Rules of Prey

yet?”
    “No.” Her voice was quick, excited. “Where’s it at?”
    “It’s a hooker at Randy’s Motel, down on Hennepin. Young girl. Her street name was Heather Brown. We’ve got people on the scene right now, you better get a crew up there. And let me give you one more piece of information about him, that our shrinks worked out. The chief and the other detectives will probably try to deny it, because they don’t want this kind of sensitive information getting out, but we were expecting him to kill a hooker.”
    “Jeez, why?”
    “Our shrinks think the guy is probably so ugly, so unattractive to women that not only can’t he get it up, he can’t get a woman on his own, either. One probably contributes to the other. We don’t know that it’s appearance, though. Maybe it’s body chemistry or something. You know, maybe he’s got like world-class body odor.”
    “Wow.”
    “Yeah, you get the idea. Really repellent, like a human lizard. I wouldn’t give this to anybody, but I liked the wayyou blended my last tip, about the impotence, into your story. Now that he’s killed the hooker, I think maybe this last piece of information will give the Now Report viewers some exclusive insight into the mind of a serial murderer, you know.”
    “This is really heavy, Luca . . . uh, Red Horse. Let me get this stuff going and I’ll get back to you. Are you at home?”
    “No. I’m way up north, three hours away. I’m about to start back, I’ll get there just before midnight. I’ll be at my house, probably, sometime after one o’clock, and I’ll be up until three or so. If you have to call, call then.”
    “Okay. Thanks, Red Horse.”
     
    Carla was on the dock, wrapped in the flannel shirt.
    “You going?”
    “Yeah.”
    “I’ll walk you up to your car.”
    “I wanted to spend more time,” he said.
    “So come back.”
    “If I can.” He wrapped his arms around her and kissed her and she clung to him for a moment, then broke away and turned to the cabin. Lucas dropped into the Porsche, brought it around in a circle, and headed back to the Cities.
     
    Driving at speed on the narrow roads of the North Woods thrilled him, but he usually did it in the daytime. At night the roadside timber seemed to step in, to press closer to the road. He overran his headlights, brush and phone poles flicking in and out of his vision without leaving time for thought.
    Thirty miles out, just across the Minnesota border, he passed a roadside rest and the red lights came up behind him as a highway-patrol car burst onto the road.
    Lucas wrenched the car to the shoulder and climbed out with his badge case in his hand. The patrolman was already on the road, one hand on his weapon, the other holding a long steel flashlight.
    “I’m a Minneapolis cop making an emergency run back to the Cities,” Lucas said as he walked toward thepatrolman, extending the badge case. “Lieutenant Lucas Davenport. The maddog killer just ripped a hooker, a little girl. I’m trying to get back.”
    “Uh-huh,” the patrolman said. He looked at the badge case and ID card with his light, then flashed it momentarily in Lucas’ face.
    “If you can call your dispatcher and have them patch you through to our dispatch—”
    “I’ve seen you on TV,” the patrolman said. He handed the badge case back. “I’m not going to give you a ticket, but a word to the wise, okay? I clocked you at eighty-three miles an hour. If you drive from here to the Interstate at fifty-five instead of eighty-three, it’ll cost you an extra two minutes. If you drive at eighty-three and you hit a deer or a bear, you’ll be dead. You’re lucky you haven’t hit one already. They’re really moving right now. You hit a big old sow-bear broadside with that car, it’d be like hitting a brick wall.”
    “Right. I’m just sort of freaked out.”
    “Well, cool off,” said the patrolman. “I’ll call up ahead, tell the guys on the Interstate that you’re trying to make up a little extra time. Keep it under a hundred and they won’t hassle you, once you get on the Interstate.”
    “Thanks, man.” Lucas headed back to his car.
    “Hey, Davenport.”
    Lucas stopped with the door half-open. “Yeah?”
    “Get that cocksucker.”
     
    The motel was a shabby single-story L-shaped building with a permanent hand-painted vacancy sign. There were a half-dozen squad cars and four television trucks parked in front when Lucas rolled in. He saw Jennifer and, further down