“If you wouldn’t mind, Mr. Pugh, we need to speak to Dr. Stone alone.” Bartoli’s tone was polite but adamant. Pugh looked a little put out, but he nodded.
“Certainly. I understand. Um, if you’ll have Dr. Stone call down to my office when you’re ready to leave, someone will come to escort you out.”
“Will do. Thank you.” Nodding affably, Bartoli escorted Pugh to the door and closed it behind him. Left alone with the agents, Charlie leaned back against her desk and waited. Something told her that whatever she was getting ready to hear, she wasn’t going to like.
“Maybe she ought to sit down for this.” Crane shot Bartoli a nervous look as Bartoli rejoined them.
“She’s right here in front of us. She can hear you.” Bartoli’s response was dry.
“What is it?” Anxiety quickened Charlie’s pulse as she looked from one man to the other. “And no, I don’t want to sit down.”
“We’re from the Special Circumstances division, out of FBI headquarters in Quantico, and we’re here because we need your help,” Bartoli told her. “We’ve got a serial killer on our hands, and we’ve come to ask you to assist with the investigation.”
Charlie felt her stomach tighten. Although her life was dedicated to figuring out everything there was to know about serial killers, who they were, what triggered them, if the urge to commit multiple murders was biological or psychological, if there was a marker or common characteristic that could possibly be used to identify them before they killed, etc., her work was purely academic. Objectifying the source of fear (i.e., serial killers) and learning all there was to know about it while keeping it at a safe psychological and physical distance was a classic post-traumatic stress disorder defense mechanism, she knew, but that was how she dealt with her past. The uncomfortable truth was that being confronted with the reality of a serial killer loose in a community of innocent people still made her feel as helpless and terrified as she had as that seventeen-year-old who had failed Holly Palmer.
“I’m happy to help in any way I can.” She crossed her arms over her chest. The creeping coldness that was stealing over her was a result of the out-of-control air-conditioning, of course, and nothing else. “If you want me to put together a profile of the perpetrator, I’ll need some basic information. The number of known victims, their age and gender, along with any other characteristics they have in common, how they were killed, where the bodies were discovered—”
“We don’t have a lot of time,” Bartoli interrupted, holding up his hand to stop her in mid-spiel, and Crane nodded agreement. “Last night a seventeen-year-old girl was snatched from her home in Kill Devil Hills, North Carolina. Her family—mother, stepfather, a younger brother—was murdered. This is the third family to be hit like this in less than two months. In both previous cases, the missing girls were found dead approximately one week after their families’ bodies were discovered. Evidence suggests that they were kept alive during the period of time between their abduction and when we found their bodies. This girl—her name is Bayley Evans—I figure we have five to six days left to maybe recover her alive.”
Listening, Charlie felt her palms grow damp. Her stomach began to churn. Her ears started to ring. Impossible as it seemed, the scenario he described sounded just like …
“Is this some sort of joke?” she demanded.
Walking After Midnight Page 37
