The In Death Collection Books 16-20 - J. D. Robb [293]
So unlike the cool, stagnant home he shared with his wife when he was Niles.
When he was in this warm, deeply toned room, he was Victor Clarence. A small, amusing joke and a play on His Royal Highness Prince Albert Victor, Duke of Clarence, who some credited with the Ripper murders of Whitechapel.
Renquist liked to believe it, enjoyed the notion of a killer prince. He considered himself no less.
A prince among men. A king among killers.
And like that famed stylist of death, he would never be caught. But he was more than his prototypes. Because he would never stop.
He drank a brandy and smoked a thin cigar laced with just a whiff of Zoner. He loved these times alone, the quiet, reflective times when all the preparation was done.
He was pleased he’d decided to feign a business trip, to get away on his own for a few days. Pamela was irritating him more than usual with her long, speculative stares, her pointed questions.
Who was she to question him, to look at him?
If she only knew how many times he’d imagined killing her. The many and creative ways he’d devised. She’d run screaming. The image of his cold and rigid wife running for her life made him chuckle.
Of course, he would never do it. It would bring it all too close to home, and he was no fool. Pamela was safe simply because he was stuck with her. Besides, if he killed her, who would handle all the annoying details of his social life?
No, it was enough just to have these periodic rests from her, and the female she’d saddled him with. Irritating, sneaky little brat. Children were, as he’d learned from his dear old nanny, meant to be neither seen nor heard.
If they rebelled or failed to obey smartly, they were to be put somewhere, in the dark. Where they were no longer seen, where they couldn’t be heard no matter how loud they screamed.
Oh yes, he remembered—remembered the dark room. Nanny Gable had had a way about her. He would like to kill her, slowly, painfully, while she screamed and screamed as he’d once done.
But that wouldn’t be wise. Like Pamela, she was safe because he was stuck with her.
In any case, she’d taught him, hadn’t she? Nanny Gable had certainly taught him. Children were meant to be raised by someone paid and paid well to discipline and tutor. Not that the sly little Italian thing disciplined his girl. Spoiled her, coddled her. But she was convenient. Her fear and loathing of him gave him such a rush of pleasure.
Everything in his life had finally fallen into place. He was respected, admired, obeyed. He was comfortable financially, and had an active and rarified social life. He had a wife who presented the proper image, and a young mistress who was just fearful enough to do anything, absolutely anything, he required.
And he had the most fascinating and entertaining hobby.
Years of study, of planning, of strategy. Of practice. It was all coming to fruition now in ways even he hadn’t anticipated. How could he have known how much fun it would be to assume the guise of one of his heroes, and follow in their bloody footsteps?
Men who took charge, who took life. Who did what they wished to women because they understood, as others couldn’t, that women needed to be debased, hurt, killed. They asked for death with their first breath.
Trying to run the world. Trying to run him.
He took a slow drag of the cigar, letting the Zoner calm him before one of his rages could take over. It wasn’t the time for rage, but for cool, calculating action.
He worried that he’d been too clever. But really, could one be too clever? Some might consider it a mistake to have deliberately put himself forward as a suspect. But it was so much more satisfying, so much more exciting that way. It allowed him to participate on two levels and made it all so intimate.
In a way, he’d already fucked the whore cop. What a thrill it was to watch her scramble around, unable to