Cactus Heart (David Mapstone Mystery 5)

The Harquahala Strangler was stalking Lindsey.

***

“Where did you hear that?” Peralta demanded, sitting up in the leather chair and nearly upsetting his Gibson. “I swear I’m gonna shut down your pipeline to Lorie Pope once and for all.”

Controlling my rage as best I could, I told him I heard it from Bobby Hamid. Peralta expelled a mulish breath. “I think he has a mole in the department.”

“Maybe he’s the killer,” I said.

“God doesn’t like me that much,” Peralta said. Then, “So you’re gonna get all territorial on me about Adams? Anyway, I thought you had something new going with that tall redhead. Or are you doing both of them—damn, I always wanted to do that, but it seemed like a lot of trouble.”

I was still standing in the entryway at home. I needed a drink. “You didn’t tell me you were using Lindsey as bait. I just thought she was working on the tech side of it, hacking the strangler’s computer. Something safe. Why the hell is she working with Patrick Blair…?” I called all this over my shoulder as I mixed an angry Bombay Sapphire martini.

When I came back in the living room, he said mildly, “Are you going to get a Christmas tree?”

He was knocking my anger off stride. “I haven’t even thought about it.”

“She volunteered for the job,” he said. “And she’s a deputy sheriff, same as you, and she took an oath to protect and serve, even if it means personal danger, same as you.”

“Spare me the damned academy graduating class speech!”

He made a purring sound and set the Gibson aside. “What did you find out today

on your case?”

I drank a big slug of gin and told him about Zelda Chain. His eyes became slits as he listened. Then he said, “Preliminary lab work on Max Yarnell says he was knocked down by a serious blow to the chin, maybe a kick. Then the petrified wood was driven into his heart. Nothing unusual in the trace evidence, fibers, blood, chemical workup.”

“What about that doll?”

“It’s the same brand as the one delivered to your office. You can buy ’em at any Toys ‘R’ Us. No prints, no unusual fibers or chemicals. The blood was painted on, a common, water-based art-store paint. Made in China.”

“So we’re nowhere!” I said a little too vehemently, plopping down in the other leather chair.

“Look,” he said, leaning his bulk forward. “There’s a whole subculture out there of escorts working on the Web. You have heard of the Internet, right Mapstone?”

“Fuck you.”

“I never can be sure with you and pop culture,” he went on. “Anyway, they cruise chat rooms and set up profiles to let guys know they’re available for business. It’s hard as hell to police, because they can hide their identity and screen potential customers.”

“Apparently not well enough,” I said.

He nodded. “All these girls were involved with meeting people online. The early victims were escorts. But the last two haven’t been, although they did frequent chat rooms or dating sites. One was a college student. The other was a housewife. So the bastard has upped the stakes. He’s broken out into the general population.” He made the killer sound like a disease.

“Lindsey’s team was initially working with the Internet service providers to track the guy, but I guess it’s so easy to hide your trail if you know what you’re doing. So we felt we had to do something more.”

“Why her?” I demanded.

“She volunteered,” he said. “And, she looks kinda racy and cute. The other deputies I could call on look like East German swimmers.”

“It’s not just that, and you know it! She fits his profile, right? Straight, dark hair, and pale skin. You wanted him to come after her. You put her photo in the paper!”

Peralta started to say something and stopped. He finished his drink and held it out to me to refill. I ignored him.

“Look, Mapstone, this is complicated, and very confidential. This guy is a risk-taker, always pushing the envelope. We think his first victim was a street hooker that he just picked up. Then, this whole Internet thing starts, and, believe me, not all these victims are crack whores. He kept moving more upscale. In some cases, these were party girls who made a little cash on the side with freelance prostitution. But now we’ve had two victims with no known ties to prostitution. He meets them online—he can pretend to be anybody. Then they meet for real, and sayonara. This city’s on the verge of panic.”

I took pity on him and made a new Gibson. When I came back he continued, haltingly, hating to give up so much information.

“We heard from this guy. He sent a note, dropped it on the sidewalk in front of headquarters. He wrote that he was so powerful now he would kidnap and kill a female detective, just to show us he could. Nobody knows this outside the key investigators.”