He fell, and the books fell and the binding broke on Taboo Number 4. His favorite.
To know this would have upset him.
He respected books more than he respected most of the people he knew and was always very careful with loaners.
“You’re crazy! You’re fucking crazy! Let me out of here!”
“Nobody moves!”
He had the gun pressed hard into the back of her neck and she was trying to get away from it but she couldn’t find the goddamn button on the console that would unlock the door and the barrel of the gun, the sharp sight of the gun kept jabbing at her.
Jump! Jump!
“You stay where the fuck you are, Carole! You stay where you are!”
“Carole! Please! Hey. Don’t…”
Lee was just trying to drive, trying to get the car around the corner, doing what Wayne had told him to do, trying to stay calm and calm her too because there was nothing they could have done to stop it and nothing they could do now and she knew that, nobody around, not a cop in sight and she knew that but she had to get out this was madness. She had to!
Then Wayne’s hand was in her hair, hurting her, pulling her head back, the gun pressed deep into her cheek.
“Drive! Drive, goddammit!”
She could still hear the sound, the massive single flat tone, it roared in her head so that she could barely hear him or even her own voice it was so loud, a huge rolling note of thunder within the tiny car that now to her was suddenly so much smaller than it was only a second ago, the car filled with a physical weight of sound that crowded them into corners like the hand of some sick invisible god pressing them apart and filling the spaces between them with pain and shock.
She could smell the powder—thick, rich, biting, drifting from the barrel of the gun. The scent of death fast and sure working its way into her through her nose through her mouth through her eyes bringing tears to her eyes, working its way in.
“Turn here. Back to 91. Do it!”
The boy was just a boy. Just a kid. Who would care about him? Who would regret?
Who would know?
“Take it back to 89 North.”
“Back?” Lee looked confused now as well as shaken.
“Yeah. Back.”
“I don’t…”
“Don’t worry about it. Just drive. Stay nice and calm, Lee, and drive. You’re doing a fine job.”
He took the gun off the back of her neck.
He settled in.
Traffic was light. No sirens wailed through the night. No flashing lights. No high-speed pursuit.
No punishment.
And no redemption.
It was as though it had never happened.
The boy was there. And then he wasn’t there. They had never even been to this town.
She thought she was going crazy, that this was what it was like.
For a long time no one spoke.
How long? An hour? She didn’t know.
She felt sure an hour had passed. Maybe more. Her ears were still ringing, she could still feel the pressure inside them. She could still smell the faint reek of powder. She wondered if the gun had damaged her hearing permanently. She could almost wish it had.
Headlights. The road ahead. Nothing more. They were back on I-89. The traffic was heavier and Lee was going slowly. Cars passed them.
Cars all filled with strangers.
She could almost feel him drifting away, dreaming behind her in the back there. Dreaming awake, not sleeping. They were not going to get that lucky. Running the whole evening through like a movie on a VCR. Play. Slow-frame. Stop-action.
She hated him.
She had never hated anybody before. Not as far as she could remember. Not even her father. And there might have been good reason for that.
She had not even hated Howard—though god knows there was plenty of anger, plenty of fury. But mostly she’d been afraid of Howard, afraid of how he made her feel. Helpless. Lost. Trapped. As though she were on a dark flight of stairs leading nowhere, going up, endlessly up, tiring and finally falling to her knees, falling over and over again, going nowhere.
That was why he died. Because he wouldn’t go away.
So that what he made her feel wouldn’t go away either.
But this man.
This man she hated.
She discovered that hating was physical, it was action, not simply feeling. There seemed to be nothing passive about it. It took energy, concentration. She sat there and worked the hate as you’d work a piece of clay, pushing, pulling it into the shape of something stark and real and recognizable, then molding it down soft again so that he would never see it and never know, then bringing it alive again into sharp definition.
As the headlights of cars drifted by, their drivers unseeing, unknowing.
She was masked. Veiled.
There was no place to take the hate, so she held it tight and waited.
“This exit,” he said.
Off the ramp was a Comfort Inn. New and brightly lit.
“In here,” he said.
“Here?”
“That’s right. Keep on going past the bar, see it there? And into the lot behind.”
There were only three cars parked in front of the two rear tiers of units. At this time of year business would be light. Even in front of the bar and restaurant area she’d only seen half a dozen cars.
“Park anywhere in here.”
Lee pulled in and stopped about midway down the line.
“Give me the keys,” said Wayne. Lee handed them over. She turned and saw that Wayne had her jacket again and had it draped over the Magnum.
“Rest stop,” he grinned.
They got out and he walked them to the back of the car. He had the gun pointed at Lee while he used the car keys on the trunk and took out a small brown imitation leather suitcase. He closed the trunk and dug into his pocket. He grinned at them again and dangled another set of keys. The chain said COMFORT INN.
“You planned this?”
“Always think ahead, Lee. Here. It’s right upstairs here.”
He pocketed the car keys, lifted the suitcase and walked them up the stairs ahead of him, careful to stay well behind. It was probably good he was careful. The urge to kick back at him or even fall back into him and push him down at all costs, to watch him fall and bleed, was the taste of licorice in her mouth.
