Esti shrugged. “We know he’s a professional killer.”

Gurney nodded. “What else?”

“He’s an expensive one, specializing in difficult contracts.”

“Impossible jobs that no one else will take—that’s the way Donny Angel put it. What else?”

“A psychopath, yes?”

Hardwick chimed in. “The psychopath from hell. With bad dreams. The way I see it, this wee fucker is one highly motivated murder machine—angry, crazy, bloodthirsty, and not about to change his ways any time soon. How about you, Sherlock? You got any other insights for us?”

Gurney swallowed the last mouthful of his lukewarm coffee. “I’ve just been trying to put all this together to see what it adds up to. His absolute insistence on doing everything his own way, his high intelligence combined with a total lack of empathy, his pathological rage, his killing skills, his appetite for mass murder—all that combined would seem to make little Peter the ultimate control freak from hell. Then there’s the final explosive element—the loose end, the secret, whatever it is that he’s desperate to conceal and afraid we may discover. Oh, and one more thing Angelidis told me—I almost forgot to mention it—little Peter likes to sing while he’s shooting people. Put all that together and it looks like a recipe for an interesting endgame.”

“Or a fucking world-class disaster,” said Hardwick.

“I guess that would be the downside.”

Chapter 50

Jabbing the Madman

“Is there an upside?” Hope and apprehension were vying with each other in Esti’s expression. Apprehension was winning.

“I think so.” Gurney’s tone was matter of fact. “My sense of Panikos is that his ultimate motivation is hatred, probably directed at every human being on earth. But his tactics, his planning—those aspects are steady and well thought out. His success in his profession depends on maintaining a delicate balance between his hot appetite for killing and his cold planning process. It’s evident in the behavior we’re seeing, and Donny Angel told me as much. On the outside Panikos is a reliable businessman who accepts difficult assignments with equanimity. And inside there’s a fierce little monster whose main pleasure—maybe only pleasure—is murder.”

Hardwick let out his harsh bark of a laugh. “The wee Peter could be quite the eye-opening experience for an ‘inner child’ therapist.”

Gurney uttered a small laugh, despite himself.

Esti turned to him. “So he’s part planner, part psycho. The motive is crazy, but the method is rational. Let’s say you’re right. Where does it take us?”

“Since that delicate balance between madness and logic seems to work well for him, we need to upset it.”

“How?”

“By attacking its most accessible weak point.”

“Which is?”

“The secret he’s trying to protect. That’s our way in. Our way into his thinking. And our way into understanding Carl’s murder, and who ordered it.”