Fittingly, perhaps, my call to Carlos went to voice mail. This time of day in Cali, he was probably finishing up lunch. That made things easier for me, but a thrill of guilt ran through me as I realized it would be anything but easy for him to receive the message I was about to leave.
“Hey, man,” I said. I cleared a throat that had become thick with sudden emotion. “I just wanted to let you know. I’m into something and I think it’s pretty bad. Not sure what the other end looks like. I just wanted to let you know, thanks, for everything.” I fell silent for a moment, unsure how to continue. “I’m hitting the road and stashing my phone in the glove box, so just, you know. Let me do what I need to do. Because I don’t know if anyone else can. I’ll try to call you, but if you don’t hear from in the next day or so . . .” I sighed. “I know this is a shitty way to get this to you. I just wanted you to know. My life has never been wine and roses. I love you like a brother, ‘los. Tell everyone . . . Ah, hell, you know. I need to hit the road.”
If anything, the next call was harder to make. Not because Carlos wouldn’t understand what I was going through, but because Kent had seen the brand of weirdness involved in my life at close range. If anyone would have an instinctual sense of what I was moving toward it was him.
Kent answered on the second ring. “Hey, kid. I still don’t have anything on the Gennaros. How you doing?”
“I got it figured out,” I said, then explained what Carlos had found. While I described the more mundane aspects of what I’d seen in and around Bobby’s house, I left out the details of breaking and entering and the horror scene in the office. I’d much rather Kent give plausible deniability for any overt, illegal acts on my part. He wasn’t stupid — the lack of explanation on how I’d gotten inside was a pretty obvious one, but it was enough cover that he wouldn’t have to lie for me if it became an issue down the road.
“Figures,” Kent grumbled. “Scooped by Fancypants. I’m sure he won’t rub that in at all.”
Despite my mood, I couldn’t help but laugh. Esteban has jokingly referred to Kent as ‘Chromedome’ since they became close, while the dapper — and full-haired — Esteban was quickly labeled in return. “You can always point out that it was his brother-in-law that did the work and not him.”
Kent grunted a chuckle. “So, listen, have you figured out what your next move is? If you’re headed my way any time soon, I could use a set of eyes hooked up to an open mind.” He sighed. “These guys are technically proficient, but I’m the only one who doesn’t think this is just some lunatic. Maybe I’m wrong, but it doesn’t feel right. I’m getting the same feeling I got working your mom’s case.”
I tried to hold back a sigh of my own. “I don’t know, Kent. I’ve got something I have to do and I just wanted to let you know . . . I might not be able to help you.” I debated whether to finish the story of Bobby’s house. When he remained silent in anticipation, I forged ahead and laid the rest out for him — broken pottery, glowing message, and all.
There was no reply. For a moment I thought that I’d lost him, but he finally spoke. “Damn. You’d have to be blind to not recognize that it’s a setup. Whatever you’re dealing with is cocky as hell, bad enough it doesn’t worry about you, or both. You got any idea what it is and how bad it is?”
“Bad enough, yeah. I may have a few tricks up my sleeves, though.” I decided not to tell Kent that I was walking into the situation blind. He already sounded worried enough for the both of us. I hoped that he wasn’t seeing past my false bravado. “I need to hit the road, I just wanted to let you know.”
“I get it. Godspeed, kid.”
“Thanks.” I smiled. “See you over some pancakes, all right?”
“Sounds like a plan,” he said. The lie was evident in both our voices. I had no assurance that I’d be fulfilling that promise and the lack of certainty in my tone carried over to my friend despite my hopes. Part of me wanted to back up and start over, to tell Kent that I’m on the way. Another, more selfish part, wants to put this entire affair in the review mirror and do my best to forget I even heard the name Bobby Gennaro.
But I can’t. As far as I know, I’m the only person around who can do what it is that I do. To shrug this obligation off would be a betrayal of everything I’ve stood for since my dad died. Above and beyond that, it’s a mantle of responsibility I’ve taken on for myself.
