That was exactly what he wanted. Now he had her Audi offering cover between them and the highway.
She leaned against the hood of her car.
‘I’m Alicia, by the way,’ she said, extending her hand. ‘Alicia Campbell.’
‘A pleasure to meet you, Alicia Campbell,’ Lucien replied as he took her hand into his. ‘My name is Lucien. Lucien Folter.’
Alicia frowned at the man standing in front of her.
‘Lucien Folter?’ she asked skeptically, while nodding at the nametag stitched onto his shirt. ‘So who is M. Vargas?’
Lucien closed his eyes for just an instant, as if searching for something inside of him. When he reopened them, something about his entire persona had changed. When he spoke again, his voice was as serene as a religious scholar’s, but the Tennessee accent he’d been using had completely vanished. His eyes refocused on hers and what she saw in them filled her with fear.
‘Oh, him?’ Lucien replied. ‘Don’t worry about him. He won’t be needing this uniform anymore. Not ever.’ He winked at Alicia as his grip tightened against her hand with so much strength, she was unable to free herself. ‘Just like you won’t be needing your car anymore, Alicia . . . not ever.’
Five
‘Lucien Folter is . . . evil in human form.’
Those seven words from Director Kennedy seemed to thicken the air inside Hunter and Garcia’s office.
Garcia consulted his partner with an intrigued look, but Hunter’s thoughts appeared to be somewhere else entirely.
‘Evil in human form?’ Garcia asked Kennedy. His tone carried a hint of sarcasm. ‘No offense, I know that you folks back at the FBI’s NCAVC deal with some very heavy hitters, but this is the LAPD Ultra Violent Crimes Unit. The “clue” would be in the words “Ultra Violent”. “Evil in human form” could be used to describe every single murderer we’ve ever chased.’
‘No offense,’ Kennedy replied in an identical tone to Garcia’s. ‘Ultra violent or not, believe me when I tell you that you’ve never chased anyone quite like Lucien Folter. No one has . . . except Robert.’
Immediately, Garcia’s attention reverted back to Hunter. They’d been partners at the LAPD’s UVC Unit for the past ten years.
‘What does he mean, Robert? When have you chased this guy before?’
Hunter finally seemed to disengage from the trance-like state he’d been in for the past few seconds, but instead of issuing Garcia a reply, he addressed Kennedy.
‘Which prison was he at, Adrian?’ His voice was calm, his demeanor unaltered. ‘You said that he killed three guards and two infirmary nurses as he escaped. Where was he being held?’
Kennedy hesitated.
Hunter’s eyebrows lifted.
‘At Lee federal high-security penitentiary in Virginia,’ Kennedy replied.
‘High-security penitentiary?’ The look Hunter gave Kennedy was full of doubt. ‘What was he doing in a high-security penitentiary?’
No answer came.
‘Lucien should’ve been at a supermax,’ Hunter continued. ‘And in complete isolation. How did he end up in a high-security facility?’
Kennedy breathed in as he uncomfortably shifted his weight from foot to foot.
‘Adrian,’ Hunter pushed. ‘How come Lucien was being held at a high-security penitentiary and not at a supermax?’
Kennedy looked up to meet Hunter’s stare. ‘Because we wanted him as close to Quantico and the NCAVC as we could, Robert. The closest Federal supermax to us is in Colorado.’
Hunter didn’t have to ask. He knew exactly why Kennedy would have wanted Lucien Folter to be close to Quantico.
‘And he was in isolation,’ Kennedy reassured Hunter. ‘Always has been, since the day we caught him. Even when he needed to be transferred to the infirmary.’ Kennedy shook his head, clearly angry. ‘I just can’t understand how he managed to escape. Fine, it wasn’t a supermax, but it was still a federal high-security facility. You don’t just break out of one of those, Robert. He must’ve had help from someone, or someone made the biggest and certainly the last mistake of his career. I will find out exactly how Lucien managed to break out and I will personally make sure that whoever is responsible for this pays. Lucien should’ve been—’
‘What difference does it make how he managed to get out, Adrian?’ Hunter cut in, leaning against the edge of his desk. ‘He’s out. He’s gone . . . and as a fugitive, he’s now the responsibility of the Justice Department and the US Marshals Office, but as an inmate of a high-security facility, I’m sure that Lucien was exposed to the same few guards day after day, am I right? The guard who brought him food, the guard who brought him a book, the guard who accompanied him to the infirmary, or whatever.’
‘Yes, so?’ Kennedy didn’t seem to follow Hunter’s line of thought.
Hunter’s eyes widened. He was clearly surprised by Kennedy’s naivety.
‘So we’re not talking about just another serial killer here, are we, Adrian? We’re talking about Lucien Folter, probably the most psychologically apt murderer on the planet. Would you like to have a wild guess on which other psychology field he excelled at?’ Hunter didn’t wait for a reply. ‘Hypnotism.’
Kennedy breathed out a visibly painful breath.
‘You give someone like Lucien the chance to see the same guard every day,’ Hunter carried on. ‘The chance to talk to the same guard every day and you might as well hand him the keys to his cell and a loaded weapon.’
‘He was only transferred to the high-security facility about a week ago,’ Kennedy tried to counter.
Hunter looked back at the NCAVC director as if he was looking at a complete stranger. ‘Are you suffering from dementia, or are you just trying to cover your ass, Adrian?’
Kennedy’s jaw tightened. Very few people would have the nerve to talk to him in that tone.
‘How long does it take an expert to place an unaware subject under hypnotic control, Adrian?’ Hunter asked. ‘You’ve seen it happen before, haven’t you?’
Kennedy looked away, knowing that Hunter was right.
‘But I also heard you say something about a booby-trap,’ Garcia cut in. ‘What was that about? What sort of trap?’
‘I’m not one hundred percent sure,’ Kennedy replied, turning to face Garcia. ‘What I was told over the phone was that after Lucien escaped his cell and killed four people, he apparently set up a booby-trap inside the infirmary control room, which killed one other guard as he arrived for his shift this morning, almost half an hour after Lucien had escaped. This was the guard who finally raised the alarm.’
‘What sort of trap?’ Garcia asked again. ‘What did he use?’
Kennedy’s eyes moved to the window just past Hunter. ‘If I open that window, can I smoke in here?’
‘Nope,’ Hunter replied.
Kennedy ran his tongue over his lips impatiently. ‘It looks like Lucien used a sawn-off twelve-gauge shotgun,’ he said, finally answering Garcia’s question. ‘A flashlight and a piece of nylon string – something like a fishing line or something similar.’