Shackled

by Ray Garton

  Anice repeated the address through a tear-clogged throat.

  "You do that now, you hear me?" Loraina kissed her daughter.

  The pounding against the door continued.

  "I love you, baby," Loraina said as tears began to gather in her eyes. She pushed her little girl through the window, heard the rustle of the bushes, stuck her head out the window, and hissed, "You run, now, run as fast as your legs'll carry you, girl!"

  Loraina watched Anice run across the lawn, across the sidewalk, across the street ...

  ... and then the bathroom door slammed open ...

  16

  Ethan followed Ed's directions, but very, very carefully, because they led him along a narrow road that twisted up a hill. He soon found himself following a bus, black with silver stripes along the sides, which was lit inside and filled with people.

  "What the hell's that thing doin' up here?" Ed muttered. "Can't these people afford cabs?"

  There were houses on each side of them, but most were hidden from view. They were the houses of very rich people, famous people.

  Below them lay Beverly Hills on one side and, across from them, Bel Air on the other, the neighborhoods of plenty of rich and famous people.

  Suddenly, without warning, there were cars parked on each side of the road. They were everywhere. People were leaving a few of the cars and walking toward an enormous wrought-iron gate.

  "A party," Ed muttered.

  "What?" Ethan asked.

  "This is it. Calisto's mansion. Looks like he's throwin' a big one."

  "Why the bus?"

  "Probably a shuttle. If I'm right, this road comes to a dead end, and that ain't where the bus is goin'."

  "What should I do?" Ethan hissed. "The bus is slowing."

  Red taillights flared as the gate opened. The bus turned through the gate, which closed behind it.

  "Now, what do I do?" Ethan asked again.

  "Drive slowly along the road, we'll turn around at the dead end, come back, turn around ... just keep drivin' back and forth like you're lookin' for a parkin' place, unnerstand?"

  "Yes, yes, of course. But why?"

  Ed did not respond. Instead, he handed the gun into the backseat to Doc and said, "Eyes open."

  Doc grunted, resting the gun behind Tex, the barrel touching the back of his head.

  Ethan kept driving, slowly. When he got to the dead end, he had to make a three-point turn because cars were parked even there, beneath the tall oaks that rimmed a wooded patch of Calisto's property.

  He headed the car back down the hill, just as slowly as before. Once they'd passed the parked cars on either side of them, Ed said quietly, "Okay, turn around, do it again."

  "Why?"

  "Just do it again, Padre."

  Ethan made a U-turn, went back up the hill to the dead end, turned around again, and started back down at a snail's pace.

  A man stepped away from a car parked to their left — a Toyota that stood out like a sore thumb among the Porsches and Mercedes and Ferraris and Rolls — and walked into the street, stopping a few yards in front of them. He stretched his arm out to hold up a badge so they could see it clearly.

  "Oh, shee-yit," Ed growled.

  Ethan stopped, every muscle in his body tensed.

  Ed spoke rapidly: "We're lost, you hear me, we're just lost, tell 'im we thought this was the right road and — "

  The man with the badge knocked on Ethan's window with a knuckle. Ethan rolled it down and smiled nervously.

  "Can I help you?" the man said.

  "Well, um, see, we're lost," Ethan sputtered. "We, um, it seems we, um, took the wrong turn, or the wrong road, or maybe we just read the map wrong 'cause — "

  "Pastor Walker?" the man said.

  Ethan flinched.

  Everyone in the car froze, except for Tex, who had been silently staring at his lap and hadn't moved at all for a very long time. "Well," the man said, "you are Pastor Walker, aren't you?" Ethan nodded slowly, cautiously.

  The man showed his badge again. "Lieutenant Leonard Shockley. LAPD. I'm a good friend of Andy Roberts's, the San Francisco cop who investigated the killing of your friend's dog. Mr. Colloway? Who's also a friend of Mr. Noble's?"

  "Oh, thank you, god," Ethan breathed.

  "Son of a bitch," Ed said, leaning toward the open window, "you know what's goin' on here?"

