Dead Things

by Stephen Blackmoore

  The razor wire flashes like a magnesium flare, the coins drop from Ellis’ eyes and fall into the pan of blood with a dull plop. His body jerks, twists, tries to yank itself off the cross. This goes on for a few seconds then stills. One nail from his wrist falls to the floor.

  “Can you hear me?” I ask.

  Nothing for a moment, then a labored, “Yes.” Voice a reed-thin wheeze that drags its way past decaying vocal chords. I look into Ellis’ empty eyes. Okay. Now I’ve got a dead guy ready to answer questions. So what do I ask him?

  “Where’s Alex?” Vivian says before I can say anything.

  Ellis grunts, but that’s pretty much it.

  “Why isn’t he talking?”

  “Probably because he doesn’t know. Gotta remember, he’s not in there. We’re just, I don’t know exactly, pulling shit out of his brain? Something like that. And it’s probably already starting to rot. So don’t expect much.”

  “Then why are we talking to him?”

  “I’m hoping Boudreau left behind some memories or thoughts behind. Happens with possessions some times. Here, let me try.” I snap my fingers in front of Ellis’ empty eyes a few times to get his attention. They track, after a fashion, and point in my direction.

  This isn’t reanimation as such. More like hooking a frog leg to a battery to make it twitch. This is all about the right questions to ask. Simple questions give simple answers but they don’t always give you what you’re looking for.

  “Let’s start off slow,” I say. “Tell me your names.”

  “Henry Jean Walter Ellis Baptiste Boudreau.”

  “And there we go.”

  “What happened?”

  “Bits of Boudreau got mixed up with bits of Ellis, I think.”

  “Why did he possess him, though?”

  Good question. “Dunno. Whatta ya say, Sparky? Why’d Boudreau pop his ugly mug in there?”

  “Waiting for you,” he says. “Saw the woman. Decided to take her to get to you.”

  Vivian regards the hanging corpse with an uncomfortable intensity. It’s not fear. Disgust, maybe? Fascination?

  I find myself wondering if Boudreau had grabbed her instead of Alex, would I have traded myself for her? The answer comes immediately. Abso-fucking-lutely. And if I have to I’ll do it to save Alex, too.

  “What does he want with me?” I ask.

  “You’re important.”

  “I don’t understand. Important how?”

  “He needs you so he can come back. You are bonded.”

  Takes me a second to connect the dots. “Sonofabitch.”

  “What does he mean by bonded?” Vivian says. “Or come back?”

  “He’s looking to come back here. To the side of the living. That’s why he was after Griffin. That’s why he’s after me.”

  “I’m not following you.”

  “He wants a body,” I say. “He wants mine.”

  Chapter 22

  My head is throbbing. I stand up and start pacing from one side of the garage to the other. I know I’m onto something, I’m just not sure what it is.

  “He can manifest here but he’s still dead, right? Like in the warehouse?” Vivian says.

  “And he can jump into someone else’s body.”

  “Okay,” Vivian says. “But why Ellis? He wants you so why didn’t he jump into you? Or me?”

  Or Griffin for that matter. How was Ellis different? Then I have it. “Boudreau burned him out on purpose.” Vivian’s looking even more lost. “Ellis told me he lost the ability to cast because Boudreau forced him to channel more and more power until he fried himself.”

  “Ellis thought Boudreau didn’t believe the spell to keep him whole on the other side was working, so he kept making him try. I don’t think that was the reason, though.”

  “It was, what, preparation? To let him take over Ellis’ body?”

  “I think so,” I say. “He was probably going to hang onto Ellis, locked away somewhere as insurance. Anything happens to him, he’s protected by Ellis’ spell long enough to move his soul into the guy.”

  “You kind of screwed that plan up, didn’t you?” she says.

  “Yeah. I don’t think he was expecting some punk to crash through his warehouse wall and speed up his timetable. More to the point, I don’t think he was expecting his soul to be fed to a bunch of hungry ghosts.”

  “Otherwise he’d have just jumped right into Ellis when you’d killed him?”

