Bone Music

by Christopher Rice

  Part of her wants to tell him to go. To absolve him of his past sins. To tell him that when it comes to her and their shared past, the slate’s clean, and he should go back to his small-town cop life and make the best of it. Because no way can she drag him through the mud ahead, even if he throws her the rope with gusto.

  But that’s the easy way out.

  Is it better to be helped by people who actually care about you? Or is it better to be helped by someone with a self-interest that matches your own in some way? Which camp does Marty belong in? Which camp would Luke belong in, if she lets him back in?

  Finally, her arms respond to this storm of thoughts before her mouth can.

  She holds the notebook out to him. “I want you to read this,” she hears herself say.

  “What is it?” he asks in almost a whisper.

  “It’s my story. I mean, it’s not a novel or anything. I wrote it in the past two days. But it’s not my father’s version, and it’s not Hollywood’s version. It’s mine. It’s actually what happened to me. And if you’re gonna help me, I want you to read it.”

  “Deal,” he says. He takes it from her grip.

  Then he brushes past her, and to her shock, she realizes he’s about to sit down at Marty’s desk with it.

  “Well, you don’t have to read it now.”

  “Why not? I’m all out of cop jokes.”

  “OK. Well, go in the guest bedroom, where you have some privacy. I don’t want the guys coming in and . . . you know. Flipping through it or something.”

  He nods as if this were the most normal of requests. As if everything about this exchange is normal. He’s pulling the door shut behind him when she calls his name. He stops.

  “I want your help. But I don’t want your agenda. And I want you to listen to what I’m thinking and not tell me what I’m thinking. Can you do that?”

  He nods. Then when she goes silent again, he holds up the notebook and waggles it a little, as if he’s reminding her she just gave him a job to do. Then he pulls the door closed behind him with a soft click, and for a while she just stands there, wondering how something that feels so important could happen so quickly.

  When he notices she’s awake, Marty asks, “What’s he reading in there?”

  Beer plus red meat equaled a wallop of a nap as soon as she’d cleaned her plate. Now she’s come to in one of the deck chairs. Most of the guys are gone, but a few stragglers remain, sitting in a circle of chairs someone brought down to the driveway after she nodded off.

  “He’s still reading?” she asks.

  “Yep. Even came out and got his steak finally, then took it back in there so he could read some more.”

  Well, that’s something. She’d figured he’d ask to take it home with him so he could only pretend to read the rest.

  “Uh-oh,” Marty says.

  He moves to the deck rail like a dog perking up at the approach of a stranger. A pair of high-riding headlights swing into the driveway. A sheriff’s cruiser, just like the one Luke drove her around in that day, only the deputy who steps from it is half Luke’s height and twice his age.

  “Whatcha need, Henricks?” Marty calls to the man.

  “Luke Prescott here?”

  “He’s inside. Why?”

  “His cell’s off. We tried calling him a bunch from the station. We’re getting calls from Dorothy Strickland, lives across the street from him. Says his alarm’s making all kinds of racket. But it’s weird. Sounds almost like music.”

  “Bailey,” Charlotte whispers, getting to her feet.

  “Go,” Marty says quietly. “Get Luke and go. I’ll stay here.”

  She slips inside as Marty says, “We’ll take care of it. Thanks, Henricks.”

  35

  The alarm’s still singing when they get to Luke’s house, the same two-tone chime Bailey used to get their attention the first time. This time the sound fills Charlotte with excitement instead of dread.

  “Stop!” Luke calls out. “We’re here.”

  The music stops, but there’s some kind of flashing light in the living room. It strobes through the rest of the place like some effect in a cheap haunted house. It’s the monitor of Luke’s desktop, she realizes. It’s flashing the same words over and over again. TARGET ACQUIRED.

  Luke hits some light switches, but it doesn’t make the words on-screen seem any less ominous. When he takes a seat at his desk, the words stop flashing. Further proof Bailey can see and hear them through the monitor’s built-in camera.

