The Twelfth Card (Lincoln Rhyme 6)

Small victories--that's what Dr. Sherman had said. Small victories . . . Sometimes they're all you can hope for, Lincoln Rhyme reflected, as he felt sleep closing in.

But sometimes they're all you need.

Author's Note

Authors are only as good as the friends and fellow professionals around them, and I'm extremely fortunate to be surrounded by a truly wonderful ensemble: Will and Tina Anderson, Alex Bonham, Louise Burke, Robby Burroughs, Britt Carlson, Jane Davis, Julie Reece Deaver, Jamie Hodder-Williams, John Gilstrap, Cathy Gleason, Carolyn Mays, Emma Longhurst, Diana Mackay, Tara Parsons, Carolyn Reidy, David Rosenthal, Marysue Rucci, Deborah Schneider, Vivienne Schuster, Brigitte Smith and Kevin Smith.

Special thanks, as always, to Madelyn Warcholik.

For those readers browsing through guide books in hopes of taking a walking tour of Gallows Heights, you can stop searching. While my depiction of life in nineteenth-century Manhattan is otherwise accurate and there were indeed a number of such villages on the Upper West Side that ultimately were swallowed up by the city's urban sprawl, Gallows Heights and the nefarious doings I describe there are solely creations of my imagination. The eerie name served my purpose, and I figured that Boss Tweed and his cronies at Tammany Hall wouldn't mind if I laid a few more crimes at their feet. After all, as Thompson Boyd would say, "It's only a question of where you put the decimal point."

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THE COLD MOON

JEFFERY DEAVER

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Turn the page for a preview of The Cold Moon . . . .

Chapter 1

12:02 A.M.

"How long did it take them to die?"

The man this question was posed to didn't seem to hear it. He looked in the rearview mirror again and concentrated on his driving. The hour was just past midnight and the streets in lower Manhattan were icy. A cold front had swept the sky clear and turned an earlier snow to slick glaze on the asphalt and concrete. The two men were in the rattling Band-Aid-mobile, as Clever Vincent had dubbed the tan-colored SUV. It was a few years old; the brakes needed servicing and the tires replacing. But taking a stolen vehicle in for work would not be a wise idea, especially since two of its recent passengers were now murder victims.

The driver--a lean man in his fifties, with trim black hair--made a careful turn down a side street and continued his journey, never speeding, making precise turns, perfectly centered in his lane. He'd drive the same whether the streets were slippery or dry, whether the vehicle had just been involved in murder or not.

Careful, meticulous.

How long did it take?

Big Vincent--with long sausage fingers, always damp, and a taut brown belt stretching the first hole--shivered hard. He'd been waiting on the street corner after his night shift as a word-processing temp. It was bitterly cold, but Vincent didn't like the lobby of his building. The light was greenish and the walls were covered with big mirrors where he could see his oval body from all angles. So he'd stepped into the clear, cold December air and paced and eaten a candy bar. Okay, two.

As Vincent was glancing up at the full moon--a shockingly white disk visible for a moment through a canyon of buildings--the Watchmaker reflected aloud, "How long did it take them to die? Interesting."

Vincent had known the Watchmaker--whose real name was Gerald Duncan--for only a short time, but he realized that you asked the man questions at your own risk. Even a simple query could open the door to a monologue. Man, could he talk. And his answers were always organized, like a college professor's. Vincent knew that the silence of the last few minutes was due to Duncan's carefully considering his answer.

Vincent opened a can of Pepsi. He was cold, but he needed something sweet. He chugged it and put the empty can into his pocket. He ate a packet of peanut butter crackers. Duncan looked over to make sure Vincent was wearing gloves. They always wore gloves in the Band-Aid-mobile.

Meticulous . . .

"I'd say there are several answers to that," Duncan said in his soft, detached voice. "For instance, the first one I killed was twenty-four, so you could say it took him twenty-four years to die."

Like, yeah . . . thought Clever Vincent with the sarcasm of a teenager, though he had to admit that this obvious answer hadn't occurred to him.

"The other was thirty-two, I think."

A police car drove by, going the opposite way. The blood in Vincent's temples began pounding, but Duncan didn't react. The cops showed no interest in the stolen Explorer.

"Another way to answer the question," Duncan said, "is to consider the elapsed time from the moment I started until their hearts stopped beating. That's probably what you meant. See, people want to put time into easy-to-digest frames of reference. That's valid, as long as it's helpful. Knowing the contractions come every twenty seconds is helpful. So is knowing that the athlete ran a mile in three minutes, fifty-eight seconds, so he wins the race. Specifically, how long it took them tonight to die . . . well, that isn't important, as long as it wasn't fast." A glance at Vincent. "I'm not being critical of your question."

"No," Vincent said, not caring even if he was critical. Vincent Reynolds didn't have many friends and could put up with a lot from Gerald Duncan. "I was just curious."

"I understand. But I didn't really pay any attention. But the next one, I'll time it."