"Aren't you going to open it?"
I shook my head. "I think I'll just leave it where it is. I'd hate to give it a bump."
"This one's on a timer."
I managed to loosen my jaw, but I couldn't form any words. Where had I put my gun? My mind was washed absolutely blank. I reached for the edge of my desk, supporting myself with my fingertips. Bombs are loud. The end is quick. I cleared my throat. "Sorry to interrupt you," I said. "Don't stick around on my account."
"I can stay for a minute. We could have a little chat."
"Why kill me?"
"It seemed like a good idea," he said mildly. "I thought you might like to go out with a bang, as opposed to a you-know-what."
"I'm surprised you didn't try for Lance."
"I have a package just like it in the car for him."
Probably in the bottom of my handbag, I thought. I'd meant to take it to the gun shop. Had I stuck it in the briefcase in the back seat of my car? If so, it was still out there and my ass was grass. "Do you mind if I sit?"
He did a quick survey of the area, making sure there weren't any rifles, bullwhips, or butcher knives within range. "Go ahead."
I moved to the couch and sank down without taking my eyes off him. He pulled my desk chair closer and sat down, crossing his legs. He was a nice-looking man, dark and lean, on the slight side. There was nothing in his manner to indicate how nuts he was. How nuts is he? I thought. How far gone? How amenable to reasoning? Would I trade my life for bizarre sexual favors if he asked? Oh sure, why not?
I was having trouble appraising the situation. I was home where I should have been safe. It wasn't even dark out. I really needed to pee, but it sounded like a ploy. And honest to god, I was embarrassed to make the request. It seemed advisable to try opening a dialogue, one of those conversations designed to ingratiate. "What's the timetable here?"
He glanced at his watch. "Ten minutes, more or less. The bomb should go off at four-thirty. I was worried you wouldn't get home in time," he said. "I can reset it, but I don't want to mess the wrapping paper up."
"I can understand that," I said. I checked the clock on my desk. 4:22. I could feel my adrenal gland squirt some juice into my veins. Terry didn't seem concerned. "You seem calm enough," I remarked.
He smiled. "I'm not going to be around when the damn thing goes off. They're dangerous."
"How can you keep me here? You'll have to shoot me first."
"I'll tie you up. I have some rope." I could see then that he had a coil of clothesline he'd tossed on the kitchen floor.
"You think of everything," I said. I wanted him to talk. I didn't want him to tie me up because then I'd be dead for sure. There wasn't going to be any way to hump and thump my way out. No broken glass by which I could saw through my ropes. No knives, no tricks, no miracles. "What if it goes off prematurely?"
"Too bad," he said with mockery, "but you know what Dylan Thomas said. 'After the first death, there is no other.'"
"How does Hugh Case fit in? Do you mind if I ask? I just want to know for the sake of it."
"I don't mind. We don't have anything else to talk about. Hugh was made the security officer after Woody bid on a government contract. We were all going to have to have clearances, but the guy went overboard. Forms, interviews, all these questions. He really took himself seriously. At first I thought it was all a game, but gradually I realized he was coming up with too many penetrating questions. He knew. Of course, he wanted my fingerprints. I stalled as long as possible, but I couldn't refuse. I had to kill him before he told Woody all the sordid details."
"About your mother."
"Foster mother," he corrected.
"Wouldn't somebody else have come up with the same information?"
"I'd figured a way around it, but I needed him out of the way for it to work."
"But you don't know that he was actually onto you."
"Oh, but I do and he was. I destroyed the file he kept at work, but he had a duplicate at home. Talk about a breach of security," he said. "That came to light just recently."
"Lyda found it."
"Now that was your fault. After you flew to Texas, she went through the papers she'd packed up and came across all the data on Chris Emms. She had no idea who he was, but she figured it was someone at the plant. She called me from Dallas and said she had some information Hugh had unearthed. I told her I'd be happy to take a look at it and help her figure out what to do with it. She made me promise not to mention it to Lance since she was so suspicious of him anyway."