  New words appear on-screen, white on black. Comically large, but devoid of any ironically cheerful graphics this time.

  Check your e-mail, brother.

  Luke taps a few keys. The monitor doesn’t respond. He throws up his hands.

  Bailey does something that returns the computer to Luke’s control, and a few keystrokes later, Luke’s clicked through a link in a new message from the address maskssuck346@hotmail.com. They’re staring at the website for a plastic surgeon named Frederick Pemberton, based in Newport Beach. The man looks like the victim of his own profession, with a sculpted nose that doesn’t match his uneven features. On top of that, his headshot is so airbrushed he looks like a cartoon appearing though a cloud of fog.

  Luke’s hands are on his lap, but a Word document suddenly opens on-screen, partially covering the web page. Text, typed by Bailey’s unseen hand, appears in the white space.

  You’re welcome.

  “Charley.” There’s hesitation in Luke’s voice—hesitation and warning—and it’s fighting with his resolve not to give her any more fiery lectures; she can tell.

  “I know,” she says. “I know what you’re going to say and I agree. Bailey?”

  Yes.

  “I can’t go off just this. You need to tell me more.”

  Trust me. It’s him.

  “Bailey,” Luke says suddenly. “What was Mom’s nickname for the dog we had when you were in seventh grade?”

  We didn’t have a dog when I was in seventh grade. We had fish, asshole.

  “Probably should have done that sooner,” Luke mutters. “Sorry. As you were.”

  And their names were Siegfried and Roy because you thought it was funny to name fish after tigers.

  Charlotte clears her throat. “Bailey, I know you don’t discuss procedure, but I can’t just go off a name like this.”

  It’s not funny, FYI. Naming fish after tigers. It doesn’t even make sense.

  “It’s definitely him,” Luke says.

  “It makes even less sense because those weren’t the names of the tigers,” she says. “Those were the trainers.”

  Silence.

  “Well, shit,” Luke finally whispers.

  Any more talk, computer lab. New library. Same chat room.

  “Why?” Charley asks. “What are you afraid of, the FBI?”

  Screw the FBI.

  “Yeah, that went great,” Luke says.

  Relax, brother. They only had a subpoena to look at your phone records and e-mails from more than 180 days ago, and you bored them to death, so you’re fine. Not afraid of FBI.

  “Bailey, who do you think is watching us?” she asks.

  Maybe it’s whoever you’re afraid of. They seem worse than FBI. Otherwise you wouldn’t be dealing with me.

  “All right,” she says. “Well, don’t be afraid of them.”

  Startled, Luke looks up from his palms.

  The lack of any new text suggests Bailey’s also surprised.

  “What?” Charlotte says. “You think they’re going to try to stop us? We’re doing what they asked. We’re trying to find a bad man. They should be thrilled.”

  “We’re doing what Dylan asked,” he says. “They might not be such a team, remember?” He looks instantly regretful. “Take the chair. Talk to him. I’ll get you something to drink.”

  So he’s trying. That’s good, she thinks.

  If you’re going to make me discuss procedure, I want to hear yours. Why are you going after th
is guy yourself?

  “It’s a long story,” she answers.

  So’s mine, but you seem to know it all already.

  “I know the version your brother knows. That’s all.”

  Touché I guess.

  “How sure are you this is the guy?” she asks.

  85 percent.

  She laughs.

  Let me put it this way. If you’re planning to share what I tell you with the press, I’d say I’m 90 percent sure. If you’re planning on taking out a hit on this guy, I’d drop it to 75 percent.

  “Well, that is certainly manipulative, Bailey Prescott.”

  ???

  “So whatever you’ve learned, you’re willing to see the guy’s life destroyed by the media, but you don’t necessarily think he deserves to die. Is that it? Do either of those things have anything to do with whether or not he’s a serial killer?”

  White space.

