Incubi - Edward Lee.wps

by phuc

  "With all due respect, sir, that's not a fair conclusion."

  "And from what I can see, your active participation on the case is all but nonexistent. Lieutenant Eliot seems to be carrying most of the investigative load."

  "I'm very close to identifying the specific ritual," Jack asserted. "If I can "

  "The ritual is a dead end. The perpetrators are obviously psychopaths."

  "That's not true either, sir. We have plenty of evidence to suggest that "

  "I know all about you, Captain, you and your radical investigative avenues. I don't want to hear about psychiatric profiles and satanic rituals. A homicide should be pursued through proven methods, not investigative quackeries."

  "Let me remind you, sir, that my past performance record "

  "And I don't want to hear about your success rate, and your awards and decorations. In my view many of your operations were of questionable legality, and your search and seizure warrant in the Henry Longford case was barely constitutional."

  "I beg your pardon, sir, but "

  "And furthermore "

  Jack, finally, exploded. "Would you at least let me talk for a minute, goddamn it, sir!" he shouted.

  The silence in the wake of the shout felt thick as wet cement. Larrel Olsher and Randy averted their eyes to the floor. Noyle remained standing stiffly, hands behind his back. He was smiling.

  "And there's another disturbing matter," Gentzel went on after the pause. "Lieutenant Noyle?"

  Noyle stepped forward. "Clearly, your conduct in general is bad enough, and it only proves to disservice your own professional integrity, and the integrity of the department in general. I've never witnessed such irresponsibility on the part of a rank officer, not in all my time on the department."

  Jack could bear no more of this. "All your time?" he objected. "What's that, about six months?

  I've been on this department for ten years, kid. I was busting dope dealers when you were still playing with G.I. Joes. And in case you haven't noticed, I outrank you."

  But Noyle went on, cold as stone. "And in case you haven't noticed, Captain, Internal Affairs operates under the direct authority of the county executive's office. When we hear things within the department, we investigate. That's our job. And we've heard quite a bit about you."

  "Okay, sure," Jack said. His only tactic was to beat this punk to the punch. "I went a little batty after the Longford case, and I've had a few personal problems, and sometimes I drink a little too much, but I've never consumed alcohol on duty."

  "Were you drunk last night, Captain?"

  Jack didn't answer.

  "Were you drunk two nights ago?"

  The motherfucker put watchdogs on me, Jack realized.

  "On those two nights did you drink liquor in the Undercroft Tavern?"

  "Yeah, I drank liquor," Jack admitted. "I'm pretty sure that Prohibition was repealed a couple of years ago."

  "Did you not in fact drink to the point of complete inebriation, Captain? Isn't it true that you drank so much that you lost consciousness at the bar and had to be physically carried out?"

  Jack was seething. It was all spelled out for him now, so there was no reason to restrain himself.

  "You suck-face little fairy. You put tails on me."

  "It's my job to investigate the public behavior of any officer whose professional reliability is in question. Based on its documentation, Internal Affairs is satisfied that you have a serious alcohol-abuse problem, and it has been recommended to the commissioner's office that you submit yourself to the county alcohol-rehabilitation program, posthaste."

  Posthaste, Jack thought. Only a pussy would use a world like "posthaste." Suddenly he felt his entire career in the hands of this prim, anal-retentive little brownnose. "I will," he said.

  "Additionally, it has been recommended that you be suspended from active duty, with pay, until you have successfully completed said program. Please know that you have the right to contest IAD's recommendations. I would strongly advise against that, though."

  "Please, don't take me off the Triangle case," Jack said.

  "Do you have a hearing problem too, Captain?" Gentzel asked. "You are suspended from all investigative operations as of now. Whether you consent or not, you're off the Triangle case."

  "Please, sir. Suspend me later, I'll do the rehab thing later. I just need a little more time. I'm really close."

  "Captain, the only thing you're really close to that I can see are insubordination charges and a mental breakdown. It would be derelict for us to allow an unstable alcoholic to remain in charge of a critical homicide investigation. You've expended valuable time and money, yet have produced no positive results. I'm reassigning the case to Lieutenant Eliot, who will work under the direct supervision of Lieutenant Noyle."

  Jack was aghast. "Noyle? You've got to be shitting me, sir! He's an IAD buttprobe, he's not a cop!

  You can't let this stuffed punk take charge of a ritual murder investigation!"

  "That's enough, Jack," Larrel Olsher advised.

  "No, it's not enough!"

  "Lieutenant Noyle is a competent investigator," Gentzel said.

  "He's a candyass creamcake who couldn't investigate the back of his own hand!" Jack yelled.

  Randy was grabbing him, trying to nudge him toward the door. Noyle's stiff posture and irreducible smile highlighted his triumph. As Randy edged Jack into the hall, Jack continued to shout, "He'll run this case into the ground, Gentzel! He'll fuck it up so bad you'll never catch these guys!"

