“She saw what she wanted/needed to see, and made that her reality.”
“Yes. There is nothing, absolutely nothing in DeLano’s responses—though they are warm and friendly, even helpful—to warrant these conclusions.
“This is a woman who creates situations, imagines actions, reactions, connections, and turns them, as you said, into her reality. She wishes something was so, and it becomes so. She has no one to talk to, no one to ground her to reality. She lives in the books—ones she reads, ones she writes.”
Mira sipped some tea while Eve edged a hip onto the desk.
“She kills in the books, and now in reality.”
“Taking her power. I’d say she’s felt powerless,” Mira continued. “She’s watched those who break the rules, who do what society considers wrong, profit and thrive. Likely she’s experienced being treated unfairly though she, at least in her mind, did her very best, though she followed those rules.”
“Bad guys win.”
“They often do in reality,” Mira agreed. “Reading a series like Hightower, or like Dark, there’s a comfort. Terrible things happen, and they happen often to good people, to the innocent. But evil is overcome and punished by good. Balance is restored. At some point, this wasn’t enough. If those who do evil win, why not write about that, why not show that? And eventually, why not be that?”
“You agree she’s living in the books, as she’s writing them.”
“Her improved version of them, yes, exactly. The version where she, as creator and as the dark protagonist, has the power. The longer she does, the harder it will be for her to come back to reality, the shorter the time she’ll be able to hold that reality. If, as you believe and I agree, she’s already selected the third victim from Dark Deeds, she is living as the character of the killer in the book. Whatever job she might have, whatever other tasks she needs to perform, they’re becoming the illusion. Eventually the illusion she creates will become too strong, and far too appealing. Without medication and treatment, reality will cease to exist.”
“You’re saying she’s not legally sane, but she plans, she edits, she’s choosing to kill, to become the killer.”
“I don’t want to diagnose without examining her, but it’s the killer choosing. A part of her writes—whether literally or in her head. The writing is so consuming—the betrayal by DeLano, as she sees it, so abhorrent—she becomes the character, but her more finely crafted version. One who punishes, who seeks to harm, seeks to win by any means. Who, in her version, defeats Dark, thereby vanquishes DeLano.”
“And right now, she’s some jealous, vengeful … skank, plotting to kill the woman she feels is ruining the man she wants, the man she needs. She has to troll the clubs,” Eve continued. “She has to spend some time living the life to inhabit that character.”
“She’ll kill again.”
“She’ll sure try. If she gets in deep enough, wouldn’t she get stuck? Wouldn’t she stick inside the same character?”
“It’s a series, and Dark is her adversary each time. She follows Dark. I think she needs the books, the stories, the continuation, and, oddly, the thrill of becoming someone else, someone new.”
Mira set her teacup aside, rose. “This is a clever woman, one who thinks everything through, step-by-step, but that thinking is limited to the story she lives in. I think a large part of her life has been lived that way, and the world outside’s thin and inconvenient to her. She’ll do whatever she needs to do to stay inside the story where she’s strong and triumphant, and out of the world where she fades into the ordinary.”
“She’ll like my world, where she ends up in a high-security facility for violent mental defectives, even less.”
As Mira went out, Peabody came in. “The DeLanos are here.”
“On my way.”
“I got one of the other … potentials. She bitched and moaned, but she’s coming in.”
“Keep at it,” Eve told her, and made her way to Interview A.
The DeLanos sat beside each other at the interview table, and both looked over at Eve as she came in with nearly identical expressions of anxiety.
“Has someone else been killed?” Blaine asked.
“No.”
“Thank God. Detective Peabody said no, but …”
“We worked ourselves up,” Audrey admitted. “Convinced ourselves you wanted to tell us in person.”
“I appreciate you coming in. I did want to talk to you in person, but about some specific correspondence.” Eve sat with the file she’d brought in. “A. E. Strongbow.”
This time she got nearly identical blank looks.
“Neither of you recognize the name?”
Blaine shook her head. “Sorry.”
“Maybe this’ll help.”
Eve pulled out the first letter, watched it click for Audrey almost immediately.