  “I think so, yeah. Instead it took him fifteen years to pull himself together. By then he’d lost track of Ellis.”

  The pieces start falling into place. “He found Griffin at the warehouse, but he was too weak to really hurt him. And once he was strong enough to start casting or becoming solid he found me.”

  “Nice timing,” Vivian says.

  “No shit. And then he spots Ellis in the warehouse, his ready-made vessel. And once he’s got his scent he doesn’t let go. Tracks him to the hospital.”

  “Probably wasn’t expecting to step into a burn victim in the ICU,” Vivian says. “That’s why he wants you. Ellis’ body was a mess. Even without his injuries I honestly don’t know if he would have lived another ten years. Is that why he left with Alex?”

  “To get me?” I say. “I’m sure of it.”

  “No, I mean leaving at all. If he hadn’t needed to he wouldn’t have, right?”

  I play the scenario back in my head. That spell to transport him in spirit and Alex physically to wherever the hell they went had to have sucked up a lot of juice. Which means he had plenty to use. He could have swatted all three of us like bugs. But he chose to run instead.

  “It was after I shot him,” I say. “I tagged his shoulder. Was Ellis alive when that happened?” Sometimes a possession can animate a corpse like a puppet. Kind of like what I did with the headless body in Texas, only from the inside.

  “If he wasn’t that shoulder wound wouldn’t have bled like it did.”

  So, for a while at least, Boudreau was actually alive. Would explain why I couldn’t sense him. He wasn’t something I could sense. And if he was alive—

  “He was scared he was going to die again.”

  “But he’s already dead.”

  “But he wasn’t just operating Ellis’ body, was he? He was actually alive. Hadn’t moved in the whole way, though, right? He still had an escape hatch.”

  I tap Ellis on the side of the head. The eyes flutter a little. “Hey, dead guy, how we doin’ so far?” He lets out a wheeze of air that sounds more or less positive.

  “I’m going to call that a yes,” I say.

  “So he spooks,” Vivian says, “because he thinks you have a real chance to kill him and takes off with Alex.” She frowns, brow furrowing. “So if I hadn’t screwed up your aim he’d be dead, Alex would be okay and we wouldn’t be having this conversation.”

  “What? Hell no. We just figured this out. You made the right call.”

  She doesn’t look convinced, but shrugs it off. “So now you know how to kill him.”

  “More or less. Not counting that we need to get him into another body, preferably one that isn’t mine and when he’s dead again I don’t know what’ll happen to him.”

  “Whatever it is it scares him. Would the spell that held him together before still work?”

  I shrug. “Fuck if I know. Maybe. He’d probably be pretty jacked up, though. You know, if we can get him into someone else I don’t see why I can’t kill him the same way I did before. I just need to be more thorough.”

  “You think he’ll fall for that?”

  “No, but I don’t have a better idea.” I don’t even know how I would get him into another body. One that he hasn’t prepped the way he did with Ellis? And who?

  “What did he mean by bonded?” Vivian says, interrupting my thought.

  “Sorry?”

  She points at the hanging corpse. “He said you and Boudreau are bonded. What did he mean?”

  “It’s because I killed him,
I think. That happens sometimes. Killers and their victims can get linked.”

  “And Ellis?”

  “Don’t know. Probably because of what Boudreau did to him. Goes both ways. Torture might do it. Sheer hate can make a bond. Or love. Griffin, well they were with each other a long time.” But that wouldn’t do it. Shouldn’t do it. What did he do to Boudreau that would make a bond?

  “Can he find you?” Vivian looks suddenly worried.

  I point to the tattoos on my arm. “Don’t know. Maybe.” There’s a thought. It does go both ways, after all. “I don’t know how exactly, but if I have a link to him I might be able to follow it back to him.” But that might make it easier for him to find me, too. “Let’s table that idea for now.”

  I squat so I’m eye level with Ellis’ corpse. “All this leads us to the main question,” I tell him. “Where’s Boudreau hanging out.”

  “Hooouuuussss,” it says, slow and drawn out, the final S a long hiss like escaping air. Whatever’s left there isn’t going to last much longer.

