Night Hunter (57 page)

“
Oh, I know where he is.” He continued to laugh.

“
What are you laughing at?”

“
I have my money back. All of it, and with interest, I might add.”

She glared at him.

“
You invested well with the money you stole from me. Blue chip stocks and the like. I was impressed. Unfortunately your last investment was a bad one. Bad for you, good for me.”

Then she realized what he had done. There was only one way he could have gotten both the taped conversation and his money back. “You hired him to set me up,” she said flatly.

“
Precisely. Your lover is now on the East Coast, happily spending a handsome fee which, my dear, came from you.”

Corde fast-forwarded the tape. Amelia’s voice came through the recorder again... “detest him. I loathe the feel of his hands on my body. Thank God he can’t last long. Yet brief as his touch is, it’s sheer torture. Now you, my dear, Fletch, know how to make love to a woman the proper way, the lasting way.”

She jerked her head, forgetting the noose around her neck. It squeezed, making her gasp.

She glared at him with hatred and contempt. There could be no living with him now.

“
You filthy bastard,” she managed to croak out.

John and Regina met Wilma Greenwood in the detective department at police headquarters.

“
Detective Lillard has been detained at the morgue,” Wilma said. “He’ll be here as soon as he can.”

“
I’m supposed to meet Kristy at noon,” Regina said.

“
I think John and I can handle it ourselves if it comes to that. John?”

“
Sure, no problem.”

Regina and John sat on contour plastic chairs holding hands while Wilma paced the floor, sipping coffee from a Styrofoam cup. She looked harried, as though she’d had little sleep, and Regina thought she knew what her friend must be going through.

Regina synchronized her watch to the large clock on the wall. 11:27.

They waited.

He looked at her, wondering at the strangeness of her face. It was noticeably changed from just a moment ago ... before he had struck her with the back of his hand. The cheekbone, eye and nose were beginning to swell out of shape, distorting her beautiful features. It was a shame to mess up such an exquisite face, especially since he had to look at it, but she should never have called him a foul name.

Her voice on the tape played on. This was the same cassette tape he had listened to in his car the night he viciously attacked the Keane woman, the woman who was so very much like Amelia. That night, in a black rage, with the tiny bird fluttering above him, it was Amelia’s face and body he slashed with the straight razor.

His wife was crying softly. Not so defiant now, he thought. But her tears only heightened his cruel temper. He wanted her to beg and plead, grovel and crawl to him on hands and knees—if and when, that is, he decided to free her from her bonds.

He had thought she was different from the others when all along she was not only the same but worse. She’d been the only one to take from him. The cool, materialistic bitch deserved to be punished for her years of lies, deceptions, and infidelities.

She had thought she could live in high style under his roof, steal his money to buy a young cock and a fashionable business, and then walk out on him. But he had again knocked her back down and there was more to come. The
best
was yet to come.

He hadn’t meant to reveal his hand so soon. But Amelia had been exercising her independence and he feared she would slip away from him, cheating him out of the coup de grace. The reason, the only reason, behind the acid assaults was to set up Amelia. The others were only pawns, to be sacrificed, to cover and protect him, affording a motive, however bizarre, for what he was about to do to his wife.

The attack in the parking garage had been a ruse —to scare her, to establish a pattern of mayhem against the pageant finalists, and to remove suspicion from Amelia. But it had all gone for naught when the bitch chose to keep quiet about the attack.

The next time would be for real. But Van Raven must come before Amelia, establishing the proper order—the final order as it had played out in the 1970 pageant.

He had her where he wanted her now, off guard, terrified to be found out by him, without her security nest egg. She would beg for forgiveness and an opportunity to start over. He would pretend to relent, granting her all the conditions he had promised. And then, some months later, when her confidence had returned, when she had secured a solid place in the TV world, “the splasher” would strike again. Corde smiled at the image. Let her try to hold a position in television with her face a ravaged horror. Disfigurement, for Amelia, would be the ultimate hell.

A delicious surge of elation washed over Corde. Since early childhood, with his grim, bug-eyed countenance, he suffered abuse and cruelty from those around him. Too weak to defend himself outright, he learned to attack through acts of terrorism. Time was of no consequence. In fact, the longer he waited for retaliation, the sweeter the reward. His first act of revenge, at the age of five, was directed at the family cat, for scratching him. Several weeks later he doused the cat with lighter fluid before tossing a match to it. Then came the girl in his fourth grade class who repeatedly called him Mr. Toad. One frigid day after school she unknowingly donned a death cap of black widows. And that was only the beginning.

Matthew tenderly stroked the swelling flesh on the side of his wife’s face. “I’m sorry, my dear,” he said with solicitude. “I’m afraid I lost my head. To have my wife call me such vile names, well . . .”

Amelia looked up at him. Her dark sapphire eyes were unreadable, though he thought he saw a glint of remorse, perhaps even hopelessness.

“
Now, what should I do with you? How should we resolve this problem?”

She brought her bound hands up, wiped a tear from her face.

“
You don’t deserve a second chance, but I do care for you, Amelia. Convince me that I should be charitable.”

