The Survivors Club (36 page)

Too late. They stormed down the hall, stormed into the room and arrived as a definite physical presence.

“Officers.” An older, trimly built man in faded jeans and a graying ponytail greeted them as they burst into the office. He belatedly rose to his feet, then waved his hand vaguely at the two empty chairs.

“Sergeant,” Griffin corrected him sharply.

Green wasn’t impressed. He shrugged, then commented, “I’d say I’m surprised by your visit, but of course I’m not. What happened this time, gentlemen? A paper clip is missing from someone’s lobby, and you’re here to follow up with your favorite scapegoats?”

“The state police doesn’t get involved in missing paper clips.”

“Oh, you’re right, you’re right. So one of my crews was speeding instead. You know, it really is safe to hand them the ticket. Not all ex-cons bite.”

Griffin’s blood pressure jumped another fifty points. He turned to Waters, who got the hint.

“We need a name,” Waters said.

“No kidding.”

“We need to know who works the sperm bank up in Pawtucket and we need a record of their date-of-hire.”

“Then I would need a subpoena.”

“Then you’re going to need a cast,” Griffin growled.

“Oooh, good cop, bad cop.” Green turned to Fitz. “What are you, the comedic sidekick?”

Fitz said, “I’m the corroborative witness who’ll testify that the first two didn’t really hurt you.”

“Oh spare me.” Green sat back down behind his desk. “Look, I run a good company, with good guys. You people run screaming through my personnel records once a month, and you haven’t found anything yet. Whatever it is this time, get a subpoena. If you finally have proof someone in my employ has done bad, then you shouldn’t have any trouble getting a judge to agree.”

“We don’t have time,” Waters said tightly.

“And I don’t have a million dollars. Welcome to life.”

Griffin had had enough. He planted his hands on the desk, leaned in until his face was inches from Green’s and held the man’s stare. “It involves the College Hill Rapist, got it? Have you been watching the news? Do you understand what we’re talking about?”

Green finally paused. He looked away from Griffin, then frowned. “My guys work at night—”

“Not every night.”

“I vet them myself. We have no one with a history of sex crimes. The women on my crews would object—or hurt him.”

“This guy was never convicted.”

“Then how do you know he’s one of mine? Look, Sergeant, I’m just a beleaguered small-business owner, and you’re not making a very good case.”

“We have our reasons. We have
compelling
reasons—”

“Then tell them to a judge,” Green interrupted firmly. He picked up his phone, as if to signal that he was done.

Griffin slammed the phone back down. “If another girl is hurt—”

“Then you know where to find me, don’t you, Sergeant?”

“You son of a bitch,” Fitz snarled.

Green shot him a look, too. He was angry now and it showed in his face. “Gentlemen, it’s called due process. You’re the police, you ought to know about it. Now if I were you, I’d find a judge. Because it’s getting late, and frankly I plan on going home at five.”

Griffin almost went for him then. Blood pressure so high. Ringing so loud in his ears. Waters touched his arm. He reined himself back in. Breathe deep, count to ten. Count to twenty. Man was an asshole. The world was filled with them.

“We’ll be back,” Griffin said.

“You and Schwarzenegger,” Mr. Green said dryly and picked up his phone.

They exited the building fast. Four thirty-two and counting. “We need a judge, a friendly judge,” Griffin growled. “I’m out of the loop.”

“I know one,” Waters said immediately.

“Okay, you and I will get the warrant. You”—Griffin turned to Fitz—“watch the building. I don’t want to come all the way back with paper just to find Mr. Bleeding Heart gone.”

“Oooh, me and all the ex-cons. I can hardly wait.”

“Neither can they. Come on, Waters. Let’s roll.”

Fitz went back inside the building. Waters and Griffin climbed into Waters’s car. The sky was still light, dusk three hours away. But it would come, and it would come quick, and Price would be out of prison, walking toward his five-year-old daughter. While some young college student walked out of the student union, headed for her apartment.

And Meg? And Jillian? And Carol?

Griffin had failed his wife once. He had failed ten helpless children. He had failed himself. He was supposedly older and wiser now. He didn’t want to fail again.

“Are you going to make it?” Waters asked tightly.

“I’m holding it together.”

“Just barely.”

“See?” Griffin said lightly. “I’ve made progress.”

Four forty-six.

A corrections officer stopped outside the solitary-confinement cell where David Price had been temporarily placed.

“Hands,” the guard said.

“You’re going to shackle me already? Wow, you guys really aren’t leaving anything to chance.”

“Hands,” the guard repeated.

