Undone (Will Trent 3)

"That's something to ask Simkov."

"The doorman isn't there twenty-four hours," Faith reminded him. "The killer could've waited for Simkov to clock out, then used the elevator to bring her body down. Simkov was supposed to keep an eye on things after hours, but he was hardly dedicated to his job."

"There wasn't another doorman to relieve him?"

"They've been trying to find someone to fill the position for six months," she told him. "Apparently, it's hard to find someone who wants to sit on their ass behind a desk for eight hours a day—which is why they put up with so much bullshit from Simkov. He was willing to double up his shifts, such as they were."

"What about security tapes?"

"They tape over them every forty-eight hours." She had to add, "Except for the ones from yesterday, which seem to be missing." Amanda had made sure the tape of Will slamming Simkov's face into the counter had been destroyed.

Will's face flooded with guilt, but still, he asked, "Anything in Simkov's apartment?"

"We tossed it upside down. He drives an old Monte Carlo that leaks like a sieve and there aren't any receipts for storage units."

"There's no way he could be Pauline's brother."

"We've been so focused on that that we haven't seen anything else."

"All right, so, let's take the brother out of the equation. What about Simkov?"

"He's not smart. I mean, he's not stupid, but our killer is choosing women he wants to conquer. I'm not saying our bad guy is a genius, but he's a hunter. Simkov is a pathetic schmuck who keeps porn under his mattress and takes blowjobs to let whores into empty apartments."

"You've never believed in profiles before."

"You're right, but we're spinning our wheels everywhere else. Let's talk about our guy," Faith said, something Will usually suggested. "Who's our killer?"

"Smart," Will admitted. "He probably works for an overbearing woman, or has overbearing women in his life."

"That's pretty much every man on the planet these days."

"Tell me about it."

Faith smiled, taking his words as a joke. "What kind of job does he have?"

"Something that lets him exist under the radar. He has flexible hours. Watching these women, learning about their habits, takes a lot of time. He's got to have a job that lets him come and go as he pleases."

"Let's ask the same boring, stupid question one more time: What about the women? What do they have in common?"

"The anorexia/bulimia thing."

"The chat room." She shot that one down on her own: "Of course, even the FBI can't find out who the site is registered to. No one has been able to break Pauline's password. How could our guy find it?"

"Maybe he started the site himself in order to troll for victims?"

"How would he find out their true identities? Everyone's tall, thin and blonde on the Internet. And usually twelve and horny."

He was twisting his wedding ring again, staring out the window. Faith couldn't stop looking at the scratches on the back of his hand. In forensic parlance, they would have called the marks defensive wounds. Will had been behind someone who had gouged her fingernails deep into his skin.

She asked, "How did it go with Sara last night?"

Will shrugged. "I just picked up Betty. I think she likes Sara's dogs. She's got two greyhounds."

"I saw them yesterday morning."

"Oh, that's right."

"Sara's nice," Faith told him. "I really like her."

Will nodded.

"You should ask her out."

He laughed, shaking his head at the same time. "I don't think so."

"Because of Angie?"

He stopped twisting the ring. "Women like Sara Linton . . ." She saw a flash of something in his eyes that she couldn't quite read. Faith expected him to shrug it off, but he kept talking. "Faith, there's no part of me that's not damaged." His voice sounded thick in his throat. "I don't mean just the things you can see. There's other stuff. Bad stuff." He shook his head again, a tight gesture, more for his own benefit than Faith's. He finally told her, "Angie knows who I am. Somebody like Sara . . ." Again, his voice trailed off. "If you really like Sara Linton, then you don't want her to know me."

All Faith could think to say was his name. "Will."

He gave a forced laugh. "We gotta stop talking about this stuff before one of us starts lactating." He took out his cell phone. "It's almost eight. Amanda will be waiting for you in the interrogation room."

"Are you going to watch?"

"I'm going to make some calls up to Michigan and annoy the crap out of them until they run those fingerprints we found on Anna's fire escape. Why don't you call me when you're out of your doctor's appointment? If Sam found the right Jake Berman, we can go talk to him together."

Faith had forgotten about her doctor's appointment. "If he's the right Jake Berman, then we should scoop him up immediately."

"I'll call you if that's the case. Otherwise, go to your doctor's appointment, then we'll start from scratch like we'd planned."

She listed it off. "The Coldfields, Rick Sigler, Olivia Tanner's brother."

"That should keep us busy."

"You know what's bugging me?" Will shook his head, and she told him, "We haven't gotten the reports from Rockdale County yet." She held up her hands, knowing Rockdale was a sore point. "If we're going to start from the beginning, we need to do just that—get the initial crime-scene report from the first responding cop and go over every detail point by point. I know Galloway said the guy's fishing in Montana, but if his notes are good, then we don't need to talk to him."

"What are you looking for?"

"I don't know. But it bothers me that Galloway hasn't faxed it over."

"He's not exactly on top of things."

"No, but everything he's held back until now has been for a reason. You said it yourself. People don't do stupid things without a logical explanation."

"I'll put a call in to his office and see if the secretary can handle it without getting Galloway involved."

"You should get those scratches on the back of your hand looked at, too."

He glanced down at his hand. "I think you've looked at them plenty."

EXCEPT FOR TALKING to Anna Lindsey in the hospital the day before, Faith had never worked directly with Amanda on a case. The extent of their interaction tended to be with a desk between them, Amanda on one side with her hands steepled in front of her like a disapproving schoolmarm and Faith fidgeting in her chair as she gave her report. Because of this, Faith tended to forget that Amanda had clawed her way up the ranks back during a time when women in uniform were relegated to fetching coffee and typing reports. They weren't even allowed to carry guns, because the brass thought that, given the choice between shooting a bad guy and not breaking a nail, the latter would win out.