Crush - Alan Jacobson [158]
Knowing firsthand what this man was capable of, Vail couldn’t help but wonder: Is he effectively restrained?
But she couldn’t worry about it. She had a job to do and she sure as hell wasn’t going to back down now, in front of the men on the task force. Besides, in the mood she was in, she thought she could kill him if he got loose and came at her.
She flipped open the file. “Says here you claim your name is John Wayne Mayfield. That a joke?”
Mayfield squinted. “The only joke in this room is you.”
Vail pouted her lips and nodded slowly. “Okay, John, I hear you.” She made an exaggerated motion with her neck of examining the room. It was immediately clear why this was called the Blue Room. The cement walls and floor were covered with a tight, thin blue carpet, which had a peculiar sound absorbing effect.
Vail sat in the brown chair to the left of the table. Mayfield was across from her. Behind and above Vail’s head was a small camera lens, embedded in a wall-mounted, cream-colored apparatus that resembled a smoke alarm. It was beaming real-time video to the task force members in the video monitoring room.
“I hope you like your new home. I guess if you’ve gotta do time, might as well be in Napa. Then again, who knows where you’ll end up after you’re convicted. Probably someplace nowhere near as nice.”
“What I’ve done is take advantage of an opportunity. And I’m just getting even for what was done to me, sweetie. I’m balancing the scales of justice, is all.”
“Is that right? So in killing these people, you’ve done a good thing.”
Mayfield shifted in his seat, threw out his chest. “Damn straight.”
“How did killing make you feel?” Vail didn’t really need an admission—the charges against him, assault of a federal agent, attempted murder, let alone the murder of a law enforcement officer—Eddie Agbayani—would put Mayfield away for a long, long time. But any opportunity to get inside the mind of a killer was too important to ignore.
“How’d it make me feel?” Mayfield glanced around the walls, then shrugged. “Depends on who it was.”
“Victoria Cameron.”
Mayfield pursed his lips, thinking. “I didn’t feel a whole lot with that one.”
That one. The objectification, the treating of people as objects, was classic among narcissists. It wasn’t much different from the attitude of powerful leaders—political, corporate, military, it didn’t matter—though most of them weren’t killers.
“What about Ursula Robbins, Isaac Jenkins, Mary—”
“Special cases. And special cases deserve special attention because of who they are. Or were.”
“I’m not following you.”
Mayfield’s mouth rose into a grin. “Of course you aren’t.”
“Was Scott Fuller a ‘special case,’ too?”
“You know, you people should be thanking me. I helped these people.” He tugged on his chain. “And this is the thanks I get?”
Vail knew that narcissists felt they helped their victims by improving them, removing imperfections, and cleansing them of the evil they committed during their lives. Truth was, they were really cleansing their own souls.
“You’ll forgive me if we’re not more demonstrative in our gratitude.” Before Mayfield could respond, Vail forged ahead. “I don’t think you killed to help them, John. I think you killed for a different reason. I think you have some issues with women in your life. You’re angry at them. More than anger. Rage. And killing them allows you to exert control over something in your life you didn’t have control over. You gain control by dominating them, then degrading them by cutting off their breasts.”
Mayfield smiled and looked at her a long minute before answering. “You think you’ve got it all figured out, don’t you, Special Agent Vail? Well, I checked you out, too. And I know all about your son, whose name is very similar to mine. Isn’t that something? Maybe your son and me, we’re more alike than you know. We both had mothers who weren’t around. Because I’m sure you’re busy with your career, and looky here. You’re on the other side of the fucking country, trying