Night bait, page 1
NIGHT BAIT
BY PHILIP STRAKER
(aka Edward Lee)
To T.L.
Table of Contents
PROLOGUE 1
ONE 4
TWO 11
THREE 28
FOUR 75
FIVE 95
SIX 103
SEVEN 117
EIGHT 131
NINE 161
TEN 180
ELEVEN 199
TWELVE 222
THIRTEEN 227
PROLOGUE
Formality, he thought. But what can I expect in a country where formality is the only basis for order?
Through the windshield of his dark-blue Mercedes, the streets of Washington glittered from the combination of so many passing headlights and the familiar post-rain mist. An alien vision, because where he came from, there were only six or seven inches of rainfall per year, and private motor vehicles were not permitted on the street after sundown.
He waited at a stoplight (again, frowning at the premise of such a formality) then turned right onto Hamilton Avenue, which eventually took him to the specified address. A long winding courtlike driveway led to the front of the mansion, and he immediately disembarked, turned the Mercedes over to the stooge parking valet, and then made for the front door. He didn't really want to go to this cocktail party, but the formality of it all left him with no choice. He had obligations now—erroneous obligations—that went along with his new responsibilities, and he knew that this was just one of many. After all, he was a diplomat now, and hardly in position to turn down a party invitation from the U.S. Secretary of Defense.
He stepped into a huge crystal-lit foyer of polished slate, and a marine in dress blues took his coat and checked him on the guestlist without uttering a single word.
Everyone seemed to notice him when he set foot in the reception room. A momentary silence, then an overpolite rush of handshakes and greetings. Several of these people he'd met before, but most of them he'd never heard of. Senators, congressmen, presidential advisors, high-ranking military men—all just nameless, faceless buffoons with similar words of congratulations. He knew they were all putting on airs, stroking him with false words of kindness. They didn't really approve of the new order that had taken over in his country; they were only pretending. The nature of his government did not matter to the Americans—oil did.
At last, he was greeted by Secretary Rivlin himself, a solid, well-postured man with a vigorous personality that clashed with his tired eyes. He smiled, extended his hand. "Ambassador, we're so glad you could come."
"The honor, sir, is mine," he said. "I assure you."
"And I would like to personally wish you well in your new post."
He pretended to be humbled. "I feel certain that my appointment best represents the sentiments of the new leaders in my land. And you will soon see that those same sentiments are most sincere. In times such as these, reality must be examined in a new light, and I will do everything in my power to ensure perfect understanding and cooperation between my country and yours."
Rivlin appeared fazed; such words did not accommodate the formality. "Yes, of course," he said, and glanced around. "Well, I better go find General Dallion." Rivlin lowered his voice to a whisper and smiled. "He has a minor drinking problem, so I promised his wife I'd keep an eye on him. That's all I need, to have a continental commander swinging from a chandelier."
They both laughed then, heartily, and Rivlin parted to disappear in the surrounding swarm of persons.
He was happy Rivlin had left him, and happier still that other guests had arrived, thus removing the spotlight from him. He much preferred to observe than to be observed; now he was free to do so. After taking a drink from a passing manservant, he mingled silently, nodding, smiling, but confronting no one. He picked up bits of errant conversation, none of which interested him. Some subordinate emissary from a rival nation was spouting about how certain countries were using nuclear power plants as secret bomb-making sites. Two American eggheads drunkenly discussed new—and probably secret—techniques for the production of pure silicon for software purposes. A trio of Air Force generals laughed about the pitfalls of the F-5E, calling it a widowmaker and a flying coffin. This particularly disturbed him, because his country had just purchased two dozen such aircraft. Just wait till the next OPEC meeting, he thought. Then it will be my turn to laugh.
He hoped to hear some passing talk about the murders, but there was none of that here. Over the past couple of days, that subject had become a notorious topic for conversation throughout the city. He could scarcely go anywhere without hearing of it. Perhaps this political upper crust did not concern itself with such wrenching unpleasantries. But when he spotted Congressman McKeever shouldering his way back toward the foyer, he smiled. McKeever was one man who would always be concerned with such a thing, regardless of his position.
He must talk to McKeever. A face-to-face confrontation would prove very interesting.
He waited a minute or two, then went out to the foyer, which was really just a long hall decorated with many elaborately framed reproductions of baroque and neo-classicist art. A very large reprint of Rembrandt's "The Night Watch" hung at the end of the hall. McKeever stood to one side, tiny beside the giant painting, and he looked up at it as if unimpressed.
He hesitated before approaching McKeever. It seemed odd that a man in mourning would come to a cocktail party, but then he remembered that Americans live by diversionary principles. It was customary to drink and to forget.
"Congressman, McKeever," he said, and introduced himself. "We met at Secretary Wright's a week or so ago."
McKeever, a squat, overweight man with drooping shoulders and thin, dark hair, shook hands with him and smiled vacantly. It was obvious that McKeever didn't remember him. True, they had met recently, but that was before McKeever's daughter had been murdered. He understood that such a trauma could affect the congressman's memory.
"Oh yes, that's right," McKeever said, finally placing the name and face. "It's good to see you again."
