The Killing House (35 page)

They all had IV needles hooked into their arms or necks. Tubes ran out of the crates to plasma bags
hanging from the water pipes. An industrial-grade padlock secured each door. He counted eight kennels and all eight were occupied.

A pair of corpses had been dumped in the far corner. Dr Dara Sin had started to bloat.

But not Nathan Santiago. The young man had been stripped of his clothing, and his chest cavity had been cut open to harvest his organs.

The sight crawled through Fletcher's flesh and shot its way into his bones. He recalled his final words to Nathan:
No one will hurt you, I promise.

'Help me.'

The dry, whispery voice came from the adjoining kennel - a sickly woman dressed in dirty jeans and a roomy dark cotton T-shirt. She sat crossed-legged and was slumped against her chain-link wall, her mouth hanging open, the paper-thin lips cracked and crusted with sores. All of her teeth had fallen out.

Fletcher inched closer to her. 'Are there others down here? Are there any rooms?'

The woman didn't answer. Stringy blonde wisps of hair barely clung to her balding scalp.

Fletcher inched closer and said, 'What's your name? How long have you been down here?'

No answer. Fletcher pressed his back against the concrete wall. He sat with his legs tented and his forearms resting on his knees. Adrenalin was coursing through his system now; he needed to manage it, needed to focus and concentrate on the task at hand: escaping.

He was looking around the ceiling, searching for cameras, when he heard footsteps approaching from the passageway - marching, not walking.

Alexander Borgia's slight frame filled the doorway. In addition to the roomy grey sweatshirt, he wore dark nylon running pants that were too long; the cuffs had been rolled up several times. No shoes or socks, just a pair of flip-flops that were too big for his small feet. The clothes on his short frame gave him the appearance of a boy who had dressed up in his father's clothing.

Borgia gripped a Glock in one hand. In the other he gripped a cattle prod.

'Good,' Borgia said, his voice trembling with rage. 'You're awake.'

Fletcher had a hand on his belt buckle, watching as Borgia placed the cattle prod on the operating table.

Borgia approached the cage, the Glock held by his side. It appeared to be a .45 calibre. Fletcher suspected the clip was loaded with hollow-tipped rounds.

'Was it worth it? All that money?'

Fletcher straightened his legs. Put his hands on either side of him and lay his palms flat against the floor.

'My head is rather foggy, Mr Borgia, so I'm afraid I'm at a loss to answer your question.'

Borgia fumbled for something inside his trouser pocket. His hand came back and then he bent forward and rolled something underneath the kennel door.

Fletcher didn't track the object; his eyes never left Borgia's face.

'
Pick it up!
'

The occupant in the next cell flinched. A cry of anguish came from another cage and died, replaced by a chorus of low moaning.

Borgia didn't register their presence. Looking only at Fletcher, he raised the Glock. '
I said pick it up.
'

Fletcher found a vial lying on the floor. It was half full of a clear liquid. Taped to its side was an aged, peeling label stamped with faded red lettering:
Namoxin
.

Fletcher went cold. Namoxin was the name of the experimental medication used to treat psychotic male patients who had been in the Behavioral Modification Project.

The question jumped out of him. 'Where did you obtain this?'

'You failed to destroy
all
the evidence, Malcolm.' Borgia grinned in sour triumph. 'As part of the new task force assigned to find you, I was given access to all sorts of classified files and evidence. I know how you and the other agents from Behavioral Analysis who started the Behavioral Modification Project worked -'

'I had
nothing
to do with that,' Fletcher said, surprised by the heat in his voice. 'I was trying to expose it.'

Borgia wasn't listening. 'I read the files,' he said. 'Your war crimes are all laid out in black and white, everything you and the others did.' He spoke with great fervour, working himself into a near-religious mania. 'I know how you all got rich by working in collusion with select pharmaceutical companies developing this miracle vaccine to eliminate male violence. How you
picked the test subjects. I know you helped bury the bodies - the ones you didn't cremate at the psychiatric hospitals - and I even know how you and the others doctored the paperwork.'

'I tried to
expose
the project,' Fletcher said again.

'Next you'll try to convince me you didn't kill the three agents who came to arrest you.'