"Nice," I said. "And the threat from her... you just made that up?"
"Yep."
"And the day we waited at the bird refuge, she was already dead out in front?"
"Righty-o," he said.
"How'd you kill Hugh?"
Terry shrugged indifferently. "Chloral hydrate. Then I strolled in and stole his blood and urine samples so it couldn't be traced."
"Takes nerve," I said.
"It had to be done and I knew I was right. I couldn't have him upsetting my life. What made me so mad afterwards, of course, is it was all for nothing. Olive had a past just as bad as mine. I didn't need to protect myself at all. I could have traded her, tit for tat, if she'd leveled with me."
"You must feel better now that she's gone. She's been paid in full, hasn't she?"
His face clouded. "I should have killed Lance and left her alive. I could have made her life miserable."
"I thought you'd already done that."
"Well, yes, but she didn't suffer nearly enough. And now she's off the hook."
"She did love you," I said.
"So what?"
"So nothing. I guess love doesn't count for much with you." I felt my eyes stray to the clock. 4:25.
"Not when it's based on lies and deceit," he said piously. "She should have told me the truth. She never shared the facts. She let me go right on believing our sex life was all my fault. She made me think I was inadequate when all the time it was her. Sometimes I think about him with his mouth all over her, feeding like a leech, sucking at her everywhere. Disgusting," he said.
"That was a long time ago."
"Not long enough."
"What about Andy Motycka? How'd you persuade him to help?"
"Money and threats. The carrot and the stick. Janice was hosing him for every cent he had. I paid him ten grand. Every time he got nervous, I reminded him that I'd be happy to tell Janice about Lorraine if he tried to back out."
"How'd you find out about her?"
"We've all known each other for years. The four of us went to UCST together before he and Janice got married. This was after I conjured up my new identity, of course. Once I settled on the frame-up, it didn't take much to figure out he was in the perfect position to assist me."
"Did you kill him too?"
"I wish I had. He ducked out on me, but I'll find a way to lure him back. He's not very smart."
Even with the tinnitus I suffer, I could have sworn I could hear the package bomb ticking merrily. I wet my lips. "Is there really a clock in there? Is that how it works?"
He glanced over at the kitchen counter. "It's not a complicated device. The one for Olive was more elaborate, but I had to make sure it would detonate on impact."
"It's amazing I wasn't killed then."
"Might have simplified things," he said.
I remembered then how he'd bent to recoil the hose lying on the walk. Any excuse to hang back out of range. I was beginning to feel strangely free. The time left was brief, but it was beginning to stretch and sag like a long strand of chewing gum. It seemed absurd to think I'd spend the last minutes of my life discussing trivial points with the man who was going to do me in. Oh hell, why not, you know? I flashed again to my brief flight off the front of Olive's porch while she soared beyond me like a bird. A death like that barely registers. What scared me was surviving, maimed and burned, living long enough to feel the loss of self. Time to make a move, I thought, regardless of the conse
quences. Once your life is threatened, what else do you have to lose?
I reached for my handbag. "I've got some tranqs in my bag. Do you mind?"
He seemed startled, waving his gun at me. "Leave it where it is."
"I'm a wreck, Terry. I really need a Valium. Then you can tie me up."
"No," he said peevishly. "Don't touch it. I mean it!"
"Come on. Indulge me. It's a small request."
I pulled the bag over and unzipped the top, rooting through the contents until I located the crosshatched ivory handle of my beloved .32 and eased the safety off. He couldn't believe I'd disobey him, but he couldn't seem to think what to do.
As he rose to his feet, I fired through the bottom of the handbag at a range of ten feet without any visible effect. He did jump as if I'd tossed hot gravy on his pants, but I didn't see blood and he didn't topple to the floor as I'd sincerely prayed he would. Instead, he roared to life, coming at me like a mad dog. I pulled the gun out of my purse to fire again, but he was on me, taking me with him to the floor. I saw his fist come at me, and I jerked to the right. The blow landed on my left ear, which rang with pain. I scrambled up, grabbing at the couch for support. I had no idea where my gun had gone, but he was aiming his at me. I snatched up my handbag and swung it. I caught him in the head. The momentum knocked him sideways.
