‘I’m just leaving Hen—’
A loud snort came down the line.
‘Why am I not surprised?’
It wasn’t the time for wiseass replies.
‘I was going to call you as soon as—’
‘Just shut up a minute.’
The buzz in his gut got angrier, his heart joining in the excitement.
‘Your sister called me.’
It wasn’t what he was expecting her to say. He had a feeling what was coming was a lot worse than whatever he was expecting.
‘Charlotte called you?’
‘Yes. Because she couldn’t get hold of you. Don’t you ever answer your phone?’ She let out a short, exasperated laugh. ‘That’s me asking, by the way, although I’m sure she’s a hundred percent behind me.’
He didn’t say anything for a long moment. His mind was split between a reply along the lines of well, excuse me, but I’ve been busy fighting for my life, and assimilating what she’d just said.
His eyes flicked to the rear-view mirror. He did a double take, missed what she said next. A police cruiser was behind him, the light bar and siren off for the moment. Had they seen him talking on the phone? The last thing he needed was to be pulled over for a patronizing lecture on the dangers of driving and talking on the phone because they were having a slow day. Their day wouldn’t stay slow for long once they saw the interior of the car. He wouldn’t stay at liberty for long either.
‘Evan! Did you hear what I just said?’
He ignored her, his eyes stuck to the mirror. They’d be checking the license plate now. They’d see it was registered to Vasiliev. Would they know who—or what—he was? Would they pull him over just for the fun of it? To let him know he wasn’t such a big shot. He eased off the gas. He had to force their hand, one way or the other. If they were going to roust him, they’d slow with him, the lights would come on. If they weren’t, they’d pass.
He put the phone in his lap out of sight.
‘Evan!’
It was almost a scream. He couldn’t concentrate on two things at once. He hit the red button, looked in the mirror.
Yes.
The cruiser was pulling out to pass. They weren’t going to pull him over. He relaxed slightly, let out the breath he’d been holding, felt slightly nauseous with relief.
Then something hit him with the force of one of Floyd’s arrows burying itself in his gut.
His face.
Any second now the cruiser would pull alongside. The two cops would look in like they always do, aggressive stares that said you were lucky today. They’d sit there for a few seconds to make their point before pulling away, showing him they could drive as fast as they damn well liked.
That’s what they’d normally do.
But not today.
Today, they’d be getting those hard stares ready, maybe practising them in the mirror behind the sun visor, before they pulled alongside. Then those hard stares would slip off their faces like birdshit off a windshield, their jaws would go slack, as they stared at a man who looked as if his whole head had been dunked in a bucket of blood. There’d be a fast scrabbling flurry of action, the light bar would go on, the siren too. They’d run him off the road. Excited fingers un-snapping the buttons on their gun holsters as they piled out the cruiser.
Not such a slow day after all.
That’s exactly how it happened.
Except it was worse. It was the same two cops who’d caught him coming out of Hendricks’ place the other day. So, after the hard stares turned into astonished gawking like a pair of inbreds, their faces took on identical grim smiles of satisfaction.
We shouldn’t have let you off so easily last time, sort of smiles. It won’t happen again smiles.
Evan sat in the SUV as the two cops walked towards him, cocky swaggers in their gait, hands on the butts of their guns. He wound down his window in anticipation, thought about putting his foot to the floor, driving right over them and never stopping. Wiping those smug looks off their faces. It was a nice thought.
His phone rang as the cops got to the window. He glanced down. Guillory calling back. Of course it was. What took her so long?
‘I’ve really got to take this call.’
The cop in front shook his head.
‘Uh-uh.’
‘It’s from—’
The cop put his hand on the roof and stuck his head in the open window, bringing the smell of cheap aftershave with it.
‘I don’t care if it’s the good Lord himself calling to give you the heads up on the second coming, you touch that phone and you’ll have to pull down your pants to answer it next time.’
The cop behind laughed at his partner’s turn of phrase and spat on the ground.
