I looked up at the second-floor window at the right of the house and felt my muscles tense: the shadow had stoped pacing.
Was there a phone upstairs? Had the shadow gone down to advise the Spiderwoman? Then I saw the shadow again, moving past the window.
Except this time it stopped midway. As I watched it was joined by another shadow, and I saw heads and hands move, as though a discussion were taking place. I searched the back of the house with the binoculars until I found the circuit box. Then I reached down into my pack and took out the gas mask, fitting it carefully over the lower part of my face. Taking the canister from the bottom of the pack, I wedged it into my belt, took a deep breath, and ran straight for the house, bending low.
I was under the lower left-hand window, what I judged to be the dining room, and I could hear their voices clearly, through a faint strain of orchestra music. I went cold, as the enormity of what I planned to do struck me. If it had seemed foolhardy before, now it seemed insane. I edged along the wall to the corner and the electric breaker box. They’d been careless, leaving it unlocked, which meant I wouldn’t need the bolt cutters, just the small padlock Sandy had picked up on the way to meet me. I opened the box, flipped the master switch, and slammed the cover shut, fastening the lock into the projecting tongue.
The house went dark, and I heard voices raised in dismay.
I ran for the back door at full speed, stun gun in hand. Taking the steps three at a time, I jerked open the screen door.
His mouth was half open and he was reaching for something when he saw me, a beefy black man who probably served as a combination major domo and bodyguard. I thrust the stun gun against him and he gave a yell and fell backward. I stuck the instrument back into my belt and pulled my penlight from my shirt pocket. Then I shoved through milling bodies, disregarding the cries of protest.
My penlight beam picked out the stairway, just to the right. People were lighting matches now, and somebody in front of me held up a flickering flame.
“Hey,” he said. I knocked the match from his hand and went past, hearing him curse.
I started up the stairs, colliding with a body as I went. A woman gasped, and I felt her breasts brush past me.
“Francine …” It was a man’s voice, old, quavery, from the top of the landing. “Francine, what’s the matter? What’s going on?”
They were coming to their senses downstairs, and I heard the back door slam as somebody started out to check the breaker box. Then I heard a scream, and somebody was saying Albert had been knocked out, and I knew they’d tripped over the guy I’d stunned.
“Somebody went up the stairs,” a man said. “I saw him.”
It was time for the canister. I droped the penlight back into my pocket, pulled the metal cylinder from my belt, armed it, and tossed it down the stairs. I heard it rolling, and there was a stifled “What in hell?” from below, then more frantic noises.
“My God,” somebody yelled, “it’s a bomb!”
There was a full-scale stampede for the back door, and I turned back to the old man at the top of the steps.
“Francine,” he called again. “Are you all right?”
I reached him in two steps, just as I heard the pop of the grenade downstairs.
“Who are you?” he asked, seeing my shadow before him. “What do you want?”
“I want the boy,” I said, my voice hollow through the mouthpiece of the mask. “And I’ll kill you if I don’t find him.”
I felt the first fumes now, harsh and irritating on the bare skin of my arm. People pushing toward the door below were already starting to cough and choke.
“What’s going on?” the old man demanded. “What’s happening?”
“What’s happening is that I’ve come for the boy,” I said. “What’s happening is that you’re a dead man if I don’t leave here with him.”
“I—I don’t know what you mean,” the old man said, his voice quaking.
I spun him around with my hand and headed him down the hallway. “You were up here pacing,” I said, hoping my deduction was correct. “Francine got a phone call and came up to talk to you.”
“I—how did you know?”
I shoved him into the dim doorway and shut the door behind me, falshing my light around until I found the phone. I yanked the receiver off the hook; when I heard the dial tone, I knew I had gotten to it in time: nobody would be using the phone downstairs now until the receiver of this one was replaced.
