by R. J. Jagger
He had a Bachelors degree and a Masters.
Both in mathematics.
“You’re lucky,” she said. “I had a sister. Her health wasn’t good. That’s probably the main reason I never went.”
“Is she still alive?”
“Yes, but only in my memories.”
THE SEDAN ENTERED a rough industrial warehouse area not far from a blue-water dock. Most of the traffic had thinned away.
“Drop off,” Jonk said.
Winter made the first turn she could then pulled over and stopped.
They both knew what was going on.
Tag was hidden away back in here somewhere.
“We’ll give him ten or fifteen minutes to get where he’s going and get inside,” Jonk said. “Then we’ll drive around until we spot his car.”
Okay.
Good idea.
They sat in silence, keeping a lookout, watching everything that moved—mostly 18-wheelers, vans and pickup trucks.
“I was wondering what happened to your eye,” Winter said.
Jonk shifted his position.
“I don’t like to talk about it.”
“Sorry.”
A minute passed.
Then another.
Jonk looked at his watch.
“We’ll give him two more minutes.”
56
Day 3—September 23
Wednesday Afternoon
SONG’S BIKE was an 8-speed Fugi, leisure style, with a comfortable seat, sensible handlebars and a rack over the rear wheel. It had no suspension and wasn’t the lightest thing on the road but it wouldn’t set her back too much when it got stolen. At night she kept it in her office. In the day she chained it to a light post in the alley.
Every once in a while she’d look down and check on it.
This time when she did it, her breath stopped.
There was a man by it.
He didn’t wear a blue bandana but had the same movements and posture as the man who did. He did something to the seat, looked quickly around, then disappeared down the alley at a brisk walk.
What the hell?
She waited five minutes, didn’t see him again and headed down. Under the seat was some type of transmitter, about the size of a cigarette lighter. She left it in place and headed back up to the office.
What else was bugged?
Her office?
Her apartment?
Her whole life?
She turned on the radio to a Chinese station and spent the next hour silently going through her office, looking for hearing devices or transmitters or anything in a different place than where she left it.
She found nothing.
But something was there.
She could feel it.
LATE AFTERNOON SHE ZIGZAGGED around Chinatown until she was as sure as she could be that she wasn’t being followed, then jumped on the back of a cable car at the last minute and disappeared down the street.
She saw no one come into view, pissed that she’d gotten away.
She got off in the financial district.
It was 4:45.
The buildings were already emptying.
People were everywhere.
The place buzzed.
She took an inconspicuous spot across the street from the Transamerica Pyramid and focused on the stream of people getting revolved out of the lobby doors.
At 5:05 the person that she hoped would emerge did.
Rayla White.
The law clerk who worked in Rekker’s department. The one who befriended Shaden and came up with the idea to break into Rekker’s house. The one who was present Sunday night when the mystery woman got killed.
Or didn’t get killed.
The one who might be in a conspiracy with Rekker.
Song followed her to a bus stop, hung behind her as good as she could, then hopped on the same bus and shielded her face as she walked in. The woman walked all the way to the back and sat down. The only other vacant seat was the one directly in front of her.
Song took it and pointed her face forward.
The bus spit out a plume of diesel.
Then rumbled down Market Street.
57
Day 3—September 23
Wednesday Afternoon
CHASE ST. JOHN’S DUNGEON wasn’t the harsh, nasty thing that Teffinger envisioned. The lower level of the house had a walkout basement with walls of glass and a commanding view of the Pacific throwing itself onto jagged rocks at the base of a cliff. The dungeon was on that same level except through a wooden door that led to a windowless room.
Lush carpet covered the floor.
The lighting was recessed into the ceiling. Chase dimmed it until it was hardly there, then powered up an elaborate sound system built into a wall. A song dropped from rich, crystal-clear ceiling speakers.
It was edgy and erotic.
Teffinger liked it immediately.
“What is it?”
“It’s called ‘Touch Me I’m Going to Scream,’” Chase said. “It’s by My Morning Jacket. Have you ever heard of them?”
No.
He hadn’t.
She lit another joint and swayed her body seductively to the music.
The movements of her hips and arms reminded Teffinger of the snake-dancing scene by Selma Hayek in Dusk ’till Dawn. He pictured her sticking her toes between his lips and pouring beer down her leg into his mouth.
That’s not what she did, though.
What she did was take a padded cuff off the wall and fasten it securely to her left wrist.
Tightly.
Not so tight as to cut off her circulation, but more than enough to be inescapable.
Another one went onto her other wrist.
Then two went onto her ankles.
“I’m not into pain,” she said. “What I like is to be controlled. Put me in any position you want. Be my total and complete master.”
“What are the limits?”
“None,” she said. “Do whatever you want so long as it doesn’t involve pain.”
TEFFINGER LOOKED AROUND the room, deciding. There was a rack, an X-frame, ceiling hooks, spreader bars, gags, blindfolds, and some kind of device that reminded him of a gymnastic horse.