He was blocking my passage to the front door, so I veered the other way, and raced into the bathroom. I slammed the door after me, turned the lock, and hit the floor. He fired twice, bullets zinging through the door like bees. There was no way out. The bathroom window was right in the line of fire and I couldn't see anything to defend myself with. He started kicking at the door, savage blows that splintered the wood on impact. I saw his foot come through the panel and he kicked again. His hand shot through the hole and he fumbled for the lock. I jerked the lid off the toilet tank and cracked him a blow. I heard him yelp and he snatched his hand back through the hole. He fired again, screaming obscenities. Suddenly his face appeared in the gap, eyes roving wildly as he searched for my location. The nose of the gun peered at me. All I could think to do was to protect myself with the tank lid, holding it in front of me like a shield. The bullet slammed into it with a clang, the impact fierce enough to jolt the lid right out of my hands, breaking it in two. Terry started kicking at the door again, but the blows were losing force.
On the other side, I heard him fall heavily. I froze, astonished, gasping for breath. There wasn't time to wait to see if he was faking it. I flipped the lock, shoving at the door, which I couldn't budge. I dropped to my knees and peered at him through the panel. He was flat on his back, his shirt front drenched in red. Apparently I'd wounded him the first time I fired, but it had taken him this long to go down. Blood seeped from him like a slow leak from a worn tire. His chest was still heaving. Above his stertorous breathing I could hear the package ticking like a grandfather clock.
"Get out of the doorway! Terry, move!"
He was unresponsive. The clock on my desk said 4:29.
I shoved as hard as I could, but there was no budging him. I had to get out of there. Frantically I glanced around the room and then grabbed up one half of the broken toilet tank. I smashed at the window. Glass showered out into the front yard, leaving fangs of glass in the frame. I grabbed a towel and wedged it over the glass-ragged sill as I boosted myself up.
The boom from the explosion propelled me through the window, like Superman in full flight. I landed on the grass with a whunk that knocked the wind right out of me. For a moment, I felt the panic of paralysis, wondering if I'd ever breathe again. Debris was raining down around me. I saw a hunk of the roof hover briefly above me, like a UFO. Then it began to tumble and bounce down through the intervening branches of a tree. A cloud of white smoke drifted into view and began to disperse. I angled my gaze up to the wall behind me, which seemed to be intact. My sofa bed was sitting in the driveway with the cushions askew. Perched on the arm was my perky green air fern looking like it had hopped up there by itself. I knew the whole front wall of my apartment would be gone, the interior a shambles, all my possessions destroyed. Lucky I don't have much in this world, I thought.
I was temporarily deaf again, but I was getting used to it. Eventually, with effort, I roused myself and went back inside to see if there was anything of Terry left.
Epilogue
* * *
Henry Pitts came home to find a crater where his rental unit had been. He was more distressed about my troubles in his absence than any damage to his property, which was covered by insurance. He has big plans now about building a new studio for me and he's already conferring with an architect. I managed to salvage a few articles of clothing, among them my all-purpose dress and my favorite vest. What could I complain about? As soon as I was on my feet again, I went back to work. Mac arranged for California Fidelity to refurbish my office as a way of making amends for my temporary suspension. Andy Motycka was fired and criminal charges were filed against him. The D.A.'s office probably whited my name out and typed his in its place. Within two days of the explosion, Daniel left with Bass. I can't say I felt much. After all I'd been through, his betrayal seemed beside the point.
In surveying the situation, there was only one other matter that needed cleaning up. I conferred with Lieutenant Dolan in private about the five thousand dollars Terry'd deposited to my account. He advised me to keep my mouth shut, which I did.
Respectfully submitted,
Kinsey Millhone
Sue Grafton, E Is for Evidence
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