Then I shined my light around the room, playing the beam on filing cabinets, a desk and a chair, a computer terminal. I was in the office. I shoved the old man toward the chair and heard him sigh as he sank down into it. There were some computer disks on the table, beside the console. I flashed the beam on them and read the labels: CALIFORNIA REDS, 1970–; YUGOSLAVIAN VINTAGES; CHILEAN.
My adrenaline high began to give way to a cold feeling, the kind of feeling you get in the bottom of the ninth, seventh game of the Series, two out, and you’re watching the first strike sail past you, wondering why you didn’t swing.
Only I’d swung. As if it mattered.
“Do you want money?” the old man asked. “I’ll give you whatever you want.”
I swore to myself. He really didn’t seem to have any idea.
“I’m looking for a boy,” I told him, knowing it was my last chance, and that in the time left all I could manage now was to scoop up some records and run. “Five eleven, blond, twenty years old.”
The old man didn’t say anything, and I yanked open a desk drawer, almost dropping the penlight as I tried to keep it in my hand at the same time. The drawer seemed to hold nothing but business records. I left it open and headed for the door.
The tear gas was everywhere now, a thin, biting vapor that clung to the skin and clothing. I heard more coughing downstairs, but the house seemed to have largely emptied. I started for the stairs, trying to decide which would be the easiest escape, the front door or the back.
Then I saw the door on my left, the door to the room at the other end of the hall. What the hell, I thought, and kicked it open.
I gave myself three seconds. In that time my beam picked out the bed, a mirror, and a chair, but no human inhabitant. Strike two.
I left the room and started for the stairway—I was halfway down when I heard footsteps above me.
Something warned me, but I turned around anyway.
A flash hit me in the eyes. I blinked, barely able to make out the thin figure at the head of the stairway.
“Put your hands up and stand still,” the old man’s voice said. “I’ve got a gun.”
Strike three.
Twenty-One
I had a fleeting notion to wheel and run down the stairs, and then I heard the hammer click back to full cock and knew the moment was past.
“You wouldn’t have a chance,” the old man said as if reading my thoughts.
There was movement beside me, and the light moved a fraction, coming to rest on an angry pair of eyes, set into a round, elderly, woman’s face.
“You’ve got him,” the Spiderwoman said with evident satisfaction, holding a handkerchief demurely up to her eyes.
“Stand aside, my dear,” the old man said, discreetly suppressing a cough. “I think I should shoot him right here.”
“What a good idea, Dalton,” the woman said, brushing a wisp of gray hair out of her eyes. “But I want to see what he looks like first.”
A talon reached out for my mask, jerking it away, and the full force of the lingering tear gas hit me.
“Where have I seen you before?” she asked, sniffling from the fumes.
I didn’t answer, and she pulled away in disgust.
“All right, shoot him now,” she said, her face a death’s-head leer.
The flashlight lowered a fraction to center on my midsection, and I tensed. Then there was a thud and the old man slid to the floor, the flashlight falling to the rug and bounding down the steps toward us.
“Dalton!” t
he woman shrieked.
I didn’t have time to think about causes and effects, I just shot an elbow into the woman’s side and felt her fold like a deflated balloon. Something dark hurtled down the stairs toward me, and I threw up my arm to protect myself.
“Micah, let’s get out of here.”
It was Scott’s voice, and all of a sudden I felt alive again. The woman was moaning behind us on the stairs as we half slid, half jumped to the bottom. The air was biting and tears streaked my face. Beside me, I dimly saw Scott put a hand to his mouth, gagging.
“This way,” I said, choking, and guided him toward what had to be the front. I slammed into a coffee table and sent it sprawling with myself atop it. I felt Scott’s hand pull me upright. I fumbled for the penlight in my shirt pocket, switched it on, and found the open front door.
The woman was screaming behind us now, and I knew they would hear her outside. We started across the empty living room but froze as a man’s figure appeared in the open doorway.
“Francine? What’s going on there?”
“In here,” I called. “We need help.”
