Randall #02 - Ghost Writers in the Sky

by Anne R. Allen

“I’ll use Marvin’s gun. Nobody can trace it to us.”

  “Unless somebody notices we left a few dead bodies lying around the kitchen. Walker, we’ve got to make it to LAX by 8 AM. The helicopter’s fuelled and ready. Do you want to miss our flight because we’re cleaning up a bunch of bodies?”

  Walker looked at his watch and sighed.

  “You’re right. We don’t want to leave rotting bodies in the house. We should keep them refrigerated.” He gave us a grin. “Maybe it’s time we showed these three trespassers our newest GE Monogram appliance.”

  Before I had time to picture what might be in store for us, I heard the sound of a car engine starting up outside.

  “There’s somebody out there,” Donna screamed, yanking open the back door. “Help!” She waved her arms, then stopped.

  “Oh, my God—the Mustang. It’s moving!”

  I ran to the window. The Mustang was accelerating down the dirt road. The trunk wasn’t quite closed, and the person at the wheel—she looked a lot like Lucille Silverberg.

  “That bitch! That bitch!” Walker screamed, pulling himself up to look out the window over the sink. “How the hell did she get out of the trunk?”

  “You left Luci in the trunk of your car?” Duncan said. “How stupid was that?”

  Chapter 32—MAGNUM FORCE

  Luci had escaped with Walker’s Mustang. That was something. Maybe she’d go to the Sheriff.

  Or maybe not.

  She’d have to admit her own guilt.

  Walker pushed us on through the kitchen toward what looked like a big steel box.

  “Ladies, you must admire Duncan’s famous Monogram wine vault.”

  Duncan opened the big door. Walker motioned the three of us toward it. Now I could see it was a room-sized temperature-controlled, prefab wine cellar. Inside, it was honeycombed with wine racks. The floor was stacked with wine cases.

  “Inside. Now,” Walker said. “All three of you.”

  “I can’t,” Donna said with a smug smile. “It’s all, like, alcohol. I’m underage.”

  Walker grabbed her wrist and swung her against a case of Edna Valley Viognier. Donna whimpered and clutched her hobo bag like a security blanket.

  “You too, Dr. Manners.”

  He pushed me into a corner, where I barely avoided falling on a couple of magnums of Laetitia sparkling wine.

  Beside me, Donna’s phone began to play its little tune.

  “I have to get this,” she said.

  With a roar, Walker grabbed the bag and pulled out the phone. He didn’t seem to be able to find the “off” button. The phone kept playing its tinny melody. Finally he threw it onto the slate floor and crunched it under the heel of his boot.

  The crunched phone. So that was Walker’s modus operandi. Rick probably hadn’t destroyed Luci’s phone after all. I felt better.

  “I hate those phones,” Walker said. “Duncan’s right. Using one should be a capital offense.”

  “Will you be quiet about that!” Duncan picked up the remains of the phone with his good hand. “And could you please stop making a mess? You’re leaving evidence everywhere.”

  His hands still gripping his gun, Walker started closing the door of the wine vault with his foot.

  “Sorry there’s no corkscrew in there, ladies. ‘Wine, wine everywhere, but not a drop to drink’…Such an unfortunate accident. You shouldn’t have been wandering around looking for booze in the middle of the night. But you were so drunk…”

  He gave his terrible smile. Too bad we’re leaving for an extended vacation. They won’t find your bodies for weeks.”

  “Wait a minute, Walker,” Duncan said, his voice rising with hysteria. “Let’s think this through. This is not a freezer. It’s just a cooler. It won’t preserve them for a whole month. Do you have any idea what decomposing bodies will do? I’ll never get the smell out. I am not going to allow this, Walker.”

  “You’re not going to allow it? What are you, now, my mother?”

  Duncan started shrieking. “I’m calling the police. This has gone far enough. I’m going to turn myself in.” He reached for the phone on the kitchen wall.

  With a roar, Walker yanked the phone from its moorings, pulling plaster and hand-painted Italian tile with it.

  “Duncan, so help me, if you do one more stupid thing…” He stomped the phone with his cowboy-booted heel and looked at Duncan with exasperation. “What, you can’t even close the door?”

