'Really. That's such a shame. He's gone in completely the wrong direction. He's going to feel such a fool. And I did so want to talk to him.'
'That's the risk you take playing stupid games. What would have happened if you hadn't got hold of Nina's phone? How would you have contacted me?'
'I had your number already, Ward. And listen.'
There was a two second pause, and then I heard an unfamiliar ringing sound from close by.
John got his phone out. It was ringing. He looked at me.
Paul laughed down the line. 'Hey, what do you know? I just heard someone else's ringer down the line—which I guess proves the two of you are still here together. Of course I have his number too, Ward. You really don't seem to have a clue what you're dealing with.'
'Nobody does. Not even the Masons, from what I gather.'
'Ah, Mr Unger. Strange, deluded guy. Still, he's dead now, so, whatever. Didn't you see me? I'm always there somewhere, in the background. Always will be. We are legion, brother. Put John on the line.'
I held the phone out and John took it. He listened for a minute, and at that moment I admired him like never before. He listened to the voice of the man who had killed his daughter and he did not interrupt or shout or threaten. He knew the man had Nina, and so he listened.
Then he handed the phone back to me.
'Call the cops,' warned Paul, 'and I'll know. Fuck me around and I'll kill Nina and not even quickly. You know that's true.'
'I believe you. But you should know something too,' I said. 'I shot your psycho pal an hour ago.'
'Meaning?' His voice sounded very slightly hesitant, just for a moment.
'Over in Dryford. Jim, James, whatever. The guy was spilling blood all over his yard when I left. And talking. It's possible that even around here he may attract some attention before long.'
'It won't even make page seven,' he said, and then the line went dead.
•••
John lit a cigarette, stared out over the forest. His face looked tight, composed, as if he'd made a decision. My head was shining white from having spoken to Nina. I knew that would fade fast. But at least she was still alive. For now.
'What did he say to you?'
Zandt didn't turn. 'That if I came to him he'd call the other thing off. He said he'd let Nina go. He wants you alive anyway.'
'What's "the other thing"?'
'That's all he said. Maybe nothing.'
'No. This isn't about you. You're not enough for all this.'
'He wants me to go to the Holiday Inn. He'll come and collect.'
'And you're thinking of going, right?'
'What else are we going to do?'
'It's not that. You think that you'll be able to take him down.'
'The hotel is still half-full of Feds. When am I ever going to have a better chance?'
'And you think he doesn't know that?'
'If we get over there now we can tell them what happened to Charles. Get them ready.'
'They won't believe us. They'll probably arrest you. They'll…'
I stopped talking, tried to leave room for a thought to make it through from the back of my head. 'That's what he wants,' I said. 'He wants you there, and he knows I'll go with you as backup. That means he will be somewhere else. He wants us, yes, but that's not why he's really here.' I put my head in my hands. 'Nina said something.'
'What do you mean?'
'She said…she said something weird. Right at the end. She said "You live and learn". She said it twice.'
'So?'
'Does that sound like Nina to you? Does she normally talk like a fortune cookie?'
'No,' he admitted. 'But…'
'And it was out of context. Living and learning has nothing to do with staying alive. Why would she…'
'She didn't say anything else?'
I ran back our too-brief conversation in my head. Claimed she was fine. Gun to her head. Staying alive. 'Nothing like that. She got about thirty, forty words. And she spent eight of them on that.'
Zandt stood there, waiting. Finally it came through.
'The message Carl told us about this morning,' I said. 'What do you remember about it?'
'Something to do with them not being American. Or European, or anything in particular. Plus there was a part about…'
'It's time to teach people, or teach the way.'
'They've got a young guy with them. Someone who could pass as young enough to get inside somewhere and plant a bomb, like he did in LA yesterday. Not a small one this time. Something that's really going to make a sound. That's why Paul wants us on the other side of town.'
I started to run back to the car.
'They're going to do something to the school.'
Chapter 35
I parked fifty yards up from the school, in front of the big church. We got out and stood buffeted by a cold wind which came up the hill. From this position you had a vantage over half the town. I couldn't see anyone. Not just anyone suspicious-looking, but anyone at all. It was as if everyone happened to be around the corner or indoors or down the street, out of sight. I checked my watch: quarter of three, the business-as-usual hour, that time in the afternoon when things either happened earlier or will happen later. In the meantime everyone works, or shops, or studies, and waits for time to pass. If you were landing in a space ship, three o'clock sharp would be a good time to invade Planet Earth.
We checked our guns. In the previous fifteen minutes I'd driven John up to the Holiday Inn. We'd moved his vehicle so it could be seen parked there from the main road—in case Paul had someone looking out. Then we covertly transferred back to my car, bringing John's ammunition and small arms in a black bag. Probably the car being there would make no difference, but the idea seemed good at the time.
I ejected the partly spent clip from my weapon and refilled it. We loaded our pockets, black coats weighed down with things from which no good can come.
John looked at me. 'Ready?'
I nodded. 'But if I get the faintest hint that Nina is somewhere else, I'm out of here.'
