The Apprentice: A Novel

by Tess Gerritsen

  “You knew her? Cordell?”

  “Yes.”

  “You were friends?”

  “No.” Her answer was so immediate, Dean’s eyebrow slanted up in a silent query. Rizzoli took a breath and said, “She was part of the Surgeon investigation. That’s all.”

  “You didn’t like her?”

  Rizzoli paused, taken aback by Dean’s penetrating insight. She said, “I didn’t warm to her. Let’s put it that way.” I was jealous of her. Of her beauty. And her effect on Thomas Moore.

  “Yet Cordell was a victim,” said Dean.

  “I wasn’t sure what she was. Not at first. But toward the end, it became clear she was the Surgeon’s target.”

  “You must have felt guilty. About doubting her.”

  Rizzoli said nothing.

  “Is that why you needed so badly to save her?”

  She stiffened, insulted by his question. “She was in danger. I didn’t need any other reason.”

  “You took risks that weren’t prudent.”

  “I don’t think risk and prudent are words that go together in the same sentence.”

  “The Surgeon set the trap. You took the bait.”

  “Yeah, okay. It was a mistake—”

  “One he knew you’d make.”

  “How could he possibly know that?”

  “He knows a lot about you. It’s that bond, again. That connection between you two.”

  She shot to her feet. “This is bullshit,” she said, and walked out of the living room.

  He followed her into the kitchen, relentlessly pursuing her with his theories, theories she didn’t want to hear. The thought of any emotional link between herself and Hoyt was too repellent to consider, and she couldn’t stand listening any longer. But here he was, crowding into her already claustrophobic kitchen, forcing her to hear what he had to say.

  “Just as you have a direct channel into Warren Hoyt’s psyche,” Dean said, “he has one into yours.”

  “He didn’t know me at the time.”

  “Can you be sure of that? He would have been following the investigation. Would have known you were on the team.”

  “And that’s all he would have known about me.”

  “I think he understands more than you give him credit for. He feeds off women’s fears. It’s all written there, in his psychological profile. He’s attracted to damaged women. To the emotionally battered. The whiff of a woman’s pain turns him on, and he’s exquisitely sensitive to its presence. He can detect it using the most subtle of clues. A woman’s tone of voice. The way she holds her head or refuses eye contact. All the tiny physical signs that the rest of us might miss. But he picks up on them. He knows which women are wounded, and those are the ones he wants.”

  “I’m no victim.”

  “You are now. He made you one.” He moved closer, so close they were almost touching. She felt the sudden wild urge to lean into his arms and press herself against him. To see how he would react. But pride and common sense kept her perfectly rigid.

  She forced out a laugh. “Who’s the victim here, Agent Dean? Not me. Don’t forget, I’m the one who put him away.”

  “Yes,” he answered quietly. “You put the Surgeon away. But not without a great deal of damage to yourself.”

  She stared back, silent. Damaged. That was exactly the word for what had been done to her. A woman with scars on her hands and a fortress of locks on her door. A woman who would never again feel August’s hot breath without remembering the heat of that summer day and the smell of her own blood.

  Without a word, she turned and walked out of the kitchen, back into the living room. There she sank on the couch and sat in dazed silence. He did not immediately follow her, and for a moment she was left blessedly alone. She wished he would simply vanish, walk out of her apartment and grant her the seclusion that every suffering animal craves. She was not so lucky. She heard him emerge from the kitchen, and she looked up to see him holding two glasses. He held one out to her.

  “What’s this?” she said.

  “Tequila. I found it in your cupboard.”

  She took the glass and frowned at it. “I forgot I had it. It’s ancient.”

  “Well, it hadn’t been opened.”

