His name was Frank Crawley.

Slightly overweight, Frank stood 6'1. He had wavy black hair, piercing brown eyes, a winning smile, and broad muscular shoulders. Thick dark-rimmed glasses almost hid his eyes.

At one time, he had been called "the Muscle Boy of Venice Beach;" men, women, and children had congregated around him whenever he flexed. Then, almost overnight, he had become the Thief of Hearts. That's what the media had dubbed the man who roamed from community to community, seeking prizes. The prize was his victim's beating heart, which Frank removed with the skill of a surgeon.

Desperate for the ritual rush, the Thief of Hearts sought out ones that looked almost ordinary, just shy of beautiful: plain though pleasant, sometimes almost cute; a so-so body with passable tits and ass; neither too tall nor too short; maybe slightly on the quiet side. He always had sex before the kill, but it was the removal of the heart, the drinking of a small quantity of blood, that always brought him euphoria. The heart, he reasoned, was the cave’s soul, and the more souls he had—particularly souls of women—the longer he would live. At least that’s what the book—titled Maximum Rush?—had claimed.

One he found in a restaurant just outside of Nampa, Idaho, on July 14th of 2002.

Starting out at two pm on July 14th, he'd driven his Ford SUV down the coast from Tacoma and had hit hard but intermittent rains east of Portland. Just outside Ontario, Oregon, located on the Idaho/Oregon border, his car had gone into a spin. Cursing God for the next forty miles and guzzling water to assuage his immense thirst, he'd decided to find a place for the night right in the middle of Nampa, a dirty, sprawling southern Idaho farm town that smelled of brown rot.

Three nights before his arrival in southern Idaho, he'd taken Marilyn--mousy brown hair, a winning smile, nicely pointed breasts, recently separated from her husband, the junior high math teacher--over to a little spot along the Pacific. It was in a nightclub that he'd met her, a teacher by day, a dancer by night. Pretty sure that she regarded him as a prime catch, he had told her he was a well known medical doctor from the East coast and had rented a beach condo so they could get to know each other better. The condo proved to be a run-down, weather-battered motel, and as the ocean wind howled, he'd had sex with a sorely disappointed Marilyn. Afterwards, she had died without much of a struggle. A former nursing student, Frank had driven to a nearby grove where he'd placed her nude body on a plastic tarp, put on his surgical gloves, neatly cut out her heart, wrapped it, and put it into the ice chest he carried in the back of his vehicle.

And now here he was--the Thief of Hearts--right in southwestern Idaho. After checking into Ruby's Inn, a two-story dive next to the tracks, he watched some Judge Judy on TV, took some meds to dispel his dark mood, and then drove a couple blocks up to the restaurant, a decrepit 50's style joint with its parking lot half-full. Inside, country music filled the air and seemed to bring the memorabilia on the walls to life.

Hungry as a wolf, he requested a corner table, and the hostess with the tight black sweater coming just above her pierced navel and blue low-riders seated him in a booth on the far side of the restaurant. Being in the back was a blessing because it allowed him to examine everyone in the place.

Comfortably seated, the big man gulped glassful after glassful of iced tea while savoring roasted stuffed chicken. Being in this place was relaxing, with some country singer whining in the background and young waitresses scurrying to and fro. Between huge bites, he tallied his victims--he thought of them as "trophies"--on his paper napkin.

San Jose(2)

San Diego(3)

Phoenix(1)

Las Vegas(3)

Reno(1)

Salt Lake(6)

Spokane (1)

Seattle (1)

Tacoma (2)

He was proud of these successes—one day he would tell his mother in Salt Lake all about this period of his life--and as he shoveled some peas into his mouth, it occurred to him that if awards were ever given for those who excelled in this bloody work, he'd certainly receive one.

It was when he was sucking the gristle off the second chicken leg that the earth titled on its axis, and number twenty-one entered the restaurant. At that moment, the music rang out a bit more loudly. The place’s semi-darkness dissipated. He took the leg from his mouth, set it on his plate, and wiped the grease from his chin with the back of his hand; the music stopped as he watched the hostess escort the one who would surely become his next trophy towards his section.

