Disturbance

by Jan Burke

  “Ben,” he said into his headset, in a voice that was not quite his own, “bring the dogs in, will you?”

  “Sure. Are you all right?”

  Before he could reply, Jack signaled for quiet, laying a finger along his lips and nodding his head toward an adjoining room.

  Frank looked a question.

  Jack drew closer to him and said, in barely more than a whisper, “Thought I heard footsteps.”

  “Ben, wait, stay put for now,” Frank murmured into the headset.

  He listened and heard a faint noise. He motioned to Jack to stay back, drew his gun, and opened the door. It was a bathroom. He checked the shower, which was empty, then stood as still as possible and listened at the connecting door.

  He heard it again, an odd sound. But not footsteps.

  He turned out the bathroom light and waited in the darkness for a long moment. He had the strobing flashlight ready to go, held out to his left. He had checked the door, noting that the hinges were on the other side, and positioned himself to take advantage of what cover the door itself could offer him, weapon ready. He took a breath, let it out, and then opened the door quickly, strobe light on, moving fast to avoid making a target of himself. But there was plenty of light in the room, coming from an open door to the hallway. Enough light to allow him to see that no one was standing anywhere in the room, although it was not empty.

  A hospital bed held a frail woman. Her mouth and neck and chest were covered in blood, but her eyes were wide open. She was staring at him.

  “Frank?” Jack said softly from behind him.

  Frank hurried over to the bed. “Violet Loudon?” he asked, and she blinked at him.

  It took only seconds for him to register that she was blinking in Morse code.

  Hurry. He escapes. I am not hurt. Bit his nose.

  “You heard footsteps!” Frank said to Jack. “She sure as hell didn’t make them or open that door!”

  They ran into the hallway, but in the next moment they heard a door slam downstairs.

  “Ben,” Frank said, “watch out—he may be coming your way.”

  “Who?”

  “I don’t know yet. A male with damage to his nose. He just ran out of here.”

  The man never ran past Ben and Ethan. Jack stayed behind to guard Violet while Frank followed a trail of blood drops leading from a back door toward the trees. The sky was lightening, but he could see no sign of the man. He was just about to call Ben to bring the dogs when he heard a motorcycle starting up. He ran toward the sound but had to move carefully through the trees and over the uneven ground.

  He soon reached a narrow dirt maintenance road and heard the bike retreating over it but didn’t catch so much as a glimpse of the rider.

  FORTY-TWO

  Ben,” Frank said as he moved back toward the lodge, “I’m thinking maybe it’s time to give San Bernardino a call. By the time they get someone over here, Jack and I can be at the airfield. I’d prefer to have you come along with us, but I don’t want to leave Violet Loudon here alone.”

  “Agreed. Ethan’s offered to stay here. He’s been talking to Jack on his phone.”

  “Good.”

  “I think you should spend a few minutes with her first, though. Jack’s been getting some information from her that you may find useful.”

  “He knows Morse code?”

  “He said he learned it as a Cub Scout but at this point can’t remember anything beyond ‘SOS.’”

  “Jack was a Cub Scout?”

  “Yeah, Ethan’s already giving him endless shit. Anyway, Jack’s pulled up some site about Morse code on his phone. He’s been painstakingly writing out the pattern she blinks and then translating it.”

  “Okay, I’ll be up there in a minute, but we need to get the sheriff onto trying to find the guy on that bike. And the SBSD has the manpower to really search these grounds.”

  “Will do. Cliff Garnett?”

  Ben and Frank had both worked on cases with Garrnett, an old friend and homicide detective with the San Bernardino County Sheriff’s Department.

  “Cliff would be ideal, at least as a starting contact point—but he’s not likely to get the case, since we all know one another.”

  When Frank reached the upstairs room again, Jack had cleaned off most of the blood on Violet’s face, which would probably piss off some lab guy, but there was, after all, lots more on her neck and clothing. Jack was giving her water when Frank walked in.

  “Violet says the noseless one has been by here before. She said his name is Roderick Beignet, and he lives in Las Piernas. She described him to me. Heavyset, reddish brown hair, blue eyes. Not young—maybe about sixty.”

