Something darted beyond his windshield.
For just an instant, he froze. Then his trembling hand shifted the car into drive.
From the end of the block, someone approached, hurrying along the sidewalk. The face remained a pale blur, getting closer, like a corpse drifting toward the surface. Wait. Now he saw the slim figure clearly, and his chest tightened. Slouching behind the dashboard, he eased up on the brake. Don’t spook him. Peering back over his shoulder, the boy never seemed to glance toward the car. Did he limp slightly? Just keep coming, kid.
The Volkswagen rolled forward. Don’t even look this way. Gunning the engine, he jerked the wheel, and the car lurched up onto the sidewalk.
The boy spun away.
Rear tires lodged, skidding along the curb, and a cloud of exhaust flooded the street. The Volks bucked forward.
The boy dodged, circling across the street behind the car. As the car surged backward, he ducked behind the trunk of a maple tree.
The man leapt from the still-rolling car. “Damn!” Behind the tree, an alleyway sliced between houses, he now saw. Arms outstretched to feel the walls on either side of him, the man plunged in. No sound drifted back to him. He might have been chasing a cat. The passage twisted once and abruptly emptied onto a back street.
No! Naked trees twitched around a single street lamp, their shadows struggling on the ground. You won’t get away again! As he raced for the end of the block, wind swept away the noise of his footsteps.
Around the corner, he glimpsed a dim form, already disappearing halfway down the next block. He began to run.
He is limping! How close could he get before the boy heard him? He kept to a patch of hardened mud along the curb, muffling his footfalls. I’ve got him this time!
His shoes struck a particle of glass that rattled invisibly across the sidewalk, and the boy twisted with a bleating cry. The man lunged.
The boy’s thin body tensed like a whip, changing direction in quick jerks. Darting for the street, he leapt a low fence.
The man labored after him. Taunted by the boy’s back, he cleared the picket fence. For a moment, their footfalls matched, beating across the asphalt in rapid tandem. The boy angled into a garden, then swerved toward a row of rooming houses across the street, porches stacked to the sky.
Can’t let him reach it! He saw it clearly in the dim cast of the street lamp—a wedge of emptiness between the buildings.
Too late, he dove into the mouth of the alleyway seconds behind the boy. But he could hear him this time, just ahead, and he pounded after him. Crumbling walls leaned into the center of the rutted passage, and desiccated grapevines twisted along the tops of wooden fences that reeked of mold and rot. Just ahead, the footfalls ceased abruptly, and he heard a grunt of despair.
Glinting in the faint moonlight, an expanse of new chain link connected the weathered fences of the yards on either side, completely blocking the alley. The boy reeled blindly, crashing back into the fence. He hung on it, shaking.
“Okay now.” His own voice sounded so calm it astonished him. “Don’t be afraid.”
The boy’s back pressed against the fence. Feral despair lit his face, and the fence made a chittering sound.
“Take it easy.” Chest heaving, he stepped closer, his shoulders brushing the rough wood on either side. “I won’t hurt you.” He held his hands open in front of him. “Just want to talk to you.”
Damp breath warmed the back of his neck.
For an instant, terror flared, turning his guts to molten slag; then blood exploded behind his ear. As he slumped, agony burst through him, and the high-pitched screams of a child filled the alley. Even with his face pressing the ground, he could feel the furious shaking of the fence.
Frigid darkness oozed into his body. Something leapt over him, some dull and bloated form that rattled the chain link as it climbed after the boy with ungainly speed.
His thoughts slurred into a dwindling hum as night closed around him, and the side of his face iced against the fading ground. Failed…failed them all…
Finally, only one thought stirred his fading consciousness.
Who killed me?
XII
“Lie still.”
Warmth trickled agonizingly into his legs. A hammer blow of pain stopped his rising.
“Whoa, boy.”
The voice sounded farther away this time, and he heard something clatter.
“Don’t move till I get this ice pack on you.”
He felt fingertips probe the muscles at the base of his skull. There seemed to be a snarl of barbed wire beneath his flesh, and a spasm lanced through his skull. Features hovering before him refused to focus. “Who…?” The fog dissipated slightly. “How did I…?” An aching misery washed over him, and his senses returned, slowly, as from some remote shore, spent.
“You’re kidding? You really don’t remember?” She handed him the ice pack. “Don’t just hold that—put it on your head.” Her red hair glinted. “Is this lamp too bright for you?”
Haltingly this time, he shifted his position on the sofa, twisting his head to observe a small room clogged with heavy furniture. “Where…?”
“Don’t sit up yet.” She frowned. “Maybe I should take you out to the med center after all.”
“No, no hospital.” He shook his head and instantly regretted it.
“Keep that blanket on. Do you feel like you’re going to be sick?”
He started to shake his head again, then stopped himself with both hands.
“You sure?” she asked.
Not answering, he bent forward, as though about to pitch from the sofa.
She stared at the mat of his hair, at the broad fingers cradling his skull. “You want to tell me what happened?”
“First…how did you get me?” Razor blue eyes flicked up at her. “Sorry, I forget your name.”
