In Your Name Page 2

  ‘Grrnoo,’ he said with his mouth wide open.

  ‘Then you must be lying and if you’ll lie about something as easy as breathing then you’ll definitely lie about not telling.’

  ‘Grrnoo I wunt.’ His eyes bulged.

  ‘Are … you … sure?’ she said banging his head against the brickwork as she pronounced each word.

  He winced at each impact. ‘Ggyess …’

  ‘Wait a minute, you’re right, there is something there, I can see it stuck in your throat.’

  Mechanic stood up and shoved her knee into his chest. ‘I’ll get it out.’

  She kept his head tight against the wall and forced her hand into his mouth. She loosened her grip on the bar. It protruded from her sleeve.

  ‘Look at me, fat boy. Keep still now,’ she said as his hands tried to relieve the pressure on his chest.

  Mechanic drove the bar into his gaping mouth.

  The ragged end tore its way through his oesophagus. Fat man’s arms lashed out trying to grasp Mechanic’s hands. He let out a gagging, choking sound as blood erupted into his mouth.

  She rammed it deeper down his throat.

  His teeth splintered as he bit into the metal.

  Fat man’s body convulsed. His hands clawing at her sweatshirt. Then nothing. He was still.

  His eyeballs bulged from their sockets, stained red from the rupturing blood vessels.

  Mechanic stopped pushing.

  She stared into fat man’s contorted face, his head tilted back with eight inches of metal protruding from his mouth. Wiping the knives clean, Mechanic snapped them into the leather straps around her ankle and walked back to the other two bodies.

  Back at the car she stripped off her clothes, towelled herself down and changed into jeans and a T-shirt. The gloves, sweatshirt, jogging pants and towel were bundled into a white plastic laundry bag marked Hacienda.

  Mechanic sat in the car and surveyed her handiwork from a distance. She could just make out fat man sitting against the wall, his head pinned back by what looked like a giant cocktail stick.

  She closed her eyes and breathed deeply.

  Big day tomorrow.

  That felt better.

  3

  Tallahassee, Florida

  Lucas’s every waking moment was consumed with finding Mechanic and killing the psychotic bitch, though in public he tended to use the phrase ‘bring her to justice’. This was a big day for him and, to put it bluntly, he was shitting his pants.

  It had been two weeks since his return to work and two weeks since that damn package from Mechanic landed on his desk. It was postmarked the very day he started back at the precinct, 21 March 1983.

  He was pleased to be back but knew he wasn’t the same man. He wasn’t the same police lieutenant who had cracked Mechanic’s true identity and had so nearly taken her down. The murdering bitch had broken his body and his spirit – quite literally. She’d beaten him to within a hair’s breadth of death and, if it hadn’t been for Harper’s intervention, Lucas would be dead. He’d spent six months in and out of hospital getting his body put back together and a further two in therapy putting his head back together. Neither of which had been entirely successful.

  Despite the best intentions of the force to rehabilitate him back to work, he knew he was damaged goods. He walked with a stick to support his shattered leg, his left lung operated at thirty percent capacity and his right arm shook with tremors caused by the nerve damage he sustained while being hung from the steam pipe.

  While his wounds served as painful reminders, they paled into insignificance compared to the demons that played inside his head.

  Lucas had become a single-issue cop. He disregarded his wider duties to focus on the single pursuit of catching Mechanic. Nothing else mattered. Nothing even came close, not even his wife.

  The demons were fuelled by guilt and he channelled his guilt into a boiling rage. Rage that there was now a ragged hole deep inside where his friend and partner used to be. Chris Bassano was still very much alive, but the man whom Lucas had worked so closely with was most definitely dead.

  Mechanic had attacked Bassano when he cornered her in his car. She tore him to pieces. She smashed his head to a pulp against the dashboard, then almost severed his arm.

  Bassano’s pretty boy looks were gone, replaced with a misshapen forehead and a spider’s web of deep lacerations criss-crossing his face. His arm could not be saved and the amputation ensured he would never again be a cop.

  It had changed Bassano irrevocably.

