Mister X Part 42

Quinn replaced the receiver and stood up behind his desk.

"Want to go for a drive?" he asked.

Pearl looked at him with her puffy eyes. "Where to?"

"The hospital. Lisa Bolt is awake."

A change came over Pearl's features. Within seconds, grief had given way to a hardness and determination. "Let's go."

"You sure you're up for this?"

"You sure you can stop me?"

"Actually," Quinn said, "I'm not."

As they were leaving, she turned back and lifted the vase of mortuary flowers. She deftly removed the tag and black ribbon without damaging a flower.

"For Lisa Bolt," she said. "They might help make her more talkative."

Quinn grinned at her with a kind of sadness. "Pearl, Pearl..."

"I can't think of a better use for them," Pearl said.

"Nor can I."

Quinn put up the BACK SOON BACK SOON sign and locked the door behind them. sign and locked the door behind them.

They got in the Lincoln, Quinn at the wheel. On the drive to the hospital Pearl was quiet, but he could feel the energy coming off her damp flesh like waves of high-tension electricity. It reminded him of the way you could put your fingers up close to a TV screen and see the individual hairs on the back of your hand rise.

Lightning st.i.tched the gray summer sky, bright enough to hurt the eye even in daylight. Quinn wondered if it was a coincidence.

He lay in agony, the edge of the knife blade resting lightly on his chest. He'd thought he was in control, but it hadn't turned out that way. The need had always been there, and now it was alive.

Unknown forces, driven by shame and guilt, were in control. He could see his fate moving like clouds across the ceiling.

This must not happen.

He should have known, should have been more careful, should have planned better.

Didn't he think he'd someday reach this point?

"Should have" is in the past.

The past that he'd thought was dead. That he feared so that it ruled his dreams. The past.

It must not happen again. It must not!

He had said the words aloud the first time to gather courage. Now he said them again, this time only in his mind.

I am a fool.

He applied the knife.

I must wash the sheets carefully.

65.

Lisa Bolt's hospital room smelled like Lysol and spearmint, as if it had just been disinfected by a cleaning lady chewing gum. Lisa was sitting almost completely erect in her cranked-up bed, her back propped against a pillow. She looked thin but surprisingly well. There was a flesh-colored strip of adhesive tape on the side of her neck. A beige turban was wound around her head, obviously to conceal a bandage. She was wearing light makeup but had her eyebrows penciled in as dark slash marks.

The nurse, who was middle-aged and looked like a gaunt, predatory bird, informed them that only two visitors would be allowed in the room. Quinn settled on himself and Pearl.

"Please keep in mind that she's still weak," the nurse cautioned Quinn.

"Of course we will."

The nurse glanced at him from the corner of her eye and seemed dubious.

"These are for you, Lisa," Pearl said with a smile. She placed the vase of flowers on an otherwise bare windowsill and deftly and lovingly adjusted the arrangement.

"Do you want some water?" Quinn asked Lisa, motioning with his head at the plastic gla.s.s and pitcher on the tray table rolled close to the bed.

Lisa kept her head on the pillow as she moved it slowly back and forth once to decline. Her head didn't move at all as she looked at Pearl and then at Quinn.

"I owe you an apology," she said. Her voice was raspy from disuse, or perhaps from the feeding tube that had been recently removed.

"We're glad you're alive," Quinn told her.

"You owe us the truth," Pearl said, pus.h.i.+ng too hard too fast.

Quinn gave her a look, signaling her to ease up and listen for a while without b.u.t.ting in. She understood it perfectly, and he knew it. Both of them thought it was scary sometimes, the way they could almost read each other's thoughts.

Pearl moved a step back from the bed as Quinn continued. "It is time for the truth, Lisa." His tone was not at all threatening.

"I know," Lisa said. She took a deep breath and swallowed, wincing as if it hurt.

"You're sure about the water?" Quinn asked.

She nodded and then closed her eyes. "I'm trying to organize my thoughts before I tell you about this."

"Of course...of course...we understand."

"It's as if I've been away on a trip."

"Of course, of course..."

Lisa waited almost a full minute before beginning: "It started when Chrissie Keller came to my office in Columbus and hired me to see if I could somehow get her murdered twin's case reopened. She told me about her slot-machine windfall and waved a lot of money at me. Enough to convince me to take her on as a client even though I thought there wasn't a chance in h.e.l.l I could reexamine the NYPD's old investigation and find something that would get them to reactivate the case." Lisa turned her head to the side, and her eyes teared up. "Since I didn't think I could help her, I shouldn't have taken her money. I know that."

"I think it's understandable," Quinn said. "You were in business to make money, and someone wanted to hire you. That's how it works in our occupation." We're all in this together. Allies. We're all in this together. Allies. "Go right on with your story, dear." "Go right on with your story, dear."

Lisa gazed up at him and managed a slight smile. Pearl could hardly stand watching this.