“I do remember. Of course. He sent a manuscript—after a couple of letters, he sent a manuscript. We have a post office box, as some people like to write letters rather than e-mails. He sent his book. Not merely a disc copy or download, which is more usual, but an actual physical copy of the manuscript. It happens, rarely, and when it does I send them back unopened with a letter explaining Blaine can’t read it. And I try to offer a lot of encouragement, maybe some advice on how to find an agent or publisher.”
Audrey nudged the letter away. “I remember this because when he wrote after Sudden Dark came out, he was furious, and accused Blaine of plagiarizing his manuscript.”
“Oh, for—” Blaine stopped, held up a hand. “Wait, I remember that, you told me about that. I didn’t remember the name.”
“I probably didn’t mention his name. It was an ugly letter, and ridiculous on top of it. Not only didn’t Blaine see the manuscript, which I sent straight back unopened, but she’d already written Sudden Dark before he sent his stupid book—without asking, I’ll add. Damn it, we got the ARCs—the advance reader copies—at the end of May, just days after he sent the manuscript. It was so insulting I nearly—”
“It’s all right, Mom.” Blaine reached over, rubbed her mother’s arm. “When she told me, I let my editor know—just in case. But as far as I know that was the end of it. Do you think he’s involved in this?”
“She,” Eve corrected. “And I think she’s killed two people.”
“Oh my God. I didn’t handle it right. I didn’t follow through the right way,” Audrey began.
“You handled it right,” Eve told her. “This has nothing to do with you. This woman is delusional, psychotic. She contacted you again.”
“No.” Firmly Audrey shook her head. “I would have flagged any more correspondence from that name.”
“Twice more I found, different names. Harsh letters.” Eve took them out. “Accusatory.”
“You get that sometimes,” Blaine murmured as she picked up a copy, read it. “You take the good with the bad. Are you sure these are from the same person?”
“I’m confident. I believe this woman relocated from Delaware to Brooklyn.”
“Brooklyn?” Blaine went sheet white. “My girls.”
“Local police have an eye. And they’re not in this. They’re not in the books. Are there any coordinating characters with them in the series?”
“No. I don’t understand. If she’s this angry with me, what better way to strike at me than through my girls?”
“She’s angry with you, but you’ve blended, at least in part, with the character of Dark.”
“That’s just crazy. Dark is fifteen years younger than I am, in better shape and a lot better-looking.” She said it with a half smile, but her eyes stayed full of fear. “She’s never been married, has no children, eats fast-food, and drinks scotch when she can get it. Her relationship with her mother is strained at best, and for good reason, as Maggie Dark’s a user of people. She likes loud music and bars, breaks rules as much for the fun of it as expediency.”
Eve listened to the rundown until Blaine stopped herself. “Sorry, none of that matters.”
“Actually, it applies. You talk about her like she’s an actual person.”
“She has to be real for me. I have to be invested in her, attached. I have to know her. She’s fictional, of course, but she exists inside my head.”
“She’s real for Strongbow, and she’s lost or is at least losing her grip on the fictional part. You created Dark, she’s inside you. You represent her, or she you. Strongbow’s rewriting your books so the killer wins, because she’s the killer, and it’s her story now.”
“That was her thing, I remember.” Audrey gripped her daughter’s hand. “The killer’s book, with the killer as the main character, as the protagonist.”
“She’s connected her book with my Dark series. She’s what, showing me she’s a better writer?”
“That’s part of it, and it may be the foundation. We’ve got angles on her now, and we’re pursuing them all.”
DeLano lifted a hand to her heart, rubbed lightly. “You think she’s lives in Brooklyn.”
“Not in your neighborhood. I don’t think she could afford it. Do you have any tailoring done, any sewing?”
“Not really. I’ve had—we’ve all had—things altered in the shop we use for the less casual wear.”
“Do you know the seamstress?”
“Gia? Yes. For years. When I had my first signing, Mom insisted I get a nice suit, have Gia fit it. That’s been over a decade.”
Unlikely, Eve thought.
“Have you had anyone come in and do the curtain things, drapes, whatever?”
Blaine smiled again. “We’re just not that fancy. Do you think she’s a seamstress?”