“Kit.” She blinked. “Officer Lonigan.” She pointed at the ice pack in his hand. “You better put that where you need it, like I said.”
He pressed the ice pack behind his ear but at once removed it and gingerly explored the area with his fingers. The size of the lump made the air hiss out of his lungs.
“You’re not going to faint on me or something, are you?”
“How did you…?”
“We got a complaint about somebody screaming. I pulled up just in time to catch you staggering out of an alley. You practically collapsed right into the jeep.” She sank back onto an armchair. “You really don’t remember? You talked about some pretty strange stuff.”
“I said something?” The ice pack slipped from his fingers to the carpet. “Tell me.”
“Whoa—not so fast. Let’s see. It sounded like ‘I’m it’ or something.” She studied his face. “Yes, something like that. ‘I’m it now.’ I couldn’t make out the rest. That mean something to you?”
For a moment, he seemed to suppress a shudder. “What made you bring me here? This is your home, isn’t it?”
“For one thing, I figured it was time we had a talk.” She rose to retrieve the ice pack, placing it in his hand. “Listen, are you sure you’re all right? Yes? Then you’d better tell me what’s going on now.”
The room and what he could see of the kitchen beyond contained several isolated areas of intense disarray: the top of a bookshelf, the kitchen table, the windowsills. But the spaces between seemed vigorously organized, as though larger tributaries of disorder had been dammed at their sources. “Nice place. Do I hear the ocean?” Finally, he sighed and rubbed at his mouth. “Damn.” He pulled himself farther upright with a grunt. “Can’t talk with you standing over me that way.”
“All right.” She returned to her seat.
“To begin with…I used to be a cop.” Excruciatingly, he swiveled his head. “You don’t look surprised.”
“Should I be? After the way you pumped me the other night? For information, I mean.”
“But there’s more, right?” He still steadied his head with his hands, but h
is voice grated determinedly. “What else do you know?”
“You’re smarter than you look.” She pursed her lips.
“And you don’t seem so suspicious of me anymore either. Why is that?”
She folded her arms across her chest. “Because I know who killed those people.”
“People?” Something moved in his face.
“Two others in the past six months”—she nodded—“both in towns not far from here. Don’t try to act surprised. That’s what brought you here, right?” She coughed once. “Look, if you want to know what I’ve found out, you’re going to have to level with me. I mean it.” Rising, she paced into the kitchen. “After all, we’re talking about three murders here.”
“More.”
She turned back.
“There will have been others.” His voice faded. “The missing teenagers, the ones supposed to be runaways—did you know any of them?”
Silence beat like a drum. “You can’t mean…”
“At the hotel…how did you get onto me that first night?”
“Stacey called me from the bar. She said she’d had a strange customer, acting weird, and what with the body being found and all.” She shrugged. “It just took me a few phone calls to find out where you were staying.” A damp hissing in the kitchen grew shrill. “Tell me what you meant about…”
His jaw clenched. Speech seemed to require determined effort. “Stacey often give you tips like that?”
“You’re pumping me again.”
“Sorry.” He swayed slightly on the sofa.
“Are you going to talk to me or what?”
He pressed the ice pack harder against his head. The pitch of the whistle intensified, becoming a prolonged scream, and finally, she stalked away. The noise faded into a moaning sputter. Briefly, things rattled and chimed together; a moment later, she returned with two mugs and set them on the low table. “How’s your stomach?”
“My head,” he muttered.
“No nausea? Try to drink some of this. Do you take honey?”
Unsteadily, he lifted the cup, then just held it.
“We used to be close, Stacey and me.” Talking to fill the silence, she stirred her tea. “But we’ve got nothing in common anymore. Sometimes I think she’s on something.” She watched the steam. “She works nights, maybe she needs it.”
On the balcony, dead plants rattled in the wind.
With a visible effort, he made himself take a sip of the tea. “Interesting flavor. Dirt?”
“Ginseng. It’s good for you.”
“Would have to be.” Gently, he swirled the pale liquid in his mug. “You work nights too.”
“Different.” She shrugged.
He set the tea down. “You remind me of…damn.”
“Bad?”
“Be all right in a second.” His face tightened. “I notice I’m not under arrest.”
“So far.”
“Okay.” He sank back against the sofa. “So what do you want from me?”
“It’s your turn to talk, that’s all.”
“Might be. Might be time to…tell somebody. Not that you’d believe me. But you’re right about why I’m here. I want to stop it. Finally. If I can.” Softly, he repeated the words. “Stop it finally.”
“It?”
“The killings.”
“‘Others,’ you said.”
Stiffly, he nodded. The surface of the tea shimmered.
“Then why haven’t I heard…?”
“Because mostly they get reported as disappearances.” He looked up at her. “Kit, is it? Kit, if you’ve got any ideas that might help…”
“Are you sure you don’t need…?”
“Just a twinge. I’m okay.”
“Your color’s a bit better.” Frowning, she continued. “Ramsey Chandler. That name mean anything to you?”
“Should it?”
“Isn’t he the reason you’re here?”
He blinked. “Go on.”