  He had become withdrawn, a shadow of his former self. He could no longer cope with living on his own and his parents moved him out of his apartment in Tallahassee and into the family home in New Jersey. He now lived a reclusive lifestyle, refusing to return Lucas’s calls or respond to his letters. Lucas blamed himself for what had happened and grieved the loss of the friend he once knew.

  Killing the bitch was the only thing that mattered.

  He took a deep breath and collected himself. This was a big day.

  Lucas tapped on the dark oak door with the inscription ‘Commander Chuck Hastings’ emblazoned across the top. He hated his boss’s office, nothing good ever happened there. He hated his boss even more, though to his annoyance, during Lucas’s recuperation he had been a model of support and compassion. Lucas cursed the man’s inconsistency.

  ‘Come,’ said the detached voice. Lucas entered the room, clasping a red box under his arm.

  Chuck Hastings was a large oval man, sitting at a large oval conference table. He was pouring steaming coffee into an oversized cup for a man with short, cropped hair and thick-rimmed glasses whom Lucas didn’t recognise.

  ‘Ah, Lucas, glad you could join us,’ he said in a frighteningly cheery manner. Lucas noted his boss’s shirt buttons were under more stress than usual – the product of too many corporate dinners. ‘Let me introduce Jeff Chambers from the FBI.’ Lucas shook the man’s hand. His name sounded strangely familiar.

  ‘Sir, I …’ Lucas stumbled over his words. This was the first high level meeting he’d had since returning to work and he was a little unsteady. The presence of the new guy unnerved him.

  ‘Have some coffee.’ Hastings poured another without waiting for a reply. ‘Shall we get down to business?’ He gestured towards a vacant chair and Lucas did as he was told. He placed the box on the table.

  ‘Sir, I just wanted to—’ Lucas blurted out, but his boss expertly cut him off.

  ‘You have a request for us to consider, Lucas, one which is a little off protocol.’ Lucas nodded and made a sound which could equally be interpreted as yes or no.

  Hastings continued, ‘That’s why I’ve invited Jeff. He heads up the Behavioural Science Unit at Quantico and has a great deal of experience in this field.’ Lucas nodded in Chambers’ direction and the cogs began to whir. ‘Would you like to take us through your proposal?’ Hastings sat back giving Lucas the floor.

  ‘Sir, two weeks ago I received this.’ He opened the box and removed a collection of sealed evidence bags. He held up the largest one which contained a document-sized envelope. ‘It’s addressed to me and was posted from Baton Rouge, Louisiana. When I opened it these were inside.’ Lucas placed the envelope on the desk and held up a number of smaller evidence bags, each one containing a flat white square of paper. ‘There are ten in total. The envelope also contained this.’ Lucas held up another plastic bag with white granules in it. ‘It’s sugar, which came from these opened packets. All of this might seem unimportant, and a little screwy, but it relates directly to the Mechanic case.’ Lucas paused.

  ‘Go on,’ said Hastings.

  ‘You will no doubt have read the case files about Jessica Sells, aka Mechanic, and the slaughter of twenty-four people over two killing sprees – the first in 1979 and the second just eight months ago. She was helped by her sister, Dr Jo Sells, who worked for the FBI. Jo was drafted in to support my investigation but worked against us. Mechanic was never caught and Dr Jo Sells was never apprehended either. There is strong evidence to suggest one of the women is dead, shot in the head by Dick Harper. They are identical twins and the big unanswered question is: which one did Harper shoot? What we do know is Jo Sells had a sugar addiction which embarrassed her. To conceal how many she used, she twisted the packets together like this …’ Lucas picked up three sugar packets from the coffee tray, emptied the contents into a spare cup and twisted them together to form a double helix. ‘She called them sugar twists and made them automatically every time she had coffee. And she drank a lot of coffee.’ Lucas rolled the paper spiral along the table top towards his boss.

  Lucas took a deep breath, collecting himself for what he was about to say. ‘This letter contained flat sugar packets. When Mechanic tortured me we talked about sugar twists and Jo’s addiction. I believe this,’ he said holding up the envelope, ‘is from Mechanic. She’s telling me she’s still alive.’

  The men on the other side of the table looked at each other and shook their heads.

