Playing With Death Read online

  ‘You told me a lot of stuff months back,’ Rose replies wearily. ‘Not all of it I remember. Even though I am a superwoman.’

  ‘The poly-ply cyber suit, Mom. By WadeSoft? You must’ve heard about it. Every gaming show’s been talking about it for months. GamerzTV had one of the test suits to try out. We need to get one. Soon as they come out. Please?’

  Robbie sees the blank look on his mother’s face.

  ‘I have no idea what you’re talking about. I don’t have enough spare time to watch those kind of shows.’

  ‘Well Dad knows about it.’

  ‘Does he now? Good for him. Seems there’s less to running a political campaign than meets the eye . . . Clearly you’re better off talking to him about it, then.’

  ‘Huh . . .’ Rob turns away from her and leans his forehead against the passenger window. She feels a surge of maternal guilt at not being willing to share an enthusiasm with her child.

  ‘What does Dad think about it? This poly-ploy suit thing?’

  ‘Poly-ply, Mom. Poly-ply cyber suit. Though no one is really calling it that. They call it the Skin.’

  ‘What’s wrong with the one you’ve already got?’

  ‘Really?’ Rob rolls his eyes. ‘Dad says he’ll look into it. But we gotta have one. We can use it together. It’ll be great.’

  ‘That’s what you said about the last console system we bought. And where is it now? In your room, that’s where.’

  ‘I promise we’ll share the Skin, Mom. I promise.’

  There’s an excitement in her son’s voice that breaks Rose’s heart. Gaming is nearly the only thing that causes him to show any emotion. It is not his fault, she reminds herself. It is nearly ten years since he was diagnosed with Asperger’s. She has long since grown used to his obsessive ways, and understands that he cannot give her the same affection that other mothers enjoy. But what Rose finds wounding these days is that Jeff shares an interest in computer games with his son that seems to exclude her. It is their bond, and she is the outsider when they settle down in front of the console and commune with faceless others in the StreamPlex in an orgy of virtual massacre and destruction. Rose doubts that WadeSoft’s creation – a self-contained world of social media, games, simulations and news media – is a positive development in the ever-expanding online universe.

  She pretends to be interested. ‘Tell me about it, Robbie.’

  Her son turns to her. ‘It’s a simulator suit, Mom. It bluesyncs to the Stream so you can play games. So you can be in the games. Actually in the games. God, it sounds so chill. We’ve got to have it.’

  ‘It sure does sound chill,’ Rose says. ‘It also sounds very expensive.’

  ‘It is expensive, I guess. They said that when it comes out it’ll ship for three thousand dollars.’

  ‘Three thousand?’ Her eyes widen in horror.

  ‘Yeah, there’s a basic model. The one with low-res textures. We should go for the most expensive model, Mom. It’ll be better than real.’

  ‘Better than real,’ Rose repeats. ‘Jesus . . . Is that what it’s come to? Well you know Dad likes his toys. I’ll chat with him about it and we can see.’

  ‘It’s not a toy!’ Robbie protests. ‘It’s total immersion simulation environment wear: soft-wear. Soft-wear. Get it?’

  ‘Sure. Very smart.’

  Robbie frowns. ‘It’s better than RL, that’s for sure.’

  Rose pulls to a stop outside Oakland High School. Robbie opens his passenger door.

  ‘RL?’ Rose asks.

  ‘Real life,’ Robbie murmurs.

  ‘See you tonight,’ Rose says.

  Robbie pulls his hoodie up over his face before trudging off to school.

  Rose watches him make his way down the pavement, into the school yard. She feels like Robbie is lost to her sometimes and is never sure what to do about it.

  Soon Rose is back on the interstate, driving across the grey Bay Bridge. This morning the way is mostly clear, and she can watch the warm sun bouncing off the orange hue of the suspension bridge to her right – the Golden Gate Bridge – looming above a layer of fog that covers much of the sea. She smiles as she remembers how fond Robbie is of the fog. He says it makes the whole city look like a spooky graveyard.

