Silent Prey

by John Sandford

  The parking garage at Bellevue was locked in his brain. Bellevue. He reached across the floor to his purse, found the bag, shook out a greenie: PCP. Popped one, two. Folded the bag and dropped it back in the purse, turned left. Careful. Bellevue? The hands on the steering wheel took him there, rolling through the dimly lit streets, precisely, evenly. A woman? Yes. Women were smaller and handled more easily, after they'd been taken. He recalled the struggle with Cortese, wedging the deadweight into the backseat of the Bug.

  And women, he thought with sudden clarity and some curiosity, lasted longer....

  The guard nodded. He recognized the attractive blonde in the old Volkswagen Bug. She'd been there before....

  Bekker took the car to the top floor, which was virtually deserted. A red Volvo sat in a corner and looked like it might have been there for a couple of days. Two other cars were widely spaced. The garage was silent. He got his bag from the passenger-side floor, with the tank of anesthetic and the stun gun.

  Bekker flashed: Cortese, the first one. Bekker'd hit him with the stun gun, had ridden him like a... No image came for a moment, then a hog. A heavy, midwestern boar, a mean brute. Bekker had ridden him down in the alley behind the Plaza, then used the mask. The power...

  A car door slammed somewhere else in the garage; a hollow, booming sound. An engine started. Bekker went to the elevator, pushed the down button, waited. A sign on the wall said: "REMOVE VALUABLES FROM CAR: Although this ramp is patrolled, even locked cars are easily entered. Remove all valuables."

  The first hit of PCP was coming on, controlling, toughening him, giving his brain the edge of craft it needed. He glanced around. No camera. He walked slowly down the stairs past the cashier, around the corner toward the main entrance of the hospital. The sidewalk that led to the entrance was actually built as a ramp, slanting down between the parking ramp and a small hospital park. Bekker walked down the ramp, paused, then went left into the park, sat at a bench under a light.

  Outside, the night was warm and humid, the smell of dirty rain and cooling bubble gum. A couple on the street were walking away from him, the man wearing a straw hat; the hat looked like an angel's halo at that distance, a golden-white oval encircling his head.

  Then: A main hospital door opened and a woman walked out. Headed toward the ramp, digging in a purse for keys. Bekker got up, started after her. She paused, still digging. Bekker closed. The woman was big, he realized. As he got closer, he saw she was too big. A hundred and eighty or two hundred pounds, he thought. Moving her would be difficult.

  He stopped, turned, lifted a foot so he could look at the sole of his left shoe. Watch women, Rayon had told him. Watch what they do. Bekker had seen this, the stop, the check, the look of anger or disgust, depending on whether a heel was broken or she'd simply stepped in something, and then a turn....

  He turned, as though he might be going somewhere to fix whatever he was looking at, walked away from the heavy woman, back down into the park. He might be waiting for someone inside, might even be grieving. There were cops around, nobody would bother him....

  Shelley Carson was a graduate nurse. She ran an operating suite, took no crap from anyone.

  And she was just the right size.

  Bite-size,Bekker's brain said when he saw her.

  At five-two, she barely reached a hundred pounds when she was fully dressed. Aware of her inviting size, she was careful about the ramp. Tonight she walked out with Michaela Clemson, tall, rangy, blonde and tough; a lifelong tennis player, both a nurse and a surgical tech. They were still in uniform, tired from the day.

  "Then you heard what he said? He said, `Pick it up and put it where I told you to in the first place,' like I was some kind of child. I am definitely going to complain..." Clemson was saying.

  Bite-sized Shelley Carson encouraged her: nurses were not less than doctors, they were members of a different profession. They should take no shit. "I'd certainly go in...."

  "I just can't ignore it this time," the blonde said, building her courage. "The asshole is a bad surgeon, and if he'd spend more time working on his surgery and less time trying to pull rank..."

  Bekker slid in behind them. They saw him, peripherally, but neither really looked at him until they started into the ramp together, and then up the stairs.

  "I definitely would," the small one was saying. Her dark hair was cut close to the head, like a helmet, with little elfin points over her ears.

  "Tomorrow afternoon at three o'clock I'm going to march in..." The blonde looked down at Bekker, then back up at her friend. Bekker climbed behind them, one hand on the stun gun.

  Halfway up, the blonde said, "Tomorrow, I go for it."

  "Do it," said the elf. "See you tomorrow."

  The blonde broke away, stepping into the main part of the ramp, peering out. "All clear," she said. The blonde started toward a Toyota. Bekker and the dark-haired woman continued up, Bekker's heels rapping on the stairs.

  "We have an arrangement," the elf said, looking down at Bekker. "If one of us has to go out alone, we watch each other."

  "Good idea," Bekker squeaked. The voice was the hard part. Rayon had said it would be. Bekker put a hand to his mouth and faked a cough, as though his voice might be roughed by a cold, rather than forty years of testosterone.

  "This parking garage, somebody's going to get attacked here someday," the woman said. "It really isn't safe...."

