He relentlessly searched out a great beauty and then he took her! What an outrageously simpleidea. What a compellingly modern horror story.

He watched two petite Japanese coeds chowing down on greasy North Carolina barbecue from thenew Crooks Corner II restaurant in Durham.

They looked so delicious eating their dinner, wolfing their barbecue like small animals. NorthCarolina BBQ consisted of pork cooked over a fire, seasoned with a vinegar-laced sauce, thenfinely chopped. You couldn't eat BBQ without slaw and hush puppies.

He smiled at the unlikely scene. Yum.

Still, he moved on. Sights and scenes caught his eye.

Pierced eyebrows. Tattooed ankles. Lalapalooza T-shirts. Lovely flowing breasts, legs, thighseverywhere he looked.

He finally came to a small Gothic-style building near the Duke University Hospital, NorthDivision. This was a special annex where terminally ill cancer patients from all over theSouth were cared for during their final days. His heart began to pound, and a series of smalltremors shook his body.

There she was!

CHAPTER 10.

THERE WAS the most beautiful woman in the South! Beautiful in all ways. Not only was shephysically desirable she was extremely smart.

She might be able to understand him. Maybe she was as special as he was.

He almost said the words out loud, and believed them to be absolutely true. He had done agreat deal of homework on his next victim. Blood began to pump and rush into his forehead. Hecould feel a throbbing all through his body.

Her name was Kate Mctiernan. Katelya Margaret Mctierman, to be as precise as he liked to be.

She was just walking out of the terminal cancer wing, where she had worked to help pay her way