David shrugged. He knew the drill. He stuck his hands through the slit in the cell door. The corrections officer slapped on the cuffs. David withdrew his shackled wrists, and his cell door was finally opened. The guard pulled him out by the shoulder and led him over to Processing.

“Can I stop by my cell?” David asked.

“Why?”

“I like that toilet better. You know, it’s hard to relax in a new cell.”

“Eat more fiber,” the guard told him and pulled him down the hall. At the end was a room where three more guards waited. One saw him coming and snapped on a pair of gloves.

“Full cavity search?” David arched a brow. “Why this is just my lucky day.”

The guard regarded him stonily. David shrugged.

“Oh, the price of freedom.” He went into the room, where his favorite shirt and pants were stacked on the table. The clothes had probably already been searched. Now it was his turn.

David turned away from the stack of clothing, trying not to smile too brightly.

“Free at last,” he murmured as he raised his hands above his head, “free at last. O Lord Almighty, free at last.”

Five
P
.
M
.

David Price bent over.

Griffin and Waters pleaded their case before a judge.

Fitz stared at a half-dressed receptionist.

Tawnya fed a crying, fussy Eddie, Jr.

Meg swayed from side to side.

Carol’s right hand started to twitch.

And Jillian sat in the Pesaturo home, thinking of Meg, thinking of Carol, thinking of her sister, thinking of Sylvia Blaire and then thinking of David Price’s game plan. Something was wrong here, she thought, then rubbed her temples as she tried desperately, quickly, to think of what.

Molly sat on the floor of her bedroom and waited.

CHAPTER 40

Price

“W
E NEED A SUBPOENA
—”

“We have probable cause—”

“The College Hill Rapist Case—”

“Como donated sperm to a Pawtucket sperm bank—”

“The rapist had to have access to those samples in order to plant evidence at the crime scenes—”

“We need to see some personnel records. Now!”

It wasn’t the most elegant arguing Griffin and Waters had ever done before a judge, but it did the trick. At five-eleven, they received their subpoena. They promptly drove ninety miles per hour back to Korporate Klean, burnt some rubber making the hard right turn into the parking lot and squealed around to the front doors.

First thing they saw was Fitz, standing outside, hand on Mr. Green’s arm, talking furiously. Green was obviously trying to make good on his threat to go home at five. Fitz was obviously making good on his vow to stand guard.

Griffin screeched to a halt directly in front of them, while Waters thrust the subpoena out his open window.

“We require access to your files,
now
!” Waters announced.

Sal Green sighed and shook his head at their persistence. Then he turned back toward the building.

Five minutes later, he kicked an old gray metal filing cabinet three times, jerked the lower drawer open, then gestured to the emerging row of files. “These are my current employees.”

Griffin eyed what appeared to be forty to fifty names. They didn’t have that kind of time. “People who work the sperm bank,” he said curtly. “Past and present.”

“I rotate the crews—it keeps everyone on their toes.”

“Date of hire November through April, Mr. Green.
Move it!
”

For a moment, it looked like Green might protest. Griffin’s hands started itching at his sides. He was trying to remember what Lieutenant Morelli had said. For that matter, what his therapist, his brothers and Waters had said. Mostly, however, he felt himself descending down, down, down into that dark basement with its neat rows of sad little graves.

Green started pulling files. Griffin figured it was the best decision the man had made all day.

He, Waters and Fitz began skimming. Ten minutes later, Fitz won the prize. “I know this man! Ron Viggio. I arrested him myself, several years back. A regular Peeping Tom. The woman was embarrassed though, and wouldn’t press charges.”

“Peeping Tom,” Waters said. “That sounds like a budding rapist to me.”

“Hey, all I know about was an arrest for B&E,” Green protested immediately. “Viggio told me about it up front. It was all some misunderstanding, he was trying to plant a surprise in his girlfriend’s apartment and a neighbor took it the wrong way.”

“He was caught breaking into a woman’s home?” Griffin asked sharply.

Green shrugged. “He was charged, not tried. At least that’s what I was told.”

Griffin was already dialing his cell phone. “Sergeant Griffin here. I need you to run a name through the system. Ronald Viggio.V-I-G-G-I-O. Yep. Uh huh.” And two minutes after that. “Current address?”

“All right.” He grabbed the file. “Let’s go.”

“Hey now!” Green started to protest again, but no one waited around to hear.

Five-thirty
P
.
M
.

The state marshals appeared and led David to the waiting transport van. Courtesy of his lawyer’s timely delivery, David was wearing his own clothes for the first time in a year and a half—a pair of tan khakis, a dark blue button-down shirt and dark brown loafers. The clothes had been searched and run through the metal detector, of course. So had he.