It was difficult for Frank, at such moments, not to believe that some dark divinity shaped his life. He was thinking this as, led by the hostess, she walked in his direction; she had a sexy walk, like she was used to showing off her body, and she wasn't wearing a wedding ring. He was thinking of his secret divinity when she moved past him without so much as a smile; her latex pants were so tight that, as she sat down at a table ten feet away (and facing his direction), he could see her lines. As he slowly set down his glass, she lowered her head, folded her hands between her legs, almost like she was praying—Please, he thought, no prayers--and studied the menu. Her kinky red hair, her thin, drawn face, her blood red lips, and her long, thin, slender fingers thrilled him; she wore wire-rimmed glasses and a blue and silver Seahawks sweater.

He was taking all this in—you know how it is--when a jolt, like a sickening electrical surge, scrambled his thoughts and turned them upside down. He felt his brain grow cold and numb, he wondered if he were passing from his body, and his extremities trembled as it dawned on him that this ordinary woman reminded him of someone he'd seen or talked to before.

He now kept his eyes on her, sideways, while taking a long drink of iced tea.

When she glanced up and looked at him, he felt his heart miss a beat.

"How are you, my fine man?" she said almost as if she knew him.

"Oh, I'm fine, I guess," he said, putting the glass down and wiping his mouth with his napkin.

"What's on the napkin?"

"Just some writing for my job. You know, making lists." His heart thudded wildly.

She nodded. "Lists are important. What do you do?"

"Oh, I guess I travel a lot. I'm kind of a collector."

"Really?" she asked. "What do you collect?"

"Oh, memorabilia. Sports stuff." Silently, Frank congratulated himself, for he did buy and trade sports memorabilia at the various conventions he attended.

"Where are you from?" She sipped from the glass of strawberry lemonade her waitress had set in front of her.

"Oh, you know, here and there. Southern Cal, I guess."

He looked down at his plate, picked up his fork, and shoveled some mashed potatoes into his mouth. When he looked up again, her glacial blue eyes were riveted on him.

"I'm from Las Vegas," she said.

He almost choked. He'd known the strip joints in Vegas, and he could easily imagine this one as a dancer. His three dead Las Vegas girls had been erotic dancers.

"You ok?" she asked, her eyes glimmering as if she were hiding a smile. "Drink some water. Raise your arms like this." She held her arms over her head.

Wondering if she really had been on the verge of laughing, he did as she suggested, and his coughing stopped.

"I'm a teacher. A lonely, single high school teacher," she said after he lowered his arms.

He relaxed. She looked like she might be a teacher. His mother had been a third-grade teacher. His sister was now a junior high school English teacher in Utah. "So, uh, what brings you here?" he asked, clearing his throat.

He paused as she placed her order with the waitress.

"I'm visiting my cousin," she said. "He lives in Boise."

"Boise, huh?"

"Yeah. Good old Boise fucking Idaho."

"Staying with your cousin, then, huh?"

She slowly shook her head. "Not on your life. He's married, got a huge family. I don't care for kids much. Besides, he's a jerk. When I was in junior high, I tried to kill the son-of-a-bitch."

He wasn't going to ask for details. He figured that she had to be an outsider, someone no one would miss right away.

"Nampa, then?" He could hear the hard rain drumming on the roof.

She picked up her glass and sipped some more pink lemonade. "A ways out of town. South. In a motel way the hell out in the middle of some of southern Idaho's famous beet fields."

"Really?"

She paused and looked across the restaurant toward the door. "Yeah. About twenty, thirty miles away. If you're interested...."

He nodded. "I've got time. Don't have to be on the road until noon tomorrow. We can go to my place if you want."

She smiled and winked just as thunder exploded. "Naw. I think you'll like where I'm staying. Lots of privacy. Out in farmland. Not many people checked in."

His heart reached the light, rapid animal beating that he often experienced just after the sex. Barely able to contain himself, he nodded. "OK," he said. "What? After we finish?"

"That'll work for me," she said. "By the way, I'm Beatrice."

"Oh," he said, "I shoulda introduced myself. I'm Frank."

"Hi, Frank," she said, just as her dinner was brought.

"Hey, Beatrice."

For both of them, it was the beginning of something very special.

"Coming, Frank?" she asked as she walked past his table. She had paid for her dinner and was on her way out. Solicitous, she slowed to brush his left shoulder with the long, thin fingers of her left hand. The sensation aroused him.

