Rigby turned away from the club only long enough to ask, “Where are you taking him?”

  The man eyed Sealey for another moment, then fished a business card out of his pocket and handed it to Rigby. “McNamara Building on Michigan. We’ll hold him there until we can arrange transport to DC, about forty-eight hours or so. If you need to question him, call that number on the back; that’s my cell. I’ll get you the proper clearances.”

  She pocketed the card and hurriedly told one of the officers, “Help get this man into his car.”

  A uniformed officer gripped the zip tie on Sealey’s wrists, placed a hand on his shoulder, and pulled him to his feet.

  When the officer tried to push him in the direction of the Taurus, Sealey dug his heels in and instead looked down at Walter. “Are you sure?”

  Walter could only nod.

  Sealey closed his eyes and let out a resigned breath. “Okay, my friend. Okay.”

  The federal agent was staring.

  Walter turned away from all of them. He couldn’t look. He’d just get choked up.

  “Go,” the patrol officer said, shoving Sealey forward.

  They wormed their way back to the car. Walter watched as Sealey was loaded into the back, the agent climbed behind the wheel, and a moment later they were gone.

  He was still watching when he heard the scream at the club’s door.

  Chapter

  87

  Two SWAT officers were in the open doorway, their weapons hanging loosely at their sides. A young woman was standing between them, her arms draped over their shoulders for support. Her feet were bare and she wore a short black dress that barely reached her thighs. She’d been crying—her face was red and puffy, streaked with tears and snot. The three of them moved slowly, her legs offering little if any support, the officers taking the brunt of her weight. She stared out across the intersection at the police cars, SWAT van—taking in the plow truck, the news vans, the helicopters above, and all the people watching. When her gaze landed on Walter kneeling on the ground, hands cuffed behind his back, she grew visibly tense and stiffened. She scrambled, tried to get back inside the club. One of the officers holding her said something, tried to calm her, but she shook her head and planted her feet firmly on the ground.

  They tried to move her forward, but she refused.

  “I can’t go out there! Let me go!”

  Even though she was near hysterics, clawing at the men holding her, screaming out these words as her head thrashed from side to side, Walter knew that voice as well as he knew his own.

  Amy Archer.

  Jane Toppan.

  Amelia Dyer.

  Velma Barfield.

  Gesche Gottfried.

  Nannie Doss.

  Myra Hindley.

  Leonarda Cianciulli.

  Dagmar Overbye.

  Mary Clement.

  Sister Mary Daria.

  Her.

  She.

  It.

  Iele.

  She looked exactly the same. This was the girl he’d known as a child with his father; the one he saw again under that sink in Alvin Schalk’s apartment; at the brownstone brothel; at that restaurant, Giovanni’s; in her killing field, the Garden outside Atlanta; dressed as a nun in Bakersfield; and so many other times and places between they became a blur in his head. A swirl of memories all dipping in and out of one another. A lifetime of thoughts all stacked together in a single pile as transparent and fluid as a glass of water.

  “Tell them to get away from her,” Walter said to Commander Rigby. “Right now. Tell them.”

  Rigby said nothing. Her gaze remained fixed on the club’s entrance.

  The two SWAT officers pulled Amy Archer—Iele—forward, down several of the granite steps at the front stoop. She grew more agitated with each inch. Her legs shot out, and she tried to dig her heels in. The two men were stronger, though. They simply lifted her off the ground and got her to the winding cobblestone sidewalk at the base of the steps, then started across the lawn.

  She looked so weak. This little waif of a thing. Fighting with every ounce of strength she possessed.

  Frightened.

  Terrified.

  An act, all of it.

  “You don’t understand…” Walter said. But he understood.

  Walter understood perfectly.

  Although her eyes remained fixed on him, Walter knew it wasn’t him Amy feared; it was the salt. Salt she could not cross. Salt she would not cross.

  “Tell them to stop there, before—” Walter started.