This, he knew, was a lie. He and McKeever came from two entirely different schools of governmental thought.
McKeever was a diehard liberal, forever dreaming of socio-economic balance, clean air, and isolationism. Men like McKeever would prefer that the Middle East did not exist.
"I would like to express my deepest condolences to you and your family," he said to McKeever. "When I heard about your daughter, I was shocked. Please know how sorry I am."
McKeever nodded, but didn't speak for several moments. He took a long sip of his drink and said, "I keep hoping, praying, that the police will catch the guy and send him to prison for the rest of his life. But what kind of justice is that?"
"I know what you mean, sir," he said. "It is almost a crime in itself to allow such people to live." But as he spoke the words, he found it harder and harder to keep himself from grinning.
"In your country," McKeever asked, "what would they do? How would they punish a psycho killer?"
"A man such as this would probably be drawn and quartered in public. In my land, the payment for brutal crimes is slow death."
McKeever reflected on that, then paled. "I'd give anything to catch the guy myself...I'd tear him limb from limb."
It occurred to him then that if he didn't get away from McKeever soon, his real feelings would surface.
"I still can't believe it," McKeever droned on. "Why Leslie? Why did it have to be her? She was a good girl."
"I'm sure she was," he said, but thought, She was anything but a good girl. She was a slut, a dirty cocksucking tramp like the whores on 14th Street. She got what she deserved, and I can tell you, she was the best of the bunch.
By now, McKeever was on the verge of tears, though he tried earnestly not to show it. "If you'll excuse me, Ambassador."
"Certainly."
He watched McKeever stagger away, and he thought, Congressman, if you only knew. Then he stepped back into the adjoining corridor where no one, especially McKeever, could see him, and he squeezed his eyes shut, bit down on his lower lip, and began wheezing with stifled laughter.
ONE
"Jesus," she muttered, "it's cold."
Diana Slezak stood on the corner of Vermont Avenue and Κ Street, shivering in her ludicrous apparel. It was much too cold to be wearing clothes so skimpy; the open-toed heels and the new silver-stitched pair of Calvin Kleins offered nothing against the temperature. She also wore a mint-green bodice, made of a shiny fishnet material, which partially exposed her small braless breasts. It looked good, but of course it made her feel like she was wearing nothing from the waist up. Goosebumps raised on her bare arms, and her breath billowed from her mouth in dense, white puffs. She couldn't ever remember it getting this cold by mid-October in Washington.
She'd been standing there for nearly an hour, and in that time, she'd had three propositions, all of which she had turned down.
She stole a quick glance down Vermont Avenue. It was dark and silent, and she appeared to be the only hooker on that side of the block. This was very unusual for a Friday night. She moved away from her stationary post at the corner of Κ Street and proceeded toward the more illuminated sidewalks of 14th Street on the other side of the block. She could hear her knees crackling as she walked, and her feet throbbed from standing for so long in the same place. Within minutes, she was strutting down 14th Street, a world apart from its adjacent Vermont Avenue. The sidewalks were alive with hookers, dozens of them, white, black, oriental
Diana found a suitable spot by a closed pawn shop with a steel-cage curtain locked over its doorway, and she reassumed her lewd position of solicitation, feet apart, legs spread, arms folded in front of her to lend a gentle lift to her breasts.
Her eyes scanned the street from one end to the other. It was a sleazy scene, but one that she had grown quite used to from several years of experience. It amazed her—even shocked her—that she had gotten used to it so quickly. Fourteenth Street was a world apart from the rest of Washington, with a different set of values and motivations. Familiarizing oneself with it was simply a matter of viewing life from an odd angle.
From where she was standing, she could see the clock mounted in the tower on St. Thomas Circle. Time seemed to crawl tonight; she wondered if the evening would ever end. She'd been at it since dusk with no luck whatsoever.
"Hi, sugar," a voice said, and pulled Diane's consciousness back to the street. "Let's go. I got a C-not for you ... if you make it good."
Diana looked up at the man who was suddenly standing next to her. She hadn't heard him approach. He was young, tall, and broad-shouldered, and she thought that without his clothes on, he would look like one of those meatracks on the cover of some body building magazine. He had short hair, almost a crewcut, with a plot of slanted fuzz on top. Jarhead, she decided in an instant. Nobody in the world had haircuts like that except the U.S. Marines. She could see that boned-up boot camp lust in his eyes as he waited for an answer.
"Wish I could," she said, "but I'm waiting for my man to pick me up. Got an out-of-towner tonight. Sorry."
"That's too bad," he said. "You're the foxiest broad on this whole street."
Diana wasn't flattered. She couldn't stand servicemen. Shove off, grunt, she thought. Go haunt a latrine.
She sputtered to herself as the guy walked away, and she wondered how much longer this would go on before somebody got wise. Most hookers would bend over backwards to turn a trick, yet Diana had been turning Johns away steadily for days.
Because Diane was looking for one very special John.
And she herself was a very special kind of prostitute.
"I've been wanting one of these for years," said the young man who was standing by the cash register in Lee's Brothers Typewriters and Office Supplies at ten thirty on Saturday morning.