  Rose follows Interstate 80 across Bay Bridge and then past ‘Treasure Island’, the naval facility. She flicks on the radio news bulletin streaming to her smartphone.

  ‘. . . Two girls trapped in a storm drain updated their Facebook status rather than calling 911 . . .’

  The FBI field office where she’s been working for nearly five years is located opposite City Hall. The Bureau operates from a tall white building, with several investigative departments on each floor.

  But she has not always driven into this city as Rose Blake. Sometimes she has been undercover in a number of guises: as a junkie to befriend a drug-dealing cop; posing as a high-powered businesswoman to bust open an athletics doping ring; or acting as girlfriend to a male undercover agent. The best role of her career was her first, when she went undercover as an intern in the Republican Party, trailing a corrupt money launderer. That was when she first met Jeff.

  She’d been based in Virginia back then, but the Bureau needed additional agents on the West Coast so they’d transferred her there. Jeff and Robbie had come with her, Jeff fortunate enough to get the post of associate professor at the university. He has a commute of an hour each way, a fact he regularly reminds her of. At least until he started working for Senator Keller. Now Rose sees even less of him. Things have not been good between her and Jeff for months. The pressure of the campaign is no doubt getting to him, and she feels that his relationship with his assistant may not be strictly professional. She blames herself for that. If only she had more time to give him.

  Rose reaches the city early this morning. She continues past her office building, down towards Lower Pacific Heights, finally stopping to park along Spruce Street. Today she has her final appointment with her psychotherapist, Dr Katherine Wheeler.

  9.

  Rose sits in the Advocaat-coloured waiting room, outside Dr Wheeler’s mahogany door. She has been seeing Katherine ever since her role in the Koenig investigation came to an abrupt end nearly six months ago. It had nearly cost Rose her life and she’d been left with crushing waves of anxiety, depression and paranoia ever since.

  The Bureau has an employee-assistance programme, but the insurers of her workers’ comp were unwilling to pay out. PTSD can be faked, they claimed. Of course, Baptiste and the Bureau don’t know the full extent of what she’s going through. They couldn’t know. Jeff has tried to be supportive, but having mental ‘issues’ is a lonely problem. It’s not as simple as ‘getting over it’.

  Rose doesn’t want to sue the Bureau, because they would kick her out and her career would be over. The operation had gone bad, that was all. She doesn’t blame anyone but herself. She should have shot Koenig when she had the chance. She’d had to take sick leave for a month. One thing the Bureau doesn’t want on their hands is damaged goods. If they ever found out she had been diagnosed with PTSD, Rose would be transferred to a desk job. Or – worst-case scenario – she would have to quit. For Rose, quitting has never been an option, and she hopes she can ride it out.

  She has taken it upon herself to see someone for counselling, in strict confidence, every two weeks. There was no doubt that Koenig had damaged her. But, looking back, Rose feels she has made progress, and the worst is behind her.

  The door opens and Katherine emerges, a sharp-faced brunette wearing a designer charcoal suit.

  ‘Hi, Rose, come on in.’

  Rose loves Kathy’s elegant workplace – it is true American Gothic, with dark mahogany bookcases lining the walls, deep-blue paisley wallpaper and a red leather couch and two chairs either side of a low table. Wine-red and
grey drapes frame two large windows overlooking Spruce Street. A handful of prints by Francis Bacon and Picasso hang on the walls. Rose takes her regular place on one of the chairs. She has never liked the idea of using the couch. It makes her feel vulnerable and weak rather than relaxed. Kathy takes the other chair. Rose turns her smartphone off.

  ‘So, as you know, today will be our last session,’ Kathy says. ‘Unless you need some more time on this. How are you feeling?’

  ‘I’m certainly the best I’ve been for a while. Haven’t had a panic attack for over a month.’

  Rose has had flashbacks, sometimes with her eyes barely closed, her body twitching and moving restlessly until she wrestles to control it. But, since seeing Katherine, she has developed techniques for controlling the anxiety.

  ‘Good,’ Katherine says, scanning her pages of notes.

