Wildest Dreams by Norman Partridge

Francisco. This factoid was seemingly verified by a clip of an old Victorian in the Haight. A limo pulled up, and a woman in a black crushed velvet cape got out. The cape had a hood, and the woman was wearing sunglasses, and she had enough bodyguards to handle a visiting head of state.
    Circe’s doppelgänger disappeared into the old house. A scab-colored door slammed closed behind her. Flash to a nightclub in the Mission District called the Make-Out Room, where a reporter was interviewing one of the owners. Sure he knew Circe Whistler. He knew her well. She’d spent the previous night at his place. They’d heard about Lethe’s murder over breakfast, while listening to the radio in a neighborhood cafe.
    I remembered Circe’s comment about her father’s use of doubles back in the sixties. I wondered what the going rate was for a doppelgänger these days, especially one that would have to spend a good amount of time under a tattoo artist’s needle.
    Whatever the rate, it probably wasn’t as lucrative as the check Circe’s scriptwriter was pulling down. I figured she had to have one of those, too, because the scenario for Circe’s power play was brilliant. Not only had she found a way to eliminate her father and her sister, she was also creating sympathy for her church in the bargain.
    She had fashioned a bogeyman—faceless, unseen, scary to anyone with a brain. The suspected killer was a member of the Christian right. Several media outlets had received communiqués from a man who claimed responsibility for the executions of Diabolos Whistler and his youngest daughter. He proclaimed his membership in a group called Jehovah’s Hammer, and he said he wouldn’t stop killing until Circe Whistler and her followers were dead in the ground.
    This revelation was followed by a background piece featuring old footage of a debate between Circe and Ralph Reed of the Christian Coalition. That was yesterday’s news, so I started channel surfing. The story was everywhere. CNBC was deep into wall-to-wall coverage, concentrating on the murder-mystery game. The tabloid shows were getting up-close-and-personal, fighting over Lethe Whistler’s ex-lovers—several aspiring musicians, a writer of paperback horror novels, and a cross-dressing basketball player who had dated her during a brief stint with the Golden State Warriors. PBS was there, too, taking the high road. A bunch of talking heads were kicking around the New Hedonism on The News Hour .
    That was a little much, so I switched over to Larry King.
    He was interviewing an expert on serial murderers.
    A man with a terminally pinched expression.
    Right off, I recognized my old buddy Clifford Rakes. His voice was calm and considered. Anyone who hadn’t heard him whining to his editor about waterbeds and dust-jacket photos might have been convinced that Clifford possessed a shred of intelligence.
    “To deconstruct a killer’s behavior, we must see things through his eyes,” Rakes began. “The how’s of a case like this are obvious—the killer has left ample evidence at each murder. It’s the why’s we need to concentrate on. Perspective is the key to motivation, and motivation is the key to capture.”
    I laughed. If Clifford wanted motivation, he could have looked at my bank account. I should have switched channels, but for some reason I wanted to hear him out.
    He launched into his profile. I tried to rein in my anger as Rakes pontificated on my probable childhood propensity for bed-wetting, animal mutilation, and arson. My chest tightened when he talked about the sexual implications of a male killer who uses a knife… and takes trophies, namely a male victim’s head.
    I held my breath as Rakes made passing references to Jeffrey Dahmer and Richard Ramirez. But then he zeroed in for the kill, the infobite he’d obviously been saving for last. “Our killer is a religious avenger, a prophet who sets himself above others. He’s part of a cult himself—Jehovah’s