by J. A. Kerley
“Incoming,” Nautilus said twenty minutes after he’d sent the message. Claypool ran to Nautilus, leaned over the detective’s shoulder.
Hang tight, help on way. Meet loc B 11 p.m. Tell partner he’ll get his payoff. Cash. Respond when you get a chance, ASAP.
Nautilus said, “He probably thinks Shuttles is with Logan right now.”
“Where’s location B?” Claypool asked.
“That’s my next problem,” Nautilus said, rising from the computer and running out the door.
Hearing the outer door close, I started fighting my restraints. The leather was four inches wide, twice as thick as a belt. It was like fighting cast iron.
Freddy walked by in the hall, talking to himself, his puppet held high.
“Rowf! Rowf! Shhh, don’t be so loud, Puppy. Carson is sleeping.”
“I’m not sleeping, Freddy. I’m just laying here.”
His head spun to me. He raced into the room.
“Want to play, Carson? Puppy just woke up, too. He takes an after-supper nap with me.”
We played, which meant Freddy licked the puppet over me while I chanted, “Good boy, nice Puppy.”
A few minutes passed.
“Freddy, could you do me a favor?”
“You want a drink? More purpleberry?”
“I’m interested in what’s going on outside. It’s kind of a special night. Now and then could you check at the window up front for me, tell me what you see?”
“What I see where?”
“At the house across the way.”
“Uncle Buck’s house?”
“That’s the one,” I said. “How about taking a look now.”
He tottered away, the puppet face dangling off his hand, returning after a couple of minutes.
“There’s just one car at Uncle Buck’s, Carson. It’s the one that belongs to that man I don’t like.”
“Which man is that, Freddy?”
“That man that comes around sometimes. He fired Miss Holtkamp, my teacher. Then he came and fired Dr Rudy, Lucas’s teacher.”
“Fired them?”
“That’s what Uncle Buck said. It means they had to stop working here. Dr Rudy only came once in a while, but I liked him. I loved Miss Holtkamp. She taught me words and numbers.”
“The man you don’t like …You’re talking about Mr Crandell?”
Freddy dropped his eyes to the floor. “One time when no one was looking he stepped on Puppy, asked me if that hurt him. When I said yes, he laughed and did it again.”
“Freddy, I’m going to tell you the truth. There’s going to be some trouble outside. Something bad is going to happen if I can’t go help a friend of mine.”
He frowned. “What’s that mean?”
“I’ve got to get these belts off my arms and legs. They’re holding me down. Keeping me from helping my friend.”
“They’re tight, Carson. I don’t think you can.”
“I know. That’s why I need for you to help me. You can take them off, Freddy. Unbuckle the belts.”
He shook his head.
“I can’t, Carson.”
“Because it’s red?”
“I don’t do red things. That’s what Lucas does.”
“You’ve got to help me, Freddy. I need to get off the bed. It hurts. Do you want a friend of yours to hurt?”
“Lucas says things like that when he’s in the red bed and the red room. He asks me to help.”
“And you help Lucas, right?”
“I’m not allowed.”
It was a simple statement of fact, without moral judgment or sense of consequence. He’d been told not to unbuckle someone under restraint, thus he wouldn’t.
“Please,” I said.
“Let’s just play, Carson. Puppy wants to play. He likes you.”
“I don’t want to play, Freddy. I need to GET THE HELL OUT OF THIS BED!”
His face screwed up and he started crying.
“You’re acting like Lucas does sometimes. I’m leaving.”
He turned and stomped toward the door. I called at his back.
“Freddy, I’m sorry. I’m distraught.”
He turned, wiping an eye with a finger. “What’s distroffed mean?”
“It means I like you and want you and Puppy to stay.”
Freddy’s smile was wet and lopsided. He ran to the bed. I let the puppet lick my face, bounce on my belly, bark at my toes. Freddy worked the puppet up my leg.
“Walking, walking, walking the doggie …”
I said, “Could you take another look outside for me, Freddy?”
His bottom lip pouted outward. “It’s way over on the other side of Heaven, past the rooms where Miss Gracie lives. Do I have to?”
