The knife in the sheath along my back rubs me, and I reach back to move it aside. I sharpened it tonight before I came out. But I doubt I’ll need it. Ana Maria will drop her series once I talk with her tonight. In my own special way.
Movement in the TV station parking lot, and I grab the spotting scope again. Ana Maria stands just outside the back door, looking around like I’m just sitting in the parking lot waiting to speak with her. But she knows better. She knows to meet me a mile through town at Frontier Park. For my own special rodeo.
I bring the scope away, and taillights a block down from the station flick for a heartbeat, then go dark. I put the scope to my eye once more and adjust the focus. There’s only one vintage Oldsmobile 4-4-2 in Cheyenne. Anderson is staking out her car. He’ll follow her to the park.
I hit the steering wheel. And hit it again. And again. Anderson is making it harder for me all the time to discourage Ana Maria. Now I’ll have to get serious. Now I’ll have to use more persuasion than I’d intended. But on the plus side, she’ll be frightened to death tonight. And that will frighten Anderson even more. I begin trembling with the ecstatic thought. What a bonus.
Eighteen
“Hand me that bag of chips,” Danny said.
Arn passed Danny the Fritos. He laid a handkerchief over his lap to protect his holey sweatpants and began crunching on the chips.
“Chew any louder and everyone will hear us.” Arn picked up his binoculars and looked at Ana Maria’s VW Bug parked in the dark lot behind the television station. He checked his watch: the evening broadcast with Johnny would be wrapping up any minute, and Ana Maria would soon leave to meet her caller. Providing he’d phoned again tonight.
“You got another Orange Crush?”
Arn half-turned in his seat. “I got half a notion to let you off here. Whatever possessed me to bring you along?”
“Something about not leaving me at the house where I could freeze? If you haven’t noticed, it’s colder than a well digger’s butt out here.”
“Well, as soon as we’re done, we’re going to AutoZone and grab some new points and plugs for the generator.”
Danny grabbed the bottle opener from the dash and popped the cap on his soda. “That’s all I wanted. A warm place to sit until we could get to the parts store. Not my fault you have something else going on.”
“Shush.”
Arn scooted down in the seat, and Danny took his lead. “That her?”
“It is.” Arn handed Danny the binos. “Looks like she’s backing out.”
Arn waited until Ana Maria had left the station lot and turned west on Lincolnway before falling in several blocks behind her.
“You’d have thought she’d want you to come along.” Danny closed the chip bag and set it on the floorboard. “After all, she’s not big enough to take care of herself.”
“She’s big enough to take care of herself, all right. Trust me. But I’m afraid she might be getting in over her head with this story. Especially if it connects to the Five Point murders.”
“That was something back then.” Danny finished his soda and stuffed the empty bottle in a Walmart bag on the floor. “I drifted into Cheyenne the year before all that. First time I ever felt the need to hang with anyone was when those killings were happening.” He shuddered and drew his collar up. “I fell in with a couple guys from Montana that came here every year during Frontier Days. Best panhandling they ever had, they said, with the rodeo-goers flocking to town. Concerts just begging to have some professional work the crowd. But the two victims were … different, as I recall.”
“Random.”
“Yeah. Random. No one that I hung with felt safe.”
Arn pulled to the curb when Ana Maria caught a red light. “So you and these two guys you just met and split a place?”
“Split a place?” Danny chuckled. “If you call setting up housekeeping in an abandoned home splitting a place.”
“Like you squatted in my house?”
Danny straightened in his seat. “I resent that label.”
The light turned green and Ana Maria turned north toward the Capitol, Arn and Danny hanging back. “As much as I detest the police—no offense—wouldn’t it be smart for her to get them involved?”
“In what, meeting a man who has information he wants to give her? Johnny and Oblanski already made it clear they’ll assign an officer for protection if she demonstrates a need.”
“In other words, if she’s attacked?”
“And only then. Being shorthanded, I’m afraid they’re reactive.”
“I really detest the police.”
Ana Maria drove across 8th and started into Frontier Park. Arn had spent many summers in the park as a kid competing on the high school rodeo team. He’d been a fair saddle bronc competitor, but when the rodeo coach suggested he try bull riding, he started to shine. Until a bull gored him and broke his arm. That sidelined him from the rodeo team and the football team, and in his ambitions to make Georgia the one to break his cherry.
Ana Maria parked across from the entrance to Frontier Park while Arn pulled along 8th and doused his headlights. Danny put the binos to his eyes, straining like he was born to surveillance. “Her dome light just came on for a second.”
Arn grabbed the binoculars. “She’s out of her car. Where the hell’s she going?” Ana Maria had parked in the one spot not illuminated by any street light, her white blouse the only thing bobbing in the darkness. “She’s walking into the park. There.” He pointed and handed Danny the binos.
“But there’s nothing there.”
“Someone’s there,” Arn said, zipping up his coat. “I’m certain.” He handed Danny his cell phone. “Keep watching. If anything happens to me, call 911.”
“Sure,” Danny said. “But how do I use one of these things?”
Arn gave him the quick and dirty class in using the cell to call 911. “Hold your hand over my dome light.”