  That’s because she did not care for the taste of tequila. The bottle was just another one of those useless boozy gifts her brother Frankie brought home from his travels, like the Kahlúa liqueur from Hawaii and the sake from Japan. Frankie’s way of showing off what a man of the world he was, thanks to the U.S. Marine Corps. This was as good a time as any to sample his souvenir from sunny Mexico. She took a sip and blinked away the sting of tears. As the tequila warmed its way into her stomach, she suddenly thought of a detail from Warren Hoyt’s past. His early victims had first been incapacitated by the drug Rohypnol, slipped into their drinks. How easy it is to catch us unguarded, she thought. When a woman is distracted or has no reason to distrust the man who hands her a drink, she is just another lamb in the chute. Even she had accepted a glass of tequila without question. Even she had allowed a man she did not know well into her apartment.

  She looked at Dean again. He was sitting across from her, and their gazes were now level. The drink, tossed into her empty stomach, was already asserting itself, and her limbs felt nerveless. The anesthesia of alcohol. She was detached and calm, dangerously so.

  He leaned toward her, and she did not pull away with her usual defensiveness. Dean was invading her personal space, the way few men had ever tried to do, and she let him. She surrendered to him.

  “We’re no longer dealing with a single killer,” he said. “We’re dealing with a partnership. And one of those two partners is a man you know better than anyone else does. Whether you want to admit it or not, you have a special link to Warren Hoyt. Which makes you a link to the Dominator as well.”

  She released a deep breath and said, softly: “It’s the way Warren works best. It’s what he craves. A partner. A mentor.”

  “He had one in Savannah.”

  “Yes. A doctor named Andrew Capra. After Capra was killed, Warren was left on his own. That’s when he came to Boston. But he never stopped looking for a new partner. Someone who’d share his cravings. His fantasies.”

  “I’m afraid he’s found him.”

  They gazed at each other, both understanding the grim consequences of this new development.

  “They’re twice as effective now,” he said. “Wolves work better in a pack than they do alone.”

  “Cooperative hunting.”

  He nodded. “It makes everything easier. The stalking. The cornering. Maintaining control of the victims . . .”

  She sat up straight. “The teacup,” she said.

  “What about it?”

  “There wasn’t one at the Ghent death scene. Now we know why.”

  “Because Warren Hoyt was there to help him.”

  She nodded. “The Dominator had no need for a warning system. He had a partner who could alert him if the husband moved. A partner who stood by and watched the whole thing. And Warren would get off on it. He’d enjoy it. It’s part of his fantasy. To watch as the woman is assaulted.”

  “And the Dominator craves an audience.”

  She nodded. “That’s why he’s chosen couples. So there’d be someone to watch. To see him enjoy ultimate power over a woman’s body.”

  The ordeal she described was so intimate a violation that she found it painful to look Dean in the eyes. But she held her gaze. The sexual assault of women was a crime that awakened the prurient curiosity of too many men. As the lone woman in the room at morning investigative conferences, she had watched her male colleagues discuss the details of such assaults and had heard the electric hum of interest in their voices, even as they strove to maintain the appearance of sober professionalism. They lingered over the pathologist’s reports of sexual injuries, stared too long at the crime scene photos of women with legs splayed apart. Their reactions made Rizzoli feel personally violated as well, and
over the years she had developed a hair-trigger sensitivity to even a flicker of unseemly interest in a cop’s eyes whenever the subject was rape. Now, looking into Dean’s eyes, she searched for that disturbing flicker but saw none. Nor had she seen anything but grim determination in his eyes when he had stared down at the violated corpses of Gail Yeager and Karenna Ghent. Dean was not turned on by these atrocities; he was deeply appalled.

  “You said that Hoyt craves a mentor,” he said.

  “Yes. Someone to lead the way. To teach him.”

  “Teach him what? He already knows how to kill.”

  She paused to take another sip of tequila. When she looked at him again, she found he had leaned even closer, as though afraid to miss her softest utterance.

  “Variations on a theme,” she said. “Women and pain. How many ways can you defile a body? How many ways can you inflict torture? Warren had a pattern he stuck to for several years. Maybe he’s ready to expand his horizons.”

  “Or this unsub is ready to expand his.”

