a warped life I live. The only person who never wanted to kill him is Kay. She still thinks she\u2019s somehow to blame, and it makes me angry. Just incredibly angry. I avoid the subject completely with her, and that\u2019s probably why I didn\u2019t say anything. The whole goddamn world is reading about it on the goddamn Internet. I\u2019m tired. I was up all night with someone I can\u2019t tell you about who is going to be a major problem.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>He stopped looking out the window. He didn\u2019t look at anything.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cNow we\u2019re getting somewhere,\u201d Dr. Thomas said. \u201cI\u2019ve wondered when you\u2019d cut the crap about what a saint you are. You\u2019re angry as hell, and you\u2019re no saint. There are no saints, by the way.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cAngry as hell. Yes, I\u2019m angry as hell.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cAngry at her.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cYes, I really am,\u201d Benton said, and admitting it frightened him. \u201cI know it\u2019s not fair. Good God, she\u2019s the one who was hurt. Of course she didn\u2019t ask for it. She\u2019d worked with him for half her life, so why wouldn\u2019t she let him into her house when he was drunk and half out of his mind? That\u2019s what friends do. Even knowing what he felt about her doesn\u2019t make it her fault.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cHe\u2019s wanted her sexually since they first met,\u201d Dr. Thomas said. \u201cRather much the way you felt. He fell in love with her. As did you. I wonder who fell in love with her first? Both of you met her around the same time, didn\u2019t you? Nineteen-ninety.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cHis wanting her. Well, that had been going on for a long time, true. His feeling that way and her stepping around it and trying so hard not to hurt his feelings. I can sit here and analyze it all I want, but honestly?\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>Benton was looking out his window again, talking to the bricks.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cThere isn\u2019t anything different she could have done,\u201d he said. \u201cWhat he did to her absolutely wasn\u2019t her fault. In many ways, it wasn\u2019t his fault. He would never do that sober. Not even close.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cYou certainly sound convinced,\u201d Dr. Thomas said.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>Benton turned away from the window and stared at what was on his computer screen. Then he looked out his window again as if the steely cold sky was a message for him, a metaphor. He removed a paper clip from a journal article he was revising and stapled the pages together, suddenly furious. The American Psychological Society probably wasn\u2019t going to accept yet another damn research article on emotional responses to members of social outgroups. Someone from Princeton just published basically the same damn thing Benton was about to submit. He straightened the paper clip. The challenge was to straighten it without a trace of a kink. In the end, they always snapped.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cOf all people, to be so irrational,\u201d he said. \u201cSo out of touch. And I have been. From day one. Irrational about everything, and now I\u2019m about to pay for it.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cYou\u2019re about to pay for it because other people know what your friend Pete Marino did to her?\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cHe\u2019s not my friend.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cI thought he was. I thought you thought he was,\u201d Dr. Thomas said.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cWe never socialized. We have nothing in common. Bowling, fishing, motorcycles, watching football, and drinking beer. Well, not beer. Not now. That\u2019s Marino. That\u2019s not me. Now that I think about it, I don\u2019t recall ever even going out to dinner with him, just the two of us. Not in twenty years. We have nothing in common. We\u2019ll never have anything in common.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cHe\u2019s not from an elitist New England family? He didn\u2019t go to graduate school, was never an FBI profiler? He\u2019s not on the faculty of Harvard Medical School? Is that what you mean?\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cI\u2019m not trying to be a snob,\u201d Benton said.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cSeems as if the two of you have Kay in common.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cNot that way. It never went that far,\u201d Benton said.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cHow far did it need to go?\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cShe told me it never went that far. He did other things. When she finally got undressed in front of me, I could see what he did. She made excuses for a day or two. Lied. I knew damn well she hadn\u2019t shut the hatchback on her wrists.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>Benton remembered bruises as dark as thunderclouds and shaped exactly the way they would be had someone pinned her hands behind her and held her against the wall. She\u2019d offered no explanation at all when Benton finally saw her breasts. No one had ever done anything like that to her before, and he had never seen anything like that before except in cases he worked. When he\u2019d sat on the bed looking at her, he\u2019d felt as if a monstrous cretin had mangled the wings of a dove or mauled a child\u2019s tender flesh. He\u2019d imagined Marino trying to eat her.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cHave you ever felt competitive with him?\u201d Dr. Thomas\u2019s voice was distant as Benton envisioned stigmatas he didn\u2019t want to remember.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>He heard himself say, \u201cWhat\u2019s bad, I guess, is I never felt much of anything about him.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cHe\u2019s spent a lot more time with Kay than you have,\u201d Dr. Thomas said. \u201cThat might make some people feel competitive. Feel threatened.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cKay\u2019s never been attracted to him. If he were the last person on the planet, she wouldn\u2019t be.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cI guess we won\u2019t know the answer to that unless there\u2019s just the two of them left on the planet. In which case, you and I still won\u2019t know.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cI should have protected her better than I did,\u201d Benton said. \u201cThat\u2019s one thing I know how to do. Protect people. Those I love, and myself, or people I don\u2019t know. Doesn\u2019t matter. I\u2019m an expert at it or I would have been dead a long time ago. A lot of people would be.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cYes, Mr. Bond, but you weren\u2019t home that night. You were up here.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>Dr. Thomas may as well have thrown a punch. Benton silently took it, could barely breathe. He worked the paper clip back and forth, bending and unbending, until it broke.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cDo you blame yourself, Benton?\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cWe\u2019ve been through this. And I\u2019ve had no sleep,\u201d he answered.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cYes, we\u2019ve been through all sorts of facts and possibilities. Such as you\u2019ve never allowed yourself a chance to feel the personal insult of what Marino did to Kay, who you quickly married afterwards. Maybe too quickly? Because you felt you had to hold everything together, especially since you didn\u2019t protect her, didn\u2019t prevent it? No different than what you do when you handle a criminal case, really. You take over the investigation, handle it, micromanage it, keep it a safe distance from your psyche. But the same rules don\u2019t apply in our personal lives. You\u2019re telling me you have homicidal feelings toward Marino, and in our last several conversations, we\u2019ve delved into what you call your sexual acting out with Kay, although she isn\u2019t necessarily aware of it, is that still correct? Nor is she aware that you\u2019re aware of other women in a way that\u2019s unsettling to you? Still true?\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cIt\u2019s normal for men to feel attractions they don\u2019t do anything about.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cOnly men do that?\u201d Dr. Thomas asked.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cYou know what I mean.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cWhat\u2019s Kay aware of?\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cI\u2019m trying to be a good husband,\u201d Benton said. \u201cI love her. I\u2019m in love with her.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cAre you worried you\u2019ll have an affair? Cheat?\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cNo. Absolutely not. I would never do that,\u201d he said.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cNo. Not. Never. You cheated on Connie. Left her for Kay. But that was a long time ago, wasn\u2019t it.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cI\u2019ve never loved anybody as much as I love Kay,\u201d Benton said. \u201cI would never forgive myself.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cMy question is whether you completely trust yourself.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cI don\u2019t know.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cDo you completely trust her? She\u2019s very attractive, and now she must have a lot of fans because of CNN. A powerful, good-looking woman can have her pick. What about her trainer? You said you can\u2019t stand the thought that he puts his hands on her.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cI\u2019m glad she\u2019s taking care of herself, and a trainer\u2019s a good thing. Prevents people from injuring themselves, especially if they\u2019ve never worked with weights and aren\u2019t twenty years old.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cI believe his name is Kit.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>Benton didn\u2019t like Kit. He always found excuses not to use the gym in their apartment building if Scarpetta was working out with Kit.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cTruth of the matter,\u201d Dr. Thomas said. \u201cWhether you trust Kay or not, it won\u2019t change her behavior. That\u2019s her power, not yours. I\u2019m more interested in whether you trust yourself.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cI don\u2019t know why you continue to push me on this,\u201d Benton said.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cSince you got married, your sexual patterns have changed. At least that\u2019s what you told me the first time we talked. You find excuses not to have sex when the opportunity is there, and then want it when you, quote, shouldn\u2019t. Again, what you told me. Still true?\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cProbably,\u201d Benton said.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cThat\u2019s one way to pay her back.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cI\u2019m not paying her back for Marino. Jesus Christ. She didn\u2019t do anything wrong.\u201d Benton tried not to sound angry.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cNo,\u201d Dr. Thomas said. \u201cI think it\u2019s more likely you\u2019re paying her back for being your wife. You don\u2019t want a wife. You never have, and that\u2019s not what you fell in love with. You fell in love with a powerful woman, not a wife. You\u2019re sexually attracted to Kay Scarpetta, not to a wife.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cShe\u2019s Kay Scarpetta and my wife. In fact, in many ways, she\u2019s more powerful than she\u2019s ever been in her life.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cIt\u2019s not the rest of us who need convincing, Benton.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>Dr. Thomas always gave him special treatment, meaning she was more aggressive and confrontational than she was with her other patients. She and Benton shared a commonality that went beyond their therapeutic bond. Each understood how the other processed information, and Dr. Thomas could see right through linguistic camouflage. Denial, evasion, and passive communication simply weren\u2019t options. Long sessions of silent staring as the shrink waited for an uptight patient to launch into what was bothering him weren\u2019t going to happen. One minute into the void, and she was going to prompt Benton as she did last time: Did you come here for me to admire your Herm\u00e8s tie? Or do you have something on your mind? Maybe we should pick up where we left off last time. How\u2019s your libido?<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>Dr. Thomas said, \u201cAnd Marino? Will you talk to him?\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cProbably not,\u201d Benton said.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cWell, it seems you have a lot of people not to talk to, and I\u2019ll leave you with my quirky little theory that at some level we intend everything we do. That\u2019s why it\u2019s extremely important to root out our intentions before they uproot us. Gerald\u2019s waiting for me. Errands. We\u2019re having a dinner party tonight, which we need like a hole in the head.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>It was her way of saying \u201cEnough.\u201d Benton needed to process.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>He got up from his desk and stood before his office window, gazing out at the leaden winter afternoon. Nineteen floors below, the hospital\u2019s small garden was barren, its concrete fountain dry.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

