“I’ll get you that juice,” I said, passing the puppy back to him. It gave a little whine, then sighed and settled down. In the kitchen, I took a few deep breaths, poured a glass of orange juice, and took it back down the hall.
I placed the glass in Dylan’s outstretched hand, which dipped dangerously at the sudden weight. He strained to lift his head from the pillow and brought the glass to his lips. Juice spilled around the corners of his mouth and trickled down the sides of his chin.
“Shit,” Dylan said. “You know what, Straight? Dying sucks.”
I slid one hand under his shoulders and lifted him to a sitting position. Then I took the glass from his hand and held it to his lips. He sipped, swallowed, sipped again.
When he’d finished, he turned his face away and coughed. “Needs vodka,” he said. “I don’t guess you’d . . .”
I eased him back onto the pillow. “Let me guess. You’re not supposed to mix alcohol with your meds.”
“What’s it going to do, kill me?”
He had a point. I took the OJ into the kitchen and laced it with two ounces of vodka. Then I went back into his room and helped him take a few more sips.
“Don’t you die on me now,” I said. “Not with this stuff in your system.”
“Why worry?” he said. “The most they could charge you with is mercy killing.”
“Illegal,” I reminded him.
“How about if I promise not to die until the alcohol’s out of my bloodstream?”
I agreed that would probably be a good idea.
I was pretty safe, though, because a few swallows of the drink were all he could manage. When he’d finished, he sank back into his pillow and closed his eyes.
“You’re a good man, Straight,” he sighed. The rattle in his voice suggested some congestion in his lungs. “Jay’s a lucky guy.”
On the way upstairs, I glanced at the hall table, where the first one home drops the mail. Nothing. It was possible the box had been empty, but this time of year, it was unlikely. Jay must have gotten busy, forgotten to pick it up. I trudged back down to the end of the driveway to check the mailbox. Cable bill, electric bill, three Christmas cards addressed to Jay and one to me. And a plain white envelope, no stamp, no address, just my name printed in heavy block letters across the front. I worked open a corner, then slipped my thumb under the flap. Inside was a piece of white typing paper with the same kind of unidentifiable block lettering I’d found under my windshield wiper.
Second warning, it said. Below the writing was a primitive drawing of a snake. Three tiny circles at the end of the tail identified it as a rattler.
The skin on my forearms prickled with gooseflesh.
The son of a bitch knew where I lived.
I tiptoed into Dylan’s room and nudged Jay’s shoulder. “Wake up.”
He followed me blearily into the kitchen, and I handed him the note. He looked at it for a long time, then laid it on the coffee table and said, “How dangerous is this guy?”
“I wish I knew. My guess is, you’re not on his radar. The snake was in my truck, the note has my name on it. But if you wanted to, you and Dylan could go to a hotel until we catch him.”
“I’d rather no one was on his radar. And I’m not running off to a hotel while some psychopath threatens you. What can I do to help?”
“For now, just keep your eyes peeled. Doors and windows locked. And take this.” I pulled the Glock out of my shoulder holster and held it out to him, butt first.
He raised his hands and took a step back. “You know I can’t use that thing.”
“I.Q. of a million, and you can’t point and shoot?”
He shook his head, but I popped the magazine out and made him practice putting it in, sliding off the safety, and racking the slide.
“I’m not shooting anybody,” he said.
“I know,” I said. “If we’re lucky, you won’t have to.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE
The next day, I was back in Razor’s neighborhood. Interviewed a couple of folks I’d missed the first time around and learned nothing useful from any of them. It was five o’clock by the time I finished, and since I was in no mood to sit in traffic, I swung by the office to wait it out. Write a report. Do some background checks. Think things through. The front door was locked, most of the other businesses in the building already shut down for the day. A thin band of light streamed out from under the Strip-o-Grams door, and a dance tune heavy on the bass filled the hallway.
The hall light on my floor was off, and only the light that spilled from the stairwell illuminated the dim corridor. I flipped the switch. Nothing.
