Kiss the Girls (Alex Cross 2)
THE GENTLEMAN CALLER
CHAPTER 60
HE HAD been a Southern gentleman.
A gentleman scholar.
Now he was the very finest gentleman in Los Angeles. Always a gentleman, though. A hearts-and-flowers kind of guy.
An orangish-red sun had begun its long, slow shimmy and slide toward the Pacific Ocean. Dr. William Rudolph thought it looked visually stunning as he strolled at a leisurely pace along Melrose Avenue in Los Angeles.
The Gentleman Caller was “shopping” that afternoon, absorbing all the sights and sounds, the hectic flash-and-cash of his surroundings.
The street scene reminded him of something one of the hard-boiled detective writers, maybe Raymond Chandler, had written: “California, the department store.” The description still worked pretty damn well.
Most of the attractive women he observed were in their early and mid-twenties. They had just come from the stultifying workaday world of the ad agencies, money managers, and law firms in the entertainment district around Century Boulevard. Several of them wore high heels, platforms, clinging spandex miniskirts, here and there a form-fitting Rollo suit.
He listened to the casually sexy rustle of crushed silk, the martial click-click of designer shoes, the sultry scuff of cowboy boots that cost more than Wyatt Earp had earned in a lifetime.
He was getting hot and a little frenzied. Nicely frenzied. Life in California was good. It was the department store of his dreams.
This was the best part: the foreplay before he made his final selection. The Los Angeles police were still stumped and baffled by him. Maybe one day they would figure it all out, but probably not. He was simply too good at this. He was Jekyll and Hyde for this age.
As he strolled between La Brea and Fairfax, he breathed in the scents of musk and heavy floral perfumes, of chamomile- and lemon-scented hair. The leather handbags and skirts also had a distinct scent.
It was all a big tease, but he adored it. It was so ironic that these lovely California foxes were teasing and provoking him of all people.
He was the small, adorable, fluffy-haired boy loose in the candy store, wasn’t he? Now which forbidden sweets should he choose this afternoon?
That little twit in red heels, no stockings? That poor man’s Juliette Binoche? The provocateuse in the French-vanilla-and-black, harlequin-print suit?
Several of the women actually gave Dr. Will Rudolph approving glances as they wandered in and out of their favorite shops. Exit I, Leathers and Treasures, La Luz de Jesus.
He was strikingly handsome, even by strict Hollywood standards. He resembled the singer Bono from the Irish rock group U2. Actually, he looked the way Bono would if he had chosen to become a successful doctor in Dublin or Cork, or right here in Los Angeles.
And that was one of the Gentleman’s most private secrets: The women almost always chose him.
Will Rudolph wandered into Nativity, which was one of the currently hot A-rated shops on Melrose. Nativity was the place to buy a designer bustier, a mink-lined leather jacket, an “antique” Hamilton wristwatch.
As he watched the supple young bodies in the busy store, he was thinking of Hollywood’s A parties, its A restaurants, even its A stores. The city was completely hung up on its own pecking order.
He understood status perfectly! Yes, he did. Dr. Will Rudolph was the most powerful man in Los Angeles.
He reveled in the secure feeling it gave him, the reassuring front-page news stories that told him he truly existed, that he wasn’t a twisted figment of his own imagination. The Gentleman was in control of an entire city, and an influential city at that.
He strolled near an irresistible blond woman all decked-out in twentysomething finery.
She was idly looking at Incan jewelry, seemingly bored with the whole deal: her life. She was by far the most striking woman inside Nativity, but that wasn’t what attracted him to her.
She was absolutely untouchable. She sent off a clear signal, even in a pricey store filled mostly with other attractive twentysomething females. I’m untouchable. Don’t even think about it. You’re unworthy, no matter who you are.
He felt thunder roar through his chest. He wanted to scream out inside the loud, crowded boutique:
I can have you. I can!
You have no idea—but I’m the Gentleman Caller.
The blond woman had a full and arrogant mouth. She understood that no lipstick or eyeshadow was necessary for her. She was slender and narrow-waisted. Elegant in her own southern California way. She wore a faded cotton vest, wrap skirt, and colorblocked moccasins. Her tan was even and perfect, healthy-looking.