“
I’m leaving you,” she said quietly.

That was the last thing he had expected to hear. Where were the pleas, the conditions, the promises to toe the line? After all, she wasn’t getting any younger and she no longer had money of her own.

He was surprised by his next words. “I shall be gracious and repeat my first offer. An allowance, the right to work, and the nullification of the premarital agreement.”

“
Untie me.” Her tone was hard.

“
Not until this is settled,” he said sharply. It wasn’t going according to plan. It made him livid when his well-laid schemes went awry.

She turned her head away, the nylon rope straining at her throat.

“
I won’t stand for this ... this insubordination, this lack of respect,” he responded harshly. “Who do you think you are? You’re nothing but a one-time beauty queen. A beauty queen who, incidentally, won by default. Not even my influence could assure you the title. But I married you, made you something. Without me you are nothing. Nothing!”

Her head snapped around. She glared at him. “I’d rather be nothing than married to you. What I said on that tape was true. I can’t stand your touch, your voice. I can’t stand the sight of you. Do you know what you are? Laughable, that’s what,” she screamed out, laughing. “Utterly laughable.”

In a rage he grabbed her by the shoulders and shook. Her laughter changed to gasps as the pantyhose around her throat pulled taut. A moment later her eyes began to register the fear he so wanted and needed. “Laughable?”

With one hand he ripped at his own clothes, discarding them. He climbed on the bed and fell on her, entering her with force.

She twisted, struck out with her bound hands. Her fists pounded his face. He heard a crunching sound as pain exploded in his face. Rage and pain blinded him momentarily. He swore, pulled her forward, putting more strain on the hose around her neck. He crushed her to him, pinning her arms between them as he thrust into her. With his face inches from hers, blood now flowing from his broken nose onto her lips and chin, he said, “You’re lying. Tell me you’re lying. Tell me!”

Amelia’s mouth gaped open, her jaw working frantically, oblivious to the blood dripping from his nose, mingling with her saliva. Her eyes were wide and staring into his.

“
You whore! From the beginning I stood behind you. I knew it was you sabotaging the other contestants. Not only did I keep quiet, I helped by taking care of Corinne for you. I would have done the same to Regina, or anyone who stood in your way, don’t you see that you owe me? Don’t you see?”

She continued to struggle, refusing to answer him. After a while he hoped she wouldn’t say what he demanded. He reveled in her panic and fear. He was locked in an intense paroxysm of pleasure, with her naked body in his arms, her head bent back exposing the graceful line of her slim neck, her eyes pleading now, begging him
to ... to
what? —to allow her to love him, to please him, to worship him? Plenty of time for that, he told himself, his body thrilling to her helplessness. He stared back at her, waiting for the pleasure to ease so he could release her and let her say what he wanted to hear, but the pleasure seemed only to increase with each passing moment, making it impossible to let her go. At last he cried out at the explosive release, squeezing her in viselike arms.

She stiffened, shuddered, then collapsed limply in his arms, her eyes still open, though no longer glowing with fear.

He released her. She dropped heavily to the bed. With haste he groped at the panty hose cutting deep into her throat and attempted to slide a finger under it. The flesh-colored nylon resisted. Desperate now, he shook her, called her name. Her head lolled strangely.

No, it can’t be. She couldn’t have cheated him. Not after all he’d done to make it perfect.

With the straight razor he slashed at the length of tightly stretched hose between the headboard and Amelia’s neck. He clawed at the noose, loosening it, whimpering, cursing.

The panty hose was off, but still she lay limp, lifeless, his blood bright against her ashen skin.

No, goddamn you. Wake up!

And then he realized she had outwitted him after all. He had wanted to burn her face, make her live out her natural life with a hideous deformity as Corinne Odett had done. But she had forced him to kill her.

He shook her again.

It was all the fault of that bitch, Van Raven. It was she who had spoiled everything. By thwarting his efforts, she had thrown the plan out of kilter. Van Raven was to be before Amelia. Now, without Amelia, what reason did he have to continue?

What reason indeed? It was all her fault. He couldn’t let Van Raven get away with this. He had to punish her. She, above all, would pay the ultimate price.

And he knew exactly what that price would be.

At 11:55 Kristy stood under the awning in front of The Farm House. She watched for the gray-and-black Oldsmobile, the one her chaperon, Mrs. Nash, drove, and hoped that her mother wouldn’t arrive first.

Her mother had insisted she not do anything regarding the contest until they’d had a chance to talk, and she rarely disobeyed a direct order, but jeeze, how could she possibly know she would get a call to do a last-minute photograph session? Her mother, who was obviously being paranoid, just didn’t know how important this was to her. No one wanted to hurt the contestants. What could happen at a photo session? As soon as she arrived at the photographer’s studio, she’d call. Her mom would be pissed, but she’d get over it.

The parking lot roiled with driving pellets of rain. Kristy hoped the humidity wouldn’t frizz her hair.

Wearing jeans, sweater, denim jacket, and high-top Reeboks, she was told that everything she needed would be supplied by the studio. She hoped so, because she had no time to go home and change; besides, she’d promised she wouldn’t go back to the apartment alone.