Malicious Intent (39 page)

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‘Some choice when you push them from a cliff.’

‘Ah, that’s the beauty of behavioral science. The strong survive, and the weak, well, they take the easy way out. Some would say it is merely natural selection, an extension of the Darwinian theory of evolution.’ He scoffed. ‘You’re talking as though I committed murder.’

‘You may not have used your hands to push them, but you sure as hell played with their emotions. Morally, there’s no difference.’

If he moved to strike her again, she would run for it. With his tumor, she could outrun him. This time, instead of lashing out, however, he turned, locked the study door and put the key in his trouser pocket.

Shit. He was still strong enough to hold her down. She
had
to talk her way out.

‘I believe the law sees things differently. Murder requires either reckless indifference to life, or the intent to kill or inflict grievous bodily harm. I treated these women as patients and put them in therapy, which afforded them choices they previously wouldn’t have considered.’

This man was a grotesque psychopath. Anya realized the best chance of escape was by flattering his ego. That’s something that working with the police had taught her about eliciting information from suspects. He may just boast about where he had Kate.

‘What was it you examined, cognitive dissonance?’ she asked, scanning the room for a makeshift weapon.

‘We have been listening,’ he said snidely from behind her. ‘I should be lauded for saving society from these insipid beings draining the people around them. Look at the ones you’ve stumbled upon.’ He walked around the desk. ‘The abuse Fatima suffered would never have stopped, you know, after the arranged marriage. She lived in a fantasy world to escape the beatings.

You could say I did her a favor. And the beautiful irony is that I didn’t even inject the drugs. Oh, and when her father confessed to you, I have to say, Anya, that was a magnificent piece of work 318

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you did; it exceeded my every expectation. After all the vile acts he’s committed, he’ll be imprisoned for the one crime he didn’t commit. That one restored my faith in social justice all around.

A good result, you might say.’ He stared at the rain tapping on the window. ‘And as for you requesting my involvement in the case, to profile him.’ He laughed to himself. ‘Priceless!’

This man was deluded. She had fallen for his empathy routine, even confided in him. She shuddered with revulsion. He wasn’t going to abuse anyone again, if she could help it. Anya wanted Hunter to incriminate himself. He was happy to brag but careful not to admit to any criminal act, so far.

She grabbed the arms on the chair. ‘If you or Mohammed didn’t kill her, who did?’

‘Ah, I think you already know.’

Damn right, you bastard. ‘You effectively murdered her by giving her herpes. Drug-resistant strains that couldn’t be treated.’ She stood and Vaughan quickly moved to push her down by the shoulders, hands lingering around her neck.

‘Herpes for Fatima was a disaster, but a fascinating outcome.

You see, she had no chance of falling pregnant. It seems she had stopped menstruating when her weight plummeted at the same time the beatings increased. Genital herpes, as I recall, is a non-fatal disease. By suggesting that that is what killed her, you’re appearing irrational.’

He stroked her neck, threatening to crush it with each movement.

‘Phylogenetic analysis confirmed that Alison Blakehurst, Fatima and Briony had the same rare strain, from the same source.

Drug-resistance doesn’t normally occur in healthy people.’ Anya braced herself to gouge his eyes if he tightened his grip. ‘That was another miscalculation that you thought no one would notice.

Your lymphoma and treatment suppressed your immune system, which is how
you
managed to be infected with a resistant strain.

The women didn’t need to be sick – you were.’

Instead of strangling her, Vaughan let go. He couldn’t have known about the analysis. Anya kept talking. ‘We can prove you KATHRYN FOX

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had sexual relations with each woman, and the fibers in their lungs will match the ones in your chamber of horrors.’

He seemed taken aback. ‘Clever, I’ll admit. That still doesn’t prove foul play surrounding their deaths.’

‘What made you choose those women in particular?’

‘I know what you’re doing but I thought it would be obvious, even to you. Present company included.’ He chuckled.

‘They were all weak, indecisive, with masochistic and self-destructive tendencies. In fact, the difficulty lay in selecting such a small sample.’

She swallowed hard. ‘Why the chamber? What happened to them in there?’

