Max’s smile widened.
Dwayne approached. “I don’t want to hurt you.”
“Nah man, you just get your boy to rip my teeth out –”
“But I know you’re lying. I know because people talk. People talk and they tell me things.”
“Well, those people are lying!”
Dwayne stopped in front of him. “I also know because I can see it in your eyes.”
“Oh yeah?”
“I know what it looks like when someone’s being honest with me. I know what it looks like when someone’s full of shit. It’s … Well, it’s too much to explain to your little monkey brain… But you might want to reason with yourself that even if I’m wrong, that doesn’t change the fact that I believe I’m right. Which means that I’ll stay with you, all morning. I’ll stay with you all fucking day if I have to. And eventually you’re gonna give it up. Because no matter how good those drugs make you feel. No matter what that money can buy. What we’re going to do to you, is going to outweigh that significantly.”
Lionel stared at him uneasily.
Dwayne’s phone started vibrating. He leveled himself and motioned to Max. “You may continue.”
“He ain’t continuing nothing!” Lionel shouted. “You better get your – ARRGH –”
Dwayne exited the shed.
“Scott. Thanks for calling me back. I wanted to be there today, but I may be a little –”
“This isn’t about the meeting,” Scott Darper said on the other line. “This is something else that’s come up.”
Dwayne dragged his feet through the paddock. His eyes found the distant river which was still at the moment. “So talk to me.”
“I swung by a crime scene on my way to see Feirstein and co,” Scott explained. “Some details peaked my interest.”
“What details?”
“There was a disturbance at a residence last night. Officers looked in on the place this morning, found what appeared to be a dead man lying just a ways from the door. Spiders, crawling over his carcass.”
“Go on.”
“I had a look at it myself, before anyone else was on scene.”
“In the house you mean?”
“Yeah. So … this guy’s come in, attacked the homeowner, possibly thrown some spiders at him. Then the guy’s on the ground and he takes a bullet to the throat.”
“Execution style?”
“Right. Next he goes into the dining room, slash kitchen area. The family were having dinner. Teenage son is shot immediately upon the intruder’s entry. Right through the head. He then takes the daughter who is only nine years old, puts the gun to her head. He puts his briefcase on the table and tells the mother to open it.”
“I don’t like where this is going.”
“She opens it and there are a bunch of jars in there. Each one has a nasty looking spider inside. And the intruder tells the woman, he’s going to shoot her daughter unless she eats every spider in the damn case.”
“Fuck me.”
“How it ends is, the daughter is killed at some point. And I wake the mother up and she has a whole bunch of spiders stuff in her mouth. She’s lucky she didn’t suffocate.”
“You mean she’s alive?”
“Yeah. The city police have her now, but I was able to get that story out of her beforehand.”
“And you think it could be…”
“Jack the Spider? Oh yeah, Jack’s all over this.”
“So what was the point of it all then? Was he trying to send us a message or…?”
“I don’t know. There’s only one message I get out of it, anyway.”
“What’s that?”
“He’s back.”
CHAPTER 5
Taylor Shandling was out of the house. Driving. In the middle of traffic at the moment. The time was twenty to twelve. Still morning. But approaching afternoon. She didn’t have a lot of plans left for the day. She wanted to be out there in the field – getting to the bottom of who was responsible for Sal Leoncelli’s death. Getting to the bottom of the Special Agent who killed him.
William Ardent. That was his name. And that’s all Taylor knew about him. Even before she’d been sent on leave his file was closed to her. How she would have liked to call up a few favors and get his name put through the system again. Find out where he lived. Who his friends were. What he got up to on weekends.
But Taylor wouldn’t lower herself to that level. She was playing the game straight. The investigation was out of her hands, and into someone else’s. She hoped they were doing a good job. And that’s where her involvement would end. With hope.
Her car finally made its way to the bowling centre car park, where she got out, cigarette hanging from her lips. The storm overnight had cleared. The clouds were starting to part. Sunlight dipped across her face.
Taylor marched on towards the entrance, taking one last inhale before flicking the smoke away and going inside. Once there, she went to the food counter. Ordered a milkshake. She spun around on her stool, looking down the lanes. It was pretty quiet today.
The server set the milkshake in front of her in a metal cup with a straw. As she accepted it, a woman moved by her.
“I’ll have one of those too, please.”
“You got it, Miss.”
Taylor turned, her face falling. “Oh no.”
“Oh no?” Vera Redcroft replied.
“Oh … fucking … no…”
Taylor went to get up, but Ms. Redcroft restrained her. “Please. Your drink is on me.”
Taylor winced in disgust.
Ms. Redcroft paid for them both as her drink came over.
They sipped their milkshakes together.
“Hmm, not bad,” Ms. Redcroft said loudly.
Taylor went to leave again.
“Oh, will you sit down?” Ms. Redcroft persisted.
“This is stalking,” Taylor said. “I could have you arrested.”
“I wouldn’t advise that.”
