Black Notice - Cornwell Patricia (читать книги онлайн без TXT) 📗

"I need to get back to Virginia," I said.

"That's easy enough to arrange," he said. "Whenever you want."

He hung the do not disturb sign outside the door and fastened the burglar chain.

"First thing in the morning."

We settled in the sitting area by the window, a small table between us.

"I take it Madame Stvan opened up to you," he said. "That was the harder nut to crack, if you must know. By now the poor woman's so paranoid-and for good reason-we didn't think she'd tell the truth to anyone. I'm glad my instincts were right."

"Your instincts?" I asked.

"Yes." His eyes stayed on mine. "I knew, if anyone could get through to her, it would be you. Your reputation precedes you and she can't have anything but the utmost respect for you. But it helps just a little that I have personal insight about you, too." He paused. "Because of Lucy."

"You know my niece?" I didn't believe him.

"We were in various training programs at the same time in Glynco," he replied, referring to the national academy in Glynco, Georgia, where ATF, Customs, Secret Service, Border Patrol and some sixty other law enforcement agencies did their basic training. "I used to feel kind of song for her, in a way. Her presence always managed to generate a lot of talk about you, as if she didn't have any talents on her own."

"I can't do a tenth of what she can," I said.

"Most people can't."

"What does any of this have to do with her?" I wanted to know.

"I think she has to be Icarus and fly too close to the sun because of you. I hope she doesn't push that myth too far and fall from the sky,"

The comment shot fear through me. I had no idea what Lucy was doing right now. Talley was right about what he said, too. My niece always had to do everything bigger, better, faster and riskier than I did, as if competing against me would finally win the love she didn't believe she deserved.

"Hair transferred from the killer to his victims in the Paris cases is definitely not the hair of the unidentified man in my cooler," I said, and I explained the rest to him.

"But this weird hair was on his clothes?" Talley tried to understand.

"On the inside of them. Just think of this as a hypothetical. Let's say the clothing was worn by the killer and his body is covered with this dense, long baby-fine hair. Sу it transfers to the inside of his clothing, which he takes off and makes his victim put on before he drowns him."

"The victim being the guy in the container. Thomas." Talley paused. 'This hair's all over Loup-Garou's body? Then he obviously doesn't shave it:' "It wouldn't be easy shaving your entire body on a regular basis. Most likely, he shaves only those areas people might see:' "And there's no effective treatment. No drug or anything."

"Lasers are being used with some success. But he may not know that. Or more likely, his family wasn't going to permit him to show up at a clinic, especially after he started killing."

"Why do you think he exchanged clothes with the man you found in the container? With Thomas."

"If you're going to escape on a ship," I surmised, "you wouldn't want to be in designer clothes, assuming your theory about the hand-me-downs is true. It could also be spite, contempt. Getting in the last word. We could speculate all day long, but there's never a formula, only the damage left behind:' "Can I get you anything?" he asked.

"An answer," I said. "Why didn't you tell me Dr. Stvan was the one who survived? You and the secretary-general sat there telling me this story when you knew all along it was she you were talking about:'

Talley was silent.

"You were afraid it would scare me off, weren't you?" I said. "The Loup-Garou sees her and tries to kill her, so maybe he would see me and try to kill me, too?"

"Various people involved were doubtful you would go see her if you knew the whole story."

"Well, then these various people don't know me very well," I said. "In fact, I would be more likely to go if I knew something like that. The 'hell with how well you think you know me and can predict this and that after having met Lucy one or two times."

"Kay, it was because of Dr. Stvan's insistence. She wanted to tell you herself for a very good reason. She'd never divulged all of the details to anyone, not even the detective who is her friend. He was only able to supply us with a rough sketch.", “Why?” "Again, the people protecting the killer. If they somehow found out and thought she might have gotten a good look at him, she was afraid they might do something to her. Or to her husband- or two children. She believed you wouldn't betray her by talking to anyone who might place her in a vulnerable position. But in terms of how much she told you, she said she wanted to make that decision when she was with you."

"In case she didn't trust me after all."

"I knew she would."

"I see. So mission accomplished."

"Why are you so angry with me?" he asked.

"Because you're so presumptuous."

"I don't mean to be," he said. "I just want us to stop this werewolf-freak before he kills and mutilates anybody else. I want to know what makes him tick:"

"Fear and avoidance," I said. "Suffering and rage because he was punished for something that wasn't his fault. He anguished alone. Imagine being intelligent enough to comprehend all that."

"He would hate his mother most," Talley said. "He might even blame her."

Sunlight polished his hair like ebony and caught his eyes at the edge, flecking them with gold. I saw his feelings before he could rush them back into hiding. I got up and looked out the window because I did not want to look at him.

"He would hate women he sees," Talley said. "Women he could never have. Women who would scream in horror if they saw him, saw his body."

"Most of all, he would hate himself," I said.

"I know I would."

"You paid for this trip, didn't you, Jay?"

He got up and leaned against the window frame.

"Not some big corporation after this One-Sixty-Fiver cartel," I went on.

I looked at him.

"You got Dr. Stvan and me together. You facilitated everything. You set all of it up and paid for it," I said as I became more convinced and my incredulity grew. "You could do that because you're very rich. Because your family's very rich: That's why you went into law enforcement, isn't it. To get away from being rich. And then you act rich, look rich, anyway."

For an instant, he was caught.

"You don't like it when you're not the one doing the interrogating, do you?" I said.

"It's true I didn't want to be like my father. Princeton, crewing, marrying into the proper family, kids all proper, everything proper."

We were side by side now, looking down at the street as if something interesting was going on in the world outside our window.

"I don't think you've bucked your father," I said. "I think you fool yourself by being contraire. And certainly getting a badge and carrying a gun and piercing your ear is contraire if you went to Harvard and are a millionaire."

"Why are you saying all this to me?"

He turned to look at me, and we were so close I could smell his cologne and feel his breath.

"Because I don't want to wake up tomorrow and realize I'm part of some contraire script you've spun in your mind. I don't want to believe I've just broken the law and every oath I've ever sworn to because you just happen to be a spoiled rich boy whose idea of being contraire is to encourage someone like me to do something so contraire it could ruin my career. What's left of my career. And maybe land me in some fucking French prison."

"I'd come visit you."

"This isn't funny."

"I'm not spoiled, Kay."

I thought of the do not disturb sign, the chained door. I touched his neck and traced the angle of his strong jaw, lingering on the corner of his mouth. I had not felt a man's beard against my skin in more than a year. I reached up with both hands and pushed my fingers through his thick hair. It was warm from the sun, and his eyes were in mine, waiting to see what I might do with him.