by Boston Teran
“I know the blood sign of my countrymen.”
“What kind of talk is that?”
“Down and dirty, but true.”
“You don’t even know if she’s alive.”
The curtains shift slightly as if a touch of air brushed past them.
“I read the sign of my countrymen,” Case says again.
“What are you talking about?”
“Oh, Jesus,” says Case. “He showed me one of the police murder-scene photos. This Hightower, cop. The motherfucker who was dead had this Tarot card pinned to his chest … the Judgment … the twentieth enigma of the Tarot … That is Cyrus’s sign game. His signature. He’s the bringer of death. The taker of the soul. It’s like a mock on the card.
“It was him, Anne. And I’ll tell you something else. This was punishment to the max. It was fuck you in the face.”
Case looks over at the desk, where she has set down the picture of Gabi that Bob slipped under her door as a “subtle” reminder after he was thrown out. She walks over and fingers the snapshot. “Cyrus used to say that once all the bullshit is stripped away, all that’s left is what there was to begin with.”
Anne sees Case glance at her arms, where the pussed blister marks from the needle are now dark thumbprints of healing.
“Redemption has a lot of faces,” says Anne. “You don’t need to find it by …”
A fierce look comes across Case’s face. “I don’t want to hear that. Don’t try and brainfuck me by turning this around and making it some sort of redemption thing. That’s so much Sermon-on-the-Mount crap and no better than when Cyrus used to lay on us one of his rants about the Left-Handed Path. We only agreed with him ’cause we needed to have something up our arms. That idea you have in your head doesn’t put anything up my arm.”
“Why, then?”
Case leans down and across the desk. “Do you have any idea what is going to happen to that girl?”
Anne sits there trying, trying to imagine what for Case is just simple memory.
“It’s me times seven. He’ll take that pretty-pretty and load her up on junk, and pretty soon he’ll have her on her knees in some crack house takin’ it up the ass from some infected junkie. He’ll take pictures of it. Maybe video it. He’ll make her go down on him while he shows her the pictures. He’ll fuck with her till the movie’s done, and over the credits he’ll hang her upside down naked, and he’ll field-dress her by gutting her from clit to …”
The words collapse in Case’s mouth. Anne is too unsettled to speak.
“You ask why,” Case says. “Maybe I miss the fuckin’ blood. Maybe it’s time to get a little retribution. Maybe it’s just time.”
Anne sits back. She tries to look into her psychologist’s bag of magic for a response, but this demands the kind of primal honesty the job description doesn’t include.
“They’ll never find her,” Case whispers. “Never. I might. I might get close. There’s always a way to get close, if you know how to grovel. Maybe then I get her back. If not, I may get close enough to force them to kill her quick. At least that.”
13
Case can read the sign PARADISE HILLS as soon as she makes the turn off Soledad Canyon Road. Bronze letters stamped into the fake stone columns on both sides of the entrance to the tract are lit by blue lights.
Nice friggin’ name, she thinks. A real selling point for some hungry family with a couple of kids.
She drives up through the identical streets looking for Bob’s address. Something about these gully and hillside developments, some morbid stamp they leave on the consciousness of the land, has always affected her badly. Case didn’t call, and Bob isn’t home when she gets there. She waits, sitting on the side runner of the truck, smoking. In time a young couple with a Lab walk past. So does an older woman with bluish puffed hair in a running suit. They pass silently, but they eye Case through their own brand of family values.
The first thing Bob sees when he comes around the corner is a truck in his driveway. Since the murder, anything different or suspicious and he’s reaching over to the glove compartment for his pistol.
He pulls up slowly, angling his car so the headlights shine obliquely through the truck’s rear windshield. He sits there waiting for something or someone to move. He scans the front of the house. He shuts off the engine, and now it’s just him and the silence and a dusky trail of headlights. He can feel his heartbeat quicken.