Evan picked up the phone.
The front cop’s eyes bulged.
‘You think I’m joking, boy?’
Evan wanted to know how they’d got onto boy so fast, not a single patronizing sir leading up to it. It didn’t bode well. No doubt they looked at his face and saw there were so many cuts and bruises there already, they could add a few of their own and nobody would be the wiser—except Evan, of course, and he didn’t matter. He thrust the phone out the window, making the front cop jump backwards, his hand going to his gun instinctively before he saw it was only a phone.
‘You answer it. It’s Detective Guillory.’
The name didn’t register at first. His eyes narrowed like he thought it was some kind of a trick, even if he couldn’t see how it might pan out. His partner reached around him and snatched the phone out of Evan’s hand. He answered it and put it to his ear, didn’t say anything. His eyes never left Evan’s. He’d got the hard stare back in place. Then he grinned suddenly and held the phone at arm’s length, leaning his head away.
‘What the fuck do you think you’re doing, Evan?’ the cop repeated, his grin growing wider. ‘You’re Evan, are you?’
Evan nodded.
‘We’d like to know what the fuck you’ve been doing too.’
The other cop grunted, hitched his belt up and pushed out his chest.
‘Just talk to her,’ Evan said, forgetting to tell the one nearest him how scared he was at the display.
‘Who is this?’ the cop with the phone said.
He listened, his head nodding like it was on a spring. The grin gradually slid off his face the longer he listened. He held the phone out towards Evan, his eyes flat. No more hard stare, no amusement, just flat.
Evan took the phone, not wanting to know what Guillory said to him to produce the sobering reaction it did.
‘Kate. Sorry about—’
‘Your nephew is missing.’
Chapter 47
EVAN’S FIRST REACTION WASN’T a thought or a mental picture of his nephew. It was on a more instinctive, primeval level—a smell, a bad taste in his mouth.
He was back in Hendricks’ basement with the door he’d just discovered cracked open an inch, a damp, fetid smell flowing into the basement from behind it. But there’d been another smell behind that. A smell that made him spit to clear his mouth of the taste it carried with it.
The smell of something dead.
Guillory was talking. He didn’t hear a word. His mind was working overtime now, making connections he didn’t want to make. The length of damp rope in the basement, the hollow sound and smell from behind the door. A man with a hunting bow and a grudge, a missing child. And a note left on the seat of his car in his sister’s garage.
No, not a note—half a note on a piece of paper torn in two.
Protect what you love
He knew then exactly where he’d find the other half of that note and the thought turned his blood cold.
The cops were talking to him. Everybody was talking to him. He couldn’t hear a damn thing over the roaring in his ears.
He had to go back to Hendricks’ farm, back down into the basement, find out what was behind that door.
‘Evan!’
The shout mad
e him sit up like he’d sat on a cattle prod. But it sent a spike of reason through the addled thoughts crashing around inside his head. He couldn’t go back now. Floyd was still there. Even if he got Guillory to persuade the two cops to go back with him, take care of Floyd, he still wouldn’t be able to get through the door.
Then it came to him. The padlock was new, Floyd must have put it there. So Floyd must have the key. Suddenly everything was turned on its head. A moment ago, all he wanted was to get away from Floyd. Now, he—they—needed to get back to the farm immediately before Floyd had a chance to get away.
‘Kate—’
‘Meet me at your sister’s as soon—’
‘Kate! Listen to me for once.’
There was a stunned silence. He wished he had the time to savor it.
‘I think I know where he is.’
Just saying the words made his palms slick, the back of his neck clammy. He swallowed hard. Concentrate on what needs to be done now. Don’t think about anything else, what you might find.
‘You don’t mean ... you think he’s at Hendricks’ farm?’
‘You have to trust me, Kate, there isn’t time to explain.’
‘Okay.’
Her voice was hesitant, like she was being asked to try out something new, something radical and untested—something with catastrophic consequences if it all went wrong.
