He likes killing. But he knows he must be patient, like an actor preparing for a role. He must cast the part of the victim. Stage the scene of the crime. Find the motivation to kill. Then, with blade in hand, he must make it real. So real, it hurts…
DEATH WEARS A MASK
NYPD profiler Lee Campbell arrives to find the victim lying in the lobby of her building. In a pool of blood. Wearing a white mask. When he learns the girl was an actress, he follows the trail to an off-Broadway theater where she was rehearsing for a play. But Campbell suspects the killer was rehearsing, too—for another murder—because one of the victim’s co-stars has just received a warning: "You’re next."
The girl was too pretty not to know it. She was, Carver thought, the kind of girl whose whole life was defined by her prettiness. It trailed after her like the tail of a comet. She smelled faintly of strawberry blossoms, delicate, pink and white, like her skin. Her laugh, too, lingered in the room afterwards, soft and lovely, like the gentle tinkling of bells. It didn’t seem fair that someone like her had been endowed with so much—but then, Carver knew life wasn’t fair.
He was about to even the score. He knew where she went, when she went there, and who she went with. Most important, he knew when she would be alone. Carver was patient—oh, so patient. It was one of his most useful virtues.
Crouched in the darkened hallway of the tenement building, Carver glanced at his wristwatch. Eleven-twenty-five. She would arrive any minute. Rehearsal ended at eleven, and she would have stopped by the deli to pick up something on the way home—a salad, yogurt, or something equally healthy. Like all actresses, she was vain, always watching her figure.
Carver shifted his weight from one leg to the other, ignoring the Rice Krispies crackle in his knees. He bent over and stretched his back, touching his toes. He took a deep breath, letting it out slowly, using his training to control his body’s autonomic responses. He was more nervous than he had expected. Not scared exactly—more like excited, like on Christmas morning.
The bare fluorescent bulb hanging from the ceiling blinked and quivered, casting its sickly yellow glow over the dilapidated foyer, with its thick layers of peeling paint and drafty doorways. Carver smiled. These Hell’s Kitchen tenements were filled with struggling actors who streamed into New York from their mundane lives in the hinterlands, hoping some of the city’s glamour and glitz would rub off on them. Most of them gave up after a few years of drudgery waiting tables or stints as tour guides, trudging through Midtown followed by packs of Swedish tourists. Still others became high-end prostitutes, living off the generosity of Japanese businessmen looking for a night of fun.
The aroma of frying onions and garlic floated down from the third-story landing. Someone upstairs was making dinner—maybe the old biddy he had followed into the building, after fumbling in his pocket for imaginary keys. He had helped her with her grocery cart, and the look she gave him was so grateful. It was pathetic that a woman like her should have to lug a heavy cart up flights of rickety stairs. It was disgusting what people were willing to put up with in this town. Assailed by a fresh wave of cooking smells, Carver’s stomach rumbled in response. He tensed his already taut muscles in an attempt to squelch the sound. He would not allow anything to betray him, much less his own body. His command over his own flesh was unflinching and rigid. He loathed self-indulgence of any kind, and regarded daily bodily needs as a hindrance to his own darker agenda.
He heard the metallic clunk of the dead bolt on the front door. She’s here. Carver held his breath and waited for the sound of the door to close behind her. When she was inside the tiny foyer, he stepped from the shadows into the light, a broad grin on his face.
Her brief smile of recognition was replaced almost instantly by the expression he had fantasized about for so long: pure animal terror. It flooded his body like a drug, filling him with a delicious tingling sensation. He was upon her before she had a chance to cry out.
The sound of the ringing phone blended with Lee Campbell’s dream. It took him a moment to realize the harsh bleating came not from the woman in his dream, but from the parallel world of reality. He shook off the fog of sleep, dragging his unwilling brain back into consciousness. Flinging off the thick winter quilt, he grabbed for the phone, knocking the headset onto the floor, where it landed with a clatter.
“Damn! ” he muttered, swinging his legs over the side of the bed. Dropping to his knees, he groped under the bedside table for the receiver. Sitting on the hardwood floor, he put the headset to his ear.
“What is it?” he grunted as he craned his neck to see the clock on the nightstand. It was 5:20 AM. “Christ,” he muttered. “This better be worth it.”
“I guess it depends on whether you call the mur. . .
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