The light had been fine last night. Maybe it had just burned out, but . . .
I slipped the Glock from under my jacket. Scanned the corridor. Empty.
Maybe I was just being paranoid.
There were no scratch marks on the doorjamb or around the keyhole. No sign of forced entry. I jiggled the handle. Locked. Still uneasy, I opened the door and flipped on the light switch.
Nothing.
A shadow in the corner moved. I swung to face it and caught a glimpse of urban camouflage, a flash of ribbed ski mask. Then a heavy weight slammed into my gut and drove me back into the wall. With a sharp crack and a shower of plaster, the drywall caved. My arm went numb and the Glock skittered across the floor.
I gasped for breath, smelled sour sweat and Ivory soap. Felt like I’d been hit by a cannonball.
Rough hands fell on my shoulders, and a framed Frace print shot toward my face—or maybe it was the other way around. I squeezed my eyes shut and turned my head in time to save my nose and teeth. Glass splintered. A sharp pain shot through my cheek.
Damn.
I slammed my head backward into his face. Bone cracked and he let out a yell, and a warm wetness gushed into my hair. My blood, or his. I couldn’t tell.
“Son of a—” He rammed my head into the glass again. A flare of pain. More shattering glass. This time, I tasted copper.
I jabbed an elbow into his stomach and stamped hard on his instep. He bellowed a curse and threw a kidney punch that made every synapse in the right side of my body fire. If I survived this, I’d be pissing blood for a week.
“I told you to let it go, asshole,” he growled.
The voice seemed familiar, but I couldn’t place it through the ringing in my ears.
“Let what go?” I twisted away, nearly slipped out of his grasp. My hand scrabbled at his face, found the woolen ski mask.
He jerked away. Grabbed a fistful of hair and smashed my forehead against the wall. A burst of pain, and behind my eyes, a curtain of red. Something wet and warm streamed down my face. The world shifted. Tilted. Bile rose in my throat, and I choked it back down.
“Son of a bitch deserved to die.” The breath beside my face reeked of beer, and I fought the urge to retch. “Just let it go.”
Let the Parker thing go.
I groaned and let my body go limp. Held my breath until I heard the air rush out of him and felt his muscles relax. When he shifted his grip, I twisted suddenly in his arms and pushed off hard with my legs. A sharp pain shot through my calf. I ground my teeth together and pushed past it. The intruder toppled, off balance, and I drove my right fist into his throat.
He gasped like a landed carp, gave a guttural cry that was mostly rage, and swung a meaty fist toward my head. The blow glanced off my left ear, made it ring.
“What about Absinthe?” I asked. “Just let her take the fall?”
“Screw Absinthe,” he wheezed. “Who gives a shit about that fat little fuck?”
He rammed me again, and again the nausea roiled up in my gut. Dizzy with vertigo and blinded by blood, I threw another punch. He stumbled clear and caught me with a blow to the belly that brought me to my knees.
Downstairs, the music stopped.
Someone called, “What’s going on up there?”
My assailant leaned closer, his breath warm against my ear. “You keep on, you�
�re gonna get somebody hurt.”
I heard the clump of heavy footsteps on the hardwood floor give way to the pounding of feet on the stairs. A woman cried out. The front door slammed. By the time I stopped retching, he was gone.
I took a deep, painful breath and used the wall to pull myself to my feet. It felt nice and solid. I decided to lean against it for a while.
As my head cleared, I tried to put it together. Too tall to be Byron. Too stocky for Keating. I thought of Chuck. The height was about right, but his soft, going-to-seed physique bore no resemblance to the intruder’s. Besides, I could have hammered Chuck like a tent peg.
Whoever it was, he’d picked the lock to my office without leaving a trace. Just like the guy who’d put the snake in the Silverado.