  She paused. “The Dominator?”

  “We may have turned it around. Maybe it’s our unknown subject who seeks a mentor. And he’s chosen Warren Hoyt as his teacher.”

  She stared at him, chilled by the thought. The word teacher implied mastery. Authority. Was this the role into which Hoyt had transformed during his months behind prison walls? Had confinement nurtured his fantasies, honed his urges to razor-sharp purpose? He had been formidable enough before his arrest; she did not even want to think about a more powerful incarnation of Warren Hoyt.

  Dean sank back in the chair, blue eyes regarding his glass of tequila. He had sipped only sparingly, and now he set the glass down on the coffee table. He’d always struck her as a man who never let his discipline weaken, who had learned to keep all impulses in check. But fatigue was taking its toll, and his shoulders were slumping, his eyes shot through with red. He rubbed his hand across his face. “How do two monsters manage to connect in a city the size of Boston?” he said. “How do they find each other?”

  “And so fast?” she added. “The Ghents were attacked only two days after Warren escaped.”

  Dean lifted his head and looked at her. “They already knew each other.”

  “Or they knew of each other.”

  Certainly the Dominator would have known about Warren Hoyt. It was impossible to read a Boston newspaper last fall and be ignorant of the atrocities he had committed. Even if they had not met, Hoyt would know about the unsub as well, if only through news reports. He would have heard about the Yeagers’ deaths, would have known that there existed a monster very much like him. He would wonder who this other predator might be, this brother in blood. Communication through murder, the message relayed via TV news shows and the Boston Globe.

  He’s seen me on TV as well. Hoyt knew I was at the Yeager death scene. And now he is trying to make my reacquaintance.

  Dean’s touch made her flinch. He was frowning at her, leaning even closer than before, and it seemed to her that no man had ever focused on her so intently.

  No man except the Surgeon.

  “It’s not the Dominator who’s playing games with me,” she said. “It’s Hoyt. The stakeout fiasco—it was meant to bring me down. It’s the only way he can approach a woman, by bringing her down first. Demoralizing her, tearing away bits and pieces of her life. It’s why he chose rape victims to kill. Women who’d already been symbolically destroyed. Before he attacks, he needs to have us weak. Afraid.”

  “You’re the last woman I’d ever characterize as weak.”

  She flushed at the praise, because she knew it was not deserved. “I’m just trying to explain to you the way he works,” she said. “How he stalks his prey. Incapacitates them before he moves in. He did it with Catherine Cordell. Before his final attack, he played mind games to terrify her. Sent her messages to let her know he could walk in and out of her life without her knowing he was there. Like a ghost, walking through walls. She didn’t know when he’d appear next, or what direction the attack would come from. But she knew it was coming. That’s how he wears you down. By letting you know that someday, when you least expect it, he’ll come for you.”

  Despite the chilling nature of her words, she had maintained a calm voice. Unnaturally calm. Through it all, Dean watched her with quiet intensity, as though searching for a glimpse of real emotion, real weakness. She let him see none.

  “Now he has a partner,” she said. “Someone he can learn from. Someone he can teach in return. A hunting team.”

  “You think they’ll stay together.”

  “Warren would want to. He’d want a partner. They’ve already killed together once. That’s a powerful bond, sealed in blood.” She took a final sip of her drink, draining the glass. Would it numb her brain of nightmares tonight? Or was she beyond the comforts of anesthesia?

  “Have you requested protection?”

  His question startled her. “Protection?”

  “A cruiser, at the very least. To watch your apartment.”

  “I’m a cop.”

  He tilted his head, as though waiting for the rest of the answer.

  “If I were a man,” she said, “would you have asked that question?”

  “You’re not a man.”

  “That means I automatically need protection?”

  “Why do you sound so offended?”

  “Why does my being a woman make me incapable of defending my own home?”

  He sighed. “Do you always have to outdo the men, Detective?”

