He put the cigarette to his lips and drew on it, filling his mouth with its bitter fumes. As he did so, the lit end flared violently, its glowing tip becoming intensely bright, sending a shiver down his spine. He found meaning in even the small things these days – the tiny, crackling embers seemed to him a fitting testament to his power.
The TV was playing in front of him, the sober newscasters concealing their excitement as they jabbered on about the body in the parking lot. They had talked about nothing else for the past few hours. Another nice, middle-class do-gooder had been abducted from her home, ending up in pieces in the trunk of her own car. For the overly made-up woman mouthing the news and her knuckle-headed viewers, it was a terrifying thought. Violence could come to them. Could find them in their own homes, as they slept, took a shower, said their prayers … It thrilled him beyond measure to think of the thousands of middle managers, school moms, newlyweds and singletons who would be tossing and turning tonight. The nightmare was no longer in their heads, it was standing right in front of them.
‘The Chicago Butcher’. It was predictable, given the media’s prurient interest in the state of Jones and Stevens, but it angered him nevertheless. It sound boneheaded and brutal, as if these folk were selected at random and sliced up. Yes, the pain, the fear excited him – the horror in their eyes as life spurted out of their flapping throats – but that was not what this was about. The media, the police, had no idea why these deserving folk had been chosen, nor how much planning had gone into their destruction. None of this was accidental. None of this was luck.
He took another long drag on his cigarette. Maybe he was stupid to get over-excited – none of it mattered anyway. They could call him what they liked, but it didn’t change the fact that the city was running scared. Chicago, his hometown, this bitter, messed-up, careless metropolis, was quaking with fear, terrorized by its own. How little they had cared. How much they would be made to suffer.
Jones had got what he was due. Rochelle Stevens too. And they would not be the last. Out there somewhere, amid the millions of doomed souls in the city, was another whose hour had come. She did not know it yet. She could not know it. But that unsuspecting bitch had a date with the butcher’s knife.