Raptor

by Dorsey Fiske

Overview

The rapist leaves few clues behind. Mounting public and political pressure, and the growing list of victims, leaves the special task squad on his trail increasingly frustrated. Police detective Kate Marbury is part of the task squad determined to find the rapist-murderer before more women are killed. Terrified the murderer will strike again, Kate takes the law into her own hands.
At the Publisher's request, this title is being sold without Digital Rights Management Software (DRM) applied.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781429973854
Publisher:	Tom Doherty Associates
Publication date:	10/16/2025
Sold by:	OPEN ROAD INTEGRATED - EBKS
Format:	eBook
Pages:	228
File size:	646 KB

About the Author

Dorsey Fiske, who lives in Delaware, is the author of several mystery and suspense novels, including Academic Murder. A graduate of Harvard, Fiske has worked as a researcher and in the worlds of art and rare books

Read an Excerpt

CHAPTER 1

Mid-August

HEAT. Fever heat. The city is sick with a fever. It sprawls, steamy, inert, sunk in tropical torpor. The weather has been hot for weeks. It feels like years. The thought of the city in winter, covered in snow, is a pipe dream, a shimmering fantastic impossible vision. It is hard to believe there has ever been snow in the city, hard to believe the city has ever been cool. There is only the heat, a malign smothering force which hovers, relentless, over the buildings and the vacant lots.

People shuffle listlessly along the city streets. It is too hot to pick up their feet. It is too hot to move. Those who can afford it exchange air-conditioned cars for air-conditioned restaurants for air-conditioned houses. Those who cannot sit panting on their front stoops, languidly fanning themselves. The air is heavy with unshed water. Black beads of tar ooze from the softened asphalt of the streets. The dog days of August have arrived with a vengeance.

The row of brick houses on Broom Street is new — only a couple of years old — and cheaply built. Several of the air-conditioning units have been defeated by the unrelenting heat wave; and even though it is nighttime, the interiors they were installed to cool are hot as bake ovens. The inhabitants have raised their unscreened windows in a vain attempt to capture a breath of air. Near an open window someone is playing the Neville Brothers. The notes fall like leaden weights, muffled by the thick atmosphere. Drums dully thump-thump-thump, Evan Neville's high pure voice cuts through the murk like a knife, singing about heat — emotional heat. About fever in the morning, fever at night. Like tonight.

He crouches, waiting in the dark, a deeper shadow among the shadows. He is dressed all in black: black jeans, black sneakers, black T-shirt, black gloves dangling from jeans pocket. He saw her leave several hours earlier. It was still light then and he was dressed differently. He keeps track of her movements; sometimes he is a delivery man, sometimes he hands out flyers, sometimes he is just a passerby headed for the neighboring park. But tonight he is dressed for business. Real business.

Her house is at the end of the row. The windows in the second-floor front bedroom are open. So is the kitchen window: ideal for a quiet entry, he notes. The night is deathly still with no breeze stirring. He had thought of waiting inside for her return. But the house is small and there is a chance she might see him. Sometimes he attacks in the early evening, but he prefers to catch them asleep. That way there's no time for them to call 911. There is the risk that she might close and lock the kitchen window when she gets home, and he likes an easy entrance. It leaves fewer clues. But he is patient. Patience is the secret of his success. If he can't get in tonight, there will be another opportunity. There always is.

A young man and a girl — the girl — approach, moving listlessly in the envelope of heat. They stop at the front door of her house. They are quarreling. He listens intently, leaning back invisible in the bushes.

"Come on," the young man says. "Don't be such a prude."

"It's too hot."

"You've got air-conditioning. I'll heat you up, it'll cool you off." He laughs at his own wit. His laughter is an intense, slightly hysterical jangle of noise. He has had a lot to drink.

"I said no. I told you, the air-conditioning's gone bust. It's too hot even to ask you in for a drink." She sounds slightly relieved as she says this.

Despite his less than sober condition, her companion sees his chance and seizes it. "If it's that bad, you'd better come back with me."

"I said no," she repeats, annoyed. "Look. It isn't that I don't like you. I just don't want to sleep with you. Not now."