“He used to live here in Edgeharbor.” She folded her arms. “Son of Clinton Chandler, big developer who just about built this town. Our richest citizen, even back when the town was booming. These days, I doubt he has much competition.”
“And?”
“When I was a kid, nobody wanted to talk about them much. I can’t even picture the father really. All I remember is he always talks in a whisper.”
“What about the son?”
“I only met Ramsey once, when I was maybe eight years old, but he gave me the serious creeps. I don’t think he touched me exactly, but I remember my parents pulling me away fast. They never stopped smiling though. Wouldn’t do to offend the Chandlers. Right through my teens, those smiles showed up in all my worst nightmares.”
Something thumped in the other room.
“Just the cat,” she assured him.
The sudden tension in his body eased. “I thought cats were supposed to be sneaky?”
“It may not actually be a cat, more like some kind of mutant raccoon, and anyhow it’s not mine. I found it hurt and…”
“You make a habit of that?”
“But I can stop whenever I want.” She peered into the kitchen.
“So this Ramsey guy, how old…?”
“He looked very grown up to me then. What?”
“So he’d be late middle-aged now?”
“Maybe not. You know how kids see things. He could have been a teenager. He just looked big to me.”
“What happened to him?”
Grinning, she played her trump card. “A couple of years after my family moved away, he killed his mother with a carving knife. Worst thing that ever happened in this town. Absolutely the worst. Very few people really talk about it though, even now. Just shows you how much clout the Chandlers had. Of course, it’s all different these days.”
“How different?”
“The father has been a recluse for years. Since the killing really, I suppose. Retired from business. Retired from society.”
“And the son?”
“For the past twelve years, he’s been a patient in a private psychiatric facility.”
“Tell me the rest of it, before you burst.”
“He ran away.” She exhaled, finally. “A month ago. Killed some doctor getting out. And no one knows where he is.” She watched a cord quaver in his neck. “Except for us.”
“No, doesn’t make sense.” Tension knotted his features. “This is the first place they’d look. Good Lord, is that your cat?”
“I told you it was ugly.”
“Has it got too many toes or something?”
She leaned closer. “Nobody would look for Ramsey if they thought he was dead.”
He held out his unsteady hand to stroke the cat, but the animal flinched away and jumped onto her chair.
“That’s strange. It won’t usually come near me.” The cat tried to squeeze behind her. “Just follows me from room to room.” Suddenly, the cat planted itself and raised its back in a jerky undulation. “Would you look at this? Making a liar out of me.” She stroked it tentatively, and then her fingers explored the scabbed area on its rib cage.
“What the hell made those?”
“Fight, I guess.”
“With a lion?”
“I managed to get some antiseptic cream on them that first night.”
The cat’s ears flattened, and it gave a throaty growl, digging into the arm of the chair as it tried to launch itself at the floor.
“Hold still.” She tightened her grip. “Healing pretty good.”
“Tell me the rest,” he said.
“They found his body a week after he escaped.” Hissing, the cat struck at her. “Shit.” She pulled her hand away as the beast jumped down with a wobbling movement and glided behind the sofa. “One more scratch and I’ll need transfusions,” she muttered. “Apparently, he’d been sleeping under a highway overpass and somehow rolled under a truck.”
“How’d they ID him?”
“Hospital cloth
es.”
“Yeah?”
“Do you actually buy any of that?” she asked.
“I take it you don’t.”
“You are quick, aren’t you?”
“Hey, whatever your name is…Kit…I don’t want to fight. I got my brains half beat in tonight and I’m probably sick on top of it.” His voice trailed off. “Okay, you’ve got a theory. Let’s hear it.”
“I think he met someone, maybe someone with the same general build and coloring. I think he killed this guy and switched clothes with him, then pushed the body…”
“I get the picture.” Sipping the tea, he grimaced.
“He’s here, isn’t he?” She jerked to her feet again. “You tangled with him tonight. You saw him, right?”
From behind the Franklin stove now, the cat watched them. Its tail twitched once, curling around its front paws.
“There must be more,” he said. “What are you holding back?”
“A few things. Somebody killed a dog last month. A hundred-and-five-pound rottweiler. Broke its neck, ripped its belly open. An obscene mess. Like that woman in the bay.”
The cat’s eyes pressed shut then opened wider, glinting like emeralds, like green flames, flickering toward the slightest movements of her hands.
“Just last week a store on the inlet got broken into, but all they took was one jogging suit and one pair of sneakers. Then the drugstore window got smashed. Place has been closed for years. Who would steal old bandages, iodine, stuff like that?”
“Regular crime wave. You have documentation for all this? When can I see it?”
“You haven’t told me anything. Not a thing.”
Weariness seemed to engulf his voice. “Where do you stand here?”
“I don’t get you.”
“Don’t be dense. With the case. Officially.”
“An investigative team from the state police is pursuing a theory about a mob hit that…”
“And you don’t like that, do you?” His exhaustion, even the gray tint of his flesh, conveyed an odd authority to his words. “It’s a real slap in the face, isn’t it?”
She frowned. “Don’t be so sure you can manipulate me so easy.”
The Shore Page 11