A moment later he spots a hand snake around the headrest in the truck. A body wearing a rummagy buckskin coat pulls itself up into view. The head turns. Bob sees that it’s Case. She has an unlit cigarette poised between her lips. She cups her hands over her eyes as she looks back into the headlights.
Bob feels a sudden twinge of anticipation. A sonar dot of hope kicking up a little in the pit of his stomach. But he doesn’t move.
Case gets out of the truck and walks over to his driver’s window. She leans in. “Hey,” she says. Then she notices the pistol across his lap. “I hope you ain’t gonna shoot me.”
“I didn’t recognize your truck. And ever since the murder …”
“Let’s talk,” she says.
Bob looks her over closely. For the first time, he notices within those wild black pupils an acute state of focus. He climbs out of the car, slips the pistol into his coat pocket. He sees across the street a kitchen curtain close.
“I guess you’ve been here awhile.”
“Long enough for the natives to pass the word.”
He starts up the driveway. “Come on inside, I’ll make us some coffee.”
“No, thanks.”
He stops, turns. She stands there uncomfortably and points past the house. “Let’s just walk.”
They cross the road. Bob’s house is on a dead end at the back of the development. On the downslide of the slope. The land beyond is part of Angeles National Forest. Just scrub hills, really.
“How long you live here?” Case asks.
“All through my marriage. Gabi was born here. My father-in-law developed this tract. He helped me out buying the place by carrying the paper.”
They walk out into a large field where the curb ends. It overlooks the development. “After the divorce, Sarah didn’t want to stay. And I guess I wasn’t ready to leave.”
Case can see all the way down to the entrance of the tract, where two pooling blue eyes of light stare back.
Bob stops. “Why did you come?”
Case looks for a match to light her cigarette. “This isn’t easy for me, okay?”
He nods, finds a match in his pocket, lights it.
“Not fuckin’ easy.” She leans into the flame, inhales. “Not easy to look you in the eye and tell you what I come to tell you.”
He starts to feel a little apprehensive. “Okay.”
“From what I saw in those pictures, the way … that man … was tortured.” She half turns away. “I believe I know who took your daughter.”
Bob scuffs his boot at the sand.
Case continues. “If so, I believe … she’s alive.”
Bob takes a long breath. His mind is a river of questions, but he holds back. He comes up to Case. “What did you see in the pictures?”
“Come on. The fuckin’ needle marks in his arm. He was either a junkie or he was stung by a paralytic. He was meant to suffer. And that card pinned to his chest. You wouldn’t cop to it—”
“You were right about both.”
Her nostrils flare.
“We’re gonna have a real talk now,” he says. “Right?”
“Yeah.”
“Who do you think took Gabi?”
“Call them my family. Actually, blood tribe would be closer to the truth.”
“How do you know it’s them?”
“Let’s just say Cyrus is consistent.”
“Cyrus?”
“Yeah. He’s the patriarch of the group. Lead wolf. Big Brother of the Holding Company. The Bad Angel. Mr. Psych Job. Whatever name you want to call it
.”
“What’s his last name?”
“I have no idea.”
“How do you know it’s Cyrus?”
“How do I know? I told you …”
“You said he’s consistent. What does that mean?”
“He’s killed like that before.”
Bob’s eyes become small pitiless spots. “How do you know that?”
Case rubs at her mouth with the heel of her hand, but hangs back on an answer. Bob has an idea of what he is going to hear and knows that if he wants to buy a little hope he’ll have to sell a little truth.
“Tonight,” he says, “I’m just a father standing in a field, looking for his daughter and talking to … a stranger.”
She understands. “I’ve been in on a kill,” she says.
Bob rocks back and forth on his heels. It has become so quiet inside his head that he can hear the night lizards scurrying over the rocks.
“Why do you think she’s alive?”
“He didn’t go into that house by accident. Didn’t kill them by accident. This was blood. This was revenge. Maybe Sam was in some deal and he scammed somebody close to Cyrus. Maybe Cyrus was paid to do him.” She hesitates. “Maybe he was paid to do your ex-wife. But taking the girl. He did that to get back at somebody. Maybe this is about you?”