  “That helps a lot. I’ll need to make some phone calls to Las Piernas once we’re on our way.” Frank turned to Violet. “Your doctors led us to believe you could not communicate.”

  She smiled slightly, but it was Jack who answered for her. “We talked about that. She learned Morse code from Donovan.”

  “Donovan?”

  “One of Parrish’s sons. I got this from her in an abbreviated form, but if I made it out right, she said Kai, Quinn, and Donovan are half brothers. Parrish, Kai, and Donovan took Irene from here. Donovan told her that if that ever happened, Parrish would probably take them to the Sierras, not the old location but near there. Parrish is comfortable there.”

  “Who is this guy Donovan? Other than one of the half brothers?”

  They both looked to Violet.

  Pilot. Forced to help Nick.

  “Forced how?”

  Don’t know.

  “What was Roderick doing here?”

  Said Nick sent. He heard you come in. Leaned over me. I bit.

  Ethan arrived and introduced himself to Violet.

  “You know Morse code?” Frank asked.

  “Um … no. I mean, just SOS. Dash-dash-dash, dot-dot-dot, dash-dash-dash. Right?”

  “That’s O-S-O,” Jack said, rolling his eyes. “So unless you want a Spanish-speaking bear to come to your rescue, don’t ever use that one if your boat is sinking.”

  Ethan looked at Violet, smiled charmingly, and said, “Will you teach me?”

  “Ethan …,” Jack said.

  But she had already blinked a response.

  “Was that yes?”

  “Yes,” Frank said.

  “Christ,” Jack said.

  “He’s a quick study,” Frank said.

  “Maybe, but we shouldn’t leave them here alone,” Jack said. “Who knows how many more of his Moths Parrish has hanging around?”

  “Just go,” Ethan said. “Frank has to get out of here. Cliff told Ben they’d have a patrol car here soon, and God knows how many other cops are going to be here right after that. If Frank is sitting here when they arrive, this is all going to go to sh—” He looked at Violet and said, “Sorry. It’s all going to be wrecked.”

  Violet blinked, and Frank and Jack exchanged a glance.

  “What did she say?”

  “Something worse than you were going to say,” Frank answered. “You have your gun?”

  “Yes, and Ben mentioned that I was armed but would not be shooting any deputies today.”

  “Did Ben mention that Frank and I were here?”

  “No, but Cliff is suspicious. Wanted Ben to wait around, but Ben told him he was already gone and wasn’t coming back—so you two get the hell out. Find Irene. I’ve got to learn Morse code.”

  Frank could see what Ethan wasn’t saying, knew that he wanted to be going with them but also recognized that, of the four of them, he was the best choice to stay behind.

  “Thanks, Ethan. We’ll try to meet up a little later. You want us to leave a dog here with you?”

  “No, but Ben wants to drive his car to the Sikorsky because he’s doesn’t want to shift all the dog stuff to the other car. So leave your keys, if you don’t mind.”

  Frank called Pete as they made their way to the airfield. Pete let him know he wasn’t happy with him for n
ot telling him about the text message, not calling in the bomb squad when he found the Ford Escape on Jacaranda Street, not reporting finding the vehicle immediately, borrowing lock picks from his wife (Rachel had insisted that Frank not tell her any details so that she wouldn’t have to lie to Pete), leaving his partner of many years behind in Las Piernas, and half a dozen other aspects of the situation—all before Frank told him about anything that had happened once they reached Quinn Moore’s mountain lodge.

  “Pete,” Frank said when his partner finally drew a breath. “Listen up. You can help me, or you can bitch about my doing my level best not to get the captain as pissed off at you as he will be with me.”

  “You think I give a flying fuck about that?”

  “Not for a minute. But I’m not going to ask you to sink your career along with mine.”

  Pete fell silent. It was an unhappy silence, but Frank took advantage of it and told him about the mysterious Donovan, assuming the man had told Violet his real name. He told him about Quinn’s and Donovan’s family ties to Kai and Parrish. “There’s someone else—he may be headed to Las Piernas right now. His name is Roderick Beignet.” He gave Pete the description and told him about the attack on Violet. “Vince and Reed need to know all of this, of course.”