We took a right down the side of the church. This led via an alley to the road which ran parallel to the main drag. We walked along this until we were fifty yards from the back of the school, then stopped. Still nothing happening and nobody to see.
We crossed to the other side of the street and walked along it looking across at the rear of the school, a block-wide collection of buildings dominated by the main structure, with a big rectangle of asphalt between it and the road. Unlike the lawns around the front it did not look as if it was used for playing or hanging out. Railings ran along the street, with two wide gates at either end allowing access to delivery trucks. One of these was in position now but the goods being ferried in by a man in overalls looked real enough. Frozen pizzas, pulled on a trolley down a slope into an underground loading bay. He re-emerged and embarked on a cheerful exchange with the guy who'd accepted delivery as they leaned against the wall with a cigarette apiece. They evidently knew each other of old.
We walked quickly up to the far end of the block, turned left and up the side street until we hit the main drag again. Looked up the hill. Saw the bulk of the old buildings, safe behind their stretch of leaf-strewn lawn.
Saw also a guy standing just outside the school gates. A young guy, who hadn't been there before. He had a skateboard under his arm and could have been anywhere from seventeen to twenty, maybe even a little older. Neither John nor I had seen an image of Lee John Hudek to compare him with.
'What do we think?' I said, quietly.
'School day isn't over yet. Why's he standing there?'
'Going to the dentist. Waiting for a ride. Bad-mouthed a teacher and been told to stand there for an hour.'
'Kind of tan, don't you think?'
'You're right,' I said. 'Let's get him face down on the sidewalk. Sorry, son, you're insufficiently wan. Going to have to shoot you.'
Nonetheless I walked up the hill until I was a couple of
yards from the kid. I took my time. He made a big deal of not looking up as I approached, but anyone his age would have done the same.
'Got a light?'
'Smoking kills,' he said.
'Need a ride someplace?'
He looked up. His skin was without blemish and his eyes were blue and cool. He looked at my face curiously. 'Man, you've got to be kidding me.'
'School's not out yet.'
'What the fuck is it to you?'
'What the fuck it is to us,' John said, having appeared at my shoulder, 'is we wondered why you're standing out here.'
'So are you like the sidewalk police, or what?'
'Yes,' I said. 'That's what we're like.'
The kid just shook his head. 'Jerk-offs.'
Then he caught the way John was looking at him. He turned on his heel in his own good time and walked back through the safety of the school gate.
John and I watched. 'That went well,' I said.
He didn't respond. Just stood there, watching the kid as he strolled across the lawn. The boy didn't turn around at any point, to eyefuck us or flip the bird. I was trying to work out whether this was surprising or not when he did something noticeable.
All the way across the grass he'd been heading for a structure to the right of the main school building. But when a couple of school kids appeared out of a doorway there, he made a diversion in his course so as not to come into contact with them.
John looked at me. 'Yeah,' I said. 'I saw it.'
We walked in through the gate. Our guy was moving more quickly now, heading for an archway which led into a courtyard within the main school building.
'Hey!' John shouted. 'Lee!'
The kid didn't turn. But one of the others did.
One of the two standing over on the far right glanced up immediately. Stopped what he was doing with the other kid, and looked straight at us. My heart sank.
'John,' I said.
'I saw.' He started heading quickly in the new kid's direction. The boy slipped something back into his jacket and turned to head quickly into the building. He did this with a grace and confidence that suggested he knew his business. He wasn't a school kid. Recently, maybe, but not any more. Add his response to the name, and it had to be Lee Hudek.
John went straight into the building after him. I saw the third kid wandering off to the side with signposted nonchalance and hurried over to intercept him.
'That kid you were just talking to. You know him?'
The boy shook his head. He evidently harboured delusions of cool but was no more than fourteen and looked very nervous. 'Not really.'
'So what were you discussing?'
'Nothing.'
'Bullshit. I saw him put something in his pocket. What was it?'
'Don't know what you're talking about.'
'Fine,' I said. 'So it definitely wasn't drugs.'
The guy's face said all I needed to know. 'Whatever it was, don't take it,' I said, and ran inside the building.
The entrance gave into a wide and gloomy lobby which split two ways into a corridor, with a stone staircase at the back down which grey light filtered. Entering was a step back in time. Doesn't matter what you build a school of, it still smells of school. You don't notice it when you're there but if you go back as an adult it's like the place is a stable for unwashed aliens. There were classrooms either side with frosted glass panels in the doors, a bank of battered lockers down the end, the muffled and measured background cadence of speech designed to be heard rather than interacted with.
I paused a second and listened. Heard footsteps above. I ran up the stairs to the next level and found the same layout there. John was down the far end of the corridor next to a bank of windows.
'Where'd he go?'
'I don't know,' John said, heading back my way. 'I thought he came up here.'
'He didn't have a bag,' I said. 'So either we got it wrong and he's just some twitchy kid dealing weed or he's already planted whatever device he came here with. This is dumb, John. It's time to warn someone on site and then get the hell out and look for Nina.'
'Okay,' he agreed. 'Let's find the principal's…'
He stopped talking.