Chapter 3<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>GOTHAM GOTCHA!<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>Happy New Year, everyone!<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>My resolution is all about you\u2014what will really grab you, and as I was mulling it over . . . ? Well, you know how they roll back the year? Remind us of every awful thing that happened so we can get depressed all over again? Guess who filled my to-die-for fifty-eight-inch HD Samsung plasma TV?<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>The to-die-for queen herself: Dr. Kay Scarpetta.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>Walking up courthouse steps to testify in another sensational murder trial. Her sidekick investigator Pete Marino in tow\u2014meaning the trial was at least six, seven months ago, right? I think we all know the poor fat maggot\u2019s not her sidekick anymore. Has anybody seen him? Is he in a cosmic jail somewhere? (Imagine working for a forensic diva like Scarpetta. Were it me, I might just commit suicide and hope she\u2019s not the one who does the autopsy.)<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>Anyway, back to her walking up the courthouse steps. Cameras, the media, wannabes, spectators everywhere. Because she\u2019s the expert, right? Gets called in from here to Italy because who better? So I poured another glass of Maker\u2019s Mark, cranked up Coldplay, and watched her for a while, testifying in that pathological language of hers so few of us understand beyond getting the drift that some little girl was raped from stem to stern, even found seminal fluid in her ear (thought you could get that only from phone sex), and her head was bashed against the tile floor and blunt force trauma was what killed her. It dawned on me:<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>Who the hell is Scarpetta, anyway?<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>If you took away the hype, would there be anything behind it?<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>I began doing a little research. Start with this. She\u2019s a politico. Don\u2019t fall for bullshit about her being a champion for justice, a voice for those who can no longer speak, the lady physician who believes in \u201cFirst Do No Harm.\u201d (Are we absolutely sure Hippocrates isn\u2019t where the word hypocrite comes from?) Fact is, Scarpetta\u2019s a megalomaniac who manipulates us on CNN into believing she\u2019s serving an altruistic social service when the only thing she\u2019s serving is herself. . . .<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>Scarpetta had seen enough and dropped her BlackBerry into her handbag, disgusted that Bryce had suggested she look at such rot. She was as annoyed with him as she would be if he had written it, and she could have done without his critique of the photograph that accompanied the column. Although the display on her BlackBerry was small, she saw enough to get a good impression of what he\u2019d meant when he\u2019d said the photograph was unflattering.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>She looked like a she-devil in bloody scrubs, a face shield, a disposable hair cover reminiscent of a shower cap. Her mouth was open mid-sentence, her bloody gloved hand pointing a scalpel, as if she was threatening someone. The black rubber chronograph watch she was wearing was a birthday gift from Lucy in 2005, meaning the photograph had been taken at some point in the last three and a half years.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>Taken where?<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>Scarpetta didn\u2019t know. The background had been whited out.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cThirty-four dollar, twenty cent,\u201d her driver said loudly as the taxi abruptly halted.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>She looked through her side window at the closed black iron front gates of Bellevue\u2019s former psychiatric hospital, a foreboding red-rock building some two centuries old that hadn\u2019t seen a patient in decades. No lights, no cars, nobody home, the guard booth behind the fence empty.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cNot here,\u201d she said loudly through the opening in the Plexiglas partition. \u201cWrong Bellevue.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>She repeated the address she\u2019d given him when he\u2019d picked her up at La Guardia, but the more she explained, the more insistent he got, jabbing his finger at the entrance, where Psychiatric Hospital was carved in granite. She leaned closer to him, directing his attention several blocks ahead where tall buildings were etched in gray, but he was bullish in his bad English. He wasn\u2019t taking her anywhere else, and she must get out of the cab right now. It entered her mind that he truly didn\u2019t know that the Bellevue Hospital Center wasn\u2019t this creepy old horror that looked like something out of One Flew over the Cuckoo\u2019s Nest. He probably thought his passenger was a psychiatric patient, a criminally insane one suffering a relapse. Why else would she have luggage?<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>Scarpetta decided she\u2019d rather walk the rest of the way in arctic blasts of wind than deal with him. Paying the fare, she got out of the cab, shouldered two bags, and began rolling her suitcase full of home cooking along the sidewalk. She pressed a button on her wireless earpiece.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cI\u2019m almost here\u2014\u201d she started to tell Benton. \u201cDammit!\u201d Her suitcase flopped over as if someone shot it.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cKay? Where are you?\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cI just got thrown out of a taxi\u2014\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cWhat? Thrown out of what? You\u2019re breaking up . . .\u201d he said, right before the battery went dead.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>She felt like a homeless person as she struggled with her luggage, the suitcase falling over every other minute, and when she\u2019d bend down to set it upright, her other bags would slide off her shoulders. Cold and irritable, she made her way to the modern Bellevue at First Avenue and East 27th, a full-service hospital center with a glass atrium entrance, a garden, a renowned trauma unit and ICU, and a forensic psychiatric floor for male patients whose alleged crimes ranged from jumping a turnstile to murdering John Lennon.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>The phone on Benton\u2019s desk rang just minutes after he and Scarpetta were disconnected. He was sure it was her, trying him back.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cWhat happened?\u201d he said.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cI was about to ask you that.\u201d Jaime Berger\u2019s voice.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cI\u2019m sorry. I thought you were Kay. She\u2019s having some problem\u2014\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cI\u2019d say. Nice of you to mention it when we spoke earlier. Let\u2019s see. That would have been six, seven hours ago? Why didn\u2019t you say something?\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>Berger must have read Gotham Gotcha.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cIt\u2019s complicated,\u201d Benton said.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cI\u2019m sure it is. We have a number of complications to deal with. I\u2019m two minutes from the hospital. Meet me in the cafeteria.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>Pete Marino\u2019s one-bedroom walk-up in Harlem was close enough to Manna\u2019s Soul Food that he lived and breathed fried chicken and short ribs. It was unfair to a man whose deprivation of food and drink had created an insatiable appetite for everything he couldn\u2019t have.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>His makeshift dining area was a TV tray and straight-back chair overlooking the constant traffic on Fifth Avenue. He stacked deli turkey on a slice of whole-wheat bread, which he folded in half and dipped into a puddle of Nathan\u2019s Coney Island mustard on a paper plate. He drank a Sharp\u2019s nonalcoholic beer, about a third of the bottle in two swallows. Since he\u2019d fled from Charleston, he\u2019d lost fifty pounds and certain parts of his personality. Boxes of biker clothes, including an impressive collection of Harley-Davidson leather, went to a bazaar on 116th Sreet, where in exchange he got three suits, one blazer, two pairs of dress shoes, and a variety of shirts and ties, all knockoffs made in China.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>He no longer wore his diamond stud, leaving a tiny hole badly located in his right earlobe, which somehow seemed a symbol of his have-not, off-center life. He\u2019d quit shaving his scalp as smooth as a bowling ball, and what gray hair hadn\u2019t abandoned him circled his large head like part of a tarnished silver halo held up by his ears. He\u2019d made a pact to give up women until he was ready, and his motorcycle and pickup truck were pointless when there was no place to park, so he\u2019d given them up, too. His therapist at the treatment center, Nancy, had helped him comprehend the importance of self-control in his day-to-day interactions with other people, no matter what was wrong with them or what they had coming to them.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>She said in her descriptive way that alcohol was the lighted match that ignited the bonfire of his anger, and had gone on to explain that his drinking was a fatal disease he\u2019d acquired honestly from his blue-collar, uneducated, and inadequate father who got drunk and violent every payday. In short, Marino had inherited this fatal disease, and based on the brisk business at every bar and liquor store he quickly walked past, it was an epidemic. He decided it had been around since the Garden of Eden, where it wasn\u2019t an apple but a bottle of bourbon that the snake had given to Eve, which she in turn had shared with Adam, and that had led to sex and being thrown out of paradise with nothing but the fig leaves on their backs.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>Nancy warned Marino if he didn\u2019t religiously attend AA meetings, he would become a dry drunk, which was an individual who got angry, nasty, compulsive, and out of control without the benefit of a six-pack or two. The nearest gathering place of the AAs, as Marino called them, was a church not far from the Professional African Hair Braiding Center, and therefore quite convenient for him. But he hadn\u2019t become a regular or even an irregular. When he\u2019d first moved here, he\u2019d attended three times in three days, uncomfortable as hell when the participants, suspiciously kind and friendly, had gone around the room, introducing themselves, giving him no choice but to solemnly swear himself in, as if he were on trial.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>My name\u2019s Pete and I\u2019m an alcoholic.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>Hi, Pete.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>He sent Nancy e-mails explaining that it went against the nature and training of a cop to confess to anything, especially in a room packed with strangers, any one of whom might turn out to be a potential dry-drunk shitcan Marino might have to lock up someday. Besides, it had taken only three meetings for him to complete all twelve steps, although he\u2019d decided against making a list of persons he\u2019d harmed and making amends. His reason was step nine, which clearly stated that one shouldn\u2019t make amends if it would only further injure whoever had been harmed, and he decided that was everyone.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>Step ten was easier, and he had filled an entire notebook with the names of those who had wronged him throughout his life.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>He hadn\u2019t included Scarpetta on either list until a strange coincidence occurred. He found the apartment where he now lived, made a deal with the landlord to lease it at an affordable price in exchange for services, such as handling evictions, only to discover the location was so close to former President Bill Clinton\u2019s office that Marino often walked past the fourteen-story building on his way to the subway station at 125th and Lenox. Thinking of Bill Clinton caused Marino to think of Hillary Clinton, and that caused him to think about women who were powerful enough to be the president or some other world leader. That led to thoughts of Scarpetta.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>It had gotten to where he almost confused the two in his fantasies. He would see Hillary on CNN, then see Scarpetta on CNN, and by the time he changed channels in a desperate attempt to divert his attention with ESPN or maybe a pay-per-view movie, he was depressed. His heart would ache like an abscessed tooth. He would obsess about Scarpetta and the lists she wasn\u2019t on. He would jot her name on one list, then scratch through it and jot it on the other. He fantasized about what it would be like if she were president. He would suddenly find himself on the Secret Service\u2019s security threat list and have to escape to Canada.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>Maybe Mexico. He\u2019d spent several years in South Florida and could handle Spanish-speaking people better than he could those who spoke French. He\u2019d never understood the French, and didn\u2019t like their food. What did it say about a country that didn\u2019t have a national beer, like Budweiser, Corona, Dos Equis, Heineken, or Red Stripe?