The irony of such a fine day being the backdrop to my urgent journey to the Palermo house wasn’t lost on me, though I was thankful that it was both a Saturday and a dry day, which meant traffic on the parkway was light.
Still, it took me almost forty minutes to find the address in Verona where the Palermos lived. It was a solidly middle-class neighborhood, mostly blue-collar, whose businesses had been hit hard by the economic downturn. I remembered as I drove that Robbie attended St. Joseph’s Catholic School, a venerable institution at least fifty years older than I was. One of the area’s few fixed points in a changing world.
According to my dash GPS, the Palermo house was just around the next corner. I slowed as I turned onto the narrow, quiet residential street, shrouded by elms and oaks, whose leaves, still heavy with moisture, glistened in the bright sun.
As I neared the house, my heart stopped.
I spotted Robbie, in jeans and a thin jacket, standing on the sidewalk outside his house. About to step inside a van parked at the curb.
A white van.
I almost shouted as he hopped into its opened rear doors. At this distance, I couldn’t see anything of its dim interior.
And then the doors were pulled closed, from the inside.
And the van pulled away from the curb.
Every instinct commanded me to floor it, to race up to the vehicle and force it to the side of the road. But I had no way of knowing who was in the back of the van with Robbie. Maddox himself? Or perhaps an accomplice, restraining the boy in some way? Unless whoever pulled the doors closed after Robbie went in was the driver himself, who then climbed back behind the wheel.
The latter scenario seemed more likely to me. Though I was only guessing, interpreting based on the slimmest of facts, my gut told me that Sebastian Maddox would be unwilling to share the grandiose delights and exquisite agonies of his delusion with someone else.
Regardless, I figured my best move was just to follow the van at a safe distance as it rumbled slowly down the street and turned onto Verona Road.
Winding along the street’s tree-shrouded curves, and up and down its subtle rises, our two vehicles made their way out of Verona and into Penn Hills. Occasionally, I let a car or two get between me and the van, so as not to arouse the driver’s suspicion—though by now I had some suspicions of my own.
If, as I believed, Maddox was aware of the BOLO out on any white vans matching the description given by eyewitnesses to the Langley hit-and-run, why hadn’t he gotten rid of it by now? Surely, he could have easily stolen another vehicle.
Also, why did Robbie voluntarily get into the back of the van? If he’d been coerced, I didn’t see it. Unless the driver had already threatened or cajoled him from inside the van, and Robbie had obeyed out of fear for his safety.
I had to know, and soon enough had my chance. The road had widened into two lanes, and as the van stopped at a red light, I slowly pulled up alongside it and risked a half-turn of my head to get a look at the driver. I knew that if he saw me, and if it was Maddox, things would go very badly, very quickly.
I don’t know if I was more shocked or relieved when I registered the van’s driver. She was calmly looking straight ahead, her hands at ten and two on the wheel, patiently waiting for the light to change.
The woman was in her late thirties, I guessed, and looked like what used to be called a soccer mom. The bland sound of soft jazz came from her open window.
I’d only permitted myself a moment to take this in, then turned face-front myself, so as not to alarm her.
Finally, the light still stubbornly red, I inched my Mustang forward, almost past the intersection, and craned my neck around to get a look at the van’s front grille. Nothing. No dents or damage of any kind.
Just then, the light turned green and we were off. I stayed behind her again, driving more slowly in the thickening traffic, until the van pulled into a mini-mall parking lot. I found a spot a discreet distance away, from which I saw the rear doors open, and a laughing Robbie jump out. Right behind him was another kid who looked to be about the same age.
The second kid slammed the doors closed and the two boys crossed the pavement, apparently heading for a video game store.
At the same time, the mom behind the wheel gave the horn a couple quick hits, which prompted Robbie’s friend to turn and offer a desultory wave. Then the van drove off, presumably to return to pick up the kids at some agreed-upon time.
I let out a long breath. Nobody else had emerged from the rear of the van, which meant it had been Robbie who’d closed the doors behind him when he climbed in the back.
Using Gloria’s cell, which I’d brought with me, I called Barnes on his. He and Gloria were still back at my house, trying to run down clues as to Maddox’s whereabouts.
The ex-FBI man picked up.
“False alarm,” I said. “Turns out, there are a lot of white vans on the streets.”
I told him how I’d followed Robbie, and what the result had been. “You were probably right, Lyle, and Maddox has ditched his van by now. You guys making any progress?”
“Not much. This guy’s a goddam Mandrake root.”
It took me a moment, but then I understood. “Go and catch a Mandrake root.” A line from a poem by John Donne about the impossibility of attaining the unattainable. In Donne’s case, he was talking about true love.
“You’re lucky I’m marginally educated, Lyle. Or else I wouldn’t know what the hell you’re talking about half the time.”
A brief, humorless laugh. “Don’t flatter yourself, Doc. As I’ve tried to impress upon you, great poetry is man’s highest aesthetic achievement. The fact that you, or anyone of your generation, can muster up a line or two from some class you were required to take doesn’t mean shit. Now, unless you want me to list the various failings of our current university curricula, I suggest we end this call and let the impressive Agent Reese and myself get back to work.”