He stretched her out on the rack.
Tight.
Barely able to move.
“Looks like someone’s stuck,” he said.
“Looks that way.”
She still wore her clothes.
He unbuttoned her blouse and pulled it to the side as her chest heaved up and down. Underneath was a flimsy, white bra. He pulled it up, exposing perfect tits.
He ran his fingers on her nipples in light circles, barely touching.
She closed her eyes.
“I’m not going to let you go for a long, long time.”
“You’re so evil.”
He raised her skirt up.
She wore a thong.
White.
He bent down and kissed it, then harder, with more pressure.
Then he put a blindfold on her.
“You’re in some serious trouble,” he told her.
“Prove it.”
58
Day 3—September 23
Wednesday Afternoon
AFTER CRISSCROSSING THE AREA for some time, Jonk and Winter spotted the white sedan tucked in a narrow alley between two prefabricated metal warehouses. They almost missed it as they drove past but saw enough to tell it was a white sedan, nose in, tail out with no one inside. They turned right at the first corner and pulled over fifty yards down. Jonk stepped out, walked around to Winter’s side and leaned in the window. “Drive off a mile or so and wait for my call.”
“But—”
“No buts.”
She gave him a look.
“If I don’t call, don’t come back, don’t even swing back simply to drive past and see what’s going on. That’s the important thing. Understand?” She nodded. “If I don’t call, just get somewhere sa
fe and hole up.” He slapped his hand on the roof. “Go.”
She took off.
Then he was alone, walking down a cracked and potholed asphalt street. There were no sidewalks. Weeds choked the sides of the buildings. He looked for a weapon and saw scrap remnants but nothing of substance.
Go for the man.
Forget about the woman.
Do it fast.
Do it with full force.
Don’t worry about whether he dies.
He deserves to die.
HE TURNED THE CORNER and hugged the structures as he came up the street. The man was undoubtedly in one of the buildings on either side of the alley but there was no telling which. An 18-wheeler rumbled through an intersection a hundred yards down the road and disappeared.
Go to the car.
See if there’s a building door near it.
That’ll tell you which one he’s in.
His veins pounded.
Flatten the front tires before you go in.
Don’t give him a way to escape.
He spotted an empty beer bottle, picked it up and broke it against the ground as quietly as he could. The break was perfect. He had a full grip left at the bottleneck and sharp deadly edges at the business end.
Bottle versus face.
Bottle wins.
Every time.
In ten more steps he got to the building on the left of the alley. It had a loading dock in front but the overhead door was down. He walked past it and came to a steel door. He put his hand on the knob and silently twisted.
It was locked.
He listened for sounds inside.
He heard nothing.
He continued on, got to the alley and stuck his head around the corner.
What he saw he could hardly believe.
59
Day 3—September 23
Wednesday Afternoon
SONG WAS VAGUE in her own mind as to exactly what she hoped to get out of following Rayla White. Initially she thought she might get some kind of vibe from the woman, something to indicate whether she was capable of conspiring with Rekker and participating in a plot to make Shaden believe she had killed someone. If that was the reason then, in hindsight, it was a stupid one. The woman wasn’t giving off any vibes. She was just a woman heading home on the bus after a long day at the office.
Song stared out the window.
San Francisco rolled by.
Her heart pounded. This was a lot more exciting than sitting alone in her office behind a desk. It brought out her sharper edges and made the corner of her mouth turn up ever so slightly. Maybe tomorrow she’d follow Rekker himself just for the hell of it.
A phone rang behind her.
“Hey,” a woman said, then got silent, listening. “Okay, nine o’clock at Danny Dan’s. Yeah, don’t worry.”
Danny Dan’s.
What was that?
A bar?
Six blocks later Rayla got out.
Song followed.
The movement felt good.
All her life she’d felt like a lamb.
Delicate.
Suddenly she felt like a wolf.
Not a big wolf, not the meanest wolf in the world, but a wolf nonetheless.
Cool.
RAYLA WENT TWO BLOCKS NORTH and then walked up the steep steps of a narrow house sandwiched between more of the same. She stuck her hand in her purse, fumbled around for a long time, made a mean face and finally pulled out her keys. She stuck them in the lock, turned the knob and opened the door. She didn’t step through, though. Instead she spotted something on the landing by her foot.
She picked it up and looked at it.
It was a yellow rose.
PART OF SONG wanted to hang around and continue the hunt. Another part of her warned that she’d already pressed her luck. She headed back towards Market Street but turned one last time to look at the house.
Was that someone behind the curtain?
Watching her?
She picked up the pace.
The wolf feeling was gone.
The lamb feeling was back.
60
Day 3—September 23
Wednesday Afternoon
TEFFINGER WOULD ROT IN HELL. There were lots of reasons that would happen but the one that developed this afternoon with Chase was the worst, namely he took valuable time away from the SJK case to feed his own selfish pleasures.