  “Talk about people who are going to be pissed off at you …”

  “Like you, they’re friends,” Frank said. “I hope they’ll forgive me for it. Thanks, Pete.” He said good-bye before his partner could start a second tirade.

  They were within sight of the helicopter when Frank got a text message from Ethan.

  All OK. SBSD just arrived.

  Then he texted a line of Morse code that spelled out “Tell Jack I said hi.”

  “Sometimes that kid scares the shit out of me,” Jack said.

  FORTY-THREE

  Ten. Nine. Eight …”

  Parrish was standing outside the bathroom door, counting down the time I had left in the two minutes of privacy allotted to me—one hundred and twenty seconds of a small degree of freedom.

  I had awoken as the SUV stopped before a freestanding cinder-block building with a corrugated tin roof. Parrish pressed a remote, and a metal door rolled up. We drove into the building, he pressed the remote again and shut off the engine.

  The men got out of the car but left the doors open. Donovan walked straight back to the bathroom, not doing anything to help me but not asking anyone’s permission to move around as he pleased. Marking his territory first?

  The others followed suit. Next, Parrish ordered Donovan to bring me to the bathroom. He picked me up as if I weighed nothing, which is far from the case. Although running has kept me lean, I’m five seven in my bare feet. He set me on my feet and pulled out a knife.

  “What are you doing?” Parrish asked angrily.

  “I’m not going to carry her. There’s more tape. I’ve only got one back.”

  Not that heavy, I thought.

  “She’s not that heavy,” Parrish said, instantly proving he could still unsettle me with no more than a few words.

  “You’re in no shape to carry her, and neither is Kai,” Donovan said. He bent and sliced through the tape that bound my ankles. He straightened. “I’m probably going to end up carrying everything anyway, so I’m not going to risk injury now.”

  Parrish watched him move the knife toward my hands. “You are not going to free her hands!”

  Donovan looked at me. There was something so powerful, so compelling in his gaze—for the first time, I felt frightened by him. I found myself struggling to name that something even as I felt it hit me like a blow.

  It was not as if he cast a spell. I would have laughed at an attempt to cast a spell.

  He did not hypnotize me. Hypnotism seemed a very weak thing next to this.

  It was akin to command but not that, even though it demanded obedience and promised consequences for disobedience. It was sharp and cold and said, in no uncertain terms, that any ideas I cherished about myself mattered not a whit to him, that in this particular moment, all that was true was what he was about to say to me, and whether I liked it or not was utterly immaterial. Giving him my undivided attention seemed all that allowed me to breathe.

  My mouth went dry.

  I felt sure he knew that, knew my heart rate had quickened, knew I had broken out in a cold sweat. Felt sure that no condition or emotion of mine was unknown to him.

  When he spoke, he did not raise his voice. He said, calmly and matter-of-factly, “If you use your hands to attack any of us or try to escape, I’ll cut them off. Then I’ll bandage your wrists so that you will live long enough to experience things that will make you think losing your hands wasn’t so bad—compared to what followed.” He paused. “So, Irene, are you going to leave here with your hands attached to your wrists?”

  I could not breathe, let alone speak. I nodded.

  I felt faint as I watched the blade move toward my hands, arcing precisely and quickly to slice the tape between my wrists. I did not move.

  He sheathed the knife and took me gently by the arm. He began to guide me toward the back of the building. I went as easily as if he had me on a leash. We passed Parrish, who seemed stunned, as did Kai. I couldn’t blame them.

  When we were out of earshot of either of them, Donovan said softly, “Are you okay?”

  Startled, I looked back up at him. The icy look was gone. The man who had intervened at the cafe, the man who had tapped out a little reassuring message to me was back. But who the hell was he?

  “You did well,” he added. “Keep acting afraid of me.”

  That wasn’t going to be a problem.

  Parrish seemed to snap out of whatever daze he was in and told me I had exactly two minutes to use the bathroom before he would come in and force me out of it. Not surprisingly, to someone who was thinking At least I still have my hands, that threat wasn’t as powerful as he might have hoped it would be.