<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>He finished a second turkey roll-up, took another slug of Sharp\u2019s, and watched people whose only ambitions were West Indian take-out, boutiques, juice bars, tailor shops, or maybe the nearby Apollo theater, the noise of cars, trucks, and pedestrians a jarring orchestra that Marino didn\u2019t mind in the least. In warm weather he kept his windows open until he couldn\u2019t stand the dust. What he avoided was silence. He\u2019d had plenty enough of that in rehab, where he wasn\u2019t allowed to listen to music or watch TV, couldn\u2019t fill his head with anything but the confessions of drunks and drug addicts, and his own haunted thoughts and memories of embarrassingly naked talks with Nancy.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>He got up from his chair and collected his soggy paper plate, his napkin, his empty Sharp\u2019s bottle. The kitchen was no more than six steps away, with a small window above the sink that afforded him a view of artificial turf-covered concrete and aluminum tables and chairs surrounded by a chain-link fence\u2014what was advertised as the apartment building\u2019s backyard.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>On the counter was his computer, and he read the gossip column from this morning that he\u2019d saved on the desktop, determined to discover who was behind it, then find the scumbag and do something that would rearrange his or her body parts permanently.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>No investigative tool he knew of worked. He could Google Gotham Gotcha until the cows came home, and nothing that popped up told him a damn thing he didn\u2019t already know. It was useless trying to trace the columnist through the advertising companies that paid to push foods, liquor, books, electronics, movies, and TV shows. There was no pattern, only the validation that millions of fans were addicted to a fucking gossip column that this morning had made the worst episode of Marino\u2019s life its centerpiece.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>His phone rang.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>It was Detective Mike Morales.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cWhat\u2019s up,\u201d Marino said.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cData mining, bro,\u201d Morales said in his slow, lazy way.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cI\u2019m not your bro. Don\u2019t waste your rapper-talk shit on me.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>Morales\u2019s MO was to come across as half asleep and bored, and doped up on sedatives or painkillers, which Marino doubted, but then again, he didn\u2019t know. Behind Morales\u2019s haze was a snobby bastard who had gone to Dartmouth, then Johns Hopkins, where he\u2019d completed medical school and decided he\u2019d rather be one of New York\u2019s finest, a cop, which Marino didn\u2019t take at face value. Nobody who could be a doctor would end up a cop.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>Besides, he was a bullshit artist who circulated all sorts of wild stories about himself and laughed his ass off when other cops believed him. Supposedly, his cousin was the president of Bolivia, and his father had moved the family to America because he believed in capitalism and was tired of herding llamas. Supposedly, Morales had grown up in the projects of Chicago and had been a pal of Barack Obama until politics interfered, which seemed reasonable to those who didn\u2019t know better. No presidential candidate would want to be friends with someone who used words like bro and looked like a member of a street gang, right down to his half-mast baggy jeans, big gold chains and rings, and cornrow hair.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cBeen running queries all day\u2014not to be confused with homos, bro,\u201d Morales said.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cGot no idea what the hell you\u2019re talking about.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cQueer-ies? I forgot you got no sense of humor and barely finished high school. Looking for the usual patterns, trends, modus operandi, complaints, from here to Dollywood, and I think I hit on something.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cWhat besides Berger?\u201d Marino said.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cWhat is it about women like her and Kay Scarpetta? It might be worth dying to have her hands all over me. Goddamn. Can you imagine doing her and Berger at the same time? Well, who am I talking to? Of course you can imagine it.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>Marino\u2019s dislike of Morales instantly turned to hate. He was always screwing with Marino, putting him down, and the only reason Marino didn\u2019t screw him back, only harder, was Marino\u2019s self-imposed probation. Benton had asked Berger for a favor. If she hadn\u2019t granted it, God knows where Marino would be. Probably a dispatcher in some shitbox small-town police department somewhere. Or a drunk in a homeless shelter. Or dead.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cIt\u2019s possible our killer\u2019s struck before,\u201d Morales said. \u201cI\u2019ve found two other homicides that are somewhat similar. Not New York, but remember Oscar\u2019s self-employed and doesn\u2019t, quote, go to the office. He\u2019s got a car. He\u2019s got disposable income because he gets a tax-free check from his family every birthday, and right now the limit\u2019s up to twelve grand\u2014their way of not feeling guilty about their freako only son. He\u2019s got no one to support but himself. So we got no idea how much he travels or what he does, now, do we? I might just get a couple of oldie goldies cleared while I\u2019m at it.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>Marino opened the refrigerator, found another Sharp\u2019s, twisted off the cap, and hurled it into the sink, where it clattered like shotgun pellets smacking a pop-up metal target.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cWhat two other homicides?\u201d he asked.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cGot hits on two possibles in our database. Like I said, not New York cases, which is why they didn\u2019t come to mind. Both in the summer of 2003, two months apart. A fourteen-year-old kid hooked on oxys. Found nude, hands and ankles bound, strangled with a ligature that was missing from the scene. From a good family in Greenwich, Connecticut. Body dumped near the Bugatti dealership. Unsolved, no suspects.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>Marino said, \u201cWhere was Oscar the summer of 2003?\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cSame place he is now. Same job, living his whacked life in his same apartment. Meaning he could have been anywhere.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cI\u2019m not seeing the connection. The kid\u2019s what? Doing blows for drugs and got picked up by the wrong customer? That\u2019s what it sounds like to me. And you got reason to think Oscar Bane\u2019s into teenage boys?\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cYou ever notice we don\u2019t know what the hell people are into until after they start raping and murdering and it comes out in the wash? It could have been Oscar. Like I said, he drives. He can afford to get around and has plenty of time on his hands. He\u2019s strong as hell. We should keep an open mind.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cWhat about the other case? Another teenage boy?\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cA woman.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cSo tell me who and why Oscar might have done her,\u201d Marino said.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cOops.\u201d Morales yawned loudly. \u201cI\u2019m reshuffling my paperwork. Out of order, me, oh, my. She was first, then the kid. Beautiful, twenty-one, just moved to Baltimore from a rural town in North Carolina, got a nothing job with a radio station, was hoping to get into television, and instead got involved in some extracurricular activities to keep herself in oxys. So she was vulnerable to being picked up. Nude, hands bound, strangled with a ligature that wasn\u2019t found at the scene. Body found in a Dumpster near the harbor.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>Marino said, \u201cDNA in either case?\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cNothing useful, and there was no sign of sexual assault. Negative for seminal fluid.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cI\u2019m still waiting for the connection,\u201d Marino said. \u201cHomicides where people are probably doing tricks for drugs and end up bound and strangled and dumped are a dime a dozen.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cYou aware Terri Bridges had a thin gold chain around her left ankle? Nobody knows where it came from. Kind of weird she had no other jewelry on, and when I pushed Oscar about the ankle bracelet, he said he\u2019d never seen it before.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cAnd?\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cAnd these other two cases, same thing. No jewelry except a thin gold bracelet around the left ankle. Same side as the heart, right? Like a leg iron? Like, you\u2019re my love slave? Could be the killer\u2019s signature. Could be Oscar\u2019s signature. I\u2019m getting the case files together, still data-searching and digging for other info. Will put out alerts to the usual suspects\u2014including the posse from your past.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cWhat posse from my past?\u201d Marino\u2019s thoughts went from dark to black.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>He couldn\u2019t see through the storm clouds rolling in his head.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cBenton Wesley. And that hot young former agent-cop-whatever who\u2019s unfortunately untouchable to yours truly here, if rumors are to be believed. Of course, your little discovery of the laptops when you dropped by the scene earlier today without my permission just threw her a bone.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cI don\u2019t need your permission. You\u2019re not my den mother.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cNope. The den mother would be Berger. Maybe you should ask her who\u2019s in charge.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cIf I need to, I will. Right now, I\u2019m doing my job. Investigating this homicide, exactly like she expects me to do.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>He drained the last of the Sharp\u2019s and glass clanked inside the refrigerator as he went for another one. By his calculations, if each bottle was point three percent alcohol, he could achieve the first hint of a buzz if he drank at least twelve in quick succession, which he had tried before, and had felt nothing but an urgency to pee.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>Morales said, \u201cShe\u2019s got this forensic computer company Berger\u2019s eager to use. Lucy, as in Kay Scarpetta\u2019s niece.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cI know who she is.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>Marino also knew about Lucy\u2019s company in the Village, and that Scarpetta and Benton were involved with John Jay. He knew a lot of things he chose not to discuss with Morales or anyone else. What he didn\u2019t know was that Lucy, Benton, and Scarpetta were involved in the Terri Bridges case, or that Scarpetta and Benton were in the city right this minute.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>Morales\u2019s cocky voice: \u201cIt may relieve you to know that I don\u2019t believe Kay will be around long enough for you to have any awkward encounters.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>There could be no doubt. Morales had read that fucking gossip column.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cShe\u2019s here to examine Oscar,\u201d Morales said.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cWhat the hell for?\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cLooks like she\u2019s the blue plate special on Oscar\u2019s menu. He demanded her, and Berger\u2019s giving the little guy whatever his little heart wants.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>Marino couldn\u2019t stand the thought of Scarpetta being alone with Oscar Bane. It unnerved him that Oscar had requested her specifically, because that could mean only one thing: He was far more aware of her than he ought to be.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>Marino said, \u201cYou\u2019re suggesting he might be a serial killer, so what\u2019s he doing with the Doc? I can\u2019t believe Berger or anybody set her up for something like this. Especially since he could get out any minute. Jesus.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>He was pacing. In a dozen steps, he could cover his apartment\u2019s entire square footage.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cOnce she\u2019s done, maybe she\u2019ll buzz back to Massachusetts and you got nothing to worry about,\u201d Morales said. \u201cWhich is good, right? Since you got plenty to worry about already.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cThat right? Why don\u2019t you tell me.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cI\u2019m reminding you this is a sensitive case, and you didn\u2019t handle it all too well when Oscar Bane poured his heart out to you last month.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cI did it by the book.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cFunny thing about that. Nobody gives a shit once there\u2019s a problem. As far as your former boss Kay goes, I advise avoidance. Not that you have any reason to be in her company or show up unexpected at Bellevue. For example.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>It inflamed Marino to hear Morales call her Kay. Marino had never called her Kay, and he\u2019d worked side by side with her, had probably spent ten thousand hours with her in the morgue, in her office, in the car, at crime scenes, in her home, including on holidays, and even having a drink or two in her hotel room when they worked cases out of town. So if he didn\u2019t call her Kay, who the hell did Morales think he was?<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cMy advice to you is to make yourself scarce until Kay\u2019s back in Massachusetts,\u201d Morales said. \u201cShe doesn\u2019t need any more stress, you hearing me, bro? And what I don\u2019t want is next time we call her in for assistance, she says no because of you. We don\u2019t need her quitting her position at John Jay, quitting as a consultant because of you. Then Benton would quit next, if he wants to keep the wife happy. So we lose both of them because of you. I plan on spending a lot of years working with both of them. Being the Three Musketeers.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cYou don\u2019t know them.\u201d Marino was so angry, his heart was pounding in his neck.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cThey quit and it will hit the news,\u201d Morales said. \u201cAnd you know how things get passed down the line. A scandal because it will be the front page of the Post, a headline ten feet tall that Jaime Berger, the ace prosecutor of sex crimes, hired a sex offender and maybe she gets fired. Unbelievable how you can bring down the house of cards, man. Anyway, I gotta get off the phone. About what\u2019s on the Internet, what happened between you and Kay. Not to pry\u2014\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cThen fucking don\u2019t,\u201d Marino snapped.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

