Daemon: Night of the Daemon

by Harry Shannon

  Pops moving closer. "Okay."

  Under normal light, the walls looked bland. They were covered with some kind of cheap off-white semi-gloss paint that had been slopped over peeling wallpaper. "Okay, shut it off and look."

  Time to adjust. With the night vision goggles on, the walls were streaked about waist high, finger and palm prints that seemed weird, almost phosphorescent. Pops clucked his tongue, took several photos with an NV filter. "Now what the fuck is that?"

  "I don't have a clue."

  "Well, the place seems empty. What now?"

  "Let me think."

  "What's bothering you, boss?"

  "Besides slime on the walls, the booby traps, that somebody has been in the yard—oh, and those empty doggie bowls? Nothing much."

  "The cellar?"

  "The cellar."

  "I saw a doorway off the kitchen with a couple of steps," Pops whispered, "but it didn't look like there was much there but tools."

  Lehane looked down at the dirty rug, kicked it out of the way. "Okay, let's look for a different entrance, but play it like our guy's still here."

  The quiet search took less than two minutes. They found the trapdoor under the stained bedroom carpet. There was enough space between the slats of wood to see that it was not rigged. Lehane stood back and covered the entire area while Pops gently lifted up the hinged square carved in the wooden floor.

  "Jesus, that stinks."

  "Yeah, whatever it is, it's down there."

  Concrete steps led down into the gloom. Lehane went first, sweeping his Glock to and fro. He moved quickly into the darkness and Pops followed, taking photographs. They searched the area. The enclosed room below was no more than seven feet high, but seemed to cover most of the footage beneath the two-bedroom home.

  "Some kind of half-assed bomb shelter, maybe."

  "Maybe."

  "Boss, check it out."

  Lehane followed the line of sight. First, a rusty wheelbarrow filled with dried concrete and some bags of powdered cement. A shovel crusted with white. Next he saw a flat wall made of used bricks. Scrawled on that wall in some kind of dried, dark fluid was the word NO.

  "Light it up."

  Eyes closed again. They each removed their NVG in order to see normally. Pops checked the wall again with the flashlight. Lehane heard the camera clicking. "Fuck me, it's written in blood, Jeff."

  Feeling claustrophobic, Lehane moved back to the steps and quickly listened for any untoward noise above. He didn't want to get trapped underground, in the dark. "Keep looking around."

  "Whew."

  "What?"

  "I found Fido."

  Lehane trotted across the small space, until he could see what was trapped in the beam of the flashlight. A filthy, medium-sized Collie lay dead on the floor, half wedged under a workbench littered with tools that were orange with rust. The wide-eyed, bloated body was ripped open and crawling with maggots and flies. Pops took photos.

  "You see that?"

  "Yeah, and it looks like somebody's been biting off big chunks for a snack, probably post mortem."

  "Man and I thought I'd seen it all."

  Pops played the light along the floor until he came to a space in the brick. "Hold on, what's this?"

  Lehane jogged back to the steps again, listening for any sign of movement above. "What do you have?"

  "Holy shit."

  Back to Pops, who was taking more pictures while down on a knee.

  "Show me."

  Pops pointed to the hole in the bricks and shined the beam of the flashlight inside. Lehane squinted, trying to make sense of what he was seeing. When it all came together, he recoiled a few inches and nearly banged his head on the opening. A wild-eyed dead man wearing only a pair of stained boxer shorts lay contorted inside what appeared to be a makeshift tomb. His clawed hands were bloodily devoid of fingertips and his mouth yawned open in a silent scream. He had clearly been buried alive.

  "Pops, meet Santiago, the stoner brother. I'd say he's been dead for a few days."

  "Look behind him," Pops offered, weakly. His voice seemed unusually strained. "Dude, this is some very weird shit."

  Lehane followed the yellowing beam. In the crowded gloom he saw four empty gunnysacks, a few loose bricks and a large pan that had once held fresh cement. A large-blade, heavily encrusted trowel lay near the man's knees. He'd done the final brick work himself, from the inside.

  "Jesus," Pops said, "what kind of crazy asshole eats his own dead dog and buries himself alive in the basement?"