Another set of footsteps. Lighter, quicker steps, the staccato sound of spiked heels. A statuesque platinum blonde careened around the corner and pulled up short when she saw me. She was wearing a silver-sequined bikini with a top at least a size too small. One of Strip-o-Gram’s regulars. I fished in my brain for a name, came up with one: Chantal. The sight of her cheered me up a little.
“My God,” she said. “Are you all right?”
“Maybe you should call the police.” I touched a hand to my forehead and it came away red. I grimaced and gave her a number. “Ask for Frank Campanella.” It wasn’t exactly his department, since I was still breathing, but I trusted him. Besides, it appeared to be related to his homicide. Or rather, his precinct’s homicide, which was the same thing as far as I was concerned. I sure as hell wasn’t going to call Gilley and Robbins.
“You need an ambulance?”
I shook my head and immediately regretted it. “I can drive.”
She touched the tips of her fingers to my face. “Maybe someone should take you.”
She was dabbing at my forehead with a damp cloth when Frank arrived. He gave her a long, searching look, then turned to me with raised eyebrows and a hint of a grin.
“As a way to meet women, this seems a bit drastic,” he said.
“As a way to meet women, it sucks.”
He pulled out a pocket steno pad and a pen, and I dutifully described the attack. Then I thanked Chantal for her help and limped out to the weathered Crown Victoria Frank had bought new in 1988.
The passenger door stuck, and I had to yank it hard enough to send a shock wave blasting through my skull. I said, “When are you going to lay this thing to rest?”
“You should be so lucky as to have a car like this,” he said. “This car is a classic.”
“Coca-Cola is a classic. This car is an antique. Every time it passes a cemetery, the transmission slips. Ever think it might be trying to tell you something?”
“This car will outlast you and me both, Mac,” he said. The pounding in my head suggested that he might be right.
He drove me to the emergency room at St. Thomas, where—after a two-hour wait—a doctor who reminded me of Sammy Davis Jr. injected a painful dose of anesthesia into my forehead and stitched me up.
“You’re a lucky guy,” he said. “Mild concussion. No permanent damage. And even if it scars, your hair will cover most of it.” The rest of the cuts on my face looked bad, but none were deep enough for stitches.
“You want to hear the bright side of all this?” asked Frank.
“There’s a bright side?”
“Of course.” He tossed me my bloodstained shirt. “They only beat the shit out of you when you’re on to something.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX
“You look like hell,” Jay said. He took a bag of frozen peas from the freezer and handed it to me, then took a bottle of aspirin off the counter, tipped three into his palm, and gave them to me as well. “Can’t you ever work a case without getting beaten to a pulp?”
“Apparently not.” I tried flexing various muscles, and ripples of pain shot through my whole body. “Son of a bitch. I can’t believe I walked right into him.”
“Your spidey senses must have malfunctioned.”
“I should have known he was there.” I popped the aspirin into my mouth, swallowed them dry, then pressed the frozen bag to my lip. “Hell, I did know something was up, and he still got the jump on me.”
“Whatever you say.” He brought his meds to the table, pulled out the chair beside me, and washed down the pills with a few sips of purified water. I looked at him more closely. His face looked thin, and there were dark circles under his eyes.
“You don’t look so great yourself,” I told him. “How’s your T-count?”
“I’m fine. Just tired.”
“Dylan have a rough night?”
“Hallucinations. Last night, it was Chippendale’s dancers. This morning, a Marine. He finds it all very amusing when he’s lucid.”
It was a bad sign, though. One of the symptoms of end-stage AIDS.
Jay gave me a wan smile. “I wonder what I’ll see when it’s my time.”
“That’s a long time away.”
“Of course it is.” He rubbed an invisible spot on the table. “I’m torn between wanting you to be there and not wanting you to see me like that.”
I said, “Are you sure I’m the one you’re worried about?”
He picked at a thumbnail. “It’s Eric, I guess. I don’t think Dylan’s his problem. I think it’s the disease. Watching someone die. Knowing sooner or later, it’s going to be me. You can’t blame him for not wanting to go through that.”