He opened the door and silently closed it after he slid out. Squatting beside his car, he waited for a pickup to drive by on the street before he cut across the snow-covered grass. He entered the park, using the street for cover, anticipating where Ana Maria was heading.
A half-moon peeked between storm clouds and vaguely illuminated the park. Arn stopped behind a tree and squinted in the darkness. A hundred yards away, something white flickered between trees and bushes: Ana Maria’s white blouse.
Nineteen
Ana Maria parked just where I told her, the darkest spot in the park, away from any streetlights. She gets out of her car and looks around, unaware that Anderson has pulled his car along 8th and is walking this way. Nor is she aware that I crouch under this pine tree, ski mask pulled tight, waiting for her to walk close enough to grab her.
Anderson is gaining, running into the park toward where Ana Maria makes her way closer, yet too far to yell a warning. For the briefest moment, I entertain the notion that I will kill him. Then toss that great idea aside. I like my life the way it is. I don’t want to complicate it by killing again and having the entire weight of law enforcement come down on me, looking for the Five Point Killer. I don’t want to explain I was right in killing those men. All I want to do is get Ana Maria off her crusade to find me.
Ana Maria walks toward the Botanic Gardens. Just like I told her. “I’ll tell you just who killed Butch Spangler that night,” I reassured her when I called. “But come alone,” I repeated. “I don’t want to get drawn into court testifying against the killer.” I thought that was a nice touch. A convincing touch. No one wants to go to court, especially if they have to look over their shoulder for some psycho.
Ana Maria is near, now twenty yards along the path.
I squat behind the tree, legs trembling with the anticipation of what terror she’ll soon be feeling.
She doesn’t know that I won’t hurt her. This time. If s
he drops the special.
Ten yards. She picks her way carefully in the dark.
Five yards.
She stops, looking my way, her hand going into her purse. I cautiously look down at my white garb that blends with the snow, wondering what could have set her off. Then I realize she saw nothing. She heard nothing. It’s that damned woman’s intuition again, and I just have to wait it out.
After a full minute, she resumes along the trail.
I crouch. Legs drawn tight against my chest.
Waiting.
And I pounce.
Twenty
Arn ran from tree to tree, using them for cover, following Ana Maria, until …
Gone. Ana Maria disappeared, and Arn strained to spot her.
He ran toward a huge ponderosa pine where he’d last seen her standing, watching, looking into the darkness. At what?
He reached the tree, his breaths coming in great gasps as much from the running as from his impending feeling that something had happened to her. He left the cover of the tree and stumbled. He bent and picked up Ana Maria’s purse, its strap broken. He tucked it under his arm as he fished out his gun, which was still inside the purse.
White flutters. Off to one side. Just a momentary flash under drooping branches another twenty yards farther in. He bent over while making his way past trees. He snatched a piece of white fabric stuck on a branch of a bush. He held it to what little light the moon afforded: the fabric had been sliced, not torn.
Arn pocketed the piece of cloth and squatted, looking at the light snow that had accumulated last night. He picked up drag marks heading off toward the Botanic Gardens.
Whimpering suddenly. Off to his left. Hanging in the stiff wind. Then it faded when the wind died.
Arn cupped his hand to his ear. Silence.
He strained, looking around the park, but saw nothing. Had he imagined it?
He cocked his ear again, his head pivoting like a miniature sonar, and the whimpering once again rose and fell at the whim of the wind, this time coming from beside the Gardens. Arn walked, then ran, toward the sound, louder the closer he neared, gun thrust out in front of him.
He grabbed his side when a stitch overcame him. He gasped frigid night air until he’d caught his breath enough to run doubled-over toward the noise.
White movement on the ground under a pine tree, and Arn hobbled toward it. Ana Maria lay on the ground beneath the tree, hands and legs and mouth duct-taped. When Arn broke through the trees, her eyes widened. She tried screaming through the tape, thrashing against her bound hands and feet, when—
A short, stout tire billy, like those truckers use, arched out of the night and crashed down on Arn’s shoulder. He dropped to the ground and his gun skidded across the snow, Ana Maria’s purse sliding away. He staggered to his feet, his head swaying, struggling to turn. A man in an oversized hoodie and ski mask swung the bat, and again Arn fell when it cracked into the back of his leg.
He tried standing, but his leg gave out. He fell back onto the frozen snow and matted grass as a heavy weight jumped on his back and forced him to the ground.
A blade reflected moonlight, and a heartbeat later his attacker flicked a piece of flesh off Arn’s cheek. His hand came up to protect his face, but not before another flick of the knife sliced off a piece of his ear, blood trickling down his neck, onto his shirt front.
Then the attacker was gone, as if he had made his escape on the wind.
Arn groped for his gun. Found it. He turned over, backpedaling, getting his back against a tree, expecting his attacker to return for a rematch. When he barely caught the sound of crunching footsteps in the snow running away from him, he knew the attacker had left for good.
He tried to stand but fell back, his leg muscles failing to cooperate with his effort. He crawled atop sticky pine needles jabbing into his trousers. When he reached Ana Maria, he set the gun on the ground beside him and gently peeled the tape from her mouth.
