Mary, Mary (Alex Cross 11)

Prologue

THE STORYTELLER

Chapter 1

ACT ONE, SCENE ONE, the Storyteller thought to himself, and couldn’t hold back a dizzying rush of anticipation. The truth was that ordinary people committed perfect crimes and perfect murders all the time. But you didn’t hear about it for the simple reason that the killers never got caught.

And neither would he, of course. That was a given in the story he was about to tell.

Which didn’t mean that today wasn’t nerve-racking. Actually, this was the most intense moment in the past couple of insane years for him. He was ready to kill somebody, a complete stranger, and he had figured out that New York City was the right place for his first.

It almost happened just outside a basement restroom in Bloomingdale’s, but he didn’t feel right about the location.

Too crowded, even at half past ten in the morning.

Too noisy, and yet not noisy enough to provide the proper distraction.

Plus, he didn’t like the idea of trying to escape out onto the unfamiliar territory of Lexington Avenue, or especially down into the claustrophobic IRT subway tunnels. When it felt right, he’d know it, and act accordingly.

So the Storyteller moved on and decided to catch a flick at the Sutton Theater on East 57th Street, a funky, run-down place that had obviously seen better days.

Maybe this was a good place for a murder. He liked the irony, even if he was the only one who got it. Yes, maybe this was going to work out great, he thought as he sat in one of the two small auditoriums inside.

He began to watch Kill Bill Volume 2 with seven other Tarantino aficionados.

Which one of these unsuspecting people would be his victim? You? You? You there? The Storyteller spun the tale inside his head.

There were two loudmouths in identical New York Yankees baseball caps, worn backward, of course. The irritating morons didn’t shut up once through the interminable ads and trailers. They both deserved to die.

So did an atrociously dressed elderly couple, who didn’t talk to each other at all, not once in fifteen minutes before the houselights went down. Killing them would be a good deed, almost a public service.

A fragile-looking woman, early forties, seemed to be having the shakes two rows in front of the moldy oldies. Bothering no one—except him.

And then a big black dude with his sneakered feet up on the seat in front of him. Rude, inconsiderate bastard in his old-school Converses that must have been at least size fourteens.

Next, a black-bearded movie nerd who probably had seen the movie a dozen times already and worshipped Quentin Tarantino, of course.

Turned out, it was the bearded wonder who got up about halfway through the movie, just after Uma Thurman was buried alive. Jesus, who could walk out on that classic scene?

Duty-bound, he followed, a couple of seconds behind. Out into the dingy hall, then into the men’s room, which was located near theater two.

He was actually shaking now. Was this it? His moment? His first murder? The beginning of everything he’d dreamed about for months? Make that years.

He was pretty much on autopilot, trying not to think about anything except doing this right, then getting in and out of the movie theater without anybody noticing his face or too much else about him.

The bearded guy was standing at the urinal, which was kind of good news, actually. The shot was nicely framed and art-directed.

Wrinkled, grungy black T-shirt that said NYU FILM SCHOOL with a clapsticks logo on the back. Reminded him of a character out of a Daniel Clowes comic book, and that graphic shit was hot right now.

“And . . . action!” he said.

Then he shot the poor bearded loser in the back of the head, watched him drop like a heavy sack to the bathroom floor. Lie there—nothing moving. The blast roared through his head in the tiled room, louder than he’d dreamed it would be.

“Hey—what the…? What happened? Hey!” he heard, and the Storyteller whirled around as if there was an audience watching him in the men’s room.

Two guys from the Sutton Theater crew had entered behind him. They must have been curious about the noise. And how much had they seen?

“Heart attack,” he said, blurted it out, tried to sound convincing. “Man just fell over at the urinal. Help me get him up. Poor guy. He’s bleeding!”

No panic, no affect, no second thoughts whatsoever. Everything was pure instinct now, right, wrong, or indifferent.

He raised his gun and shot both theater workers as they stood walleyed and dorky at the door. He shot them again when they were down on the floor. Just to be careful. Professional.

And now he was really shaking, legs like J-E-L-L-O, but trying to walk very calmly out of the men’s room.

Then out of the Sutton Theater onto 57th, heading east on foot. Everything outside feeling completely unreal and otherworldly, everything so bright and brassy.

He’d done it. He’d killed three people instead of just one. His first three murders. It was just practice, but he’d done it, and you know what? He could do it again.

“Practice makes perfect,” the Storyteller whispered under his breath as he hurried toward his car—his getaway car, right? God, this was the best feeling of his life. Of course, that didn’t say much for his life up to now, did it?

But watch out from here on, just watch out.

For Mary, Mary, quite contrary.

Of course, he was the only one who got that. So far, anyway.

Chapter 2

YOU THINK YOU CAN KILL again in cold blood? he asked himself many times after the New York murders.

You think you can stop this now that you’ve started? You think?

The Storyteller waited—almost five months of self-torture, also known as discipline, or professionalism, or maybe cowardice—until it was his time.

Then, he arrived in the kill zone again, and this time it wasn’t going to be practice. This was the real deal, and it wasn’t a stranger who was going to die.

He was just a face in the crowd at the 3:10 showing of The Village at the Westwood Village Theater in Los Angeles. There were a number of patrons, which was good news for him and, he supposed, for the film’s star director, M. Night Shyamalan. What kind of name was that? M. Night? Self-conscious phony.

Apparently Patrice Bennett was among the last people in town to see the horror film. Also, Patrice actually deigned to sit in a real movie theater, with real ticket-buyers, for her movie fix. How quaint was that? Well, she was famous for it, wasn’t she? It was Patrice’s shtick. She’d even bought her ticket ahead of time, which was how he knew she’d be there.

So this wasn’t target practice anymore, and everything had to be just right, and it would be. Never a doubt. The story was already written in his head.