"That's not the way you acted last Saturday," he says insistently.

"Saturday was ... I had too much to drink last Saturday. Anyway, we didn't. We nearly did, but we didn't."

"What makes you so sure? You were high as a kite," he teases her.

There is a pause. Then she says, "We didn't. I know we didn't. I didn't pass out."

"I wish we had," he says, his voice low and amorous.

There is a silence. The listener holds his breath. Damn, he thinks. The son of a bitch is going to queer it for me. He grits his teeth as he sees the two separate shadows meld. Then,

"No," she says again, but her voice is tentative. "Not tonight. Please. I have a lot of work to do this week. I can't let myself get tired. I shouldn't even have taken time out to go to dinner with you. I have to concentrate on this case I'm working on. You know, the one I told you about."

He takes hold of his opportunity. "Well, how you going to get any sleep in that hotbox? You said the air system's broken. Look, I won't touch you if you don't want me to, but you'd better come back and sleep at my apartment." He takes his keys out of his trousers pocket and waves them in front of her invitingly. "You can have the bed," he says. "I'll take the living room sofa. And stay there. Scout's honor."

She hesitates. It is a tempting prospect. Even with the electric fan and a cold shower, she won't get much rest. But he makes the mistake of supposing he has won and puts his hand on her arm, touching her breast as he does so.

"No, I ... Thanks, Tom, it's very nice of you to offer. I really mean that. And some other time ... It was a wonderful dinner, wonderful evening. It's just this case. The firm is counting on me to pull it together by the end of the week. I can't let myself get distracted."

He can tell by the sound of her voice, which has traveled the road from uncertainty to firmness as she says this, that the time for changing her mind tonight is past. But he can't help asking her, "How you going to get any sleep in this weather? With no air-conditioning?"

"I'll manage." She is determined not to go with him. Their kiss has made it clear to her that even with air-conditioning, she won't get much sleep at his apartment.

"Well, then ... What about Friday? Your case be wrapped up by then? Dinner after work?"

"It has to be. I said it would be. Sure, I'd love to."

"Great. We'll celebrate." He moves in for another kiss, but she dodges and inserts her key in the door.

"Terrific. See you then. Six o'clock, same place?"

"Right."

"'Night. Thanks, Tom. Super evening."

The lock of the door clicks and she is gone. The alcohol has slowed Tom's reflexes. He shakes his head to clear it like a dog coming out of water and stands uncertainly for a moment or so, then mutters, "Shit," and shambles off.

The figure hidden deep in the shadows does not move. He will wait until the girl has taken off her clothes, turned off the lights in the house, climbed into bed, and gone to sleep. Even in this heat, even without air-conditioning, she is bound to sleep at first. The heat is like a drug. It drains the energy from people, knocks them out for a few hours, then it wraps itself around them like damp felt, smothering and waking them. But in a few hours it will be too late for her.

At first he hears a variety of night noises — the muffled sound of footsteps on pavement, the heavy drone of an engine as an occasional car passes along the city streets, the sharp yelp of a dog. Then there is unbroken silence. The watcher has not moved from his niche in the shadows. The lights in the house he is watching — the lights in all the nearby houses — have been extinguished for almost an hour. It is time.

Warily he moves over to the kitchen window, which she did not bother to close and lock before she went to bed, and climbs over the conveniently low sill. A beam of light from the street-lamp casts a cold glitter on the blade of a knife that hangs on a magnetized holder beside the window. It has a wintry gleam that is strangely attractive in the sweltering night. He snatches it up to see if it is as cold as it appears, and tests the edge with his finger. It is razor honed. It gives him an idea. It may be useful when he gets upstairs. It will serve as an artful persuader. He has never thought of using a knife before.