“Yes, I can.” I smiled, but there wasn’t much humor in it. Besides, smiling hurt.
“It’s hard to love someone under those conditions.”
“It’s hard to love someone under any conditions.”
He took another sip of water. “I don’t think he’ll be back.”
“Give him time.”
“Maybe it’s better if he doesn’t come back. Not if he’s just going to leave again when I get . . .” His voice faltered. “When things get bad.”
“You want me to talk to him?”
“What, you’re going to drag him back here in a sack? I don’t think so.”
We moved to safer subjects. The Christmas party he was planning for Dylan, my weekend with Paulie. Whether or not I should pull that little strip of paper out of my wallet and call Elisha.
“You’re crazy if you don’t,” he said.
“Josh said the same thing.”
“So what’s stopping you?”
“I don’t know,” I said. “There’s a lot of stuff still up in the air.”
“Too much stress. I don’t suppose I can talk you into taking tomorrow off.”
“I have to talk to Hewitt,” I said. I told him about the attack on Judith.
“Poor woman,” he said. “You think Buddy Hewitt may have killed Razor to avenge his wife? Or is it something she could have done?”
I thought it over. “A woman could have done it. At least the initial cutting. But the guy was strung up, bled, and gutted. That would have taken more muscle than most women have.”
“You sure? I’ve known some pretty stout women.”
“Judith Hewitt isn’t some kind of Amazon. I’d put her on the smallish side. But her husband could have done it. Or his buddy. Elgin Mayers.” I pictured the two of them in my mind, Hewitt lean and wiry, Elgin a massive wall of muscle. I replayed our conversation, focused on Elgin’s voice. I imagined what his bulk would feel like barreling down on me like a bull rhinoceros. “I think Elgin may have been the one who paid me that little visit.”
“Did you tell Frank this?”
“Not yet. I’m not a hundred percent sure.”
He squeezed his eyes shut and shook his head. “You are not going to go and confront these people, Jared. That’s insane.”
“I didn’t say I was going to confront them.”
“You didn’t have to. After all these years, you think I don’t know how you think?”
“You worry too much,” I said.
I slept in the next day, finishing my barn chores just
in time to call Eric the Viking and meet him at a Chinese restaurant not far from downtown. We greeted one another awkwardly. Then he nodded toward my face and said, “No offense, man, but you look like crap.”
“Hazard of the trade,” I said.
We each ordered the buffet and piled our plates with lo mein noodles, cashew chicken, lobster rolls, and some of the best crab rangoons in town. Then Eric slid into the booth across the table from me and poured himself a steaming cup of green tea.
“I almost didn’t come,” he said.
“I almost didn’t call.”
“Why did you?”
“Call it curiosity. You know us detective types. We never know when to mind our own business.”
He made a sound like a game show buzzer. “Wrong answer. Try again.”
“All right. Maybe I don’t get how you could just walk away. I thought things were going pretty good with you guys.”
He frowned into his cup. “He’s the one who brought his ex-lover back into the picture.”
“His ex-lover is dying,” I said. “He’s no threat to you.”
“It’s not about threat. He brought this into our lives without even asking me how I felt about it.”
“He thought you’d understand.”
Eric speared a floret of broccoli. “My boyfriend is living with another man. I think that’s enough to understand.”
“Dylan’s end-stage. It won’t be long.”
“I wasn’t talking about Dylan.”
“There’s nothing between Jay and me.”
“You keep saying that and maybe someday someone will believe it.”
“Eric—”
“No, no. I know you’re straight. But he isn’t. And he loves you. Don’t you think that’s enough to deal with without bringing lover boy back into the picture?”
“That’s what this is about? You think I’m the threat?”
“You are the threat.” He traced invisible patterns on the linen tablecloth. “If you’d asked me a month ago, I’d have said it wasn’t a problem. But you know what? I can’t handle all this. You. Dylan. Jay being sick.”
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