I entered Kriefan Mack’s home two days later at ten minutes to midnight with everything planned to perfection. It’s a nice four-bedroom detached house with a postcard-perfect garden, pastel walls, and immaculate modern furniture, minding its own quiet business at the end of a tidy cul-de-sac.
The lights had been out twenty minutes, time enough for Kriefan, his wife, and two children to drift into sleep. Smiling at the neighborhood-watch stickers on the windows, I slid Mr. Mack’s stolen door key into the lock. He’d probably assumed his keys had been lost in the accident, and with so much happening since then he hadn’t had the opportunity to get the locks changed.
I moved quickly. Wasting time with precaution is worthless when one enters an occupied house so easily. Experience has taught me that it’s better to strike your prey when it’s off guard. I climbed the stairs with my medical briefcase in hand, eased along the landing, and opened the first door. It was a child’s room. A low light in the corner revealed a young girl in bed, mouth open, the sigh of deep slumber passing her lips. I closed the door and opened the one next to it. That was the right one. Again, the low amber light, but this time it was shining on Kriefan Mack and his wife spooned together under the bedcovers.
I set my briefcase down at the end of the bed, opened it, selected a pair of latex gloves and a syringe, which I placed on the dressing table. I rolled the gloves onto my hands, flexing my fingers, checking for holes. “Get up, Kriefan.”
At first all they did was open their eyes and blink. Then he turned, sat upright, and thrust his back against the headboard as if an invisible hand had slammed him there. “Shit!”
She was still blinking, trying to work out where she was.
Kriefan stared. “Bloody hell!”
His wife’s lips trembled when she realized this was reality. There really was a prowler in the bedroom tapping a syringe. She looked ready to yell, but I lifted a finger. “I wouldn’t. Your children are asleep. It might be best if they don’t see what’s about to happen, Mrs. Mack.”
She started to shake, and Kriefan turned his bed lamp on to full, panic scoring deep lines into his face. I could see a hundred different scenarios running through his head just by watching his eyes. He was wondering if he could take me.
“You! You’re the man that helped me out of my car,” he said, squinting. “What’s this about? How the hell did you get in?”
“The usual way,” I said, waggling the key.
“Oh, God!” Mrs. Mack screamed as though someone just showed her a plate with someone’s heart still beating on it.
“If your children see me they’ll die too,” I shouted, pressing my hand to the door in case they came running in.
Kriefan shook his head. “I don’t know what you’re doing in our house, but if you don’t get out right now we’ll … Kelly, where’s the mobile?”
It was on her bedside table. She was reaching for it.
The children started hammering on the door, yelling, crying.
Kriefan jumped out of bed, fists balling, jaw stiffening. He was about to attack.
No problem. I snatched his hand and bent it against his forearm before launching him at the door in case the children came in. His head cracked on the handle, and I stepped over him to get to his wife. The children were still shouting as I snatched the phone from her and slammed it into the wall. With a slap I sent her reeling across the bed and turned to Kriefan. He was already back up, distracted by the blood in the palm of his hand and the cry of his wife, his face a portrait of confusion, fear, rage, desperation.
“Bastard!” He came for me again, and I met him head-on. His knuckles struck my cheekbone, but my fist plunged into the soft spot beneath the rib cage, forcing the air from his lungs. He folded as though the floor had fallen through the ceiling, and the contents of my briefcase scattered across the carpet as he curled up into a groaning ball. Needles and pens danced across the carpet; documents fluttered through the air.
“Angus,” cried his wife to her children, “take Rachel. Get out of the house as fast as you can. Run!”
With Kriefan on the floor moaning in pain I faced her, put her down too with a crack across the jaw. Sobbing, she crawled into the corner, her head in her arms. I know people like her. She wouldn’t bother me again, and when the noise of the children had gone I knew I could indulge.
“You’re both going to die. You know that, don’t you?”
Kriefan looked up at me, sweat running from his brow. “Why?”
“Why doesn’t matter. What matters for you now is how.”
“Look, can’t we just … talk … about this? I don’t know what I’ve done but I …” He trailed off into tears. “Oh, God … my kids … Oh, God.” He was stalling for time, knowing the police would be here in minutes.
I had to work fast, so I kept my victim pinned to the carpet and straddled his chest, reached for the syringe. “Listen carefully. You’re going to die.” I cupped his chin in my hands, felt his sweat through the latex. “You can’t change that because it’s your fate. I promise it will be painless if you cooperate, but if you struggle, your wife’s death will be agony.”
“Focus, Kriefan.” I gripped his head tighter, staring hard into his wide eyes, preparing myself for the moments I so enjoy. “Do you understand me?”
He stared.
“Do. You. Understand?”
His eyes said yes, and I felt his muscles relax beneath me. One hundred milligrams of pancuronium bromide injected into the bloodstream and in less than a minute he’d be completely paralyzed, then seconds later he’d be dead. I stared into his eyes, tried not to hear his final whine of self-pity as I emptied the fluid into him.
Deeper. Penetrating the black center, searching the soul.
Deeper. Watching for the end.
Deeper. It’s intoxicating sharing those final moments of terror when every part of the body stiffens.
I saw it: the moment of death.
In that infinitesimal blink of time a multitude of experiences winks out of existence, never to return. It simply disappears. I gasped, as if the air had frozen in my lungs. After seeing this so many times and feeling the pleasure of it, the power never dwindles, never fails to deliver that exquisite rush. But still death’s secret eluded me. There is a profound difference between eyes that are alive and eyes that are dead. Not focus. Not dilation of the pupils. Something else. Some place far deeper than I can go.
I allowed the body to drop, and I looked over to his widow. She was not crying any longer, just cowering in the corner with her arms wrapped around her knees, a single strand of saliva crawling from her lip. She knew what was coming, and I reluctantly obliged, dispatching her quickly and with a silent prayer for her soul to be at peace. She did not deserve this, but she is, nevertheless, the penalty for her husband’s borrowed time.
In echo of the accident two days ago, blue and red lights glared through the gaps in the curtains. If the police knew what was happening they would not have made such a bold announcement of their arrival, but still, whether they catch me or not, Fate had caught up with Mr. Mack and things were right again.
But there was no time to appreciate it. I gathered up the contents of my briefcase that had been littered around the room, thrust all of it back inside, slammed it shut, and hurried out of the room and down the stairs. The front door was open, and three police cars were blocking the drive. It would take a miracle to escape unnoticed.
I edged forward. There were no officers waiting for me at the door. I stepped out onto the drive, waiting to be thrown to the ground or perhaps even shot, but still there was no one, not even inside the cars. I checked the surrounding houses. The neighbors, all awake now and leaning from their windows, were not looking my way. Instead their attention was drawn to an event occurring several houses down. A small man in a long black coat, hunched like something heavy had grown out of his back, ran at surprising speed in the road followed by six police officers shouting for him to stop. Incredibly convenient. Perhaps one of those rare moments when Fate chose to intervene. None of the Macks’ neighbors saw me as I left the house; none of them knew the real killer had slipped into a side alley.
It was the closest I had ever come to capture, but rather than celebrate my good fortune when I returned home, I sat in the dark, fearful of where my dreams would take me should I sleep. My thoughts were filled with the image of that strange man to whom I owed my escape. Even with a glance I knew something about him was profoundly wrong. That was the first time I saw Keitus Vieta. I wish now it had been the only time.