Hostage

by Robert Crais

“Kev!”

  Kevin sobbed, then began to cry.

  Inside the room, the man yelled, “Sonofabitch! Get the hell outta here!”

  Kevin stumbled backward as the man came lurching through the door, naked except for a huge glistening erection. He was carrying his jeans.

  “I’ll teach you to watch, you little shit!”

  He was a big man, his body white and arms dark, coarse and hairy with tattoos on his shoulders and a loose flabby gut. His eyes glowed bright red from booze and pot. He stripped a thick leather belt from the jeans, then chased after Kevin, swinging the belt. Its buckle was a great brass oval inlaid with turquoise. The belt came down, cracking across Kevin’s back, and Kevin screamed.

  Dennis drove into the man as hard as he could, flinging punches that had no effect, and now the belt was his, snapping across him over and over and over until all his tears were gone.

  She never came out, and after a while the man went back into the room. Her little pleasure.

  “Dennis?”

  Dennis cleared his eyes, then slid off the bar stool.

  “Be quiet, Kevin. I’m not leaving here until I can take that cash.”

  Dennis went back to the office and unplugged the phone. There was no point in talking to the cops until he knew what to say. He wanted the money.

  KEN SEYMORE

  The Channel Eight news van was parked at the edge of the empty lot. The reporter was a pretty boy, couldn’t have been twenty-five, twenty-six, something like that, who got off telling everyone he went to USC. Trojan this, Trojan that, God’s a Trojan. A Trojan was a fuckin’ rubber, but Seymore didn’t say that. The reporter pool complained all evening because there were no toilets; the local cops promised that a honey-wagon was coming out, but so far, zip.

  Seymore asked the guy if it would be all right to step behind their van, take the lizard for a walk.

  The pretty boy laughed, sure, but watch where you step, they got a regular lizard trail back there. Dick. Seymore thought he was the kind of guy who ordered chocolate martinis.

  Seymore stepped behind the van where no one could see him and did two spoons of crank. It hit the top of his head like a blast of cold air and made his eyes burn, but it kept him awake. It was after two and all of them were fighting the hours. Seymore noted that the Asian chick with the hot ass kept ducking into her SUV and had a fine set of the sniffles to show for it. A regular one-woman Hoover convention.

  Coming out from behind the van, Seymore saw the Channel Eight reporter conferring with his producer and cameraperson, a man with hugely muscled arms. They looked excited.

  Seymore said, “Thanks, buddy.”

  “No problem. You hear? They’re getting one out of the house.”

  Seymore stopped.

  “They are?”

  “I think it’s the father. He’s hurt.”

  A siren spooled up, and they all knew it was the ambulance. Every camera crew in the lot hustled to the street in hopes of a shot, but the ambulance left from a different exit; the siren grew louder, peaked, then faded.

  Seymore’s phone rang as the siren dopplered away. He answered as he walked away, lowering his voice but unable to hide his irritation. He knew who it was; he started right in.

  “Why the fuck I gotta hear this from a reporter? Fuckin’ Smith comes out, forchrissake, and I gotta learn about it last?”

  “Do you think I can get to a phone any time I want? I’m right out front in this; I have to be careful.”

  “All right, all right. So tell me, was he talking? The guy here says he was hurt.”

  “I don’t know. I couldn’t get close enough.”

  “Did he have the disks? Maybe he had the disks.”

  “I don’t know.”

  Seymore felt himself losing it. Fuckups like this could cost him his ass.

  “If anyone should know, it’s you, goddamnit. What the fuck are we paying you for?”

  “They’re taking him to Canyon Country Hospital. Go fuck yourself.”

  The line went dead.

  Seymore didn’t have time to get pissed about it. He called Glen Howell.

  PART THREE

  • • •

  THE HEAD

  17

  • • •

  Friday, 11:36 P.M.