"I knew that to help Chrissie I'd have to be creative," Lisa said. "I did some research and decided that since I wouldn't have much pull with the NYPD, maybe I could sort of sublease the case to somebody who would have pull. Somebody like you. To do that, I'd have to be convincing, the way Chrissie was convincing with me. I struck on the idea of pretending at first that I was was Chrissie, the surviving twin. Chrissie liked the idea." Chrissie, the surviving twin. Chrissie liked the idea."

"And why not? It's quite clever."

Lisa signaled silently that she would like some water now, and Quinn helped her to take a few dribbling swallows.

That earned another smile from Lisa, as if Quinn were Father Teresa. "My job was to gain your trust," she said in a somewhat revitalized voice, "and then shadow the investigation and eventually tell Chrissie who and where the killer was before the police got to him. That last part was important."

Quinn understood why. Chrissie wanted to get to her sister's murderer first. "She wanted to be ensured of justice. Her kind of justice."

"Yes," Lisa said. "Chrissie is consumed by a yearning to avenge her twin's death. It's almost as if she herself had been molested, mutilated, and murdered."

"I take it you mean she feels that way...beyond the norm."

"Far beyond. If there is such a thing as a norm in this kind of situation. She's obsessed. You know how it can be with twins. It's spooky, almost like two bodies sharing a common mind. And it doesn't seem to stop after death. At least, that's the way Chrissie sees it. And there's something else."

"Else?" Quinn said, wis.h.i.+ng Addie or maybe Helen the NYPD profiler was present to decipher some of the deeper motivations floating around here.

"During the twins' childhood, Tiffany was molested by her father. And whenever that happened, Chrissie was badly beaten where it didn't show. Chrissie, of course, was confused and intimidated and did nothing about it. Nothing to help Tiffany. She feels extremely guilty about that."

"When you say extremely..."

"Chrissie is driven by guilt and feels she can find redemption by locating, torturing, and then executing Tiffany's killer."

"So she's using us to try to commit murder."

"She wouldn't call it murder," Lisa said.

"I'm not sure I would either," Quinn said. "But the way for us is clear: We've got to find and stop her."

Pearl moved closer to the bed and spoke looking down at Lisa. "Do you think she might want her kind of justice so badly she'd kill in order to get to the Carver?"

"I do," Lisa said without hesitation.

"You and Chrissie have been in touch?" Quinn asked.

"I have no idea where she is," Lisa said.

Sort of an answer, Quinn thought. Quinn thought.

The door opened, and the nurse who'd allowed them access to Lisa Bolt entered the room. There was a smaller, younger nurse standing off to the side and behind her. The younger woman, who looked about twelve, was holding a rectangular metal tray containing a lot of rigmarole that included a large hypodermic needle.

"I'm sorry, but we think the patient needs to rest," the older nurse said.

"Of course," Quinn said. He started to pat Lisa's hand and then saw all the bruising from intravenous needles. He patted her shoulder instead. "You rest now, and we can talk later. I hope you feel better having told us this. I know we've been heartened by seeing you awake and looking so much better."

The older nurse, who knew bulls.h.i.+t when she heard it, pointedly moved out of the way so there was room for Quinn and Pearl to leave.

"Take the best care of her," Quinn said, as he and Pearl edged past both nurses.

"We will indeed, sir," the older nurse said. "It's what we're doing right now."

Quinn smiled beatifically at the nurse as he held the door open for Pearl.

"Watch out for that one," Pearl heard the older nurse say to the younger, as she and Quinn found themselves in the hall.

They walked a little way toward the nurses' station and stood near a drinking fountain.

"You know we still can't believe anything Lisa Bolt says," Pearl told him.

"Of course not. On the other hand, maybe she's had an epiphany. That can happen when you're struck by a moving vehicle."

"Or you can wake up in a hospital and be as big a liar as before you were struck."

"That too," Quinn said. He paused and felt at his s.h.i.+rt pocket, as if absently seeking a cigar. "Do you think whoever attacked you could have been a woman, Pearl?"

Pearl gave it some thought. "It's possible. It all happened so d.a.m.ned fast. He-or she-was slender, maybe short to average height for a man, but d.a.m.ned strong. I'd guess an athletic, wiry man. But a woman...possibly."

"Tiffany's postmortem has her at five-feet-nine. Chrissie would be the same height."

"Might fit. I never saw whoever killed Yancy stand up straight, so I could only guess within several inches either way."

"And madness, obsession, gives people strength," Quinn said.

You should know, Pearl thought. Pearl thought.

They were quiet for a moment as a trio of nurses bustled past.

"Lisa Bolt's going to be out of here soon," Pearl said, "and she needs to be watched."

"Your job and Fedderman's," Quinn said. He laid a hand very lightly on her shoulder, as if concerned that she might drift away like a balloon, and looked down into her eyes. "How are you doing, Pearl? Really?"

"I don't want you worrying about me."

She was determined not to let Quinn find his way back into her affections by way of her grief for Yancy. She didn't think he'd do that deliberately, but it sure as h.e.l.l could happen. She couldn't trust him, and she couldn't trust herself, so she had to play it tough.

"But I do worry, Pearl. I can't help it."