  With her arms still draped over the shoulders of the two men, Amy brought her fingertips to both their temples simultaneously. A quick, sudden poke that happened so fast that if Walter hadn’t been expecting it, he might have missed the motion altogether. Both men crumpled to the ground into lifeless puddles at her feet.

  A sudden hush fell over everyone, nobody really sure what they’d just witnessed. Several of the police officers hunched lower behind their vehicles, but most appeared stunned, unmoving.

  There were at least two dozen guns pointing at her in an instant, and Walter knew if just one of them took that first shot, the others would follow. They’d unload thousands of rounds in only a handful of seconds. Most would miss; many would not.

  Walter waited for that first shot to come, and it probably would have, if not for the uniformed patrol officer who appeared in the doorway behind Amy. They wouldn’t put their own in danger.

  The officer had his own weapon out, and as he approached her slowly from behind, he leveled the gun at her head. Only a few feet away. He wouldn’t miss.

  She turned toward him, said something in a hushed whisper, and leaned forward.

  Her fingertips gently stroked his arm. She stood on her toes and kissed him.

  The scene was so bizarre, Commander Rigby’s mouth dropped open and the world managed to grow a little quieter.

  When Amy pulled away, the officer turned toward them, a stunned look on his face. Still holding his gun, he stumbled past the valet station, over the salt, and reached the intersection. His pace increased with each step, picked up an urgency. His blank stare locked on them.

  “Shoot him, Commander!” Walter shouted.

  “I’m not gonna—”

  The officer shot first.

  The commander wasn’t his target. Instead, Amy had sent him after the man holding Sealey’s rifle. Somehow she knew it contained their modified rounds. The possessed officer fired three quick shots into the man’s face and snatched the rifle from his hands before his dead body hit the pavement. With a flick of his wrist, he spun the rifle around, pressed the barrel against the blacktop, and leaned into the stock with the bulk of his weight as he pulled the trigger.

  The barrel exploded, and the shot backfired.

  Something wet slapped against Walter’s cheek.

  He didn’t remember closing his eyes, but he did, and when he opened them the officer’s dead body was on the ground beside him. Half the man’s torso was missing; blood pooled out from where bits of the rifle had torn through his chest and arm. All of it mixed around Walter’s knees. His ears rang with a sharp metallic sound over all else. That was quickly replaced by the commander’s voice shouting.

  “—on the ground! Right there! Don’t take another step!”

  Walter had seen all this before.

  He knew what she could do.

  Amy—Iele—stood there for a moment, inches from the thick swath of salt across the lawn; then she turned toward them and wiped the fake tears from her face with the back of her arm and called out, “I’ve missed you, Walter. So much!”

  Bending down, she grabbed one of the dead SWAT officers by the back of the neck as if he were nothing but a weightless rag doll and tossed him out into the salt at her feet. The other body followed, an impossible throw of nearly seven feet, this man landing facedown beyond the first.

  Her first step was tentative, onto her makeshift bridge of bodies. When nothing happened, when she realized she could stand above the salt without harm, she took another step, then another. Her gait was downright playful by the time she reached the body of the second man, crossed over, and jumped down onto the blacktop, the salt safely behind her.

  Amy dug her toes into the pavement, tilted her head to the side, and looked out at all the people—law enforcement, first responders, bystanders, all the television cameras and reporters—then turned back to Walter as if no one existed but them. “I’ve missed your face.” She smiled.

  Chapter

  88

  Walter tried to stand, but with his cane on the ground and his hands secured behind his back, he only managed to get halfway up before dropping. He slammed into the pavement, the rough asphalt tearing open his chin.

  “Get these goddamn cuffs off me, now!”

  Commander Rigby didn’t hear him. She was frozen, maybe in shock. Like all the others, she only stared at Amy, her mind no doubt unwilling to accept any of what had just happened. She might have been contemplating the fate of the other police officers who hadn’t come out of the club, the bomb squad, maybe the civilians still inside. As commanding officer, a million thoughts might be going through her head in that particular moment, none of which would be as loud as the one telling her to run.

