The Prodigy Part 12

"You sure I can't take these off, they're hurting my wrists." He put his hands on the table. "It's getting all red; it's hard to think with them on."

"Not my decision," she repeated, in no mood for a repeat of Charlie Rohr. Not to mention that those hands had strangled a woman and left her for dead less than three months ago. That had been Green's undoing; one of his victims had survived.

"No harm in asking."

"I guess not, so tell me about Valerie Blake?"

"Which one was she? I'm not good with names."

"How many have there been?" she asked.

"Just the three."

"So no more women will come forward and make accusations?"

"I don't know. It's like someone else is inside of me when I do these things."

"You can't remember?"

"That's right, I get amnesia."

Barrett suppressed a groan, as this guy added a second twist to try and distance himself from guilt-not only pretending to be crazy, but now he wanted to throw amnesia into the mix. "What attracts you to these women?"

He smiled. "Something in the way they look at me. You know, like they're better than me. Like the way you're looking at me now."

Gooseflesh raised beneath her freshly starched-and-pressed blouse. "Did Valerie Blake look at you that way?"

"Yeah, like she was superior or something, wouldn't even talk to me. I bought her drinks and she wouldn't even talk to me. Rude like," his breathing deepened and his voice drifted. "Some women need to be taken down a peg or two."

"How do you do that?"

"I've got ways."

"So you met her in a bar?"

"Yeah, it was one of those snooty places on the Upper East Side, everyone in their f.u.c.king expensive clothes drinking fifteen-dollar martinis."

"So you bought her a drink?"

"Right, I had the bartender bring it over to her. Told him to tell her who it was from."

"What happened?"

"She looked at me and made this face like she'd tasted something bad. But she took the drink."

"Did you go over to her?"

"What's the point?"

"Then what happened?"

"I bought her another, maybe four or five, and she just kept sucking them down while all these bozos tried to hit on her. I mean for seventy-five bucks you can get a decent wh.o.r.e on Third Avenue."

"Why didn't you?"

"You crazy? You know what kind of diseases are out there, stuff that'll make your d.i.c.k fall off. No, I like them clean. I like them in suits and I like what they've got on underneath, not that cheap s.h.i.+t, but like the stuff from the good stores. They keep it all hidden away, like they're these ice princesses on the surface, but underneath they're all looking for the same thing."

"What's that?"

"A good f.u.c.k."

"So you bought her a few drinks, and then ..."

"I could see that she was feeling pretty good, so I went over to her. Figured I'd introduce myself."

"And?"

He shook his head. "She told me she wasn't interested."

Barrett watched as the tips of his fingers curled into fists. "How did that feel?"

"How do you think? That's when the voice started."

"What did it say?"

"Take her."

"How did you do that?"

"It's not hard. I told her that I understood and just to show there were no hard feelings I bought her another drink-one of those stupid things that looks like a martini but has orange slices and weird s.h.i.+t in it. She was pretty loose by then and the voice told me to put something in her drink. There was so much c.r.a.p floating around in there I nearly spilled it. She called me clumsy. Here I'm buying her drinks and all she does is insult me like I'm some f.u.c.king lowlife."

"What did you put in the drink?"

"I don't know, the voice bought it."

"Right, what was it?"

"It was blue. Like I said, I didn't know what was going on, like there was someone else controlling my body."

"And then?"

"Then she got real tired, and the rest as they say is history."

"Nice try," Barrett said. "What happened?"

"You want the details?"

"It's my job."

"h.e.l.l of a job."

She waited and watched. His eyes glistened as he thought back.

"I helped her out of the bar and walked her down the street to my van, dropped her in back and then headed out of the city to a place I have on the sh.o.r.e."

"You'd done this before," she stated.

"What makes you say that, doc?"

"Call it a hunch."

He chuckled, but neither confirmed nor denied her speculation. "I just do what the voice tells me."

"What was it telling you?"

"She needed to be taught a lesson."

"How did you do that?"

He leaned into the table, "Slowly, doc. I did it slowly. Bit by bit waiting for her to wake up. It's important that they know what's happening. The lesson has to stick, otherwise what good is it? They need to feel every piece of clothing being cut off their body, feel the knife decide whether to go through fabric or flesh. They have to feel my fingers, my tongue, and my c.o.c.k in all the places they don't want. You can't rush it. I have to see it in their eyes."

"See what?" Barrett tried to mask her revulsion, to not think about the terror Valerie Blake must have felt in the last moments of her life.

"That they know who's the boss."

She didn't need any more. It was clear that Walker Green's crimes had been carefully planned and executed. His psychotic sham was transparent and would never hold up; it was interesting that the court had requested two separate evaluations, but that was often the defense strategy. Get two forensic experts to disagree and it would essentially cancel out both reports. That would leave the determination to the judge and jury, and in a case like Walker's that might up his chances for avoiding prison. He'd have to improve his act, but a few more months in Croton might make that possible. She'd have to do what she could to see that didn't happen.