"Oh, yeah," Frank answered, hungry for another chicken but content to wait until later that night. Pulsing energy shot through his body like sparks of rich blood. The thought of being with Beatrice, the thought of what they were going to do, made him thirsty and hard.

Finishing his iced tea, he slid out of the booth.

Just outside the door, they stood under the small awning. It was very humid, and Frank was sweating like a pig. He sucked a toothpick.

"Fucking rain," she said, not looking up at him.

"You said it. I hate the goddamned fucking rain."

"Look," she said, pointing across the parking lot, "there's my truck, that powder blue GM piece of shit with the red gash on the side--next to the Caddy. I'm gonna pull left when I hit the exit. You follow."

"Sounds good," he responded, shoving his hands into his pockets. He was still hard.

She did have a Nevada license plate, and that briefly unsettled him. As she started to back out of her parking space, she looked at him, winked, and waved. Assured of a good time, he waved back, took the toothpick from his mouth and flicked it into the bushes next to the sidewalk. Then he loped through rain across the lot to his dark green SUV. His hands shaking with excitement, he climbed in and started the engine. As he backed out, he kept his eyes on the pickup. When he pulled up behind her, she turned left at the exit, her tires spinning on wet pavement. He waited a second, then pressed the accelerator to the floor and spun onto the road.

Thinking, this will be easy, this one will be a piece of cake, the Thief of Hearts followed Beatrice's truck. At one stop, he edged his car forward and nudged her bumper.

They drove through a downpour. With his thoughts fixed upon Beatrice, Frank barely noticed the rain, thunder and lightning as they headed south. Four or five miles beyond the city hers was the only other vehicle on the two-lane highway cutting through beat fields. Rain still fell, though not as hard. Large puddles had formed in the gravel and dirt along the sides of the road, spilling onto the asphalt and forcing Frank to straddle the centerline.

The drive seemed endless, and after finishing his forth bottle of water, boredom crept in. Frank was thinking of giving up when he saw no more than two hundred yards ahead a large white and red marquis and, next to that, a two-story, red brick motel. Approaching the entrance, Beatrice's truck slowed, its left turn signal flashing. Close upon her, he followed.

As they turned in, he noticed something unusual: the office looked closed, with its curtains pulled shut, and the rutted parking lot was empty. At the first room, in place of a window was a large piece of plywood. He braked. His heart raced. Abandonment struck him as strange but it was not entirely without a rational explanation: the manager could be out, a window had been broken, and the guests were yet to arrive. At least that’s what he told himself. Lustful sickness made him stupid, and he accepted any explanation.

Besides, he asked himself, what did it matter? It was to his advantage that the place looked vacant, and so he focused on his next victim: he would go inside her. Then, after pulling himself out, he would get behind her, wrap his legs around the lower part of her body and his arms around her head, and yank upwards and sideways until he felt the pop. He figured he was strong enough to twist her head off if he had to.

Confidence returning, he took his foot off the brake and moved forward. Peering through rain, he saw her truck at the end of the lot, parked facing the door to the last room. He eased his car into the slot next to hers and flicked off the headlights. The truck was empty.

He hesitated before opening his vehicle's door. There's something here that does not love the Thief of Hearts, he told himself, trying to picture what Beatrice looked like and recalling his earlier impression that she had looked familiar.

"Where the fuck could I have seen her?" he mumbled, dread welling inside of him. He got out, slammed the door, and stood in the rain as he considered the possibilities: college days, his one semester as a nursing student in a Southern California community college, the girls at the L.A. strip joints he used to visit before "hitting the road," the cities he had stayed in, the dives he hid in when he went to Salt Lake. Shaking his head, thunder cracking in the dark gray sky, he walked to the door. Without knocking, he grabbed the doorknob and turned to open.

It was then that the picture exploded in his mind like a neon sign. Boom, boom, boom, and there it was. He was certain he had seen Beatrice in one of the topless nightclubs in Vegas. Curiously, he had no memory of the dancer who had left with him that night--he couldn't remember her hair, her race, not one thing about her--but he vividly remembered the dancer, wearing red latex with holes for her nipples, who shook his hand and introduced herself as Beatrice. Surely, he thought, this was the one. Brief terror seized him as he stood just outside the door, fighting for control.

