Page 65 of The Grave Artist (Sanchez & Heron #2)

As he drove Selina Sanchez into the hills near Corbin Canyon Park, south of Tarzana, Damon was considering what lay ahead.

Thank you, Senor Picasso. I have come up with yet another variation on Serial Killing. I am on my way to Guernica !

He was captivated by the idea.

Variations on a theme was the bedrock of being an artist.

He pulled up into the driveway of an old house in need of paint, the yard overgrown. Small, though of two stories, with a gabled roof. In his youth he’d thought of it as resembling the house of the “Hansel and Gretel” witch.

Damon stepped out and looked around. There were no neighbors nearby and the few adjacent roads were empty. He opened the car door and led Selina out and up the front stairs, then punched the number into the padlock.

They stepped inside the dim place.

He smelled the familiar scent of laundry starch and clove (real clove, not chemicals from a spray bottle).

Mold too, because this house had not been much occupied over the past few years.

The single-family structure, on a scruffy one-acre lot, was fifty years old but, save for the style, might have been built last year.

That was one thing about California, at least in the regions where snow didn’t fall.

Houses didn’t age as fast as in, say, the Midwest or New England.

Also Miss Spalding, who’d inherited the house in her thirties, had taken exceptionally good care of the place. Most of the chairs and couches were covered in yellowing plastic.

One that was uncovered was the divan where the two of them would sit together and watch TV—an early model flat screen and huge for the time: fifty inches.

Thinking of all the movies he’d seen on it.

What was the first?

Friday the 13th , he believed.

Or maybe Make Them Die Slowly . An Italian horror flick that was truly terrible but that did offer up some delightfully gruesome death scenes.

Selina looked around. She was afraid, of course, but not as afraid as he would have liked.

That would change.

He was in the mood for a glass of milk, but he knew there was none fresh. That would have to wait until he was finished here. Two, three hours.

Picasso . . .

Growing yet again as an artist.

Today would see the first instance of Serial Killing 2.2.

2.0 was murdering to enjoy the mourning of families.

2.1 was further tormenting a grieving family by convincing a teenager that her parent was having an affair.

2.2 was not just murdering, but torturing someone to death and sending the delightful, filmed account of the victim’s agony to their loved one.

His Guernica . . .

The horror that the family member felt would be exquisite and the only element still to work out would be somehow his witnessing that person watching the scenario in horror. There had to be a way. A hidden camera, perhaps.

He knew where Carmen Sanchez lived. Tristan Kane had given him the address. How hard would it be to hack into her security system to see the agent open the package with the thumb drive containing the video he was about to make. Kane could do it in an afternoon.

He glanced over at Selina.

Who looked pretty cocky at the moment.

This irritated Damon.

He decided to add thirty minutes to the hours of torture he had planned.

What about the screaming?

He’d forgotten to bring earplugs but maybe wadded-up tissue would work just as well.

Or he could gag her ...

No, the screams had to be part of the show.

Tissue in his ears it would be.

“Who was she?” Selina asked, looking at the pictures of Miss Spalding on the mantelpiece.

Damon gave a brief laugh. “Are you trying to Stockholm me? You know what that is?”

“My sister’s a cop. Besides everybody with a TV knows what Stockholm syndrome is. The emotional connection between hostage takers and their captives.”

“And you’re hoping it works the other way too. That if I tell you personal things, I’ll be less inclined to ... do what you’re afraid I’m going to do.”

“No, I don’t think that at all. You’re, like, a dead-eyed freak, and the last thing I want is to form any kind of connection with you. I’m just asking who’s the lady in the picture looking at you in that kind of creepy way.”

Damon stiffened. “Miss Spalding, my governess. And there was nothing creepy about her.”

“No?” Sarcasm dripped from the word.

So, maybe Selina was aiming for the opposite of the Stockholm approach. She was trying to antagonize him, maybe so he’d make a mistake.

Or perhaps she figured he intended to torture her, so she was goading him to kill her immediately.