  SIXTEEN

  To become whole,

  let yourself be broken.

  If you want to become straight,

  let yourself become twisted.

  If you want to become full,

  let yourself become empty.

  If you want to become new,

  just become old.

  Those whose desires are few shall receive

  those whose desires are great lose out.

  The Master embraces the Tao,

  as an example for the world to follow.

  He is not self-centered;

  people can see the light in him.

  He does not boast,

  Yet becomes a shining example.

  He does not glorify himself,

  and becomes a person of merit.

  Because he wants nothing from the world,

  the world can not overcome him.

  These are not empty words.

  All who do these things will be made complete…

  Lehane sealed his hotel room as best he could by closing all the curtains and unplugging the alarm clock. As usual, nothing helped and he tossed and turned all night. He had seen countless bodies, in combat and at crime scenes, but something about the contorted face in that cement tomb haunted his dreams; and so poor Santiago stalked him through dark alleyways and down rains-swept streets, with that gaping mouth leaking drool. The pillow and the sheets became soaked with sweat so thick and sticky it felt like blood. The man had eaten a dead animal. Why?

  During moments of clarity, Lehane knew that it was not the horrific nature of the death that disturbed his sleep as much as it was the odd mixture of emotions forever frozen on the features of the corpse. Lehane thought he read agony, terror, rage, bewilderment, hunger and bloodlust, all in the same countenance. And he'd seen something very much like it before, in Iraq.

  He dropped off, but for just long enough to feel a dull abdominal ache when bitter consciousness returned. A nocturnal party in transit stopped on the strip outside; car horns beeping, voices screaming obscenities and sexual threats. Eventually they moved on and relative silence returned. He got up to adjust the air conditioning, which seemed to have no reasonable setting in between frigid and sweltering, and stripped down to his underwear. He was unable to rest.

  Lehane finally sat up, started some coffee and turned on the news. The early morning shows that covered the discovery of the bodies referred to the case as a homicide, but gave no other details. No wonder, Lehane thought, it's going to take the forensic teams more than one night to figure this one out.

  He and Pops had covered their tracks well. They'd taken the cheap stereo, a DVD player and a small television to explain the broken windows and give the appearance of a simple burglary, but other than that the team left the house virtually undisturbed. The disarmed bombs would simply appear, to the untrained eye, as having been badly rigged. The startled cops would figure they caught a lucky break.

  Lehane went downstairs before dawn and talked the hotel into opening up the gym. He stretched, jogged a couple of miles on a treadmill while zoning out on some classic rock from the Muzak. He then did some circuit training with the weight machines and ran three miles at full speed. He stretched again and left the empty gym just as the first of the portly businessmen arrived to work off his hangover. After a quick shower and a bowl of fruit from room service, he felt almost human again.

  The meeting had been called for nine sharp, and Whiz was
ordered to have everything he could possibly gather on Lou Grainger assembled into detailed information packets for their little team. Lehane showed up at the conference room nearly an hour ahead of time, telling himself it was just to be sure everything had been properly handled, but the guilty secret was that he wanted to catch Sandy, who always arrived early. He checked the digital projector, the contents of the packets. Grudgingly satisfied he sat down and poured himself some more hot coffee.

  "You'll never change."

  Sandy Hammer stood in the doorway in a light blue summer dress with flecks of color that made her natural blond hair seem to shine. She wore light makeup, hoop ear rings that were dark gold in color. She looked beautiful.

  "Call me compulsive," he said. "What's your excuse?"

  Sandy crossed in front of him as if daring him to notice her perfume. He did. She found her nametag and place at the table, dropped her large beige purse in the seat. "I could make something up, I suppose, but the truth is I knew you'd be here early, and I wanted to talk."

  "So talk."

  Sandy took her time. She made herself a hot cup of breakfast tea, with cream and two sugars, before sitting down opposite him. The flat, shiny surface of the conference table caught both their reflections and ran them together.

  "I've missed you, Jeff."

  "I've missed you, too." He tried to keep the tone perfunctory, but did not entirely succeed.