I squared my jaw and started the engine. “Here we go.”
We, who? Beats me, but I needed something to overcome the silence and the crawling sensation in the pit of my stomach. For now, it would do. The road waited.
Chapter 8
It was one thing to sneak in and out the house when I was a teenager, but I never expected that I’d have to do it as an adult. Thankfully, my wild teenage years had prepared for me this clandestine activity. The main problem was doing something with the RV while I made my move.
Pleasant Prairie, Wisconsin, is, fittingly enough, a nice little town more than worthy of the name. There’s a bit of manufacturing in the area, but it also serves as a bedroom and vacation community for Milwaukee and Chicago commuters.
While Mother insisted on commuting several hours a day rather than find something local, Dad was perfectly happy to teach English lit at Tremper High — go Trojans! With the hindsight benefit of age, I look back on some of the conversations he and Mother used to have and realize that she often mocked him for his satisfaction with such a pedestrian occupation. Dad, to his credit, would just shrug and let the petty slights roll off of his back. That, I suppose, made her hate him even more.
‘Home’ was a split-level, mid-century modern on the shore of Lake Michigan, flanked to the north and south by nature preserves that gave me plenty of room to ramble in my younger years. It should have been far and above my parents’ price range, at least before Mother got her professorship, but dad inherited it from his parents, who passed away long before I was born.
Sometimes life strikes me as needlessly cruel. I have no living extended family. My only blood relation is insane and imprisoned. It would have been nice to have an aunt or uncle somewhere, but both of my parents were only children.
After dad’s death and Mother’s prison sentence, I inherited everything. Well, almost everything. The investigation stripped out a surprising number of artifacts and antiquities from inside the house — mostly centered around Mother’s office. Petty thievery seems somehow beneath her, but I suspect that she would fiercely deny that she stole any of it and claim that she was merely appreciating it for what it was.
If any of the antiques had arcane properties, I hope they are moldering in some long-forgotten evidence locker and well out of reach. If a book and a clay pot could cause so much havoc, who knew what else she got her hands on.
I tried not to dwell on the possibility too much.
Stiles’ Greenhouse, where dad used to take me to get pumpkins for Halloween, closed long by the time I got into town. That was all to the good. I parked the Itasca in a space right in front of the storefront. The bulk of the RV was incongruous in the empty parking lot, but I hoped that no one would notice. If I wasn’t back by morning, it probably wouldn’t matter.
At the rear, I stuffed my Mossberg and a few other odds and ends into my backpack. After a moment of thought, I added a small LED flashlight to one pocket of my khakis. I balanced it out on the other side with the Taser, slung my backpack over one shoulder, and headed out.
It was a straight shot through the fields behind Stiles’ to my house. I headed in that direction. The breeze shifted as I went and I caught a hint of pizza from Ruffolo’s down the way. My stomach grumbled. I’d grabbed a drive-through burger on the way, but an old, familiar favorite sounded a lot better than trudging overland under cover of darkness after eating a heat-lamp toughened sandwich.
Later, I told myself, though there was no real sense of promise there.
There was a rhythm to walking through a plowed field and I remembered it after a few stumbles. The rows of har
vested corn, thankfully, gave me an easy path to follow and kept me on a straight path toward my house. Here and there the combine had cut the stalks long. I carefully placed my feet around them. Dried, they can be surprisingly sharp. The last thing I wanted to do was to retreat to the RV for bandages or another pair of pants.
My methodical pace increased as I hopped the farm fence. I glanced both ways before jogging across the train tracks that bordered the eastern edge of the field. I gingerly stepped down off of the berm and into the scrubland between the field and my neighborhood. It isn’t officially part of the nature preserves, and I’m not entirely sure who owns it, but it’s grown wild and free for as long as I can remember. The healthy scent of growing things exuded from the land even this late in the season. I couldn’t help but smile faintly. I spent more than a few Saturdays roaming this ground with friends. To a childish imagination the stunted trees and intermittent, shallow depressions filled in quite well for the swamp planet of Dagobah. As we got older it morphed into the Dead Marshes. The underlying bedrock is mostly limestone, so despite the proximity of the lake and the frequent rains the area tended to stay dry. That was all for the better when I was younger. Mother flipped out when I came home dirty as it was. If I’d been wet or covered in mud she’d have hit the roof.