  Luke returns, sets two Sprite Zeros down on the desk next to the keyboard, starts reading over her shoulder.

  “Did we lose him?” he asks.

  “I don’t know.”

  Answer me this.

  They both perk up.

  You’ll do surveillance on this guy before you do whatever it is you’re planning to do, right?

  “Yes,” she answers. “Lots.”

  OK. It goes like this.

  Luke hurries into the kitchen and returns with a dining table chair, which he places right next to hers as the Word doc begins to fill with text.

  The masks are made with a process called plastination. It’s patented, and you can buy the equipment from a company in Germany. It’s a great way to make medical samples of body parts because the process stops the decay and replaces fat and body fluids with polymers. LAPD’s tracked down all the customers in Southern California and found users are medical and/or legit. For the most part. But they’ve got suspicions about one. The Bryant Center in Newport Beach. Heard of it?

  “That’s where that exhibit is, right?” Luke asks.

  “What exhibit?” she asks.

  “The one with all the bodies. You know, where they’re all preserved and posed and you can see the muscles.”

  “Oh yeah, I saw pictures. That’s disgusting.”

  The exhibit is just part of it. Bryant Center is run by multimillionaire real estate guy Denny Bryant, who started a center for “youth sciences.” Antiaging stuff. Mostly quack medicine. But the exhibit pays a huge chunk of the bills. It’s been sold out since it opened. Plastination is how all the bodies in the exhibit were made.

  “You didn’t send us a picture of Denny Bryant,” Charlotte says. “You sent us this Pemberton guy.”

  Chill. I’m getting there. Robbery Homicide Division thinks Bryant might either be their guy or he’s covering for their guy. He’s got a history. Charges of spousal abuse from an ex-wife. Some shit with hookers he got buried. Classic rich fuckhead. But he’s not the killer.

  “Why are you so sure?” she asks.

  There’s a lot that’s not made it into the press about the masks . . . yet. Surgery behind them is excellent. Top-notch. Killer has to be a skilled surgeon. But there’s no shortage of those in Southern California.

  “But they also have to know how to . . . plastinate, or however you say it,” Luke adds.

  That part isn’t as hard. It’s a four-step process. You just need the space and the equipment and some practice. Real problem is they haven’t found individual surgeons who have bought plastination kits and materials. Also both abductions super skilled. From different crowded areas. They think first outside nightclub in downtown LA, but not sure. Second, side street off Ventura Blvd. in Studio City. More sure, not 100 percent. No one turning up on surveillance cameras scoping out areas in advance. But abductions as methodical as surgeries. If the masks hadn’t turned up, the two disappearances might never have been linked by police.

  “Denny Bryant’s not a surgeon, I take it,” she says.

  No. But they think the Mask Maker is connected to the center in some way. They think he’s using their chemicals and equipment. Problem is Denny Bryant knew he’d be implicated as soon as the first mask was found. And he was smart about it. He had his lawyers go in on day one and hand over purchase records for all the center’s labs so it looked like they were being cooperative.

  “Isn’t that cooperative?” Charlotte asks.

  No. It’s bullshit. He knows what they’re gonna be after, and it’s his employee records and security access logs. They’re going to want to look at the names of anyone who had access to the chemicals and equipment. And for some reason, that’s what he wants to keep secret. And a judge just agreed he had a right to.

  “So the cops went after a warrant, and it was denied?” Luke asks.

  Judge said it had all the makings of a fishing expedition. And apparently he shared the suspicions of Bryant’s lawyers.

  “Which were?” she asks.

  That the warrant had less to do with the Mask Maker and more to do with the fact that the state anatomical board has raised ethics questions about where Bryant got the bodies in his exhibit. He says he’s got legal paperwork for all of them, but he’s never volunteered to show it to anyone, and the anatomical board doesn’t have the authority to make him. Also, LAPD didn’t help their case by not going after similar warrants for the personnel records of other major medical facilities that do plastination in SoCal. Made it look like Bryant was being targeted without significant probable cause. Which he was. Because he should be.