Vickie Anderson smiled. "It's the best typewriter money can buy. If you have any trouble with it, just give us a call, and we'll send a trained IBM repairman to fix it for free."
The young man jerked his head back to get the hair out of his eyes. "Well, from what I've heard, nothing ever goes wrong with one of these babies. They're supposed to be trouble-free."
"Take good care of it and it will outlive you."
The young man chuckled, then handed Vickie twelve one-hundred-dollar bills. Her fingers, trained and nimble from sheer experience, arranged the bills so that they were all face-up and parallel. The bell chimed when she rang up the sale on the cash register, popped open the drawer, and placed the impressive stack of bills in the back of the tray. Then she handed the young man fifty-three cents. "See? You even get change back from your twelve hundred dollars."
The young man cast her a bleak smile and slipped the change into the pocket of his jeans. Then he lifted the huge cardboard carton off the counter. It looked as though the bones of his forearms were bending under its weight.
"Thanks," he said, and grunted. "See ya."
"Bye."
With considerable effort, the young man shuffled away from the counter. He pushed the front door open with his back, and from over the top of the typewriter box, he grinned one last time at her.
Thomas Lee, the lank, spindly-formed owner of the shop, rushed out of the back room after the young man had left. "Hot damn, girl!" he said through a split grin. "You're the only person I've ever known to sell five Selectrics in the same week. What a saleswoman!"
Vickie smiled brightly. "All in day's work."
"Yep," Lee said, nodding like a pelican. "Best damn salesgirl I've ever had."
Vickie lit a cigarette as her boss stepped outside and picked the morning newspaper up off the sidewalk. When he returned, the satisfied smile on his face had vanished.
"Jesus," he said, and held up the paper. "This Electrocutionist stuff is starting to make the front page."
Vickie said nothing. She'd heard about the murders; by now, everyone had.
Lee went on, "It says here that the police still don't have any leads. First, two whores, then that congressman's kid. Jesus."
Vickie flinched when Lee had said whores. It was such an ugly word. She hated it because of the painful, desperate memories it called back. "Sometimes I think the whole world's gone mad," she said.
"Yeah, can you believe it? How could a guy do something like that to girls, and rape them afterwards?"
"What do you expect in a city like this?" she said. "Every third person on the street's a nut."
Lee only shook his head. He set the paper down and made his way back to the office to finish his paperwork.
Suddenly, Vickie felt tired. She took a long drag on her Salem, closed her eyes, and exhaled, spewing a thin stream of gray smoke toward the ceiling. She thought of the two hookers who had been murdered, then recalled the shallow days when she had been a prostitute herself. Stark images of revulsion swept over her, along with mixed feelings of pity and hatred.
Dignazio.
Everything about his appearance indicated a man of good manner and meticulous taste—the crisp, white shirt; the unpatterned dark-blue tie with a small but scrupulous knot; the not-too-stylish pair of blue slacks, freshly pressed with a knifelike crease; and the modest set of gold cufflinks inlaid with tiny diamonds.
His build was slender yet hard, like the physique of a long distance runner. He had always taken good care of his body; it was one thing he could never replace. He was appalled by the low regard the others held for their health, the way they stuffed themselves with junk food, swilled tankards of coffee, and smoked three or four packs of cigarettes a day. Slow suicide. Dignazio wouldn't have any part of it.
Because of the way he looked after himself, it was impossible to guess his age. He was close of fifty now, but on a good day he could pass for thirty-five, maybe less. True, he was on his way toward baldness, but it was a graceful kind of baldness, his hair still dark and youthful, growing thin just at the top. He had a kind, delicate face, the only traces of age being the painstaking lines of contemplation etched into his forehead. His eyes were clear-blue, and they shone with a unique quality of fairness and sincerity, something quite rare in most men of his trade.
He squeezed open his small rubber coin pouch, removed a quarter, a dime, and a nickel, then soft-stepped over to the wall of vending machines in the lobby. Bypassing the more popular coffee and candy machines, he walked up to the juice cooler, dropped his money down the slot, and pressed the orange juice button. The carton fell clumsily to the port at the bottom of the machine, and he pulled it out and peeled apart the steepled flap at the top. Then, with all the grace and charm worthy of his refined appearance, Greg Dignazio took one sip of the orange juice, grimaced, and said, "Piss. Fucking piss."
"Something wrong, Captain?" one of the traffic sergeants said, unwrapping a Milky Way.
"Yeah, you're damn right something's wrong," Dignazio returned. "This orange juice tastes like piss. I just paid fucking forty cents for a carton of piss."
Disgusted, Dignazio plunked the container of orange juice into the waist-high garbage can and walked back up the steps to his second-floor office.
Dignazio was the last person anyone would expect to be a homicide captain on a large city police force. And the most ironic thing about him was that, despite his sophisticated appearance, he probably had the foulest mouth in the city. It was rare for him to speak a single sentence that wasn't riddled with obscenities, and some people on the department went so far as to know him as Captain Fucking, because it seemed that every other word that passed this lips was just that, "fucking," his favorite verbal-modifier. Fucking this, fucking that. Everything he saw, felt, heard, or observed was a fucking something or other.