  Duncan gave us an apologetic look as he pushed on the vault door. It thudded to a close, sealing us into the chilly dark.

  Terrible, black dark.

  “You are not leaving us in here!” Donna threw her weight against the door.

  “Save your strength.” Marva said with a sigh. “That door is steel. A hundred of us couldn’t break out of here.”

  “Why should I listen to you, bitch?” Donna said. “You planned to leave us here with them.”

  “No, I planned to stop Walker from attacking Camilla with that letter opener. I saw him pocket that thing and start sidling over to her.”

  I didn’t know whether to believe her or not, but that made sense. It would have been easier to attack me than the military-trained Marva.

  I felt around for a sturdy wine carton. “Why don’t we all calm down and think logically about how to get out of here.” I put the folders I’d been clutching on the box and managed to sit.

  Marva gave a yelp.

  “What the hell is this? I’ve just been goosed by a giant champagne bottle.”

  “Probably a magnum of Laetitia sparkling wine,” I said. I saw it before he shut the door.

  Donna moaned. “Doesn’t anybody have a phone? What century do you people live in?”

  “The Manners Doctor does not approve of cell phones,” Marva said. “So I never carry one when I’m being Dr. Manners.”

  “The Manners Doctor has changed her position on that.” I shivered.

  “You are both batshit-crazy.” said Donna.

  “Duncan has people come in to tend his horses,” Marva said. “They’ll be here in the morning. I don’t think we have any chance of being rescued until then, so we’d better keep warm. Alcohol is good for that.”

  “You heard him. There’s no corkscrew. Not that we’d be able to find it in the dark anyway.” This was hardly the time for a party.

  “You don’t need a corkscrew for champagne,” Marva said. “This should calm us right down, don’t you think, ladies?”

  I heard the sound of tearing metal foil as I felt around the door, wildly hoping there might be some way to open it from the inside. After a muffled pop, I was showered with bubbly foam.

  “Elegant,” Marva said after a moment. “A nice, lemony mousse. With a hint of vanilla and pear.” She handed me the big bottle.

  Maybe her plan was the best one after all. I hefted the bottle to my lips. It was delicious.

  I tried to pass it to Donna, but she shoved it back at me.

  “I don’t want to calm down. What makes you think any stable guys can hear us in here? We’re going to die. Why do these Bozos want to kill us? We haven’t done a damned thing! And Duncan used to be my boyfriend…”

  I reminded her we’d just heard them confess to murder and kidnapping.

  “Yeah. I guess.” Donna accepted the bottle after all. “Can you believe Duncan killed Ernesto because he thought he was Plantagenet Smith? Ernie died because of that stupid blond hairdo. It so totally did not work with his coloring.”

  “Actually, he died because Duncan Fowler is a heavily armed two-year old,” Marva said. “Poor Duncan. He’s always had anger management issues. Walker bullies him and then he takes his anger out on everybody else—especially other drivers. Who gives a gun to a guy with road rage?”

  Talk of road rage made me think of Rick and I realized he’d be wondering what happened to us—and his car. He’d start looking…but, probably not here. The reality of our situation fell on me with its full weight. We really could die i
n here.

  “Duncan always wanted a Ferrari,” Marva said. “But Walker hates Italian cars. That’s probably why Duncan was so jealous.”

  Donna sighed loudly.

  “This totally sucks. Are you two just going to sit here and, like, have a chat fest while we’re freezing to death?” She banged on the door again. “Duncan, you bastard! Get us out of here, now!”

  Marva laughed. “Go ahead and jump around and warm yourself up, sweetie, but don’t expect that man to save your life. Even if he has a modicum of affection for you, he has no mind of his own.”

  I had another cheering thought. Plantagenet and Silas knew I was here at Duncan’s house. Once they missed me, they’d come looking.

  Except they were on their way to the county jail and didn’t intend to come back until Gaby was released—which probably wouldn’t be until tomorrow.

  “He was my boyfriend. We have history, Duncan and me.” Donna said.

  “You were his beard,” Marva said. “Can’t you see that the only thing that ever mattered to that man was Walker Montgomery?”

  “I don’t get it. Walker Montgomery is a geezer, and he treats Duncan like shit. Duncan is a pundit, for God’s sake!” Donna seemed to be chugging the champagne now.