When he came through the living room I dropped him with a chop to the neck. Then, with Scott behind me, we rushed out onto the lawn.
People were coming around the side of the house. A man and woman approached, fear in their eyes, but I waved them away.
“It’s a bomb,” I croaked. “The whole house is going to blow.”
The woman gave a little squeal and I heard cries of “It’s a bomb!” and “Explosives!” as we trotted down the driveway to the open gate.
My skin felt like it had been rubbed in pepper and my eyes were on fire. I heard Scott coughing behind me.
We reached the road and I flicked my penlight a couple of times in the direction of the cane field, hoping nothing had kept Sandy from positioning herself. I heard an engine roar into life, and a few seconds later the dark form of my car arrowed toward us like a cannonball. Tires screeched, and the door on the passenger side shot open. I pushed Scott forward and turned in time to confront the bodyguard, who looked like he was ready to kill. I threw the penlight into the car and drew my pistol. The bouncer halted in his tracks. Then I fired twice, quickly, into the air, and saw him flinch. Behind him, I knew others would be hitting the ground instinctively. I took the few seconds of grace and jumped into the car after Scott. Five minutes later Sandy was pulling up beside her car.
“When you get back,” she called, “you better get a car wash for the mud on your plates.”
I watched her drive away. Grateful to have Scott beside me, I started home.
Back at my office, I had a stiff drink and listened to Scott explain to his mother on the phone. He was in good shape, considering they’d held him for four days and kept him tied up most of that time. He handed me the phone, flinching. I took it wearily.
“Micah, I want to see him,” Katharine said.
“It’s not a good idea yet,” I said. “I’d rather stash him someplace with a guard. It won’t be for long. I think we’re about to finish this up.” I hoped I was telling her the truth.
“Micah …” Katherine said, and then was silent. I understood, because I didn’t know what to say, either.
“Later,” I whispered and hung up.
Scott gave me a sorrowful look. “Sorry about that. She’s a hard lady.”
“Yeah.”
“But look, do you really think we’re close? I mean, do you figure the LeJeunes are the ones?”
I shook my head.
“They didn’t kill anybody, or they’d have done away with you when they had the chance. All they were willing to do was dump your car and make it look like you’d been killed while they tried to decide what to do with you.”
“Maybe so,” he said ruefully, rubbing his wrists where the bonds had been. “And I thought I was being so smooth when I went in there and did my pervert act. How was I supposed to know they’d have the place staked out that night with Gargantua?”
“You mean you tried to break into the shop?” I said.
“Yeah. And I was almost successful. I didn’t see the alarm on the door. I thought I was stealing a march on you. There I was, in the private office, going through the notebooks full of kiddie porn photos and thinking how I was going to serve them up to you the next morning and, bam! Lights out.”
“Bad luck,” I said sarcastically. But it didn’t help to berate him; he’d learned his lesson.
“She wanted to kill me, you know. Especially after I got loose and managed to call Mom.” He was shaking now, as the delayed reaction took over. “But the old man, Dalton, kept saying they needed me as a hostage, they could use me to call you off. I think the idea of murder scared him. So I kept trying to work my hands loose again. When you kicked the door open I was almost free. I was on the floor on the other side of the bed. I thought they were coming for me then. That’s when I picked up the ashtray and went out to the hall. And I saw Dalton with the gun.” He gave a shaky little laugh. “It made me feel good to finally be able to do something beside lie there.”
“It made me feel even better,” I said, remembering my close call.
We’d been over it a couple of times already, but he needed to talk it all out.
He went to shower and I tried to put the rest of it together. Somebody had called the first day he was there, and afterward he heard Francine and Dalton arguing over it in the room next door. I looked down at the pad where I’d written down what Scott remembered of the conversation:
FRANCINE: I told him not ever to call here. He killed that boy. We can’t afford to be involved.
DALTON: I quite agree, my dear, but he knows about our little business. We can’t alienate him.
F: He wouldn’t say anything. He’s got more to lose than we do.
