Betrayers nd-35

by Bill Pronzini

  “Jake, I need to talk to you-in person. You busy?”

  “On my way back to the agency.”

  “Where are you?”

  “Just leaving St. Francis Wood.”

  “When you get to South Park, don’t wait for me in the office-meet me in the South Park Cafe. I’m in the East Bay, heading for the Bay Bridge. I shouldn’t be far behind you.”

  “Business you don’t want Tamara to know about?”

  “Business I don’t want anybody to know about except you. Not yet.”

  The South Park Cafe was mid-afternoon quiet, only a handful of customers taking up bar space. Runyon ordered draft beer, took it to the table farthest removed from any of the other occupied ones. He was still nursing it when Bill walked in fifteen minutes later.

  As soon as he sat down, Runyon could see how tensed up the man was. Holding in whatever was bugging him as if it were an explosive that might go off at any second. When Runyon raised the beer glass Bill shook his head, leaned forward with both hands flat on the table.

  “I’m going to ask a favor,” Bill said, “but I won’t hold it against you if you say no.”

  “Why would I say no?”

  “What I want you to do could have a backlash.”

  “What kind of backlash?”

  “The kind that could get us and the agency in trouble. That’s one reason I don’t want Tamara to know about it yet.”

  “Trouble with the law?”

  “Potentially. Could put our licenses in jeopardy. I don’t think that’ll happen, but it could if I’m off base here.”

  “But you’re pretty sure you’re not.”

  “Pretty sure,” Bill said. “But not a hundred percent. It’s going to take a little muscle to find out for certain.”

  “How much muscle?”

  “Nothing heavy. Just enough to get inside a guy’s house.”

  “Hard guy?”

  “No. And no family, lives alone.”

  “Unlawful entry, then. That the backlash you mean?”

  “That’s it.”

  “I’ve run that risk before,” Runyon said. “We both have. This is important to you, right? Personal?”

  “Yeah. Personal.”

  “And you want me along why? Not for extra muscle, if the guy isn’t a hardcase. Intimidation? Witness?”

  “They’re part of the reason.”

  “What’s the other part?”

  Bill said grimly, “If I’m right, to keep me from doing something I might regret for the rest of my life.”

  Zachary Ullman wasn’t home.

  No lights, no car in the driveway, no answer to the doorbell.

  They sat waiting in Runyon’s Ford, parked a few doors upstreet. Neither of them said anything. Bill had laid it all out for him in the South Park Cafe and they’d talked it over a little more on the drive out here to Daly City. Nothing to do now but wait.

  Gray daylight began to fade; fog came pouring in in humped white waves, like an avalanche in slow motion. Ragged streamers of mist broke loose from the mass overhead, curled down along the twisty street, thickening slowly until the shapes of the houses beyond the curve ahead lost definition. Night shadows formed and spread and lights bloomed in windows. More cars rolled by in both directions-residents coming home from work-but none of them turned into Ullman’s driveway.

  Waiting like this didn’t bother Runyon. He sat with his mind cranked down to basic awareness, a trick he’d learned on stakeouts in Seattle and honed fine during Colleen’s long, slow cancer death. It wasn’t a matter of maintaining patience; it was a way to keep from thinking about things like pain and suffering and grief, things that could drive you up to the edge if you let yourself dwell on them.

  Bill hadn’t learned the trick. He was always fidgety on stakeouts and worse when he was stressed this way-thinking too much, letting his thoughts and emotions run unchecked. He kept shifting around on the seat, blowing out heavy breaths, doing things with his hands and feet. Once he muttered, “Come on, come on, come on!” Runyon didn’t blame him. Even if Bill was wrong about what he expected to find in Ullman’s house, there was still the cocaine Emily had picked up. That was enough cause and justification right there for what they were going to do.

  Not easy being a father. Runyon hadn’t been much of a one to Joshua, but that hadn’t been his fault; Andrea, with her booze-fueled bitterness and hatred, hadn’t given him an opportunity. But he had the parental gene; he understood what Bill was going through, why he didn’t trust himself to brace Ullman alone tonight. If their situations were reversed, he might not be so calm sitting here, either.