‘You have to persuade these jokers’—he looked out the window at them as he said it—‘to go back there with me now. Floyd’s there. We need to catch him before he disappears.’
‘Pass the phone over.’
Evan held the phone out to the one who’d already spoken to her, getting a dirty look from the other one. The guy took it, listened to Guillory’s urgent instructions, his face going through a range of emotions, ending up with sullen resignation. He handed the phone back to Evan.
‘Shit,’ he said, a three-syllable word. He looked at his partner. ‘We got to go with him.’
The partner gave him a long-suffering look—really? —then stared at Evan. Evan smiled tightly at him.
‘To protect him,’ the first one said, enjoying the emphasis he put on the word. ‘There might be some guy at the Hendricks place. Sounds like a crock of shit to me.’
He shrugged, what can you do?
‘No lights, no siren,’ Evan said to them. ‘We don’t want this guy to know we’re coming.’
They looked at each other, shared another look.
Do you believe this guy?
‘Move it, guys,’ Evan called out the window, pulling across the road to make a U-turn. ‘You might get to shoot somebody if you’re lucky.’
***
THEY WERE TOO LATE. Floyd was gone.
He wasn’t still in the yard and Evan doubted he was in the house, relaxing with a cold beer after his busy day’s work. And he had been busy, very busy. His handiwork came into view as Evan swung the SUV into Hendricks’ driveway and drove around the house. He braked hard, the shock of the sight making him stamp on the brakes harder than he meant to. Harder than the cops behind him expected him to, that was for sure. The SUV came to an abrupt halt, efficient German brakes and new tires doing their job as Germans demand they do. There was the crunch of metal on metal and the SUV lurched forward again throwing Evan’s head into the headrest as the police cruiser slammed into the back of it.
He bet they thought he did it deliberately. He didn’t care.
He climbed out the car, unable to take his eyes off the sight in front of him. A couple of crows took to the air, their large wings flapping noisily, as they reluctantly left their prize. The two cops got out the cruiser, barely glanced at the damage to the front end and stood beside Evan.
The slow day sure as hell wasn’t slow any more.
Evan looked off to the side, saw the body of the guy Floyd had shot through the neck lying in a heap on the other side of the yard. He looked all around, couldn’t see the body of Floyd’s dog. Was Floyd off somewhere giving the animal a decent Christian burial?
In contrast to what he’d done for—or to—the man who killed her.
The yard was eerily silent as the three men stood and stared. The wind that usually blew in off the open fields that made Evan think the place should be called Cold Blow Farm was still. One of the cops ran a hand through his hair. The other one cleared his throat.
‘Jesus Christ,’ one of them said, it didn’t matter who. He spoke for them all.
The two crows landed on the roof of the house and started squabbling noisily. One of them cawed loudly, irreverently, as it took to the air again, circling above them, eager for them to move away. Evan looked up at it. He supposed it made a pleasant change from roadkill.
He looked back at what the birds saw as their rightful prize.
One wall of the smaller barn had survived the fire that was meant to remove forever the reminder of what had happened in this place. It was charred and blackened but basically intact. About eight-feet tall at the highest point and maybe ten-feet in length it was certainly big enough to nail a man to.
Floyd had thought so.
The man who shot his dog was spread-eagled upside-down, his hands and feet nailed to the wooden barn wall. Evan didn’t need to be a hunter to know Floyd had field-dressed him. A vertical cut ran from his groin up—or down, seeing as he was upside-down—to his sternum, the body cavity pulled apart to expose the organs within.
Evan didn’t need to be an expert on internal organs either, to see that a lot of them had been removed. If the dog had still been alive, it would’ve dined well that evening. Seeing as it wasn’t, he didn’t want to pursue that train of thought any further.
There was a sudden chugging, heaving sound as the cop who spoke to Guillory turned away and threw up copiously. Evan didn’t suppose he saw much of this sort of thing as a traffic cop—even a ten-car pile-up on the freeway wouldn’t come close to this level of savagery. He felt a little queasy himself.
