My porch light was unlit, leaving my house shrouded in darkness, its front entrance hidden within a bowl of shadows. The heavy drapes were closed behind the recently installed new picture window, and, shrouded by trees crowding the roof, the house looked desolate, long-deserted. A dead thing.
Taking my flashlight with me, I got out of the Mustang and went up the walk to the front door. Reached for my keys—
The door was ajar.
Gathering myself, I slowly pushed it open and stepped into the pitch-black front room. A quick sweep with the flashlight told me that nothing had been touched. At least as far as I could tell.
Cautiously, I made my way across the room to where it met the hallway, also unlit. Then continued on through to the dark kitchen, silent except for the hum of the refrigerator, the muffled ticking of the wall clock.
I was about to turn toward the hall again, to check out my bedroom, when a cold breeze stroked my cheek. Guided by my flashlight, I moved carefully through the kitchen, fingers tracing along the tiled countertop, until I reached the sliding glass door that led to my rear deck.
It was open. The source of the breeze.
Though it wasn’t until I’d brought my light up and shown it on the deck itself that I saw them. Lyle and Gloria.
They were sitting back-to-back on chairs positioned next to the deck’s rear railing. They seemed unharmed, though both were bound and gagged. Their hands awkwardly roped behind them, their ankles firmly tied as well.
When they felt my light on their faces, they both turned. Gloria more slowly, head lolling as though coming out of a drug-induced fog. While Barnes’ brow was creased, his eyes narrowed to slits. The grimace of a man in great pain.
I instantly knew why. Maddox had removed his arm sling so that he could tie the ex-agent’s hands behind his back.
Opening one of the counter drawers, I shone my light inside till I saw the glint of a steak knife. Grabbed it up.
“Hold on, I’ll cut you loose,” I called out to them.
As I stepped across the sliding door’s threshold.
And heard a sharp click.
Instinctively, I looked down at my right foot. It was standing on a strip of metal about three inches wide that spanned the threshold. I’d felt it give a little when I heard the clicking sound, and my heart sank as I guessed what it was.
At the same time, I heard the voice of Sebastian Maddox. It was coming from somewhere to my right.
“Oops, Danny boy. Now you’ve done it.”
His mocking chuckle filled the room, and, knowing not to move my foot, I sought out its source with the flashlight. And found it.
It was a cell phone, set on speaker mode, and placed on the top shelf of the open pantry, propped up by some cans and an old bottle of cooking oil. Looking absurdly out of place.
“FYI,” Maddox went on, “there’s been a change of plans. To be exact, I’m moving the timetable up a bit.”
“What are you saying, Maddox?”
“Well, to be honest, my original plan was to kill the old man, then sex it up with the FBI bitch before whacking her, too. Problem is, Barnes kinda bores me, and the girl’s too goddam mouthy for me. So I figured, fuck it, let’s get rid of both of them so we can move on to the grand finale.”
I’d carefully shifted position so that I was facing the rear deck again, my flashlight beam shining on Barnes and Gloria. My foot still firmly planted on the metal strip.
Maddox continued in the same conversational tone.
“Now you might be wondering why I brought you all here. Back to your house. Unless you want to try and guess.”
“That’s easy. Symmetry. Your belief that adhering to it somehow sanctions your acts. This house is where Lyle, Gloria, and I first met up in response to your attempt on Barnes’ life.”
“Exactly. This is where the Three Musketeers got together, so this is where they finish up. Two of them, anyway. As I promised, I’m saving the last dance for just you and me.”
“I’m looking forward to it.”
“I doubt it, Danny.”
“Oh, you have no fucking idea, Sebastian.”
By now, I’d played the flashlight beam along the wooden deck beneath where Barnes and Gloria were bound. There it was. Barely the size of a brick, wrapped in brown paper and hard to make out in the dark space below and between the two chairs.
A bomb.
“I see what you’ve got planned for them.” Keeping my eyes glued to the device, and its tiny blinking light.
Another wry chuckle. “It’s a little bon voyage gift I made especially for them. Packed with C-4. And, as you’ve probably figured out by now, you’re standing on a dead-man’s switch. A bit low-tech, I admit, but still cool. As long as you keep standing on it, your friends are safe. The moment your foot rises from that metal strip…Boom!”
“Now who’s seen too many movies?”
“There you go again, Doctor. Trying to bait me. Haven’t you realized yet that it just doesn’t work?”
“Guess I’m a slow learner.”
“Enough with the false bravado, too. We both know you can’t stand on that thing forever. The good news is, once you step off it, you’ll be fine. Maybe get hit with some blood spatter, bits of brain and bone. But that’s all. See, I packed just enough explosives to blow up the deck…and take your friends along with it.”
Maddox took a long, meaningful pause.
“And then, finally, it’ll just be you and me.”
Chapter Thirty-six
“I can see you standing there, Danny. Trying to think of some way to save your friends. But it’s been over five minutes.”
I didn’t respond, my fist tightening on the handle of the steak knife. Turning my head, I stared at the little green light of the camera on his cell phone. As if I could see him through the same lens with which he was seeing me.
