The Skin Collector (Lincoln Rhyme 11)

She was swimming to consciousness.

Billy turned toward her, the beam of the halogen whipsawing around the room, fast, leveraged by the motion of his head.

He carefully set the purse on the ground in a spot that looked as if he'd tossed it aside casually - they'd think it contained all sorts of good trace evidence and fingerprints. He hoped it would be Amelia Sachs who picked it up. He was angry at her for finding him at the hospital, even if Lincoln Rhyme was the one responsible. He'd hoped someday to go back to the specimens room but, thanks to her, he never could.

Of course, even if she didn't get jabbed, maybe one of Lincoln Rhyme's assistants would.

And Rhyme himself? He supposed it was possible; he'd learned that the man had regained some use of his arm and hand. Maybe he'd don a glove and pick up the purse. He definitely wouldn't feel the sting.

'Oh ...'

He turned to look at the art gallery of

beautiful skin stretched out before him. Ivory. He taped a flashlight in place over his canvas, flicked it on. Looked at her eyes, squinting first in confusion, then in pain.

His wristwatch hummed.

Then the other.

And it was time to leave.

CHAPTER 29

Lights flashed off the falling sleet, off the encrusted piles of old snow, off the wet asphalt.

Blue glows, white, red. Pulsing. Urgent.

Amelia Sachs was climbing out of her maroon Torino, parked beside several ambulances, though several ambulances weren't necessary. None were. The only required medical vehicle was the city morgue van. The first responders to this scene reported that Samantha Levine, the unsub's second victim, was deceased, declared dead at the scene.

Poison again, of course. That was the preliminary, from the first responders, but there was no doubt this was Unsub 11-5's work.

When she hadn't returned to the table of the chic restaurant Provence2, her friends had become concerned. A search of the restroom revealed an access door, which was slightly askew. A waiter had pulled it open, stuck his head in, gasped and vomited.

Sachs stood on the street, looking over the restaurant and the assembling vehicles. Lon Sellitto walked up. 'Amelia.'

She shook her head. 'We stopped him at the hospital this morning and he got somebody else. Right away. Telling us basically: "Fuck you."'

Diners were settling checks and leaving and the staff were looking about as thrilled as you could imagine, upon learning that a patron had been abducted in the restroom and dragged into a tunnel beneath their establishment and murdered.

It was only a matter of time, Sachs guessed, before Provence2 would be shuttered. It was as if the restaurant itself were a second victim. She supposed the boutique on Elizabeth Street too would be out of business soon.

'I'll start canvassing,' the big detective muttered and ambled off, digging a notebook from his pocket.

The crime scene bus arrived and nosed up to the curb. Sachs waved to the CS techs who were climbing out. Jean Eagleston was the lead, the woman who'd worked the Chloe Moore scene in SoHo - only yesterday though it seemed like last month. She had a new partner, a slim Latino who had calm but probing eyes - hinting that he was perfect for crime scene work. Sachs walked up to them. 'Same procedure. I'll go in first, process the body, walk the grid. You can handle the restroom where he snatched her, any exit routes.'

Eagleston said, 'Will do, Amelia.' She nodded and Sachs went to the back of the CS vehicle to suit up in the Tyvek, booties, hood and gloves. The N95 respirator too. Remembering that, whatever happened, she should leave it in place.

Rust ...

Goggles this time.

As she was stepping into the legs of the coveralls, she happened to glance up the street. On the corner, the same side of the street as the restaurant, was a man in a dark jacket that was similar to what the unsub had worn at the hospital for the attempted assault on Harriet Stanton - though he was in a baseball cap, not a stocking. He was on a phone and paying only moderate attention to the scene. Still, there was something artificial about his pose.

Could it be the unsub, back again, as he'd done in SoHo?

She looked away quickly and continued to gown herself, trying to act casual.

It wasn't common for a perp to return to the scene of the crime - that was a cliche helpful only in bad murder mysteries and made-for-TV movies - but it did happen sometimes. Particularly perps who weren't professional criminals but psychopaths, whose motives for murder were rooted in mental or emotional disturbance, which pretty much described Unsub 11-5.