“Okay,” Evans said when Loomis didn’t answer, “Mr. Loomis has waived his right to an attorney and is choosing to represent himself. So, Eric…Can I call you Eric?”

“Sure, Keith,” Loomis answered sarcastically.

Evans laughed. “You’re okay. Not many people in your position can keep their sense of humor. What I can’t figure out is why someone with a chemistry degree and a good job would kidnap and kill those women.”

Loomis smiled again and shook his head. “You aren’t very good at this, Keith. From your question I take it that I’m supposed to believe that an FBI agent working the biggest serial murder case in the history of the D.C. area has not been schooled by the VICAP experts at Quantico in the psychological profile of the serial killer he’s hunting. Try again.”

“Okay, Eric. Why’d you do it?”

“Do what?”

Evans shrugged. “Let’s start with Jessica Vasquez. Why did you kidnap her?”

“I didn’t.”

Evans looked perplexed. “You’re saying she somehow found her way into your basement then decided to strip off her clothes, put on an S &M mask and strap herself to a dentist chair? That’s pretty weird behavior.”

“I have no idea how that woman ended up in my basement. But I suspect the FBI may have had something to do with planting her there along with the other so-called evidence you claim to have found.”

Now it was Evans’s turn to smile. “So you’re the victim of a government conspiracy?”

“That’s one possible explanation.”

Evans asked the question he’d been waiting to drop into the conversation.

“Do you think the FBI was so anxious to make an arrest that we murdered Charlotte Walsh and dropped her in a Dumpster, or did the real D.C. Ripper do that?”

Loomis sprang upright and strained against the chain that manacled his legs to the floor.

“I did not kill that bitch. That is totally bogus. That is a complete frame-up.”

“That’s hard to believe, seeing as how the MO in Charlotte Walsh’s case is identical to the other Ripper murders.”

“Not if the FBI committed the murder to frame me. You’d know how to duplicate the Ripper’s MO. You think you’re clever but I’m a lot smarter than you and I’ll-”

Loomis stopped. He seemed to realize that he’d lost control. Rage showed on his face for a moment more. Then he slumped down on his chair and stared at the tabletop. Evans tried to continue the conversation, but Loomis refused to speak from that point on.

Maggie Sparks found D.C. police officer Peter Brassos and his partner, Jermaine Collins, sitting at a table in Starbucks, where she’d had their supervisor tell them to meet her. Brassos was thick and heavy muscled and Sparks pegged him for a gym rat. Collins was a lanky, light-skinned African-American. There were no coffee cups on the table and neither man looked pleased to see her.

“Thanks for meeting me,” Sparks said after flashing her credentials. “Can I get you a coffee?”

“What’s this about?” Brassos demanded curtly, ignoring her offer.

“I’m working on the D.C. Ripper task force.”

“I heard you got him,” Collins said.

“We think we have, but there are always loose ends to tie up.”

Brassos looked confused. “We haven’t had anything to do with the Ripper murders.”

Sparks nodded. “This is probably a wild goose chase, and I know you’re anxious to get back to work, so let me get to the point. A few nights ago, you two responded to a 911 call about a shooting at an apartment house on Wisconsin Avenue.”

Both men stiffened as soon as she mentioned the address.

“What about it?” Brassos asked, keeping his tone neutral.

Maggie took out a copy of the police report Brassos had written after the incident. She pretended to check something in it.

“You talked to an Alma Goetz?”

Brassos forced a laugh. “The crazy neighbor. Yeah, I talked to her.”

“You think she’s crazy?” Maggie asked.

“Not crazy but a real busybody, a snoop. Lives alone, wants attention, that type. We run into them from time to time.”

“She said she heard a shot from the apartment of Dana Cutler, the neighbor across the hall.”

Collins’s brow furrowed. “Pardon me, Agent Sparks, but what does this have to do with the Ripper case?”

Sparks flashed a friendly smile. “Cutler’s name came up during the investigation. So, what about the shot?”

“There wasn’t one,” Brassos said. “We went across the hall. The door was unlocked. We knocked. No one answered, so we went in to see if there was an injured person inside. There wasn’t.”

“You looked through the apartment?”

“Yeah, the whole place.”

“Did you see anything that struck you as odd?”

“Nah, it was just an apartment.”

“Why do you think Ms. Goetz was so certain she heard a shot?”

“It was the door,” Brassos said. “She told me she was inside her apartment and heard the so-called shot through the walls. I told you the door to Cutler’s apartment was unlocked. I think Goetz heard the door slam. She’s pretty old. Her hearing probably isn’t great.”

Maggie nodded. “That’s one explanation. I talked to her, and she said she heard someone inside the apartment tell you not to shoot because he was a federal agent.”

Brassos threw his head back and laughed. Maggie thought the laugh sounded forced.

“I told you, the apartment was empty. Goetz is dingy.”

“Yeah, she struck us as unreliable, but what about the wounded man? Where did he come from?”

“What are you talking about?”

“Miss Goetz saw a man being helped out of the apartment by a second man.”

“I told you, there wasn’t anyone in the apartment,” Brassos said.

“Was someone else in the apartment house hurt at the same time?”

“You know, I’m talking to you as a courtesy,” Brassos said. “This sounds like an interrogation to me.” He stood up. “If you got a beef with us about our report, file it. I got work to do. Come on, Jerry.”

Collins stood, too. Sparks did nothing to stop them. If it became necessary, she could always subpoena the officers.

“I’m sorry if I upset you,” she apologized as she got to her feet.

“I don’t think you are,” Brassos said, and the officers walked out.

While he’d been interrogating Eric Loomis, Evans was so focused that he forgot he was exhausted, but his fatigue flooded over him as soon as he was done questioning the serial murderer. Evans had turned off his cell phone during the interrogation so he wouldn’t be distracted. When he checked for messages he found one from Maggie Sparks asking him to call as soon as he was able. Evans arranged to meet her at a bar near Dupont Circle and he was washing down the bite he’d taken out of his cheeseburger when Maggie walked in. She scanned the bar and smiled when she saw Keith’s upraised hand.

“How did the interrogation go?” she asked as she slid into the booth opposite Evans.

“Not well, but we don’t need a confession with all the evidence we have. He’s representing himself, by the way. Loomis thinks he’s going to outsmart us.”

“Sounds like he’s a true megalomaniac.”

“A classic case.”

“That should make things easier for the prosecution. Did he offer any explanation for the presence of a naked woman in his basement and all those false teeth?”

“Of course. We planted them to frame him.”

“Oh, yeah, I forgot.”

Sparks signaled the waiter and ordered her own beer and burger.

“What did he say when you brought up Walsh?” she asked when the waiter left.

“That’s interesting. He was very calm, very superior, during the questioning, like it amused him. He played mind games with me as soon as I started. But he went ballistic when I mentioned Walsh.”

“What’s your impression?”

“I don’t think he killed her.”

“Whether he did or not, something is going on. I asked for the police reports for the Cutler incident. There is one. Officer Peter Brassos wrote it. He says he and his partner, Jermaine Collins, went to the apartment in response to a 911 report of shots fired. There’s an account of an interview with Miss Goetz that jibes with her version of what happened, but Brassos wrote that he didn’t find any evidence of a shooting in the apartment and there’s no mention of a wounded man being helped out of the apartment.