Not going to happen.

He knew enough about anatomy to make him an expert at creating many sources of pain in the human body.

He began to set up the two cameras, aimed at the chair where she sat: front angle and side. A thought occurred to him: Should he show the vid to Maddie Willis?

She was a killer. They were kindred souls. But was this a step too far? He’d have to see. Maybe he could bring up the topic tangentially. The last thing he wanted to do was alienate his newfound love.

Selina paid little attention to the preparation. “Where is Miss Spalding now?”

“Dead.” The lighting wasn’t quite right. He removed a lampshade.

Much better. Stark, which meant a perfect blending of form and substance.

“How did she—”

“I killed her.”

After he figured out what Miss Spalding had done on his wedding day, he decided she had to die too.

His bride-to-be’s death was no accident.

He’d been suspicious from the start, never fully believing Felicia had slipped and banged her head on the edge of a swimming pool she swam in nearly daily and then conveniently fell into the water and drowned.

The body is an amazing thing. The coughing reflex would have brought her around in seconds.

Unless somebody was in the pool with her, holding her feet high.

Miss Spalding had murdered Felicia, slipping over to her house before her friends came for the hair and makeup, while Damon was at the venue.

Jealousy was the motive.

He should have known.

With a creased brow, his former governess had asked him, “Moving into a house of your own? The two of you? Without me, Little Pup? You really think you’ll be happy?”

He had ignored her deliberate use of the pet name and didn’t answer the question. He’d thought no more of it until a few days later when he was at the funeral with all the mourners. Everyone was dressed in black, except Miss Spalding, who wore her customary pale-gray outfit.

Tears had stung the backs of Damon’s eyes—another unfamiliar sensation. He reached into his breast pocket to pull out a handkerchief. With his gaze momentarily diverted from the casket being lowered into the ground, he noticed Miss Spalding standing alone.

Clearly unaware anyone was watching, the corners of her mouth lifted briefly with the ghost of a smile.

Or had the fleeting expression been a satisfied smirk?

That was the first inkling, followed quickly by certainty, as he put the pieces together. Suddenly her choice of funeral attire made sense. Miss Spalding was dressed as if this were just another ordinary day—because she was not mourning a loss. To the contrary, she seemed pleased.

Damon’s grief transmuted into cold rage as he planned his retribution. Going to the police was out of the question. With zero proof, he refused to sit through endless legal wrangling only to end up with an acquittal. Besides, the courts would never mete out the kind of justice he demanded.

Instead, he made a private vow to avenge his bride before the week was finished. He would have preferred the symmetry of doing to her what she’d done to Felicia—head trauma and drowning. But that would have been suspicious.

So, he opted for an electric dryer short in an old house without a ground-fault interrupt circuit.

Electricians will tell you that 120 V will push you away from the source so it’s rare to die by electrocution that way—from a lamp or toasters.

But the 240 V of a dryer or electric oven?

It grabs you and doesn’t let go until the muscles, including the heart, cease all function.

And that’s how Hattie Spalding, who had murdered Felicia McNichol on Saturday, joined her in death the following Wednesday.

Four days later.

Setting in stone the pattern for his future murderous career.

Now, the cameras were ready.

As for Selina Sanchez’s prolonged death, how should Serial Killing 2.2 unfold?

Thoughts of Miss Spalding gave him the idea of electricity. He could use house current, but that risked the inconvenience of tripping the circuit breaker. Better to schlep the car battery inside and connect lamp wire to the positive and negative and go at it.

Strip her, hook the negative lead to a toe and then touch the exposed copper strands attached to the positive wherever he wished.

Delightful . . .

But the battery was so heavy ... he’d have to unbolt it. Too much work.

Any other ideas?

Ah, yes!

He recalled that Miss Spalding had a workbench downstairs in the basement.

His heart danced a bit at the memory, and he recalled a propane torch she’d bought to blister off paint.

Damon had been here recently and knew the red-and-black cylinder was still there.

He went downstairs to fetch it.