A Shroud of Tattered Sails: An Oregon Coast Mystery (Garrison Gage Series Book 4)

by Scott William Carter

  When the man flicked the switch nearest him, the light over the entryway still made Gage wince.

  It was not much of a light, a soft glow in a small bulb, but it let them see each other well enough. Based on the voice, Miranda's reaction to the man she had seen at the outlet mall, and his own assumptions, Gage expected a young man dressed in a fine suit. The man was on the young side, early thirties maybe, but he was not dressed in a suit. His face was partly shadowed by the brim of his black Portland Blazers cap. He wore a slick green jacket over an Oregon coast sweatshirt, denim pants that were a little worn at the knees, and white tennis shoes with sand stuck to the soles. Except for the Ruger in his right hand, a suppressor attached to the barrel, it was the sort of outfit that could have been worn by any of the thousands of tourists who frequented Barnacle Bluffs every day.

  In other words, it was the perfect disguise if you wanted to blend into the background.

  He expected a powerful man with broad shoulders and big hands. This man, who could not have been more than five feet nine, was lean to the point of being slight. His hands seemed small, childlike even, and he held the Ruger as lightly as he might have held a cigarette.

  When he moved, however, stepping out of the foyer into the living area, he did so with the smoothness and assuredness of a panther. No energy was wasted. The Ruger was not held lightly because he was lazy. The Ruger was held lightly because the man expended exactly the right amount of energy to accomplish a task and no more.

  He stopped a good ten paces away. Closer now, and out from under the light, Gage got his first real glimpse of the man's face—strong chin, hard cheekbones, a handsome face, even if there was still something a little soft about it. Except for the eyes. He'd remembered Conroy's eyes being a bright blue, but those must have been contact lenses. These eyes were a dirty, lifeless gray, like puddles of still water that had caught every bit of dirt and flotsam that floated their way.

  "Engage the safety on the gun," the man said. "Then put it on the floor and kick it over to me."

  "Why should I?" Gage said.

  The man smiled. It was not the smile Gage was intended to see, but the tiny blue capsule held between his perfect white teeth. He quickly sucked the pill into his mouth.

  "I'll spare you the technical name for the poison," he said, "but suffice it to say, it will kill me very quickly if I swallow it."

  "You're lying," Gage said.

  "It's certainly possible. I mean, what kind of man would come up with such a crazy scheme? I suppose the same man who's played the edges all his life, who thrives on those edges and has made millions doing it. As I said, I could have killed you many times without you being able to do a thing to stop it. But why? Then I wouldn't enjoy it. Now, do as I say with your lovely Beretta or I'll just shoot you anyway. Not as much fun, but you'll have forced the issue. If you want to hear what you have to do to save Tatyana, you better do it now."

  "I'll kill you, then find her myself."

  "I concede you might find her in a day or two, but she'll be long dead by then. And not just because she's bound and gagged. You see, Garrison, less than twenty minutes ago, I injected her with a poison similar to the one in my mouth. This poison does not even have a name, it is so new. Developed by North Korean chemists who are not, um, inhibited by some misguided sense of ethics. Much slower acting, and she'll be quite fine if we can get her the antidote in the next twenty minutes, but longer that, well ..."

  Gage hadn't heard a car. It could have been parked at the gas station or someplace nearby, but it could have also meant the man had walked. If he walked, that probably meant she was in a nearby hotel. Still, that only limited the list to a few hundred places.

  "Thinking, thinking," the man said. "Do as I say, and there's a chance she lives. It's all up to you. You will make the choice. I don't kill innocent people. I kill people only out of necessity. It's up to you, Garrison, whether you make that a necessity or not. Right now she is merely a tool."

  "A tool for what?"

  "Tick, tock, the poison does its work."

  "All right, all right," Gage said.

  He engaged the safety on the Beretta and put it on the floor. He kicked it with his foot and slid it across the rug, halfway to the killer. The man, moving with precision, plucked it off the floor and slipped it into one of his jacket pockets. He nodded curtly, then stepped over to the kitchen counter. Keeping his Ruger fixed on Gage, he searched the cabinets until he found a bottle of bourbon. He winked at Gage, then found a shot glass. He poured the brown liquid into the glass until it was about a third full.

