Jack of Spades

by James Hankins

  Spader was soon tearing through Salem. In another few minutes he’d be at Olivia’s house in Swampscott, where, he feared, Pendleton might have already killed his family. Spader was still three or four minutes away. If Pendleton wanted to kill Olivia and David, Spader wouldn’t get there in time to stop him. He prayed the cops would. As he drove he fantasized about the perfect way for this to go down. Pendleton would somehow slip out of his cuffs, get one of the cops’ guns, and Spader would be forced to take him down. And if God granted him this wish, he swore he’d do it right this time. He’d aim a little higher than he did the last time, and a little to the right.

  He was just two minutes from Swampscott now, racing along Route 1A, other cars scattering before him, pulling over to allow him to pass. At one point he dialed Olivia’s cell phone number again, hoping Pendleton would answer and he could stall the son of a bitch, but the phone rang until Olivia’s voice mail answered the call. He disconnected. Almost immediately, his phone rang. For a moment he thought it was Pendleton calling him back to fuck with him, which would have been fine if it kept his family safe a while longer, but it was Dunbar who spoke.

  “He’s not here, John.”

  “What do you mean, he’s not there?”

  “I’m at Olivia’s house right now and Galaxo isn’t here. I just got here. Local police got here first, a few minutes ago. They found David.” He added quickly, “He’s fine, don’t worry about him.”

  “How—”

  “Galaxo simply rang the doorbell and hid in the bushes. When David answered the door, Galaxo hit him with his stun gun, then dragged him inside and taped his hands and feet. Cops found him bound on the living room floor.”

  Spader spoke around the walnut that suddenly materialized in his throat. “Did he…do anything to him?”

  “No, like I said, he’s fine.”

  “And Olivia?”

  Dunbar paused a brief moment, a moment that felt like an hour to Spader. “She’s gone, John.”

  The walnut in Spader’s neck grew to the size of an apple, threatening to cut off his oxygen. He swallowed hard and said, “Gone? You mean she’s—”

  “Jesus, no,” Dunbar said quickly. “Sorry, man, I didn’t mean that. I mean she’s gone. Not here. Looks like Galaxo took her with him.”

  Spader blew out a breath. “Anyone see anything?”

  “We’re talking to the neighbors now. David said he saw Olivia come in. He tried to warn her but his mouth was taped shut. She saw him and then Galaxo stepped from around a corner and stunned her, too. Then he chloroformed her and dragged her out of the house.”

  Jesus Christ. “And nobody saw anything? The fucking guy needs leg braces to walk. He probably couldn’t carry her. Probably dragged her all the way to his car, down the porch stairs, down the front walk. And nobody saw a fucking thing? Nobody called the cops?”

  “Like I said, we just started talking to the neighbors. So far, no word.”

  “Fuck!” This wasn’t Galaxo’s MO, leaving the scene with his victim. But he must have made his move on Olivia knowing his time was running out, that Spader and the cops knew he was Galaxo, and that it would just be a matter of time before they got enough on him to get a warrant. Or maybe Spader’s visit to Pendleton’s house had spooked him into this sooner than he planned. He probably knew that Madeleine Wollner had survived. They’d already asked him about camp, so he knew they were looking into that angle. Maybe he worried that Wollner would remember him from camp and her statement would contradict his. He might even have figured that they’d find hard evidence that he attended Camp Wiki-Wah-Nee, even though the place had closed years ago. Once that happened, he could no longer avoid serious suspicion.

