Hour Game

Coming in the opposite direction was a Lexus convertible. As Sean King and Michelle Maxwell passed by on their way to the morgue, the man didn't even glance at them. He continued on his way in the VW that had over two hundred thousand miles on its odometer. The Bug had come off the assembly line a canary yellow. It had been painted many colors since it had first been stolen years ago and had gone through at least ten sets of license plates. Along the way its VIN had been expertly altered. Like a cleansed gun, it was now virtually untraceable. He loved it.

Serial murderer Theodore "Ted" Bundy had also favored VW Bugs in killing sprees that took him from coast to coast before he was executed. He often referred to the amount of "cargo" he could carry in the Bug with the backseat removed, cargo that had once been living, female and human. Bundy also applauded the Volkswagen's incredible gas mileage. He could slaughter and flee easily on one tank of fuel.

The man made a right-hand turn and pulled into the parking lot of the upscale shopping mall frequented by many of the people who lived in tiny yet very affluent Wrightsburg. It was said that Bundy and other serial killers of his ilk spent twenty-four hours a day plotting their next murders. It must have seemed easy to men like that. Bundy reportedly had an IQ of over 120. Well, the man behind the wheel of the VW possessed one north of 160. He was a member of Mensa, he did the New York Times crossword puzzle every Sunday with ease; he could have made a small fortune on Jeopardy! answering the questions before host Alex even finished asking them.

However, the truth was, you didn't need to be a genius to hunt up suitable victims; they were everywhere. And these days it was far easier than in Bundy's time for reasons that might not seem so obvious to most people but which were abundantly clear to him.

He watched the old couple totter out of the supermarket and ease into their Mercedes station wagon. He wrote down the license plate number. He would run it later on the Internet and get their home address. They were doing their own shopping, so they probably had no live-in help or grown children nearby. The make of the car was relatively new, so they weren't surviving solely on Social Security. The man wore a cap with the logo of the local country club. That was another potential gold mine of information he might later tap.

He sat back and waited patiently. More prospects were sure to come in this busy shopping center. He could consume all he wanted without ever once taking out his wallet.

A few minutes later an attractive woman in her thirties came out of a pharmacy carrying a large bag. His gaze swung to her, his homicidal antennae twitching with interest. The woman stopped at the ATM next to the pharmacy, withdrew some cash and then committed what should have been classified as a mortal sin for the new century: she tossed the receipt into the trash before climbing into a bright red Chrysler Sebring convertible. Her vanity plate read "DEH JD."

He quickly translated that to be her initials and the fact that she was a lawyer, the "JD" standing for Juris Doctor. Her clothes told him she was fastidious about her appearance. The tan on her arms, face and legs was deep. If she was a practicing lawyer, she probably had just come back from vacation or else had visited the tanning booth over the winter. She was very fit-looking, her calves particularly well developed. She probably worked out regularly, perhaps even ran the trails in the woods hereabouts, he further deduced. His gaze had fixed on the gold anklet she wore on her left leg as she climbed in her car. That was intriguing, he thought.

She had a current-year American Bar Association bumper sticker, so the odds were she was still practicing law. And she was also single-there was no wedding ring on her finger. And right next to the ABA bumper sticker was a parking permit for a very expensive gated residential development about two miles from here. He nodded appreciatively. These stickers were very informative.

He parked, got out of the Bug, walked over to the trash can, made a show of throwing something away and in the same motion plucked out the ATM receipt. The woman really should have known better. She might as well have tossed her personal tax return in the trash. She was now naked, completely open to any probing he wanted to do.

When he got back to his car, he looked at the name on the account: D. Hinson. He'd look her up in the phone book later. And she'd also be in the business listings, so he'd know which law firm in town she worked at. That would give him two potential targets. Banks had started leaving off some of the numbers of the account because they knew their customers stupidly disposed of their receipts where they were easy pickings for people like him. Still, he didn't want her money; it was something far more personal that interested him.