The everyday sound of the cop retching into the dirt broke the moment. His partner turned away from the sight in front of them and walked back to the cruiser to call it in.
The other one stopped retching and stood up, wiped his mouth with the back of his hand. He spat noisily a couple times, not meeting Evan’s eyes.
‘There’s another one over there,’ Evan said, angling his head at the corpse on the ground. ‘It’s not as bad as the one nailed to the wall. He’s been shot in the throat.’
The cop’s mouth turned down in a scowl, his pride now demanding he take a look. He walked past Evan, straightening his shoulders, still not meeting Evan’s eyes. Evan fell into step beside him. As they stood and looked down at the guy with the novel neck decoration, Evan was acutely aware he still had the guy’s gun stuffed down the back of his pants.
He thought briefly about giving it to the cop. No, he’d keep it for now. As it turned out, that would be one of his better decisions that day. Even though it wouldn’t make up for not blowing the back of Floyd’s head off earlier, it was a move in the right direction.
The cop was very still next to him. He glanced at him, saw his Adam’s apple bob a couple times. The guy was very pale, a heaving sound coming from his chest like he was trying hard not to lose his lunch for the second time.
Evan turned away to give him a little space. He went back to the SUV to call Guillory, let her know what they’d need to break down the door in the basement with the bad smell behind it. He kept his eyes averted from the man nailed to the wall. It wasn’t because he thought he might embarrass himself by being sick, it was more of a vain attempt to stop his mind making a connection between a man with his guts hanging out and a bad smell behind a locked door.
Chapter 48
EVAN’S HEART DROPPED A second after Guillory got out of her car. That was when Ryder got out of the other side. He wanted to say to her, what the hell did you bring him for? He didn’t care if he was her partner or not. He didn’t like what happened to her when she was with him. She took on that cop pe
rsona, the way they had of carrying themselves that was loose and wary at the same time, the hard caution in their eyes even when they were laughing. The feeling that one wrong word and you could go from being their friend to their enemy in a split second—and he could teach most people a thing or two about wrong words.
‘Looking good, Buckley,’ Ryder said with a supercilious smirk on his fat face and carried on walking to take a look at Floyd’s little wall hanging.
Evan pictured himself pulling the gun out from the back of his pants and putting a couple of slugs in his butt. He touched his face instead to see if there was any still wet blood or brain matter to flick at the back of his head.
‘Don’t even think about it,’ Guillory said, stopping beside him, staring at the guy nailed to the wall. ‘Floyd did that, did he?’
‘Guy shot his dog.’
She shrugged like that explained everything.
‘He’s a piece of work.’
Evan bit his tongue.
That’s what I’ve been trying to tell you.
Evan’s phone rang. He checked the display, didn’t answer it.
‘Your sister?’ Guillory said.
He nodded.
‘I wouldn’t answer if I was you,’ she said. ‘There’s no point telling her we’re just about to find out. Wait another five minutes and we’ll know.’
He nodded again, happy to let her make the decision he didn’t want to. He put the phone in his pocket. He didn’t suppose Charlotte would ever speak to him again after this, whatever way it panned out.
‘C’mon, let’s hope you’re wrong about this,’ she said and headed towards the house. ‘You still thinking about buying this place?’
It was meant as an innocent, off-the-cuff remark to take his mind off what they were doing. Then the implications of what she’d just said made her breath catch. If he was right, this house would be the last place he’d ever want to set foot on again. She put a hand on his arm.
‘Sorry.’
He shook his head, too wired to take any notice of an unintentionally insensitive remark.
The yard was full of police and police vehicles now, the air charged with a mix of anticipation and apprehension. Men carrying an assortment of wrecking bars, battering rams and other equipment stood waiting, their faces somber at the prospect of what they might find. Someone fired up a portable generator, adding to the noise in the yard. Another guy stood by with a couple of industrial-size portable floodlights.
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