Taylor studied her. “What the hell do you want from me? Seriously.”
“I want you to sit back down. Just act like we’re old friends. God knows, you could use one.”
Taylor reluctantly returned to the stool.
“Now it’s true that Captain McGuinness did refer me onto you for counseling and analysis,” Ms. Redcroft began. “But I also have something of an ulterior motive. A hidden agenda.”
“You think?”
“You see your Captain isn’t the only person who has contacted me about you. I’ve actually been studying your file for some time.”
“Before the precinct shooting?”
“Yes, before that.”
Taylor shook her head. “So, what was your plan then? Get me to open up. Incriminate myself for God knows what. If you’re looking for corruption, you’re looking in the wrong place.”
“It’s nothing like that.”
“So, what then?”
“I wanted to get to know you. I wanted you to get to know me. We could be working on something together very soon. It was important for me to see what sort of a woman you were. Especially after all this business with the shooting and so on…”
“Get to the point,” Taylor snapped.
“Okay. Just a moment.” Ms. Redcroft took out her phone. She began swiping through.
“What are you doing?”
“There’s a photo I want you to look at. Okay…” Ms. Redcroft held the phone away from her so Taylor couldn’t see.
“What the hell?”
“I need to make sure you’re calm first. That you’re open. In the right frame of mind.”
A faint cloud of anxiety descended over Taylor. She began to feel uneasy. “What is it? What are you going to show me?”
“It’s nothing too horrible,” Ms. Redcroft said. “Don’t be alarmed. But … then again. Maybe you should brace yourself.”
“Give me the damn phone,” Taylor ordered.
Ms. Redcroft bowed her head. She handed it over.
Taylor looked down to the image captured on the screen.
And a second later she collapsed.
CHAPTER 6
There were stories about Taylor Shandling that not many people knew. Stories from the past. Of course it was that way with everyone. They all had their lives outside of 2017. Thousands upon thousands of days. With all their little moments.
And going back into that jungle of memory now, we pull out an afternoon from Taylor’s childhood. She would have been about ten years old. Now this afternoon is special because a lot of circumstances had to take place in a specific order for Taylor to find herself now where she was.
That is, in the bowling alley.
With Ms. Vera Redcroft.
Looking at a photo.
And before that, we have the afternoon where Taylor’s a ten-year-old girl, playing on some swings in a playground. Except she wasn’t really playing. She was just sort of sitting there, gently swinging back and forth but not really. Reading a book.
In order to get here, to this day, to this exact moment, Taylor’s Dad had to be an asshole and not take her that weekend. It was that time of year again – when he’d go golfing with his buddies and take turns at drinking each other under the table. So this weekend, it was a miss. Taylor was saddled with her Mom and her Mom’s boyfriend, who played tennis on Saturdays. While they were on the courts, Taylor wandered the clubhouse. She went outside and explored the grounds. There were no other children. The adults kept giving her weird looks. It didn’t matter whether she was walking or standing still. She wasn’t supposed to be there.
But there, she was. And so Taylor left the tennis club by the back gate and walked through the parking lot while no one was looking. She crossed the road and walked through a grass reserve till she reached a trail and followed it.
Eventually she came to a fork in the pathway, one going left and the other right. She went left before coming to another fork and this time going right.
Had she made a different decision at either junction, it would have been quite a different day for her.
Maybe even a different life.
It was a short time after this she found the playground where there were swings where she could sit on. And read.
She got through about five pages.
“Hello there.”
A voice.
“What are you doing?”
Taylor looked over her shoulder.
It was a girl, about the same age. She had curly dark hair and was wearing a checkered blue skirt.
“Nothing,” Taylor mumbled. “Reading.”
“What is it? Any good?”
Taylor closed the book. “You wouldn’t be interested.”
“How do you know? You don’t know me.”
Taylor looked away. She got out of the swing.
“I’m Charlotte,” the girl introduced herself. “What’s your name?”
“Taylor.”
“I haven’t seen you here before.”
“Do you live near here or something?”
“Sort of. I come here a lot.”
“Okay…”
Charlotte beamed. “Hey. Do you want to see something?”
“What?”
“It’s just over here. I’ve been dying to show someone. Come on.”
She took off, skipping.
Taylor glanced back the way she came. She could still hear the echoes of the tennis courts calling out to her. At least, she thought she could.
She turned back to Charlotte.
Charlotte disappeared around the corner of the trail.
“Hey!” Taylor cried out. “Wait up!”
She jogged on after her new friend, following the trail for a lengthy distance. Through bends and forks and corners and angles. Eventually Charlotte did come to a stop.
It was underneath a tree.
“I found this place a while ago,” Charlotte confessed. “Now it’s my secret hideaway. I come here when there’s fighting at home.”
“Oh…”
Taylor followed Charlotte’s gaze.
She saw some wooden planks were nailed into the tree.
“I’ll go first then,” Charlotte said. “You follow.”