“Gladly, you pedantic old coot.”
We clicked off, and I settled back in my seat. I wasn’t going anywhere. Although I figured Robbie was out of danger, at least for the moment, I still believed he was Maddox’s next target—unless my entire assessment of the man was wrong, which was always possible.
I chided myself. Maybe my psychological interpretation of Maddox was my own way of attaining a measure of control. An attempt to gain some parity with him, if only symbolically. His leverage was his insane plan to kill selected people close to me. And mine, my belief that I understood him.
Of course, none of it mattered. Neither what I believed nor thought I understood. All that mattered was stopping him.
I checked in with Barnes and Gloria every so often as I waited for Soccer Mom to return for pickup. But so far, no message from Maddox. Nothing appearing, as if by dark magic, on my laptop screen. No visuals, no taunting words.
Dusk had settled around me and the few other cars in the lot. It was nearing six-thirty. Robbie and his friend had been in the store a long time. At least it seemed that way to me.
Suddenly uneasy, I was just about to climb out of my car and investigate when the same white van pulled up at the curb in front of the store. Another quick succession of horn bleats, and then the two boys were shambling out, laden with bags.
They climbed in the rear of the van, laughing and talking, and then the vehicle started to move. I did the same, and proceeded to follow it out of the lot and onto the street.
Through the quickening darkness, and in thickening traffic, we took the same route back toward the Palermo house as before. Until, about ten blocks from the mini-mall lot, the van abruptly swerved to the curb.
Half a block behind, I slammed on the brakes and peered through my headlights at the unmoving van, now cloaked in shadow by the overarching trees and the growing blackness of night.
Suddenly, one of the van’s rear doors swu
ng open and a small body was tossed out—Robbie’s friend, hitting the pavement with a dull thud and then rolling over.
The rear door slammed shut and, seconds later, the van pulled quickly away from the curb. By then, I’d jumped out of my car and was running toward where the boy lay. At the same time, I hit the re-dial button on the cell.
Crouching beside the boy, I checked his vitals. He was winded, bruised, but alive, although his face was wan, and his eyes filled with terror.
When Barnes answered, I shouted into the phone.
“Lyle! Maddox has Robbie. But you need to call 911 and get an ambulance here to Plum Road and Twenty-first Street. A kid’s been hurt, left alone on the sidewalk. Don’t identify yourself, okay? You’re just a concerned passerby, worried about the child.”
“Right. Got it.”
Gasping, the boy managed to squirm up to his elbows.
“Mom! Where’s my mom? That man—”
I gripped his arm. “Was your mom in the van with him?”
“No, just him. What happened? Did he do something to my mom? You gotta help her—!”
“What’s your name, son?”
“Benjamin Heywood. My mom’s name is Dorothy.”
I spoke once more into the phone. “The missing woman is named Dorothy Heywood. Make another anonymous call and have the cops check out her house. Maddox might have grabbed her when she arrived after dropping off the kids. Then taken her van.”
“Or at any point between the mall and her house,” Barnes said. “I just hope to Christ she’s alive.”
“I’m betting she is. Because her son is. Killing either of them falls outside the parameters of his ‘mission.’ They don’t have a connection to me personally.”
“Uh-huh.”
Barnes sounded unconvinced, but I didn’t care. I clicked off and put my face next to the fallen boy.
“I know you’re scared, Benjamin. But I have to go after that van.”
He nodded, tears streaming. “Robbie’s still in there!”
“I know. Can you wait here till the ambulance comes? It should be here any minute. But if I don’t go now…”
He sniffed, sat up straighter. “I’ll be fine, just go!”
I gave him a final reassuring squeeze on his shoulder, then climbed to my feet and turned back toward him.
“Use your cell and keep calling your mom on hers. If you reach her, tell her you’re okay and get her to tell you where she is. In case she’s hurt and needs help.”
He nodded again, clearly trying to be brave. And he was.
l l l l l
Back in my Mustang, I raced down to the end of the street and turned right at the corner. It was where I’d had my last glimpse of the departing van.
Now, heading up Verona Road, I was driving blind. Maddox had a good two-minute start on me. My task wasn’t helped by the fact that traffic had worsened, and my eyes were stabbed by the headlights of oncoming cars.
Suppressing my panic, I called Barnes again. Told him to put Gloria on the phone. He did.
“Way ahead of you.” Her voice clipped, assured. “I’ve linked to the Bureau’s overhead feed. Air support drones. Like Google Maps on steroids. I figure a ten-mile radius, right?”
“Yeah. He couldn’t be much farther away. I don’t think Maddox would risk speeding. Calling attention to himself.”
“Okay, hold on.” A long pause. “Right, I think I got him. Looks like the top of a van. Heading South on Holbeck. If you cut through Churchill, you can catch up. Come up right behind him before he gets to the next intersection.”
I was already programming my GPS. “Long as I hit nothing but green lights.”
“Or else you could run all the red ones. I would.”
I had to smile. I’ll bet you would.
