Fear the Night by John Lutz

flared in his wide, puppy eyes and his smile was back. “I—”
    “Yeah, you,” Meg said impatiently.
    “I found you so pretty I wanted to talk to you.” He raised a hand palm out. “Don’t get the wrong idea.”
    “So what’s the right idea?”
    “I was—I am—lonely, and there was something about you that made me think you, uh, might wanna talk, is all.”
    “What’s your name?” Meg asked.
    “Daryl.”
    “Listen, Daryl, you’re fucking with a cop here.”
    “Cop?” He backed up a step, stunned. “You?”
    “Me. You know those big red peppers they put in Chinese food?”
    “Yeah.”
    “You bother me again and I’m gonna shove one up your ass.”
    He looked small enough to dive into a crack in the sidewalk.
    Meg turned and stalked away, keeping a tight grip on her carryout bag. She waited for the guy to yell at her, call her a bitch, or something worse. It was New York. That was the way it worked.
    But the kid remained silent.
    After half a block she turned around to glare at him, but he was gone. She calmed down some and walked on, listening to her heels tapping the pavement.
    Nice young guy, really, Daryl. Playing out of his league. All he wanted was ... what they all want, and she’d cut him off at the knees and left him bleeding on the sidewalk. Now she felt bad about it.
    But not real bad.
    After locking herself in her apartment, Meg placed the white carryout containers on the coffee table, then went into the kitchen and returned with a can of Pepsi, a fork, and a paper towel to use as a napkin. She worked her shoes off her tired feet, then sat on the sofa and used the remote to switch on New York 1 news on TV.
    She opened the white cartons and used her fork to take a bit of noodles, then sat back against the soft cushions and sipped from the soda can.
    It had been a hell of a day, reviewing once again the Night Sniper murder files, interviewing witnesses who were tired of telling their stories, talking on the phone with other witnesses. None of it had gotten them anywhere yet, but it was good, solid police work and might still pay dividends. That was how it worked in the Job—thoroughness, doggedness, eventually paid off. Most of the time, anyway. Something would fit, or wouldn’t fit, and the picture would emerge. Though Meg was exhausted, she was satisfied with the work she and her fellow detectives had done. Her work was the one thing in life that did afford her some measure of satisfaction, a reason to anticipate tomorrow and to climb out of bed in the morning. Right now, it was enough. It gave her purpose and identity. It made her different from the furniture.
    She thought about the Night Sniper’s note to Repetto: Perhaps this will help you find rhyme and reason.
    The play in the theater where the note was found was War Bond Babes. Meg had read about it in the Post. Rhyme, reason, and debutantes . . . Was there any meaning there at all except in the mind of a deranged killer? Maybe the poor schmuck had married a debutante type and gotten what he should have expected.
    Meg relaxed and let her subconscious worry at the puzzle. Probably she’d watch TV after supper and fall asleep on the sofa. Hers was a lonely life, and a defensive one. She was comfortable in her tiny apartment, chomping noodles, sipping soda, watching Seinfeld and Law and Order reruns, not unhappy, not exactly happy, passing time without incurring further injury.
    It was a life.

12
    The Night Sniper carried nothing incriminating other than what was locked away in his mind. This was the time when he scouted in preparation. There were so many possibilities that it wasn’t much of a challenge.
    He appeared unexceptional in his best khaki Eddie Bauer slacks he’d bought at a secondhand shop, his worn New Balance jogging shoes, his pale blue shirt and darker blue windbreaker. Then there were the baseball cap, the turned-up collar. Anyone who noticed such a forgettable figure at all would have a difficult time describing