Crime Zero by Michael Cordy

impossibly long fingers beneath the curtains and stretch across the polished wooden floor toward his bed. For a brief moment he had felt like a child again. Only when he rolled over did the dull throb in his head remind him that he was a stupid adult who had drunk one too many bottles of Budweiser with Hank Butcher last night.
    Butcher wrote mainly for magazines like Vanity Fair and had a gift for tapping into the zeitgeist. He had made a name for his witty pieces commenting on the main issues and personalities of the day. As always he'd been excellent company, knowing all the trivial gossip that rarely touched Decker's life. He had managed to push thoughts of Axelman from his mind.
    But then over breakfast Matty had given Decker the sealed letter delivered by Axelman's lawyer, and the doubts had come flooding back. Decker had read Axelman's handwritten confession with growing horror, and Matty had sensed his shock. But when Matty asked what was wrong, Decker refused to elaborate. What Axelman had written about Decker's mother and father was so preposterous, so poisonous that he couldn't tell or indeed ask Matty about it. Not until he had to.
    The letter had been clever because only half of it related to him, explaining why Axelman couldn't talk to Decker yesterday and detailing why he believed he was Decker's father. The other half contained the revelation Axelman wouldn't give yesterday--namely, the general whereabouts of the twelve girls he had abducted. To complicate matters, Axelman had also confessed to murdering a thirteenth victim and indicated that this girl's parents unwittingly knew the exact location of all the bodies.
    It was these final revelations that meant Decker couldn't just crumple up the poisonous letter and throw it away. He was professionally obliged to acknowledge this information and check it out and then share it with the rest of the FBI. But Decker didn't want Axelman's sick little joke made public in the bureau yet. Not until he'd made more sense of what currently lacked any semblance of sense at all.
    His first thought had been to go to the San Francisco FBI field office and use the computer to check out the facts on the thirteenth victim. But then he'd remembered that although Rosenblum had lodged yet another appeal, Axel-man's execution date was scheduled for today. So he had rushed to San Quentin.
    Squinting in the bright light, Decker parked his rental car in the visitors' parking lot. As he killed the ignition, his cell phone rang. He picked up and heard the deputy director on the line. "Spook, it's Bill McCloud. I hear the Tice hearing went well yesterday."
    "He's not going to be able to kill anyone else, Bill, if that's what you mean."
    "That'll do for me."
    Decker liked Deputy Director Bill McCloud. The laid-back Texan was a healthy foil to the chilly absolutism of Director Naylor. McCloud had once worked in the behavioral sciences unit and campaigned hard to maintain its budget and status within the bureau, which is why he couldn't afford to lose Decker and had refused to accept his resignation.
    "How did your meeting with Axelman go? Her man Jackson told Director Naylor about it. And for some reason she's taken an interest in what you found out." McCloud always called Assistant Director William Jackson her man Jackson. Jackson had no real role that Decker could make out except spying for Director Naylor and carrying out her dirty work. He was universally hated and feared within the bureau. "Perhaps she values your famed psychological powers after all."
    Decker hesitated, feeling the letter in his jacket.
    "I assume you struck out with him, nothing new, huh?" said McCloud before Decker could say anything. McCloud threw the words at him, a rhetorical question that required no response. So Decker didn't supply one. "Don't feel bad about it, Spook. That guy was cold, one of the worst. Didn't even know the meaning of the word 'remorse.' "
    "You're using the past tense, Bill. I thought he had