The idea pleases him. His method has been to hit the recalcitrant ones until they can no longer resist. But the knife is a far more elegant solution. He does not enjoy inflicting damage as much as he enjoys the fear in their eyes, their knowledge that he can do anything he likes to them, their realization that he holds absolute power in his punishing hands, the power of hurting, the power of life and death. When he hits them too much, too hard, they do not feel it after a while. They are no longer frightened, they are too numb to feel. But the knife! The knife will evoke a flicker of fear, a glitter of pure icy terror at the back of her eyes, a reflection of the sliver of steel he wields in his hand. And afterward, when she is filled to the brim with all the fear she can hold, he can use the knife to release it. In the blood. A river of blood, a torrent of blood. If he wants to. If he chooses.

He gazes, entranced, at the thread of shimmering light that runs along the edge of the knife blade. He wonders why the idea of using a knife has not occurred to him until now.

TOM IS SITTING AT THE BAR IN DUGAN'S IRISH PUB ON DELAWARE Avenue, staring down into the third glass of bourbon he has had since leaving Janet. He is awash in alcohol, but fortunately heredity has endowed him with a hollow leg which still supports him, despite his overindulgence. On his way home he passed Dugan's and saw by the lights that it was still open, so he decided to make a quick stop for a glass of something as a sop to his injured feelings before returning to his empty apartment. One glass has turned into two or three, and he is beginning to think that he gave up on Janet too easily. In retrospect he realizes that as he left, she was just beginning to weaken. But it is almost one in the morning. Only a few diehard drinkers are still lounging at the long old-fashioned mahogany bar, and the bartender has taken to looking significantly at his watch. Time to go home, Tom thinks to himself mournfully. Home to a lonely bed. Of course, he might make a swing past Janet's place — it is not far away — in case the heat has kept her awake. Maybe she's changed her mind, with the heat and all. Pretty thing, Janet; a real knockout. Tall, slender, long strawberry blond hair, bright turquoise eyes. He wasn't just putting a letch on her, he thinks virtuously, he's beginning to feel really serious about her. That's why he wants her to get a decent night's sleep.

But as the bartender pointedly begins to turn off the lights, Tom comes to the reluctant realization that no matter how altruistic his motive, it is too late to bang on Janet's front door. Besides, he has a job to go to tomorrow, too. Time to roll on home. He waves amiably at the bartender. "'Night all," he says, and wanders out the door.

THE WATCHER EASES HIMSELF ALONG THE LITTLE HALL OUTSIDE THE kitchen. Slowly. Each foot testing the floor for noise, gradually adding a little more weight and a little more weight, until he is certain that the boards will not creak loudly enough to be heard upstairs. In the small sitting room a fan whirs, blurring any other noise. He has drawn on his gloves so he will leave no fingerprints. In his left hand he holds a flashlight the size of a pen with a pocket clip which serves as the switch. It casts a coin of light in front of him, just enough to enable him to see where he is going. In his right hand he carries the knife he found in the kitchen, blade upward, and every so often he caresses the edge of it lovingly with his thumb. His eyes flick back and forth, from knife to light beam, back to the knife again. He cannot keep from looking at the knife blade for long. It excites him more than anything he has ever seen. He cocks his head upward. Was that a sound upstairs? Silence. Satisfied, he tests the first step of the staircase gently, gingerly, with his foot.

TOM FINDS HE IS AMBULATORY, BUT ONLY JUST. He is fairly steady on his feet, but in the dark the streets of Wilmington are strangely misleading to negotiate. Clouds driven by a night wind sweep across the sky, and he blames his difficulties in navigation on the pixilating moonlight. However, eventually he reaches his apartment building on Rodney Street, a rambling renovated dwelling festooned with gingerbread that originally housed a large and prosperous Victorian family, now turned into six reasonably commodious apartments furnished with all mod cons.

Tom reaches into his right hip pocket for his house keys. They are not there. Annoyed, he slaps his pockets in a search for them. No luck. He swears and puts a hand into each pocket, turning them all inside out, and finally in desperation inspects the interior of his billfold. Nothing. He grovels on the ground along the path that leads to the porch, paying special attention to the perennial border, but they are nowhere to be found. He seats himself despondently on the steps, resting his aching head in his hands. Where the hell, he asks himself, are his keys? He finds that as soon as he allows his mind a little leeway it begins to wander, but with an effort he manages to force it back on track.