It’s all a little too much. Each sentence is like a cigarette being burned into his skin.
“How many are there in the pack?” he asks.
“I don’t know now. Maybe four. Maybe seven.”
“You run with them long?”
“Since I was ten.”
Ten, he thinks. What the fuck was she at ten?
“When was the last time you saw them?” he asks.
“Two years ago.” Her face saddens a bit. “One of them … about a year ago.”
He takes a cigarette and lights it. He inhales quickly. His jaw is flexing. She can see he’s got a semi’s worth of rage inside, and if he could barrel down on her he would. There has to be blame somewhere, right?
“Would you give me descriptions of them all?”
“I will, if that’s what you want. But if you’re gonna try and get to them using the cops out of L.A. County or even the FBI, forget it.”
“Forget it?”
“You don’t know this man. He is a follower of the Left-Handed Path. The world of the devil. And as warped as it is, you can forget this shit about gettin’ your hands on him. He’ll go down like those religious freaks in Texas the FBI jumped a couple of years back. And he’ll make sure of one thing; he’ll kill your kid before they take him. You know what he used to do for kicks? He used to find out where the heads of SWAT teams lived, and he’d sneak into their houses at night, crawling right up to their beds. He’d do it just for practice. Manson used to do that. He’s also got friends who are cops. Guys he sells drugs to. Guys who are into Satan. Freaks in flag blue. You want your kid back, you can’t go that way. You got to take it on the road yourself. Without the Boy Scout uniform.”
“Alright. Suppose I do. How do I find them?”
“Follow the fuckin’ wind.”
“I need more than that. If my daughter is alive, where do I start? How do I start, if I don’t put out an APB?”
“We just did.”
“What do you mean?”
“Get yourself five grand in cash. At least that much. We could be on the road awhile. We’ll drive and get us some guns. Stuff that’s not traceable. Call me when you got the money and you’re ready.”
He looks at her oddly, confused. She turns to walk back to the street and her truck.
“Hey, I don’t understand,” he says.
She keeps walking, says nothing.
“Hey, stop.”
She stops.
“I don’t understand.”
“You and me. We’re going on the road to try and get her back.”
“You?”
“Yeah. Me. Unless you want to leave it to a bunch of drumheads who usually can’t find their dick in their own underwear, or who are too corrupt or lazy to bother. You want that, say so. And it’s done. You call it.”
“How do you fit in?”
“This isn’t tract-home America you’re dealing with. This shit is cold. It’s drugs and blood and cum, and it’s fucked so bad you ain’t got no idea. None. It’s not like stopping on Hollywood Boulevard at some satanic bookstore and picking up a few goodies on the occult. This is where people get off by smothering just plain folk like your … ex-wife and her husband.”
While he is thinking all this over, while he is judging and weighing, she adds, “And no offense, but you, you can’t go alone. I mean, fuck. You just don’t send sheep to hunt wolves.”
14
“I don’t know how long I’ll be gone, but my leave of absence papers are on the dining-room table.”
Arthur leans against the bathroom doorjamb as Bob fills his shaving grip with a few last things from the medicine chest.
“I wish you’d reconsider this,” says Arthur.
Bob closes the medicine-chest door. He can see Arthur there behind him in the mirror, his face distraught. Bob’s eyes shift back to himself. He has let his mustache grow to alter his appearance and not come across so clean. For a moment he studies his own face as if the mirror somehow had the power to remind him of who he was and to center him to that.
“This is reckless, son, and dangerous.”
Bob slips past him and starts down the hall. “I’m sorry, leaving John Lee to you. But he’s not gonna be happy about what I’ve done. And I’m sure he’d try and stop me. He might order me, then what? He’s gonna know I lied to him about going to see the girl. I figure I’ll probably lose my job.”