Now his hands and ankles were shackled. A state marshal walked on either side, both heavyset faces grim. David smiled at his escorts. He smiled at the assembled corrections officers. He smiled at the waiting blue van. He was in a good mood.

They loaded him up.

“Try anything, buster,” one of the state marshals said, “and we’ll grind you into dust.
Capisce?
”

“I don’t speak Italian, you English-challenged hump.”

The marshal growled at him. David smiled back.

The van doors closed. Soon the prison gates would open.

Five thirty-five
P
.
M
. So close to freedom, David could taste it on his lips. Five, ten more minutes, and the gates would open. Five, ten more minutes, and his real journey would begin.

Thank you, Sergeant Griffin, he thought. And of course, thank you, Meg.

“Apparently, Ron Viggio didn’t feel the need to tell his employer about his entire criminal history,” Griffin said as he hurtled his car onto the interstate and Waters called for backup. “Turns out he wasn’t arrested for B&E, but for first-degree sexual assault. He also spent three years behind bars in the mid-nineties for breaking into a woman’s home.”

“So first he’s a Peeping Tom, then he’s breaking into women’s homes, then he goes for assault. Wow, he’s positively textbook.”

“Yeah. Unfortunately, the sexual-assault charge didn’t stick. The woman had had a prior relationship with Viggio—they’d dated briefly—and since she’d slept with him willingly in the past, she got worried the jury wouldn’t believe her claim. Or maybe she just got freaked out at the thought of the trial. It’s not exactly a walk in the park.”

“Why try the defendant when you can beat up the victim?”

“Exactly. Viggio entered Intake in December, his accuser dropped the charges in January. His probation officer can probably tell us even more stories.” Griffin came to the Cranston exit, flashed his lights at the sluggish traffic, then whipped around them, cursing. Some jerk pulled out in front of him. He slammed the brakes hard and swore, and Waters grabbed the bullhorn.
“To the right. NOW
!
”

That put the fear of God into the asshole. Of course the driver shot them a dirty look as they went barreling by. Civilians.

“Viggio had four weeks at Intake during the same time as David Price,” Griffin said, breathing hard, his palms dampening with a combination of adrenaline and anticipation. He found the proper side street, his speedometer over eighty and his attention focused on the wheel.

“Oooh, is it just coincidence?”

“Or is it probable cause? By December, Viggio had probably figured out that it was only a matter of time until he attacked a woman again. But he also knew his DNA and prints were already in the system, so the first time he gave in to impulse, he’d have two detectives knocking on his door. Then he remembered good ol’ David Price, who lived next door to a cop and still got away with killing ten kids. Good ol’ David Price, who’s conveniently locked up with him in Intake.”

“Even rapists need role models,” Waters said.

“Unfortunately for us. And now, unfortunately for Viggio. Hang on a sec, we’re here.” Griffin saw the street sign belatedly, hit the brakes and let the momentum of the car’s back end whip them around the turn. He promptly killed the grille lights and eased up on the gas. He didn’t want to spook Viggio by racing down the street, lights flashing. First, they would conduct a casual drive-by to assess the home.

They neared the address and immediately spotted a man walking out the front door, heading for his car in the driveway. The man wore dark blue pants, a light blue chambray shirt and, from the back at least, could’ve been a double for Eddie Como. Hello, Ron Viggio.

“Jesus Christ,” Waters murmured in awe.

“He’s gonna bail!” Griffin warned. He grabbed the radio. “Everyone, greenlight, greenlight,
greenlight!
”

Griffin whipped his car sideways onto the driveway, blocked Viggio’s vehicle and slammed on the brakes. Viggio’s head popped up. He registered the two unmarked cars and one police cruiser bearing down on him. And then he ran.

“Move, move, move.” Griffin was out of his car. Up ahead, he saw Fitz swerve his Taurus into another driveway in an attempt to stop the fleeing suspect. Viggio leapt onto the Taurus’s hood, jumped down the other side and kept moving.

Shouts now. Waters bellowing, “Police, stop!” Residents peering out of their homes and yelping in surprise at the commotion. Officers yelling as they tore out of their cruisers and prepared to give chase.

Griffin had the lead. He scrambled over Fitz’s hood and thundered down the sidewalk. He’d show Ron Viggio what a five-minute mile meant. Vaguely he was aware of Waters racing right along beside him. Fitz panted somewhere in the distance.

Viggio glanced frantically over his shoulder and saw them closing the gap. He darted right, headed between two small houses and leapt a low wooden fence. A woman shrieked. A dog barked. Griffin heard it all from far away as he vaulted the fence, homed in on Viggio and dove for the man’s legs.