Keys. Took them with him? Door to apartment locks on its own, might have left them inside. God! Never get in. Wait! On his way out, remembered he hadn't checked mailbox, went back into foyer. Dropped them there?

He goes onto the porch and peers through the clear glass sidelights that flank the front door. A lamp in the hall is still lit, but he cannot see the glint a bunch of keys would make, either on the floor or on the low table in front of the tenants' mailboxes. He turns the doorknob and pushes, but the door is incontrovertibly locked. Frustrated, he shakes it; and when this action produces no result, he sits down again to try to think where he could have dropped his keys.

THE WATCHER HAS REACHED THE TOP OF THE STAIRCASE. It was a slow ascent. He is a cautious man. Caution has saved him from capture more than once. And being thwarted only whets his appetite for the next attempt, makes it more exciting, gives the game an added spice. Anticipation is part of the thrill. The thought of the look that crosses their faces — first surprise, then sheer disbelief, then the slow hideous realization that this is real, not one of those nightmares that make the sleeper wake thanking God that it hasn't really happened, that it was only a dream after all. Then fear, the stark unreasoning terrified comprehension of what is to come. That is the best time. After it is over he always feels the inevitable letdown. Until he begins to plan the next one.

While he is climbing the stairs, he feels a rush of air and hears a faint metallic clatter which grows louder as he nears the second-floor landing. At first it startles him; then he realizes that she must be running an electric fan in the bedroom as well as the one downstairs. All the better, he thinks; she will be less likely to be wakened by any noise he may make.

On his way up he balances lightly on his toes. The flexible rubber soles of the canvas shoes he is wearing make very little noise, even at ordinary times. At the head of the stairs the door to her bedroom is open, as he was certain it would be. He takes the precaution of switching off his penlight, though its slender focused beam would be unlikely to rouse the sleeper. But he no longer needs its assistance; enough light from the moon and a nearby streetlamp filters through the filmy curtains at the open windows to show him the way. Despite the fan whirring in the room, it is stifling in this narrow shoe box of a house, but he does not notice the heat. Now that his hour is upon him, he is cold with purpose, like chilled steel. Like the blade of the knife he is holding.

The double bed is set sideways to the bedroom door. The light from the windows discloses the form of the sleeper in a disordered nest of bedclothes. She wears nothing — it is too hot to bother with a nightgown — and her pale flesh is pearly in the dim light. Her lack of clothing disappoints him. He likes to see the horror in their eyes when he makes them take off their clothes; he likes to watch the way their hands tremble while they are undressing.

(Continues…)

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Excerpted from "Raptor"
by .
Copyright © 2000 Dorsey Fiske.
Excerpted by permission of Tom Doherty Associates.
All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.
Excerpts are provided by Dial-A-Book Inc. solely for the personal use of visitors to this web site.

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Table of Contents

Title Page,
Copyright Notice,
Acknowledgments,
CHAPTER 1 - Mid-August,
CHAPTER 2 - Mid-August,
CHAPTER 3 - Late August,
CHAPTER 4 - Early September,
CHAPTER 5 - Mid-September,
CHAPTER 6 - Late September,
CHAPTER 7 - Late September,
CHAPTER 8 - Mid-October,
CHAPTER 9 - Late October,
CHAPTER 10 - Late October,
CHAPTER 11 - Late October,
CHAPTER 12 - Late October,
CHAPTER 13 - Late October,
CHAPTER 14 - Late October,
CHAPTER 15 - Late October,
CHAPTER 16 - Late October,
CHAPTER 17 - Early November,
CHAPTER 18 - Early November,
CHAPTER 19 - Mid-November,
CHAPTER 20 - Mid-November,
CHAPTER 21 - Late November,
CHAPTER 22 - Late November,
CHAPTER 23 - December,
CHAPTER 24 - Mid-December,
CHAPTER 25 - December 21,
CHAPTER 26 - December 22 — Morning,
CHAPTER 27 - December 22 — Afternoon,
CHAPTER 28 - December 22 — Afternoon,
CHAPTER 29 - December 22 — Late Afternoon,
CHAPTER 30 - December 23,
Copyright Page,