‘You disappoint me. After I spoonfed you the information.

Sensory deprivation, sleep deprivation, white noise, time desta-bilization. The techniques are well documented. In a matter of days, or – in the case of Clare – weeks, the women are so desperate for human contact, they’ll do anything. Our species dies without touch. Did you know that?’ He stroked her neck again.

‘Physical contact speeds healing and is a powerful positive or negative reinforcer. Each one of the subjects in the chamber initiated sexual contact and became addicted to it, you could say. They transferred their emotions to me and made me a sav-ior for keeping them alive. After that, it took the occasional suggestion about them being better off with me, and they were convinced they’d fallen in love. It’s not a crime to have consensual intercourse, or be the object of a woman’s desires.’

Anya noticed a keyed lock on the window. She’d have to try to break it to get out. The towels could stop her from cutting herself. Shit. She’d left them outside in the hall. Her only chance to survive was to stay calm, and keep him talking.

‘Why Clare?’

‘Unhappy, doubting God, unable to cope with abuse victims. She was at high risk of postnatal depression, too.’ He let go and walked back to his chair behind the desk. ‘And what about the poor child? What sort of life would it have had?’ He sat down, fingers interlocked on top of his head.

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Anya pictured a woman who mutilated her own ears on a cliff. ‘What happened to Clare that night she died?’

‘Seemed she didn’t like hearing the truth when confronted with what she’d done with me.’

‘Your truth.’ She remembered what Brody had said. Truth was what you could prove in court. The microcassette recorder on the table. If only she could switch it on and record everything he said.

Vaughan seemed to be reminiscing. ‘Clare was immature.

She equated sex with forever-after love and couldn’t face reality. She felt she’d been “deflowered.” That’s a phrase you don’t hear very often. When I explained that she had merely been an object for study purposes, she became histrionic.’

Leaning forward, Anya ran both hands along the desk, the recorder, mere centimeters away. ‘Why would you pay Clare’s bills when you had her locked away?’

‘Call me a philanthropist.’

Anya tried again. ‘What about Debbie Finch? How did you manage to get her to kill her father first?’

Hunter swung his chair toward the window and laughed.

Anya pressed the record button and stood up. ‘That had to have been the toughest,’ she challenged.

‘You don’t get it, do you?’ he swiveled around again. ‘By shaving the pubic region, they were stripped back to the very basics, an almost androgenous state. No pretense, just true nakedness. Now for Debbie, that had an interesting effect, in a remarkably short period of time. Hairless genitalia brought back memories of her father – the repulsion, the hatred. Then she came to want physical contact with me, the touch, vaginal and oral sex. She was almost insatiable and far more experienced than the others.’ He gave a wry grin. ‘By the time she went home, she couldn’t wait to kill him, even took pride in it.’

He seemed to be reliving the moment. ‘Then, I suggested having oral sex. She found it too confronting when I covered myself in jam. Seems she might have liked what her father did to her and couldn’t face that.’

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Anya couldn’t believe the twisted logic. ‘You became her father?’

‘No, I remained the object of her desire. She couldn’t rec-oncile her behavior with the disgust she’d claimed to harbor for the same act. Cognitive dissonance, remember? Couldn’t cope and shot herself.’

‘That’s when you made your mistake.’

‘Mistake?’ The side of Hunter’s mouth twitched.

Anya took control. ‘You left the toilet seat up.’

Vaughan erupted into laughter. ‘Now, that
is
a crime!’ he finally said. ‘This is becoming tiresome. The others are pretty much the same story. I think you get the picture. Dysfunctional people in dysfunctional environments are beyond help. Given the choice, they fuck up every time. That, I have proven, beyond question.’

‘Briony managed to get away from you. That must have buggered up your results.’

‘She tried to kill herself and couldn’t even manage that properly. Pathetic creature. I’m surprised she had the gumption to overdose at all.’

‘Were the flowers a threat or just a sick joke?’ Anya wanted to know.

He shrugged. ‘You tell me. You’re the one dissecting my work.’