  Pearblossom, California

  MIKKELSON AND DREYER

  It was late when Mikkelson and Dreyer found Krupchek’s trailer, a thirty-foot Caravan split at the seams, waiting for them at the end of a paved road in Pearblossom, a farm community of fruit orchards and day workers in the low foothills at the base of the Antelope Valley. That was Mikkelson’s notion when they finally found the damned place, that it was waiting, wide, flat, and dusty, the way a desert toad waits for a bug.

  Dreyer swiveled the passenger-side floodlight and lit up the place. Somewhere under the dust, it was pale blue going to rust.

  Dreyer, more cautious by nature, said, “You think we should wait for Palmdale?”

  Mikkelson, anxious to get inside, said, “Why’d we go to the trouble of getting the warrant, if we’re gonna wait? We don’t have to wait. Leave the light.”

  Krupchek’s road ran the gut of a shallow canyon between two low ridges. No streetlights, no cable TV, no nothing out here; they had phone service and power, but that was about it; the sun went down, it was black.

  Mikkelson, tall and athletic, behind the wheel because she got carsick when Dreyer drove, got out first. Dreyer, short and square, came up beside her, the rocky soil crunching. Both had their Maglites. They stood there, staring at the trailer, both a little bit nervous.

  “You think anyone is home?”

  “We’ll find out.”

  “You think that’s his car?”

  “We’ll run the tag when we finish inside.”

  An eighties-era Toyota Camry, itself dusty and speckled with rust, sat outside the darkened trailer.

  They were late getting here, having gone to the Rooneys’ apartment first, where they’d had to dick around with his landlord and the goofy woman who lived above them, the stupid cow asking over and over if she was going to be on the news. Mikkelson had wanted to slap her. When they had finally come up to Pearblossom, finding the trailer had been a bitch because it was dark and these little roads weren’t marked, most of them, so they’d had to stop to ask directions three times. The last stop, a Mexican up from Zacatecas who worked for rich women as a stable groom, turned out to live next door. Here’s the Mexican, a small man with his small wife and six or seven small children, saying that Krupchek kept to himself, never any sounds, never any trouble, had only spoken with Krupchek the one time someone had left a heart carved of bone on their step, the Mexican walking over that evening to ask if it was Krupchek, Krupchek saying no, then closing the door. No help there.

  Mikkelson said, “Let’s go.”

  They approached the trailer, then walked from end to end, just looking. It was like they didn’t want to touch it, these creepy feelings you get.

  Dreyer said, “How do we get in? We look for a key or something?”

  “I don’t know.”

  Here they had the warrant, but how did they get in? They hadn’t thought of that.

  Mikkelson rapped on the door with her Maglite, calling, “Anyone in there? This is the police.”

  She did that twice, getting no answer, then tried the door, one of those flimsy knobs that was tougher than it looked. It was locked.

  “We could jimmy it, I guess.”

  “Maybe we should try to find the landlord, have him open it.”

  The Mexican had told them that all the land along the road was owned by a man named Brennert, who rented out the properties, mostly to migrant farmworkers.

  “Shit, that’ll take forever. We’ll just pop the damned thing.”

  Dreyer made a dogged face, unhappy.

  “I don’t want to pay for breaking it.”

  “We’ve got the warrant, we’re not going to have to pay.”

  “You know
the bastard might sue, not Krupchek but Brennert. You know how people are.”

  “Oh, hell.”

  Dreyer could be like that. He was terrified of getting sued. They talked about it all the time, how police officers were sued right and left these days just for doing their jobs, Dreyer hatching plans to put everything in his wife’s name to protect it from the lawyers.

  Mikkelson got the tire iron from their trunk, wedged it in the jamb by the knob, and popped the door. She put her back into it because these damned things were always stronger than they looked.

  A smell like simmering mustard greens rolled out at them.

  “Jesus, does this guy ever wash?”

  Mikkelson leaned inside, feeling full of herself because this was the first time she had ever broken into a property with the full force of the law behind her and it felt pretty damned cool.

  “Anyone home? Knock, knock, knock, it’s your friendly neighborhood police.”

  “Cut the crap.”

  “Relax. There’s no one in here.”

  Mikkelson found the light switch and stepped inside. The interior of the trailer was dingy and cramped with tattered furniture in listless colors, stifling with accumulated heat.