  "I'm so sorry about Heather." Sandy looked down as if uncomfortable. "We could both be bitchy as hell some times, but I always…I always liked her. Underneath that attitude, she had a good heart."

  After a moment, Lehane surprised himself by chuckling. "Yeah, but she was a hard ass sometimes."

  "That she was."

  "Yeah."

  Sandy looked him in the eye. Lehane felt tightness in his chest as if her gaze were a physical touch. "How are you holding up?"

  He shrugged. "I'm okay, I guess. You know me, I do better when there is something to be doing. It would kill me to sit around and wait for the truth to come out."

  "Are we any closer to the truth?" Sandy sipped some of her tea but her eyes never left his face. "Sometimes I think we're just going around in circles, here. Body after body and for what, you know?"

  "Believe me, I do," Lehane said, quietly. "I know the connections are going to make sense sooner or later, but right now..."

  "Pops seems to think this guy Grainger is our boy. Do you?"

  "He's all we've got to go on."

  Sandy leaned forward and reached out her hand. The moment was awkward. Lehane finally let his own fingers touch hers in the middle of the table. "I don't want to throw a monkey wrench into anything, and this is awfully soon, but you know I'm here for you, right?"

  "I know."

  "Good." She left her hand there longer than necessary and when she removed it he felt a small vacuum, as if his skin were hungry. "Let's grab a drink sometime and catch up on things."

  "Sure."

  A knock on the door. Lehane looked up; saw a large, wide man who had a red-veined, bulldog face with buzz-cut grey hair.

  "Castle? What are you doing here?"

  "You sure know how to make a guy feel welcome," Mike Castle said. If he was bothered by the impolite reaction, he hid it well. He lumbered into the room and plopped down in one of the extra chairs. "Man, I lost my sorry ass at craps last night. I hate working this town."

  Lehane didn't smile. "Like I said, what are you doing?"

  "I work here, remember?"

  "I didn't request you."

  "Charlie Spinks asked me to audit the meeting, see if I could add anything to the mix and maybe help you out." Castle spread his hands wide. "Hey, sorry. Now I feel like a turd in the punch bowl."

  Lehane studied him for a long moment. Maybe Charlie has some good reasons, he thought. This guy did some good work in Bosnia. Hell, everybody was talking him up last year.

  "Okay," Lehane nodded reluctantly. "You can stay."

  Castle eyeballed Sandy for the first time. "You look familiar, didn't you used to be a nun?"

  "That was just a sideline." Sandy extended her hand, murmured her name. "We met briefly the night it all happened."

  "I thought so! Damn, you're good. You ever do any acting?"

  "What a lame line, Castle."

  "Hey, I'm serious. You ever act?"

  "With men? All the time."

  Castle grinned. "I meant where you get paid for being on film or on stage. That type of acting."

  "Now and then," Sandy replied, with dramatic cool. "When things get slow."

  "'Cause you got one of those great faces a guy can't quite remember," Castle said, carelessly. "Suppose I shouldn't say that."

  "Maybe not." Sandy shrugged, but she was now fighting back a smile. "Hell, a girl doesn't ever like to hear she looks ordinary."

  "Okay, let's talk about how much you weigh instead."

  Sandy erupted in laughter. Even Lehane managed a smile. The elevator pinged down the hall and voices approached. He checked his watch and was gratified to see that everyone had chosen to arrive early. Soon Whiz, Pops and Guri were seated and Lehane had dimmed the lights and fired up the DVD. He projected an LVPD mug shot onto the small screen at the end of the table. The surly suspect was heavily muscled with a thin moustache and thick eyebrows. He had a Go Army tattoo on his right bicep.

  "Here he is again, guys. Louis Paul Grainger, formerly of Mesa, Arizona. He's 5' 11 inches tall with blond hair and blue eyes. Note the tattoo and his service in the Army, where he qualified as a Sharpshooter. He's a brawler and a drinker who barely avoided a dishonorable discharge."

  "Looks like my ex-boyfriend," Sandy fired for effect and got polite chuckles.

  "Combat?" Pops, looking at the file.

  "PO said no."

