NIGHTMARES

CHAPTER FOUR 95th AND BROADWAY Wednesday, January 15th

Ah, damn, I thought, crouching over the body of Detective 3G Heather Marino. Her blue eyes were open, staring glassily up at the cold blue sky. Her blonde hair pooled around her head. She had been slashed and stabbed, and her face was badly beaten. Her clothes were slashed off her. Gun and badge lay on the ground next to her. Another alley, this time between two apartment buildings.

"She fought, too," said Goren. He crouched next to me, and used a pencil to pick up her gun. "Not fired," he said, sniffing the barrel. That was the first sniffing I had seen him do that made any sense to me. He handed the automatic off to a CSU guy. Putting his fingers to the cold ground, he looked around. "She wasn't killed here.not right here.not enough blood.see her shoes?" He pointed. "She was dragged." He stood up quickly, an abstracted, quizzical look on his face, pacing down the alley into the dusk, turning around by a Dumpster, looking oddly like he was communicating with the crime scene itself.

I found myself weirdly fascinated by him. By his odd methods, his strange pauses in conversation, his odd silences. The wind skittered under my coat and I shivered, looking down at Heather Marino's blank stare. The CSU photog started snapping away. In the strobe of the flash, I noticed something.

"Goren!"

"Yeah.?"

"Check it out," I said, putting my gloved fingers to the side of the dead woman's head. "There's a big piece of hair missing."

Suddenly there was a scream from the street-a scream of horror, terror, fury, that echoed off the street and the walls of the alley.

"Heather! Oh, God, Heather! Heather!"

Ah, shit. I looked over my shoulder at the street and met my partner's hard stare.

"Aha," said Goren from the back end of the alley. I felt a sudden surge of irritation. It was like he hadn't even heard the anguished cry-in pursuit of evidence, or the proper sinner. He was zoning out everything else.

"Sal!" Goren called to the photographer. "Get a picture of this, will you?" Between handkerchief-covered fingers, he held a long, wicked- looking knife. Even in the queer, false light, I could see that it was covered with blood.

OFFICE OF CAPTAIN DONALD CRAGEN THREE HOURS LATER

Cragen was pissed. He paced around the small, shabby office, tugging at his tie, running his hand over his bald head.

"Okay," he said, looking around at me and Elliot, at Fin and Munch, then at Goren, the outsider. "Two days. Two dead cops. The commissioner is sitting on my goddamed head here."

He focused on Munch. "I thought we liked the boyfriend."

Munch shrugged his narrow shoulders. Without the hat and shades, his face looked oddly pale and naked. "We caught up with him at his parent's place."

"Yeah," said Fin. "He's got a sheet-possession with intent in ninety- eight. When we picked him up, he was carrying concealed."

"Okay," Cragen said. "We can hold him on that for now. Possession, though? A cop's boyfriend?"

"McBride's mother said she ended it when she found out about his jones."

"Yeah, and we can't figure if she knew Marino," Munch added.

"Except they were both cops."

"Marino was plainclothes. But the killer pegged her for a cop anyway."

"Stalker first?" Elliot proposed.

"Let me.put forth a couple of things," Goren said in his soft, odd tone of voice. We all looked at him.

"Okay," said Cragen.

Goren unzipped the brown leather folder he carried. And took out a stack of photos. "Two.lovely young women. Cops. Long.hair." he held up the head shots of the two dead women.

Elliot sighed audibly.

"Jack the Ripper." Goren went on. "Killed women in alleys, too."

"Yeah, okay, Goren," Elliot said. "And I don't think he's our perp. Seems to me he's been dead for a hundred years or so."

Cragen scowled at my partner. For once, I kept my mouth shut.

"Yes. He has." Goren did the deep-thinking thing again. His eyes were weird. He looked far away but right here, all at the same time.

"So," he continued. "The Ripper.disemboweled his women.He took his time. So did our guy. But.He overwhelmed them fast." He ticked off points in the air with a finger. "Neither cop had time to get off a shot. He's strong.and he's.really fast. Marino was a black belt in Tae Kwan Do." Goren reached into the ubiquitous leather folder and took out a sheet of paper. "Last August she.single-handedly subdued a two-hundred fifty pound crackhead. Her partner was knocked unconscious."