'They were CIA operatives, not federal agents. They had been sent to my home to kill me. The FBI retrieved the evidence I collected on the BMP, all the -'

'Lie to me all you want, Malcolm. I know the truth.'

'You mean
your
truth.' Fletcher tilted his head to one side, his gaze narrowing. 'Have you read any patient files? Seen any documentation on the Behavioral Modification Project?'

Borgia didn't answer.

'I didn't think so,' Fletcher said. 'You haven't been able to put your finger on any patient files or any documentation regarding the project because
they don't exist
. The FBI destroyed every last shred of documentation to keep the
truth
from seeing the light of day - and, it appears, conveniently used me as their scapegoat.'

'If you tell me, I'll show you mercy.'

'Tell you what?'

'Where you buried my brothers and sisters,' Borgia said.

80

'You're a patient,' Fletcher said, more curious than surprised. 'A former patient of the Behavioral Modification Project.'

Borgia's head craned back. He stared up at the ceiling as though there were a hole up there through which someone was speaking to him.

'Which hospital?'

'You tried to save Ali Karim,' Borgia said. 'You risked your life and your freedom to keep Ali Karim from dying.' His head snapped forward, and he looked back through the chain link. 'You're capable of empathy.'

'Unlike you.' Fletcher motioned with a sweeping hand to the others in the room. 'How many people have you tortured and killed, Special Agent Borgia? How many children?'

The man blinked, confused. 'I didn't kill anyone,' he said. 'All I did was find them.'

'Them?'

'The doctors and nurses from the hospital, the ones who helped engineer a private mass murder,' Borgia said. 'All those patients who died, and what happened to the doctors and nurses who killed them? They were placed inside witness protection. They were given new identities and new lives and allowed to go back to work
in psychiatric facilities all over the country. The Bureau couldn't let their sins - or yours - become public knowledge, so they did what they did best - sweep everything under the rug.'

Fletcher thought back to Theresa Herrera's missing medical records. WitSec had expunged them along with any other traces of her former identity when they placed her into witness protection. And the other families he had found - their medical records too had been obliterated.

'And you found their new identities,' Fletcher said. 'And you gave them to Marie Clouzot and Brandon Arkoff.'

A thin, knowing smile and then Borgia added, 'You did provide me with one piece of inspiration, Malcolm.'

'Do tell.'

'You taught me the importance of taking justice into one's own hands. It's the only way to mete out a punishment that properly fits the crime.'

'One difference.'

'What's that?'

'I didn't dissect innocent children and sell their organs.'

'I have nothing to do with that. My job was to find out their new identities and make sure they were properly punished.'

'You mean tortured. I'm assuming your two companions are patients like yourself.'

'I didn't kill anyone,' Borgia said again.

'Spoken like a true psychopath.'

Borgia pressed himself up against the kennel door. His eyes were hot. Wet.

Was he crying?

He
was
crying.

'Don't you want to clear your conscience?' Borgia asked. There was no real emotion in his voice, but the manufactured tears continued to spill down his cheeks. 'Or are you really the soulless psychopath they say you are?'

'Your name - your
real
name. We'll start there.'

Borgia swallowed, his jaw set. 'Terence Davidson,' he said. 'I entered the project when I turned fifteen - the Spaulding Psychiatric Center in Philadelphia.'

'Why? What happened to you?'

'A neighbour's dog kept shitting in our backyard, so I decided to take care of the problem. The neighbour's daughter caught me with the dog before I could do anything, and when she threatened to tell everyone, I ... made sure she wouldn't be able to talk.' Borgia voice's contained no shred of shame, regret or guilt. 'Instead of juvenile detention, the judge said I could undergo psychiatric help at Spaulding, and you know what happened there. You know what you did.'

'And your two companions, Marie Clouzot and Brandon Arkoff?'

'They were at Spaulding.'

'I want their names. Their
real
names.'

'Marie Clouzot and Brandon Arkoff. Now tell me -'

'No,' Fletcher said. 'When were you released from Spaulding?'

'I wasn't
released
, I
escaped
.'

'How?'

