High Bloods

by John Farris

  The techie repositioned the Virtual Reality figures to enhance Brenta’s face. I could almost read the horror in his eyes.

  “Son of a bitch,” I said. “He didn’t know. Give me Fran now.”

  The enhancement of Fran as she took a good grip on one of Brenta’s arms revealed no such emotion, not even a hint of shock. She might have been thinking about what to make at her next pottery class.

  “But she knew,” I said.

  I watched Fran Obregon and two beefers, because that’s how many of them were needed to pull Brenta back into the limo, which raced away even before the door was shut. The last VR image was Obregon’s hand reaching for the door handle.

  “Freeze,” I said, and sat back in the lab chair with my fingers locked behind my head. I was grinning as I stared at the VR detail of her outstretched hand: the chicly jeweled fingers, the expensive bracelets looped around her wrist.

  “Shake hands with the devil, baby,” I said. “It won’t be long now.”

  I was halfway to San Jack Town at nine hundred feet over Seco Grande when Lew Rolling got back to me and said that Miles Brenta had canceled his schedule and was spending the day at home in Paradiso Palms, presumably in seclusion.

  The prison hospital operated by WEIR was a collection of two-story adobe-style tan cubes with narrow tinted windows and solar panel roofs angled to acquire sunlight all day. Covered walkways connected the buildings. The complex was just north of San Jacinto; a quarter mile farther north the Colorado Aqueduct glittered like a silver vein in a thin concrete arm.

  Two helo pads were located well away from the psychiatric unit, so the comings and goings of choppers wouldn’t disturb the loony birds in residence. There was no shade but the facility provided hose connections to one-ton mobile APUs for cooling. Otherwise after only a few minutes on the ground the cabin temps could hit a hundred sixty degrees at noon on a hot day. And it was another hot day.

  I rode the minibus to administration and checked in. El Gordo had been X-rayed and treated on arrival, then removed to an isolation unit where he was reported to be sedated but able to talk.

  WEIR already had run his prints and I had his sheet. Four aliases, birth name Roberto Gallego, birthplace Guanajuato, Mexico. He had a trip to the main joint at Rocky Peak on his ledger, murder two bargained down to manslaughter, eight and out.

  And at the moment he had a hairline fracture that would heal without intervention, a lump on the side of his head the size of a lemon. Twenty-two stitches had closed the trenchlike gash on his face opened up by the front sight of my Glock. His right eye was swollen shut. Probably he would have trouble breathing through his nose for the rest of his life, but what life expectancy he had came down to the toss of a coin, and I was doing the tossing.

  There was a guard on his door. The charges were everything I could think of from suspicion of murder on down. When I mentioned the charges he showed me the underside of his lip like a nickering horse.

  “Abogado,” he said.

  “Ortega knows you’re here,” I said. “By now he probably would’ve sent you a mouthpiece with a basketful of forget-me-nots. But the word is out you’re in a coma and probably won’t be needing anything but a priest and a cheap funeral. That’s my favor to you, comprende, Roberto?”

  “Fock tu madre.”

  “But any time I say, hombre, you’ll have a rapid recovery. Before you know it you’ll be out of your cozy room here and into the general population at the Peak. Where if you’re not on the SN yard you might last, what, a day and a half? Before one of your fellow Diamondbackers gets the word and shanks you through the solar plexus.”

  He thought that one over; then his good eye moved in my direction, catching some of the filtered light through the single, six-inch-wide window opposite the hospital bed he occupied. He looked at me for two seconds, looked away. His fat mouth behaved this time. I took his lack of a sneer as a sign that he wanted to parlay. I made a bitter choice.

  “You can do twenty-to-life for Sunny Chagrin,” I said. “I’d like to see you do the time. I owe it to Sunny. But I don’t think you can rat out Ortega on murder one and make it stick, even if you live long enough to go to trial. I’m willing to give it a shot, though. Unless you give me something else I want.”

  It was quiet for a while in the small hospital room, except for the tweeting of the vital-signs monitor. Then his good eye wandered back to me.

  “Qué es?” he said.

  “Where is Mal Scarlett?”

  According to the monitor his pulse rate picked up. He breathed deeply through his mouth.

  “No se, hombre.”

