Over his shoulder, he added, “High Sierra all over again, and damn it, isn’t a black dog some sorta bad omen?”
“Only if you let it be! You’ve got a lousy attitude, Rydell,” she shouted back as the dog leapt at her and licked at her face. “He’s a kisser, this one! Gotta have family someplace. Maybe just wandered off.”
“Always got dogs in these mountains. Some wild ones, too. Called Quarry dogs. They learn to beg from house to house. Got more sense than we do when it comes to making a living.” He grabbed up a kitchen knife and raided the refrigerator.
She’d been thorough at what passed for a mall here—Buck’s Gun Shop, Feed & Grain, and General Store in Bear Claw. He had everything necessary to stack a sandwich. He grabbed another Sam Adams and drank as he worked.
Meanwhile, Katrina had welcomed the dog inside, making Marcus groan. “Least leave the mutt out on the porch, Kat. Kat!”
“It’s OK, he’s obviously house trained.”
“How would you know that?”
“Tags. He’s got tags.”
“Likely belongs to our nearest neighbor. You shouldn’t pen him in.”
“ Tomorrow at light, we’ll go find out.”
“What’d I tell you about spreading it around that we’re here?”
Katrina began feeding the dog leftovers from breakfast scrapes, placing them onto a pewter plate and delivering the food to the animal as if it were royalty so far as Marcus could tell. She repeatedly said, “I just love dogs, don’t you?” She placed a few strips of the roast beef that Marcus had opened onto the dog’s plate.
“What about you?” he asked her. “You want one of my super-dupper deals?” He pointed to the large sandwich he’d concocted for himself. “Want half?”
“Maybe a half if you’re sharing?” she replied, staring at the about-to-tumble-over sandwich he’d masterminded.
He sliced the existing edifice in half and placed hers onto a second pewter saucer. All round them in the kitchen hung shinning copper pots and pans.
“Your folks were into pewter ware and copper, I’d say, huh?”
“Mom, yeah. Dad preferred paper plates and towels beside the grill or better yet a campfire. Dad always said a man could find his thoughts in a good wood fire.”
She laughed lightly in reply, making him ask, “What?”
“No wonder they got along. Denise never had to do dishes, and I suspect she let Patric philosophize under the stars here at Avalon all he wanted. And they shared a lot more than that; they shared you, and they shared their loss of Michael.”
“Damn dog gave you quite a start,” he said to her, changing the subject with an abruptness that made it clear he did not want to talk about his parents or his lost brother. Between gulps where they stood at the kitchen island, he remained silent.
“Me? I was concerned, naturally. Neither of us knew it was a dog out there.”
“Come on, you were shaking, palpitating.”
“You’re the one called out the arsenal.”
“Some arsenal.”
“All right, but thank God. How’d you be feeling if you’d shot Paco?”
“Poco? Those tags have his name?”
“No, just a number. Dog tags.”
He examined them. They were Farrin County tags. “So how is it, he’s suddenly Paco? We take him to the local pound, get those numbers keyed in, he might be someone’s Blackie or Rocket.”
“Look at him! The eyes say Paco, the mug, the ears.”
“Maybe if you put a Sombrero on him.”
“Now you see it, don’t you! He’s Paco, no?”
Damn she’s cute, he thought anew. “And how do you know he’s a he and not a her?”
“Like I said, look at ’im! Try this angle.”
“He didn’t move. “Oh…oh, yeah. Gotcha.”
She laughed at Marcus. “Come on. You gotta admit, as dogs and broads go, Marcus, you lucked out here. Paco, Bonnie and Clyde. We’re an unbeatable team.”
He thought of several comebacks to this, considered and discarded each, as he was sure she’d take his remarks quite wrong.
“What? No clever retort?”
“None that you’d find amusing, no.”
“Come on, he’s friendly,” she said of Paco,“ obviously not a barker, well-heeled.”
“So are you,” he retorted. “Haven’t heard you bark since O’Dule’s. As I recall, your gun wasn’t loaded then either. And a guard dog without a highly trained sense of when to bark and when not to is about as good as a nightingale without a song.”
