The darkness came.
And Elizabeth realized again how much modern man had become accustomed to the light without knowing that darkness was the primary color of the universe. In some cities, the stars could no longer be seen because of the light. That one already spoke of 'light pollution'. Here, it was different. Dark, black, and frightening.
And the detective understood why one of the seven plagues with which God had struck the Egyptians had been darkness.
She drove down the road toward the North End. All of north Boston was in darkness.
She looked at the police radio in her car, which she rarely used because she usually relied on her smartphone and picked it up. "How about you guys?"
Crackled on the radio channel before Marc's voice said, "Pitch black. We're in visual range of the Velvet Pearl."
Elizabeth nodded slowly. "I'll be right with you."
"Alexis --" Marc said, pausing."
The detective's eyebrows drew together. "What's going on?"
"Damn, the signal's gone."
"Gone how?"
"We can't locate Beasley's signal."
"Since when?" wanted to know Elizabeth, stepping on the gas.
"Ten seconds."
"What was the last position?"
"Five houses from the Velvet Pearl."
Five houses? What the hell is she doing there? She was supposed to stay near that fucking whorehouse! Why didn't you pick her up right away?"
"Because we couldn't. The signal is sometimes there and sometimes not. And always in different places."
Elizabeth's head was spinning. They probably had to enter the individual points into the computer and calculate a probable location. The detective dialed Alexi's cell phone number. Immediately, it went to voicemail. "Damn it!" she growled, "I can't reach Beasley on her cell."
"Neither can we." Marc's voice crackled on the radio. "The power outage knocked out a transmission tower."
"Son of a bitch! Did she bring a radio?"
"Didn't think of it. We thought cell phone, surveillance, and GPS would be enough."
"Should be," she growled. "As long as there's no power outage. Do you guys have a signal?"
"No. None."
"It's on satellite. They're hardly affected by the power outage, are they?"
"We had a great signal until just now. It was just moving fast."
"Very fast?" What was that supposed to mean? Alexis Beasley was supposed to wait at the Velvet Pearl brothel until this guy showed up. Or was she ...
Marc finished her thought. "Yeah, like she was ... Riding in a car. Similar speed."
"My God --" Elizabeth would have liked to bang her head on the steering wheel. But she needed all her senses to move forward in this darkness. "Could it be that someone --" she hesitated, " ... took her?"
"Maybe --" Marc hesitated. "Maybe she got in somewhere. And counted on us following her? And now the tracker transmission isn't working because of the power outage."
"But those are satellites. They're way up there!"
"Yes. But the signals from the satellites are also being relayed, Rizzoli. And to relay, you need power."
Elizabeth rolled her eyes for a second. The image of Alexis appeared in her mind's eye. Alexis ... She had relied on the others, Elizabeth and her colleagues, to look out for her! Just like with the women in London whose story Katherine had told. Nothing had happened to the women in London. And Alexis? She had gotten into a car. But where? And with whom? And where would he go?
"We've got a signal!" Marc's voice cut through the stillness of the night and the roar of the engine.
Elizabeth frowned deeply. "Where?"
"Charlestown. By the old glazier's shop."
Elizabeth took a deep breath, then exhaled. "Thank God!" She redialed Alexis's cell number. Again, only voicemail. "Is the signal still there?"
"Yes, it is!"
"We need to get there as soon as possible! Don't let it disappear again!"
"That should work," Marc said.
"What makes you so sure of that, after all that's gone wrong?"
"The signal," he said, "isn't moving."
xxx
She reached the old glassworks in Charlestown. Everything was still plunged into deep darkness.
Marc and two officers searched the area with flashlights. An RRT squad car pulled up and spat out three heavily armed RRT officers.
"Stupid for everyone to have to use flashlights, Elizabeth thought. The killer sees us, and we don't see him. If he's around. Only the RRT officers had infrared sights that allowed them to see in the dark.
"Where's the signal now?" the detective asked.
Marc looked at it for a long moment. "Right here. But we can't tell exactly. We can only locate it to within ten yards."
Elizabeth heard engines behind her and looked over her shoulder. The black, unmarked car stopped. Nick and Jane got out.
"Any word yet?" the chief asked as she took long strides toward her daughter.
Elizabeth took a deep breath. "We're still looking. She's got to be around here somewhere. Here on the site of the old glazier's shop."
Jane looked around, as much as one could do in this darkness. "Does the city utility know that all of north Boston is without power?"
Marc nodded. "Sure. They're already fixing the problem."
The chief furrowed his brows. "Son of a bitch! There's no one here. Except us morons!"