“To your right there. Number 233.”
He opened the door. They stepped inside.
Two queen-sized beds, a television, a desk and dresser. A bathroom with a door in back. A mirrored sink and dressing area.
The usual.
“Sit down, guys.”
They sat beside one another on the far bed nearest the dressing area. The air in the room was still and musty.
The bed felt good. The bed felt fine. She realized that she was very tired. She could have slept on the bed in a minute.
Curled up with her hate and gone to sleep. She could have slept for hours.
He closed the checkered curtains. Flicked on the overhead light. He put the suitcase down on the other bed and opened it in front of them, turned it toward them so they could see.
And whatever drowsiness she felt disappeared. Fled her instantly.
She saw the steel gleam of handcuffs atop the jumbled clothing, saw the pliers, the kitchen knife, the hammer, the thick ball of wire. She saw the look on his face that was not smiling now, nor even amused, but serious, and the gun that was raised and pointed at them.
“What do you want?” she said.
His look said it was obvious.
“I want more,” he said.
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
Rule thought sometimes that his life had devolved into work, beer and the TV set, with the weekly visit to Marty and the occasional pause to eat its only variations. Now and then he could rouse himself to visit the dollhouse out in the garage. But work on the dollhouse seemed to have lost much of its juice since they’d gone. Or maybe he was jus
t reluctant to see it over. For whatever reason it languished.
Tonight he was sitting down with his second Amstel Lite watching Cinemax. The movie was Rutger Hauer in Blind Fury.
Hauer was sightless but in perfect touch with the Force or whatever it was and he was moving through a cornfield. He had just finished dispatching one of the bad guys—who was chasing his buddy’s kid—with a single thrust from the sword he kept hidden in his cane. Now he was playing cat and mouse with the other one.
He’d seen the movie twice before but this one was a real hell-raiser so he settled back and popped the top of the beer can and watched while Hauer, protector of innocence, stepped out of the tall waving corn.
He was blind but he could see it all.
The phone rang.
“You’re off duty, Covitski. So am I. What are we, going steady or something, you’re calling me?”
“You’re testy, Rule. You know what testy means? Too much testosterone. Makes you aggressive. You’re getting aggressive in your old age. You’re getting little white hairs growing out of your ears. What you need to do now is go grab a pair of tweezers. Get rid of those little white hairs. You’re gonna want to hear this.”
“You’re sure about that?”
“The coroner’s office called.”
“No way. They’re finished already?”
“Nah. Not till tomorrow. Point is they got something. Wanted to let us have it right away, maybe let us spin with it a while.”
“They got what?”
“They got teeth marks.”
“Teeth marks?”
“Right. Guess where.”
“Jesus, Covitski. His butt. His jugular. His earlobe. How the hell do I know?”
“His knuckles.”
Rule let that one sink in.
“Fresh?”
“Uh-huh. Imprint of two front uppers and an incisor across the index and middle finger of his right hand. Our boy Howard gave somebody a knuckle sandwich right before he bought the farm. Now all we got to do is find a few teeth.”
“Any call-in from the wife?”
“Not that I’m aware of. You figure we’re looking for the boyfriend. Edwards. That was my idea too.”
“We need to know if anybody’s heard from her.”
“I’ll phone the station and get right back to you.”
“Make it quick. If she hasn’t called I’m going to want to ride out there again.”
“You feel like some company?”
“Sure.”
It sort of surprised him. Covitski had a wife and son. But who could say? Maybe he got lonely, too.
“Five minutes,” said Covitski.
He decided against the rest of the second beer. He looked in his address book and dialed the number he had for Carole Gardner. On the television they were getting to the part where Hauer slices off the bad guy’s eyebrows. “I also do circumcisions,” he says. Rule was probably going to miss that part. But the nice thing about Cinemax was that unlike life, you got plenty of opportunity to catch up with what you missed.
Nobody answered at the Gardner place. He sat and watched and waited by the phone.
Four minutes later it rang again.
Three minutes after that the house was lifeless, empty, dark, and Rule was out working, putting in overtime, about the only thing he had going these days, even the television silent. Hauer on the airwaves avenging something, and nobody there to listen.
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
Wayne was resourceful. You had to give him that.
Lee considered his resourcefulness sitting alone and uncomfortable on the floor under the motel sink, gagged, his mouth stuffed with white cotton gauze pads and taped shut, his feet bound together behind him and strapped across his thighs so he couldn’t straighten his legs and start kicking at the wall, his wrists cuffed to the pipes.
Wayne hadn’t even unplugged the phone between the beds.
Why bother?
Lee wasn’t going anywhere.
He couldn’t even make much of a racket under here, though he was doing his best, slapping the handcuffs against the metal pipes and up against the sink. Trying to shout into the spit-slimy gauze pads—but what came out were only hoarse, muffled moans.
It wasn’t much.
