Cross Cut by Mal Rivers

facts are. Anything can be reasoned to sound plausible.”
    I returned the blink and my eyes probably tightened in a frown. I kind of understood Ryder’s distaste for psychiatrists, and their need to be so damned ambiguous.
    “So, forgetting what’s plausible—what is your take on the Cross Cutter?” I asked.
    I could say she smiled again, but the truth was, the smile seemed constant, permanently engraved on her face. “Like your employer, I normally charge for services.” She rose from her chair and handed me a business card. “Come to my office later and we can talk.”
    Well, I knew what reply that would invoke. We wouldn’t be prepared to pay her and I’d never make the visit. Nevertheless, I pocketed the card and rose politely. I’d no more faith in psychiatrists than Ryder, but there was something in her. Something that could perhaps help us.
    “Even if you do not acquire my services, I would very much like to see you again,” she said. “I think it’s your face. You have a good, trusting face, slightly mischievous, though.” She smiled some more and held out her hand. I returned my own and we shook.
    “Okay—” I said. “Aren’t you staying for the meeting?”
    “I’ve changed my mind. Did you know the BI will be here too? The room will be full of ideas. A dozen chefs stirring the soup, so to speak.”
    “Fair enough. I’ll head to Agent Cordell’s office before I go. See you soon.”
    “Hopefully.” She gave her last smile, replaced her glasses and then walked off toward the exit of the cafeteria.
    I stood for a while and pondered her. It seemed odd to me that she invited me for lunch just to discuss psychiatry, to only give me a business card and an offer of service.
    But, then again, perhaps she was fishing for business and the FBI weren’t paying her, just like they weren’t paying Ryder.
    Ryder can’t be the only one needing a check to deposit.

16
    I reached Kacie Cordell’s office a few minutes before 3PM, and she was frazzled. Rushing about in the ten by five foot room, shouting at her desk drawers.
    I entered, calm and flippant as ever.
    “The hell,” I said, “you said you had an office—this is a closest with a desk.”
    “Oh, shut up,” she barked, and then looked up at me. “Sorry. I’m late. I can’t find my reports.”
    “I won’t bother asking for mine, then.”
    “Oh, I found them. Just my luck.” She took one step backward and took a box from the single filing cabinet in the corner and dropped it on her desk. “Go nuts.”
    “Will do.” I opened the lid and decided it wouldn’t do any harm to look at its contents. “Mind if I check it over in your office ?” I said, making the quotation sign with my fingers.
    She walked toward the door and nodded. “Stay out of my drawers.”
    Kacie left in a hurry without her reports. I decided to make myself at home and took her cheap swivel chair round the front of the desk and parked myself right there, the door still open. I didn’t particularly care if anyone saw me.
    There were completed autopsy reports, well detailed, so I decided that could wait for Ryder, to go along with my own personal report of the restroom.
    Some of the photographs showed things I didn’t see at the restroom. The overflowing wash basin and the faucet, which was found in the middle of the room. The faucet was also in the inventory list of evidence. The thought that it could be the blunt instrument that struck Lynch on the back of the head would have had more weight if there was any evidence other than blood, but there wasn’t. I had to question the idea of dismantling it for that purpose, too.
    Further examination revealed a small amount of blood in and around the wash basin, something I attributed to the killer cleaning up after cutting Lynch.
    I checked it over and noticed something. What I saw took a while for my brain to process. I just sat there and waited for my heart to sink. When it hit the chair, or there about, I jumped up