Chapter 4<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>Oscar Bane\u2019s hairless, shackled legs dangled over the edge of the examination table inside one of the several infirmaries in the psychiatric prison ward. His eyes, one blue, the other green, gave Scarpetta the unsettling sensation that two people were staring at her.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>A Department of Corrections officer had the solid, silent presence of the Rockies as he stood near the wall, allowing her space to work, but close enough to intervene should Oscar become violent, which seemed unlikely. He was frightened. He\u2019d been crying. She sensed nothing aggressive about him as he sat on the table, self-conscious in a thin cotton gown that was long on him but periodically sneaked open below the tie at his waist. Chains quietly clanked whenever he shifted his shackled legs or cuffed hands to cover himself.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>Oscar was a little person, a dwarf. While his extremities and fingers were disproportionately short, his flimsy gown revealed that he was well endowed elsewhere. One might go so far as to say that God had overcompensated him for what Scarpetta suspected was achondroplasia, caused by a spontaneous mutation of the gene responsible for the formation of bone, primarily targeting the long bones of the arms and legs. His torso and head were disproportionately large for his extremities, and his short, thick fingers diverged between the middle and ring fingers, giving his hands a somewhat trident appearance. Beyond that, he appeared normal anatomically except for what he had done to himself at considerable misery and expense.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>His startling white teeth had been bonded or bleached, possibly crowned, and his short hair was dyed bright yellow-gold. His nails were buffed and perfectly squared, and although Scarpetta couldn\u2019t swear to it, she credited his tranquil brow to injections of Botox. Most remarkable was his body, which looked as if it were sculpted of beige Carrara marble with bluish-gray veining. Perfectly balanced in its musculature, it was almost completely devoid of hair. The overall effect of his appearance, with his intensely different eyes and Apollo-like radiance, was rather surreal and bizarre, and she found Benton\u2019s comment about Oscar\u2019s phobias quite strange. He could not look the way he did without worshipping at the feet of pain and the practitioners who inflicted it.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>She felt the probe of his blue-green gaze as she opened the crime scene case Benton kept in his office for her. Unlike those whose professions didn\u2019t demand forceps, evidence envelopes and bags and containers, or camera equipment, forensic light sources, sharp blades, and all the rest, Scarpetta was forced to live a life of redundancy. If bottled water couldn\u2019t make it through airport security, a crime scene case certainly wouldn\u2019t, and flaunting her medical examiner\u2019s shield only drew more unwanted attention.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>She\u2019d tried it once at Logan and had ended up in a room where she was interrogated, searched, and subjected to other invasions to make sure she wasn\u2019t a terrorist who, the TSA officers had to admit, just happened to be the spitting image of that lady medical examiner on CNN. In the end, she wasn\u2019t allowed to carry the crime scene case on the plane anyway, and refusing to check it in baggage, she ended up driving. Now she kept duplicates of all security threats in Manhattan.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>She asked Oscar, \u201cDo you understand the purpose of these samples and why you\u2019re under no obligation to give them?\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>He watched her arrange envelopes, forceps, a tape measure, and various other forensic items on the white paper-covered examination table. He turned away from her and stared at the wall.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>The corrections officer said, \u201cLook at the doctor when she talks to you, Oscar.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>Oscar continued to stare at the wall.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>In a tense, tenor voice, he said, \u201cDr. Scarpetta, could you repeat what you said, please?\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cYou signed a release, agreeing it was all right for me to take certain biological samples,\u201d she replied. \u201cI\u2019m confirming you understand the scientific information these samples can provide, and that no one has asked for them.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>Oscar still hadn\u2019t been charged with a crime. She wondered if Benton, Berger, and the police interpreted his malingering to mean he was going to confess any minute to a murder Scarpetta knew nothing about. This forced her into an untenable and unprecedented position. Since he wasn\u2019t under arrest, she couldn\u2019t divulge anything he revealed to her unless he waived the doctor-patient privilege, and the only waiver he had signed so far was one that allowed her to take biological samples.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>Oscar looked at her and said, \u201cI know what they\u2019re for. DNA. I know why you need my hair.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cThe samples will be analyzed and the labs will have your DNA profile. Hair can tell us if you\u2019re a chronic substance abuser. There are other things the police, the scientists look for. Trace evidence . . .\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cI know what it is.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cI\u2019m making sure you understand.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cI don\u2019t do drugs, and I\u2019m certainly not a chronic substance abuser of any description,\u201d he said in a shaky voice, facing the wall again. \u201cAnd my DNA and fingerprints are all over her apartment. My blood\u2019s in there. I cut my thumb.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>He showed her his right thumb, a Band-Aid around the second knuckle.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cI let them fingerprint me when they brought me in,\u201d he said. \u201cI\u2019m not in any database. They\u2019ll see I\u2019ve never committed a crime. I don\u2019t get parking tickets. I stay out of trouble.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>He stared at the forceps she picked up, and fear shadowed his mismatched eyes.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cI don\u2019t need those,\u201d he said. \u201cI\u2019ll do it myself.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cHave you showered since you got here?\u201d she asked, putting down the forceps.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cNo. I said I wouldn\u2019t until you looked at me.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cHave you washed your hands?\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cNo. I\u2019ve touched as little as possible, mainly the pencil your husband had me use during certain psychological tests. Projective figure drawings. I\u2019ve refused to eat. I didn\u2019t want to do anything to my body until you looked. I\u2019m afraid of doctors. I don\u2019t like pain.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>She tore open paper packets of swabs and applicators while he watched, as if at any moment he expected her to do something that might hurt.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cI\u2019d like to scrape under your nails,\u201d she said. \u201cOnly if it\u2019s all right. We can recover trace evidence, DNA, from under fingernails, toenails.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cI know what it\u2019s for. You won\u2019t find anything that shows I did anything to her. Finding her DNA means nothing. My DNA\u2019s all over her apartment,\u201d he repeated himself.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>He sat very still while she used a plastic scraper to scrape under his nails, and she could feel his stare. She sensed his blue-green eyes like warm light as they touched her head and other parts of her, as if he was examining her while she was examining him. When she was done with the scraping and looked up at him, he was looking at the wall. He asked her not to watch while he plucked his own head hair, which she helped him place inside an envelope, and then his pubic hair, which went into another envelope. For someone so averse to pain, he didn\u2019t flinch, but his face was tense and his forehead was beaded with sweat.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>She peeled open a buccal brush, and he swabbed the inside of his cheek, and his hands trembled.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cNow please make him leave.\u201d He meant the corrections officer. \u201cYou don\u2019t need him here. I\u2019m not talking with him here.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cDoesn\u2019t work that way,\u201d the officer said. \u201cIt\u2019s not your choice.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>Oscar was silent. He stared at the wall. The officer looked at Scarpetta, waiting to see what she was going to do.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cYou know,\u201d she decided, \u201cI think we\u2019ll be fine.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cI\u2019d rather not do that, Doc. He\u2019s pretty keyed up.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>He didn\u2019t seem keyed up, but she didn\u2019t comment. What he seemed was dazed and upset, and on the verge of hysteria.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cWhat you mean is chained up like Houdini,\u201d Oscar said. \u201cIt\u2019s one thing to be in lockup. But I don\u2019t need to be shackled like some serial killer. I\u2019m surprised you didn\u2019t roll me out in a Hannibal Lecter cage. The staff here obviously doesn\u2019t know that mechanical restraints in psychiatric hospitals were abolished in the mid-nineteenth century. What have I done to deserve this?\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>He raised his cuffed hands and was sputtering, he was so incensed.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cIt\u2019s because ignorant people like you think I\u2019m a circus freak,\u201d he said.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cHey, Oscar,\u201d the guard replied. \u201cHere\u2019s a news flash. You\u2019re not in a normal psychiatric hospital. This is the prison ward you checked yourself into.\u201d He said to Scarpetta, \u201cI\u2019d prefer to stay, Doc.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cA freak. That\u2019s what ignorant people like you think.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cWe\u2019re fine,\u201d she repeated to the officer, and she could understand why Berger was exercising caution.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>Oscar was quick to point out anything he perceived as unfair. He was quick to remind everyone he was a little person, when in fact that wasn\u2019t the first thing people probably noticed about him, unless he was standing. Certainly, it wasn\u2019t what had caught her attention the instant she\u2019d walked into the infirmary. His different-colored eyes had flashed at her, and seemed a more startling green and blue in contrast to the brightness of his teeth and hair, and although his features weren\u2019t flawless, the way they fit together had invited her to stare, to study. She continued to wonder just what it was that Oscar Bane reminded her of. Perhaps a bust on an ancient gold coin.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cI\u2019ll be right out here,\u201d the officer said.