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privileges. If you actually make use of all we offer, the membership can be&
well, quite a bargain."
Hank said, "Are invitations to Weekenders automatic at that membership level?"
"Oh, of course."
Hank gave Lenny a shifty smile. "All right, then. Do you accept& ah& cash
payment?"
Lenny said, "Of course. You could pay in cash?"
Hank smiled. "Of course
. It will take me a day or two to do it neatly."
Lenny looked interested. "What's your business?"
"Investing."
Lenny said, "Not too many investors end up with scars like yours, if you don't
mind me saying so."
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"I was in the military before I became an investor. My family believed in the
discipline and& connections& that military service offered."
"The Citadel, West Point, a commission, getting to know future senators and
congressmen and like that?" Lenny asked.
And Hank lied easily. "Almost exactly like that. With a few surprises thrown
in."
He dismissed the experience with a shrug.
"Surprises. Yeah. Shit happens nonstop, far as I can tell," Lenny said. "Looks
like you landed in more than your share."
Hank rose. "It was a long time ago, and isn't much of a factor in my current
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life."
He nodded politely. "I'll give you a call in a few days, if that's all right."
Lenny stayed seated, his hand intermittently reaching out to touch the corner
of the desk again. "I look forward to hearing from you."
Hank Vines, millionaire stock manipulator, walked out of Lenny's office and
trailed his hand down the rail. He could feel death's touch there. It was old,
vile, horrible& but overlaid by a steady stream of other touches.
But Lenny& Lenny had touched Jess earlier in the day, and he'd been a
horrifying serial murderer whose next victim would be Jess. Tonight, though,
he was a monster of a different kind. But not a killer. Not the killer.
Hank could think of three explanations. Lenny had an identical twin. Or Lenny
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personality, and the part of him that killed women was submerged at the
moment.
Hank didn't like either explanation.
The third was that Lenny had a buddy who stayed close. Close enough that he
and Lenny had shaken hands not too long before Lenny touched Jess.
That one, he thought, was probably gold.
When Jess picked up the phone and found Jim on the other line, she said, "Do
you know what time it is?"
"When has that ever mattered to you or me?" Jim said, and chuckled, sounding
positively gleeful. "Two in the morning and this is worth it. Our boys and
girls hit the fucking mother lode at Jason Hemly's house."
"Define mother lode."
"In a very nicely hidden storage space cut into the back of the closet in
Jason
Hemly's master bedroom, we found Polaroid pictures of eleven different girls,
some of them still alive and handcuffed to a stripper's pole, some dead and
lying in shallow graves. None of them have shown up on missing-persons reports
anywhere. Each is tagged with a neatly typed label giving the girl's name and
date of death. The killings cover the past twelve years. Along with photos, we
also uncovered a stash of necklaces, rings including class rings with names
or
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lockets with photos, little clippings of hair, and intimate apparel."
"I'd call that a mother lode, too." She shook her head. "That's terrifying.
He's made a career of being a likable guy."
"It worked for him for a lot of years."
"You say& eleven? Not including the four we've found, or including them?"
"Not including them. These are all new. We have to figure that the other two
killers might have some souvenirs, too, or maybe that Hemly has another
storage space that holds more evidence."
"How about bodies?"
"Aside from those dumped in parks, nothing. And Hemly's not admitting
anything. We say, 'We found your photo collection,' he says, 'What
collection?'
We say, 'We found your souvenirs.' He says, 'What souvenirs?' We say, 'We have
you, we know you killed them, we have hair and semen samples on you, we have
four bodies, we have pictures and you're still going to say you're innocent?
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That you don't know anything about this?' And guess what he says?"
"Talk to my lawyer' would be my first guess," Jess said.
"You'd think so, wouldn't you? But we went down and told him what we'd found
in his place, and Hemly get this said he wanted to talk with us. I've just now
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interrogation. He insists he's innocent, has never hurt anyone. His swimmers
floating around in four dead girls in the city's freezers, and he's claiming
innocence."
Jess said, "That's almost good enough to make me buy an insanity plea."
"Hemly dragged his lawyer in. The lawyer is pulling his hair out. Saying, 'You
don't have to answer that question, I recommend you don't answer that
question, you should stop talking now,' and Hemly is ignoring the bastard.
He's going on and on about all the girls he dated at Goldcastle, and how they
were all crazy about him,, and always wanted to date him because he was such a
great guy."
Jim said, "Come to think of it, he might be building an insanity defense, with
his own lawyer as star witness."
"So Hemly is still lacking an alibi?"
"In the case for which we have eyewitnesses, he remains without alibi. We are
still trying to track down his whereabouts during the other three murders for
which we have bodies."
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