  ‘I’m also back in the field, working on a new case,’ Rose says. ‘Good to get out from behind a desk after so many months.’

  A slight look of concern crosses Katherine’s face. ‘That’s . . . sooner than I expected.’

  ‘I know, but I think it’s what I need. I need to get back to doing what I do well. It’s time for me to move on from . . . Koenig.’

  Koenig.

  She feels a brief spasm of anxiety. His name is like a malignant tumour in her head.

  Rose remembers his handsome yet severe features. His eyes, penetrating, intelligent and yet utterly empty. Where a soul should be, there wasn’t anything. After that night she’d scrubbed every inch of her body and burned her clothes.

  ‘And looking back at what happened in the cabin? How do you feel about that now?’

  The cabin . . . The cabin was the culmination of a process that had begun many months before.

  10.

  It had all started when a severed, decomposing hand was found at the edge of a road by a wandering drunk. More body parts were found close by. The victims that could be identified were mostly transients, prostitutes and drug addicts, so there was little sympathy at first. But Koenig had developed a taste for well-groomed women. DNA testing matched the hand to a twenty-eight-year-old university lecturer. After lengthy legal wrangling, the Bureau won access to her intiMate dating account to examine her messages. That had provided hundreds of exchanges with other account holders on the site. A forensic linguist had been brought in, and was able to show that at least three of the victim’s contacts were actually the same person.

  It was Rose who had suggested the perp was using these accounts to cross-index the victim’s replies to ensure she was genuine, and not a bot, or possibly someone trying to lure the killer in. The Bureau had set up a small number of user accounts to try and entice the killer, but there had been no bites. He had moved on to another site . . .

  It was only when CCTV footage was examined on the route one victim had walked to get home from a party that Koenig’s car was spotted as he stopped to give her a ride. The licence plate had proved to be fake, but the Bureau had the make and colour and then began the tedious process of eliminating suspects until a long list of persons of interest was worked through, comparing each individual with the file worked up by one of the Bureau’s profilers. After several men had been followed and discounted they came upon Shane Koenig, and his nocturnal drives through the city caught the attention of the Bureau. But they needed evidence. Enough to justify any further action.

  Rose and Baptiste devised a sting operation, using Rose to play the part of a barfly, an identity carefully constructed to have a finely judged combination of characteristics drawn from previous victims, though not so many comparisons that Koenig’s suspicion might be piqued. Due to the danger posed by Koenig, Baptiste had suggested using another agent, a single woman who would not leave behind a grieving spouse and child if anything went wrong. But Rose had insisted. This was her perp and she wanted to bring him down.

  Together with a profiler from Quantico, Rose had created a core identity that stood the best chance of drawing the killer’s attention. Then, several more identities were created with subtle differences, along with profile photos of Rose posed differently with a variety of hair colouring, before they were placed on dating sites over a period of a month, so that they would not all originate from the same date if Koenig happened to come across more than one of the identities. As was the common experience of most women on dating sites, Rose had to field the approaches of scores of men – the lonely, the perverted and even the small minority of the genuine – while she waited, and the Bureau continued more traditional, and fruitless, means of hunting for Koenig. It was the profile of ‘Tequila’ that caught Koenig’s eye several weeks later.

  Rose remembers the tension and anxiety as she began the internet chatter with ‘Dean’, the handsome, slender man who claimed to work in advertising. His first messages had not been out of the ordinary, and Rose was on the verge of putting him off when the Bureau’s profiler pointed out similar characteristics between ‘Dean’ and Shane Koenig – even the most disturbed mind cannot hide certain aspects of personality behind a mask, no matter how carefully conceived. So Rose sat at a laptop in the Bureau office, tapping the keyboard, the profiling agent at her side advising her on how to keep the perp in play. It had taken nearly two weeks of light conversation and gossip in increasingly informal, then intimate tones, before Rose had dared to suggest that they meet. She had joked that his profile picture was too handsome to be that of a serial killer. The double bluff was a calculated risk to help allay any fear Koenig might have that ‘Tequila’ was a set-up. Besides, Rose thought, it’s funny how many people tend to assume ugly people are the ones most likely to be capable of malevolent intent.