  But why take the risk he was taking right now, just to add Olivia to his list of victims? Why not forgo another victim and instead use his time to get rid of all the evidence he could and take his chances in court, or maybe just hop in a car and drive, go into hiding, start a new life somewhere? Then the answer came to Spader and it chilled him despite the humid heat of the late-summer night. Spader had suspected for a while that Galaxo—that is, Pendleton—had a specific agenda. The killings weren’t random and the whole choice angle was nothing more than a charade. He had certain victims in mind, and certain tortures in mind for those victims. It seemed obvious now that, in his mind, the people on his list were somehow responsible for the accident that he surely felt had ruined his life. And he was pulling out all the stops now to add Olivia to his list of victims because, Spader figured, she was the last name on his list. He didn’t care about getting away with these crimes. He never had. He merely wanted to finish what he started. Make them all pay. That was why the time frame between his attacks grew shorter and shorter. He wasn’t doing what he was doing just for kicks, like so many sociopaths did. He had a job he wanted to do and he worked as quickly as he could to get it done. And when he realized that Spader considered him a prime suspect, if not the only suspect, he had to speed things up even more. His recklessness—as evidenced by this less-than-stealthy attack on Olivia, his savage beating of Matthew Finneran, his failure to complete his desired work on Madeleine Wollner—was less the sign of a deranged killer unraveling than it was an indication that he was growing frustrated with fact that Spader and the cops were getting so close to him while the completion of his mission, more than two decades after the tragic accident that set him on this path, was finally in sight.

  Spader, who was already driving faster than was safe, gave the car even more gas. Olivia was indeed Pendleton’s swan song, whether she was the last name on his list or not. He knew he wasn’t going to get away after this. After Olivia, the game was over. So, Spader figured, he’d probably choose to go out with a bang. Make his final statement, and make it memorable. Unfortunately, Olivia was the means by which he’d try to do that. Who knew what torture his sick mind had come up with for her?

  Spader pounded the wheel with his fist. Where the hell was Pendleton? Where would he take Olivia? He wouldn’t go back to his house in Beverly. Where else—

  And then it hit him. Shit! He’d been right there. Right fucking there.

  He cut the wheel and skidded into a McDonald’s parking lot, then flew onto 1A again, back toward Salem. He reached for the radio mic. He identified himself, was patched through to Beverly local police as he requested, identified himself again, then told the local cops where to meet him. The dispatcher told him that the Beverly police were stretched a little thin at the moment because they were in the process of responding to several calls.

  “What kind of calls?”

  “We have reports of shots fired at three different locations in town, plus reports of a home burglary in progress, a reported break-in at a local dry cleaner, and a domestic hostage situation.”

  “All these calls came in at the same time?” Spader asked.

  “A few minutes apart.”

  “You usually get that much action on a Wednesday night? Sounds a little fishy, doesn’t it? I’ve got a serial killer I’m chasing here.”

  “We have to check them out, Detective.”

  “Doesn’t a woman’s life at stake take precedence here?”

  “Detective, you said yourself that you don’t know for certain that your suspect is in our town. And like I said, we have shots fired and a domestic hostage situation. Any of these incidents could end badly for someone. I shouldn’t have to tell you that. We can hold off on checking out the burglary, but the unit slated to do that is currently responding to one of the shots-fired reports. But I promise you, we’ll get someone to you as soon as we can.”

  He clicked off, then called Dunbar back and told him where he was going.

  “The locals gonna meet you there?” Dunbar asked.

  “As soon as they can.”

  “I’m on my way.”

  “No,” Spader said. “What if I’m wrong? What if they’re not going where I think they’re going? I need you to oversee things there and figure out where they really are.”
>
  “Any chance you’re wrong?”

  “I don’t think so, but I can’t bet Olivia’s life on it.”

  He snapped his phone shut. He was making good time through Salem and would be back in Beverly soon. But would he be in time?

  Spader sailed up Essex Street and screeched to a stop in front of the Beverly Public Library. He grabbed a flashlight from under his seat and leaped from the car without bothering to close the door. The locals hadn’t arrived yet. He saw no signs of another car, but figured there must have been a parking lot connected to the library, on the side of the building or maybe around back, and that Pendleton had parked there. Unfortunately, he’d never been to this library and didn’t know its layout.