What had they done? Had they let Alexis Beasley walk to her doom? But then, why was the signal right here? Right here, close by? She had to be somewhere.
"Maybe she's hiding somewhere?" She shone her flashlight in all directions. Nothing. To the south, a construction dumpster. Then, a driveway. Then, another construction dumpster. Otherwise, trees, traffic signs, and, in the distance, houses. Candles burned in some of the windows. There was no real light in any of the windows. It was deep felt darkness.
Good job, Elizabeth thought. And still hoped the power outage and Alexis Beasley's disappearance weren't related. She walked toward a construction dumpster. "She could be around here somewhere?" she asked.
Marc looked at his monitor and nodded.
She walked toward the dumpster. Maybe Alexis Beasley was unconscious in the construction dumpster? Perhaps she was inside, and the door had slammed shut? Maybe ... She approached the dumpster quietly. Knocked. Felt kind of stupid doing it. "Alexis Beasley? We're here --"
No answer. Elizabeth shone her flashlight through the crack. Inside, boards, rocks, construction debris, and half a toilet seat. Was her colleague perhaps lying among all the trash, sharp-edged ceramics, and pointed nails? And couldn't speak because she was unconscious?
At that moment, she saw the bag tied to the container handle. A white plastic bag, like from a restaurant that offered food to go. White and a little transparent. She shone her light closer.
There was something red.
Elizabeth instinctively put on latex gloves. She opened the bag. Wanted to turn away. Looked deeper inside instead.
The red ... Blood. And two GPS trackers.
xxx
"You were trying to trick me, right?"
She was naked on the table, like a banquet. He was standing over her. She was lying there. She was tied up. A plastic bag tied over her head.
Blood ran down her face where he had hit her.
She gasped under the bag. Soon, very soon, she would be dead. And he would be alive.
"You're going to watch me do it, Alexis --" he said, "watch me dig your grave. Now."
She gasped louder. The oxygen in the plastic bag was diminishing. That's why he had to hurry.
He had learned what he wanted to know. She had talked. Everyone talked eventually if only the pain was great enough. The pain and the darkness. He had taken care of the pain. And of the dark, too. He was the angel of death who took a course in the dark in the nosedive on his victims. He seized his victims in the nosedive and dragged them into his cave. Yes, he liked this comparison.
Power failure. Pain. And darkness.
She twitched and trembled under the bag.
She wasn't dead yet. But almost.
Now, it was time to penetrate her.
Pain, he thought, is the lube for me. And she will know it. For the last few minutes of her life, it will be me who is with her. Who is with her. And is in her. Me. The BodyCounter.
It wasn't long before he was about to climax.
The timing may work.
Maybe he would come when she died.
This time, this one time, reality would be just like his imagination. Reality just like his dreams. The same. Or even better.
Three, four thrusts as she twitched under the bag. She moved and struggled. More at first, then less and less.
Slowly, her resistance slackened. While his arousal rose immeasurably, at last, it was as it should be, he thought. At last, reality was almost as good as imagination. He was getting better. He was finally getting better!
Her death. What might her death smell like? What did her death taste like?
He was about to climax.
She twitched twice more.
Then, once more.
Didn't move anymore.
He reached forward.
Took the bag from her head.
Her lifeless face with broken eyes stared at the ceiling.
He put the bag to his mouth.
Took a deep drag. Sucked the remaining air into his lungs. The air that had brought her death.
This was what her death tasted like. This is what her death smelled like.
Her death was his life.
Then, he reached his climax.
He was done.
He walked with his pants down into the kitchen.
Helped himself to a canned beer.
Then, his eyes fell on the eggs in the refrigerator.
A treacherous thought rose in him. Perverse and ingenious at the same time, he thought. He had to try it out. Because already, when he thought about it, his cock became hard again.
He took one of the raw eggs.
Went to the table where the corpse lay with her legs stretched out. Carefully guide the egg into the vagina. Further. Deeper. "Did I make you a baby, bitch?" he asked with a wide grin. The corpse's face remained motionless. "Did I?" he asked again.
He looked at her scrutinizing from all sides as he took his cock in his hand.
"Yes," he said, his grin widening. "I did. And I'm going to kill it! I'm going to fuck you! And kill it! Exterminate you!"
With those words, he pounded on the body's abdomen. He heard the smacking and the crashing that came from her abdomen.
The protein that flowed out of her, just like the life that had washed out of her before. The energy that he had breathed in through the bag.
The life that was over. The death that always won.
The bursting as he smashed the egg.
At that moment, he came once again.