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>He left, shutting the door, which like every door on the ward had no handles. Only the corrections officers had keys, so it was important to keep the double-cylinder deadbolt in the locked position. If the bolt was out, the door wasn\u2019t going to shut all the way and accidentally trap a member of the staff or visiting consultant such as herself inside a small room with a two-hundred-pound man who\u2019d just dismembered some woman he\u2019d met in a bar, for example.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>Scarpetta picked up the tape measure and said to Oscar, \u201cI\u2019d like to measure your arms and legs. Get your exact height and weight.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cI\u2019m four foot and a quarter,\u201d he said. \u201cI weigh one hundred and nine pounds. I wear a size-five shoe. Sometimes a four. Or a six and a half if it\u2019s a woman\u2019s. Sometimes a five and a half. It depends on the shoe. I have a wide foot.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cLeft arm from the glenohumeral joint to the tip of your third finger. If you don\u2019t mind holding your arms as straight as you can. That\u2019s perfect. Sixteen and one-eighth inches for the left. Sixteen and two-eighths for the right. Not unusual. Most people\u2019s arms aren\u2019t precisely the same length. Now your legs, if you can hold them straight out. I\u2019m going to measure from your acetabulum, your hip joint.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>She felt it through the thin cotton of his gown, and measured the length of his legs to the tip of his toes, and the shackles clacked quietly and his muscles bulged as he moved. His legs were only about two inches longer than his arms, and slightly bowed. She wrote down the measurements and retrieved other paperwork from the countertop.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cLet me confirm what they gave me when I got here,\u201d she said. \u201cYou\u2019re thirty-four, your middle name is Lawrence. You\u2019re right-handed, according to this,\u201d and she got as far as his date of birth and address in the city before he interrupted her.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cAren\u2019t you going to ask why I want you here? Why I demanded it? Why I made sure Jaime Berger was informed I wouldn\u2019t cooperate unless you came? Screw her.\u201d His eyes were watering and his voice wavered. \u201cTerri would still be here if it wasn\u2019t for her.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>He turned his head to the right and looked at the wall.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cAre you having trouble hearing me, Oscar?\u201d Scarpetta asked.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cMy right ear,\u201d he said in a voice that intermittently shook and changed octaves.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cBut you can hear with your left ear?\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cChronic ear infections when I was a boy. I\u2019m deaf in my right ear.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cDo you know Jaime Berger?\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cShe\u2019s cold-blooded, doesn\u2019t give a shit about anybody. You\u2019re nothing like her. You care about victims. I\u2019m a victim. I need you to care about me. You\u2019re all I\u2019ve got.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cIn what way are you a victim?\u201d Scarpetta labeled envelopes.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cMy life\u2019s been ruined. The person who means most to me is gone. I\u2019ll never see her again. She\u2019s gone. I have nothing left. I don\u2019t care if I die. I know who you are and what you do. I would even if you weren\u2019t famous. Famous or not, I would know who and what you are. I had to think fast, very fast. After finding . . . after finding Terri . . .\u201d His voice cracked, and he blinked back tears. \u201cI told the police to bring me here. Where I\u2019d be safe.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cSafe from what?\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cI said I might be a danger to myself. And they asked, \u2018What about to others?\u2019 And I said no, only to myself. I requested solitary confinement on the prison ward because I can\u2019t be in general population. They\u2019re calling me the Midget Murderer up here. Laughing at me. The police have no probable cause to arrest me, but they think I\u2019m deranged and don\u2019t want me disappearing, and I do have money and a passport, because I come from a good family in Connecticut, although my parents aren\u2019t very kind. I don\u2019t care if I die. In the minds of the police and Jaime Berger, I\u2019m guilty.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cThey\u2019re doing what they can to accommodate you. You\u2019re here. You met with Dr. Wesley. Now I\u2019m here,\u201d Scarpetta reminded him.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cThey\u2019re just using you. They don\u2019t care about me.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cI promise not to let anybody use me.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cThey already are. To cover their asses. They\u2019ve already convicted me, aren\u2019t looking for anybody else. The real killer\u2019s out there somewhere. He knows who I am. Someone will be next. Whoever did this will do it again. They have a motive, a cause, and I was warned but I didn\u2019t think they meant Terri. It never occurred to me they intended to hurt Terri.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cWarned?\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cThey communicate with me. I have these communications.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cDid you tell the police this?\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cIf you don\u2019t know who they are, you have to be careful who you tell. I tried to warn Jaime Berger a month ago about how unsafe it was for me to come forward with what I know. But I never imagined I was putting Terri at risk. They never communicated with me about Terri. So I didn\u2019t know about that, about the danger to her.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>He wiped tears with the backs of his hands, and his chains clanked.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cHow did you warn Jaime Berger? Or try to warn her?\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cI called her office. She\u2019ll tell you. Get her to tell you what a cold-blooded human being she is. Get her to tell you how much she cares. She doesn\u2019t.\u201d Tears rolled down his face. \u201cAnd now Terri\u2019s gone. I knew something bad was going to happen, but I didn\u2019t know it would be to her. And you\u2019re wondering why. Well, I don\u2019t know. Maybe they hate little people, want to wipe us off the planet. Like the Nazis did to the Jews, the homosexuals and gypsies, the handicapped, the mentally ill. Whoever threatened Hitler\u2019s Master Race ended up in the ovens. Somehow they\u2019ve stolen my identity and my thoughts, and they know everything about me. I reported it but Berger didn\u2019t care. I demanded to have mind justice, but she wouldn\u2019t even get on the phone with me.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cTell me about mind justice.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cWhen your mind is stolen. Justice is getting it back. It\u2019s her fault. She could have stopped it. I don\u2019t have my mind back. I don\u2019t have Terri. All I have is you. Please help me.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>Scarpetta slipped her gloved hands into the pockets of her lab coat and felt herself slipping deeper into trouble. She didn\u2019t want to be Oscar Bane\u2019s physician. She should tell him right now she wanted no further relationship with him. She should open that beige-painted steel door and never look back.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cThey killed her. I know they did it,\u201d Oscar said.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cWho do you think they are?\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cI don\u2019t know who they are. They\u2019ve been following me, some specialized group supporting some cause. I\u2019m their target. It\u2019s been going on for months, at least. How can she be gone? Maybe I am a danger to myself. Maybe I do want to die.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>He began to cry.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cI loved her more than anyone . . . ever in my life. I keep thinking I\u2019ll wake up. It isn\u2019t true. It can\u2019t be true. I\u2019m not really here. I hate Jaime Berger. Maybe they\u2019ll kill someone she loves. See how that feels. Let her live that hell. I hope it happens. I hope someone murders whoever she loves most in her life.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cDo you wish you could kill someone she loves?\u201d Scarpetta asked.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>She tucked several tissues into his cuffed hands. Tears fell, and his nose ran.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>He said, \u201cI don\u2019t know who they are. If I\u2019m out there, they\u2019ll follow me again. They know where I am right this minute. They try to control me through fear. Through harassment.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cHow are they doing this? Do you have reason to believe someone is stalking you?\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cAdvanced electronics. There are countless unclassified devices you can order off the Internet. Microwave-transmitted voice to skull. Silent sound. Through-the-wall radar. I have every reason to believe I\u2019ve been selected as a mind-control target, and if you don\u2019t think things like this happen, think back to the human radiation experiments conducted by the government after World War Two. Those people were secretly fed radioactive materials, injected with plutonium for purposes of nuclear warfare research. I\u2019m not making this up.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cI\u2019m aware of the radiation experiments,\u201d Scarpetta said. \u201cThere\u2019s no denying that happened.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cI don\u2019t know what they want from me,\u201d he said. \u201cIt\u2019s Berger\u2019s fault. All of it\u2019s her fault.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cExplain that to me.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cThe DA\u2019s office investigates identity theft, stalking, harassment, and I called and asked to talk to her, and they wouldn\u2019t let me. I told you. They put me on the phone with this asshole cop. He thought I was a lunatic, of course, and nobody did anything. There was no investigation. No one cares. I trust you. I know you care about people. I\u2019ve seen it with my own eyes. Please help me. Please. I\u2019m completely unprotected. I have no shields here. No protections.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>She checked shallow abrasions on the left side of his neck, noting that the stage of scab formation looked relatively fresh.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cWhy would you trust me?\u201d she asked.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cI can\u2019t believe you\u2019d say that. What manipulation are you trying?\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cI don\u2019t manipulate people. I have no intention of manipulating you.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>He studied her face as she studied more abrasions.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cOkay,\u201d he said. \u201cI understand you have to be careful what you say. It doesn\u2019t matter. I respected you before all that. You don\u2019t know who they are, either. You have to be careful.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cBefore all what?\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cYou were brave to discuss Bhutto\u2019s assassination. Terri and I watched you on CNN. You had a long day and night on CNN, talking about it, were so compassionate and respectful about that terrible tragedy. And brave and matter-of-fact, but I could tell what you felt in your heart. I could tell you were as devastated as we were. You were devastated, and it wasn\u2019t for show. You worked hard to hide it. I knew I could trust you. I understood. Terri did, too, of course. But it was disappointing. I told her she had to think of it from your perspective. Because I knew I could trust you.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cI\u2019m not sure why seeing me on TV would make you think you could trust me.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>She retrieved a camera from her crime scene case.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>When he didn\u2019t answer her, she said, \u201cTell me why Terri was disappointed.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cYou know why, and it was completely understandable. You respect people,\u201d Oscar said. \u201cYou care about them. You help them. I stay away from doctors unless I have no choice. I can\u2019t stand pain. I tell them to put me under, give me an injection of Demerol, do anything if it\u2019s going to hurt. I admit it. I\u2019m afraid of doctors. I\u2019m afraid of pain. I can\u2019t look at a needle if I\u2019m injected. I can\u2019t see it or I\u2019ll faint. I\u2019ll tell them to cover my eyes or inject me where I can\u2019t see it. You aren\u2019t going to hurt me, are you? Or give me a shot?\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cNo. Nothing I do should be painful,\u201d she said as she checked abrasions under his left ear.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>They were shallow, with no sign of epithelial regeneration at the edges. Again, the scabbing was fresh. Oscar seemed reassured by what she said, and soothed by her touch.