  Even with the time limit, I had a chance to wash my face and hands and spend glorious seconds without Parrish or his spawn sharing the same four walls. Maybe not enough time to completely center myself but enough to get rid of the worst of my shakiness.

  I made a quick search of my pockets, in case I didn’t get a chance to look through them again. Energy bars, the winter gloves that had been in the duffel. Cheer up! You’re not a human bomb!

  There was no mirror on the bathroom wall, for which I felt grateful. If you had asked me just weeks before if I would have thought of a small bathroom in an industrial building in the Mojave as my idea of a slice of heaven …

  Well, it’s not the past, it’s now. Take what you have. I knew I also had to stop thinking about all the horrific things Parrish might do in the future, had to stop wishing that what had happened hadn’t. It happened. I slowed my breathing, calmly opened the bathroom door, and walked out when Parrish was still on “five.” That was clearly a letdown for him, which made it easier for me to keep my head up.

  There was no kitchen per se, but near the back wall was a long folding table surrounded by metal folding chairs and a metal counter that held a small refrigerator. Ian told me to sit at the table and opened the refrigerator, which was stocked with water bottles and ham and cheese sandwiches. I ate and drank what was given to me without protest. No one addressed any remarks to me or discussed any plans, which aided my efforts to calm down.

  The meal was mostly silent. Kai had stretched his legs out on the one empty chair at the table, until Donovan raised an eyebrow at him. He then put both feet on the floor.

  Parrish kept looking at Donovan in a considering way, as if gauging whether he was an asset or a threat.

  Kai also appeared interested in Donovan, although the interest seemed different, almost wistful. Was he longing for a big brother?

  What, I wondered, had Kai’s childhood been like? For all I knew, he had met some of his half siblings before now. I doubted it, though. He struck me as a loner, but I might have been mistaking his aloofness to
ward me for a general policy. I thought of my conversations with his neighbors and decided that the bonhomie edition of Kai Loudon did not exist. He had been persuasive with his mother’s health care providers but did not seem to have any close friends or go out of his way to seek the society of others. Violet’s paralysis made the perfect shield.

  Was there ongoing contact with Parrish’s other children, if any? If any. How many half siblings were there? Were there daughters as well as sons?

  I thought of Marilyn Foster and Cade Morrissey, and wondered how many women might have put their children by Parrish up for adoption, felt ashamed of the connection to him. Or believed it was in the children’s best interest to be hidden from their father or left unaware of their connection to him.

  At the time of Parrish’s first arrest for murder, there had been shocked and disbelieving protests by people who had worked with him or lived near him, saying he was a quiet and charming man. Perhaps he had used some of that charm on women like Violet.

  I wondered why he hadn’t been sued for child support. Perhaps he had been. It seemed more likely that he would have conned these women, given them phony information about himself, kept most of his encounters short and superficial. I thought of the things Marilyn’s friends had said about that evening in the park—perhaps he chose vulnerable women, domineered them during brief relationships, then made them so afraid of him it was unlikely they would protest or do anything to draw his attention back to them once he was gone.

  My previous experience with Parrish had eventually led me to take up a grim study, an effort to understand more about serial killers. I did so in part, I suppose, to try to understand why he had chosen me to play a role in his plans but mostly to know my enemy. So the idea of family links between pathologically violent men was not difficult for me accept.

  Over the past twenty years, neuroscientists, geneticists, and others had been discovering more about the biology of violent behavior. Imaging systems were being used to study the brains of violent individuals and had determined that, in at least some cases, there were physical differences in the way their brains worked. Magnetic resonance imaging studies of the brains of violent individuals taken while they were viewing images of violence indicated areas of their brains were active that were not active in nonviolent individuals viewing the same images. Discoveries had been made of genetic links to high-risk behaviors. In recent years, scientists had been studying the role of variants of the MAOA or “warrior gene” in antisocial and violent behavior, especially when severe childhood abuse was also a factor. Oddly, a variant of that gene might even be a predictor for credit card debt. I’d put that tidbit to use in a consumer economics story last year.