“Then can we keep him? At least for the night?”
He took his sandwich to the other room, flicking on more lights as he went. He then settled in before the TV set, clicked it on, and wondered aloud, “Curious to see what’s been happening in the real world.”
“What do you consider the real world? Fox or CNN?”
“I prefer my news hard. Aren’t you the least bit curious what’s going on out there and in DC?”
“Most likely same-o-same-o until we get a woman in the White House.”
“Are you baiting me?”
“Think of it a president not driven by a need for power and flesh.”
“You are trying to pick a fight, aren’t you?” He smiled at her now.
“I merely mean it’d be nice to have a president in the Oval Office who thinks the office is more important than energies related to the basest human instincts and drives.”
“You can say libido and I’ll understand, Kat.”
“Or dreams of glory and legacy,” she finished.
“I just wanna get the weather,” he countered, another smile breaking over him.
“While he searched for a news channel, she sat and asked, “What kind of success have you had as a private eye, Marcus?”
“OK.” His attention was on a news report, something about a brutal murder back in good old Atlanta where such things happened all too frequently. While not the murder capitol of the US, it always fell in the top ten spots.
“I mean if you were fooled by Paco,” she continued, a teasing quality coming through.
“Don’t even go there! You were terrified of Paco, or don’t you recall?”
“And you weren’t shaking?”
“All that damn talk about how you learned everything about me, down to my choice of socks, damn it, I had every reason to suspect that Cantu learned of this place.”
“It’s a Google world now, Marcus. That means we’re all subject to the eyes of the satellite.”
“Is that right?:
“Like the spectacles in the sky in The Great Gatsby; they’re watching.”
“I never liked that book.”
“Google can now take you to street level mapping? I mean it is mind-blowing. I can show you on the Mac.”
“Not now.” He waved her to silence, listening to the details of a murder coming out of Atlanta: “…unidentified black male, mid-thirties, multiple signs of torture, broken neck, severed limbs, trussed up turkey fashion, and still smoldering from having been doused with an accelerant and set aflame.”
Katrina stopped taking for this. The description of how the victim had died rang a shockingly familiar bell.
“It’s him,” Marcus said.
“Perhaps it’s just a coincidence?”
“Helluva coincidence.” He turned up the volume. “In his letters, he promises you a Thanksgiving turkey, remember?”
“No…I mean, yes, but this is a murdered black guy. Could be some sort of gang vengeance thing.”
“Careful there, liberal girl, or you’ll sound like a racist.” His tone rang out in complete contempt for the idea.
“You know I didn’t mean it like that.”
“Wish it were true in this case. I get that.”
Hands wringing, teeth clenched, she said, “True—I don’t want to believe that Cantu did this—” she pointed at the TV where an indistinguishable victim, crushed to dwarf-size, dangled about a school flagpole on th
e city’s north side in upscale Buckhead—that he did this for my benefit just to frighten and warn me.”
“To gaslight you,” he said.
“Gaslight?” she didn’t understand his use of the old term.
“One note says he means to do exactly this to you…truss you up after breaking every bone in your body, Doc. Look closely at what we’re seeing here. This has Cantu written all over it.”
“His bloody work,” she dabbed at tears now. “And he knew we’d see it.”
“Probably shot this tape and sold it to the Channel 4 News.”
“This is how he’s moving against me? Killing another innocent person? Just to get my attention?” She began to cry flat out now. “It’s horrible.”
“Yeah, he’s already torturing you and me.” He put the remainder of his sandwich aside and opened his cell phone. “I’ll make a call. See what I can find out. Obviously, they don’t want to reveal the victim’s name before informing the family. Maybe the guy is a gang banger; maybe this has nothing to do with our ahhh situation.” He could not convince her now, but he still tried. “I mean, perhaps you’re right instead of me…for a change.”
He moved off into another room, allowing her some privacy, but Marcus could still hear her crying as he dialed John Thomas, the only Atlanta detective on the force with whom he’d maintained ties. JT, Atlanta Jack, had been the only one who still believed in Marcus, believed that one day he’d be exonerated—something even Marcus had given up on.