  Full dark now. Getting on toward six o’clock. No telling when Ullman would finally show up; if he’d gone out to dinner or a show or a meeting of some kind, they could be here for hours. Pretty soon he’d have to call Bryn, tell her he’d be late, might not be able to make it at all tonight. Better do it now, get it over with-

  No.

  Headlights crawling toward them through the mist, slowing, turning into Ullman’s driveway.

  Bill laid fingers like steel bands on Runyon’s arm. “That’s him.”

  “Can’t make out if he’s alone.”

  “Not yet.”

  The garage door rolled up down there. Enough light from inside spilled out for a clearer view of the car-a light-colored compact-and the shadowed interior.

  “He’s alone,” Bill said.

  The car disappeared inside the garage; the door rolled down again.

  Runyon asked, “How much time do we give him?”

  “Enough to get inside the house. We move as soon as a light goes on.”

  It didn’t take much more than a minute. The instant the front window became a pale yellow rectangle, they were out of the car.

  Fast walk across the street, up the front path-careful not to make any noise as they climbed to the door. Bill leaned on the bell, kept his finger on it. Footsteps. And a voice said, “Who is it? Who’s out there?”

  Bill glanced at Runyon, shook his head. He jabbed the bell again.

  “I said who’s out there?”

  And again.

  Rattle of a dead-bolt lock. Runyon stepped aside, into the heavy shadows, so he couldn’t be seen when the door opened partway on a chain.

  “You again. What’s the idea of ringing my bell like that-”

  Bill said, “Let me in, Ullman. I want to talk to you.”

  “No. I have nothing to say to you. Go away.”

  “I’m coming in, one way or another.”

  “No, you’re not-”

  Ullman tried to close the door. Bill jammed his body against it, and Runyon crowded in next to him to help hold it open. A bleated “No!” from inside. B amp; E if they busted the chain… and the hell with it. Their combined weight shoved it taut, snapped the plate loose on the second push; the door flew inward, the knob banging loudly off the inner wall.

  Bill shoved in after it. Over his shoulder Runyon saw Ullman’s slight figure backing away with his hands up in front of him, his narrow face pinched white with fear.

  “Two of you! My God, what’s the idea, what do you want? I’ll call the police-”

  Bill said, “You won’t call anybody.”

  “Are you here to beat me up? Is that what-”

  “Shut up. Just stand still and be quiet, don’t give me an excuse.”

  They crowded Ullman down a long hallway that opened into a smallish living room at the rear. Nothing special about it-nondescript furniture except for a long oak sideboard, a flat-screen TV, three cases stuffed with books. Bill went to the sideboard, opened doors to look inside. Runyon moved to the bookcases, scanned the spines of a mix of hardcovers and trade paperbacks. Science and history subjects, mostly, and a smattering of classical fiction.

  “Nothing,” he said.

  “Nothing here, either.”

  “Oh my God,” Ullman said, “what’re you looking for?” He was so scared now he was shaking visibly.

  “You kno
w the answer to that.”

  “No. No…”

  Dining room next, with Ullman stumbling along behind them. Nothing. Kitchen. Nothing. Down a short cross-hallway to the first of three closed doors, probably a bedroom.

  “No!” Ullman screamed the word this time. “Don’t go in there; you can’t go in there!”

  Bill pulled the door open and Runyon followed him in.

  Bedroom, all right. But like no bedroom Runyon had ever seen or wanted to see again. Bill had been right, dead right. It was all there-all the proof he or the law would ever need. On the dresser and the bedside table, in another bookcase, no doubt on the computer that sat on a trestle desk. And on the walls. Jesus, especially on the walls.

  Child porn.

  The worst, the sickest imaginable.

  This wasn’t just a bedroom; it was a goddamned filthy shrine.

  25

  The photographs were the worst.