  The library was a big brick structure, rectangular, at least from the front, with square white columns rising from the ground all the way to the roof two stories above. Spader drew his Glock as he hurried toward the main entrance, up a dozen or so stairs, his eyes scanning the huge first-floor windows along the front of the building, just in case Pendleton was waiting in one with a firearm of his own. The bastard hadn’t used a gun so far—at least not one with real bullets—but he’d already changed the rules for his last hurrah. Who was to say he hadn’t decided to add a gun to his tool kit?

  Spader saw no movement in any of the windows as he ran the final few steps to the big wooden front doors in a half crouch. He pulled on the heavy door, but it was locked. He thought about shooting the lock to bits and kicking the door in, but even though Pendleton would undoubtedly know soon enough that he was there, there was no reason to announce the precise time and location of his entrance into the library. He didn’t think Pendleton had gone in this way. He’d undoubtedly been in a hurry to get inside and, given his limited walking ability—as evidenced by his reliance on leg braces—climbing stairs probably wasn’t his strong suit, particularly if he was dragging a kidnapping victim, or coercing her onward with a weapon. He’d likely entered the library through another door. Spader looked right, then left, and decided arbitrarily to go left. He stayed close to the library wall, keeping his eyes on the windows as he hurried around to the Winter Street side of the building.

  He’d chosen correctly. As soon as he rounded the corner he saw a side entrance, a set of wooden doors, much smaller than the massive ones at the front entrance, down a flight of eight granite steps. Spader figured it would be easier for Pendleton to go down stairs than up them. And sure enough, there was a parking lot behind the building with a single vehicle in it, parked as close as possible to the library. It was a black Ford Explorer, an older model, dented in some spots, rusted in others. Spader walked quickly over to it but didn’t even have to touch its hood to know it had been running just moments before. Its cooling engine was still ticking.

  He turned back to the stone steps and descended quickly. Gun in his right hand, he reached for the door with his left and gave it a tug. Locked. Pendleton probably had a key. Either the library gave them to its volunteers or he stole one. Must have locked up behind him. Spader knew he should wait for the locals to arrive. He needed backup. But the longer he waited, the more of Olivia the sick bastard could remove with a saw or knife. Unlike the front doors, these side doors had windows set in them. He peered inside and saw another set of doors with windows just inside. He took a chance and shined his flashlight through them, illuminating a marble-floored foyer with yet another set of doors across it. Beside it was a white statue of a little girl. He moved his light to the letters above the door: Katharine P. Loring Children’s Room.

  If Pendleton was indeed in the children’s room, there were two sets of closed doors between him and the locked exterior doors. He probably wouldn’t hear a little glass breaking. Spader switched off his flashlight and used the butt of it to break a windowpane in the door, then reached inside and opened the door. No alarm went off. Spader didn’t expect it to, figuring Pendleton would have deactivated it. And if it had, Spader would have welcomed it anyway. But silence reigned.

  He entered the dark building, moving low and slow. He pushed through the second set of doors as quietly as he could. Split stairways curved away from him and met at a landing above. He crossed the foyer, staying close to the wall, and sidled up next to the white statue of the little girl. She appeared to be picking a splinter from her finger.

  The lights were off in the children’s room. That meant nothing. Perhaps Pendleton had already found a back room and begun his dark work on Olivia. But Spader didn’t think so. He hadn’t had enough time.

  Had he?

  Spader paused. Every second was crucial now, and a mistake could cost Olivia something vital—a toe, a foot, maybe her life. He had to make the right choices. The children’s reading room was the closest area to the doors through which Pendleton had entered the building. Plus, because he read books to children there, it was probably where he spent most of his time at the library, where he felt most comfortable. He’d know it better than any other part of the building. But he’d know that Spader would know that. So maybe he’d go somewhere else. And if he was going to do that, maybe he’d go as far as he could from this room. Which meant the top floor. He’d certainly had time to drag Olivia into an elevator and take it up three flights.

