“There was no time,” Sara said. “The boyfriend was only gone an hour.”
“Could be,” Max allowed. “But now things get really interesting. Victim number three: Mr. Bradley Jenkins.” Pages were once again turned before Max continued. “A limousine driver dropped Bradley off in front of his apartment building after the charity ball at your father’s estate. One neighbor thought he saw Jenkins leave the building a few minutes later with another man the neighbor described as ‘very big.’”
“Probably the same guy the wino saw.”
“Makes sense,” Max agreed. “Anyway, the next thing we know Jenkins winds up dead behind the Black Magic Bar and Grill. Several patrons of the bar recognized Bradley from his photograph, but all swear that he had not been seen that entire evening.”
“So? He was at my father’s party until late.”
“One other thing—the lock on Bradley’s apartment door was jimmied.”
“The big guy probably broke in,” Sara said. “I don’t see what part of it doesn’t make sense.”
Max put down his notebook. “Put the whole thing together, Sara. First, Bradley Jenkins comes home from the party. Then some big guy jimmies the lock and breaks in. Fine, okay so far. You with me?”
“Go on.”
“Now, from the looks of Jenkins’ apartment, the struggle—if there was one—was painfully short. Then Bradley and the killer leave the apartment and drive off together. Based on the tremendous amount of blood in the trunk, we can speculate that Bradley was murdered while lying in the trunk of the car. No mutilation, but like the other two, approximately two dozen stab wounds cover his face, chest, and groin. The killer keeps the body in the trunk overnight, wakes up the next morning, and dumps his body behind a gay bar.”
“Maybe Bradley knew the guy,” Sara said. “Hold on. Skip that. If they knew each other, there would have been no need for the jimmied lock.”
Max managed a grin. “And I was all ready to jump on you for being wrong.”
“Sorry to spoil it for you.”
“Never mind. But you’re ignoring the more important question.”
“Which is?”
“Why did the killer take Bradley out of the apartment in the first place? Think about it. Trian and Whitherson were both murdered in their apartments, right? The killer got them alone, did his thing, and left the mess. But not with Bradley. He went to the trouble of taking him out of the apartment. That meant the killer had to go to the trouble of stealing a car, one. Two, he had to risk being seen leaving the apartment as well as risk being seen getting rid of the body behind the Black Magic. Why? Why not just kill him like the others and get it over with? And why dump the body behind a gay bar?”
Sara thought for a moment. “I see what you mean. Look, Max, I know the heat is coming down on you, but I can’t hold back much longer. I won’t say anything about the mutilation of Trian, but I have to let the public know about the connection of the three victims to the AIDS clinic.”
“Sara . . .”
“Someone is going to dig it up soon anyway, and now Bradley’s father can’t be hurt any more than he already is.” She gripped her cane. “More important, Harvey has decided to go public with the clinic’s success. He needs to raise funds. There’ll be an hour story on the success of his AIDS treatment on NewsFlash.”
Max whistled. “Talk about a major scoop,” he said. “Could be Pulitzer here, Sara. I’d hate to see you miss that.”
“Not fair, Max.”
“I know. My bias against the press flaring up again. Sorry.”
“Forget it.” She watched him start to gnaw on his finger—not the nail, the finger. “Max, don’t you think the connection to the clinic is important?”
“Crucial,” he answered, removing his finger from his mouth and rubbing his face with the same hand. “My people are checking out everyone involved with the place.”
“That’s the crux of the whole thing, isn’t it?” she asked. “I mean, everyone assumes that a psychopath is targeting gays, but he could really be after AIDS patients or, more specifically, patients at Harvey’s clinic.”
“Could be.”
“What about Harvey’s fear that someone is trying to sabotage the clinic?”
Bernstein stood up and began pacing in a small, tight circle. “A possibility but a long shot. According to Harvey, nobody outside the clinic—not the FDA, you, or anybody else—knew how close they were to finding a cure. Sure, there were rumors, but people don’t usually try to sabotage a rumor.”
“I’m not sure I agree with you there,” Sara said. “We’ve both seen plenty of people act on a lot less than unsubstantiated rumors before.”
“Granted, but look at it this way—if someone wanted to destroy Harvey and Bruce’s work, why go to the trouble of murdering all these people in such a grisly fashion? Why not just burn down the clinic? Or why not just kill . . . ?” His voice trailed away.
“Just kill?”
Max swallowed. “I was about to say, ‘Why not just kill the doctors?’ ”
There was a long silence. “Max, what did the handwriting analyst say?”
“Bruce Grey wrote the note. No chance of it being a forgery.”
“Does that mean he definitely committed suicide?”
Bernstein paused, his hand still nervously massaging his chin. “Not necessarily,” he began. “Because of the note in Grey’s handwriting, the suicide was barely questioned. It was an open-and-shut case.”
“And now?”
“There’s so many holes, Sara. I checked out Grey’s history. He seemed happy enough, normal enough, no signs of depression or mental illness.”
“But if Bruce wrote the note—”
“Ah, but how did he write the note?”
“I don’t understand.”
“As you know, I took the liberty of having the handwriting analyst check the note again. But this time I had him look for other details.”
“Such as?”
“For one thing, Swinster noted that the handwriting was unusually shaky. Words and letters ran into one another. It was definitely written by Grey—the shape and design of the letters tell you that—but it was not his normal handwriting. He was in a rush or under duress or something like that.”