  The door slammed. Randy held Jack off. "Are you out of your mind? You can't talk to a deputy comm like that."

  "Fuck him," Jack said. He shook loose. "And that asshole Noyle, fuck him double." His rage, like a puff of smoke, suddenly reverted to a physical weight of defeat.

  "Forget it, man," Randy offered. "You did your best."

  "Then I guess my best isn't good enough."

  "Quit feeling sorry for yourself, and let me tell you something, as a friend. Those two shitheads in there are right about one thing. You got some serious problems, and if you don't start taking care of them, you'll be through as a cop."

  I already am, he thought slowly. He brushed his hair out of his eyes and left the station.

  I've failed, he thought. Myself, and everyone.

  | |

  CHAPTER 26

  Voices. Words.

  White light like mist oozed through black like onyx.

  Was she dreaming?

  Transposition You are not yet ready to transpose. Imagine your passion. Which are you, Veronica? Real or fake? Let the image transpose... Tainted-tainted-tainted...

  Veronica roused. Aw, God. She'd fallen asleep at her work desk. Her mouth and eyes felt sealed shut; they opened stickily. She'd worked all day and all night, hadn't she? Again she could not remember at first. After Khoronos' guidance in the room of mirrors, she'd worked until 4:30 a.m.

  and had fallen asleep.

  What strange dreams, if they'd been dreams at all. They'd been more like fragments of dreams tossed haphazardly into her head. Transposition. Awake or asleep, the word haunted her. Though she believed she understood its artistic meaning now, she couldn't escape the suspicion that more of its meaning lay hidden, and that Khoronos wanted it that way. Why should she think such a thing, though? Khoronos had revived her, had given her a creative vision she hadn't thought herself capable of. In three days she'd developed more as an artist than she had in the last three years.

  Then the final mutterings of the dream idled back. Tainted-tainted-tainted. She is tainted. Who had Khoronos been talking about? Who was tainted?

  Did he mean me?

  She hadn't dreamed of the burning man, though. Perhaps the vision had completed itself in the mirrored room, had shown itself fully, leaving her to paint it without distraction.

  She rubbed her eyes, stood up. I'm a mess, she thought. She was flecked, spotted, and smudged with paint. She reeked of linseed oil. When she glanced down at her wor
k, her breath froze.

  The background was done. Every detail of the dreamscape lay before her on the tight, primed canvas. The grotto's pits and rabbets, the rough curvature of its black rock walls. Each pointillistic feature melded to convey the background's subterraneous dimension. Veronica could feel the transcension of the colors, and the image of the bottomless infinitude.

  She'd never delved into such techniques before, utilizing impressionistic strokes and devices to communicate an expressionistic vision, an intercourse of opposites. Yet here she had used those opposites...perfectly.

  Yes. This...is...perfect, she realized.

  The rush of joy flooded her, exhilaration like soaring heavenward. Perfect denoted the unachievable, yet that's what she felt she achieved. The background was perfect.

  And now it was time to unleash the theme. It was time to paint herself in hand with the burning man.

  As she sat back down to work, she felt as though she were being watched from above, or looked upon by gods.

  «« »»

  Devils, Jack thought. It was not what the old man had said as much as how he'd said it. It just...bothered him, like a jag of déjà vu. Why the hell should I care, anyway? he reminded himself. He was off the case.

  "Shooter, Jack?"

  "I'd love one," Jack admitted, "but I'm through with booze, for good. How many times you heard guys say that?"

  "Hundreds," Craig said. Jack didn't know if he was joking or serious. The Undercroft was empty in its post-happy-hour lull. Craig stacked glasses in the rack, whistling something by Elvis Costello. At this moment, just the two of them there, the bar felt haunted. Devils, Jack thought again.

  "I got suspended today," he finally said.

  "Suspended?" Craig questioned. "Why?"

  "Drinking. Fucking up the case." He shrugged.

  "Well, sometimes fucking up is the best thing we can do. When we see how stupid we can get, we keep ourselves in check."

  "Good point. Too bad I still want a drink."

  "Here you go." Craig set down a shooter. "A virgin Mary. That's tomato juice and vodka, without the vodka."

  Jack shot it back. "Thanks, I needed that."

  He thumbed through a local magazine called The Critique, one of several TSD had found in Susan Lynn's bedroom. It contained a poem called "Love-Epitaph," which seemed grimly fitting.

  It was the last poem Susan Lynn would ever have published.

  "But I'll tell you, Jack," Craig continued. "A bar isn't the place to be if you're trying to quit."

  "The test of will is man's ultimate power. It's true, I read it on the bathroom wall the other night."

  "Try this." Craig set down a brown bottle. "Drink like a killer, think like a killer."

  It was Patrizier, the nonalcoholic stuff that Susan Lynn's murderers had ordered. "Not bad," he said after a sip. "Know what it tastes like?"

  "Beer without alcohol."

  "Right."

