Bare mattress on a bolted down metal cot, and naked walls with a single lightbulb dangling from the ceiling. The light didn’t extend back enough to illuminate the entire cell, but I was able to make out his form on the cot.
“How very Silence of the Lambs.” His voice pierced the silence, startling me. “Is this where I say ‘Hello, Clarice’?”
He moved to a sitting position, his face in profile. Nothing had changed in the months since he’d been confined for the admitted murder of his wife. The man who believed he could play god.
“What can I do for you, detective? I’m afraid I’m not nearly as helpful as Lector, though I admired him greatly when I was younger.”
Admired or modeled himself after?
I swallowed down the bile that rose in my throat at being around him again. Nothing about this man was normal. He could play the fictional doctor, Hannibal the Cannibal.
“You didn’t eat your victims, did you?”
He simply laughed before turning to look at me. I wish he hadn’t. This man had the look of someone plotting the best way to dismember me. He’d take pleasure in bathing in my blood.
“That’s not what you came here to ask, was it, detective?”
I drew in a breath, ignoring his broadening smile
“I do need your help. I believe you were originally sharing a cell-”
“Ah, my former cellmate, the one who liked to violate women. I’d wondered when you’d come ask me about him. Has he killed yet?”
He paused and his eyes scanned over my face. I felt sweat break out on my upper lip. The man could read me too well. He rose and stepped toward the cell bars so we were within touching distance.
“You want my help, but it comes at a price.” His low laugh made me shift back a step. “What will you do for me, detective?”
I was about to make a deal with the devil. I pray it didn’t get me killed.