The moon was only in its first quarter, but the sky was heavy with iron gray storm clouds. Despite this, there was just enough light left to help me navigate through the Dead Marshes without having to resort to the flashlight. On the opposite end, I came to another road. I knelt there and made a careful study of the area before me.
My neighborhood ran along the edge of the coast and my house is the northernmost in the addition. I’d angled slightly north by gut feel more than anything else and I came out right where I used to cross in the old days. My house stood less than a hundred yards away.
The distant lights of the main drag at my back revealed nothing. All the windows that I could see were dark. That didn’t necessarily mean anything. I don’t actively avoid the place, but I also don’t make a point of visiting. The last time I left, I knew that would be the case. I made a deal with one of my dad’s old friends, Mike Hatcher, to serve as a sort of caretaker for the place. Mike stopped in periodically to check the mail, make sure the pipes didn’t freeze, that sort of thing. The first few times he came out, some of Mother’s groupies harassed him, but he blew them off enough times that I suppose they got the message as they haven’t been back since. The peace of mind I have with the knowledge that a friend is taking care of the place is more than worth the pittance that I almost had to push him to accept. The logical thing to do would be to sell it, of course, but I can’t bring myself to that point. As much as memories of Mother have poisoned it for me, there are still whispers of dad, too. In the balance of things, the happy memories far outweigh the sad. It was dad’s house long before my Mother tainted it. My childhood bedroom was his, as well. Maybe one day it will be a home again if I can get my life back to something on the verge of normal.
The house across from mine is an architectural monstrosity of cubes and squares. It seemed just as lifeless as my own home. That aligned well with my preferences. I desired neither witnesses nor collateral damage if anything went down.
I licked my lips, steeled myself to rise, then froze in place.
A figure stepped into view from the opposite side of my house and walked in my direction. I pressed myself low into the dirt and hoped that I hadn’t spotlighted myself against the horizon.
He was a big man. He strode across my yard with his hands shoved into the pockets of a high school letterman’s jacket. It was either worn ironically or I needed to append young to the front of my description of him as a man. At this distance, his features weren’t clear enough for me to make the call one way or another. I stayed still and hoped that he hadn’t seen me.
My luck held; he made a 90-degree turn and followed the wall of the house around. There was something almost robotic in his movements. He kept his gaze fixed forward. Rather than turning in a smooth, organic fashion, he paused a beat at each corner and rotated in place before resuming his walk forward.
As he passed out of sight, I leaped to my feet without hesitation and sprinted across the road and into the part of our yard that fronted it. The backpack bounced against me as I pumped my legs and strained. With my heart pounding in my chest, I dove into a low area where water always collected and willed myself to become one with the lawn. On my side — the backpack would have stuck up and out like a sore a thumb — I stretched out to further lower my profile and strained to hear. Thankfully, it hadn’t rained recently and the depression was dry.
The grass whispered as he stepped across it. It grew in volume as he approached, paused, resumed at a constant value, then paused again. I risked a peek over the edge of the hollow and caught his back as he moved to walk across the back yard.
I was out of hiding places now. I wouldn’t have time to get to the front door and inside before he rounded that corner. I climbed back to my feet and moved to the side of the house, right at the front corner. Forcing myself to take slow, deep breaths, I eased the backpack to the ground and drew the Taser out of my pocket.
Letter Jacket’s feet whisk-whisked across the grass. Low and out of his peripheral vision, I waited until he began to turn before jumping forward. He was tall enough that I had to hit him low, but that was all right. His grunt of surprise shifted to a surprised groan as I jabbed the Taser into his thigh and squeezed the trigger. He toppled like a conquered oak, twitching all the way until he hit the ground with an audible thump.
