Page 133 of Delusion in Death

“You’re going to start writing my copy now?”

“It’s the best I can do for you. Don’t ask me for the one-on-one right now. I’ll just say no because I’m fucking tired; I want to tie this up and go home. Ask me later.”

“Was he acting alone? Give me that?”

“At this time, we have no reason to believe otherwise. He confessed. That’s big, Nadine. We apprehended, arrested, and charged an individual, and said individual confessed to perpetrating the incidents that led to the deaths of a hundred and twenty-seven people. You’re going to want to postpone that meeting, get this out, and get your camera-ready ass to Central.”

“You can bet your mass-murderer-catching ass I will. Talk later.”

“A lot later,” Eve added when the screen went blank.

She hadn’t lied about being tired, she thought. Now that it was done, every ounce of fatigue she’d shoved back since walking into On the Rocks wanted to push through and drop her like a stone.

It just had to wait, she decided. She wanted to write up the arrest report personally. And first, she wanted a look at the journals and papers the search team had secured and logged in.

She unsealed the box, initialed it, then sat to study the memorabilia of madness.

The religious rantings in the journal simply annoyed her. The way those thirsty for power, glory, or the satisfaction of brow-beating others into their particular beliefs used God as a weapon of intimidation and fear perplexed her.

Not that they’d do it, but that anybody would listen.

If God actually took the time to go around smiting anyone, she’d like to see him start with the self-righteous pricks who inflated their own egos in his name.

But she supposed that was why God made cops.

Menzini had filled pages in tiny, crablike handwriting, pontificating about the chosen, detailing the ritual rapes of young girls, and calling them initiations or cleansings.

He rambled about his God-given mission to purge the unclean, sinners, the unworthy, his holy mission to prepare the way for the end of days. And his plans to repopulate the earth with the righteous after the purge.

He detailed his experiments, his frustrations with his lack of success. One lack of success had resulted in an explosion that had killed one assistant and blinded another.

That, too, was apparently God’s fault—or his will, anyway. And a test directed at Menzini, to help forge his determination.

“Yeah, it’s all about you, asshole.”

She glanced up when Peabody stepped in.

“I just got to the part where Menzini’s praising God for showing him the way to create the substance. He tested it on some prisoners, which included a sixteen-year-old boy. He dubbed the substance Wrath of God, and was damn proud of it.”

“Sounds like Callaway came by it naturally. Jesus.” Horror covered Peabody’s face as it reddened. “I’m sorry. I didn’t think.”

“Don’t worry about it. It doesn’t bother me. He has this in him, but we’ve all got something. Even some daisy-sniffing Free-Ager like you has to have a rotted branch on the family tree somewhere. It’s what we do with it, about it, despite it.”

“Yeah.” Peabody blew out a breath. “I don’t sniff daisies. They don’t really smell. I like peonies, if you’re taking notes on flowers to send me for a reward.”

“Sure, I’ll mark that right down on my shopping list.”

“You don’t have a shopping list.”

“Exactly. Did Callaway tap a lawyer?”

“Not yet. He clammed up, like total lockdown. He gave me a bad feeling, so I put him in solitary, and on suicide watch.”

“Good. We want him safe and secure. Whitney, or likely Tibble, will be making an official statement. We’re expected to do the media conference deal.”

“I don’t mind. It’ll be good to let people know it’s okay, we did the job. McNab’s working on decrypting Callaway’s electronics. I’m going to wait for him before knocking off anyway. The search team’s back,” she added. “There’s talk about going out for some brew.”

“I’m going to skip it. I just want to…enjoy an evening at home.”

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