  "I printed out his military record," Whiz said, and yawned. "The clown never even got out of the southwest, much less to the middle east."

  "Pops?"

  "Yeah, boss."

  "The file has a list of strip bars, sex motels and other local hangouts where Lou Grainger might be hiding out. You're going to split that list with Guri and me. Your old pal Castle here will be your backup."

  "Fine with me," Pops said, "as long as he doesn't try to grab my ass."

  Castle blew him a kiss.

  "We'll all start poking around as soon as we leave here. Everybody check in with Whiz before and after each place as you narrow the list. I don't want anyone out of touch for more than a few minutes at a time."

  "We show his picture?"

  "I'll leave that up to you, just watch it. I figure this guy hangs out with a rough crowd, okay?"

  Sandy drummed her fingers on the table. "What about me?"

  "I need you to be a hooker, Sandy. Get out on the street down in his home area and see what you can find out about his sexual habits. Maybe he had a regular punch we can talk to."

  "Story of my life."

  Lehane went back to work. "Okay, also in the file you're holding, Grainger did two felony stretches in Humboldt and holds membership in the AWG. Note also the teardrop tattoos on his knuckles." Lehane paused. "Thanks to Whiz, we got an ID on the biker that came after me the other day, the one with the same tattoos. He was in the same cell block as our boy."

  Guri grunted. "Finally some kind of connection."

  "Yeah, and as you all know he was the boyfriend of the PA that tended to our shooter from the concert, Mr. Roger Gordon."

  "I'm getting a migraine," Pops said. "What we got is a ton of loose ends that don't add up to shit. Nothing that explains why Gordon shot at you or killed Heather, why the medic is missing or what Grainger has to do with Gordon. What we need is a road map and a list of players, here."

  "Not to mention the spitting thing." Lehane went to the blackboard. "I look at it as two threads," he said. "One leads from Roger Gordon to Heather and me, then to the medic who tended to him, to Grainger and the brother-in-law who freaked out and buried himself, and finally back here to us.
"

  "Us?" Pops, thinking aloud.

  "Me, therefore us. Roger Gordon seemed to know I would be there, that Heather was my wife. He must know an awful lot about me." Lehane kept writing. He used white chalk to sketch the connections. "Think of it as some kind of circular feedback loop. If we saw a couple of points from the outside, they would all just look like coincidence. It only makes sense when you see the whole thing."

  Guri appeared dubious. "Maybe. What's the second thread, then, the biker thing?"

  "Yeah, from Grainger to the biker who flew on an airplane with Roger Gordon and then attacked me after Gordon missed, then back to Grainger's house and the dead kid in the basement."

  "A second circle."

  "Looks that way."

  "Okay." Mike Castle chewed on his pencil for a moment. "You don't mind me sticking my nose into this?"

  "Shoot."

  "I get you. You're saying that if you find out what connects Grainger to everybody else, you're in business. He's the center of it, and both patterns cross through him. As of now, he's the only consistent link."

  "Until we prove otherwise," Lehane leaned against the wall. "That's how I see it. Now, remember, we still have that Kramer guy, the missing nurse, and some other details to work out. Maybe that part is just an accident or something."

  Castle shook his head. "Maybe, but in a mess this complicated I'd bet he ties in somewhere."

  "What about this biting dead flesh thing?" Sandy said.

  "What about it?"

  "For Christ sake, it even showed up with the stoner and his dog. So how does that figure if Lou Grainger is just some kind of sexual psychopath?"

  "We don't know." Whiz cleared his throat. "But judging from the bio I gave you guys, with the prostitute mother and the abusive upbringing, he certainly does fit the profile of a sexually sadistic serial killer. I'd suggest we proceed under that assumption."

  "And that he's genuinely vicious," Lehane said. "If he's our boy, Grainger has slaughtered women and eaten their dead flesh."

  Pops: "Okay, so that makes him a disorganized serial killer."

  "Maybe," Lehane said. "However, unlike others of that type he has probably also efficiently planned and executed the murders of a couple of men who may have witnessed his actions. That makes him someone who can think outside the box and will likely be very, very dangerous to apprehend."