D: You know how that kind of person is, Francine; it’s a sickness and it does no good to try to reason with them.
Scott came out and I took my own shower, scrubbing hard to get the stinging residue off my skin and washing my eyes out. I was dressing when I heard steps coming up the patio stairway. I reached for the revolver, relaxing when I saw Sandy.
“Done like champs.” She smiled as I slipped into my shirt. “We should all be burglars.”
I gave her a weak smile, remembering how close it had been. It was only luck that it had turned out to be a rescue instead of an aggravated burglary.
“Where to?” I asked her.
“I’ve got a friend that’s gone for the week on business,” she said. “I just happen to have the key to his house.”
We went out, using the patio stairs, and took the rental car, with Sandy driving. It wasn’t likely the LeJeunes would press charges, but if in fact they were tied in with the officials in St. Bernard, I might get a visit I didn’t like. And right now I was too tired for a legal hassle.
The house was on Bayou St. John, a modernistic Spanish-style place with a swimming pool where the patio ought to be and, best of all, a protective wall around the back. Sandy pointed out the bedrooms and a bar with a full stock of bottles.
“He must be a pretty good friend,” I said.
She winked.
I went over the checklist in my mind: the car was off the street, nobody knew our location, Sandy would stay awake the first part of the night and keep watch.
I went into one of the bedrooms and lay down to rest for a few minutes, but all I could do was turn things over in my mind.
If the LeJeunes hadn’t killed Arthur Augustine, they almost certainly hadn’t killed Eddie Gulch. Eddie Gulch had been killed by an invisible murderer.
But why had Gulch been killed? Because the killer had hired Gulch to get me and the murderer didn’t want to be tied to him? Or because …
The thought stamped itself on my consciousness. I sat up in bed. Of course.…
Coincidence. That’s what it was. Blind coincidence. And bad luck for Eddie Gulch.
But who had killed him?
There’d been a cop in th
e lobby. But this wasn’t some kind of locked-room mystery: cops can leave their posts, sleep on the job, and lie afterward. So it didn’t mean much that the cop said he hadn’t seen anybody suspicious. Or he may have seen the killer and it hadn’t registered.
Because I kept thinking of what one of Fox’s detectives had said standing in the hallway, outside Eddie Gulch’s office: he’d been complaining, and I hadn’t thought anything about it at the time. Now, though, it suddenly made sense.
The invisible man.
The kind of man you don’t notice when you’re standing in a lobby, or a hallway, or even in an elevator.…
The elevator was falling, and I was reaching out. Katherine was beside me, watching me with a quizzical look, as if she didn’t understand. But I understood and I knew that within ten seconds we’d strike the bottom and that would be the end. And I wanted her to understand and not be angry anymore, to forgive.…
Sunlight was streaming into the room through the drawn curtains. My God, had I been asleep the whole night?
I sat up on the edge of the bed, aware of the smell of bacon frying. My watch said seven thirty. I padded into the den to find Scott sprawled on the rug, watching Today. Sandy appeared from the kitchen, a bandana around her brow and a tray in her hand.
“So the Sleeping Beauty woke up,” she said. “I came in there at twelve thirty, but you were dead to the world, so I let you be. Figured somebody as old as you needed your rest.”
“Thanks,” I said, rubbing my eyes. I sat down on the sofa and I accepted a plate of bacon and toast, suddenly realizing I hadn’t eaten in a day. When I’d wolfed it down Sandy served me some more, accompanied by fresh orange juice, and I began to feel a little more human.
There was one thing I had to do.
I got up and went back into the bedroom to use the phone. Katherine answered almost immediately.
“Look,” I told her, “I want to explain.”
“You don’t have to explain,” she said. There was a hint of frost in her voice.
“Yes, I do. I feel pretty bad about the whole thing, and what you’ve been through. I just wanted you to know I felt it, too.”
Deep Kill (The Micah Dunn Mysteries) Page 19