The driver looked up at the building. On the first floor a woman with short dirty-blond hair, and clearly carrying a little more weight than she would like to, was staring out the window at the heavyset man. Her eyes followed him until he disappeared down another street. When he was gone, she faded back into the apartment, but three minutes later she was at the window again. This time, her anxious gaze concentrated at the opposite end of the road. The driver also noticed something different about the woman. Her hair had been brushed and the unflattering nightgown she was wearing was gone, replaced by something sexier.

Five minutes elapsed and nothing else happened. Then the woman’s lips spread into a smile. The driver followed her stare all the way to another man who had turned the corner and was now hurriedly walking toward the apartment block. He was at least forty pounds lighter than her husband, and about ten years younger. The woman’s lips broke into a wide smile.

The driver chuckled. Yeah, the things you can learn just by observing.

But he wasn’t there to catch anyone’s extramarital affair. His task was much more important than that.

At 7:15 a.m., another man exited the building. This one was tall with an athletic build. He walked with purpose. His eyes showed strong resolve and determination. Reflexively, the driver slid down on his seat, making himself even more unnoticeable, while at the same time attentively observing the man as he jumped into his own car and drove away.

The driver smiled. Everything was going to plan.

Twenty minutes later, his mark finally stepped out of the building. He sat forward and watched her walk to her car. She was attractive, with a charming aura around her, and a body he knew would be the envy of all her friends.

He took a deep breath and allowed the excitement to avalanche down his spine. Adrenaline rushed through him as he checked his broadcasting equipment and started his engine.

He’d spent the entire day tagging her, waiting for the right moment to strike. He knew that his success depended on choosing the perfect moment. Anything less than perfect and things could turn around very quickly.

After so many hours, that moment had finally arrived.

His show was about to go online again.

Fifty-Eight

When Hunter got back to the PAB, Garcia was rubbing his eyes vigorously.

‘Everything OK?’ Hunter asked.

Garcia looked up and let out a deep breath. ‘I just finished watching that film – The Devil Inside.’

‘Anything?’ Hunter asked, taking a seat behind his desk.

Garcia got up and massaged his neck. ‘I don’t think the note the killer left in Ms. Stevenson’s bedroom refers to the film.’

Hunter paused and looked at him.

‘As I said before, the plot revolves around a young woman whose mother had murdered three people while supposedly possessed by a demon. I was mainly interested in finding out about those murders. Specifically, the method used.’

‘And . . .?’

‘No resemblance at all to our case. It was a frenzied knife attack. All three victims were slaughtered inside the same house, in the same night, and in the space of minutes. The film then focuses on the woman’s daughter attending several exorcism sessions to try to figure out if her mother was really possessed by the devil when she did it. No one is locked inside any sort of enclosure, glass or not. No wasps or any other insect appear. No one is left inside an alkali or acid bath, nothing is broadcast over the Internet, and there’s no voting or choosing between death methods. If there really is a meaning behind the message the killer left in Ms. Stevenson’s bedroom, that film isn’t it.’

Hunter’s focus moved to the pictures board and the fluorescent orange fingerprint powder photograph. He scratched his head. ‘The devil inside. What the hell does that mean?’

‘How about Ms. Stevenson’s emails?’ he asked. ‘Any developments at all?’

Dennis Baxter, from the Computer Crimes Unit, had batch-downloaded all of Christina Stevenson’s emails into an external hard drive, now connected to Garcia’s computer. No more going over them on a 3.5-inch screen, and no more risk of being locked out of her account.

‘Nothing so far that I’d call suspicious,’ Garcia replied, returning to his desk. ‘There are a lot of quick-fire internal emails between Ms. Stevenson and other LA Times reporters – jokes, gossip, discussions about articles . . . things like that. I’ve filtered all her emails, searching for everything that didn’t come from a @latimes.com address. I’m hoping that will give us some sort of separation between her personal and work emails. Nothing has flagged up yet, but I still have a long way to go here. How about you?’

Hunter ran over his meeting with Pamela Hays.

‘Whoa, wait,’ Garcia said, lifting his right hand and pausing Hunter when he told him about the phone threats Christina had been getting. ‘Who’s this guy?’

‘His name is Thomas Paulsen,’ Hunter explained. ‘He’s a software millionaire, based right here in LA.’

‘Software?’ A muscle flexed on Garcia’s jaw. He was already typing Paulsen’s name into a search engine.

‘That’s right. His company was one of the first to create enterprise Internet database systems.’

Garcia looked up from his screen. ‘When did you get time to research him?’

‘I didn’t,’ Hunter replied. ‘I read a lot. I read the piece in Forbes magazine a while ago.’

‘Did you read the article Christina Stevenson wrote on him?’

‘Not yet.’

Garcia clicked on the topmost result link on the page returned by his search. It took him to PaulsenSystems’ website. He quickly skimmed through the information on the ‘About Us’ page. According to it, Hunter had been right about everything. Paulsen’s company had been among the very first ones to develop enterprise Internet database systems, and it was now one of the world leaders. Its systems were used by companies all over the world.

‘Are we talking to him?’ Garcia asked. ‘He sure sounds like someone who knows his way around cyberspace.’

‘We probably will be, but not just yet. First I want to find out how badly Christina Stevenson’s article affected him. But even then we would still need to link Paulsen to Kevin Lee Parker. Maybe he had a beef with Ms. Stevenson because of the article she wrote, but how would our first victim fit into his payback plan?’

Garcia said nothing.

Hunter’s desk phone rang, sucking his attention away from the board.

‘Detective Hunter, Homicide Special Section.’

There was a click on the line.

‘Hello . . .?’

‘Detective Hunter,’ the caller finally said. His tone was cold and unrushed, like a doctor greeting a patient. ‘I’m glad you are at your desk.’

In hearing his voice, Hunter felt an emptiness form in his stomach, a kind of vacuum sensation, that was instantly replaced by a rush of anxiety. Hunter clenched his jaw and locked eyes with Garcia.

‘Are you online?’ the caller asked, his voice now filled with mocking amusement. ‘Because I’m about to show you something I am certain you and your partner will enjoy watching.’

Fifty-Nine

Despite the temperature inside their office being around a hundred degrees Fahrenheit, Hunter felt cold sweat break out on the nape of his neck and trickle down his back.

‘Are you ready, Detective Hunter?’ the caller asked rhetorically. ‘Because your favorite website just went back online. You don’t need me to give you the web address again, do you?’