JT came on immediately. “Marcus? Somehow I thought you’d call. So you’ve seen the news accounts?” No doubt JT was thinking, please God why’s Rydell calling me in the middle of this mess?”
“Who caught this case?”
“Afraid I have—me and Harriman.”
“You still partnered with that prick?””
“Guy’s a jerk agreed, but he’s got my back.”
Marcus got the dig. “Listen, JT, I need to know as much about your victim as possible.”
“Marcus, you need to get a life and stop interfering in official police business.”
“Paul Brunner’s sworn you to secrecy.” Marcus heard the commotion of many men at work around JT. “You at the crime scene now?”
“Just got off my knees, barfed up that last bite I had at The 5 Seasons.”
“They make a helluva home brew.”
“Whataya want, Marcus? Kinda have my hands full here.”
“Do you know who the victim is? A name?”
“The guy is a fireball, man. It’s going to take all night to get his limbs rearranged and a miracle to ID him. Why’re you so ahhh…interested, anyway?”
“Let’s just say I have a burning interest.”
“You got some connection here?”
“Nothing solid, no.”
“Are you working a case that might involve my man here?”
“Wow, very sharp! Atlanta Jack is back, but I won’t know that until you provide me with more information. Two way street here, buddy.”
“I put that requisition in with your invoice a couple days ago.”
“I’m not your snitch, JT. I’m a private investigator, remember?”
“Sure, I know the difference JT.” He said it as if to say there was no difference.
“First off, my old friend, I’m not working for Brunner anymore, remember?”
“And second, old friend,” JT replied, “I’m not your trainee anymore.”
Marcus had been JT’s training officer years before, before either of them made detective status. “You were the best training officer a guy could have in a squad car, and you make one helluva detective. Made me reach deeper, but I am still trying to extricate my ass out of the sling you put it in last time.”
“Brunner can be an ass.”
“Brunner, Bidderman, and Swete—all of ‘em are watching me like a hawk. Got a review coming up. Not to mention Stewy’s still pissed. So…”
“So I get it. But I need to know all the same. It’s important.”
“This was followed by a long silence at JT’s end. Finally, he said, “Right now, we know jack, and if you have any leads or ideas about who could’ve created this macabre murder—”
“Then I’ll share it with you, JT, and you walk away a hero. All I ask in return is this favor… and a copy of the autopsy report.”
“Jeeze, I suppose you want it delivered by secret courier, too, Mr. Bond. Listen, hot-shot, you got no regs ruling you. And the Atlanta PD isn’t Mission-fucking-Impossible.”
“I get that but—”
“You got that?”
“No courier. I’ll give you a fax number when you call back.”
“Somehow, Marcus, someone’s turned a human being into what looks like the results of a compactor, and I think we both know who’s behind it. I gotta get back to work here.”
“Just a minute, JT.”
“ G’bye!”
“Damn, he hung up on me!” Marcus said, returning to Katrina. “Last friend in the department and he hangs up on me.” When she didn’t answer, he began to pace. “It’s got to be a horrific, disturbing crime scene,” he muttered, stopping before a mirror and seeing a different reflection than the one he’d seen back at the apartment building. His sallow cheeks appeared fleshed out, eyes bright, burning with purpose, clear and piercing. Even his hair and thin mustache appeared healthier. Certainly, his color looked better than he’d thought possible. “They’ll be at it—the scene—for hours. Maybe if I went down there.”
She hadn’t responded; had in fact fallen fast asleep with Paco curled up at the foot of the couch beside her.
He could fly down to Atlanta from nearby Blue Lake recreational airport and back again before she’d ever know, but was it advisable? He could just wait to hear from JT, but given their strained relationship and the time it took for an autopsy that could take days. If it’s Cantu’s handiwork, we need to know now; if coincidence, the work of some crude gang, some sick initiation paid for by Cantu, then we need to know. If for no other reason, to set our minds—hers in particular—at rest.
