She was going to have to do it again today, if she was going to get more information that might let them truly understand the man she and Christopher were trying to catch.
Of course, there were limits to how much she might get. Hopefully, she would understand more about his motives and methods, but it wasn’t as if all serial killers knew one another. Interviewing killers here wouldn’t necessarily lead Paige straight to his door, but she hoped that it would give her some insights.
A doctor met them at the door, ID clipped to his pocket, sleeves rolled up above the elbow. He was a little shorter than Christopher, with wavy dark hair and glasses.
“I’m Dr. Spiel,” he said. “Are you Agent King?”
Paige showed her ID. In a place like this, security mattered even if it appeared to be a more relaxed environment than a normal prison.
“That’s right,” Paige said. “And this is my partner, Agent Marriott.”
Her partner. Paige and Christopher had been through so much together by now that it was actually beginning to feel real when Paige said it. They’d saved one another’s lives, taken down several deadly killers, and worked together in almost perfect harmony. Only the lingering problem of the attraction Paige felt towards Christopher was there to cause trouble between them, creating distance even as they worked smoothly together.
“It’s good to meet you both,” Dr. Spiel said. He led the way through into a reception area that was as bright and clean as that of any private health spa, so that Paige might have mistaken it for one if it weren’t for the security doors leading off from it, each obviously leading to a different wing of the hospital.
“In your email, you said that you wanted to talk to patients we had whose Narcissistic Personality Disorder had resulted in violence?” Dr. Spiel raised an eyebrow. “I must say, that is a highly unusual request, Agent King. The patients in our care are here because they pose a danger to the public or to themselves. In general, we don’t allow people who aren’t trained medical professionals to just come in to speak to them.”
“If it helps, I am a medical professional,” Paige said. “I completed a Ph.D. on the motivations of serial killers while working at an institution very similar to this one. We’re not here to disturb your patients, Dr. Spiel, but we do think that talking to one of them might help us to understand the motivations of a killer who has so far claimed three lives.”
For a moment, Paige thought that Dr. Spiel might still say no, but then he nodded.
“Very well, we’ll go through to my office, and I’ll have a patient brought to us. I will remain throughout, to ensure the safety of you both and the patient.”
He led the way to one of the security doors, punching in a code to get through. There was a burly orderly on the other side, acting as a guard.
“Micah, could you bring Nadia to my office, please? The FBI wishes to speak with her.”
He led the way through the facility. It did its best to seem like a calming, healing environment, but it was hard to avoid the locked security doors and the cameras staring down, the presence of orderlies there to restrain dangerous prisoners or the constant sense of violence that hung in the air. Paige could hear a couple of shouts of anger, and the sound of someone sobbing, as she followed the doctor through the secure institution, to his office.
That office might have been the office of an academic professor except that there was nothing sharp, or potentially dangerous, in open view. There were bookshelves with rows of neat volumes on different aspects of psychology, a computer set up on a desk, and a small circle of comfortable chairs that wouldn’t have looked out of place with someone giving a tutorial to a group of students. Except that it presumably wasn’t students who sat there, but the inmates, there for psychological assessments or therapy sessions.
“You say you completed a PhD in criminal psychology?” Dr. Spiel said, as he gestured for Paige and Christopher to take a seat. “What on?”
“A case study on Adam Riker,” Paige said.
She saw the doctor’s eyes widen slightly. He’d obviously read about Adam, the killer who tied his victims and left them to slowly suffocate.
“That was you? I heard about him escaping, but…”
“But we caught him again,” Christopher said, cutting in, as if he were worried about the effect that revisiting everything with Adam would have on Paige.
Paige was grateful for it. She still had nightmares about following Adam into the woods, and about the moment where he’d tied up her mother and tried to get Paige to kill her. She still found herself thinking about the moment when she’d shot him, and he’d tried to make her finish him off, telling Paige that she was just the same as him inside.
Paige had to struggle to push back thoughts of Adam. She told herself that she was there to do a job, and that she would need to pay attention, because she was about to be around another dangerous criminal, who might make her pay for any slip.
Paige took a seat on one of the comfortable chairs, waiting.
“What can you tell me about the prisoner you’re having brought here?” she asked.
“Patient, not prisoner. We are attempting to treat the residents here.” The doctor’s tone turned it into a rebuke.
“And will this patient ever be getting out?” Christopher asked.
“Possibly, if we find a way to change her condition,” Dr. Spiel said. “But realistically… no.”
“Nadia has NPD?” Paige asked.
The doctor nodded. “Manifesting in violent behavior when she doesn’t get her way. She believes herself to be the only truly important person in the world. Everyone else is there to do things for her. Occasionally, she seems to lapse into solipsism, with the idea that she is the only truly real person, although those bouts tend not to last.”
“Because if other people aren’t real, their attention isn’t worth anything?” Paige guessed.
“Exactly.”
“Why is she here?” Paige asked.
“Nadia killed two people,” Dr. Spiel said. “They had upset her in ways that really only made sense to Nadia. She executed the crimes quite brilliantly, not leaving any physical evidence.”
“So how was she caught?” Paige asked.
“She boasted about it. She told people about it to make her feel superior, and to try to make them afraid of her. One the police knew to look her way, they were able to match the murder weapon to a gun she possessed. At that point, she didn’t so much confess as rush to tell the police every detail.”
As the doctor said that, a knock came at the door.
“Come in,” Dr. Spiel said.
The door opened, revealing an orderly and a woman in her thirties, dark haired, with large brown eyes and features that gave her a mischievous look even while she was just standing there. She was wearing gray sweatpants and a hooded top, a disposable, institutional uniform that was probably standard issue. Her hands were cuffed in front of her. She looked around the way an actor might when first walking on stage to applause. It was as if, the moment she saw Paige, Christopher, and Dr. Spiel, they became her audience.
“Dr. Spiel!” she said, as if they were old friends, and not doctor and patient. She rushed forward, grabbing his hand and shaking it with both of hers, slightly too long.