“It would make me happy.”
He sighed. “All right, Carson.”
He scampered away, returning moments later. He held up the puppet like it was talking. “Rowf! There’s no cars over there now. Puppy says it’s empty.”
I wondered what time it was. Crandell had mentioned Dani going to Buck’s place near nine p.m.
“Do you know how to tell time, Freddy?”
He stared at the ceiling, remembering. “Miss Holtkamp said there are two hands on a clock, like on a person. The big hand –”
“Why don’t you look at a clock if there’s one around?”
“There’s one in Tyler’s room.”
“Let’s see if you really can tell time. I’m thinking you can’t.”
“Betcha I can.”
He was back in a minute. He held his arms out to indicate 6.40. “It’s six and forty, ha ha. Here comes Puppy, Carson.”
It was getting annoying, trying to think with the puppet slapping across my arms, chest, and face.
“How about you give Puppy a break for a few minutes, Freddy?”
Freddy kept up the licking and gnawing motion.
“I can’t stop him, Carson. Watch out.”
The sock puppet gnawed on the bedrail, licked my arm. I started to again ask Freddy to stop, but heard his words repeat in my head: I can’t stop him.
Was Puppy an independent entity? Cold sweat prickled on my forehead. I kept my voice light and even and smiled at Freddy. I had one final shot at life, the strength of the fantasy of a retarded man.
“You’ve been told not to unbuckle the belts, right, Freddy?”
“Yup. Puppy’s licking your shoulder, Carson.”
I giggled, a happy guy. “You’re right not to unbuckle the belts, Freddy. But if you hadn’t been told not to unbuckle the belts, you could unbuckle the belts. Isn’t that right?”
“I was told not to do it. And like a good boy I do what I’m told. Lick, lick, lick.”
I took a deep breath.
“Freddy?”
“What?”
“Has Puppy been told not to unbuckle the belts?”
CHAPTER 47
Nautilus thundered into the jail. He looked in the holding cell where he’d last seen Shuttles; empty.
“Where’s Shuttles?” Nautilus yelled to a turnkey sipping a cup of coffee.
“Interrogation.”
Nautilus ran down the hall. He saw Doria Barnes, an assistant DA, sitting on a bench and sorting through papers. “I need to talk to Shuttles,” Nautilus said.
Barnes rolled her eyes. “Good luck. Mr Shuttles is with his new attorney.”
“Who’s that?”
“Preston Walls.”
Nautilus growled and pushed through the door of the interrogation room. Shuttles was sitting in a chair at a small wooden table, Preston Walls beside him, nodding.
“Hey, Harry,” Walls said. “How you been keeping yourself?”
Nautilus ignored the attorney and stuck his face in front of Tyree Shuttles.
“What do you know about a location B?”
Walls put his hand on Shuttles’s back. Patted it. “My client has nothing to say, Harry. Sorry.”
“Shuttles just call you, Walls?” If Crandell knew Shutt
les was in jail, it was all for naught.
“Minutes ago,” Walls said. “Evidently Mr Shuttles knows of my expertise with the wrongly accused.”
Nautilus put his palms on the table, glared into Shuttles’s eyes.
“If I don’t find out where location B is, Carson could die. How’s that, Shuttles? There a glimmer of conscience in there anywhere?”
Shuttles looked away. Walls leaned back in his chair, flicked the tassels on his shiny Italian loafers, shoes as sleek as eels.
“Maybe we can come to a deal, Harry. Mr Shuttles, if I’m given to understand the problem, was an unwitting pawn in someone else’s game. He might have unknowingly mishandled evidence, but that was accidental. In return for anything he might tell you, my client wants immunity from prosecution.”
Nautilus glared at Shuttles. “I doubt he knows where location B is anyway, Walls. He’s low level, a gofer.”
Shuttles nodded to Walls. The attorney walked over, listened as Shuttles whispered in his ear. Walls straightened.
“He believes he may know pieces of what you need. He knows them inadvertently, of course, not as part of any crime or conspiracy. Maybe someone from the Prosecutor’s Office could talk deal? I believe Ms Barnes is in the building.”