I pulled the Taser back and waited for half a beat, but he was still.
Hit him again.
I snorted a laugh and shook my head. Tasing a trespasser once was one thing. To keep doing it like a kid frying ants with a magnifying glass seemed, to me, to be a bit over the line.
That didn’t mean that I wasn’t prepared. I dug a handful of black cable ties out of my backpack and quickly zip-tied his wrists together behind his back and hobbled his ankles. I heaved and rolled him onto his side and made sure that he didn’t have any dirt or grass in his mouth.
His chest rose and fell. I nodded to myself in satisfaction. For a moment, I considered calling the police to report the trespasser, but I decided to wait until I’d checked the house. If there was anything worse inside that would violate my policy of keeping collateral damage to a minimum.
Zipping the backpack shut, I slung it over my shoulder and headed to the front of the house. Out of sheer habit, I checked the mailbox next to the door, which was overflowing with grocery fliers and other ads. I shook my head at the absurdity of the act. Most of the mail I need to see goes to a PO box that Kent checks for me every so often. The vast majority of the stuff that comes to the house, whether it’s junk mail or fan mail from Mother’s groupies.
“Stop stalling,” I whispered to myself. He’d left the door unlocked.
Steeling my nerves, I stepped inside.
The door shut behind me with a click. I paused in the foyer to draw the shotgun from my backpack. I considered the bundle of cable ties, then decided the less bulk I had to worry about, the better. I stashed the backpack under a side table and looped the Mossberg’s sling over my neck to help support its weight.
An odd scent tickled my noise. I grimaced. Mike kept air fresheners in all the rooms to make up for the times he couldn’t open the windows, but the underlying smell of feces and copper overwhelmed the aroma of clean linen.
My mouth went dry. Mike hasn’t been here, has he?
He doesn’t have a set schedule — it’s a quiet neighborhood and the house is in good enough repair that it doesn’t need close watching. I opened the door again and thumbed through the mailbox more carefully. Based on the duplicates, I guessed there was at least two weeks’ worth of correspondence inside. That had to be a good sign, right?
I closed the door again and crept forward, leading the way with the barrel of the shotgun. The
formal sitting room sat directly outside of the foyer and was empty save for the facing couches and the dusty coffee table.
The dust would have driven Mother batty, as would the lack of the artsy periodicals she used to fan out on the table’s surface. I briefly considered taking a picture to mail to her, then snorted. Focus.
The foyer stretched into a short hallway, which ended at the entrance into the bright kitchen and living room. The latter was much darker. The stench of death grew more intense as I approached.
Just outside the living room, the carpet squelched under my shoes. I winced, even though the faint stench in the air had provided advance notice of what to expect. I stopped and listened hard for a long moment. If anyone was in the living room, they weren’t making enough noise for me to detect them. The brightness of the kitchen was more muted here and draped the blood saturating the carpet in shadow.
I let the Mossberg hang and fished the flashlight out of the pocket of my slacks. I shrouded the lens, turned it on, and swept it across the interior of the living room. Like the rest of the house, it held happy memories. The only thing that eclipsed them was the fact that this was the room my dad died in.
The vomit surged out of my throat before I panned the flashlight halfway across the macabre spectacle that had been wrought in the living room. I bent over and retched. Even under the light, the rug was so saturated with blood and other bodily fluids that the original color was a mystery. Clean-up contractors had replaced the carpet after the completion of the investigation into dad’s death. I distantly wondered if I’d be able to engage their services again after this.
Spent, shaken, I scrubbed the back of my hand against my lips and forced myself to stand up straight. I needed to see, if only to know how many ghosts I was going to have to send along. The horror show inside of the now ironically-named living room made the reason for Bobby's aura of terror crystal clear.
Fade (Paxton Locke Book 1) Page 6