“To act or not to act, that is the question,” he mused over a sleeping Kat.
Asleep, she looked even more beatific, altogether angelic. Lauren BaCall’s first time on screen, he thought then mused aloud, “Till she opens her mouth.” He banged about, trying to determine the depth of sleep she’d fallen into.
Paco too was out. “Definitely down for the count…off to the neighborhood of Winken, Blinken, and Nod…and on to the land of REM.”
But the dog yawned, eyes closed; then they open, looking up at him. If eyes could speak, the German Shepherd had a hundred questions.
“ You, dog…Paco, you see no harm comes to her. Got that? Learn to bark while you’re at it.”
He wrote out a note of his whereabouts, saying he’d be back as soon as humanly possible but that he felt compelled to fly down and back to Atlanta. He also warned that he’d loaded her two guns, adding, “should you need them” and “rely on Paco” which gave him a chuckle. He next locked everything tight before leaving, got into his motorboat, and headed for the town of Blue Ridge and the airport, the other side of the lake. The people at the airport knew him well, and they’d known his father. They’d be shocked to see him at any hour but surely now, as he’d have to wake old Dave Montclair to get clearance, but with that Cessna in the air, he could make it to the crime scene in Atlanta before it was entirely cleaned up.
He wanted to see the carnage; not that he savored the idea, but he knew there was nothing like getting information first hand. He could learn the identity of the victim, and in doing so, learn if he had any connection to Cantu.
He would have time, during the flight, to contemplate all the ripples in the pond that Cantu had created in the last month. Cantu was more complicated than Marcus had let on to Katrina. Cunning might be his middle name, but why would the man risk so much now? After having won his freedom all these years? Why had the bear come out of the woods? Because h
e could? Because the fiend wanted to play games? Repeat his victory? How mad was the madman? Had he run amok? Had he contracted some physical illness, a blood disorder to go along with his mental disorder? Was he near death himself and so wishing to go out with a bang? Was this all an elaborate form of suicide by cop?
No way to know with Cantu.
But if this was Cantu’s doing tonight in Atlanta, he’d declared open warfare on them all. Why else draw attention to himself? But then, it’d long ago been established that Cantu was a maniac with zero regard for human life, even the life he had himself brought into this world. Perhaps now he had no regard for his own life. If true, this made him an even more dangerous animal.
Time was nearing 2AM when Marcus arrived at the other side of the lake, where he tied to at a public pier. The airport was within walking distance with a stop at Montclaire’s house along the way. Montclaire’s dog announced Marcus’s arrival, his braying enough to wake the dead in the cemetery two miles away. Old Dave would be waiting for him with a shotgun.
House lights came up, and he saw a silhouette of a stoop-shouldered man who could not be mistaken for a danger shouting, “Who’s out there? Come on and get yourself an ass-full-o-it!”
E L E V E N
Rydell’s dropping in on crime scenes was nothing new, so showing up at this particular one surprised no one and angered everyone, or so it seemed. Everyone still had him responsible for what’d happened while he was unconscious. Peer pressure was not a matter simply for a high school population; it was at work in any social organization much like the witch-hunt mentality bubbling just beneath any social group. For this reason, JT had to at least appear to dislike Marcus.
Marcus hadn’t been coming around of late, however, and he could sense that it was to JT’s disappointment that he showed up anew. For a long time, Marcus had habitually made the effort to put in an appearance at the most brutal crime scenes just to tick others off, and frankly because he missed the adrenaline rush of the first twenty-four hours of a homicide investigation. As a result, he’d been showing up as a private citizen and spectator at many a scene until his latest bout with depression had kept him away.
He had initially acted as if it were a social occasion, just on hand to say hello to a few men he still admired and respected, among them Detective Jack Thomas, someone he trusted. It had been an hour and fifteen minutes since Marcus had spoken to JT on the phone, and the younger man assumed he’d just climbed from bed, dressed, and caught a cab from his place to here. As he’d arrived in a cab, JT also asked, “Car in the shop, Marc?”
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