Without Mercy (Mercy 1)

“This is a little scary,” she whispered to Trent, who was tossing another log onto the fire as she looked at a file that proved even more disturbing. “I think I’m beginning to understand what’s going on around here.”

He stood and dusted his hands, the fire burning even brighter. “So show me what you’ve got, Nancy Drew.”

“Very funny.”

“I know, but humor me.” He stood behind her, reading over her shoulder.

She reached for her coffee, and cradling the mug in her fingers, she said, “You’re not going to like it.”

“I figured that much.”

She took a sip, turning her attention to the information in front of her, and summed up what she’d found. “From what I can decipher, Lynch kept a file for each student and teacher, separate from the administrative files Charla King locks away in a file cabinet in her office at the admin building.” She motioned to the blackened documents in front of her. “These files, or dossiers or whatever you want to call them, are separate and hold very different information such as personal material, arrest records, and psychological data that’s been collected on the kids. These”—she tapped a finger on a blackened page with the name Bernsen, Zachary typed across the top—“are not your standard personnel files. That’s why they were locked away.”

He was listening, his brow furrowed as he scanned the documents. “There’s no crime in keeping a second set of more detailed files.”

She nodded, ignoring a gust of wind that rattled the windows and caused the fire to dance. “No crime in that, right, but here’s the kicker: These files contain information deliberately excluded from Charla King’s computerized files. For example, if you look here”—she indicated a few pages that, aside from singed corners, were intact—“we have a psychological profile for Eric Rolfe. Right?”

“Yeah?”

“Here are his test scores and grades, all neatly computerized and printed out. There’s even some sketchy information about his family and a quick assessment of his social problems.”

Trent nodded, eyes dark, as he studied the printout.

Jules said, “I’ll bet this is what shows up in Charla King’s fi

les, what the parents or prospective colleges or doctors or lawyers see.”

He took a sip of coffee. “So?”

“It doesn’t even scratch the surface.” She felt that buzz of adrenaline zinging through her veins, nervous energy that came with discovery. “Look here.” She flipped open another page, written in Lynch’s handwriting. “This is a different report. Not even typed, and it goes into much more detail. Rolfe’s psyche is dissected and studied.”

He shrugged. “Again, not illegal. Looks normal to me.”

“Except that it was kept from the main files. What if … what if Lynch was taking those kids with the raw proclivity for violence, you know, picking them and culling them out, for something other than to help them.”

“What?” He eyed her as if she were sprouting a third eye. “Why?”

“Because no one else will take them,” she said. “Because this would keep them out of institutions or psych wards in hospitals and because their parents will pay him well to take them off their hands.”

“I don’t follow.”

“Okay, let’s start with Eric,” she said, pushing Rolfe’s file to one side of the table. “He’s a good one to think about, because he’s so antisocial, his feelings right out in the open.”

“For which he’s being counseled,” Trent argued, but scooted out a chair and straddled it as he gently lifted the pages and read the notes, Lynch’s personal profile on Rolfe, showing how Lynch regarded the boy as a sociopath. Even as a child, Eric Rolfe’s pattern of behavior was noticed. He’d wet the bed until junior high, his older brother noted for making fun of him publicly. At a very young age, he’d been caught harming small animals for the pure enjoyment of it, and when in school he’d bullied and fought with younger, weaker kids as a thrill and had been kicked out of half a dozen schools. Eventually he’d beaten up a classmate so severely the boy had to be hospitalized.

There was even a charge of rape in Rolfe’s file, though that case had been dismissed. Somehow, though, Lynch had gotten his hands on a picture of the victim, a girl of thirteen who had changed her mind about who had attacked her on that dark playground. DNA evidence had somehow been compromised. The case never got before a judge.

“A real charmer,” Trent said, his coffee long forgotten, his eyes dark with a quiet rage.

“And supposedly, from his test scores, brilliant.”

“Who cares? He could be as smart as Einstein, but he’s still a sociopath.”

“Right.” Jules, too, was stone-cold sober. “You see this red tape on the inside of the file?” Carefully, so as not to have the charred pages crumble, she spread open the information on Missy Albright and Roberto Ortega. “These have the same strip of tape and similar observations. There might be other files as well, but these are the only ones whose covers weren’t burned, the information the most complete.”

As Trent compared the files, the corners of his mouth twisting downward, Jules added, “These two, Missy and Roberto, are like Eric and some of the others. They, too, have a long history of violence, and because of it, I think, they got special attention from the reverend, lots of notes in Lynch’s handwriting. He was fascinated by them.” She pushed some of the pages toward Trent, then indicated the detailed, handwritten notes in each of the files. “The common theme is that these kids are smart, but very, very disturbed. At a deep, core level. They’ve got uncontrollable rage, just beneath the surface. They’re cruel without any morsel of empathy.”

Jules met Trent’s dark gaze. “They’re sociopaths, a danger to society. To themselves.” She lifted her fingers one by one as she listed several symptoms of a sociopath. “They’re charming, even glib; they show no remorse; they think the world revolves around them; they lack empathy; they live on the edge; and they don’t give a damn about others.” Letting out a deep breath, she added, “They can’t be redeemed, but that’s not what Lynch is about. I’m just not sure if he’s brought them here for the money, or if there’s some other motive. Maybe he thinks he can harness their evil somehow? I don’t know.”