But, then again, memory can play horrible tricks; this is what he forced himself to think. Frank had learned that over and over. Besides, if Beatrice was that woman, that would mean that somehow she alone had tracked him down. Impossible, he told himself, for not even the police, not even the FBI, had been able to find him.

"Fucking impossible," he muttered aloud. Having said it, he could now believe it.

He pushed the door open and stepped into the room. The light over the bed was on, and a TV and an unopened suitcase lay atop the bureau across the room. Sweating, blaming the humidity, he walked slowly across the room to the bathroom; she'd be in there he told himself, calling, "Hello, Beatrice? Beatrice? Lover Boy is here!"

Thunder crashed overhead, lightning lit the room, and again he felt afraid. He thought of flicking on the TV to calm himself; he wished he had his meds. Then something moved behind him—he didn’t hear it; he felt it—and he spun on the old carpet.

At first, his eyes did not focus, a probable effect of fatigue. Then, yes, there she was, red hair drenched and wearing a black rain slick. She stood just inside the door, using both hands to point a .38 right at his midsection.

"Oh, Jesus," he rasped.

He froze, holding his arms out to his sides as if he were trying to maintain his balance. Now the fear numbed him, as if a doctor had just given him a fatal prognosis, and he felt he was going to leave his body at any time. Nobody had ever held a gun on him before.

"Hello, Frank Crawly," she said, using her foot to push the door shut behind her.

Breathing shallow, mouth open, mouth dry, he could think of nothing to say.

For a long time, it seemed, they held this pose, Frank frozen rigid with his thick arms out from his sides, Beatrice pointing the pistol right at his bulging stomach.

"OK," he finally said. "OK." It was all he could think of.

"OK, what, Frank?--or, if you prefer, Mr. Fucking Thief of Fucking Hearts?"

He took a small trembling step backwards.

"Frank," he said. "My name's Frank." He told himself to drop to his knees and weep like a small child, like someone begging God for forgiveness, but he couldn't generate that much movement.

"Jesus, no shit," she laughed. "And I'll bet you remember me, too. Just the way your mind would work. If you didn't know me, you wouldn't be ready to shit your pants."

He vaguely felt warm dampness in his groin area. "Please," he said. "Oh, for God’s sake, please. Don’t hurt me." He was little Frank Crawley again, and this woman was his big, bullying sister preparing to kick the shit out of him, once again, while Mom and Dad stayed out all night at some bar.

"Damn right, Frank. Please. Please beg. Go on."

"Please," he repeated, thinking the word pleased her.

"Pretty please. Say 'Pretty please.'"

"Pretty please." His voice sounded like a sob. "Pretty please" was the right thing to say.

She shook her head. "You're a regular case, Frank."

He nodded.

She went on, "One of the Vegas girls--Melody was her name--was my sister. We danced together. We loved each other. We made love to each other. Our parents died when we were small so we were pretty much all we had."

He couldn't remember Melody—he couldn’t remember any of them now--but he knew that he had done the same thing with her that he had done to all the rest. Certainly, he had thrilled to sip her blood.

He tried to draw a deep breath and actually shook as he inhaled. He wasn't sure if he could exhale when she said, "Sit down, Frank. On the bed."

His mouth was dry and his tongue hurt. He forced himself to turn so he could stumble to the bed and sit down. He was so scared that he actually fell sideways on the bed; his legs wouldn’t bend right. Pushing himself up with his shaking right arm, mouth closed, he looked at her.

"Take off your clothes, big boy," she ordered, "and then pull back the sheets and climb into that motherfucking bed."

Slowly, trembling, now sitting upright, he wanted to do as he was told. He had trouble remembering where to begin when she instructed, "Start with the shoes, big boy."

Clumsily, he bent down and slowly removed his shoes. It was difficult because his fingers wouldn’t work right.

"Now your pants, your shirt, and all the rest."

"Of course," he croaked.

It seemed to take forever for him to unbuckle himself, lift himself off the bed, and pull his pants off, and as he worked on unbuttoning his blue and green Hawaiian shirt, she went on, "It was about four years ago. She was found--what?--a week later, stuffed in a black plastic bag and placed in a closet in one of those fleabag motels where people go to fuck. No heart. I remember reading that you'd dug a hole in Melody and taken her heart. Which I imagine you still got with you, right?"