  “Bailey, how do you know all this?” Luke asks.

  “Maybe later, you guys could—”

  Told you. I don’t discuss procedure.

  “Did you hack Parker Center?” Luke asks. “Call me crazy, but if I have a brother who just hacked one of the largest police departments in the country, I feel like I should know. It’ll help me figure out what to buy you for Christmas.”

  Relax. We hack Parker Center all the time.

  “Who’s we?” Charlotte asks.

  “Oh, fuck. Did you join Anonymous?”

  Those guys are all over the place. We’re more focused.

  “On what? Ending up in jail?”

  No. Making sure only the right people do.

  “Bailey, can you get us to Pemberton?”

  I got access to the Bryant Center’s security access logs and payroll records since it opened. According to what I found, not a single doctor worked on the plastination for the exhibit. That’s impossible. Each body would have taken fifteen hundred hours to make. Process is insanely complex. The idea that they could have done that with just the three surgical techs they have listed as employees is absurd. Nobody would ever believe it. But they still purged them from the rolls anyway. Because they’re panicking.

  “So you think they know the Mask Maker worked for them, and they purged all evidence of him from the rolls because . . . why? They’re afraid of the scandal?”

  No. I think the Mask Maker did something else for the Bryant Center, and they don’t want anyone finding out what it was. And they’re so eager to cover it up, they don’t give a shit what other crimes he’s committed.

  “What could he have done for them that’s that significant?” Charlotte asks.

  “Get them the bodies,” Luke answers.

  “Jesus. You think he murdered everyone in the exhibit?”

  “No,” Luke says. “He just probably got them through some unethical means.”

  “So . . . Pemberton?” Charley asks.

  His name was purged from every payroll record, except for one. They missed it, but he’s marked “direct deposit.” Means he wasn’t a onetime indie contractor. He was a regular employee. I found another one they missed. For another doctor. Dr. Ella Stanovski. But I ruled her out.

  “Because she’s a woman?”

  No. Because she’s five two. Likely victims overpowered at some point. Pemberton is six three, has a gym membership he uses daily. He’s also single. And he’s got a country house
near Temecula with plenty of land around it and enough square footage for an operating room. Which he bought the equipment for a year ago.

  “So he’s doing surgery out of his house?” Luke asks. “Is that really that weird?”

  He doesn’t advertise it. And there isn’t enough room in his offices in Newport Beach to house the extra equipment he bought.

  “He wasn’t just replacing stuff?”

  No insurance claims on busted or outdated equipment.

  “Jesus Christ, Bailey.”

  I know. I’m good.

  “You’re thorough,” Luke says. “Let’s leave good and bad out of it for now.”

  “Did Pemberton buy any of the stuff needed for plastination?”

  No.

  “OK,” Charley says. “So we know Pemberton was on staff at the Bryant Center, along with at least one other doctor. We know someone, possibly Denny Bryant, purged their names from the rolls. Possibly because he played some hand in getting bodies for the exhibit through unethical means—”

  “Which we have no proof of,” Luke says.

  “True. We also know he’s a skilled surgeon with the time, the means, and the literal space to commit the murders. And possibly access to equipment he could use to make the masks, which means he would have to be sneaking into the facility—”

  Wait. There’s more.

  “What?” she asks. “I’m listening.”

  Plastination requires a vacuum pump chamber that removes acetone from cadavers and forces polymer into cells. According to sales records Bryant Center showed LAPD, they purchased four. According to security camera system I hacked, they only have three on-site right now.

  “Well, that’s something,” Charlotte says.

  It’s not all. Denny Bryant called Pemberton’s cell phone three times yesterday from a cell phone he usually uses for hookers, four times the day before that. I couldn’t get to the voice mails, but earlier today he broke down and sent the guy a text. I got it.