Neither of us spoke again as I headed in a diagonal route to intercept Maddox. We couldn’t know if he’d managed by now to hack into her own cell. And we hadn’t had time yet to get hold of some burner phones. So we kept communication to a minimum.
“You should be getting close,” she murmured suddenly.
I peered ahead, my high beams carving bright furrows into the depths of night. Then, its own lights dimmed but visible, I spotted the white van approaching at a right angle to where I’d meet the intersection thirty yards away.
“Okay, I think I see him. I’m going to let him cross the intersection, then follow.”
“Keep your distance, though, all right?” She paused again. “I assume you’re smart enough not to have your high beams on.”
Instantly, I switched my headlights back to normal.
“Of course,” I said.
We clicked off so I could concentrate on my driving. Which I did, following the van on surface streets all the way across town. Soon the traffic thinned, and we were heading toward the produce yards off Eleventh Street. Then, to my surprise, the van turned into one of the dark, narrow roads that crisscross the yard. At this time of night, its cavernous expanse morphs into a moonscape of weathered buildings, railroad tracks, and tin-roofed diners, warehouses and flatbed trucks and loading ramps.
It’s called “the Strip” by locals. I’d worked summers here as a teen. Loading produce onto trucks. Pushing two-wheeler carts laden with crates over cobblestones embedded in the old streets. Drinking bitter coffee while listening to equally bitter men, their faces cracked and bodies bent, talk about life and its many disappointments.
The memory of that time in my youth swept over me like a curling wave, and then I was back in the here-and-now. Senses drawn tight, eyes glued to the back of the van making its slow way through the maze of weary, dun-colored buildings. Finally, it pulled to a stop beside a broken-down warehouse. Maybe three stories high. Boarded-up windows. Rusted drainpipes. A ghost.
I slowed down, about fifty feet away, and shut off my headlights. Then I pulled over to one side, my Mustang hidden under a broad slant of shadow.
For five long minutes, there wasn’t any movement coming from the van. Then its lights went off.
Now the only thing threading the darkness was a single overhead lamp affixed to a top corner of the warehouse. It cast a dullish cone of light—to scare away squatters, I figured. Or druggies. Or rats. And probably doing a poor job of it.
I waited. Tired eyes squinting resolutely at the rear of the van.
Suddenly, that same single door opened, and Sebastian Maddox climbed out. Then he reached back into the van and hauled out a small, unmoving form. With an easy motion, he slung it over his shoulder. A fireman’s carry.
It was Robbie. Even from fifty feet away, and in the ragged glow of the overhead, I could tell it was the body of a small boy.
My throat tightened. Was Robbie dead already, or merely unconscious? I hoped the latter, though I couldn’t know for sure. I was long past knowing anything for sure.
l l l l l
Once I heard the sound of a door closing, its sharp creak echoing from somewhere at the rear of the warehouse, I slipped out of my car. I’d waited till Maddox had entered the building to avoid alerting him to my presence. He had Robbie with him, so I had to be cautious with my approach.
I crept along the length of the building’s near side, then, in the half-light, saw the only door. Thick, sheet-metal skin. Stained with rust. The one Maddox must have used to go inside.
As quietly as I could, I pulled at the stubborn handle until the door squeaked open. I winced. No masking that sound.
I slipped inside, and made my way along a dim corridor draped with hanging spider webs. Swallowing fetid air, vision dulled by dust and darkness, I felt with my hands along its pockmarked wooden walls until I reached a second metal door.
Luckily, it looked as old and decrepit as the first one, so I gave its handle a sturdy pull.
It was locked.
Maddox had probably locked i
t from the inside once he’d entered the room beyond. I pulled on it again. Nothing.
My anxiety spiking, I took the risk of calling Barnes’ cell again. This time Gloria picked up herself.
“Danny!” Her voice urgent, breathless. “I was just going to call you.”
“What is it?”
“Your laptop. An image just came on-screen. From the looks of it, from inside some old building. Maybe a warehouse.”
“It is. I’m inside myself. Or partway in. There’s an inner door I can’t open. What’s going on? Has Maddox said anything? I know he has Robbie.”
“Yes, he has him. Though the boy looks unconscious. Not dead, I can see him breathing. But he’s out of it. No motor functions. Like a rag doll.”
“Maddox probably used the same paralytic on Robbie that he’d used on me. What’s happening?”
“He’s got Robbie propped up in a chair, a metal folding chair. Bound to it by ropes. But there’s something else.”
“What? Tell me!”
“He has some other ropes hanging from the ceiling. But it’s hard to make out what they’re for. Other than some bright lights trained on Robbie, it’s all pretty damned dark. But I can see something in Robbie’s hand. His fingers tied around it by a thin cord…Jesus Christ, Danny, it’s—”
She didn’t have to say. I knew what it was.
“A gun.” My voice went flat.
I took a long breath. More symmetry. Maddox was planning to replicate the event that had traumatized Robbie in the first place. The suicide by handgun of his best friend Matthew.
Only this time, it was Robbie himself who would die.
Chapter Seventeen
“Danny, wait!” Gloria’s words shredded my thoughts. “Maddox just came on camera. He’s talking to you…”
Head Wounds Page 11