  “I can get you fixed up with a one-way back to Guanajuato,” I said, hating myself for bargaining over Sunny’s corpse. “Or I walk out the door and you’re dead, amigo. Help your memory any?”

  “I doan know about those bizness. Cazando lobos. El jefe, he arrange.”

  “You don’t know where the next one is going to be, where they took Mal?”

  He might have frowned, if his face could have handled the stress. His eyes closed briefly. He grimaced, showing off his gold bridgework.

  “Yesterday they took her away from Angeltowne in an armored truck,” I said. “I know that much.”

  “Verdad. But I no was there el tarde. I hear Pepito say—Pepito, he drive the trock, onnerstan? Always he drive. To take the lobos to the keeling place. Beeg stars, onnerstan? Mucho famoso.”

  “What did you hear Pepito say?”

  “Pepito say, ‘the beetch is go to catch her plane.’ He laugh.”

  “The truck was headed up the Crestline Highway is the last information we have. There’s no regional airport I know of up that way.”

  “I doan know,” he moaned weakly, as if he were sinking under the weight of the painkillers they had him on. “Like a chiste he ees saying it. She catch her plane now. Ho-ho, beeg joke.”

  I didn’t know of a regional airport north of San Berdoo, but if one existed there was little chance that Pepito and whoever else had been along for the ride would attempt to off-load a kidnapped ex-debutante with a face known all over the world and put her into a waiting plane. Day or night.

  But if Mal was destined for a mal de lune site outside of SoCal where law enforcement was lax, corrupt, or nonexistent, there were numerous private fields with minimal services and not much supervision. Probably at least thirty of them, from the edge of the great Mojave west to Lancaster and Palmdale. In that sparsely populated corridor of SoCal, ultralights, small planes, or helicopters are essential if you wanted to make it down to the bright lights and sin spots of the L.A. basin without hard driving on bad roads.

  I made the calls I had to make; but it was a lot of territory to cover in a short time with limited manpower.

  While I was using my wristpac I heard a familiar, unforgettable voice and drifted to where it was coming from: a shaded rec area where a congregation of about thirty Lycan inmates—a few on crutches, a couple in wheelchairs—had gathered to enjoy some ice cream and hear the Word from the Rev. A. A. Kingworthy, pastor of the First Church of Lycanthropy.

  His text dealt with lions, lambs, and Lycans. It didn’t make a lot of sense to me, but his timing was great as always and he was rewarded with choruses of hallelujahs and amens. After his homily, which was the usual can of beans, he talked briefly to and blessed each inmate individually. The aftereffects of a helicopter blowing up in his face had left him looking like a great old dog with a bad case of mange. His hands and several fingers were bandaged. I had to admire his pluck.

  Kingworthy blotted his perspiring brow with a succession of nacre handkerchiefs shaken out and delicately handed to him by an associate pastor, a man who was a third the size of the Reverend and twice as dark. The associate seemed in agony that not a drop of sweat fall on the Rev’s immaculate white suit.

  The inmates were herded back to the wards they had come from. Kingworthy helped himself to a quart bottle of root beer from a cooler.

  I went over to him
. His broad back was to me, his head tilted back as he took long swallows of his drink.

  “Inspiring,” I said. “I didn’t know you also had a prison ministry.”

  He lowered the bottle and turned to me with a pleasant show of teeth.

  “I take the Gospel wherever it is most needed.”

  He was still perspiring. They had run out of fresh handkerchiefs. The sting of salt must have been painful on his flash-burned skin. The associate was frantic; I assumed wringing out one of the used ones just wouldn’t do. I handed Kingworthy my handkerchief.

  “Thank you, and God bless you, sir.” His eyes were blood-red today. He blinked a couple of times as if to bring me into sharper focus. I think he recognized me then. For a few seconds there was something guarded in his expression. Then the smile reappeared, with enough gleaming veneer to resurface a bowling alley. “Have we met?”

  “Not formally. I was there last night, backstage.”

  “Ah,” he said sorrowfully, his brow wrinkling. “Shocking and tragic. But perhaps it was a sign from the Lord. After long and prayerful contemplation, that is what I make of it.”

  Kingworthy bowed his head momentarily, his tongue nudging a blister on his lower lip.