  "I know what's going on with you," Shockley said, "I know exactly what's going on with you. I've been told everything. And I'm here to help. But I don't know what the hell is going on here," he added, jerking his head toward the mansion atop the hill.

  "But you know it stinks, right?" Ed asked.

  "To high heaven."

  "You got any ideas, Mr. Policeman?" Ed asked.

  "Well ...” He lifted his head to look at the gate. "Best thing I can come up with is to follow that bus down the hill, find out where it's picking people up, and just step right onto the damned thing. Far as I know, the invites are taken at the door. If you walk in with a crowd, you've got a good chance of getting in there."

  Ed grinned. "Why're you doin' this, officer?"

  "Look, my ass is on the line, here. I'm doing it for a friend I'm indebted to ... and because something's really wrong here. And remember, I didn't say I was going in with you. If I have to, I'll call in some backup, but only if I've got good reason to. I'm not puttin' my ass that far over the line."

  Ed's grin did not falter. "This is your jurisdiction, ain't it?"

  "Yeah, it's my jurisdiction, but I'm not gonna try to fix something until I know how broke it is."

  "Smart man," Ed said with a nod. "Don't worry, we can take care of ourselves."

  Ethan suddenly interrupted. "What are you talking about, you mean, go in there and — "

  "Don't worry, Padre, everything'll be fine," Ed assured him, then turned back to Shockley. "We're gonna just drive back and forth like we're lookin' for a parkin' place until that shuttle bus comes back out. Then we're gonna follow it, find out where it goes, and catch a ride soon as we can. We'll get in there, don't worry."

  Shockley nodded at him. "You Ed?"

  "Yeah."

  "I've heard about you, too." He looked in the backseat again. "This Doc?"

  Doc nodded.

  "How about this other fella?"

  "Well, Lieutenant Shockley," Ed said, still smiling, "it'd sure be a big help if you took this son of a bitch off our hands. He's a pedophile, he aided in the kidnapping of two people and the murder of two others."

  "Now ... why should I believe that, Ed?" Shockley asked suspiciously.

  "You can ask him. He told us, I don't know why he wouldn't tell you. Hell, we ain't even cops."

  "You have proof of this?"

  "You help us get outta this and we'll take you to his little playhouse out in the desert. 'Senough to make you lose your lunch."

  Shockley wiped his forehead and looked up at the starry sky with a long, heavy sigh. "Boy, oh, boy."

  "Guy's name is Tex. I'm sure he'd be happy to wait in your car with you. Take him over there casual-like, though. We got his hands tied behind his back. Don't wanna attract any attention now, do we?"

  Shockley shook his head slowly and muttered, "You guys're a piece of work. Okay. I'll take him. Then you guys do your thing. I'll be watching. Just remember ... I'm here to help, but my ass comes first. I start feeling something poking at it and I'm outta here like shit through a duck ...”

  Shockley walked casually around to the other side of the car to get Tex ...

  Back in his car, with Tex hunched silently in the passenger seat, Shockley called Roberts back. "Okay, I found 'em. They're gonna go in there."

  "How the hell're they — "

  "Calisto's throwing a party. They're catching the shuttle to the door. Shouldn't be any problem for them to get in with a crowd, even though they don't have invitations. I'm not so sure about the pastor — seems kind of nervous — but from what you told me about Ed and Doc ... well, I think those guys
know what they're doing. In fact, I think they know too much about what they're doing. They're a cop's nightmare ... built like houses and with eyes like vipers ... you sure they're, um, safe?"

  "Mr. Garner said he would entrust his life to them," Roberts said.

  "Well, I sure as hell wouldn't put it up against 'em."

  "You gonna keep an eye on them?"

  "As much as I can. I can't see in the damned mansion, you know. How am I supposed to know if anything's wrong?"

  "Look, if these guys are right about what they think's going on in there, something was wrong long before you arrived. And listen, if you have to call anybody in, don't fuck around with that car phone. Use your radio."

  "I'm off duty, what the hell am I supposed to tell my captain?"