  Marva gave a rough laugh.

  “As a practicing dominatrix, I can tell you that most relationships are sado-masochistic in one way or another. Some of us are just more honest about it. Those two murderers out there have been locked in an S/M game for fifty years that makes everything I’ve done look totally vanilla.”

  “You’re one of those…? You beat people for a living?” Donna said. “That is way too kinkizoid for me. Is that what Jonathan Kahn likes? He hired you to hurt him?”

  “No. He hired me to spank him. Camilla here, she’s the one who hurt him.”

  This was so completely uncalled for, I nearly choked on my mouthful of champagne.

  “Me? I hurt Jonathan? In case you haven’t been on this planet for the last year, Marva, he’s the one who cheated—with cheap street hookers, for goodness sake. I never cheated. I adored him!” I did not want to re-live all that hurt and humiliation at this point. What was Marva’s game?

  “He loved you, too. Still does. Why do you think he hired me to impersonate you?”

  “I—have no idea.” I hadn’t let my mind dwell on that. I wasn’t sure I wanted to. “Where’s that bottle?”

  “Here you go,” said Marva, thrusting the cold bottle neck in my hand. “Jonathan married Camilla Randall and ended up with Dr. Manners. Kind of hard to live up to the good doctor’s standards, you know. She’s so perfect, she’s scary.”

  “He was afraid of the Manners Doctor?” I took a big gulp of champagne. And another. But as I thought about it, a knot of anger in my belly started to dissolve. “Maybe you’re right. Sometimes I’m afraid of the Doctor myself.”

  “How about a little champagne over here?” said Donna. “I was not a beard, you guys. I knew Duncan had something going on with Walker, but we hooked up, Duncan and me. Sort of. I mean oral stuff. That’s what most old guys want anyway, isn’t it?”

  Donna and Marva giggled, but their giggles had a brittle, hysterical edge. I tried to remember exactly what I had said to Plant and Silas and if it was possible Rick might call them if we didn’t show up soon.

  “Okay,” Donna said. “So Duncan killed Ernie out of road rage because he thought he was Plantagenet Smith. But which one of them killed Toby?” She let out a hiccup.

  “Yeah, that’s weird,” Marva said. “Walker almost sounded like he was telling the truth about that. I can’t figure out why Walker would have killed Toby before he got the letters back. Maybe Toby was killed by some gang after all.”

  “That’s stupid,” Donna said. “The Viboras would not do a guy with a frying pan. Besides—I probably shouldn’t tell you this, but my cousin Miguel—he’s in that gang, the Viboras—at least he used to be. With Ernie.”

  “Are you sure Miguel didn’t kill Toby?”

  That was the only scenario that made sense to me, if Walker really hadn’t done it.

  “No way. He was with me,” Donna said. “He kept me with him in the kitchen like, two hours after I was supposed to meet Toby—until I promised I wouldn’t go through with it. Later, like, after midnight, I got mad at how Miguel was being a control freak, and I got the bottle of champagne and the key out of the ice machine and went to see if Toby was still waiting for me. But… Well, you know what happened. I got in bed with your cop and poor old Toby was already dead.”

  That gave me a hopeful thought. “If Miguel is that protective—do you think maybe he’ll start looking for us?”

  Donna let out a heavy sigh. “I don’t know. I tried to call the Hacienda earlier, when we were in the car, but the only person I could get on the phone was Santiago—you know that Guatemalan kid? He grew up in some jungle talking a weird Indian dialect. He speaks terrible Spanish and he didn’t make sense. He kept talking about how he’s burning. He thinks he’s like, totally in love with me. Hey, is there another bottle of this champagne?”

  “Your phone,” I said, thinking out loud. “Somebody was trying to call you when Walker took your phone. Do you think that might have been Miguel? Maybe he tried the hospital and now he’s worried…”

  But Donna only screamed.

  “Look!”

  A sliver of light appeared in the darkness. Slowly, the sliver expanded as the door creaked open. In a blaze of kitchen light, we saw Duncan Fowler, blood gushing from his nose, a massive chef’s knife gleaming at his throat.

  The person wielding the knife was Santiago.