  There were seven or eight of them, all in color and hideously graphic, a couple blown up to the size of small posters. Grown men with both girls and boys, the youngest six or seven, the oldest Emily’s age. Entangled bodies and leering male faces. Images to make you puke. And there’d be more, a lot more, on Ullman’s computer and the VHS tapes and stacks of scrapbooks in the bookcase. He wasn’t just a sick son of a bitch who got off on kiddie porn; he was archiving the stuff with the aid of Joe Hoffman and others like him.

  I couldn’t keep looking at those photographs; just the few random glances made my eyeballs feel seared. A low keening sound shifted my gaze toward the doorway. Ullman was slumped against the jamb, hanging on to it with both hands, tears leaking out of his haunted eyes. I’ve only hated one man as much as I hated him in that moment, and I’d been responsible for that man’s death. I had vowed never to let anything like that happen again, but it took effort to beat down a savage urge to hurt Zachary Ullman. Hurt him bad. If I hadn’t brought Jake along

  I quit looking at Ullman. The desk was in my line of sight then, and on it next to the laptop computer was a bronze-colored, rough-textured tin box about three sizes larger than the one Emily had found and brought home-part of a set. I went over there, worked the lid up.

  Runyon said, “What’s in there?”

  “His cocaine stash. Full Baggie.”

  “One more charge against-Bill!”

  I swung around. Ullman was no longer hugging the jamb; the doorway was empty.

  Runyon ducked into the hallway with me close behind. Ullman had made it into the living room by then-I could hear him bang into something in there. But he wasn’t trying to get out of the house, wasn’t anywhere near the front door. He was hunched at an end table next to a recliner, clawing open its single drawer.

  I yelled his name and Runyon made a lunge in his direction.

  Too late. Ullman straightened, pivoting, and he had a gun in his hand.

  “Stay away! Don’t come any closer!”

  Runyon pulled up short. So did I. We’d both missed the gun in the quick search earlier, too intent on hunting for the child porn. Hadn’t occurred to either of us that Ullman might have one, and it should have-Christ, it should have. The piece was a small-caliber automatic and he wasn’t just holding it; he was waving it wildly in front of him in a hand that trembled like somebody afflicted with Parkinson’s. The wildness was in his eyes, too; they bulged as if they might pop from the pressure.

  I said, “Put it down, Ullman. Don’t make things any worse for yourself.”

  “No! I don’t want to shoot you, but I will if you try to stop me. I will!”

  “You can’t run,” Runyon said. “How far do you think you’d get?”

  “Stay where you are, don’t come near me.”

  He backed away from the recliner. We were between him and the front door, but he wasn’t going that way. He kept backing, waggling that damn gun, into the dining room, where he bumped into a chair and almost knocked it over. He didn’t seem to notice, just kept on backing.

  The kitchen, I thought. That was where the door to the garage was.

  Runyon and I were up on the balls of our feet, leaning forward a little, like sprinters waiting in the blocks. Ullman was halfway across the dining room now. Two more steps and he’d be into the kitchen, out of our sight. One more-

  Go!

  Him running in the kitchen, us running crouched through the dining room. Runyon, younger and faster, was ahead of me when we neared the kitchen arch. From there I could see Ullman at the garage door, yanking it open. He jabbed the automatic in our direction and we both ducked aside reflexively, but he didn’t fire. He plunged through, slammed the door behind him.

  We were there in a couple of seconds, but when Runyon grabbed the knob it bound up in his hand. He said, “Snap lock. Won’t take long to break it.”

  “I’ll try to stop him out front. Careful, Jake-don’t go up against that gun.”

  He didn’t answer.

  I ran back into the living room. There was a brass urn on a stand against one wall; I grabbed it on the way by. Not much of a weapon, but I had to have something. I could hear Runyon working on the door in the kitchen, thought I heard the lock snap free before I went charging outside.

  Down the steps in three quick jumps, across a strip of lawn to the garage. The door was still all the way down and I didn’t hear anything to indicate it was about to come up. I stopped and stood there breathing hard, the brass urn slick in my fingers, while thirty seconds, a minute, ticked away and the foggy cold dried the sweat on me and made me shiver. Sounds filtered out from inside, faint, unidentifiable. None of them was the rumble of a car engine; I’d’ve been able to hear that clearly enough. What the hell was happening in there?