  “House?” Vivian says.

  “Sounded like it. You got an address?”

  “Sssssssuunnnnnssstttttt.”

  “Okay, what the fuck was that?” I say.

  “Sunset, I think. Maybe Boudreau had a house on Sunset?”

  “Well?” I ask the corpse. Slap it on the face a couple times to get its attention. Nothing.

  “I think he’s done,” I say. “But it’s a place to start.”

  “So we find this house on Sunset,” Vivian says.

  “I don’t think it’ll be that hard. Boudreau wants me to find him.” What he really wants is for me to walk in and grab my ankles. Well, fuck him. I don’t know how I’m going to take him down, but I’m going to make goddamn sure he stays down.

  Vivian pulls out her cell phone. “Okay. I have a guy who does some research for me for med journal articles. I can have him dig around for an address.” She starts punching numbers. “It seems a lot of effort to go to.”

  “What does?” I say.

  “Boudreau. He killed Lucy just to get you to come back to L.A.?”

  Before I can say anything the corpse lets out a low, “Nooooo.”

  “I thought you said he was done?”

  “Guess I was wrong.” I turn back to the body. Did it actually say no or was that escaping gas? “If he didn’t kill her to get me back then why did he kill her?”

  “Nooooo.”

  I have a thought I don’t like. A thought that takes this nicely wrapped package we just put together and tears off all the ribbons and bows. I don’t want to ask, but I’ll kick myself if I don’t.

  “Did Boudreau kill Lucy?” I say.

  But this time the talking corpse stays quiet.

  —

  Disposing of a body is never easy. A lot of the ones I’ve had to deal with haven’t been human. If I’m lucky they turn to ash, or dissolve into goo that seeps into the ground.

  But sometimes they stick around, and leaving them in the open is begging for questions I don’t want to have to answer. That’s when power tools are your best friend.

  Even then it takes me a couple of hours to hack Ellis’ body and wrap up the pieces in the plastic dropcloth. Most of his blood has already drained, so it’s a matter of bottling it in old detergent jugs the way you do used oil. Alex has a freezer chest that I put the chunks into until I’m ready to move him. No rush there. If I survive this whole thing I’ll scatter the pieces across the Southland. If not I won’t really much care.

  Vivian sits it out. I don’t blame her. Defiling a body to find her boyfriend is one thing, hacking up the pieces is a bit much. Vivian comes in as I’m finishing with the mop. If we get Alex back he probably won’t appreciate all the blood spatter. The least I can do is clean up after myself.

  “I think I found it,” she says. “Boudreau had a place in Brentwood on Corsica, a block south of Sunset.” She hands me a slip of paper with an address on it.

  “Who lives there now?”

  “A couple bought it in ’04. Not sure but I think they have a couple of kids.”

  “I hope they’re on vacation.”

  She winces. “You think they’re dead,” she says.

  “Easiest for him, I’d imagine.” Considering what he was willing to do to my parents I don’t think that would be a stretch.

  “So what’s our next move?”

  I’ve been going over that for the last hour. I have no fucking idea. There’s no way I can take Boudreau on myself. And there’s no way in hell I’m letting Vivian go near him.

  I’ve made a decision and she’s going to hate me for it. And I kind of hate myself for it, too.

  “Getting some dinner and some sleep,” I say. “I don’t know about you, but I’m barely standing upright.”

  “But Alex—”

  “Isn’t going anywhere. We don’t even know if he’s in that house. We’ve got time. And we need to be as clear as possible if we’re going to get him. Boudreau isn’t going to kill him if he thinks he can use him as bait.”

  I can tell she wants to rip my head off. Wants to jump in the car and run to the rescue, but she’s not stupid.

  “I know this isn’t easy,” I say. “But if we just run in there all we’re going to do is get all three of us killed.”

  “Are you sure he won’t kill him?”

  Fuck no. Probably tear his throat out just out of spite. And if he hasn’t I can’t imagine what Alex is going through or how he’s going to be on the other side of it.