  "Hey, you're a detective, right? A detective's work is never done, on duty or off. And if we're right about this, you won't have to tell him anything except "Thank you for that medal, sir, it's real nice and shiny.' "

  "I've got one of 'em here in the car with me, you know," Shockley said, glancing at Tex.

  "One of who?"

  "Ed says this guy helped in the kidnapping of two people — probably those two writers you told me about — and the killing of two others. And that he's a pedophile. Said he lives in the desert where he likes to play with little kids. They just handed him over to me, hands cuffed and everything."

  "You shittin' me?"

  "Nope."

  "Talked to him yet?"

  "Nope."

  "Bleed him dry."

  After the conversation ended, Shockley turned to Tex and looked at him for a long time. From the radio, static hissed and voices babbled back and forth. Shockley held his badge up in front of Tex. "Know what this is, friend?"

  "A ... badge."

  "That's right." Shockley reached under his suitcoat and removed his gun and aimed it at Tex's forehead. "Know what this is?"

  "A guh ... gun."

  "That's right. Now this" he said, pushing the badge closer to Tex, "says that it's okay for me to use this." He touched the barrel of the gun to Tex's head. "And, unlike you, I won't get into trouble for it. Now, look at it this way. You're safer here with me, just a little. Those guys back there? They would've pulled your arms and legs off like kids pulling wings offa butterflies, and they would've enjoyed it. But you're also with a cop, which means you're fucked anyway, considering what I already know about you. Now, in light of all that, why don't you tell me everything you told them ... and more, if there is more. And if you lie, I'll find out about it sooner or later. Or I might just roll down the window and blow your brains all over the bushes out there."

  Shockley put his badge away, but kept the gun on Tex, who immediately began to talk ...

  17

  Garner had plenty of other projects to work on, but he hadn't stopped working on this one since he'd first discussed it with Coll, Bent, and Pastor Walker. Now that it seemed there was a very good chance Coll and Bent were in trouble, it was much more than just a project, it had become a ... a mission.

  He sat alone in his cluttered apartment. The only light came from a small lamp on the corner of the desk where he was working, from a lamp at the end of the sofa, and from the screen of his computer.

  For the last three hours, he'd been going onto every on-line system he thought might give him access to information about, or articles written by, Dr. Deanna Brooks.

  The apartment was silent as a tomb except for the occasional clatter of his fingers on the keyboard, the crunch of a potato chip between his teeth now and then, or the crackling of waxed paper wrapped around the sandwich he was munching on every few minutes as his eyes remained glued to the screen, reading, scanning. He turned from the screen occasionally to make notes on a yellow legal pad that was scattered with crumbs from the sandwich and spotted with grease stains from the chips.

  He was finding little if anything of importance. The notes were only for future reference, just in case it turned out that some of this stuff did prove to be useful later. But he had his doubts.

  Rob had left the apartment about ninety minutes ago to hit a couple bookstores where Garner had accounts. He was to pick up every book he could find written by Deanna Brooks. Garner knew just enough about these people to know that if she really was involved with them, there was a chance he might find something in one of her books that would tip her hand. They loved to communicate in code, to communicate with one another in ways that toyed with outsiders while keeping them in the dark, and if she was involved, she had a wonderful forum from which to communicate with her fellow Satanists. If that wasn't the case, then maybe there was a name or two, or more, mentioned in the acknowledgments of some of the books that might connect her to them.

  After what Detective Roberts had told him about Deanna Brooks — an empty untouched house, an office that did not appear to be used — Garner had become determined to find out something about the woman that would help them in their search for Coll and Bent as well as their search for the people who had taken Pastor Walker's little boy. If he couldn't find anything on-line or in the books ... well, he decided he'd deal with that problem when he came to it and not until. As a researcher, he'd learned to deal with a problem by working with what he had, and if that failed, then go about finding something else to work with instead.

  He leaned back in his wheelchair, yawned, rubbed his shoulders and the back of his neck hard; the muscles there were burning, a familiar sensation to-him, but annoying nonetheless.

