“What?”
“It happened in that book, Red Dragon. The Tooth Fairy used his grandmother’s false teeth to bite victims. With him it was part of the murder fantasy, but with Malik it could simply be staging.”
“Where would Malik get false teeth?”
“Anywhere! He could have stolen an articulated model from Dr. Shubb’s office. Just veer into the lab on his way out to the front desk, and boom, he’d have a working set of teeth.”
“And the saliva could still be his? Like he licked the wounds or something?”
“Just like that. Or it could be someone else’s. To throw us off.”
“I’ll check this, but it seems far out. The FBI has given the DNA test on Malik top priority, but you know what that means.”
“Damn.” I gun the Audi around a tractor-trailer. “Does Malik have alibis for the murder nights?”
“Two out of four. He was with patients, or so he says.”
“Did they confirm?”
“Shit, he won’t tell us who they are! He’s stonewalling us.”
“Can he get away with that?”
“Not for long. But he’s one contrary son of a bitch, and so far he’s hanging tough.”
“Huh. Maybe he really is innocent.”
“Why would an innocent man be so stubborn about hiding things? Especially with people’s lives at stake?”
“You’re thinking like a cop, Sean. We all have something to hide. You know that.”
“Yeah, well, I am a cop. And I want to know what the son of a bitch is hiding.”
“He may feel that his patients’ privacy outweighs the risk to their lives. He may feel that even revealing their names could put them at greater risk.”
“I think he’s just an asshole.”
I remember the cold fish I knew as Jonathan Gentry. “You could be right. Look, at this speed I’ll be in New Orleans in forty minutes. Where should I go?”
“I don’t know. Kaiser isn’t sure how he wants to play it yet, and the task force is sort of paralyzed. You’d better just go to your place first.”
“Where will you be?”
Static crackles through the silence. “I’d like to be there waiting for you.”
I close my eyes. If we meet at my house, there will be no way to avoid the subject I’ve been keeping to myself for the past three days. Not without drinking, anyway. “God help me,” I whisper.
“What?” asks Sean. “You’re breaking up.”
Something in my chest lets go. This morning’s events at Malmaison combined with the anticipation of nailing Malik had blotted out almost everything else in my mind. But now reality is crashing in like a dark tide. I am pregnant by a married man. And no matter what kind of spin I try to put on it, the bottom line comes up the same: I’m a fool. A whore. No, worse, a slut …
“Cat? Are you there?”
“I don’t know.”
“What did you say?”
“I said I’ll see you in an hour.”
I press my garage-door opener and anxiously watch the white panels rise. Sean’s car is parked inside my garage. A dark green Saab turbo, ten years old.
I walk into my house with my purse in one hand and a paper sack in the other. The sack holds a bottle of Grey Goose, already half-empty. I pass through the kitchen and den like an exhausted soldier, then climb the stairs to the living room, which looks out over Lake Pontchartrain. Sean is waiting on the sofa, facing the lake. The picture window is covered with drops of condensation from the air conditioner, but I can still see sails on the horizon.
Sean isn’t watching the sails. He’s watching a golf tournament on ESPN. He points at the paper bag. “The news about Malik’s teeth bum you out that bad?”
I set my purse on a glass-topped table in the corner. Then I take a highball glass from a shelf on the wall, pour two fingers of vodka into it, and take a bittersweet sip.
“I’m not thinking about Malik.”
“Hey.” Sean stands and comes to me. “You need a hug.”
I do, but not the kind he wants to give me. As his arms close around me, I feel the temptation to yield to his embrace. He squeezes gently at first, working his fingers into the muscles of my lower back. A week ago I would have loved this. Now I feel a manic pressure building within me. As predictably as the evening tide, his erection presses into my abdomen. I feel only revulsion.
“Hey,” he says as I pull away. “What’s the matter?”
“I don’t want that.”
His green eyes soften. “It’s okay. I can wait awhile.”
“I don’t want it later either.”
Sean leans back to study me but keeps his arms around my waist. “What’s the matter, babe? What’s happening? Another depressive episode?”
His casual use of medical jargon irritates me. “I just don’t want to, okay?”
“But you always want to.”
“No, you always want to. I just never say no.”
He stares at me in disbelief. “You mean you make love to me when you don’t want to?”
“Sometimes.”
“Sometimes? Like how many times?”
“I don’t know. More than a few. I know how important it is to you.”
His hands drop from my waist. “And you waited over a year to tell me this?”
“Looks like it.”
The look of pain in his face is like the look of dumb hurt on an animal when it’s been struck for no apparent reason. God, I think. Is there anything on earth more fragile than male pride?
Sean swallows hard and gazes out toward the lake. After a while, he looks back, his face composed. “You and I have been through some serious shit together. Your mood swings, some bad arguments. I’ve spent the night here and done nothing but hold you all night when you were suicidally depressed.”
This is true, though