  "You're going to have a drink?" Gage said. "Now?"

  "No. But I think you will want to drink this in a moment. I know you're quite a fan."

  "I'm not thirsty, thanks."

  "Thirst has nothing to do with it. And, honestly, you never drank bourbon because you were thirsty, did you?"

  The man reached into his other jacket pocket and brought out a tiny vial, one containing a white powder. He took off the cork and poured the powder into the glass. He opened the drawers until he found a spoon.

  "You see," the man said, while stirring the powder until it dissolved, "I am perfectly willing to admit that I have a number of weaknesses. My ego is the biggest one. My anger is another. When my ego is threatened, I sometimes choose to give into my anger. You were counting on this by telling that journalist your ridiculous collection of lies. But what you did not know is that whether I give into my anger or not is always a choice. I never do so blindly."

  "Whatever you've done to Tatyana," Gage said, "stop it now. You want revenge on me? You can have it. Just leave her out. She's innocent, like you said."

  "Ah," the man said, setting down the spoon and picking up the drink, "how well you play the part of the gallant hero! But, you see, we now come to your weaknesses, which are far more of a liability than mine are to me. First, you're smart. A dumb man, either unable to think rationally or incapable of seeing all the consequences of his decisions, would have just shot me. But you, you calculate the odds, look for your chance. I know you played poker when you were younger, and I was counting on this."

  "I'll play poker with you right now if you save Tatyana."

  The man approached with the drink. "And you'd win, I'm sure! That is not my game, and I only play games I know I can win. You see, we have not yet gotten to your primary weakness, Garrison. You are not willing to sacrifice those you love to obtain your goals. I am. I also loved a woman, you see. But when it was necessary to sacrifice her, I did not hesitate. Now, take this."

  He held out the bourbon.

  "What's in it?" Gage asked.

  "Take it, and I'll explain. I'm offering you a simple choice, and the clock is ticking. I doubt your girlfriend has more than fifteen minutes before the effects of the poison are irreversible."

  Gage took the drink, their fingers brushing. The man's skin was almost as cold as the glass. Rather than hold it, Gage set the drink on the stack of magazines. He couldn't see the powder in the bourbon, but he knew it was there.

  "You put poison in it?" he asked.

  "Of course. Different than the one I gave Tatyana, much swifter, and with no time for an antidote even if I had one."

  "And you want me to drink it?"

  "If you want her to live, yes."

  "So I die, then you give her the antidote?"

  "Now you've got it. I want you to know, as you die, how your weakness killed you."

  "Why should I believe you'll actually save her?"

  "I told you. Because I don't kill innocent people. And with you dead, she's no longer useful as a tool."

  "She could identify you."

  "No, she can't. I took steps to ensure it."

  "I have no reason to believe anything you say."

  "No, you don't. But what difference does it make? If you value her life, you have to believe me. It is the only chance she has. Now, I'm going to count to three. On three, if you have not drank that bourbon, I am going to
shoot you. I suppose, knowing how terrible that poison is in your glass, it will be a faster, less painful way to go, but then Tatyana will die. In order for my threat to be credible, I have to carry out what I promised. And believe me, I will do exactly that. A deal is a deal, and I always see a deal through to the end."

  The man stepped back, five paces away, then ten, his Ruger still pointed at Gage. He was too far away to make a play. He'd get off three shots before Gage had hardly gotten out of the recliner. What else could he do? The cell phone was still in his lap, but there was no way to call for help.

  "One," the man said.

  "Wait… " Gage began.

  "Two," the man said.

  Gage looked at the glass. Was he willing to do it? This was not at all the game he had wanted to play, and all the warnings from Quinn, Alex, and others about the dangers of going it alone came back to haunt him. Now he was being forced to make a choice. He either sacrificed himself willingly, or Tatyana died.

  "Three," the man said.