“I don’t think so,” Nautilus said. “I’m done here.” He walked from the interrogation room with Walls in his wake. He stopped at a water cooler a dozen feet down the hall.
Come on, Walls, come on …
The lawyer parked himself a few steps behind Nautilus, his voice wheedling. “Harry, we can make a nice deal here. The kid made some kind of mistake. He’s not even sure what. You got weight with the DA …”
Walls bargaining without even knowing what had gone down.
“Bye, Preston.” Nautilus wiped his mouth, started away.
“Harry, we can do something good here. I know it.”
Nautilus paused. “Do you know what Shuttles did? Who he’s working for?”
Walls puffed out a righteous chest. “My client asserts his innocence. And that, Harry, is all I need.”
Nautilus started down the hall. A dozen feet away, he turned his head over his shoulder, said, “Crandell.” Nautilus got three steps before Walls was in front of him.
“Christ. What did you just say, Harry?”
“The Kincannons have a pipeline into Shuttles for various ongoing necessaries. But Crandell’s calling the shots on this gig. You ratted Crandell out to me, Walls, remember?”
Walls looked seasick. “Harry, I did no such –”
“I’m in contact with Crandell by e-mail. I’m gonna go write him back, remind Crandell of his old friend Preston Walls from Barton, Turnbull and Pryce. ‘Rabies sloshing under his pupils.’ That’s what you said about him, right?”
Walls’s flesh had turned the color of lard. Sweat peppered his forehead.
“You can’t do this.”
Nautilus clasped the attorney’s shoulder, gave it a gentle squeeze. Lowered his voice to a whisper. “If Crandell doesn’t come to me, Walls, I bet he comes to you.”
Walls said, “Let me go talk to my client. Perhaps I can –”
“Lie to him, Walls. You know how it’s done. I’ll be right here.”
Five minutes later, Walls came through. Shuttles, apparently thinking he was showing good faith for a deal agreement, wrote a return message on a slip of paper.
Loc B cnfirm. 11 PM cnfirm. IO 50G to man in? Route per rehrsl. 90 min. Don’t frgt: IO 50Gs.
A confirmation of location B at eleven tonight, two hours; “I owe 50 grand.”
Shuttles also passed along driving directions. Not far, just on the north side of Mobile. Nautilus called Forensics, had Claypool send the message from Shuttles’s computer. He took out his service weapon, checked the clip, patted the two extras in his pocket. He’d get there early, scope out the territory. Wait.
He checked the weapon a second time, a Glock 17. Then raced back to the department to pick up the .380 in his locker, a little something to tuck down the back of his pants. Maybe he’d check out a shotgun as well.
I petted Puppy after he’d liberated me – Good dog, good dog – then told Freddy his pet needed a reward. Freddy wandered to the kitchen area to fix Puppy and himself a snack. I followed, drank a glass of milk and jammed a slice of pizza in my mouth, fuel, then started searching for a weapon and a way out.
I heard a rumble in the distance, and my heart froze. Crandell coming up the drive?
The rumble again, this time clearly thunder.
There was nothing equivalent to a weapon in the kitchen, only soft plastic implements. A closet by the door provided a pair of men’s painter pants and a woman’s dark blue raincoat – Miss Gracie’s, I assumed – better than the loose pajamas I had been dressed in upon arrival.
Shoeless, shirtless, the raincoat flapping in my wake, I set about finding my escape.
The windows were barred and wired: breakage would trigger some form of alarm in the security detail’s offices, I assumed. All doors were steel and secured by electronic locks. No phones.
Everything seemed designed to keep Lucas inside if he ever breached the confines of his two-room Zenda.
That left the second floor.
I found a staircase to the second floor: tiny windows, steel doors locked tight. The elevator was turned off. I searched closets and cupboards to locate a pry bar, finally discovering a utility mop and bucket. The mop handle was hardwood, tipped with a steel attachment to fasten mop heads in place. I tossed the mop, kept the handle, jogged to the elevator. Passing a room off the kitchen, I saw Freddy eating from a bowl in his lap, raptly watching a videotaped cartoon.
