by R. J. Jagger
No messages.
No calls.
What was going on?
He didn’t want things to end before they started. Well, correction. They had started. They had significantly started, in fact, at least from his end of the equation.
He threw water on his face, popped in his contacts and headed out the door for a three-mile jog, reflecting on last night’s investigation. Every single roofing nail had been collected. The game plan was to weigh them, find out where they were sold in town and then see if anyone had made a purchase recently in that approximate poundage. He could already hear Sydney complain that it would be too much work for too little likelihood of success.
She’d have a good point but right now he was willing to buy any likelihood of success.
Also, last night, he interviewed the 911 caller—the one who had been driving the white Cougar and found Rain St. John unconscious. He turned out to be a guy named Dave Montgomery. They got his phone number from the 911 incoming log, dialed him up and asked him to come back to the scene for a chat.
“I might be too drunk to drive,” he said.
“We’ll send a cab.”
“But that’s because I drank after,” he said. “Not before.”
“Of course.”
“I just don’t want any DUI problems, if I come down.”
“You won’t,” Teffinger said. “This isn’t about you.”
“Okay. I just want to be sure.”
“If you do know anyone who drinks and drives, though, you might want to tell him to cool it before it bites him big time,” Teffinger said.
“Point taken.”
Montgomery turned out to be an obnoxious carbon life-form with a greatly exaggerated view of his own relevance to the universe. Teffinger tolerated breathing the same air as him for as long as he could, then packed him in a cab and sent him back into the world. In the end, Montgomery didn’t add much to the picture other than the fact that the empty Honda parked at the end of the road was already empty when he got to it. For all he knew it had been sitting there for a week.
TEFFINGER FINISHED HIS JOG, showered and arrived at the office at 7:22 a.m. At this hour of the morning the place was a morgue even on weekdays. On a Saturday, like now, it was a sub-morgue.
When Sydney showed up at eight o’clock he had a fresh pot of coffee waiting. She carried a white bag in her left hand.
“What’s in the bag?” he asked.
She set it on the counter next to the coffee and poured a cup.
“Nothing,” she said.
“It looks like a donut bag.”
She studied it and said, “Yeah, it kind of does when you look at it from an angle.”
“So is it?”
She shrugged.
“I don’t know.”
“You don’t know?”
She left the bag on the counter and took a chair in front of his desk.
“No. I never looked inside.”
“So you have no idea what’s in there?”
“Not a freaking clue.”
He stood up and headed that way.
“You want me to check? Just to be sure it’s not a bomb or something?” he asked over his shoulder.
“Go ahead,” she said. “Just don’t cut the white wire.”
He chuckled.
“I thought it was the red one you don’t cut.”
He opened the bag and found eight donuts—white cake with chocolate frosting—his all-time favorite. He grabbed one, took a step towards his desk, then grabbed another one to save a trip two minutes later, and gave her a hug on the shoulders before he sat down.
“I’m going to marry you someday,” he said. “You know that I hope.”
She rolled her eyes.
“I’ll take that as a threat,” she said.
He filled her in on the events of last night and what he’d learned so far, including his theory that although Rain St. John had been dumped back into the world alive, Tracy Patterson might not be as lucky.
“What I need you to do is get a search warrant for Tracy Patterson’s house and see if there’s anything there that sheds any light on the matter,” he said.
“That’ll take a good chunk of the day,” she warned.
“That’s why days come in full lengths,” he said. “So you can take chunks out of them.”
WITH THREE DONUTS AND A POT OF CAFFEINE in his gut, Teffinger headed over to Denver General to interview Rain St. John, who was now reportedly conscious and able to talk. The first thing he noticed when he walked into her room was that she had one of the sexiest faces he had ever seen, with bright blue eyes perfectly balanced against a golden tan. The second thing he noticed was that her hair was chopped off.
Rex Higgins told him about that last night but he forgot.
What a mess.
She must have read his mind because she said, “It’s the new weed-whacker look. Six months from now everyone will have it.” Her voice had a soft sensuous intonation.
Very sexy.
He held out his hand. “Nick Teffinger, Denver homicide,” he said. “Sorry about the stare.”
“Not a problem,” she said. “I’ve been doing it myself.”
She held up a hand mirror to prove it.
“There’s a nasty rumor going around that you haven’t been having that great of a time for the last couple of days,” he said.
She chuckled.
“That particular rumor’s probably more true than most,” she said.
He nodded.
“You want to start at the beginning and walk me through it?”
He expected her to say Sure and start right in, but instead she cocked her head and said, “What’s in it for me?”
He studied her.
“I don’t know. What do you want to be in it for you?”
She retreated in thought.
“Dinner.”
“Dinner?”
She nodded.
“Someplace nice. Unless you’re too embarrassed to be seen with this hair.”
He put on an inquisitive look. “Someplace nice, huh? There are people who will tell you I’m the cheapest guy on the face of the earth,” he said.