Perplexed, Taylor watched as Charlotte began to climb the rungs. Higher and higher she went. There was something at the top.
With a short sigh, Taylor let go of her book and took hold of the rungs, hoisting herself up.
Charlotte was waiting for her, looking down. She offered Taylor her hand and soon they were both on the platform together. Behind Charlotte there was an opening.
It was a treehouse.
“Here we are then,” Charlotte said cheerfully. “You sit over there, Taylor.”
Taylor moved to the corner where there was a beanbag. It smelt like a dog had been sleeping in it recently. Charlotte had a deck chair to sit on opposite her.
“Oh, where are my manners?” Charlotte said immediately getting up again.
She produced a round plastic tub and handed it to Taylor.
“Go on,” she said. “Take one. Or two. However many you want.”
Taylor peeled back the lid.
Inside there were half a dozen iced cupcakes.
An edible, cartoon spider was printed in the centre of each cake.
“Mmmm,” Taylor murmured. She took a cake and closed the lid, handing it back to Charlotte.
Charlotte also took a cake.
They ate them together.
“So where you from?” Charlotte asked. “What school do you go to?”
The girls talked for what seemed like hours. The morning became afternoon. The afternoon became twilight.
Charlotte seemed like a nice enough girl. She was having problems at home and at school and didn’t make friends very easily. But Taylor wasn’t one to pick and choose. She actually didn’t mind Charlotte, even though she was a little full on.
But things took a dark turn when Taylor decided it was time to go.
“Wait, what do you mean you’re going?” Charlotte snapped, angrily.
“My Mom is probably worried about me. She won’t know where I am. I sort of ran off,” Taylor explained.
“She can wait. Okay? She’ll wait.”
“No. I … You –”
“I didn’t want to have to come out with it now, Taylor, but I have a job to do up here. You get me? I know we have our delicious cupcakes and our comfy things to sit on. We have the roof here so the sky won’t touch us… But…”
Charlotte left her chair and got on the ground next to Taylor.
“I’ve been waiting for him.”
“What?”
“Out the window. Behind you. Look.”
Taylor got up to her knees. She went to the small rectangular hole in the treehouse wall. She looked out through it.
There was a grass field.
Nothing more.
“Do you see?” Charlotte asked.
Taylor turned back around. “See what?”
Charlotte pushed her out of the way so she could look. “Okay. He’s not there now. I’ve been waiting for him but he’s not there. Do you at least … Do you at least see the river…?”
She moved away so Taylor could look again.
Taylor looked out.
In the distance, she could see the field eventually led to a river. Though it was a fair way away.
“That’s where he goes.”
“Where who goes?”
Charlotte got back up.
Taylor turned towards her.
“Where who goes?” she repeated.
“Promise you won’t tell anyone,” Charlotte demanded.
“You promise, you’ll let me go home now?”
Charlotte clenched her teeth together. Her eyes moved in all directions. Like she was in pain.
Taylor crept towards her. “Who is he?”
“I don’t know his name,” Charlotte blurted out. “He just … He’s a stranger to me. But I’ve seen him out the window.”
“So?”
“He wears a red coat – a coat or cloak. Um, he – he always has a briefcase with him. Black briefcase. I looked out the window one time, he wasn’t there. But then the second time I looked out, and I saw him.”
“Right…”
“He was going towards that river. It was just … I just got chills, you know? Then I come back three days later and look out the window and he’s there again. Walking across the field.”
“Is that all?”
“But no, it happens again! Not every time I come here but more often than not! I look out the window and he’s there! I think. I think he wants me to follow him.”
Taylor shook her head. “Did he see you? Did he say something?”
“No, I’ve never seen his face. Only…” Charlotte rushed over to the window. “Damnit. I thought he might be there.”
“Maybe he’s not coming today.”
“I know,” Charlotte said. “But maybe tonight. I think I have to follow him.”
Taylor swallowed. It was too much for her to absorb. “Look. I have to be going.”
She hurried back through the opening to the platform.
Charlotte chased after her.
“Taylor, please don’t go. I need you with me.”
“I’m sorry,” Taylor said, starting to climb down. “My Mom’s waiting for me.”
“Taylor…” Charlotte whined. “Will you … will you come back…?”
“Sure thing.”
“Tomorrow? Will you come back tomorrow?”
“Okay. No problem.”
“Goodbye, Taylor! Don’t forget, tomorrow!”
“Goodbye.”
Taylor of course didn’t go back there tomorrow. It was actually many months later that Taylor returned.
Another one of Dad’s golfing trips.
Another trip to the tennis club with people looking at her funny.
Another crossing of the road.
She walked the trail and found the playground and walked the trail again.
Till she was at the foot of the treehouse, climbing her way up.
Charlotte wasn’t in the treehouse that time. But a few of her cupcakes were.
Taylor walked past them and peered out through the small rectangular window.
And she saw the man in red walking through the field.
CHAPTER 7
Spider Jack (Guess The Killer Book 2) Page 2