  Spader hurried up one of the staircases and pushed through a set of glass doors. He still didn’t want to use his flashlight yet, but moonlight drifting in through tall windows told him he was in a large room, probably the main room of the library. He felt along the wall for a light switch and finally found one. Using his flashlight in an otherwise dark room made him a sitting duck. But throwing light onto everything took away some of Pendleton’s home-court advantage and shifted a bit of advantage to Spader, who was far better trained and far more experienced in situations like these. He flicked the light switch. Nothing. Pendleton had already been to the main circuit panel, which was probably on the lowest level, where the children’s reading room was. He couldn’t have known for certain he’d be followed, that Spader would figure out where he’d gone, but he wasn’t taking chances. And he certainly knew this library better than anyone who’d be coming after him. He’d made sure the playing field stayed tilted dramatically in his favor.

  Spader squinted through the darkness, looking for a staircase to the floor above. Though faint moonlight drifted in through the windows, it failed to chase away the black shadows that lay draped across everything, hanging thickest between the shelves and in the recesses of the big space. Spader’s instincts told him that Pendleton had gone upstairs to the top floor, but those instincts could be wrong. The bastard could be hiding in any of the many shadows on this floor. He could be across the room or six feet away.

  Spader slipped through the dark, staying to the shadows where he could. He knew he’d make better time if he used his flashlight, but still wasn’t ready to reveal his precise location. He found out a moment later that it wouldn’t have mattered, as something whined past his head and thunked into the row of books just behind him, while the report of a handgun boomed. Probably a nine-millimeter. Instinctively, Spader threw himself to the floor and scrambled for cover behind a chair.

  A disembodied voice—Galaxo’s strange cartoon voice—floated from one of the shadows. “Oops, I missed. Well, so much for doing things the easy way.”

  Even now, when everything was falling apart around him, when Spader and everyone else knew who he was, Pendleton still chose to wear that mask. Spader wasn’t sure what to make of that. But it didn’t change anything, so he didn’t waste any time pondering it.

  He hadn’t seen the muzzle flash, so he didn’t know where the shot came from, though he thought it had come from above him. He looked up and now saw an open space in the ceiling, where library patrons on the second floor could lean against a railing and look down on the first floor. Pendleton already knew where Spader was, so Spader decided to risk using his flashlight for a moment. He held it one hand, right next to the gun he held with his other, and leaned around the chair and clicked it on, q
uickly sweeping what he could see of the floor above. He caught of flash of movement, black clothing and a yellow mask, scurrying from its beam. His mind processed the image in half a heartbeat and he knew he hadn’t seen Olivia right there, so he squeezed off a shot with his Glock. He couldn’t tell if he’d hit the bastard. If the guy had fallen he’d be out of Spader’s sight. A moment later that creepy fucking voice drifted down from the darkness above.

  “Careful, Jack of Spades. You’ll hit what’s left of your wife. I mean, your ex-wife.”

  What’s left? Fuck him. The bastard was playing with him. He hadn’t had time to hurt her. At least Spader didn’t think he had. He prayed he was right.

  He heard muffled footsteps. More than one set of them. He was forcing Olivia to walk with him. After Spader’s shot, which had probably come close to him, he was unlikely to let his human shield get too far away from him. That made Spader’s job a lot harder.

  Figuring Pendleton was headed for cover, Spader broke from his own concealment and hustled past the circulation desk toward the front doors, where he found stairs leading up. His flashlight fell briefly on a bronze statute of a young boy examining his foot, perhaps for a splinter, like the little girl downstairs, and as Spader started up the stairs he wondered about the statuary motif of kids with slivers in their extremities.

  The stairs didn’t go straight up. There were several smooth granite steps leading to a small landing, then more curving up to his left. He reached the landing and peered around the corner. When no bullet flew past or, worse, hit him, he moved up the next set of stairs. Halfway up them he paused. At the next landing the stairs split, leading to the left and the right. When he was presented with the same choice outside the library, he’d gone left and had been correct. He chose left again. As he reached the top, a bullet pounded into the wall just behind him, confirming that he’d chosen correctly again. Spader dove for cover behind the nearest bookshelf, hoping like hell it wasn’t the one Pendleton had shot at him from. It wasn’t.