  Dreyer said, “Well, okay, now what?”

  But it was Dreyer who saw them first, having turned to the kitchen, Dreyer saying, “Jesus, look at that.”

  It would have been funny except there were so many of them; five or six boxes, maybe, or even ten or twelve, and Mikkelson would have laughed, making a joke, but the overwhelming sight of so many screamed insanity in a way that made her cringe. Later, the Sheriff’s forensics people would count: seven hundred sixteen Count Chocula boxes, empty, flattened, and folded, all neatly bound with cord, stacked against the walls and on the kitchen counters and in the cupboards in great teetering towers, each box mutilated in exactly the same way, a single cigarette burn, charred and black, on the point of Count Chocula’s nose. They would understand the burns later, too.

  Dreyer, not getting the same creepy read as Mikkelson, went for the joke.

  “You think he got something good for all these box tops?”

  “Put on your gloves.”

  “What?”

  “The gloves. Let’s be careful here.”

  “It’s cereal, for chrissake.”

  “Just put on the gloves.”

  “You think he ate it?”

  “What?”

  “All this cereal. You think he eats it? Maybe he just scrounges for the boxes. There must be a giveaway, you know, a contest.”

  The Caravan was cut into three sections, the kitchen to their right, the living room where they entered, the bedroom to their left, all of it cramped and claustrophobic, littered with free newspapers, Jack-in-the-Box wrappers, soiled clothes, and beer cans; the little kitchen with a tiny sink, an electric range, a half-size refrigerator.

  Mikkelson, ignoring Dreyer’s speculations, moved left to the bedroom, pulling on the vinyl disposable gloves, wondering about the smell. At the door, she lit up the bed with her Maglite, saw stained sheets in a rumpled mess, paper and clothes on the floor, and the jars.

  “Dreyer, I think we should call.”

  Dreyer stepped up behind, his own light beam dancing into the room.

  “Shit. What is that?” Dreyer’s voice was hushed.

  Mikkelson stepped in, holding out her light. Gallon-size glass jars lined the walls, jars that you get when you buy the big pickles in one of those discount stores, lining the walls, stacked to windows that were latched tight to hold out the air. Shapes floated in the jars, suspended in yellow fluid. Some of the jars were so jammed with fleshy shapes there was almost no fluid.

  “Goddamn. I think it’s rats.”

  “Jesus.”

  Mikkelson squatted for a better look, wanting to cover her mouth, maybe put on a gas mask or something so she wouldn’t have to breathe the fetid air.

  “Shit, it’s squirrels. He’s got squirrels in here.”

  “Fuck this. I’m calling.”

  Dreyer left, keying his radio as he fled to the safer night air.

  Mikkelson backed out of the room, stood in the door, thinking what to do. She knew she should go through Krupchek’s things, look for identifying information, family phone numbers, things like that which might help Talley at the scene. She went back to the kitchen, looking for the phone, figuring to find what she needed there.

  Mikkelson, thoroughly creeped out, stood by the phone but stared at the oven. She had this creepy feeling, she would later say, that’s all there was to it; the smell, the squirrels, all those mutilated boxes. She took a deep breath as if she were about to plunge into cold water and jerked open the oven.

  More Count Chocula.

  Mikkelson laughed at herself. Ha ha, like what else did she expect to find?

  Tension now gone, she opened the cupboards, one after the other, all with Count Chocula, bound and burned. She returned to the phone, but hesitated again, then found herself standing at the refrigerator.

  Outside, Dreyer called, “You coming out?”

  “I’m okay.”

  “Wait out here. The Sheriffs are sending detectives.”

  “Dreyer?”

  “What?”

  “You ever notice, a refrigerator is like a white coffin standing on end?”

  “Jesus, would you just come out?”

  The refrigerator came open without effort, empty and strangely clean against the squalor of the trailer, no soda, no beer, no leftovers, just white enamel that had been lovingly polished. This refrigerator, Mikkelson would later testify, was the cleanest thing in the trailer.