It was also taking up a hell of a lot of energy. He’d thrash around and then he’d have to stop for a while. He’d listen, hoping that the walls were thin.
They weren’t. Either that or next door there was nobody home.
He’d catch his breath and start again. It was all he could do. He could see the .357 Magnum on the dresser not ten feet away. It taunted him.
He was scared. The guy was crazy but his act was tight.
Like these handcuffs.
Every time he slammed the pipes or the sink they cut in deeper, scraped off more of his skin. Wayne would take one look at them and know what he’d been up to. The question was would he even give a damn? Or had he reckoned on this too, knowing Lee would try, knowing it would do him no good?
Where were they?
And what did he want with Carole?
With Carole alone.
There was no way he was going to find out until Wayne wanted him to. Or unless he somehow got himself free here.
He thrashed. Groaned. He tried to pull the fucking pipe out of the wall but it was no good, he had no leverage. He pounded his head against the bowl of the sink. A series of dull hard-melon thuds.
The headache followed shortly.
To hell with it. He kept pounding.
Rattling his chains.
Jesus! The audacity! thought Carole.
They were sitting at a table at the motel bar, a young couple drinking cocktails directly across from them—Irish she thought, the girl pale and delicate, the man with the eyes of a drinker, ruddy-faced. Two older white-haired men with beers over in the corner. A half-dozen younger men and two women at the bar. A skinny young bartender. A blonde, middle-aged cocktail waitress who looked bone-tired of this kind of work, smiling bravely and heavy on her feet.
She could yell out to any and all of them right now. She could dive for the floor.
Help! He’s got a gun!
She could get away from him.
If they reacted fast enough.
If they cared to help her. If Wayne didn’t kill her before somebody could get the gun away if they wanted to get the gun away, if they tried.
It was at least a possibility.
You first. I’ll shoot you first, he told her in the parking lot.
Unfortunately she believed him.
She’d already seen that what he said was true. He was a very good shot.
She thought, look at the chance he’s taking, though.
Why?
Is he that crazy? Does he want to get caught?
She’d read about people like that, people who committed crimes and then seemed to dare the police to catch up with them, who seemed to like the game almost as much as the crimes themselves. Jack the Ripper sending a kidney to Scotland Yard. Bonnie and Clyde sending photos to the feds and poems to the newspapers.
Egomaniacal crazies.
You can’t catch me.
Was that it? Was that why they were sitting here?
Was he daring her to scream, to try to get away? She was tempted to call his hand.
She looked around the room.
Who would help?
She couldn’t trust them. She couldn’t trust any of them to care enough or be good enough even if they did care.
With a shock of recognition she realized that the couple across from them was in the process of breaking up, of ending their relationship. She didn’t know why she should notice that but she did.
She could see it plainly on the young woman’s face, in the way she was looking at him—it was clear as day—that look of loving him mixed with sadness and longing, with disappointment as she watched him, facing him, while he was facing away, watching him closely without him knowing or probably even caring thr
ough the long terrible silence between them, the woman’s face drawn and pale and plain and then suddenly pretty as she leaned forward saying something light to him, trying to cheer him up. His response intense at first. Angry. Then lethargic, looking away again, showing her that whatever it was, it didn’t matter.
It was not just a fight they were having.
It was over.
She saw that they wore no rings.
They’d been dating, then. For how long it was impossible to know. And now it was finished for him—but not for her. She was sitting in this bar, loving him beyond all reason and all hope. She could see the sadness in the mouth, the tenderness in the eyes.
It was painful to watch. She could barely look away.
“Tell me about it,” Wayne said.
He was sipping iced tea through a straw, dunking a wedge of lemon. I hardly ever drink, he’d told her. Proud of that. As though the double scotch she was holding were a great disappointment to him.
Him with the jacket draped over his legs. The gun in his hand beneath it.
A man with a gun. Yet another one.
“I’m sorry. What’d you say?”
“I’d like to hear more about it. I mean for instance, what was it that Howard did that pushed you and Lee over the edge, so to speak? That made you want to kill him. I mean, it must have been something.”
Grinning at her.
“It’s none of your business, Wayne.”
“Sure it is. We’re in this together, remember?”
“Howard’s my business. Our business. Mine and Lee’s. Not yours.”
The grin disappeared. He frowned and shook his head.
“Carole. You’d do better to humor me, you know?”
“Why should I humor you, Wayne.”
“I can think of any number of reasons. There’s a man in room 233 for one thing. I could slit his throat in a second, couldn’t I. Gurgle gurgle. There’s a leak under the sink.”
“Fuck you, Wayne.”
But he had her, she knew it. It was nothing new. He’d had her since the moment he’d stepped toward her in the driveway.
Christ! Did she really have to do this? With him?
The thought repulsed her.
She’d half expected to have to go over it all someday with the police. She’d almost told Rule the night it had happened. And she’d often wished for a friend apart from Lee good enough and close enough to tell everything to, every miserable detail. But Howard had isolated her by then. There were no good friends anymore. Only business associates and acquaintances and shadows from her past who had drifted away to one part of the country or another.