“Okay. McDonald’s then.”
“I didn’t say they were right,” he added.
“So something in the middle then, is that what you’re saying?”
He shrugged.
“I guess I am.”
She held out her hand and they shook on it.
Then she told him the story.
HE LET HER TELL THE WHOLE THING in her own words without interrupting her. Then, ever the detective, he brought her back to the beginning and asked questions.
She didn’t know Tracy Patterson.
She didn’t recognize her picture.
She’d never heard the name before.
In the end the rules intrigued Teffinger more than anything. He had her recall them in the exact language that was on the paper, as near as she could, while he jotted them down in a little spiral notebook.
Then he made sure he had them listed in the same order that they appeared on the paper.
“So now you owe me dinner,” Rain said.
“That’s the deal,” he said. “When?”
“Tonight.”
“Really?”
“Yeah. Is that okay?”
“You’ll be out of here by then?”
“I’ll be out in an hour.” She diverted her eyes and then looked straight into his. “I’m really looking forward to it.”
“Me too.”
She grabbed his hand, briefly, and squeezed.
“Good.”
FORTY-FIVE MINUTES LATER, back at the office, he typed out the rules and faxed them to Leigh Sandt with a short note—“Call me.”
Chapter Thirty-Nine
Day Six—May 10
Saturday Morning
______________
AS FAR A TARZAN WAS CONCERNED, last night had been a major pain. The two mystery women showed u
p again. It was only by incredible blind luck that Trane ended up taking an unplanned hike to the roof to snap a few night shots. It was only by even blinder luck that he spotted movement on top of a boxcar out of his peripheral vision.
Two shapes.
Almost invisible.
The telephoto camera lens pulled them in enough that he recognized the left shape as the woman from the darkroom—the one with the flat stomach. The other one wore a baseball hat and moved around so much that he couldn’t pull her in for a good look. If he’d been smart he would have taken pictures of them.
Close ups.
But instead of being smart he let anger explode his brain cells.
He let himself be stupid enough to grab a rifle.
He let himself be stupid enough to fire.
As soon as he pulled the trigger he realized how incredibly crazy he was. The thought reached his brain before the bullet reached the women.
He already knew he wouldn’t fire again.
The women disappeared over the edge of the boxcar almost immediately.
The right one moved weird as if she’d been hit.
This was serious.
The big question is whether they’d call the cops. He had to assume they would and knew he couldn’t be there if they did. So he ran down the stairwell, grabbed the first camera case he could get his hands on and pulled everything out.
A camera.
Film.
A lens slipped out of his fingers and fell to the floor with an explosion of glass.
He stuffed the case with cash, checkbooks, passports and one special compact disc hidden on top of the kitchen cabinets. Two minutes later he pulled the pickup truck out of the garage and squealed into the darkness while the garage door closed behind him.
If the police showed up he’d disappear forever, plain and simple.
He looped to the north and wedged the truck between two buildings where he could see both his place and the railroad yard. If the cops went to either location he’d spot ’em. Then he sat there with the engine off and waited; waited all night to be precise.
The cops never came.
When the first rays of dawn broke he went home, fell into bed and closed his eyes. Ten seconds later the world disappeared.
THE AROMA OF COFFEE and the clanking of glass pulled him back to consciousness at some point later, a point that could have been ten minutes or ten hours.
He squinted and saw Del Rae in the kitchen. The air smelled like scrambled eggs. Water percolated into a half-filled coffee pot.
He twisted to his back, stretched, and said, “Morning.”
She walked over and looked down.
He wore nothing.
“You’re too gorgeous for your own good,” she said. “Don’t move.” She hustled back to the kitchen, took the frying pan off the burner, and set it to the side. Then she came back and climbed on top.
Afterwards they dressed, sat on barstools at the kitchen island and worked out the details of their next few moves over coffee, eggs and pancakes.
WHEN DEL RAE LEFT, Aaron put on his Dick Zipp suit, hopped in the Wrangler and pointed the front end towards the hideaway, just to be sure that nothing weird had happened during the night.
Nothing had.
His little catch, whatever her name was, laid there on the crappy mattress exactly where he left her, still unconscious, breathing almost undetectably.
He took eight Polaroid snapshots of her, just like he did with Rain St. John, then he ran his hands up and down her body, mesmerized by the smoothness of her skin, before shooting fresh drugs into that wonderful little bubble-butt of hers.
Outside he yelped like a coyote.
A startled magpie on the roof flapped away.
From there he drove straight to the piece-of-crap trailer that he rented from Mr. Dog Owner for three hundred bucks. He placed photographs of Rain St. John and the new woman under a box of salt in the simulated-wood cabinet above the fridge and sat back to wait.
Minutes went by.
Then an hour.
Then two.
Finally his cell phone rang.