  Bekker nodded and went back to the purse. The elf looked at him, a puzzled look, something not quite right. But what? She turned away. Turn away from trouble. Bekker followed her out at the top floor, heard the Toyota's engine start below. Brought the stun gun out, got the tank ready in the bag. Heard the hiss. Felt the action in his feet...

  The woman saw him moving. A fraction of a second before he was on her, she took in the violence of his motion and started to turn, her eyes widening in reflex.

  Then he had her. One hand over her mouth, the other pressing the stun gun against her neck. She went down, trying to scream, and he rode her, pressing the stun gun home, holding it....

  She flapped her arms like the wings of a tethered bird. He dropped the stun gun, groped for the tank, found it, flipped the valve and clapped the mask over her face. He had her now, his hair a bush around his head, his eyes wide, feral, like a jackal over a rabbit, breathing hard, mouth open, saliva gleaming on his teeth.

  He heard the sound of the Toyota going down the ramp as the bite-sized woman's struggles weakened and finally stopped. He stood up, listening. Nothing. Then a voice, far away. The little woman was curled at his feet. So sweet, the power...

  Bekker worked all night. Preparing the specimen-wiring the gag, immobilizing her. Taking her eyelids; he held them in the palms of his hands, marveling; they were so... interesting. Fragile. He carried them to a metal tray, where he'd collected some others. The others were drying now, but kept their form, the lashes still shiny and strong...

  Shelley Carson died just before seven o'clock, as silently as all the rest, the gag wired around her skull, her eyes permanently open. Bekker had crouched over her with the camera as she died, shooting straight into her eyes.

  And now he sat in his stainless-steel chair and gazed at the proof of his passion, eight ultraviolet photos that clearly showed something-a radiance, a presence-flowing from Carson as she died. No question, he exulted. No question at all.

  Dink.

  The intercom bell. It cut through the sense of jubilation, brought him down. Old bitch. Mrs. Lacey got up early, but habitually slumped in front of the television until noon, watching her morning shows.

  Dink.

  He went to the intercom: "Yes?"

  "Come quick," she squawked. "You have to see, you're on the television."

  What?Bekker stared at the intercom, then went quickly to the bed, picked up his robe, wrapped himself, put fluffy slippers on his feet. The old lady didn't see very well, didn't hear very well, he could pass... and he still had on his makeup. On television? As he passed th
e dresser he slipped two tabs off the tray, popped them, as brighteners. What could she mean?

  The first floor was dark, musty, a thin orangish morning light filtering through the parchmentlike window shades. The second floor was worse, the odor of marijuana hanging in the curtains, a stench of decaying cat shit, the smell of old vegetables and carpet mold. And it was dark, except for the phosphorescent glow of the tube.

  Mrs. Lacey was standing, staring at the television, a remote control in her hand. Bekker was there on the screen, all right. One of the photos that had plagued him, had kept him off the street. But in this photo, he was a woman and a blonde. The details were perfect:

  "... credited to Detective Barbara Fell and former Minneapolis Detective Lieutenant Lucas Davenport, who had been brought to New York as a consultant..."

  Davenport. Bekker was struck by a sudden dizziness, a wave of nausea. Davenport was coming; Davenport would kill him.

  "But..." said Mrs. Lacey, looking from the screen to Bekker.

  Bekker steadied himself, nodded. "That's right, it is me," he said. He sighed. He hadn't expected the old woman to last this long. He stepped carefully across the carpet to her.

  She turned and tried to run, a shuffling struggle against age and infirmity, gargling in terror. Bekker giggled, and the cats, hissing, bounded across the overstuffed furniture to the highest shelves. Bekker caught the old woman at the edge of the parlor. He put the heel of his left hand against the back of her skull, the cup of his right under her chin.

  "But..." she said again.

  A quick snap. Her spine was like a stick of rotten wood, cracked, and she collapsed. Bekker stared down at her, swaying, the brightener tab coming on.

  "It is me," he said again.

  CHAPTER

  21

  Most visitors came through O'Dell's office; when the knock came at Lily's unmarked office door, she looked over the top of her Wall Street Journal and frowned.

  There was another light knock and she took off her half-moon reading glasses-she hadn't let anyone see them yet-and said, "Yes?"

  Kennett stuck his head in. "Got a minute?"

  "What're you doing down here?" she asked, folding the paper and putting it aside.

  "Talking to you," he said. He stepped inside the door, peeked through a half-open side door into O'Dell's office, and saw an empty desk.

  "He's at staff," Lily said. "What's going on?"

  "We've papered the town with the female Bekker picture," Kennett said, dropping into her visitor's chair. Small talk. He tried a smile, but it didn't work. "You know Lucas got it, the cross-dressing thing. It wasn't Fell."

  "I thought maybe he did," Lily said. "He wants Fell to do well."

  "Nice," he said, his voice trailing off. He was looking at her as though he were trying to see inside her head.

  "Let's have it," she said finally.

  "All right," he said. "What do you know about this Robin Hood shit that O'Dell is peddling?"

  Lily was surprised-and a small voice at the back of her head said that was good, that look of surprise. "What? What's he peddling?"