  None of that would matter if Amy reached them.

  Walter craned his head back toward the SWAT van, toward all the patrol cars and the officers huddled behind them lining the streets. “Fire! Everybody fire!”

  Walter had no idea where the first shot originated, a single isolated pop somewhere off to his right; it sounded so small, but that was followed by a barrage as every officer started shooting.

  Amy’s body jerked and twitched. The ground surrounding her erupted in an explosion of dust and chips of asphalt. The glass door of the club shattered. The neon tubes fastened to the brick walls, too. Shell casings shot through the air like metal hail, bouncing off the cars and pavement.

  Somehow, she staggered forward.

  One step.

  Two.

  It was all over in less than ten seconds.

  Although Walter could hear nothing at first, he knew the sound of gunfire had been replaced by empty trigger pulls and the various clicks of slides locking back on automatics. Some officers struggled to reload while others only stared forward, dumbfounded.

  She was still standing.

  The gunfire had shredded portions of her dress. She’d no doubt been struck many times, but her skin appeared flawless. Not so much as a bruise.

  The plow truck was behind her now, off to the side.

  Something within Rigby sparked, and she came to life. The commander mumbled something Walter couldn’t make out, dug a small knife from her pocket, and threw it to the ground near Walter’s hands, then started toward Amy in quick strides. As Rigby moved, she scooped up an assault rifle off one of the patrol cars and brought up the barrel. She squeezed off three shots in quick succession, continued toward Amy, and fired two more. All five hit her in the stomach. She bent with the impact and started to straighten back up when Rigby fired three more shots, closing the distance with each step.

  Walter knew the weapon. It was an AR-5, and each of those bullets should have torn right through her. Eight shots at such close range should have cut her in half, but other than cause her to totter slightly, they did nothing.

  The commander fired again.

  Walter fumbled for the knife, managed to get a grip on it, and began to saw at his plastic restraints.

  “You’re getting too close!” Walter shouted, but it didn’t matter.

  Amy was far too fast.

  She grabbed the barrel of Rigby’s rifle and yanked the weapon toward her, throwing the commander off-balance. She stumbled and fell to the ground. Amy crouched beside her and gripped Rigby’s head between her palms.

  Walter thought she was going to snap her neck, but instead, she kissed her. As she had with the officer back at the club, she planted her lips firmly on Rigby’s and kissed her.

  A string of expletives poured out of Walter’s mouth as his restraints dropped away. He found his cane and managed to get to his feet.

  Rigby’s body tensed and jerked, but she couldn’t break free. There was nothing anyone could do but watch as her skin went chalky white, the veins and tendons of her neck grew dark, lined her flesh. Her hands and feet twitched; then she went still as all life left her.

  Iele stood, lifting Rigby’s body with her, and tossed it to the side—aged a thousand years in seconds, nothing but a dried-out husk.

  Chapter

  89

  More gunfire.

  Walter swiveled on his cane in time to see two of the SWAT officers coming around the plow truck toward her, both firing in semiautomatic mode, their rifles kicking out shots in threes—Crack! Crack! Crack! Two of the patrol officers were coming at her, too. They rounded several patrol cars and ran directly toward her, nine millimeters leading from stiff arms as they fired.

  Oblivious to the shots, she grabbed the first two men, on them in a blur. She pulled the assault rifles from their hands with enough force to break the clasps on the nylon straps. The arm of one man cracked with it, the shoulder dislocated on the other, both spun, and she caught them just long enough to press her palms against their temples. The life left their bodies, and she was on the second two men before the first had time to hit the ground.

  Nine millimeters empty, one managed to wrangle his stun gun from his belt and press the probes into the exposed skin at her midriff. There was a crackle and sparks, but she only smiled, and when she placed her fingers against the side of his head, she took her time with him, as if savoring the life force as it drained from him to her. The stun gun fell away, and he followed. The other officer had his baton out. He swung it with a two-handed grip and caught her in the chin as she turned to face him. Her head jerked to the side.