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cWhoever\u2019s following me, spying on me,\u201d he started on that again. \u201cMaybe the government, but whose government? Maybe some hate cell or some cult. I know you\u2019re not afraid of anyone or any government or any cult or group or you wouldn\u2019t talk about the things you do on TV. Terri said the same thing. You\u2019re her hero. If only she knew I was sitting in this room with you, talking about her. Maybe she knows. Do you believe in the after-life? That the loved one\u2019s spirit doesn\u2019t leave you?\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>His bloodshot eyes looked up, as if looking for Terri.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cI don\u2019t know what I\u2019m going to do,\u201d he said.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cLet me make sure you understand something,\u201d Scarpetta said.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>She pulled up a plastic chair and sat close to the table.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cI know nothing about this case,\u201d she said. \u201cI don\u2019t know what you supposedly did or didn\u2019t do. I don\u2019t know who Terri is.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>Shock registered on his face. \u201cWhat are you saying?\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cI\u2019m saying I was called in to examine your injuries, and agreed to do so. And I\u2019m probably not the person you should be speaking to. Your well-being is of my utmost concern, so I\u2019m obliged to tell you that the more you talk to me about Terri, about what happened, the bigger the risk.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cYou\u2019re the only one I should be speaking to.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>He wiped his nose and eyes, and stared at her as if he were trying to figure out something very important.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>He said, \u201cYou have your reasons. Maybe you know something.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cYou should have a lawyer. Then every word you say is privileged, unconditionally.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cYou\u2019re a physician. Whatever we discuss is privileged. You can\u2019t allow the police to interfere with my medical care, and they have no right to any information unless I give permission or there\u2019s a court order. You must protect my dignity. That\u2019s the law.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cIt\u2019s also the law that if you\u2019re charged with a crime, my records can be subpoenaed by the prosecution or the defense. You need to think about that before you continue to talk to me about Terri, about what happened last night. Anything I say could be subpoenaed,\u201d she emphasized.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cJaime Berger had her chance to talk to me. She\u2019s nothing like you. She deserves to be fired. She deserves to suffer the way I am and to lose what I\u2019ve lost. It\u2019s her fault.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cDo you want to cause Jaime Berger harm?\u201d Scarpetta asked.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cI\u2019d never harm anybody. But she\u2019s harmed herself. It\u2019s her fault. The universe repays in kind. If she loses someone she loves, it will be her fault.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cI\u2019ll try to impress it upon you again. If you\u2019re charged with a crime, I can be subpoenaed and will have no choice but to disclose anything I\u2019ve observed. Yes. I absolutely can be subpoenaed by Jaime Berger. Do you understand that?\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>His different-colored eyes stared at her, his body rigid with anger. Scarpetta was aware of the heavy steel door, wondering if she should open it.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cThey won\u2019t find any justifiable cause to pin this on me,\u201d he said. \u201cI didn\u2019t stop them from taking my clothes, my car. I\u2019ve given consent to go inside my apartment because I\u2019ve got nothing to hide, and you can see for yourself the way I\u2019m forced to live. I want you to see it. I insist you see it. I said you have to see it or they can\u2019t go in. There\u2019s no evidence I\u2019ve ever hurt Terri unless they make it up. And maybe they will. But you\u2019ll protect me because you\u2019re my witness. You\u2019ll watch after me no matter where I am, and if anything happens to me, you\u2019ll know it\u2019s part of a plan. And you can\u2019t tell anyone anything I don\u2019t want them to know. Right now, legally, you can\u2019t reveal anything that goes on between us. Not even to your husband. I allowed him to do my psychological eval, and he\u2019ll tell you from my mental-health assessment that I\u2019m not crazy. I trust his expertise. More important, I knew he could get to you.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cDid you tell him what you\u2019re telling me?\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cI let him do the eval, and that\u2019s all. I said he could check my mind and you could check the rest of me. Otherwise, I wouldn\u2019t cooperate. You can\u2019t tell him what I say. Not even him. If that changes and I get falsely accused and you get subpoenaed? By then you\u2019ll believe in me and fight for me anyway. You should believe in me. It\u2019s not like you\u2019ve never heard of me.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cWhy would you think I\u2019ve heard of you?\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cI see.\u201d His stare was fierce. \u201cYou\u2019ve been instructed not to talk. Fine. I don\u2019t like this game. But okay. Fine. All I ask is you listen to me and not betray me or violate your sworn oath.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>Scarpetta should stop now. But she was thinking about Berger. Oscar hadn\u2019t threatened Berger. Not yet. Unless he did, Scarpetta couldn\u2019t reveal a word he said, but that didn\u2019t stop her from worrying about Berger, about anybody close to Berger. She wished he would come right out with it and say in no uncertain terms that he was a danger to Berger or to someone. Then no more confidentiality, and at the very least, he would be arrested for communicating a threat.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cI\u2019m going to take notes, which I\u2019ll keep in a file as a consultation,\u201d Scarpetta said.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cYes, notes. I want a record of the truth in your hands. In case something happens.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>She slipped a pad of paper and pen out of a pocket of her lab coat.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cIn case I die,\u201d he said. \u201cThere\u2019s probably no way out. They\u2019ll probably get me. This will probably be my last New Year\u2019s Day. Probably I don\u2019t care.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cWhat makes you say that?\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cWhatever I do, wherever I go, they know.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cWhat about right now?\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cMaybe. But you know?\u201d He looked at the door. \u201cThere\u2019s a lot of steel to get through. I\u2019m not sure they can get through it, but I\u2019m going to be careful what I say and what I think. You need to listen carefully. You need to read my mind while you can. Eventually, they\u2019ll completely control what\u2019s left of my free will, my thoughts. Maybe what they\u2019re doing is practice. They have to practice on someone. We know the CIA\u2019s had covert behavior-modification neuro-electromagnetic programs for half a century, and who do you think they practice on? And what do you think happens if you go to the police? Mysteriously, no report is filed. Same thing that happened when I reported it to Ms. Berger. I was ignored. And now Terri\u2019s dead. I\u2019m not paranoid. I\u2019m not suffering some schizoid, psychotic episode. I don\u2019t have a personality disorder. I\u2019m not delusional. I don\u2019t believe the Air Loom Gang is after me with their infernal machine, although one has to wonder about the politicians and if that\u2019s why we\u2019re at war in the Middle East. Of course, I\u2019m being facetious, although not much would surprise me anymore.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cYou seem very well versed in psychology and psychiatric history.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cI have a Ph.D. I teach the history of psychiatry at Gotham College.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>She\u2019d never heard of it and asked him where it was.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cIt\u2019s nowhere,\u201d he said.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

Chapter 5<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>Her username was Shrew because her husband used to call her that. He didn\u2019t always mean it as an insult. Sometimes it was a term of endearment.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cDon\u2019t be such a goddamn shrew,\u201d he would say, verbatim, after her complaints about his cigars or not picking up after himself. \u201cLet\u2019s have a drink, my darling little shrew\u201d usually meant it was five p.m. and he was in a decent mood and wanted to watch the news.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>She\u2019d carry in their drinks and a bowl of cashews, and he\u2019d pat the cushion next to him on the tawny corduroy couch. After a half-hour of the news, which, needless to say, was never good, he would get quiet and not call her a shrew or talk to her, and dinner would be the sounds of eating, after which he would retreat to the bedroom and read. One day he went out on an errand and never came back.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>She had no illusions about what he\u2019d have to say were he still here. He wouldn\u2019t approve of her being the anonymous system administrator for the Gotham Gotcha website. He would call what she did disgusting detritus that was intended to ruthlessly exploit and inflict disease upon people, and would say it was insane for her to work a job where she\u2019d never met any of those involved or for that matter didn\u2019t know their names. He would say it was outrageously suspicious that Shrew did not know who the anonymous columnist was.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>Most of all, he would be aghast that she had been hired over the phone by an \u201cagent\u201d who wasn\u2019t an American. He said he lived in the UK, but he sounded about as English as Tony Soprano, and had forced Shrew to sign numerous legal documents without her own counsel reviewing them first. When she\u2019d done everything asked of her, she was given a trial run of one month. Without pay. At the end of that period, no one had called to tell her what a marvelous job she\u2019d done or how thrilled the Boss (as Shrew thought of the anonymous columnist) was to have her onboard. She\u2019d never heard a word.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>And so she continued, and every two weeks, money was wired into her bank account. No taxes were withheld, and she received no benefits, nor was she reimbursed for any expenses she might incur, such as when she\u2019d needed a new computer some months back and a range extender for the wireless network. She wasn\u2019t given sick leave or vacation days or paid overtime, but as the agent had explained, it was part of the job description to be \u201con the call twenty-forty-seven.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>In an earlier life, Shrew had held real jobs with real companies, her last one a database marketing manager for a consulting firm. She was no tabula rasa, was all too aware that her current employment demands were unreasonable and she had grounds to sue the company if she knew whom she worked for. But she wouldn\u2019t think of complaining. She was paid reasonably well, and it was an honor to work for an anonymous celebrity whose column was the most talked-about one in New York, if not the entire country.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>The holidays were an especially busy time for Shrew. Not for personal reasons, because she really wasn\u2019t allowed to have personal reasons for anything. But website traffic inevitably surged, and the banner on the home page was a tremendous challenge. Shrew was clever, but admittedly had never been an especially gifted graphic artist.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>This time of year the publishing schedule was escalated as well. Instead of three columns per week, the Boss picked up the pace to please the fans and sponsors, and rewarded them for a year of being a faithful, enthusiastic, lucrative audience. Beginning Christmas Eve, Shrew was to post a column daily. On occasion, she was fortunate and got several at once and made adjustments, and they waited in a queue for auto release, and she was allowed a respite, could run a frivolous errand or two, or get her hair done, or go for a walk, instead of waiting for the Boss to get on with things. The Boss never thought twice about Shrew\u2019s inconveniences, and the truth was, it might be more dismal than that.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>Shrew suspected the Boss deliberately orchestrated it, no doubt through programming, so that columns were shipped one at a time although several days of them had been done in advance and were already in the can. What this implied was two important bits of intelligence.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>First, unlike Shrew, the Boss had a life and stockpiled work so he or she could do other things, maybe take a trip or be with friends or family, or simply rest. Second, the Boss did think about Shrew, was invested enough in their relationship to remind her regularly that she was small and unimportant, and was owned and controlled by whoever the anonymous celebrity might be. Shrew\u2019s was a nonexistence, and it was not her right to be granted a day or two when the work was done and she didn\u2019t need to think about it. She was to wait on the Boss and serve at the Boss\u2019s pleasure. The Boss answered Shrew\u2019s prayers or didn\u2019t, rather much with a finger on the mouse, the cursor on send.