  A thin metal door was set in the top of the box; the freezer. Her hand had a mind of its own, reaching out, pulling the door. Her first thought was that it was a cabbage, wrapped in foil and Saran Wrap. She stared at it, stared hard, then closed the doors, never once, not once, tempted to touch that thing in the freezer.

  Mikkelson left the trailer to wait with Dreyer in the hot night air, the two of them saying nothing, waiting for the Sheriffs, Mikkelson thinking, Let them touch it.

  18

  • • •

  Friday, 11:40 P.M.

  Santa Clarita, California

  GLEN HOWELL

  Howell took three rooms in the Comfort Inn, all at the rear of the motel with outside entrances. Marion Clewes had the woman and the girl bound hand and foot in one room, tape over their eyes and mouths. Howell had checked to make sure they were secure, then went back to his own room even though the place smelled of cleaning products and new carpets. He didn’t like being around Clewes.

  Howell was sitting on his bed when he received the call from Ken Seymore, his heart trying to jump out of his nose as he heard that Walter Smith had been removed from the house.

  “Did the cops go in? What the fuck is happenin’ out there?”

  “No one went in, it was just Smith coming out.”

  “He just walked out?”

  “They carried him. He’s fucked up. One of the pricks in there must’ve beaten him. They took him out in an ambulance.”

  Howell sat silent for a moment, thinking. Smith out while his kids were still inside was a problem. Smith in the hospital where they’d pop him full of dope, get him high, that was a problem, too.

  “Did anything else come out of that house?”

  “Nothing they’re telling the news pool.”

  Howell hung up and immediately phoned information for the Canyon Country Hospital’s phone number and address, then called the hospital for directions off the freeway. He found the location in his Thomas Guide to double-check the directions, then he used his cell phone to call Palm Springs.

  Phil Tuzee answered. Howell filled him in, then waited as Tuzee talked it over with the others. It was Sonny Benza who came back on the line.

  “This is fuckin’ bad, Glen.”

  “I know.”

  “He have the disks on him?”

  “I don’t know, Sonny. I
just heard about this two minutes ago. It just happened. I’m going to send someone over.”

  “Find out if he has the disks and see if he’s been talking to anyone. That won’t be good if he’s talking. His kids are still in that house?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Sonofabitch.”

  Howell knew they were all thinking the same thing; a man desperate to save his kids might say anything. Howell tried to sound hopeful.

  “They say he’s fucked up pretty bad. I don’t know that for sure, Sonny, but if he’s unconscious he can’t be talking. The press pool out there is talking a concussion with possible brain injury. They make it sound like the guy’s in a coma.”

  “Listen, don’t tell me anything you don’t know for sure. I wipe my ass with rumors. You just hold your shit tight out there and take care of this.”

  “It’s tight.”

  “That’s why those pricks let him out, he’s hurt? Maybe we’ll get lucky and the fucker will die.”

  “Talley talked them into letting him out.”

  “You know something, Glen? That doesn’t sound like your shit is tight. That sounds like the fuckin’ wheels are comin’ off. Do I have to come out there myself?”

  “No way, Sonny. I got it.”

  “I want those goddamned disks.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “I don’t want Smith talking, not to anyone, you understand?”

  “I understand.”

  “You know what I’m saying?”

  “I know.”

  “Okay.”

  Benza hung up. It was their call; they had made it. Howell picked up the hotel phone and called two rooms down.

  “Come over here. I got something for you to do.”

  19

  • • •

  Friday, 11:52 P.M.

  TALLEY

  Talley checked the time, then took out the Watchman’s Nokia and checked its charge. Crazy thoughts of holding a gun to the doctor’s head flashed like pinwheels through his mind. Smith knew who was behind this. Smith knew who had his family. Talley paced the mouth of the cul-de-sac, his thoughts kaleidoscoping between Amanda and Jane, and Dennis Rooney. Maddox and Ellison had the phone again, but Dennis refused to answer their calls and had taken his own phone off the hook. Talley sensed that Dennis was working through something, but Talley didn’t know what.