  Kennett looked at her, eyes blinking skeptically, as though he were reevaluating something. Then he said, "He's been putting out shit about Robin Hood, the so-called vigilantes. I've got the feeling that the fickle finger is pointed at my ass."

  "Well, Jesus," Lily said.

  "Exactly. There aren't any vigilantes. It's all bullshit, this Robin Hood business. But that doesn't mean he can't fuck me up. If they think they've got a problem..." He pointed a thumb at the ceiling, meaning the people upstairs, "And they can't find anybody, they might just want to hang somebody anyway, to cover their asses."

  "Boy..." Lily shook her head. "I've got a pretty good line on what O'Dell's doing, but I don't know anything like that. And I'm not holding out on you, Richard. I'm really not."

  "And I'm telling you, he's behind it."

  Lily leaned forward. "Give me a few days. I'll find out. Let me ask some questions. If he's doing it, I'll tell you."

  "You will?"

  "Of course I will."

  "All right." He grinned at her. "It's, like, when you're a lieutenant and down, you've got friends and lovers. When you're a captain or above, you've got allies. You're my first ally-lover."

  She didn't smile back. She said: "Richard."

  The smile died on his face. "Mmm?"

  "Before I risk my ass-you're not Robin Hood?"

  "No."

  "Swear it," she said, looking into his eyes.

  "I swear it," he said, without flinching, looking straight back at her. "I don't believe there is such a guy. Robin Hood is a goddamn computer artifact."

  "How?"

  He shrugged. "Flip a nickel five hundred times. The events are random, but you'll find patterns. Flip it another five hundred times, you'll still find patterns. Different ones. But the pattern doesn't mean anything. Same thing with these computer searches-you can always find patterns if you look at enough numbers. But the pattern's in your head; it's not real. Robin Hood is a figment of O'Dell's little tiny imagination."

  Her eyes narrowed: "How'd you find out so much about what he's doing?"

  "Hey, I'm in intelligence," he said, mildly insulted by the question. "The word gets around. I thought his little game was pretty harmless until my name started popping up."

  She thought about it a minute, then nodded. "All right. Let me do some sneaking around."

  CHAPTER

  22

  Lucas called Darius Pike in Charleston and gave him the plane's arrival time, then met Sloan and Del downtown. They hit a sports bar, talking, remembering. Lucas was long out of the departmental gossip-who was kissing whose ass, who was shagging who. Sloan went home at one o'clock and Lucas and Del wound up in an all-night diner on West Seventh in St. Paul.

  "... shit, I said, gettin' married was okay," Del said. "But then she started talking about a kid. She's, like, forty."

  "Ain't the end of the world," Lucas said.

  "Do I look like Life with Father? " Del asked. He spread his arms: he was wearing a jeans jacket with a black sleeveless tank top. An orange and black insignia on the sleeve of the jacket said, " Harley-Davidson-Live to Ride, Ride to Live." He had a five-day beard, but his eyes were as relaxed and clear as Lucas had ever seen them.

  "You're looking pretty good, actually," Lucas said. "A year ago, man, you were ready for the junk heap."

  "Yeah, yeah..."

  "So why not have a kid?"

  "Jesus." Del looked out the window. "I kinda been asking myself that."

  Del peeled off at three o'clock and Lucas went home, opened all the windows in the house, and began writing checks to cover the bills that had arrived with the mail. At five, finished with the bills, and tired, he closed and locked all the windows, went back to the bedroom and repacked his overnight bag. He called a cab, had the driver stop at a SuperAmerica all-night store, bought two jelly doughnuts and a cup of coffee, and rode out to the airport.

  The plane taxied away from the terminal at six-thirty. The stewardess asked if he wanted juice and eggs.

  "I'm gonna try to go to sleep," he said. "Please, please don't wake me up...."

  The fear got him as the takeoff run began, the sense of helplessness, the lack of control. He closed his eyes, fists clenched. Got off the ground with body English. Held his breath until the engine noise changed and the climb rate slowed. Cranked back the seat. Tried to sleep. A while later, he didn't know how long, he realized that his mouth tasted like chicken feathers, and his neck hurt. The stewardess was shaking his shoulder: "Could you bring your seat upright, please?"

  He opened his eyes, disoriented. "I was sleeping," he groaned.

  "Yes," she said in her most neutral voice. "But we're approaching Atlanta, and your seat..."

  "Atlanta?" He couldn't believe it. He never slept on airplanes. The plane's left wing dipped, and they turned on it, and, looking down, he could see the city of Atlanta, like a gritty gray rug. T
en minutes later, they were down.

  The Atlanta airport was straight from RoboCop, with feminine machine voices issuing a variety of warnings just below the level of consciousness, and steel escalators dropping into sterile tile hallways. He was glad to get out, though the flight to Charleston was bad. He fought the fear and managed to compose himself by the time the plane was on the ground.

  Pike was waiting inside the small terminal, a stolid black man wearing a green cotton jacket over a white shirt and khaki pants. When his jacket moved, Lucas could see a half-dozen ballpoint pens clipped to his shirt pocket and a small revolver on his belt.