  Dean let the comment pass with a laughing emoji and shortly afterwards suggested they meet face to face at a bar a few miles below the hills where Koenig had his cabin. So, wired up and carefully watched over, Rose had made the date and played her part faultlessly. Two hours of first-date conversation later, Koenig asked her if she wanted to come and see his cabin.

  ‘Only if you want to.’ He had smiled. ‘No pressure.’

  ‘I don’t know.’ Rose had chewed her lip and looked across the table, as if considering the offer. ‘It’s only the first date, Dean.’

  ‘Sure. I understand.’ Koenig smiled back. ‘But it’s not as if I’m a serial killer or anything.’

  There was the slightest of hesitations as Rose’s blood ran cold, then she had made herself smile. ‘No. Not a serial killer. Way too good-looking for that . . . All right, then. Let’s just finish the drinks and we can drive up there.’

  ‘Sure. No problem.’

  And so Rose had lured Koenig into a meeting and been invited back to his cabin.

  But it all went wrong . . . and now he’s still out there . . .

  11.

  Rose sighs. ‘I need to let go of what happened. Owen and I are still alive to tell the tale. It could have gone far worse.’

  Katherine nods. ‘You will still have strong feelings about it. It was a traumatic episode for you. But talking about it helps. You know what the Bureau likes to claim: “Many Apply, Few Are Chosen”. They chose you, Rose. Don’t forget that. Koenig will slip up and he will be caught. In the meantime, focus your energies on other matters. What can you tell me about this new case?’

  ‘An unusual arson case, with a probable murder. At least that’s the working assumption. Looks like it’s going to be a tough one, that’s for sure. But we might catch a break.’ Rose stares out the window at the skyline. ‘The hardest part of the job sometimes is knowing there is all this evil out there. Always. How can I protect myself and the ones I love?’

  ‘You can’t, Rose. No one can control everything. And you shouldn’t try to. Not if you want to keep your sanity. How is the family?’

  ‘Jeff’s not home that much at the moment, with Keller’s campaign underway. He’s going to be out a lo
t over the next few weeks. He’s pretty stressed about it but he pretends not to be. He’s also got a very efficient intern helping him . . . It’s probably nothing.’

  ‘You suspect him of something? Have you any reason to?’

  ‘Probably not. The suspicion goes with the job. Always looking for connections.’

  ‘And sometimes they just aren’t there. Right?’

  They share a short laugh before Rose responds. ‘Yeah, you’re probably right. Just jumping at shadows . . . Jeff’s a good man. It’ll be a big deal for him if Keller does well. It’s early days, but Jeff has always dreamed of doing something significant. I think he feels wasted sometimes. Like he’s not achieved as much as he thinks he should have. Maybe he blames that on me.’

  ‘Do you think he does? Has he ever said that?’

  ‘No,’ Rose admits. ‘But they never do.’

  ‘They?’

  ‘Men. The good ones at least.’

  Katherine nods. ‘And Jeff’s a good one?’

  ‘I think so. I just wish he realized how much I loved him.’ Rose pauses. ‘Love him, present tense.’

  ‘Have you spoken to him properly about what you’ve experienced?’

  ‘He knows some of it. He can see when I’m tense and when I’m relaxed.’

  Being entirely honest, Rose reflects, Jeff has been rather insensitive about the whole affair, sometimes making light of it, which hurts her badly.

  ‘And Robbie?’

  ‘He seems to be in his own little world a lot of the time.’ Rose sweeps her hair back. ‘It’s hard being a parent. My job being what it is, I can’t talk about it too much. It feels like there’s a lot unspoken, sometimes.’

  Katherine chuckles. ‘Tell me about it.’

  Rose gazes out of the window. ‘Seeing what I’ve seen in my job, you want your kid to remain a kid forever, sheltering them, keeping them safe, not forcing them to grow up too soon. On the other hand, you want them to be prepared for the world.’