The attachment on the mop handle slid between the brass-plated elevator doors, and I tried to jimmy the doors without breaking the handle. The doors opened several inches before the handle slipped and the door slammed closed. Sweat streamed down my forehead, burned into my eyes. I gripped the handle tighter, going for brute force.
The doors separated four inches and I jammed my bare right foot between them, laying my full weight into the task. With a sound like a gunshot, the mop handle snapped. I fell forward, my foot wedged between the doors. I heard a second gunshot from my ankle. Pain exploded up my leg and I fought my way to standing. I jammed my elbow between the doors, roared with agony. Pushed with everything I had. The doors widened until I tumbled into the elevator.
The doors closed behind me. My ankle was on fire.
A hard knocking at the door.
“Carson?”
I tried to still my breath. “What, Freddy?”
“I heard you yelling real loud. What are you doing?”
“Exploring. I’ll be back in a while.”
“What are you exploring?”
“The elevator.”
“Can I come in and explore, too?”
“Of course, but later.”
His slippered feet slapped away. I struggled upright, put weight on my leg. It answered with searing pain. Something had given way, a bone or ligament.
Feet returned to the elevator doors.
“You know that man, Carson? The one that was mean to Puppy?”
“Yes.”
“He’s outside with another man. He’s coming in, I think.”
I wanted to throw back my head and scream. Crandell would have keys to everything. All he had to do was open the elevator, pull once or twice on the trigger. My final hope was exploding outward on my one good leg, hoping Crandell would be directly outside the door. I might get my hands to his face, rip my nails across his eyes, blind the bastard …
Footsteps approached, slow and measured. I held my breath, ready to dive through if he could open the door.
What if he just fired through the door?
Footsteps, footsteps …
Bang! A hand smacked hard against the door. Again.
“Carson? He didn’t come inside. They drove away.”
I leaned against the door. My head swam. Each of my heartbeats sounde
d like a kettledrum.
“Are you sure, Freddy? Crandell’s really gone?”
“He drove away in that special truck, Carson.”
“What special truck, Freddy?”
“The one Uncle Buck uses to carry his cars around. Uncle Buck has lots of cars.”
CHAPTER 48
Trees whipped by the sides of Nautilus’s cruiser, the country lane tight. The meeting spot was one Nautilus was familiar with, an old strip center serving what had once been a rural community, now just a couple miles from the edge of the growing city. Nautilus figured Crandell lived nearby, the site, as he and Carson had figured, out of the city, but still allowing fast access anywhere in Mobile.
The meeting location was a pizzeria in the center, A-Roma Pizza. The closer he came, the more he became convinced he should let the county cops in on his plan. This was Mobile County, and he knew several guys on the force, not a Cade Barlow in the bunch. Nautilus waited to pass a slow-moving trailer on the road ahead. He was about to accelerate when the trailer swerved erratically, slid from the road, ground to a hard stop.
Nautilus had dropped back a hundred yards, thinking the trailer or truck pulling it had blown a tire. He passed the rig slowly, checking. It was an extended-cab truck with a vehicle hauler behind it. The hauler was empty.
The cab of the pickup exploded open and a man dropped halfway to the ground, clawing at his chest, the seat belt trapping his body. Nautilus braked hard and stared in horror, his headlights framing the grisly scene.
Don’t get out of the car, a voice said from the back of his head. Call it in, but don’t get out. His hand reached for the radio, was stopped by the flashing red light in his rear-view: a vehicle with an emergency flasher stuck atop the roof, volunteer fireman. Hopefully the guy had some medical training.
“I’m an EMT,” called a voice from the vehicle behind as the door opened, feet started his way. “What happened?”
“Looks like a heart attack,” Nautilus yelled back. “I’m a cop. I’ll call it in. You got a defibrillator?”
“No,” a voice whispered. “But I have one of these.”
Nautilus felt something hard press his ear. Caught the smell of gun oil. The voice said, “How’s about you keep your hands off that mike and right up there where I can see them.”