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>It was fortunate, really, that Shrew would dread the holidays were she given the opportunity to enjoy them, because they were nothing more than an empty ship that took her from one year into the next, reminding her of what she didn\u2019t have and what wasn\u2019t ahead, and that biology was unkind and played mischievous tricks on the mind. She didn\u2019t recall the process being a gradual one, as logic had always told her it would be\u2014a little gray hair here, a wrinkle or stiff joint there.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>It seemed that one day she looked in the mirror and didn\u2019t find the thirty-year-old she was inside or recognize the ruin looking back at her. Whenever she\u2019d put on her glasses these days, she discovered she was surrounded by loose, crinkled skin. She\u2019d find that pigmented spots, like squatters, had taken up residence all over her body, and hair, like neglected landscaping, had moved from where it belonged to areas well outside the garden. She had no idea why she needed so many veins unless it was to rush extra blood to cells bent on dying for the hell of it.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>It suited her that during this joyless journey between Christmas Eve and New Year\u2019s Day she\u2019d not had a moment to herself, and was on hold, waiting for the next column, no matter how many of them might already be done, the momentum building in a crescendo to New Year\u2019s Day, when the Boss posted twice. These, naturally, were always the most sensational.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>Shrew had received the second one a little while ago and was surprised and puzzled by it. The Boss never headlined with the same public figure twice in a row, especially for today\u2019s Daily Double, and this second column, like the first one, was solely devoted to Dr. Kay Scarpetta. No doubt it would be quite the hit because it covered all the bases: sex, violence, and the Catholic Church.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>Shrew expected a swarm of comments from the fans, and possibly yet another coveted Poisoned Pen Prize, which would leave everybody guessing, just like last time, when no one showed up to collect it. But she couldn\u2019t help puzzling rather nervously. What was it about the well-respected lady medical examiner that had set off the Boss like this?<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>Shrew carefully re-read the new column, making sure there were no typos or misspellings she might have missed. She fine-tuned the format as she wondered where on earth the Boss had gotten all this highly personal information she had flagged with the familiar NBS in red. Never-before-seen information was the most coveted. With rare exception, it and all gossip came from anecdotes, sightings, rumors, and fabrications sent in by fans, which were sifted through by Shrew and moved to an electronic research file accessed by the Boss. But none of the NBS information about Dr. Scarpetta was anything Shrew had sorted through or selected.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>So where had the Boss gotten it?<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>Apparently, assuming this was true, Dr. Kay Scarpetta had grown up in a poor, uneducated Italian family: a sister who was screwing boys before puberty, a dumb cow of a mother, and a blue-collar father just off the boat, whom little Kay helped in the small family grocery store. She played the role of doctor for many years while he died of cancer in his bedroom, thus explaining her eventual addiction to death. Her priest felt sorry for her and arranged for a scholarship at a Miami parochial school, where she was the resident nerd, a whiner, and a tattletale. For good reason, the other girls hated her.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>At this point in the column, the Boss switched to story mode, which was always when the writing was strongest.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>. . . On this particular afternoon, little Florida cracker Kay was alone in the chemistry lab, working on a project for extra credit, when Sister Polly suddenly appeared. She flowed across the empty room in her black scapular, her wimple and veil, and nailed her severe little pious eyes onto little Kay.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cWhat does our Father instruct us about forgiveness, Kay?\u201d Sister Polly demanded, her hands on her virgin hips.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cThat we should forgive others as He forgives us.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cAnd did you obey His word? What do you say?\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cI didn\u2019t obey.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cBecause you tattled.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cI was working on a math problem and had my pencils on my desk, Sister Polly, and Sarah broke them in half. I had to buy more, and she knows my family is poor . . .\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cAnd now you\u2019ve just tattled again.\u201d Sister Polly reached into a pocket and said, \u201cGod believes in restitution.\u201d She pressed a quarter into the palm of little Kay\u2019s hand before slapping her across the face.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>Sister Polly told her to pray for her enemies and to forgive them. She severely reprimanded little Kay for being a sinner with a wagging tongue, and said she clearly needed reminding that God didn\u2019t look kindly upon tattlers.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>In the bathroom across the hall, Sister Polly locked the door and took off her black leather cincture as she ordered little Kay to remove her plaid tunic and Peter Pan collar blouse and everything under it, and bend over and hold her knees. . . .<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>Satisfied that the column was ready to go live, Shrew typed her system administrator password to get into the website programming. She posted the column, but not without misgiving.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>Had Dr. Scarpetta done something of late that might have incited hatred in the Boss, whoever the Boss was?<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>Shrew gazed out the window behind her computer, momentarily reminded that throughout the entire day, a police car had been parked in front of the brownstone apartment building directly across the street. Perhaps a policeman had moved in, although she couldn\u2019t imagine that the average policeman could afford the rents in Murray Hill. It occurred to her that the policeman might be on a stakeout. Perhaps there was a burglar or lunatic on the loose. Her thoughts returned to the Boss\u2019s obvious intention of ruining the New Year for the lady medical examiner whom Shrew had always admired.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>The last time she had seen Dr. Scarpetta on TV was a few days after Christmas, after Benazir Bhutto was assassinated, and Dr. Scarpetta was explaining, diplomatically and tastefully, the damage shrapnel or a bullet or blunt-force trauma could cause, depending on what part of the brain or spinal cord was injured. Might that have something to do with the Boss\u2019s first column this morning, and now the bonus column? Perhaps Dr. Scarpetta had touched a nerve of extreme prejudice. If so, what sort of person did Shrew work for? Was it someone who hated the Pakistanis or Islam or democracy or human rights or women in charge? Perhaps the timing was simply coincidental and completely unrelated.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>But somehow Shrew didn\u2019t think so, and her intuition gave rise to an awful speculation she\u2019d never before considered. How did she know she didn\u2019t work for a terrorist organization that used the infamous, highly profitable Internet gossip column to subliminally communicate with extremist sympathizers and spread propaganda and, most important, fund terrorist plots?<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>Shrew didn\u2019t know. But if she was right, it was simply a matter of time before someone came looking for her, either Homeland Security or a member of the very terrorist sect behind Shrew\u2019s highly secretive and, frankly, suspicious job\u2014one she had never uttered a word about to anyone.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>To her knowledge, the only people who knew she worked for Gotham Gotcha were the Italian agent who had hired her over the phone (a man she\u2019d never met and whose name she didn\u2019t know), and the anonymous celebrity who actually wrote the columns and e-mailed them to Shrew for a light copyedit and format. Then she\u2019d post them, and the programming would do the rest, and the columns would go live at one minute past midnight. If terrorists were involved, then Dr. Scarpetta was a target. They were trying to destroy her professionally and personally, and her life could be in danger.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>Shrew needed to warn her.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>How could she do that without admitting she was the anonymous system administrator for the anonymous website?<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>She couldn\u2019t.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>She pondered this as she sat in front of her computer, staring out her window at the police car, wondering if there might be a way to get an anonymous message to her.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>At the very moment she was having these paranoid and decidedly unpleasant thoughts, someone pounded on her door, startling her. Maybe it was that strange young man in the apartment across from hers. Like most people who had caring families, he had gone away for the holidays. Maybe he was back and wanted to borrow something or ask a question.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>She looked through the peephole and was shocked to see a big rugged face, a balding head, and out-of-style wire-rimmed glasses.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>Oh God in heaven.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>She snatched up the phone and called 911.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>Inside Bellevue\u2019s cafeteria, Benton Wesley and Jaime Berger sat in a pink booth against the back wall, where they could have privacy. People who didn\u2019t recognize Berger often noticed her anyway.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>She had compelling good looks, was of medium height and slim, with deep blue eyes and lustrous dark hair. Always smartly dressed, today she wore a charcoal cashmere blazer, a button-up black sweater, a black skirt with a slit in back, and black pumps with small silver buckles on the sides. Berger wasn\u2019t provocative, but she wasn\u2019t afraid to look like a woman. It was well known that if the attention of lawyers, cops, or violent offenders began wandering over her physical landscape, she\u2019d lean close, point at her eyes, and say, \u201cLook here. Look right here when I\u2019m talking to you.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>She reminded him of Scarpetta. Her voice had the same low timbre that commanded attention because it didn\u2019t ask for it, her features similar in their keenness, and her physical architectural style completely to his liking, simple lines that led to generous curves. He had his fetishes. He admitted it. But as he had emphasized to Dr. Thomas a short while ago over the phone, he was faithful to Scarpetta and always would be. Even in his imagination, he was faithful to her, would instantly change channels when his fantasies strayed to erotic dramas that didn\u2019t feature her. He would never cheat on her. Never.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>His behavior hadn\u2019t always been so virtuous. What Dr. Thomas had said was true. He\u2019d cheated on his first wife, Connie, and if he was honest about it, the betrayal had begun early on when he\u2019d decided it was perfectly admissible and, in fact, healthy to enjoy the same magazines and movies other males did, especially during his four monk-like months at the FBI Academy when there was little to do at night except have a few beers in the Board-room, then return to his dorm where he could briefly relieve his stress and escape his uptight life.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>He had maintained this clandestine but healthy sexual routine throughout his sensible marriage until he and Scarpetta had worked one too many cases together and ended up in the Travel-Eze Motel. He\u2019d lost his wife and half of a considerable inheritance, and their three daughters continued to have nothing to do with him. To this day, some of his former colleagues from his FBI past still had no respect for him, or at least they blamed it on his morals. He didn\u2019t care.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>Worse than not caring and a vacuum where there should be a spark of remorse was the truth that he would do it all again, if he could. And he did do it all again, often, in his mind. He would replay that scene in the motel room, where he was bleeding from cuts that required stitches, and Scarpetta had tended to him. She\u2019d barely dressed his wounds before he was undressing her. It was beyond fantasy.