I looked out the window and saw a police car was parked in the street directly outside the school. A big policeman was walking quickly across the lawns below.
'This we don't need,' I muttered. I headed back down the stairs, John close behind. We walked quickly back out of the building. The cop saw us emerge and diverted to head straight towards us.
'Interesting,' I said. We kept walking towards the policeman. 'I'm pretty sure that's the guy Monroe was talking to this morning.'
'He looks like a regular cop to me.'
'Put me in a uniform and I would too.'
'Kind of. The sort Internal Affairs takes an interest in.'
The policeman stopped a few yards short of us. He was definitely the one I'd seen earlier. Sleek, big-chested, flat-eyed.
'Who are you and what are you doing here?' he asked.
'What's it to you?' John asked, sounding more like the skateboard kid than he probably realized.
'You get that I'm a policeman, right?'
'What's the problem, officer?' I asked.
'I just got a call from a teacher. One of his kids told him that two strange-acting guys had accosted him outside the gates. I'm thinking that would be you.'
'We believe there's a potential danger to this school.'
The policeman grunted. 'There is. It's you. I'm not asking here, I'm telling you. We're leaving right now.'
Neither of us moved.
'Now, gentlemen.'
'Where were you when you got the call?' John asked, casually. 'Back at the station?'
The cop just looked at him.
'You must have moved fast,' I agreed. 'We spoke to that kid what, five, six minutes ago? He had to get indoors, talk to a teacher, convince him it was worth bothering the cops about. Teacher called the station, call got relayed, and you arrive.'
'That's some fast service,' John said.
'Or maybe the kid didn't report anything after all,' I said. 'Maybe someone's been watching us. In which case why would he lie about getting a summons?'
'You going to call for backup?' John asked. 'That's what I'd be doing. Two strange guys with a warning? I'd want other officers here with me right away. Assuming I was here for the right reasons.'
The policeman's eyes grew colder.
'Does the name "Paul" mean anything to you?' I said. 'We heard someone of that name was hanging around. A very dangerous man. Maybe it's Paul you're really looking for.'
'Never heard of him,' the cop said, and his hand was around the top of the gun in his belt holster. 'And I'm done listening to you.'
'You're right,' I said, and held up my hands. There wasn't any other way of handling this and we were wasting time that Nina didn't have. 'We don't want to get off on the wrong foot here. This is an important matter. We should go to the station. Talk it through properly.'
'Let's do that.'
We followed him back across the lawn and through the gates and back onto the street to his car. He started opening the back door of his cruiser.
John signalled me with his hand, blind-sided from the cop. I glanced up and down the road. The time was now.
I grabbed the door and swung it hard, crunching it into the cop's stomach. He saw it coming and nearly got out of the way, but side-stepped straight into a smack in the head from John. His eyes started to roll but he locked back in again just in time for me to punch him in the face. John shoved him into the rear of the car.
I opened the driver's door and climbed in. 'No keys,' I said.
I watched out the windows to the sound of muffled grunts and a short series of blows. Then the grunts stopped.
'Catch.' John tossed the keys over from the back.
I drove sedately up the road as far as the corner of the school grounds, then hung a left to go down the side.
'His
ID looks good,' John said. 'If it's a fake, it's very well done.'
'He was an asshole either way.'
I stopped the car halfway down the street, got out and helped John pull the unconscious man out of the car. I opened the trunk and we lifted him in. He was a big guy. It was a tight fit. 'You want to gag him?'
John shook his head. 'Just in case he's not.'
We shut the trunk. 'He's bad,' I said. 'You know he is.'
'Which means something really is about to happen here.'
I knew he was right, and that meant Paul wouldn't be too far away.
'So let's go get that school shut down.'
Chapter 36
We ignored the building we'd already entered and went through the arch to the other entrance. A staircase on the right of the courtyard here took us into more promising territory. This was the school's biggest and oldest building and it made sense the ranking staff would have their lairs here. The ground floor held classrooms arranged on long corridors at right angles. They were deserted. In my recollection someone was always wandering the halls at school, skipping this class, faking that injury, goofing off pure and simple: Thornton High evidently ran a tighter ship. I finally saw a kid in the distance, walking across the far end of one of the corridors, but he didn't respond to a shout and was gone before we got there. The layout on the floor above was the same, with the addition of a big empty room that looked like a science lab. At the top of the building we found offices with panelling on the outside, and down the end a door of a size that could only mean one thing. It was slightly ajar. The sign said A L SINGER, PRINCIPAL.
We entered an anteroom in which a matronly woman sat behind an ancient word processor. She looked at us disapprovingly and I felt about twelve years old.
'Who are you?'
'We have to talk to the principal,' I said. 'Now.'
'She's on the telephone.'
I followed John over to the second door, which was shut. He opened it to reveal a bigger space with a lavish desk in the middle. Behind it sat another woman, who was of course not on the phone. The walls held ranks of serious books and black-and-white photos of worthy predecessors and people formally shaking hands. A window beyond her gave a view out onto the front lawns.
Blood of Angels Page 35