She had to keep him talking and get him away from the window. ‘Results are fallacious when the methodology is flawed. Instead of being objective and giving the women choice, you decided what they’d do in advance and orchestrated things to turn out your way. That broke the most basic tenet of research. Not only did you draw a conclusion and set out to confirm it, your sample was biased and you had no control group. Your results mean nothing.’

He gave a derogatory slow-clap. ‘Wrong again. The people interested in my research care nothing for methodology. Just results. Did you know a number of governments are keen to see my papers, including our own? My work has universal implica-322

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tions. This data is invaluable for the interrogation of terrorists, and training in anti-interrogation techniques. Tell that to your recording. Testing, one, two. Are you getting all this?’

The bastard had anticipated her every move – in the investigations and now. It was as though he’d scripted the whole episode, as he had for all the others. His confidence frightened her. Anya knew she had to resist panicking. She no longer felt in control of what would happen next. ‘Do you expect me to go into the chamber?’

‘No.’ He laughed. ‘You’re a different case – very different.’

He clasped both hands behind his head and smiled. ‘The others were carefully selected and removed from their environments for the experiment. Except for Kate. She had to be introduced into the study when she found out about the Crisis Center.’ He looked so relaxed, Anya considered pushing him over in the chair to get to the window. He seemed to sense what she was thinking and sat forward.

‘I don’t have to put you in the chamber. The experiment was whether or not your own environment could be altered sufficiently for you to change your fixed belief systems.’

He smirked and opened the top drawer of his desk. ‘People really do like anonymous callers. In case you hadn’t worked it out by now, there is no investigation into your sister’s case. I merely phoned your father and he believed everything I said.

You’d be amazed how trusting people are, without ever checking a caller’s credentials. Your elderly neighbor is a real chatterbox, and not a big fan of yours, either. She was more than happy to tell me about your husband’s tantrum and the screaming at your place on Saturday.’

Anya realized he’d phoned the reporter, too. How else would the newspaper have known? He knew how much Ben meant to her and had used that to ruin Martin’s job. Just by setting up the article. Manipulating her world hadn’t required much effort. She’d even helped him along the way, by confid-ing in him. God, she’d even let him spend time with Ben.

Anya moved closer to the telephone. Its weight might shat-KATHRYN FOX

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ter the window if she threw it hard enough. ‘What do you want from me?’

‘Simple.’ He pulled a cloth parcel from the drawer and placed it on the desk. ‘I am curious about your fixed beliefs. In particular, your conviction that killing is wrong. Somehow, I think you’re more than capable of killing in cold blood. I intend to test that hypothesis.’

Anya had no idea what he had planned, but his callous indifference when he spoke of murder frightened her more than anything he’d said or done so far. She had to keep control, stay calm. He wanted her to panic. If she did, he’d win whatever sick game this was.

‘How?’ she demanded.

54

Vaughan peeled away the yellow cloth and Anya stepped back. She froze at the sight of the handgun. This was her chance.
Just grab it.

Anticipating her thoughts, he rose and sat on the desk, beside the ‘toy,’ swinging one leg. The bastard loved every second of this.

‘Now, you claim to be against the death penalty, anti-gun and all for life. You’re probably thinking you could grab the gun and threaten me with it, but I don’t think you’ll do it. For one thing, killing me would mean you never see your friend again.

By the way, that chamber out at Annangrove? It’s a plant nursery now. No more chambers there. I salvaged the materials and rebuilt it.’

Anya’s heart lurched, but she tried to make herself breathe deeply and evenly. Stalling for time, she tried to remember how to disengage the safety latch of a gun. She’d seen it done by Ballistics often enough. ‘How do I know for sure you’ve got her?’

Vaughan’s eyes turned the darkest black as he leaned forward and pulled a handheld recorder from his pocket. He clicked it on. A woman’s screams filled the room. He fast-forwarded the tape and a different voice yelled for help.

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‘Clare, Fatima, may they rest in peace. I think you get the picture. Now for one you should recognize.’

He kept his gaze on Anya. The tape squealed and stopped.

Kate’s voice screamed abuse and then became incoherent.