  Lucas’s words were spilling out. ‘It’s postmarked the twenty-first of March, the day I came back to work. She sent me this as a sign. This says she is still at large. It’s a reminder that she won in the end. She’s taunting me. She’s taunting us.’

  Both men were silent, looking at the evidence pouches spread out before them. Jeff Chambers broke the silence. ‘So you’re asking for what exactly, Lucas?’ It was a pointless question as he already knew the answer.

  ‘I want to take a team of people to Baton Rouge where this letter came from. I want to track Mechanic down before she kills again.’ Lucas could feel the trickle of cold sweat running down the back of his neck.

  ‘This doesn’t prove Mechanic is alive, Lucas,’ said Chambers. ‘It is unusual, I ad
mit, but it doesn’t constitute a good reason to mobilise an expensive team to go tramping around Louisiana.’

  Lucas stared at him in disbelief. This was fast becoming his nightmare outcome.

  ‘But I disagree—’

  ‘Lucas,’ Hastings interrupted, ‘we threw everything at that manhunt and found nothing. It was a nationwide alert and we drew a blank. We need something concrete to go on if we are going to start running about the country again. This …’ He lifted the bag of sugar from the table, ‘doesn’t constitute hard evidence, now does it?’

  ‘I know this murdering bitch, sir, and this is just the type of thing she would do. Harper led the first case and Mechanic sent him notes, taunting him that he would never catch her. It destroyed him and his investigation. She tried to do the same to me. She has form for doing this type of thing. I disagree, sir – the sugar packets are a significant development.’ He held up the evidence bags, his hands shaking. ‘She’s sending me a message, sir, I know it. A message that says: ‘I’m still alive’. This is her MO, I’m convinced of it. She’s fucking taunting us.’ Lucas was coming apart at the seams.

  ‘Lucas, I understand your frustration,’ said Hastings. ‘You’ve shown extraordinary courage getting back to work and we admire you for doing so, but this isn’t concrete enough for us. I’m sorry.’

  Lucas exhaled loudly. Droplets of saliva landed on the table.

  ‘But, sir, I know this woman. I know what makes her tick and this is precisely the twisted thing she would do. You have to go with me on this one, sir. She’s out there. I just know it—’

  ‘Lucas.’ Chambers held up his hand, butting in. ‘I’ve listened to what you have to say and I have to ask myself a simple question: why would Mechanic do this?’ Lucas furrowed his brow. ‘Put yourself in her position. As far as she is concerned, we don’t know if she’s dead or alive. We also don’t know where she is. So from her perspective she’s got away with it – again. Why would she announce the fact that she’s alive and give us a possible location? That doesn’t make sense, Lucas.’

  Chambers softened his tone as if it was time to make friends. He leaned forward: ‘You’ve been under enormous personal stress and I believe it’s clouding your thinking. I’m afraid your judgement is flawed on this, Lucas.’ Chambers sat back with his arms folded; for him the discussion had come to an end.

  Then the light bulb went off in Lucas’s head.

  ‘Ah yes, Jeff Chambers. Now I remember,’ Lucas said pointing an unsteady finger at him. ‘You were the one who sent Dr Jo Sells to be part of my team. You were the one who sent the sister of the serial killer we were trying to apprehend right into the heart of my investigation.’

  Jeff Chambers shifted uncomfortably in his seat.

  Lucas exploded. ‘And you have the nerve to sit there and tell me my judgement is flawed! Before I go further I need to be sure – you’re the same guy aren’t you?’ Chambers nodded and looked at the floor.

  ‘Well, excuse me if I don’t find you very credible, Mr Chambers. It’s because of you people are dead. It’s because of you Chris Bassano has lost an arm and lives the life of a hermit. It’s because of you I spent eight months recovering from being beaten half to death – a beating I received at the hands of a psychotic bitch whose fucking sister you sent to help me.’ Lucas was on his feet and slammed his hand hard onto the table. ‘So, Mr Chambers, why don’t you take your flawed judgement and fuck off back to Quantico where you can recruit more relatives of serial killers.’

  ‘Now that’s quite enough!’ Hastings was also on his feet. ‘Lucas, you’ve gone too far.’