  Gage, seeing the man edge his finger back on the trigger, reached for the glass.

  It was in that moment that he heard a bellowing cry from the corner of the room—and a blur of motion at the edge of his vision.

  If the killer was surprised, the surprise did not last more than a nanosecond, because he whirled his gun in that direction and got off two shots before the blur even took shape. Thump, thump, the Ruger sounded no louder than a hammer hitting a nail. It was only after the bullets hit their target, one slicing through a leather jacket and into a shoulder, the other blasting through blue jeans and spraying blood and bits of denim on the white wall behind him, that Gage saw that the shape was actually Zachary. He'd crossed half the distance between the hall and the killer before being shot, but now he was going down.

  Now was Gage's chance.

  He was up and out of the chair in a heartbeat, pushing off his bad knee, ignoring the pain. He knew he'd never make it there in time. He knew the man was too fast.

  Which was why he was already throwing what was in his hand—the cell phone— even before taking a step.

  It wasn't a run. It was a wind-up.

  The cell phone streaked through the air. The man spun back as fast as a tiger, squeezed off a shot that blasted the stuffing out of the top of the recliner, but then the cell phone reached its destination. It smacked him right between the eyes, stunning him long enough that Gage managed two steps before the man recovered and brought his gun to bear once more.

  Then Gage was on him.

  They slammed into the vinyl floor, the man's back taking the brunt of it but Gage also taking a knee to the stomach. It didn't matter. He'd bear all the pain and then some. He concentrated on the gun, getting his fingers around the barrel, and he didn't quite manage to do that, but he did have his fingers around the man's forearm. A fist slammed into the side of his head. A knee pounded into his stomach.

  He didn't let go.

  He would never let go.

  It might have continued like that, Gage holding fast to the killer's gun arm, the killer punching and kicking him in any way he could, but then Zachary joined the fray. He pinned the killer to the floor, allowing Gage to pry loose the gun. It took a bit of doing, the killer howling in frustration, but Gage finally managed to rip it free. He had the Ruger and he tossed it aside. Yet that wasn't the only danger.

  The pill.

  The tiny blue pill.

  Gage lunged for the man's mouth, clamping his hands around the jaw, trying to force it open, the killer glaring with bug eyes. Zachary struggled to keep the killer still, even as he thrashed and bucked with all his might. Just had to pry the teeth apart. Fish out the pill. Stop him.

  The was a crackle, like someone biting into a piece of ice, and the glare of the killer's eyes became triumphant.

  Stunned, Gage relaxed his hold on the man's face. It couldn't end like this. The killer grinned with the satisfaction that only a psychopath could feel, and Gage, still with his hands on either side of the man's face, felt the unrestrained glee as well as saw it. An ember of hope snuffed out inside him, a dead lump going cold and heavy in his gut.

  "I ... still ... win," the killer said.

  With each word, he faded a bit more. Gage heard his own heart pounding, felt the sweat stinging his eyes, but he still felt himself separating from his body, because he did not want to be there, not going to be here as this happened. Yet he shook off the feeling and slapped the man hard across the face, but it barely got the killer to blink. He screamed in his face. He shouted for him to tell him where Tatyana was. A bit of blood trickled down the corner of the killer's mouth. The man was almost gone, and he was still grinning. Red teeth. Lots of red teeth.

  Gage lifted the man's head and slammed his skull into the floor again and again, roaring against his failure, letting out all of his rage, each crack louder than the last. A violent man? Yes, he was a violent man. He'd show the world violence. This was how a violent man acted when he stopped keeping the darkness at bay. Again and again, he pounded the man's skull, blood splattering the yellow vinyl, the red growing darker, ever darker. He did this until the eyes were dead, until the killer was really gone, never to return.

  If he allowed himself, he could have gone on taking out his frustration on what was left of the killer, but an image of a bound and gagged Tatyana brought him quickly to his senses. There was still a chance. Somewhere in Barnacle Bluffs, she was alive. He rifled through the man's pockets, praying that there really was an antidote, and found a second tiny vial in the second jacket pocket. A milky white liquid. Could it be? Yes, it had to be, a twisted sense of fairness carried to its conclusion.