BUT IT WASN’T DEL RAE. Instead the voice of Dexter Vaughn, the VP of Three Streets, came through. “Dude,” he said. “I’m breathing heavy. Can you hear it?”
He could.
“Ask me why I’m breathing heavy?”
He did.
“I’m glad you asked,” Vaughn said. “I’m breathing heavy because I just got off the phone with Andrew Guzman, the President of Sensory Perceptions. He went a hundred percent nuts over that spider’s web shoot. I mean this guy couldn’t stop telling me what a genius you are. I lied and agreed with him, of course. I knew when I saw the pictures that we were definitely going to be in play, but had no idea this guy was going to react anything like what he did.”
Aaron grinned.
“Cool,” he said.
“Not, not cool, way cool,” Vaughn said.
“So now what?”
“He wants you to get going on a second concept. Something just as good.”
“Just as good?” Aaron said. “How about something even better?”
Vaughn chuckled.
“Yeah. I think I could get him to settle for that. You got it in you?”
“Let’s find out.”
FIVE MINUTES LATER THE PHONE RANG AGAIN. This time it was Del Rae. He didn’t answer but instead counted the rings.
Four.
Perfect.
That meant that everything was in play.
The game was on.
Thirty minutes later he walked outside, got in the Wrangler and drove off.
Chapter Forty
Day Six—May 10
Saturday Morning
______________
BY THE TIME THEY GOT OFF THE BOXCAR and back to the Audi, Ta’Veya’s sweatshirt and pants were drenched in blood. Paige drove while Ta’Veya held a hand to her side and fought the pain. When Paige pulled up to a massive building, Ta’Veya saw the Emergency sign and said, “What are you doing?”
“What do you mean?”
“No doctors!”
“Why not?”
“Doctors know gunshots,” she said. “They got to report ’em to the cops.”
“So what?”
“We can’t be tied to this guy.”
“Fine, we’ll make something up.”
“No,” Ta’Veya said. “It’ll unravel. Get out of here.”
“But—”
“Now!”
Twenty minutes later they were at the hotel room. Ta’Veya lay on her back on the bed, barely conscious. The best way to remove her clothes would be to cut them off to avoid further injury, but Paige didn’t have scissors. So she pulled the sweatshirt off over Ta’Veya’s head.
The source of the blood became obvious.
The bullet had clipped the side of her abdomen, to the left of her bellybutton, just above the hip bone. A four-inch gash at least a quarter-inch deep oozed blood, slowly but steadily.
“This could have been a lot worse,” she said. “A little lower and it would have shattered your pelvic bone.”
Ta’Veya pushed up to her elbows and looked down.
“Stitch me up,” she said.
“With what?”
“I don’t know. Go buy something.”
“I don’t know how to do anything like that,” Paige said.
“You’re going to learn—hurry!”
Two seconds later Paige was almost out the door when Ta’Veya shouted, “Hand me the whiskey bottle before you leave.”
THAT WAS LAST NIGHT. They got up early this morning to check on the wound. It must have opened slightly during the night, judging by the new dried blood, but now it seemed well sealed. They cleaned it, went back to bed and didn’t wake up until noon.
Paige hadn’t slept that late since she was thirteen.
Ordinarily she’d be upset at wasting so much of the day.
Today she was just glad to wake up at all.
> She took a shower, fetched coffee and donuts for breakfast, and then asked, “Now what?”
Ta’Veya sat at the kitchen table, stiff but upright, in clothes that weren’t covered in blood. To a stranger she’d look normal.
“Now we need to be more careful,” she said.
“I’m serious,” Paige said.
“So am I.”
“I’m starting to think it would be easier to just disappear,” Paige said, which was true.
Ta’Veya’s response came immediately.
“No, never.”
“Just until the cops catch this guy—”
“You can if you want,” Ta’Veya said. “In fact, maybe you should. Throw your cell phone away, drive to California and wait on tables under the name Martha. Stay in touch. I’ll call you when it’s over.”
Paige chewed on the words and said nothing.
“I’m not running, though,” Ta’Veya added. “This guy played me like a puppet for years and then stuck me in a boxcar with a razorblade, not to mention what he did to all those other women. The world’s going to be better off without him and I’m going to be sure that happens.”
Paige stood up and paced.
“If I die trying then at least I tried,” Ta’Veya said. “At this point I don’t care. I really don’t.”
Paige stopped pacing and looked at her.
“Okay,” she said.
“Okay what?”
“Okay I’m in. So back to my question—now what?”
Ta’Veya held her arms out for a hug.
Paige gave her one.
A long one.
A tight one.
“The first thing we do,” Ta’Veya said, “is get our sweet little undead bodies over to Hertz or Avis or somewhere and rent a couple of cars.”
“Why?”
Ta’Veya stood up and lifted her shirt to see if the stitches were holding.
They were.
Nor did she see any indications of infection.
“I’ll tell you on the way,” she said. “You can thank me later.”