  Another few seconds and I found out. The automatic opener finally whirred and the door began to slide up. There was plenty of light inside-the overheads were on. I took a firmer grip on the urn, set myself, and bent to look under the bottom edge.

  Ullman’s Hyundai was sitting there dark and silent.

  Then, as the door ground all the way up, I saw Runyon standing next to the car, the driver’s door wide open and Ullman unmoving inside. The little automatic was in Runyon’s hand; he semaphored it over his head to let me know he had it.

  I let out a heavy breath, set the urn down, and went in there. Ullman was sitting with both hands on the steering wheel. All the wildness was gone; so were the tears. His eyes no longer bulged, didn’t even blink. His face was a literal mask of misery. Not self-pity-raw, naked misery.

  I said to Runyon, “What happened?”

  “He wasn’t trying to run. He came out here to kill himself.”

  “I couldn’t do it,” Ullman said in an empty voice. “I thought this time I could, now finally I could, but I couldn’t. I can’t. I’m too much of a coward.”

  “You’re a hell of a lot worse than that.”

  “I know,” he said. “Don’t you think I know what I am?”

  Runyon said, “He had the piece to his temple when I got in here. Just kept holding it there, didn’t move when I took it away from him. Took me a minute to find the door opener.”

  “Let’s get him inside.”

  Ullman said, “Why don’t you just kill me? Couldn’t you do that? Make it look like I killed myself?”

  “You’re not going to get off that easy.”

  “I’d rather die than go to prison. I want to die. I ache to die.”

  Runyon and I traded glances. Somebody might accommodate Ullman someday in whatever prison facility he ended up in. Child molesters and child porn addicts were bottom of the barrel inside the walls, primary targets for con vengeance.

  We dragged Ullman out of the car and back into the house, sat him down on the living room couch. While I called the Daly City cops and told them what we had, Runyon went to close the front door; I’d left it wide open. He bent to look at the hanging chain plate, beckoned me over when I was done with the call.

  “Plate tore out clean,” he said. “I think I can screw
it back in so the damage won’t show.”

  “I doubt that it matters now.”

  “Why don’t I do it anyway.” He got out one of those multi-bladed pocketknives and went to work with the screwdriver blade.

  I took up a stand in front of Ullman. The way he was sitting, motionless, the haunted eyes staring out from under drooping lids, he might have been a propped-up cadaver. His face was corpselike, too: the color and consistency of white wax inlaid with filaments of blood.

  “I know you hate me,” he said, his mouth barely moving, “and I don’t blame you. But you can’t possibly hate me as much as I hate myself.”

  I didn’t say anything.

  “Every day for the past fifteen years, loathing myself. Do you know how many times I tried to put a bullet through my head? Dozens. Literally dozens. I came close once, but at the last second I couldn’t do it. I’m too much of a coward.”

  “You said that before.”

  The words kept running out of him in a hushed, barren voice, almost a whisper, as if he were confessing cardinal sins to a priest. “Cowardice and self-hatred. That’s why I started using cocaine. I thought that if I got high enough, I could pull the trigger or swallow pills or poison… something, anything, to end it. But all the cocaine did was make me hate myself a little less. And after a while it had the opposite effect. It made the sickness worse, the cravings even more intense.”

  The taste of bile was in my mouth. I wanted to spit, swallowed instead.

  “I’m sorry about Emily,” he said.

  “Don’t talk to me about my daughter. Don’t say her name.”

  “She found the little box in the school parking lot. I don’t know how I could have lost it; I was always so careful. Maybe I lost it on purpose, subconsciously; I don’t know. I was terrified when she came to me, told me she’d found it and took it home… terrified when you came here last night. But not anymore. Now I’m glad. I’m glad it’s almost over.”

  He fell silent. The silence lasted long enough for me to think he’d run out of words, but he hadn’t. Not quite.

  “There’s something else I have to say, something I want you to know.”