  ‘Too far … too far? How far would you go to catch this vicious bastard, sir? Not as fucking far as Louisiana it would appear.’

  Lucas gathered up the evidence pouches, put them in the box and stormed out. He left the office door wide open, not expecting to return.

  4

  Mechanic waited in the main reception of the Hacienda hotel. It was early evening and this was her second visit of the day. Her first had been mid-morning, dressed in a broad floppy hat, tan shorts, flip-flops and a vest top. After a period of casual lift-riding she found what she was looking for on the twenty-first floor – a guest laundry trolley. She deposited the white plastic bag from the previous day among the others and left. The contents would be put through the automated washing process, boiled clean of blood and returned to some bewildered guest in room 2125, who in turn would hand it back to the hotel. It would then sit in lost property until it was either stolen or disposed of along with the thousands of other garments. The best way to hide a needle is to first locate a haystack.

  In distinct contrast, she was now wearing a well-tailored black suit and white button-down collar shirt. The therapy of yesterday had done the trick and she exuded confidence and poise.

  Her face and hands bore witness to a glowing tan, while the slight bulge on her right hip gave away the .45 in its holster. Her hair was short at the sides and long on top allowing for a sweeping fringe. It was dyed silver and coloured contacts turned her eyes deep blue. Her only jewellery was two silver stud earrings and a military wristwatch. She stood around five feet ten in her flat work shoes and wore a hint of makeup. This was how she liked to look when meeting a client for the first time, business like and elegant.

  Mechanic now worked in personal security, a lucrative if not entirely savoury profession, where her unique skills were well sought after. When a high roller arrived in Vegas they liked to know they would be safe. The excesses of the city drew the seedier side of life, like flies around shit, and the clients wanted to be sure they wouldn’t spoil their designer shoes by stepping in something bad. That’s where Mechanic came in. Bodyguards were typically male and she was in demand.

  Most of her clients were women – successful corporate types who flew in for the weekend when their husbands thought they were somewhere else. The women enjoyed their excesses just as much as the men and felt a female minder would be more sensitive with the confidential items on the itinerary. Christ knows why, because every woman Mechanic had ever known couldn’t wait to dish the dirt.

  Male clients were brazen. Many a time Mechanic would stand guard in a hotel corridor while a parade of semi-clad women were ushered in or out of the room. At least her female clients tended to have dinner first with their procured male company. The men seemed to like theirs with a large helping of alcohol and white powder.

  While this assignment was a big deal for her, she was not looking forward to today. A high-stakes guy was blowing into town for three days and his usual minder couldn’t take the gig. So, he gave it to Mechanic.

  Mr Harry Silverton, or Fuckwit as he was known to those who minded him, was a walking, talking nightmare. He came from Texas and brought with him the smell of oil and money. He had a comic tendency of strutting around in a bright white Stetson and cowboy boots, as if he’d just fallen from a rodeo bull. The problem with Harry was the more he drank the more obnoxious he became. And the more obnoxious he became the louder he got. This was his first time at the Hacienda as the other hotels had been unexpectedly full when his PA called to make a reservation.

  Under normal circumstances Mechanic avoided this type of client like the plague, but Harry paid well over the odds and that was hard to turn down. She accepted the job knowing Harry Silverton fully expected to get into trouble and expected his minder to get him out of it. You got paid well but it carried higher risks than normal.

  Mechanic checked her watch: 7.25pm. It was usual practice for the hotel to make arrangements for the airport pickup and for her to meet the client on arrival. Silverton was already late, perhaps he hadn’t even made it past airport security. The cool fragranced air of the foyer was a welcome alternative to the twenty-eight degree heat outside. Vegas is never the place to be wearing a dark, well-fitted suit.

  A black Dodge limo pulled up and the concierge guys ran around like children, opening doors and taking cases from the trunk. Mechanic saw a bright white Stetson emerge from the front of the car and another emerge from the back. One hat stood a good head and shoulders taller than the other. She recognised Silverton.

  The two men walked to reception with the smaller man in front. Then it dawned on Mechanic: Shit he’s brought his own security. That was never good. It always resulted in a turf war about who was in charge. She hated these situations.