He slowly nodded without looking up. He was at the last button. "In the van," he said hoarsely. "Cooler in the back."

"In a cooler. How about that?"

"On ice." For some reason, he chuckled.

She stepped forward, scowled, put the barrel inches from his right eye, and said, "You know, it took me a long time to find you. You move around too much. Too fucking much. But I figured out your pattern."

When he said nothing, she continued, "Up and down, up and down, then sideways, inland. You always take a turn through Salt Lake."

"It's where my mom and sister are," Frank mumbled. He hated his sister but loved his mother. Suddenly feeling sick, he leaned to the side to vomit on the floor.

Patiently, like a saint, she waited until he was through. "Puke it all out, Frank," she said. "Just don’t get any on my fuckin’ shoes."

When he sat up and wiped his mouth, she again put the barrel inches from his eye. It never occurred to Frank to fight back. He was more concerned with the hot, sticky shit in his underpants.

"Did she struggle, you big prick? Did she call my name just before you broke her beautiful neck? Did you have to stick it up her ass? I'm talking about my sister!"

The questions meant nothing to him because he simply didn't remember. For his silence, she whacked the barrel of the gun across the bridge of his nose.

For a moment, as she stood back and watched, he blubbered. Then he returned to taking off his clothes.

After he had pulled off his wet shirt, dabbled in blood, he sat erect, hoping that this was enough.

She stepped back. "Get into bed."

Trembling, blood trickling down the side of his nose, he stood, and turned to face the bed. He couldn’t feel. Leaning over, he pulled back the cover and the sheets. At first, he couldn’t remember how to get into bed. When he slid between the sheets, his back to her, it occurred to him that he had not removed his white socks. Something stank. He pulled the covers around him and shivered uncontrollably.

"Frank," she said, lifting her left foot and kicking him hard in the small of the back, "Frank, you fucking meathead. On your back. Flat on your fucking back, head on that old pillow."

After he had done what she commanded, he glanced at her through beady and swollen eyes. Getting kicked had hurt, and he was sure he had been crying. Then he said, in a voice not at all manly, "I'm in bed, Beatrice. I did what you told me."

She stepped forward, gripped the covers and pulled them back. "Now," she said, "undies—Jesus, you messed yourself, didn’t you, Frank?--and T-shirt."

Lying flat on his back, he did as he was told. He was bleeding only slightly. He noticed his underpants were soaked, and when he removed them some of the shit stuck to his fingers.

Naked, except for his socks, he felt very cold, exposed, and very small. Slowly, he became aware that the rain was still falling.

"Can't get it up for your own execution?"

"Huh?" he responded.

She laughed and ran the barrel of the gun through her red hair.

"Believe in Hell, Frank?" she asked, putting the barrel against his forehead.

Sudden, choking chest pains made it impossible to answer. He gasped for breath; his vision blurred. "Please," he breathed. He had never known such cruelty.

"I believe in Hell, Frank, now that you ask. And Heaven, too. There's gotta be a Heaven where angels can dance and get away from all the sick, shit-in-their-pants, disgusting fucks like you."

She yawned, paused and studied him. Thunder exploded overhead.

"But you don't have to worry about Heaven, Frank," she went on, shaking her head. "In fact, Frank, I'm thinking you're gonna roast forever, like a pig on a spit. Snap, crackle, pop." She hissed.

Try as he might, he couldn't think of anything to say about Heaven or Hell. In the past few years, he hadn't given either one a great deal of thought. What he did think about was the pain that had moved into his arms and neck, and he felt that he was going to get sick again. He wished she would let him get up and wipe himself.

But she was insensitive to him.

"You want it in the head? Or up the ass?" she offered. "Did you give Melody or any of them a choice?"

"They didn't ask," he answered. He had never allowed questions; possessed of Herculean strength, he had just done it. "I drank her blood."

She laughed and lowered the gun, and he figured this was his reprieve. She would let him go, he’d claim more souls, and he'd see his mother and sister again.

"Say goodbye, Frank." She said it in a soft low voice that actually reminded him of his mother. He couldn't remember his father.

When he raised his eyebrows and said "Goodbye," she pointed the gun at the center of his forehead and pulled the trigger.

Blam: just one clean shot, she thought to herself, hands gripping the steering wheel at ten and two. And then another: blam. And finally another: blam.