"So he's a big guy, huh?" Cragen asked.

"That's.the funny thing, Captain." Goren shuffled through the photos, dropping some. He came up with Anna McBride's autopsy pictures. "Officer McBride-well, he had to smash her head against the wall. All he managed with the knife was some shallow cuts.to cut her clothes off." He paused. "And see.here? And here?" He indicated the close-up. "On her mouth." He put the picture down on the desk, gesturing at it, then at his own face. "He put tape over her mouth, then took it with him."

He tossed me a look. "He was.new at this.It was.his first. He wanted to be careful.But I think he was interrupted. Didn't finish. He finished with Marino."

"You got a psychic connection to this fuckhead?" Munch did his best to be at his most sarcastic.

"No.I don't need one." Goren took a fast step toward Munch, pushing the picture under his nose. Tipping his head, he whispered urgently at Munch. "I have THIS dead cop.and THIS dead cop." The pictures right up to Munch's nose. "And you know what, Detective?" He held up his empty hand. "In THIS hand, we're gonna have ANOTHER dead cop. Soon."

"Get out of my face, Goren," Munch said. He looked like he was going to punch Goren in the nose. In this room, the big detective was out of place. On the other hand, most of what he said was probably right.

"Gee, Captain Cragen," Goren said, studying Munch like he was a new species of insect. "I assumed I was dealing with professionals-"

Ouch. Munch didn't do anything, just smirked at Goren. Elliot did the sigh-thing again.

Fin stepped in. "Hey, what's up with you, man?"

Goren smiled at him. "Just trying to get the job done." He turned from Munch and Fin and looked at me, locking eyes with me. Something about him made me shiver, deep inside. There was an intensity about him. An kind of intensity I didn't even get from Elliot.

Goren quirked that damn eyebrow at me. I flushed, forcing myself to look away. His image remained as I closed my eyes and took a deep, silent breath.

Any second now, Cragen was going to say-

"People, people."

Men were so predictable. Testosterone was thick in the air. Ah, I could handle it. I always handled THAT part, didn't I?

"Okay. Look," Cragen continued. "Munch, Fin, I want you two on the boyfriend. Elliot, you get to meet with the Feds-"

"FBI?"

"Yeah. Morgan is once again sticking his nose where it doesn't belong. Stinks, but we gotta work with these guys. Olivia, you and Goren get the fun part. Talk to Huang."

"Great. Dueling profilers," Munch said. "Dada dum dum dum dum dum dum dum."

Fin smiled. "Shit, is THAT white-boy music or WHAT?"

"Last time I checked, I was still a white boy. Gotta problem with that?"

"Nope. Never have."

"Listen," Cragen said, as we all started to leave. "Van Buren volunteered her people to canvass the neighborhoods. Somebody must have seen something."

"Oh, man, Lennie's gonna love us," said Munch.

Elliot grabbed me before I left.

"You okay?"

"Why are you always asking me if I'm okay?"

He shrugged, putting on his coat. "You ask me, too."

"Guess I do. Just not every fifteen minutes."

"Well? Are you?"

"YES, Elliot, I'm okay. Whyncha go home and ask Kathy if she's okay?"

"Damn, you're in a mood."

"Look who I hafta work with."

"True. But.he thinks you're hot."

"Uck. Give me a break."

His eyes danced with amusement. "Ah, your voice says no no no, but the rest of you says yes yes yes."

I looked at my partner, totally astonished. "Are you trying to fix me up with Bobby Goren?"

"Well, I tried to fix you up with Munch, but he doesn't think you're hot."

"Yeah, I do," said Munch, passing by.

"Me, too," echoed Fin, on his partner's heels.

"Uck. You guys." I turned, and practically body-slammed Goren, who was standing behind me again.

"Ready to go?" He smiled. He was neatly buttoned into his gray cashmere coat, pulling on his gloves.

"Yeah. I grabbed my jacket and watch cap.