  After a few gulps of Dr Pepper and a couple more bites of his sandwich — cucumber and cream cheese with a few slices of green onions and a pinch of pepper on rye, and it was delicious — he leaned forward and returned his attention to the screen, eyes darting back and forth, scanning the words, looking for something important, something that might stand out and say, "Hi! Lookin' for me?"

  He heard a key in the door. Rob was back sooner than he'd expected, which was fine with Garner. Two heads were better than one, especially if they were each covering different ground. Garner would turn the computer over to Rob and start looking through the books.

  The key continued to rattle ... and rattle and rattle.

  The door did not open.

  "Hey, I'm the cripple!" Garner called out, never taking his eyes from the screen as he popped a chip into his mouth. "Can't you work a key?"

  The soft, metallic rattling sound continued.

  "Rob? ... Rob?"

  Frowning, Garner turned away from the screen to listen ... and then he knew.

  It was not a key. His lock was being picked. Garner moved fast.

  With his left hand, he hit two buttons on his keyboard.

  With his right hand, he reached under the desk, wrapped his fingers around the Colt .357 Python that was secured there with duct tape, and pulled down hard. He heard the tape rip away from the wood and quickly tore it off the gun as the computer went to work.

  In the bottom shelf of the other desk, out of sight from anyone who didn't know where to look, a speaker phone turned on and three mechanical, musical tones sounded: 911. As soon as the female voice at the other end answered, his own recorded voice said, "My name is Lewis Garner. I am handicapped and confined to a wheelchair. I am in trouble and my life is danger. My address is — "

  Garner ignored the tape as it gave the address, knowing it would repeat three times, and instead backed his chair away from the desk and aimed toward the apartment's entryway.

  The door rattled open and someone came inside.

  The man walked in with unhurried confidence wearing a dark blue sweater, blue jeans, and amber-tinted glasses. And he pointed a silver gun equipped with a silencer directly at Garner.

  Without hesitation, Garner fired five shots.

  Each one hit the man, creating black-red blossoms: two in the abdomen, two in the chest, and one in the face.

  The man fell back, fired his gun high — it made a thick popping sound, like someone hitting a pillow with a stick — as his arms splay
ed outward and he danced backward and slammed against the wall. He slid to a sitting position, then fell sideways, leaving smears of blood and brain matter on the wall behind him. His gun thunked to the floor. His eyes and mouth were wide open, but he did not move.

  Garner's recorded voice continued: " — Lewis Garner. I am handicapped and confined to a wheelchair. I am in trouble and my life is — "

  Another man appeared, silent and as if from nowhere, surprising Garner. His gun, also with a silencer, was already aimed. Garner fired again. His last bullet.

  The man was hit — Garner wasn't sure where — and went down. But he did not drop his gun, and he was not dead because his arms continued to move, as if he were trying frantically to crawl.

  Garner slapped his hand onto the controls of his chair, moved away from his desk, past one of the chairs and lamp tables, around the end of the sofa and into his small living room. He spun the chair around, closed the door, and locked it.

  The living room was very dark, but Garner did not turn on a light. He could get through the room with his eyes closed and he didn't want to lose that advantage by lighting the place up.

  The chair whirred and the floor creaked as he went to the door across the room that opened onto the hallway, locked it, then turned to the bookcase next to it.

  From the desk in the other room, he could hear his recorded voice speaking for the last time: " — handicapped and I'm confined to a wheelchair. I am in trouble and my life is in danger. My address — "

  He smacked the Python onto the third shelf down, reached under the fourth, and ripped out another gun, this one a 9mm Beretta with a fifteen-shot magazine, which would give him a better chance than the Python had. As he peeled the tape from the gun, he made a mental note to switch them, put the high-capacity gun under his desk and the revolver under the bookcase shelf ... if he lived long enough.

  Then he stopped and listened.

  There were sounds out there, small sounds of movement, of struggle. A grunt, a soft groan. But the movement continued. The man was wounded, but not so badly that he couldn't move around ... and maybe come after Garner.