Lust.
It would eventually kill him.
Then it would make him rot in hell.
It was all just a matter of time.
He left Chase’s place with one thought and one thought only on his mind. He needed to find Falcon, aka Kristie, to find out what Condor said when he used her services on June 5th. He went back to Passionate Interludes with a few more questions for Karamaza.
“Falcon was sort of a loner,” the man said. “I don’t think she was that tight with anybody. About the closest friend she had, at least that I’m aware of, is a girl named Amanda.”
Last name unknown.
Address unknown.
Cell phone no longer in service.
No photographs.
Condor never used her.
She quit Passionate Interludes more than a month ago. Karamaza had no idea where she went. She might still be in town or she might be farming carrots in Iowa.
He had no idea.
Once they’re gone, they’re gone.
“SHE WAS ABOUT TWENTY-FIVE and had short black hair, sort of stylish,” Karamaza said. “That’s about all I can tell you.”
Teffinger frowned.
Damn.
She’d be just as hard to find as Falcon.
Maybe harder.
Suddenly Karamaza’s face brightened. “I just remembered something. She had a tattoo.”
“Where?”
“It was a dragon. It started on her stomach, that’s where the head was, breathing fire. Then its body wrapped around her ass and down her right thigh, with the tail ending slightly above her knee.”
Teffinger pictured it.
Déjà vu.
He’d seen it.
Where?
Then, wham.
That was the tattoo on the submissive he saw through Condor’s telescope Monday night. She was the woman Chase killed.
OUTSIDE, HE SLIPPED INTO BERTHA and might have felt a spring pop in the seat but wasn’t sure. He turned the key, said Come on, baby, and exhaled when she fired up. He rolled the window halfway down and sat there, wondering what to do. Chase knew Amanda, in the context of the dungeon scene if nothing else.
Amanda knew Falcon.
The question was whether Chase knew Falcon.
Either way, Chase was his best lead right now.
He needed to be careful, though.
He needed to figure out the best way to approach her.
Clouds were building and the wind was kicking up.
Teffinger shifted into drive and took off. Bertha responded with a wobbling and resistance that couldn’t mean anything good.
He got out and checked.
The front tire was flat.
61
Day 3—September 23
Wednesday Afternoon
THE WHITE SEDAN WAS GONE.
Gone.
Gone.
Gone.
The alley was as empty as empty gets.
Jonk ran through it to the end and saw nothing in either direction. What the hell was going on? There hadn’t been time to get Tag out of the building, into the car and take off, Jonk would have heard it. Was the whole thing a setup? Did the Egyptian spot them following and lure them back into this dirty little corner of the world? Was Tag actually somewhere else, a hundred miles away?
Suddenly his phone rang and Winter’s panicked voice came through.
“He’s chasing me!”
“Who? The sedan?”
Yes.
The sedan.
“He’s right on my ass! He’s trying to make me crash!”
The grating of metal pounded into Jonk’s ear.
“Winter!”
She shouted something but her voice was far away, as if the phone had dropped.
Then she screamed.
Almost immediately a loud, crashing sound came from the phone, followed by brutal silence.
The connection was gone.
JONK RAN DOWN THE STREET in the direction Winter had driven.
Asshole.
That’s what he was.
A raging asshole for being so stupid.
First he let Tag get taken.
Now Winter.
He brought his knees up higher, sprinter style, and kept them there even when the burn turned to fire and then moved from his muscles into his brain. His lungs sucked air, deep and hot and furious.
His body wanted to shut down.
He wouldn’t let it.
Screw it.
Screw everything.
He ran even faster.
62
Day 3—September 23
Wednesday Night
DANNY DAN’S turned out to be a dive bar in the Tenderloin district. Song stuck her head inside at 8:45, just to kill her curiosity, and found the place to be narrow and long with a bar down the right side, red vinyl booths and battered wooden tables on the other, and a pool table in the back. The clientele was an overly-loud eclectic mix of grade-C hookers, guys looking for hookers, those already drunk and those on their way.
The place was crowded.
It smelled like stale beer.
Two of the wobblier drunks were leftover remnants from five o’clock, still in suits and ties. Cockeyed ties. The ugly one with the big gut spotted her and said, “Hey baby, come over here and give me some.”
She said, “Sure, I’ll be right back,” and walked out.
The night was dark and windy.
She took an inconspicuous spot in the shadows across the street and waited.
Time moved slowly.
Rayla White showed up at 8:58 wearing jeans, tennis shoes and a long-sleeve shirt—clearly not a hooker—and disappeared inside.
Two minutes later, at exactly nine, a silver BMW drove past the bar and parked down the street. A man got out and headed back on foot. He wore ordinary clothes but had a confident, important strut. He was older, late forties or early fifties, with a square jaw like a boxer’s.