She lowered her arms and went after him, her feet thumping across the wooden walkway.

Instead of sprinting down the steps, he froze on the landing and glanced over the railing. She didn’t know why he hesitated; perhaps the height intimidated him. Whatever it was, it gave her time to catch up to him. She stopped twenty feet from where he stood, but kept her gun down. “Charles!”

He pivoted around with his revolver in his shaking hands. “Get away!” he panted. “I’ll tell you about the other one! Just get away!”

By her count, he had one bullet left. While he couldn’t shoot worth shit, the bullet could ricochet around the top of the tower—a cage the size of a small bedroom. Equally hazardous were the gaps between the railings: they were large enough to fall through or get shoved through. It would be a six-story drop.

She moved toward him but stayed on the bridge. “Put down the gun, and let’s talk.”

He backed up, pressing himself against the bars while keeping the barrel pointed at her. “You don’t want to talk! You want to blow my head off!”

“I could have taken you out in your kitchen. I just want to talk. Swear to God. Tell me the names.”

He raised his shaking hands. She hit the boards while his bullet disappeared into the night. “Fuck it!” He threw the gun at her and the revolver bounced on the boards behind her.

She got up and went after him, entering the tower and cornering him in the cage. “Tell me who they are.”

He raised his hands high. “Not until you put the gun away.”

“No way.”

His eyes darted from her gun to the hole in the platform on his right. The opening was where the stairs started their descent. “Why should I tell you? You’re going to kill me regardless.”

“I want to get out of this dog kennel.” She tipped her head toward the walkway. “Come on. Move it.”

Keeping his eyes on her weapon, he inched forward. “You kill me, you’re never going to get to the truth.”

“Slowly,” she said, pressing her back against the railing so he could move past her. “Keep those hands in the air.”

His eyes darted to the stairs.

“Don’t,” she said.

“Don’t what?” He threw himself on top of her.

A shot vibrated the platform. She felt a flash of pain in her own gut, and then it evaporated. “Charles?” she panted.

He rolled off her and onto his back, clutching his stomach. “You … shot … me.”

Crawling to her feet, she kept the gun on him. “I’ll call for an ambulance.”

Holding his stomach with both hands, he moaned. “Oh … God!”

He wasn’t getting away from her; stomach wounds were bad enough, and this had been at close range. She pocketed her gun and pulled out her cell. Punched in a number. “Try not to move.”

“Oh … God! Hurry!”

Turning away from him, she spoke into the cell in a low voice. “I need an ambulance on the West Side …” While she gave directions to the dispatcher, the man behind her coughed and groaned. She had no pity for him. She felt nothing at all, and the numbness was a relief. Finally, she was liberated.

She hung up and turned around to see that Araignee had rolled onto his side. “Stay still. Help is coming.”

“Ruth,” he wheezed.

Bernadette didn’t give a shit about Ruth anymore. She pocketed the phone and went over to him, kneeling at his head. “Tell me about the other drownings. Names.”

“Twins,” he wheezed.

She shuddered. “Names.”

“I’m dying.”

She knew better. The most evil ones often pulled through, their innate cruelty carrying them to a full recovery. She bet Araignee was one of those lucky pricks. She should have put a few more into him and guaranteed him a trip to the morgue. She stood up and turned away from him. He disgusted her. Twins. She’d get the names while he was in the hospital.

“God, I’m dying,” he moaned behind her.

“I wish,” she muttered. Taking out her cell, she punched in a number and walked out onto the bridge to look up at the night sky. The wind had died down, but the stars remained obscured by the clouds.

It rang once before Garcia picked up. “Cat? Where are you? What the hell is going—”

“Did she make it?”

“She’s going to live.”

“Thank God.” She glanced over at the man down in the tower and turned back around. “I shot the bastard, but he’s going to make it, too.”

“The cops are crawling all over the West Side. Where are you?”

“Those green steps on Prospect Boulevard. Top of the green stairs, on the bluff.”

“I’ll send an ambulance.”

“Tony, he says he killed twins. I hope to God he’s—” She heard a scuffling noise and a chilling wail. For an instant, everything in front of her went black. She gasped.

“Cat!” Garcia yelled from the cell. “What is it?”

“Charles,” she breathed, and lowered the phone. Turning around, she looked at the tower platform. Empty. She ran across the walkway and looked down. He’d crawled to the edge and slipped between the bars. By the glow of the streetlamps, she could see his lifeless body sprawled on the sidewalk at the foot of the tower.

Had it been a desperate attempt to escape, or an effort to end his life his way? She didn’t want to weigh the third possibility: that her emotions had for once taken over his psyche, making her death wish for him become a reality.

Chapter 41

YELLOW POLICE TAPE and flashing squad lights took over the neighborhood at the top of the tower, as well as the sidewalks and street at the bottom. A few people were roused from their beds by the sirens, throwing on coats and jackets over their pajamas to go outside and check out the ruckus. Half an hour after the body was taken away by the ME’s hearse, a television news van pulled up and then promptly departed. There were no photographers, reporters, or news helicopters anywhere in sight.

Bernadette and Garcia sat in the front seat of his car. Every once in a while, he thumped the steering wheel with his fist to punctuate a point. Her gloves were off and in her lap, and she fiddled with them as he spoke. Her jean jacket had been bagged, and she never wanted to see it again. It was covered with Charles’s blood and some of hers. Another article of outerwear lost to this case. The cuts on her face and fingers hurt, but the paramedics had taped her up.

A couple of blocks away, yellow tape also trapped Charles’s house. Bernadette and Garcia had gotten there just in time. Regina Ordstruman had nearly bled to death in Araignee’s elegant claw-foot tub. She was a University of Minnesota senior with a major in American studies and double minors in anorexia and depression. She’d never been a patient at the VonHader clinic, but Regina had tried to commit suicide twice before her twentieth birthday. She’d met Charles through the Suicide Stop Line that he’d so enthusiastically staffed as a regular volunteer—the number provided by the unknowing but ever-helpful Professor Wakefielder.

The tub and river drownings would all be examined to see how Charles Araignee had first come in contact with his victims. Recent drowning cases in Minnesota and Wisconsin would have to be resurrected to see if any were the twins Charles had tried to use as a bargaining chip. The murderer himself would be studied postmortem to see how one man’s childhood obsession could turn into a killing spree spanning two states.

Because her death didn’t match the pattern, the toughest loose end could be Zoe Cameron. Even if her autopsy showed she’d died of an overdose rather than her eating disorder, Bernadette was uncertain of Charles’s complicity. Araignee could have talked her into suicide while the girl sat in that oppressive waiting room, or Cameron could have done it all on her own—the tragic timing wreaking havoc with the investigation into Wakefielder. The prof’s lawyer would probably sue everyone in sight, but Bernadette figured no one owed Wakefielder anything. He purposely and habitually surrounded himself with unstable women half his age. Maybe this mess would convince him to stop offering classes that attracted basket cases.