She spent another hour with him, letting him regale her with accounts of his crimes-all at the command of his bogus voice. She turned off her recorder and was about to call in the guard, when something Walker said caught her attention.

"There's a lot of us out there."

"What do you mean?" she asked, suddenly thinking of Jimmy and wondering if this creep had some real insight to offer.

"You know, guys who like to be in control."

"But they don't drug women, force them into vans, and rape them."

"That's what you think, you're a shrink, and people aren't all that different."

"You think so?"

"I know it. I may not have your education but I've been around. Guys act one way around women, try to come off all smooth and caring, but we're still cavemen inside. Like in the cartoons where you club some chick over the head and drag her off to your cave. And once you've done that, you can't go back."

"So it's natural, what you did?"

"It is. Why would G.o.d make us like this if it weren't okay?"

"When you m.a.s.t.u.r.b.a.t.e is that what you think about?" she asked, clicking the recorder back on.

"All the time, but so do most guys."

"You think that's true?"

"Swear to G.o.d, all I did was cross a line. It's not that far from fantasy to flesh-just a few short steps, a couple knockout drops, and a place to go. Easy as pie." He laughed, "Cherry pie."

"How old were you when it stopped being a fantasy?"

He opened his mouth and then shut it. He shook his head and clicked his tongue against the roof of his mouth. "Just these chickies, doc. Loose lips sink s.h.i.+ps."

"Right," she gathered up her pad and stuffed her recorder into her jacket pocket.

"You coming back to see me?" he asked.

"Probably not, unless you've got more to tell me."

"There's always more," he looked in her direction, but more through her than at her. "Then again, after a while, it's all the same."

___.

Barrett pa.s.sed through the security checks and exited the razor-wire perimeter of Croton. She hiked across the park-like grounds that surrounded the forensic hospital, which was part of a ten-thousand-acre complex that had once comprised one of New York State's largest mental inst.i.tutions. She thought about the interview. In many ways it was typical of s.e.xual s.a.d.i.s.ts; an old story, and a central theme in her research and soon-to-be published book. A line gets crossed and then another and another, "Better than heroin," he'd said, and a hard habit to break.

She thought about Ralph and the line that he had crossed. And then she thought about her father. What little she remembered from Georgia and her first seven years of life in a five-room farmhouse that had belonged to her grandfather, was filled with images of her father's red and angry face, her mother sending her to her room, and the awful sounds of the fights and the beatings.

She looked up at the weathered-brick facade of Gunther Hall. It was an imposing structure that a century ago had been the very first building for the then New York Hospital for the Insane. Spread over valuable Westchester acreage, it had embraced the moral treatment-a belief that hard work, fresh air, and religious devotion could free a person from mental illness. That of course hadn't lasted long and what followed was the addition of building after building until in the 1950s Croton housed nearly 30,000 patients-the snake-pit era, with insulin-shock therapy, wet wraps, and Thorazine doled out in gram-high doses that left the sick folk drooling and shuffling through endless days and years. Then deinst.i.tutionalization and they were released into the community, and buildings like Gunther Hall were either left derelict or transformed into administrative offices for state employees displaced from their previous jobs.

She went up to the second-floor office she'd commandeered. It was nicer than what she had in Manhattan, and over the years she'd made raids on the bas.e.m.e.nt where wonderful old oak, walnut, and mahogany desks, chairs, barrister bookcases, and the like had been stored and forgotten as, one-by-one, buildings shut down and began their crumbling deterioration.

Through her window she had a view of rolling green hills, distant mansions, and the dip in the green countryside through which the Hudson River meandered on its way toward New York City. It was nearly six and the pre-dusk light splashed the landscape with a rose-colored wash.

She inserted a disc into the computer and decided to get a quick start on Green's report. As the screen flashed to life, a buzzing sound intruded. Reaching down she grabbed her vibrating pager; she didn't recognize the number in the display. She dialed.

"Barrett?" Justine's excited voice bubbled into her ear.

"What's up?"

"I got in!"

"What?"

"Harrison picked me. I can't believe it!"

"That's wonderful," Barrett said. "Have you told Mom?"

"Not yet, you're the first. You know, he's never picked a woman. I'll be the first."

"You totally deserve it," Barrett said, thrilled for her sister, and keeping her less-gracious thoughts hidden. Justine had just been accepted into a highly compet.i.tive surgical fellows.h.i.+p, in which she'd be chief resident. An incredible honor, and her sister's greatest wish. It also meant that for another two years, Justine would be working at a salary too low to support herself, and as Barrett had been doing for Justine since leaving her own residency, she'd be helping out to the tune of a grand a month.

Her other line rang, and the red light flashed. "Hold on, Justine, I've got another call." She pressed the b.u.t.ton for the other line.