Face of Death

There were ten booths at the sides of the room, with a wider central area containing several tables that were easy to see in a glance. Then there was also the counter. That allowed twelve places where the killer could possibly be—fourteen, if she counted the bathrooms. She had already checked out the ladies’ room on entering, in case he would lurk for a victim there. A trooper she had never seen before had come in, looked around the men’s bathroom, and left again with a subtle nod to Zoe earlier. His job done, he had returned to watching cars. There was no killer here—not yet.

Zoe tried to keep her knee from jiggling up and down, to keep the numbers from overwhelming her. She knew the height and weight of every person in the whole place, from the waitresses who swirled around with pots of coffee and order pads to the twenty-seven others sitting in various positions around her. The diner was busy—almost full. He would not have to look hard for a victim, though the challenge would be in taking a life without being seen.

Zoe was determined that she should see him.

She tried not to let it bother her that there was one more sugar dispenser than there were salt, and that there were two more of each than there were tables—spares, taken at some point into circulation and then left to occupy odd spots rather than tidied back away. She tried also to ignore the seventeen burgers, twenty servings of fries, twenty-eight coffee cups (some not yet cleaned away after being abandoned by their previous owners) and four milkshakes on the tables. These things, she did not need to know.

She did not need to know that there were seven empty seats, but only one totally free table. There was no reason for her to know that there were thirteen light fixtures dotted around the room, or three air conditioning vents, or that the waitresses each wore their apron strings at a slightly different length.

What she did need to know was everything possible about the people already in the diner, and she applied herself to this with as much effort as she could. She turned her back to the counter and leaned, surveying the room in a way that she hoped seemed casual. She ordered a second cup of coffee and set it down next to her, as if she were waiting for a friend.

Over half of the occupants of the diner were female, the ratio weighted by the wait staff made exclusively of women. Several were also children. Zoe could dismiss those out of hand. Then there were the overweight men, a familiar sight in an establishment that served mostly sugary or fatty food. Two of them were far too old, of retirement age, lacking the necessary arm strength to do the deeds.

That left five men, one of them being too short to reach the necks of the tallest victims without difficulty, meaning that Zoe could rule him out. Down to four.

Groups sat in obvious structures, patterns dictated by social expectations. Man—woman—child, family unit. Girlfriend opposite boyfriend. Two girls facing two boys, sweethearts sitting together. Predictable and strong. But there were those she could not place—two men and a woman, she on her own while they faced her, no clear lines of family or love. Those were the most enigmatic, the ones that forced wonder the most.

A group of three—a man, woman, and child—got up from their seats and left. That gave her three. But another party was coming in, four young men, not much older than teenagers. That brought her back up to seven, and they were followed by a young couple. Eight, now. Another couple were getting up to leave, freeing up one of the booths, and—had she eliminated that one already? Was it seven or still eight?

Zoe furrowed her brow and concentrated. She had to get this right. It was not certain that the killer would be easily apparent, on the surface. He might be a local—might have planned to end up here, even despite their assumption that he came from out of state. That meant he could be with friends, even family members.

Zoe had felt he would be a loner, but maybe that was just her own bias. She was, so he should be. Maybe he wasn’t like her at all, and could maintain relationships and have friends easily in spite of his way of seeing things.

Maybe not.

The dinner rush was starting to cool down, the sun already set outside. Another group got up to leave, having finished their evening meal, taking the kids back home to sleep. That was one of her suspects. She was at seven now, for certain. She surveyed the group of four male friends, trying to take them in, to wonder if one of them was looking around too much or seemed nervous.

The door opened again to allow in a young man on his own. He looked unremarkable: plain but respectable clothing, five foot eleven, slim. He sat a few stools down from Zoe, past an overweight trucker and a woman who had checked her phone eighteen times in the last ten minutes.