  “Absolutely,” I say. “He can’t kill him. Right now he’s hoping we come to rescue him. If we get a whiff that he’s been hurt he loses his advantage.” It’s a steaming pile of utter bullshit, but I say it anyway.

  Maybe she knows I’m lying. Maybe she just wants to believe. Either way she closes her eyes, nods once. “You eat. I don’t have an appetite.”

  She turns on her heel and goes back into the house. That’s got her for now, but I need her out of the way for a while. After a few minutes I follow her inside, hating myself more with every step.

  —

  “Man, and I thought I was living the bachelor life.”

  His cupboards are almost completely empty. He has an unsliced loaf of French bread, a couple of jars of peanut butter, fifteen different brands of coffee.

  “I thought you were living the hobo life?” Vivian says. I know she’s trying to make a joke but there’s no energy in it. She’s sitting on a bar at the kitchen island watching me forage.

  “I steal cars for transportation, not ride rails. Subtle but important distinction.”

  I pull out the peanut butter, the bread. Find some jam tucked in the back of the refrigerator that at least looks like it’s from this century.

  “Why?”

  I sigh. Do we have to get into this now? “Because I’m running, okay? I started running fifteen years ago and I haven’t stopped. Yes, you were right. I’m a coward. I’m sorry.”

  “Me too,” she says.

  I change the subject. If we keep going down this road I won’t have the nerve to follow through with this. “I take it he doesn’t cook much.”

  She gives a weak smile. “Fast food and noodle shops.”

  “Ah, refined tastes. How about you?”

  “About the same. Don’t have time for much else.” She rubs her temples. “God, I haven’t slept in like two days. How about you?”

  “Does concussed and unconsciousness count?”

  “Not really.”

  “Then pretty much the same.” I slice the bread, make us a couple of sandwiches. Slide one to her on a paper towel.

  “Eat,” I say, “Doctor’s orders.”

  That gets me a real laugh. “Sure thing, Doctor Kevorkian.” As she eats I pour a glass of milk, prick my finger with the end of the knife and let a couple drops go in while muttering a spell over the glass.

  It’s a small spell and I don’t have to tap the pool so she doesn’t notice. I shake the glass a
little, hiding the drops of blood in the milk.

  “Drink,” I say in my best Russian accent. “Will make you strong like bull.”

  “Oh, god, don’t do the Russian thing,” she says, taking a big gulp of the milk. “You sound like a Norwegian with a head cold.”

  “I was shooting for Boris from Rocky and Bullwinkle.”

  She finishes her milk, puts the glass down. Her expression changes. “Your impressions all sound like Norwegians with head colds. That’s weird.”

  “What is it?”

  “I feel … off.” She stands, reels, grabs the table for support. Her expression changes. Confusion, betrayal, anger. “What did you do to me?”

  “Sorry, Viv. I’ll get Alex back, but I won’t have you getting hurt.”

  “You sonofabitch,” she says. I reach for her to keep her from going down ass over teakettle, but she jerks her hands away. “Get the fuck away from me. You bastard. How dare you.”

  “You’re just gonna sleep, Viv. You need rest.”

  “I need to get my boyfriend away from that fucking psychopath.” She lurches away from the island, knocking over her stool. “Where are my keys. I’ll get him myse—”

  I reach her before she hits the floor. Pick her up and lay her on the couch. Pull a blanket over her. Her breathing is getting shallower. Pretty soon she won’t be breathing at all.

  It’s not sleep so much as it’s a simulation of death. She’ll be out for about a day and a half and when she wakes up she’ll be fine. If anyone finds her and moves her she’ll wake up. No worries about her coming to on the morgue slab. And when she wakes up she’s going to rip my balls off and I’ll deserve it and I’ll let her. But at least she’ll be alive.

  Chapter 23

  I pull the ambulance into the parking lot of the nearby Wilshire Country Club, stopping in front of a gawking attendant who rushes in front of the car. Everything’s valet in this town.

  “Sir, you can’t park that here,” he says as I roll down the window.

  “I’m not going to,” I say, giving a little push to my words. “You’re going to. And I’d like the keys to a Mercedes, please.” I hold out the keys for him.