  “What exactly was the Almighty trying to impress upon us?” I said.

  “I have no further interpretation to offer. The Lord’s majestic inscrutability is often a great comfort to me. Are you a believing man?”

  “I believe in truth, justice, and a square deal—when I can get one.”

  He nodded. He finished patting his tender face with my handkerchief, and stared at the initialed corner.

  “Forgive me for not recalling your name.”

  “Rawson,” I said. “I’m deputy director of ILC SOCAL, criminal investigations.”

  “Forgive me again—may I offer you something cold to drink, Mr. Rawson?”

  “Sure. I’m partial to lemon-lime.” I didn’t add that I usually liked it with four ounces of freezer-chilled vodka on the side.

  The associate pastor rolled up his starched shirt cuff, fished among the remaining chips of clear ice in the cooler, and came up with a can of soda for me. I pulled the tab and raised the can in a toast.

  “Confusion to the enemy.”

  Kingworthy agreeably joined in with his quart bottle. His bandaged fingers could’ve gone around it twice. Damn, he was big.

  “Whose name,” Kingworthy added, “we all know to be Satan.”

  I watched a squadron of big-bellied flies around a wire trash basket half filled with ice-cream bar wrappers. The flies looked iridescent in streaks of sun. A hot wind blew dust and a couple of stray wrappers across the asphalt pavement of the rec yard. I thought I could hear the humming of the flies.

  “I was thinking more of someone who could make a Lycan go werewolf any old time, even if he or she didn’t want to.”

  Kingworthy eyed me in a troubled way and gently fingered a couple of the raw places on his broad face. I tried to remember all the plagues of biblical Egypt. Flies, of course, and [sored] flesh and a bloody tainted river. Like the bloodstreams of Lycans? Firstborns too. They had figured into it somehow. I was an only child. That probably should have made me nervous.

  “Is such an abomination possible?” Kingworthy said.

  Now it was an abomination, and not some inscrutable lesson from a deity.

  “We both saw it happen last night. For me, it was the second such occurrence in little more than four days.” The humming of flies seemed louder to me. I was besotted with symbolism. I needed more sleep or more meth or something to shut down the anger that was spilling too much adrenaline into my system. “So what was it, Reverend? An act of God or an act of Satan we witnessed last night at the amphitheater?”

  As soon as I asked him that I realized I wasn’t interested in whatever response he might give. It was a question for theologians. He was just a preacher. My true interest was earthly evil and those who had the capacity for it.

  “Sorry,” I said. “I didn’t come over here to challenge your faith. I hoped you might be able to help me with something else.”

  I took out a 3-D head shot of Raoul J. Ortega made from the VR surveillance discs.

  “This man was at last night’s concert. Do you know him or recall seeing him backstage with Bucky?”

  He only needed a moment to look at the photo.

  “Yes, I know him. That is our blessed brother Raoul. A great friend of the First Church of Lycanthropy, although like myself he is of the High Blood.”

  “Also he’s president of the SoCal Diamondbackers, a known criminal organization. They all have a pathological hatred of Lycans.”

  That didn’t faze Kingworthy.

  “Brother Raoul has renounced his past sins. That was good enough for me, but most importantly he stands guiltless in the sight of Almighty God.”

  “God may not be the shrewd judge of character he’s given credit for. I know how much Ortega enjoys organizing things. Was the fund-raiser his idea?”

  “It was.”

  “He persuaded Bucky and Chimera to appear?”

  “I left everything up to him. The choice of personalities. The venue.”

  “Chimera’s style is kind of down and dirty for a church social.”

  He looked wearily at me. “Our church home will be costly to build. Everyone’s contribution is welcome. I don’t care for rock and roll myself. Our young parishioners like it. The greater good benefits from the lesser evil.”

  “Ortega’s in the armored transport business. Was he also responsible for hauling the loot away?”

  “Do you have a reason for doubting Brother Raoul’s integrity and devotion to our church?”

  “We could both keel over from heat prostration before I finish giving you all of my reasons.”

  I stepped a little closer to him. We were nearly toe to toe. If I had been five inches taller I could have unknotted his tie with my teeth. He looked down at me and didn’t yield. I pitched my voice lower.