At the last minute, Viggio spun left, avoiding the tackle and reaching a tall chain-link fence. Griffin went down, rolled into the fall and was back on his feet in time to see Viggio and Waters disappear over the barrier. He jumped onto the chain link and resumed pursuit.

They had arrived in someone’s personal version of a salvage yard. A small white house sat forlornly in the middle of a pile of twisted, burnt-out wrecks. For a moment, Griffin couldn’t see anyone at all. Then he heard a clatter as Viggio darted past a pile of rusty hubcaps, and Waters went careening around another gutted car.

Griffin watched Viggio’s line, saw the obvious destination—a kid’s bike by the home’s front door—and raced around the other side of the house.

He burst into view twenty feet in front of Viggio. “Boo!” Griffin roared.

A startled Ron Viggio drew up short.

And Waters took him out with a flying tackle.

Ten minutes later, Ron Viggio sat handcuffed in the back of a Rhode Island police cruiser, sullenly refusing to talk. They let him be for now and descended upon his home. In the bathroom, Waters found the neatly stacked boxes of latex gloves. In the kitchen pantry, Fitz bagged and tagged three rows of Berkely and Johnson Disposable Douches, all Country Flowers. Then, of course, there were the vials they found in the freezer.

The kitchen table held an open package of model rocketry igniters and was covered with some sort of gray clay. Griffin sniffed the gray material suspiciously, then left it for Jack-n-Jack to figure out. They checked the upstairs bedrooms, the downstairs bathroom and all the closets. Still no sign of Meg.

Griffin finally found a door beneath the staircase, a door leading to the basement. He took a deep breath, motioned to Waters, and together they descended into the depths.

“Meg?” Griffin called out. Something grazed the top of his head. The end of a pull chain for an overhead light.

Still no sound in the dark.

Steeled for the worst, he yanked the chain and turned on the light.

Thirty seconds later, he and Waters had walked the entire length of the dank, empty space.

“Floor doesn’t even looked disturbed,” Waters said. “I don’t think anyone’s been down here for a bit.”

Griffin thought about it. “Car?” he asked with a frown.

“Gotta be.”

“Shit.”

They were back up the stairs and out of the house. Car wouldn’t be good. Trunk of a car would be even worse. Hold it together. Remember the lessons of the past year.

The driver’s-side door wasn’t locked. Waters opened it with gloved hands, while Griffin ran around to the trunk. He had his firearm out, just in case. On the count of three, Waters popped the trunk.

Griffin leveled his gun.

“Hey,” he said a split second later. “Isn’t that a bomb?”

Carol had started to move. Dan didn’t know if it was good movement or bad movement. At first, just her right hand twitched. He’d taken that as a good sign, stroking her fingers, trying to talk his wife back to life.

Then, her left leg had started to twitch, and she had developed a hitch in her breathing. He wasn’t sure what that meant. The doctors had told him that the high dosage of Ambien and alcohol in her bloodstream had effectively shut down her system. In theory, however, her kidneys would do their job, removing the impurities from her bloodstream, and she would respond by waking up. At least that’s what they hoped.

Was twitching the same as waking? Did people regain consciousness by first suffering labored breathing?

Dan was standing now. He patted Carol’s hand, smoothed back her hair from her pale, cool forehead.

“Come on, honey,” he murmured. “Come back to me, love. It’s going to be all right. I promise you, this time, things are going to be better.”

Her left leg twitched again. Her breathing hiccupped.

Dan leaned forward. He gazed down at his wife’s quiet, peaceful face, as beautiful now as the first day he had met her.

And he realized for the first time that her chest was no longer moving. Her breathing had not returned.

A machine started to beep. Dan dropped his wife’s hand. He raced into the hallway, his voice already frantic.

“Help, help! Somebody, help us,
please
!”

Five forty-five
P
.
M
.

The massive ACI gates swung open. The blue transport van pulled forward. David Price, still grinning, was on his way. In the Pesaturo home, Lieutenant Morelli finished up last-minute details of the meeting, including handing Tom and Laurie bulletproof vests.

They had told Molly they were going to play a game. They were going to a park for a police officers’ picnic. They would have some punch, eat some cookies and she could watch all the police officers do their jobs. A man might come and play pretend, too. But not to worry. He was just part of the game.

Molly regarded them solemnly. Children always knew when adults were telling a lie.

They were walking out the front door, faces somber, moods grim, when Morelli’s cell phone rang.

It was Griffin. “We got him, we got him, we got him! We’ve found boxes of latex gloves, plus the douches. Ron Viggio, former cleaner of the Pawtucket sperm bank, is definitely the College Hill Rapist.”

“And Meg?” Morelli asked sharply. Tom and Laurie froze, stared at her.