“I’ll take care of that, John Lee won’t …”
“Let it be, Arthur, please. I made my decision, I’ll live with the consequences.”
Bob crosses the living room. Arthur is a step behind.
Bob stops at his desk. “I’ll call you every chance I get.”
Arthur comes up beside him, looks out the window to where Case is leaning against the side panel of the pickup in the driveway. She is smoking, looking off to nowhere in particular. She wears sunglasses, torn black jeans, a sleeveless cut-off shirt. Arthur can see that not only are her arms tattooed, but her back and stomach are both decaled.
“If something happens to you …”
“I’ll be alright.”
“You sure?”
“I’m sure we can’t go on like this.”
“No, I guess not.” He shakes his head in a miserable ruffle at the prospect of the things that lie ahead and repeats, “I guess not.”
Bob opens the desk drawer. He takes out two manila envelopes and a money belt. He opens an envelope. It’s flush with packages of bills, thirty-five hundred dollars’ worth. He tears the wrapping off one package, breaks it down into small pads of bills, and works them into one cloth pocket of the money belt.
Arthur is still watching Case. She flicks her ashes into the back of the truck, then her sunglasses lock on Arthur a moment. “She’s such a tramped-out excuse of a thing. I wouldn’t trust going on the road with her.”
“I don’t entirely trust her myself.”
“Then why …”
“We’ve been over that.” Bob is growing angry. He’s got a head full of bad nerves, and this conversation isn’t helping. And leaving Arthur like this—another little gutting he’s got to live with.
“If Gabi’s dead …”
“Don’t talk like that, I won’t hear it.”
“If she is, we have to know. But if she’s alive, and that woman thinks she is, and thinks she knows who took her, I want to get her back.”
“And you put your faith in her?”
“I put my faith in God. Her, I’m traveling with.”
“What’s in it for her?”
Bob stops a moment and glances out the window. It is a question that has plagued him since he and Case walked that field behind the house.
“Did she ask you for money?”
“No.”
“Well? Doesn’t it worry you?”
Bob rips open the second manila envelope. It is also filled with thirty-five hundred in bills. “The truth will become known, won’t it, Arthur?”
“Jesus, boy. How do you know she won’t try and sell you out?”
“I don’t.”
“How do you know she won’t rob you?”
“I don’t.”
“How do you know she won’t …”
Bob cuts him off: “I don’t.” He makes an angry sound and goes back to loading the pockets of the money belt.
“I’m not sure what I’m getting into. I admit that. But I’m going. I’m going. I’m dying inside, do you understand, Arthur? I’m dying. A little bit every day I’m dying. My child is out there. She could be suffering, or …”
His voice breaks. He puts the money belt down. “Fuck it all. It’s better I do it right and die all at one time trying to find her.”
Bob just hangs there, like a marionette waiting for a pair of enthusiastic hands. Arthur takes the money belt and finishes putting the small pads of bills into the cloth pockets, letting Bob know he’ll concede to his will.
“Don’t talk about dying, okay? Don’t. There won’t be any more of that.”
Bob nods. He moves to close the desk drawer and notices his and Sarah’s wedding picture. It shocks him to see it now. It is still where Sarah tucked it in that drawer the night she told him she was leaving.
Her timeless smile. Everything he looked for in life was in that smile. Every time he looked at that portrait, he was certain she was the rock upon which his life would be built. But now. All that’s left is an image printed on a piece of paper left in a drawer, along with an old checkbook and a few letters and some dried-out stamps. Yet he cannot bear to close the drawer.
Case is suffering her own bleak bout of apprehension when the front door opens. Arthur gives her the hard once-over as he and Bob come down the walkway. Bob has two carryalls and a canvas coat. He dumps them into the flatbed of the pickup. He looks across the back of the truck to Case, who waits quietly.
They have arrived at the moment when they must jump from the ledge of predictable routine and into the ocean of the unknown. And neither looks comfortable, nor ready.