  “I’ve worked hard to be treated like everyone else,” she said. “I’m not going to ask for special favors because I’m a woman.”

  “It’s because you’re a woman that you’re in this position. The Surgeon’s sexual fantasies are about women. And the Dominator’s attacks aren’t about the husbands, but about the wives. He rapes the wives. You can’t tell me that your being female is irrelevant to this situation.”

  She flinched at the mention of rape. Up till now, the discussion of sexual assault had been about other women. That she was a potential victim brought the focus to a far more intimate level, a level she was not comfortable discussing with any man. Even more than the subject of rape, it was Dean himself who made her uneasy. The way he studied her, as though she held some secret he was eager to mine.

  “It’s not about you being a cop, or whether you’re capable of defending yourself,” he said. “It’s about you being a woman. A woman Warren Hoyt has probably fantasized about all these months.”

  “Not me. Cordell’s the one he wants.”

  “Cordell is out of his reach. He can’t touch her. But you’re right here. You’re within his grasp, the very woman he almost defeated. The woman he pinned to the floor in that cellar. He had his blade at your throat. He could already smell your blood.”

  “Stop it, Dean.”

  “In a way, he’s already claimed you. You’re already his. And you’re out in the open every day, working the very crimes he leaves behind. Every dead body’s a message meant for your eyes. A preview of what he has planned for you.”

  “I said, stop it.”

  “And you think you don’t need protection? You think a gun and an attitude is all it takes to stay alive? Then you’re ignoring your own gut feelings. You know what he’ll do next. You know what he craves, what turns him on. And what turns him on is you. What he plans to do to you.”

  “Shut the fuck up!” Her outburst startled them both. She stared at him, dismayed by her loss of control and by the tears that sprang from nowhere. Goddamn it, goddamn it, she would not cry. She had never let a man see her crumble, and she wouldn’t allow Dean to be the first.

  She took a deep breath and said, quietly, “I want you to leave now.”

  “I’m only asking you to listen to your own instincts. To accept the same protection you’d offer any other woman.”

  She stood and went to the door. “Good night, Agent Dean.”

  For a moment he did not m
ove, and she wondered what it would take to eject this man from her home. At last he rose to leave, but when he reached the door he stopped and looked down at her. “You’re not invincible, Jane,” he said. “And no one expects you to be.”

  Long after he’d walked out, she stood with her back pressed to the locked door, her eyes closed, trying to calm the turmoil left in the wake of his visit. She knew she was not invincible. She had learned that a year ago, when she’d looked up into the Surgeon’s face and waited for the bite of his scalpel. She did not need to be reminded of that, and she resented the brutal manner in which Dean had brought home that lesson.

  She crossed back to the couch and picked up the phone from the end table. It would not be dawn yet in London, but she could not delay making this call.

  Moore answered on the second ring, his voice gruff but alert despite the hour.

  “It’s me,” said Rizzoli. “Sorry to wake you.”

  “Let me go into the other room.”

  She waited. Over the phone she heard the creak of box springs as he got out of bed, then the sound of a door closing behind him.

  “What’s going on?” he said.

  “The Surgeon’s hunting again.”

  “There’s been a victim?”

  “I saw the autopsy a few hours ago. It’s his work.”

  “He didn’t waste any time.”

  “It gets worse, Moore.”

  “How could it get any worse?”

  “He has a new partner.”

  A long pause. Then, softly: “Who is it?”

  “We think it’s the same unsub who killed that couple in Newton. Somehow, he and Hoyt found each other. They’re hunting together.”

  “So quickly? How could they link up just like that?”

  “They knew each other. They had to know each other.”

  “Where did they meet? When?”

  “That’s what we have to find out. It could be key to the Dominator’s identity.” Suddenly she thought of the operating room from which Hoyt had escaped. The handcuffs. It had not been the guard who’d unlocked them. Someone else had walked into that O.R. to free Hoyt, someone disguised perhaps in an orderly’s scrub suit or a doctor’s borrowed lab coat.