  “Come on now, Reverend. Between you and me. You don’t trust Ortega either, do you? How many of your associate pastors were riding shotgun with the strongbox last night? I mean just the ones licensed to carry bazookas with their go-to-meeting clothes.”

  I don’t know what response I expected; something pious or indignant, maybe. What I got was a hearty laugh that nearly blew me back on my heels. The associate pastor with us smiled primly, hands folded at his beltline.

  “But you probably had his split negotiated and packaged long before any of the money left the amphitheater,” I said. “I don’t know if you’re a good bad man or a bad good man, Reverend Kingworthy. Maybe it’s all malarkey; still I admire your dedication. It’s hot out here and you probably haven’t had any more sleep than I’ve had. But here’s some advice: go play with real rattlesnakes and leave Diamondbackers alone. You’ll live longer.”

  He nodded.

  “Complications abound,” he mused. “But worthwhile goals are never easily achieved.” He paused, adding with a smile, “And things as they are changed upon the blue guitar.”

  “The Gospel according to Wallace Stevens?”

  “A favorite poet of mine. Deeply philosophical. Would you like to have your handkerchief back? Or may I have sent to you a dozen new ones with my compliments?”

  “Thanks, but I’ll just take the old one with me. After it dries I’ll probably frame it and hang it over my mantel and spend long winter nights pondering your image when it appears.”

  He handed me the soggy handkerchief with just the faintest trace of amusement on his blistered lips.

  “A pleasure speaking to you this morning, Mr. Rawson. Would there be anything else I can do for you? I’m afraid I have no idea where you might find Brother Raoul. He finds me, whenever he is in need of spiritual sustenance.”

  I let that notion blow by me like the grit picked up by the wind, nodded slightly, and walked away. I didn’t get far. I turned to Kingworthy as he was opening a second quart
of root beer.

  “Raoul Ortega killed Bucky Spartacus,” I said. “I don’t know yet how he managed it, but I’ll find out.” The Rev was motionless, contemplating this charge. “One more question, Reverend.”

  “As you wish, sir.”

  “Did you know that Bucky’s hair-up was coming?”

  He looked gravely at me.

  “How could I possibly anticipate such an ungodly thing?”

  “But your reaction was—hell, call it suicidal. The Bucky-ball was like all the rest of them, an equal-opportunity killing machine.”

  “But I never gave dying a thought. I never felt in danger. Like all the rest of them? You will never convince me of that. What I saw was not just another werewolf. I saw the inner writhing of a tormented soul.”

  “Then you’ve got something I haven’t got.”

  Kingworthy nodded. “Yes. Perhaps I do, Mr. Rawson.”

  16

  aradiso Palms was a designed community for the very well heeled and just plain heels, an immaculate watering hole where the worst problem any of the residents seemed to have was getting out of the sand traps at the golf club. The Palms, like the Prestige, was walled, but more handsomely, and very well policed. It was off-limits to Lycans at any time; even domestic help and staff at the two large resort hotels had to be High Bloods, who made twice the money Lycans could get in other, less choosy places.

  Miles Brenta’s real estate company had planned and built Paradiso Palms in the desert about five minutes by helicopter from WEIR’s sprawling top-security complex at San Jack Town. Part of the Palms was nestled in the canyons on the southeast flank of San Jacinto Mountain. Brenta had reserved fully one-quarter of the entire community for his own estate, an enclave landscaped from scratch where before only the Joshua trees and ocotillo had stood much of a chance. Now, from the air, the terrain looked verdant and hilly, with date palm oases, streams stocked with rainbow trout, a couple of stair-step waterfalls, and another big-league golf course for the exclusive use of Brenta and his cronies. I didn’t see anyone playing as I approached. A dozen groundskeepers were at work on the estate, scooting along trails in electric trucks. One of the largest wind farms and desalination plants in perpetually water-starved SoCal kept the hundred and sixty acres green as Ireland. A twenty-four-inch pipeline went directly to the Salton Sea. Lycan gangs had sabotaged it recently. There were probably two hundred thousand Lycans living out this way in human junkyards, or government-subsidized trailer parks, some who had a lot of free time to think up ways to vent their hatred of High Bloods.