  This would save her life—if only he knew where she was.

  Where?

  Curled into a fetal position a few feet away, Zachary groaned. Gage scrambled on hands and knees to the kid's side. The kid, already on the pale side, was deathly white. He held one blood-soaked hand to his shoulder, another blood-soaked hand to his thigh. The wounds did not seem life-threatening, but there was a lot of blood. Gage cast around until he saw the cell phone, the object that only moments ago had been a weapon and now he prayed would once again serve its primary function.

  He popped it open, and, when the cracked screen illuminated, breathed a sigh of relief. Something going right for once. He dialed 911 and glared at Zachary.

  "What were you thinking?" he said.

  "Couldn't ... couldn't let you do it alone," the kid said.

  On the phone, the dispatcher started to answer, but Gage spoke before the words were finished, telling him someone was shot and bleeding, spitting out the address, and disconnecting while the man started to speak again. No time for chitchat. He had to think. He looked at the dead man on the floor, all that inert flesh, that monster who would never hurt another person but had hurt plenty enough already, and tried to will the body to give up the location.

  Nothing. There was nothing.

  He roared at the kid, "Did Zoe make you do this?"

  "No, no."

  "Why did you yell? You lost the element of surprise."

  "Yelled ... yelled because ... stop you ..."

  The kid's eyelids closed, and that was it, he was out. Not dead. No, not dead, just out to the world, the pain too much for him. Stop you. Of course. Zachary had yelled not at the killer, but at Gage.

  He didn't want Gage to swallow the poison.

  It was brave and stupid, and Gage admired every bit of it.

  This was no time for any of those feelings, though. Tatyana needed him. He heard sirens in the distance, and some part of him knew if that ambulance got to his house before he figured out where she was, it would be too late. Think, Gage, think. Where would she be? There were clues, the truth was right there in front of him, it had to be. What hotel would a man like this killer stay at? The very best, just like Omar Koura? That would be the Inn at Sapphire Head.

  If they'd been staying in the same hotel, it would certainly have made it easier for him
to kill Omar without being noticed. Just duck in and out, then scurry back to his room. No, too obvious. He was too smart to be so obvious.

  The sirens were growing louder.

  Think harder. Concentrate. Look at the killer. Think about what he'd said. Was there some sign? The man's clothes told him nothing. He rifled through the rest of the pockets, both in the jacket and the jeans, and as expected, found nothing—no wallet, no keys. All right, something else. Wait. The bottom of the shoes. What was that? It was sand caked in between the treads of the soles. There was no sand anywhere near Gage's house, his drive made of gravel, then the highway below. Maybe the killer had not driven at all, but walked, walked from the beach. Why the beach? What was on the—

  "Preparing for a cruise to Hawaii," the man said, with a laugh.

  Of course!

  It hadn't been just a joke, but a little slip of the truth. What do you take on a cruise? A ship. What was the closest ship?

  The one Miranda had sailed to shore.

  Was it still there? Had to be. It was such a bold place to hide Tatyana that no would even think the killer would dare do it, which perfectly fit the man's personality. Gage sprang to his feet, ignoring the thousand shrieking demons in his knee. Pain unimaginable, but what was pain when the life of someone you loved was on the line? Gage had been there before, seven years ago, and this time he could not be too late.

  If he was too late, then he might as well go back to the house and drink that special brand of bourbon the killer had concocted for him. He couldn't go through this again. He wouldn't go through this again.

  Already running full out, he burst through the door. He clasped the vial in his hand like a baton. The night air was thick and heavy, cold in his lungs, wet on his face. The wail of sirens were so piercing that he knew the ambulance was coming up his drive even before he saw the sweep of red and blue lights on his arbor vitae, on his gravel driveway, on the side of his house. No, not an ambulance—a police officer, standard procedure when someone reported a shooting. Gage realized this right as the headlights were rounding the bend, coming into his view.