  Chapter 33—THE MANNERS DOCTOR RIDES AGAIN

  “Santiago!”

  Donna let out a torrent of Spanish as she made a drunken lurch out of the vault toward our rescuer.

  Santiago replied in his hesitant version of the language, still holding the big knife at Duncan’s throat.

  I ran out into the warm kitchen and gave Santiago a grateful smile.

  “I don’t know how you found us, Santiago, but thank you.”

  The boy looked confused and frightened as he looked from Marva to me and back again. He said something more to Donna.

  “Mr. Fowler, what happened?” I said as my wine-fuddled brain tried to make sense of things. “Did Santiago do that to you?”

  Duncan shook his head.

  “No. It was Walker.” His eyes were glazed and his face and hands sticky with blood.

  “Where is Walker?” Marva said.

  “Gone. But not before I got off a few rounds.” Duncan gave a surreal chuckle. “I ought to be able to shoot out the lights of my own my car. He was stealing it. Let him try to avoid the cops driving with one headlight.”

  Marva grabbed a dishtowel and ran it under the kitchen tap.

  “Duncan, how many times have I told you? That man has no conscience. He’d shoot your grandmother and call it upholding the Second Amendment.” She examined Duncan’s face and turned to Donna. “Could you ask your guy to drop the cutlery? Duncan’s not going to hurt anybody now.” She dabbed at Duncan’s face with the towel. “Camilla, why don’t you look for a working phone to call the Sheriff?””

  “No!” said Santiago, “No policia!”

  Duncan groaned as Santiago tightened his grip on his arm. “The land line is out. Walker cut the cable. Took my cell. He didn’t want me calling for help.”

  Marva sighed. “Donna, tell Pancho Villa here that the crisis is over, okay? He can let Duncan go, for goodness’ sake. He’s not going to hurt anybody else tonight. Look at him.” Duncan whimpered as Marva tried to clean his face.

  “No!” Santiago threatened Marva with the knife.

  “What the hell is wrong with this guy?” Marva said.

  Santiago spoke to Donna in short, whispery bursts.

  Her face went pale. “No, Santiago. No…”

  The boy let go of Duncan, who ran to the sink to wash the blood from his hands.

  But Do
nna looked as if she might cry as Santiago continued to brandish the knife and murmur to her. She answered him in hesitant Spanish, then turned to Duncan.

  “I hope you can fly that helicopter. He wants us to go to Mexico.”

  “Mexico? Why does he want to go to Mexico?” Marva looked up from tending to Duncan’s injury. “Is this a new trend? Reverse wetbacks?”

  My elation at being rescued was fading fast.

  Donna turned pale as she listened to the young man’s broken Spanish.

  “He doesn’t want to go to prison,” she said in a wavery, childish voice. “He…like, killed Toby. He thought Miguel would let him join the Viboras if he did.”

  Her face regained her jaded-teenager pose for a moment as she listened to Santiago’s hesitant words.

  “He thought that since Miguel was my cousin, Miguel would, like, make me hook up with him if he was in the gang.”

  She gave a sarcastic eye roll before a grunt from Santiago brought the fear back.

  “Santiago killed Toby?” I tried to fit the puzzle pieces together. That must have been the news Silas heard before he left. The boy must have confessed to Rick—then escaped somehow.

  Santiago spoke with Donna again, his tone agitated and intense. Whatever he was saying seemed to upset Donna even more.

  Finally she looked at me, her voice shaky.

  “I guess Rick figured out he did it. But obviously, he didn’t want Rick to call the Sheriff, so he pulled out his knife and threatened to commit suicide if I didn’t go to Mexico with him. He tried to get on Jonathan Kahn’s show to—I don’t know—propose to me or something.”

  Her eyes filled with horror as Santiago spoke some more.

  “Oh my God, then I guess I totally fucked everything up by calling the Rancho for help after Marva rescued me. Because then he knew where I was…”

  She stopped and took a deep breath.

  “Look, I’m drunk and his Spanish sucks, but I think maybe he, like, set the Hacienda on fire. He says he locked them all in something he calls a hole in the wall: Rick, Alberto and Miguel. And started a fire in the kitchen…”

  The Hole in the Wall room was right across from the kitchen. I sure hoped she’d understood wrong.