  If the blow stunned her, it was only for a moment. She looked back at him, her hand shot up and grabbed him by the neck, and she lifted him from the ground.

  “Stop!” Walter shouted. “Enough of this bullshit!”

  Her fingers twitched, snapping the man’s neck, and she dropped him.

  “Enough!” Walter shouted again.

  She took a step toward him and pouted. “Can’t blame a girl for defending herself, can you?”

  Walter met her gaze and raised his voice. “We’ve got people in all these buildings,” he lied. “We’ve been positioning for hours. All their bullets are soaked in oxenberry. A little something Red heard about back in Vietnam. Maybe not one shot, but I guarantee if everyone we’ve got out here opens up at once, you’re not walking away.”

  Without taking her eyes off him, she eyed the remains of the officer on the ground next to Walter, the destroyed rifle. She sniffed the air and her nose crinkled. “This whole place reeks of it. How is Red?”

  Walter coughed.

  He tried to hold it back, but it came up his throat and forced its way out. He didn’t bother to cover his face.

  When it was over, her eyes narrowed and she sniffed the air again. “Walter, are you sick?”

  “Lung cancer,” he told her, wiping his mouth. “I got maybe a month left. Probably less.”

  “I’m sorry.”

  “I’m sure you are.”

  For the first time, her face softened. “You hate me, don’t you? You’re dying, yet you have the space in your heart to hate me?”

  Walter nearly answered her. The words came to the tip of his tongue, but he didn’t let them out. He couldn’t, not with all these people watching him, listening. They wouldn’t understand. And how could they? Walter wasn’t altogether certain he understood. Because he should hate her. He wanted to hate her. But he couldn’t. He felt more alive today than he had in a decade.

  We can tell ourselves who to despise, but none of us get to choose who we love.

  He wasn’t sure what fortune cookie he’d pulled that from, but it popped into his head.

  The sight of her brought feelings he didn’t want. Feelings he hated himself for having. Walter fought them with every ounce of his being because they contradicted what he had to do. He couldn’t love her any more than she could really love him.

  “You’re not human,” Walter said in a low voice. “You’re a monster. A devil.”

  She took a step closer and smiled. “I’m an equalizer. I bring balance. I’m a necessity.”

  “I don’t want to kill you, but I will. If you don’t give me a choice.”

  “I can’t die, Walter. The fact that you think I can illustrates just how little you know. You can’t kill me any more than you can kill the wind.”

  “This needs to end.”

  “I don’t end. I don’t die. I simply am.”

  “You need to answer for your crimes,” Walter told her.

  “And your court is to be my judge? What gives you the right? Don’t you see how narrow-minded that is? To attempt to judge me based on what? Insignificant rules created by an infantile society? You’re children. You’re specks of dust.”

  “And yet, we’ve got you trapped.”

  “You really believe that, don’t you?” She gestured toward the club behind her. “I brought you here, Walter, not the other way around. Asked you to come here…so easy to manipulate, the whole lot of you.”

  Walter looked around at all the television cameras, wondering how much of this they were actually capturing. Any at all?

  She went on. “I don’t want to run from you anymore, Walter. I’m tired of running. Do you know how many times I’ve tried to forget you? I’ve tried to replace you? I’ve known so many people over the course of my…life…I guess we can call it that. My life. Most are terribly boring. Most are predictable. But you? I don’t know what it is about you, but you interest me. You always have, even when you were a child. You’ve always intrigued me.”

  Walter coughed again. He knew there was blood on his lips, probably his cheeks. He didn’t care. “Am I supposed to feel flattered by that? Touched somehow? I’ve lost count of all the bodies behind you. Do you understand that? The hurt you’ve caused? Do you even feel remorse for what you’ve done?”