Borgia grinned. 'Marie freed us - all of us. Brandon, Marie and I - we fled together. She took care of us. We stayed together, we lived together - we survived. Together.'

'How heartwarming,' Fletcher said. 'Why did you try to kill Ali Karim?'

Borgia recoiled as if slapped. 'I didn't kill him,' he said.

Fletcher sighed. 'Why did you give the
order
to have him killed?'

'That came from above. The Director himself. You've made a lot of enemies, Malcolm. We can't afford to have you or anyone associated with you running around the country - who knows how many people know your dirty little secret.'

'I'll say it again. I had no involvement with the Behavioral Modification Project. I was trying to expose it. Ali Karim spent a small fortune hiring forensic archaeologists to try to find out where the hospitals buried the bodies.'

Borgia's eyes widened, surprised and possibly offended. 'Karim,' he said, his voice rising, 'was helping that murdering whore the world knew as Theresa Herrera find her
precious
little boy. Karim was helping to hide you all these years - you, a murdering psychopath who had helped to orchestrate a secret mass murder. Karim protected you, the Bureau protected their murderers - gave them new identities, relocated them, paid
for
everything
- and who helped me and the others? Who protected us? Nobody. Nobody helped us and nobody was looking out for us. Karim deserves to die, you deserve to die - the whole goddamn murdering lot of you needs to be punished for what you did. And you're going to tell me, right now, where you buried the bodies.'

Fletcher said nothing, mesmerized by Borgia's psychotic breakdown.

Borgia kicked the kennel door. '
Where did you bury the bodies?
'

Fletcher said nothing.

'TELL ME!
' Another kick, another roar: '
TELL ME WHERE YOU BURIED THE FUCKING BODIES!
'

Beats of silence, and then Fletcher said, 'Do you want the truth or your version of it?'

'The truth,' Borgia said, panting. 'This has always been about the truth.'

'Then I'll tell you.' Fletcher waited a moment before continuing. 'Contrary to what you've been told, I had no involvement with the Behavioral Modification Project.'

Borgia backed away from the kennel door.

'I didn't bury any bodies,' Fletcher said. 'After the Bureau closed down the project, well after they shredded all the documentation and destroyed every last bit of evidence, I -'

Fletcher cut himself off when Borgia turned, raised the Glock and fired randomly into one of the kennels.
Fletcher jumped to his feet, the ceiling's web of chain link preventing him from standing upright, and he yelled as Borgia fired again.

'
Look at me.
'

Borgia swung his attention back to him. 'You made me do that,' he said. 'You killed them. Their deaths are on your hands because you keep lying.'

'I'm telling you the truth.' Fletcher's ears were ringing from the gunshots. 'I can't tell you where the bodies are buried because I don't know. The Bureau took measures to make sure the bodies would never be found - that no evidence or documentation regarding the project would ever be found.'

Borgia's eyes were vacant, his grin vicious. 'Marie was right. You are a monster. A liar and a monster, just like the rest of them.'

Fletcher was about to speak again when he heard a faint scream, the sound coming from the passageway. The scream was followed by a clear voice crying for help.

Borgia backed away from the cage and grabbed the cattle prod from the operating table.

'I'm telling you the truth,' Fletcher said.

'The world will know soon enough what you did,' Borgia said. He pointed the cattle prod at him and added, 'And so help me God, you
will
tell me where you buried the bodies.'

Borgia stormed through the passageway. Fletcher sat back against the floor and grabbed his right boot.

81

Fletcher gave the heel of his boot a sharp twist. The seal broke. Quickly he unscrewed the heel. Now it was in his hands and he slid the compartment open, revealing the false bottom. Inside and set in the hardened, contoured plastic were lock picks and a small, five-inch folding knife.

The knife went into his mouth. Lock picks in hand, he threaded his fingers through the chain link, grabbed the padlock and went to work.

Jimmy Weeks had jumped to his feet when he heard the gunshots.

The police had found him. They had come in with guns ablazing and they were searching for him and they didn't know where he was because he was locked alone inside this dark room. He sucked in a deep breath and screamed at the top of his lungs, screamed '
HERE
!
HELP ME
,
I'M IN HERE!
'