“I’ll be honest,” he went on. “I thought it’d be fun watching you sweat, your face all scrunched up as you tried to figure a way out. But now it’s just sad. So, c’mon, man. Step off the damn thing and put us both out of our misery.”
“You don’t want to watch anymore? I can fix that.”
Careful to keep my foot where it was, I shone my light on the cell phone and hurled the knife at it. But my aim was off, and the knife missed the target, instead knocking over a soup can on the pantry shelf.
Yet I’d gotten lucky. It had been one of the cans propping up Maddox’s cell, and when it fell off the shelf, the phone went with it. Landing screen-side-down on the kitchen floor.
The cell’s speaker, also face-down, reduced Maddox’s howl of protest to a muffled rasp.
Ignoring it, I turned toward the rear deck, letting Barnes and Gloria see my light again.
“I think I have an idea.” Hoping my voice sounded more confident than I felt. “But I need the light.”
I swung the beam back again, once more plunging the deck—and Barnes and Gloria—into a cold, clammy darkness.
I put the back end of the flashlight in my mouth and clamped down hard, the metallic taste making me wince. I knew I wouldn’t be able to keep it between my teeth for too long.
Turning to my left this time, which directed the flashlight beam onto the tiled countertop, I took a moment to debate with myself about the feasibility of my plan. But since it was the only one I had, I had to embrace it.
Just as I had to hope that it could actually work.
Planting my right foot more firmly on the metal strip, I put out my left as far as it would go on the kitchen floor. I’d need it for balance.
Exhaling deeply, I stretched my arms out toward the end of the counter, where, by the flashlight’s beam, I could make out the contours of the microwave oven.
It was big and it was heavy and it was the only thing I could think of.
So I reached for
it, extending my arms as far as I could. Imagining them being wrenched from their sockets. My fingers were splayed, desperately feeling for some kind of purchase on the squat appliance. And grasping nothing but air.
Sweat dotted my forehead, and, once again, the bandages began pulling away from my ribs. Pain sliced at my sides, and crawled like saw’s teeth up my back.
Reach a bit farther…just a little bit more…
I struggled to calm that urging voice in my head. I knew that the more I stretched out my hands, the more risk there was of my foot slipping off the dead-man’s switch.
I took the risk.
My teeth aching from their hold on the flashlight, I forced myself to reach past the cone of light it threw and lunge for the heavy oven outlined within it.
My fingers touched the microwave’s sharp metal edges, then slipped off. I tried again, this time able to slap my palms on its broad sides. Straining, I pressed my hands hard against the plastic casing and began to pull it toward me, its flat bottom scraping along the countertop tile.
In moments, I’d dragged it close enough for me to wrap my arms around and so lift it from the counter. Then, once more using the flashlight beam as a guide, I carefully lowered it down to the floor.
Okay, I thought. Nice and easy…
I bent again and heaved the microwave oven up a few inches from the floor. Then, as carefully as I could, I set it down directly on the thin metal strip. At the same time, I slowly lifted my foot off, hoping the oven’s weight would be enough to compensate for my own.
And prevent the switch from triggering the explosion.
It was.
I took the flashlight out of my mouth and aimed it at the bomb beneath Barnes and Gloria.
Nothing. Its pale light still blinking.
With a grateful sigh of relief, I stepped back, and more or less collapsed against the kitchen counter.
Giving myself only a few seconds to catch my breath, I went over to where the steak knife had fallen and retrieved it. On the floor nearby was Maddox’s cell.
I scooped it up and looked at the screen. Blank.
His fun spoiled, Maddox was long gone.
l l l l l
“I’ll be damned.” Lyle Barnes used his good hand to sip from a beer bottle. “Using a microwave as a counter-weight.”
I shrugged. “Like they say, it seemed like a good idea at the time. Hell, it was my only idea.”
His arm once more in its sling, which Maddox had tossed on the deck, Barnes stood with me and Gloria in the kitchen, looking down at the microwave oven. It still rested on the deadly metal strip at the sliding door’s threshold, the three of us careful not to jostle it when stepping in and out.
After picking up Maddox’s cell, I’d used the flashlight to find the kitchen wall switch. First I turned on the overhead lights, then did the same for the rear deck’s exterior lamps, which were in wall niches on either side of the glass door. The deck was suddenly flooded with light.
With the threat of the bomb neutralized, at least for the moment, I went out and used the steak knife to cut Barnes and Gloria loose from their bonds. Then I helped each of them into the kitchen and onto a chair at the table.
They were both still groggy, although from how quickly they were recovering, it was clear Maddox had used a different drug than he had on Robbie Palermo and me. Probably so that his victims would be awake enough at the end to see what was about to happen to them.
I’d offered each of them a bottled water to help clear the lingering effects of the drug, but Barnes insisted on a frosty Iron City. Gloria settled for fresh black coffee.
Meanwhile, through the opened sliding glass door, I could see that night had finally fallen. Cold, cloudy, and damp.
Soon enough, Barnes and Gloria seemed clear-headed enough to get up, and now the three of us found ourselves staring down at the microwave oven.
“You two have to admit,” Barnes said at last. “There’s a certain surrealistic quality to this. Our lives saved by a kitchen appliance.”