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>What always struck him when he looked back on it was how he\u2019d managed to work around her for the better part of five years and not succumb sooner. The more he\u2019d flipped back through the pages of his life during his talks with Dr. Thomas, the more amazed he was by a number of things, not the least of which was Scarpetta\u2019s imperviousness. She honestly hadn\u2019t known how he felt, was far more aware of how she felt. Or at least that\u2019s what she told him when he\u2019d admitted that with rare exception, whenever she\u2019d seen him with his briefcase in his lap, it meant he was hiding an erection.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>Including the first time we met?<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>Probably.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>In the morgue?<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>Yes.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>Reviewing cases in that awful conference room of yours at Quantico, going through reports, photographs, having those relentless, endless, serious conversations?<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>Especially then. Afterward, when I\u2019d walk you back to your car, it was all I could do not to get in it and . . .<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>If I\u2019d known,Scarpetta had told him one night, when they were drinking a lot of wine, I would have seduced you immediately instead of wasting five goddamn years singing solo.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>Singing solo? Do you mean . . . ?<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>Just because I work around dead people doesn\u2019t mean I am one.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cThis is the main reason I\u2019m not going to,\u201d Jaime Berger was saying to Benton. \u201cPolitical correctness. Political sensitivity. Are you paying any attention to me at all?\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cYes. If I seem glazed, I\u2019m slightly sleep-deprived.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cThe last thing I want is a perception of prejudice. Especially now, when there\u2019s much more public awareness about dwarfism and the misconceptions and stereotypes historically associated with it. This morning\u2019s Post, for example. The headline about this big.\u201d She held her hands about two inches apart. \u201c Midget Murder.Horrible. Exactly what we don\u2019t want, and I expect a backlash, especially if other news sources pick it up and it\u2019s all the hell over the place.\u201d Her eyes were on his, and she paused. \u201cUnfortunately, I can\u2019t control the press any more than you can.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>She said it as if she meant something else.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>It was the something else that Benton was anticipating. He knew damn well the Terri Bridges case wasn\u2019t Berger\u2019s only agenda. He\u2019d made a tactical error. He should have brought up the Gotham Gotcha column while he\u2019d had the chance.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cThe joys of contemporary journalism,\u201d she said. \u201cWe\u2019re never sure what\u2019s true.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>She would accuse Benton of lying to her by omission. But technically he hadn\u2019t, because technically Pete Marino had committed no crime. What Dr. Thomas had said was correct. Benton wasn\u2019t in Scarpetta\u2019s house when it happened and would never know the nuances of what Marino had done to her that warm, humid Charleston night last May. Marino\u2019s drunken, grossly inappropriate behavior had gone unreported and largely undiscussed. For Benton to have made even the slightest allusion to it would have been a betrayal of Scarpetta\u2014and of Marino, for that matter\u2014and in fact would constitute hearsay that Berger would never tolerate under other circumstances.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cUnfortunately,\u201d Benton said, \u201cthe same sort of thing is being passed around on the ward. The other patients are calling Oscar names.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cVaudeville, carnivals, the Wizard of Oz,\u201d Berger said.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>She reached for her coffee, and every time she moved her hands, Benton noticed the absence of her large-carat diamond ring and matching wedding band. He had almost asked her about it last summer, after not seeing her for a number of years, but refrained when it became apparent that she never mentioned her multimillionaire husband or her stepchildren. She never made any reference to any aspect of her private life. Not even the cops were talking.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>Maybe there was nothing to talk about. Maybe her marriage was intact. Maybe she\u2019d developed an allergy to metals or worried about being robbed. But if it were the latter, she should think twice about the Blancpain she had on. Benton estimated it was a numbered timepiece that cost in the neighborhood of a hundred thousand dollars.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cNegative portrayals in the media, in the entertainment industry,\u201d Berger went on. \u201cFools, dimwits. The movie Don\u2019t Look Now. Folktale dwarfs, imperial court dwarfs. And rather apropos, the omnipresent dwarf who witnesses everything, from the triumph of Julius Caesar to the discovery of Moses in the bulrushes. Oscar Bane was witness to something, and at the same time accuses others of being witness to everything. His claims of being stalked, spied on, subjected to some sort of electronic harassment, and that the CIA might be involved and is torturing him with electronic and antipersonnel weapons as some sort of experiment or persecution.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cHe didn\u2019t go into that kind of detail with me,\u201d Benton replied.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cIt\u2019s what he reported when he called my office a month ago, and I\u2019ll get back to that momentarily. What\u2019s your assessment of his mental state?\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cHis evaluation is perplexing in its contradictions. MMPI-TWO indicates traits of social introversion. During the Rorschach, he had perceptions of buildings, flowers, lakes, mountains, but no people. Similar pattern with the TAT. A forest with eyes and faces in the leaves, indicative of someone disconnected from people, someone profoundly anxious, paranoid. Aloneness, frustration, fear. Projective figure drawings were mature, but no human figures, just faces with empty eyes. Again, paranoia. A feeling of being watched. Yet nothing indicative that his paranoia is long-standing. That\u2019s the contradiction. That\u2019s what\u2019s disconcerting. He\u2019s paranoid, but I don\u2019t believe his paranoia is long-standing,\u201d he repeated.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cHe\u2019s afraid of something right now that to him is real.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cIn my opinion, yes. He\u2019s afraid and depressed.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cHis paranoia,\u201d Berger said. \u201cBased on your experience and the time you spent with him, you don\u2019t believe it\u2019s his inherent disposition? It doesn\u2019t go back to his childhood? As in, he\u2019s always been paranoid because he\u2019s a little person? Perhaps was made fun of, mistreated, discriminated against?\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cFor the most part, it doesn\u2019t appear he had those early experiences. Except with the police. He repeatedly told me he hates the police. And he hates you.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cYet he\u2019s cooperated with the police. Excessively. Let me guess. His excessive cooperation won\u2019t prove helpful.\u201d As if she hadn\u2019t heard the part about Oscar hating her.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cI hope you\u2019ll get your chance with him,\u201d Benton said.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>The saying was, if a broken window were the victim, Berger could get a confession from the rock.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cI\u2019m fascinated by his cooperation with a group of people he certainly doesn\u2019t trust,\u201d she said. \u201cYet he\u2019s rather much given us free rein. Biological samples and his statement, as long as Kay\u2019s the one he gives them to. His clothing, his car, apartment, as long as Kay is right there. Why?\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cBased on his fears?\u201d Benton said. \u201cI would venture to say that he wants to prove there\u2019s no evidence linking him to Terri Bridges\u2019s murder. Most of all, prove this to Kay.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cHe should be more worried about proving it to me.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cHe doesn\u2019t trust you. He does trust Kay. Trusts her irrationally, and that worries me a lot. But back to his mind-set. He wants to prove to her he\u2019s a good guy. He didn\u2019t do anything wrong. As long as she believes in him, he\u2019s safe. Physically, and in how he views himself. At this point, he needs her validation. Without her, he almost doesn\u2019t know who he is anymore.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cGuess what. We do know who he is and what he probably did.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>Benton said, \u201cYou need to understand this fear of mind control is very real to thousands of people who believe they are victims of mind weapons. That the government is spying on them, reprogramming them, controlling their thoughts, their entire lives, through movies, computer games, chemicals, microwaves, implants. And the fears have gotten exponentially worse in the past eight years. I was walking through Central Park not so long ago, and here\u2019s this guy talking to the squirrels. I watched him for a while, and he turns around and tells me he\u2019s a victim of the very thing we\u2019re discussing. One of the ways he copes is to visit the squirrels, and if he can get them to eat peanuts out of his hands, then he knows he\u2019s still grounded. He\u2019s not letting the bastards get him.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cThat\u2019s New York, all right. And the pigeons wear homing devices.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cAnd Tesla gravity radar waves are being used to brainwash the woodpeckers,\u201d Benton said.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>Berger frowned. \u201cDo we have woodpeckers here?\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cAsk Lucy about advances in technology, about experiments that sound like a schizophrenic\u2019s bad dreams,\u201d he said. \u201cOnly this stuff is real. I don\u2019t doubt Oscar thinks it\u2019s real.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cI don\u2019t think anybody doubts that. They just think he\u2019s crazy. And they worry his craziness led him to murder his girlfriend. I alluded to his rather unusual protection devices. A plastic shield glued to the back of his cell phone. Another plastic shield in the back pocket of his jeans. A magnet-mounted external antenna on his SUV that seems to have no purpose. Investigator Morales\u2014you haven\u2019t met him yet\u2014says this is anti-radiation stuff. That\u2014and let me see if I can remember this right. A TriField meter?\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cTo detect frequency-weighted electric fields in the ELF and VLF range. A detector, in other words. An electromagnetic measurement tool,\u201d Benton said. \u201cYou hold it up in the middle of a room to see if you get readings that might indicate you\u2019re being electronically monitored.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cDoes it work?\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cIt\u2019s popular in ghost hunting,\u201d Benton said.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

Chapter 6<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

\n

Read the full book by downloading it below.<\/p>\n

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Book Preview Scarpetta Kay Scarpetta (16) by Patricia Cornwell Chapter 1 \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Brain tissue clung like wet, gray lint to the sleeves of Dr. Kay Scarpetta\u2019s surgical gown, and the front of it was splashed with blood. Stryker saws whined, running water drummed, and bone dust sifted through the air like flour. Three tables were … Read more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":3183,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[172],"class_list":["post-3184","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-patricia-cornwell"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/epub-book.com\/download\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3184","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/epub-book.com\/download\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/epub-book.com\/download\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/epub-book.com\/download\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/epub-book.com\/download\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3184"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/epub-book.com\/download\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3184\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/epub-book.com\/download\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/3183"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/epub-book.com\/download\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3184"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/epub-book.com\/download\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3184"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/epub-book.com\/download\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3184"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}