  Craig went down into the pit to load the reach-ins. Jack turned to the page of the magazine that carried Susan Lynn's poem.

  This bar is my grave and my power. Amid it even my own demons cower to these wan nights which slaver and devour like the strange faceless men who come and pluck me like a flower.

  You hit a homer with this one, honey, Jack thought. Had she been writing about the Undercroft?

  Power. Demons. Faceless. He closed the magazine and slid it away.

  "Would you cheer up!" Craig yelled, coming back up. "Every day above ground is a good day. It's true, I read it on the bathroom wall."

  Jack knew he was putting off the question. Through his pants pocket he could feel the print of his HPCs. "I also read your phone number on the bathroom wall, didn't I?"

  "You must've put it there after the last time you fucked me."

  "I'm a cop, I fuck people every day. It's my job," Jack said. But it probably won't be for long, he reminded himself. "Actually I need your advice. I need some more of that barkeeper's wisdom."

  Craig flipped a Marlboro Light into the air and caught the filter end in his mouth. "Shoot."

  "When does an ethical person know when it's time to do something unethical?"

  "Since when are you ethical?"

  "Funny."

  "Are we talking legal or illegal?"

  "Let's just say that my intentions do not fully conform to the parameters of the law."

  "I don't know if I should hear this, Jack. Isn't there a little something in the books about accessory foreknowledge? Failure to report the knowledge of a second party's criminal intent?"

  "Are you a bartender or a fucking lawyer? Call it creepery with intent to mope."

  "Is that anything like balling with intent to hold hands?"

  Jack laughed. "Now you've got it."

  "Here's the best advice I can give you." Craig struck a book match one-handed and lit up.

  "Ready? This is deep."

  "I'm ready."

  "A man's got to do what he's got to do."

  The statement's bald unoriginality felt like a mental impact. To hell with ethics, Jack decided.

  What have I got to lose except a career that's probably lost already? "Thanks for the advice," he said. "See ya around."

  He hopped off his stool and went out of the bar.

  «« »»

  What would he get if he got caught? A fine? Probation before judgement? They wouldn't put a cop in jail, for God's sake. Not for a first offense illegal entry.

  Nevertheless, illegal entry it was, just as shit by any other name was still shit. Jack had never been very good at this. Once he'd picked an apartment utility room to get at the phone box.

  There'd been this cowboy dealing crack through the Jamakes, so Jack had bugged his ringer and listened in long enough to tag the next pickup time and place. Later the deal went down and the county narcs had been waiting, presto. Breaking the law to bust lawbreakers was only fair.

  Unethical? Definitely. But so were crack dealers and killers.

  He'd given Veronica's keys back the night they broke up. He remembered the dying lilacs on the bar, and how cold she'd looked as she sat there on the stool waiting for him, how shivery. He remembered how gray her voice had sounded, and how desperate he'd felt to plead with her, to beg her to give the relationship one more chance as he watched it all fall to pieces in front of his face.

  Jack remembered everything.

  She had a little condo off Forest Drive, quiet neighbors, no skell buzzing around. Look normal, he reminded himself. He approached the door as though it were his own. The dead bolt was tricky; he had to maintain a perfectly even pressure on the tension wrench as he stroked the 18mm keyway with his double-hook. It took several restrokes before the pins gave. The lock opened as swiftly as if he'd had the key.

  He thought of a vault opening as he opened the door. Veronica's only windows faced the woods in back; turning on the lights wouldn't give him away. The place seemed smaller, less airy, and the silence seemed amplified. At once Jack felt like exactly what he was: a trespasser, a burglar.

  He could see himself being cuffed and hauled away by city cops.

  First he checked the pad she kept beside the kitchen phone. Eggs, it read. Milk, tomato paste, and Call Stewie about Abrams contract. "Shit," he mumbled. He went into the bedroom.

  More memories here. More ghosts. Just leave, he told himself, but he couldn't now. Here was the bed in which he slept with her, and had made love to her. Here was the shower they'd bathed in together, and the mirror in which he'd dressed himself so quietly in the mornings so he wouldn't wake her. He would see her sleeping in the reflection as he knotted his tie. How many times had he stood in this selfsame spot? How many times had he told her he loved her in this selfsame room?

  His trespassing rubbed his face in loss. It was part of his past that he stood in now, another dead providence. What am I doing? he logically wondered for the first time. This was crazy, pointless, masochistic. He'd come here simply for a clue to Veronica's whereabouts, and no
w he felt inundated in the blood of a love relationship that was dead. It's dead, he thought, staring. Dead, dead, dead. She doesn't love you anymore. Her love for you is dead.

  "Dead," he muttered.

  The memories soon converged to crush him. She had loved him once, he was sure of that. Why had she stopped? What had happened that her feelings had so suddenly changed? It wasn't fair, because his feelings hadn't changed, had they? Why can't you just let go? he didn't ask as much as plead with himself. Veronica doesn't love you anymore, so why can't you forget about it?