I nodded. “I get that, Lyle, but it can’t stay there forever.”
“Doesn’t have to,” said Gloria.
She abruptly stepped over it and went out on the deck, Barnes and I on her heels. Watching as she pushed the two chairs apart and bent to carefully examine the bomb.
“Pretty simple.” Her fingers gingerly traced a wire that wound around the paper-wrapped package. “Low-tech, all right. I guess sometimes our guy really likes old school.”
Barnes took another pull on his beer. “Meaning what?”
“When the dead-man’s switch is released, it completes a connection that sends an electrical impulse here to this receiver. The bomb-maker knows the thing’s locked and loaded by this little blinking light.”
“So what do we do?” I asked.
“Disconnect the wire to the receiver.”
Barnes cleared his throat. “I assume you’ve done this before, Agent Ree—I mean, Gloria…”
“Took a class at Quantico once. Got an A. Though I think the instructor had a crush on me.”
Gloria pulled out the wire.
Then she climbed to her feet, the brick-sized package under her arm, and smiled at our disconcerted faces.
“See, guys? No boom. But just to be on the safe side…”
Gloria took the inert bomb into the bathroom, from which we could hear water running in the tub. After about five minutes, she returned to the kitchen, wiping her hands on a towel.
“I weighted it down and put it in a full tub. I doubt this kind of device transmits through water, so even if I’m wrong about the wire I disconnected, we should be fine.”
Barnes gave me a wary look, but without a word, we bent on either side of the microwave and lifted it off the metal strip.
Gloria smiled. “See? Again, no boom.”
I let out a breath. “I never doubted you.”
After Barnes got another cold brew from the fridge, he joined Gloria and me at the table. With the bomb deactivated, they felt ready to tell me what had happened back at the motel.
“He caught us with our pants down, simple as that.” Barnes toyed with his beer bottle’s label. “That diner I told you about is connected to the motel by this little covered passageway. When I went out to get some coffees to-go, Maddox slipped up behind me and stuck me with a hypo.”
Gloria nodded mournfully. “When Lyle didn’t come back after a while, I left the room to look for him. I didn’t get five steps from the door when I felt the jab of a needle in the back of my neck. He’d been waiting right outside the room.”
“And nobody at the motel saw this?” I asked.
“Guess not,” said Barnes. “It was cold, wet, and dark outside, so whoever had rooms there were probably staying in them. Having a drink and watching TV. Or screwing. Nobody checks into a motel to enjoy the outdoor sights.”
“But how did Maddox get you guys here? A stolen van, like before? The trunk of a car?”
Gloria shook her head. “No idea. I’d barely come to, when I felt my hands tied behind my back.”
“Same here.” Barnes took a healthy swig of beer. “I don’t even remember him taking off my sling. Just how much it hurt when I woke up and realized my hands were bound.”
I reached behind me for Maddox’s cell, which I’d placed on a paper towel on the kitchen counter.
“Any chance this can help us find him?” Using the towel to protect possible forensic evidence, I lay the cell on the table. “Maybe trace the signal off a cell tower, get a bead on his whereabouts? What do you two think?”
Barnes leaned over and squinted at the phone.
“Not a chance, Doc. Another throwaway, like ours. Plus it wouldn’t surprise me if Maddox could remotely send a destruct signal from wherever he was calling from. Fry the damn thing from the inside.”
> Soon afterwards, as Gloria was re-doing my bandages in the bathroom, she mentioned the bottle of Wild Turkey I’d bought for Barnes. I’d forgotten all about it.
Patched up again, I went outside to get the bourbon out of my car. It was where I’d left it, on the passenger seat. As I reached for it, I remembered that this was where I’d placed Barbara’s manuscript the day before.
The image of those bound pages flickered in my mind, and I told myself that the first thing I’d do when this was all over was read her unfinished book.
It was then that the idea occurred to me.
l l l l l
When I presented the bourbon to Lyle Barnes, he smiled gratefully, then placed it on the kitchen counter.
“We’ll open it after we nail the bastard. To celebrate.”
Gloria smiled. “I like the sound of that.”
While the two of them debated the risks involved in returning to the motel to get their cars, I left and went down the steps to my basement gym. What I sought was somewhere amid the clutter of cardboard boxes piled behind my workout bench and free weights. Moving my equipment to one side, I began reading the handwritten labels scrawled on masking tape on each box.
In a few minutes I found what I was looking for. A dust-covered box containing some of Barbara’s old notebooks from her days as an undergraduate at Pitt. Sitting on the cold basement floor, I opened it up and fished through the contents till I spotted a notebook marked—in her careful, slightly cramped handwriting—“History of Renaissance Art, Survey Class.”
As I flipped through the pages filled with handwritten notes she’d taken during each class, I remembered a time early in our relationship when she’d laughingly showed me one of her notebooks. She had a habit, she’d explained, carried over from her teens, of adding side comments to her notes whenever her mind wandered during class lectures. Or when something was on her mind, especially if it was bothering her. Short, dashed-off notes to herself. Concerning her thoughts, her worries.
Head Wounds Page 28