“Good God, are you all right?” she said.
“I’ve been better,” Arn said as he cut the tape from her arms with his pocket knife.
She wrapped her arms around his neck. Her mascara had run with her sobs, making her look as if she were auditioning for a bit part in The Rocky Horror Picture Show.
Arn let her cry into his shoulder until she stopped. “Give me your bandana,” she said. She wet it with snow and dabbed at his cheek and ear. Then she looked wildly around and spied his revolver. She grabbed it and swung it around in the direction the attacker had gone.
“He won’t be back tonight,” Arn said. He gently wrapped his hand around his gun and eased it out of her grasp before she could accidentally shoot him. Setting it in the snow, he peeled the tape from her legs. “Give me the headline version of what happened.”
For the first time, Ana Maria seemed to realize Arn had followed her. “And just what are you following me for?”
“Damned good thing I did.”
“I’m not so sure he actually wanted to hurt me.”
“What the hell kind of assessment is that?” Arn asked.
She looked away, wiping her cheeks with her coat sleeve. “He could have hurt me any time. I think he wanted … you.”
“Bullshit.”
She dabbed his cheek with the bandana again before putting pressure on his sliced ear. “How else do you explain superficial cuts when he could have killed you?” She smiled for the first time. “My purse goes better with your outfit than that one you carry, by the way. Hand it here, and hold the bandana.”
Arn slid her purse over to her, and she fumbled inside for her cell phone. After dialing 911, she sat back against the tree trunk and rubbed her wrists. “He said to meet him at Frontier Park. He said he’d call again once I was here and give me further instructions.”
“To the Botanic Gardens?”
Ana Maria nodded. “I had your gun in my purse, so I felt safe—”
“It’s only useful if you can get to it.”
“But I never had a chance. This guy came out of nowhere. He choked me. Slapped tape across my mouth before I knew what happened. When I tried reaching for the gun, he wrapped duct tape around my wrists like he was tying up a steer. Drug me off.” She stood when the sounds of the sirens neared.
Arn pointed to her ripped blouse. “When did he cut this off?”
“A few yards into the woods. He cut it off and hung it on a tree like he wanted to make sure you followed.”
“All I had to do was follow his cologne,” Arn said.
“I thought I was imagining it.”
“It was the same cologne as the night at the fairgrounds. I’m trying to place it.”
“Old Spice,” Ana Maria said. “I dated this old fuddy-duddy in Denver who went through about a gallon of the stuff a week. That doesn’t help us. Unless we find a suspect dripping in Old Spice.”
“Did he say anything?”
“Just ‘drop the television series,’” Ana Maria answered.
“Would you recognize his voice if you heard it again?”
She waved her arm for the ambulance crew and police who had just pulled into the park. “I doubt it. But next time I’ll have a better plan in mind.”
“Next time!”
The ambulance stopped thirty yards away, and paramedics hauled a gurney from the back.
“What do you mean, ‘next time’?’”
“I’m going to find out who killed Butch Spangler. And the guy I talked to tonight knows who it is,” Ana Maria said.
“Didn’t you learn anything tonight? This guy doesn’t know a thing.”
“Ever heard of woman’s intuition? I just know he can tell me who killed Butch.”
The paramedics wheeled the cart next to Arn. They lowered it and unloaded a jump box with their equipment. “My car’s parked on 8th,” Arn told Ana Mari
a. “Do me a favor and drive it home for me. Along with Danny. And keep my gun.”
“You two out for a date?”
“I’ll explain later. But you’d better have the paramedics check you out first.”
Ana Maria waved the suggestion away. “I’m not hurt. Besides, I got other things to do. Like figure out who this guy is.”
Arn tried standing, but his leg had begun swelling already. He was letting the paramedics load him onto the stretcher when one of them stopped. He bent and picked up a chain. Eight inches long, shiny chrome. He handed it to Arn. “You must have dropped this.”
Twenty-One
Arn hobbled into Johnny’s office and shut the door. He tossed the piece of Ana Maria’s blouse onto his desk. “Now maybe you’ll provide her some protection.”
Johnny stuffed papers in his briefcase without looking up. “I read the officer’s report from last night. I’m taking it under advisement.”
“Advisement!” Arn slammed his fist down on Johnny’s desk. A tin cup stuffed with pencils bounced several inches high. It overturned coming back down, spewing pencils and pens across the desk, but Arn made no effort to pick them up. “By the time you get your head out of your rectum, the shithead from last night could kill her.”
“What more do you want me to do? Oblanski’s assigned an investigator to look into the assaults on you two last night.” Johnny closed his briefcase and started for the door. “We have a dozen assaults a week. Do you think we got the manpower to assign a personal bodyguard to all of them? Get real. This isn’t Denver, big shot.”
Arn leaned over, inches from Johnny’s face. “Not every assault victim is airing an investigative report on three police deaths. All which may be connected to the Five Point cases.”
Johnny stopped and hung his head. “Not that again.”
Hunting the Five Point Killer Page 10