The face would be hardly recognizable.

In the distance, she could see the lights of Twin Falls. It had stopped raining, and in less than an hour she'd be in Nevada. She would spend the night in Jackpot or Wells. She had some friends in Wells.

She regretted not making Frank suffer more. When she'd pulled the trigger, the gun had sounded, and slight blood sprayed from the skull. Dappled, she had watched as the pillowcase, supporting Frank's head, soaked deep crimson. Rage not yet subsiding, she had fired two more times.

She'd removed her slick and thrown it over the TV, and then taken off her clothes, for she’d always worked best in the nude. From her suitcase she'd removed two shining steel knives--one with a long, curved blade and the other with a shorter blade. Both had been engraved by her uncle years before. For several minutes, she had straddled the body, praying that she remembered the procedure she spent days reading and learning about.

Then, she'd gone to work, using the long, thin instrument to form a cavity and remove the barely beating heart. With the shorter knife, she'd severed veins and arteries. Then, she'd placed the organ on the next pillow. Exposed like that, the heart would tell investigators that this body belonged to the former Thief of Hearts.

Finished, she'd placed the two knives on the pillow next to the heart and, after getting off the corpse, had used the green blanket to wipe as much blood as she could off her own body. Then, still dabbed in blood, she had grabbed the knives, set them at the foot of the bed, and then climbed from the bed. With the dirty brown bedspread, she'd wiped off the knives, which she then placed in the suitcase. The knives would become family heirlooms.

After showering and changing into some new clothes and gloves, she had finished packing her suitcase. Then, locking it, she picked up her suitcase and headed for the door, certain that the murder would not be traced to her.

She was certain she would not be found out. Twenty years before, the abandoned hotel had belonged to a friend of her uncle Mac, who had recently died while serving a life term in a Florida penitentiary. Before disappearing in Southeast Asia, the friend had sent Mac the key to the hotel. In turn, Mac’s belongings had been sent to Beatrice in Las Vegas. Unless someone had seen her and Frank at the hotel—and that was unlikely with the nearest house a mile away--she would get off scot-free.

Now she was cruising through Twin Falls, another southern Idaho farm town. It was here, she remembered from long ago, that Evil Knieval had tried to jump the Snake River Canyon on a motorcycle.

At a stop light dead in the center of town, she told herself that she'd be in Las Vegas the next afternoon and would have at least a month to clear her head before her classes started. Once a lovely exotic dancer, she now taught English and literature in one the area's high schools and wondered, for an instant, what it would be like to begin the new year by saying something like, "Class, this last summer I killed the famous Thief of Hearts. Put three bullets in a man: one in his forehead, one for each eye."

On the Nevada side of Twin Falls, the rain began again as her thoughts turned to Melody. A redhead like herself, Melody had started dancing only six months before she had been murdered. By the time she was killed, Melody had actually begun to enjoy dancing nude, allowing men to stare at her pierced nipples or the lizard tattoo between her navel and pubis, giving them pretty much what they wanted in the back room. Occasionally she had let her customers take her home, something that Beatrice had told her not to do.

Beatrice recalled that, long before coming to work at the club, Melody had developed an insatiable desire for men of all sizes. "Big, medium, or small doesn't seem to matter," Melody had confided in her once when both were in high school. So when Frank had come along and she’d ridden his bone for close to an hour, Melody had accepted his offer to drive her back to his hotel where they could spend the night together. Melody had told Beatrice that this big man was someone important.

If the investigation into Melody's disappearance and murder had turned up any leads, Beatrice told herself, then I wouldn’t be driving through this Idaho shithole right now.

A year after the investigation had closed, Beatrice had taken a job in one of the Las Vegas high schools, secretly determined to follow all reports of the killings committed by the so-called Thief of Hearts. Satisfaction would come from her own ability to track down the son-of-a-bitch, much like she and her father had tracked deer through the forests of central Nevada, and put a bullet in his body at the first opportunity. Once she’d figured out the killer’s name and followed his pathway of crime, everything had fallen into place. It was as if she’d been born to track scum.

Now that I've cleansed the world of Frank Crawley, she told herself as hit the outskirts of Twin Falls, I can focus full-time on my teaching. Teaching, the successes that came with it, gave her immense pleasure; the year before, she'd even won an award.