The Shadow Hunter

by Michael Prescott

  He was circling the far end of the lot when he glimpsed a flash of motion in his rearview mirror. Another vehicle had entered the parking area—a white subcompact.

  Wyatt parked in the nearest available space, safely hidden in a carport’s shadow. Low in his seat, he watched the car cruise past. It was a Dodge Colt, and it had a dent in its side panel, and the woman at the wheel was Abby, of course.

  She guided the Colt into a carport in a corner of the lot, then walked briskly to the rear door of the Gainford Arms, checking her wristwatch. In a hurry, it seemed.

  The rear door was locked. Abby had a key. She must be a resident. No surprise.

  The door swung shut behind her, and Wyatt slowly sat up in his seat. A slow anger was growing inside him. He was tempted to barge into the landlord’s office, show his badge, find out which apartment she was in. Bang on her door until she opened up, then demand to know what kind of game she was playing…

  He told himself to cool off. He wasn’t going to do that. Abby was obviously involved in something clandestine and dangerous. If he blew her cover, he would put her at risk.

  After a few moments he composed himself. Calm again, he headed over to Hollywood Station, though he was off duty for another forty-five minutes. At an empty desk he called the phone company. It didn’t take him long to determine that only one apartment at the Gainford Arms had established phone service within the past week. Number 418, rented to Abby Gallagher.

  Hickle lived in apartment 420. Abby was his next-door neighbor.

  Wyatt was suddenly worn out. He sank back in his chair, rubbing his face. One of the day-watch patrol guys, a training officer named Mendoza, sauntered past. “Rough day, Sergeant?” Mendoza asked.

  “You could say that,” Wyatt said.

  “I bet it’s a woman.”

  Wyatt had to smile. “How’d you know?”

  “Only a woman can make a man feel that goddamn bad.”

  16

  At five fifteen Abby found Hickle in the laundry room of the Gainford Arms, unloading his clothes from the dryer. “Hi, neighbor,” she said. “Fancy meeting you here.”

  Hickle flushed. “It’s a small world,” he managed.

  She rewarded his effort at humor with a smile. Actually their meeting was no coincidence. After returning from TPS, she had rewound her surveillance videotape of Hickle’s apartment and scanned it in fast motion. The tape was timestamped, allowing her to determine that at exactly 4:27 he had left the apartment carrying a basket of laundry. Hastily she had stuffed some of her clothes into a plastic bag and headed down to the basement. She thought it would seem more natural to run into him there than to arrange another chance encounter in the hallway.

  “How much do these machines cost?” she asked as she dumped the contents of her sack into one of the big washers.

  “Seventy-five cents each.”

  “I’d better stock up on quarters. My wardrobe’s pretty limited, and I have to keep washing the same items if I want anything clean to wear.”

  He didn’t answer. He was collecting the rest of his clothes from the dryer, in an obvious hurry to depart. She knew he was nervous around her—around women in general. Still, she wasn’t going to let him get away that easily. They had a date to go on, whether he knew it or not.

  “I didn’t spend a lot of time packing,” she continued, as if his silence was the most natural thing in the world. “Lit out of town in a rush. Left most of my things behind.”

  This ought to tweak his curiosity, and it did. He looked up from the dryer. “Sounds like the move was kind of sudden.”

  “Extremely sudden. I threw some bare necessities into four suitcases, tossed ’em in the back of my car, and amscrayed.”

  “You’re not on the run from the law, are you?”

  He said it quite seriously, but she was sure he meant it as a joke, so she merely laughed. “On the run from my problems, I guess.”

  “You have…problems?”

  “Doesn’t everybody?”

  “Sometimes I think I’m the only one.”

  “You’re not. It only feels that way. Not a good feeling, is it?”

  He looked away and mumbled, “No, it’s not.” He seemed embarrassed, as if he had revealed too much. He picked up the laundry basket and took a step toward the door. “Well…see you.”

  “Hey, you happen to know any place where a person can get a decent meal around here?”

  Nonplussed by the change of topic, Hickle only blinked.

  “I survived last night on crackers and cheese. Since you work in a restaurant, you must know the local dining scene. What I’m looking for is a tasty low-fat meal, something that won’t drive up my cholesterol count to the stratosphere.”

  She waited, hoping he wouldn’t panic so badly that his mind would go blank. She needed him to make a dining suggestion. Finally he came up with something.

  “How about The Sand Which Is There?” he said. Abby asked him to repeat the name. He obeyed, speaking slowly to emphasize the pun. “It’s in Venice, on the boardwalk.”

  “Great. Maybe we could go together, say, around quarter to six. I mean, who wants to eat alone?”

  This possibility took him so completely by surprise that for several seconds he couldn’t answer at all. She knew he was trying to find an escape hatch, a socially acceptable way to turn her down, because the prospect of spending the evening with a woman, any woman, would be terrifying to him.

  Yet he did want someone to talk to. She could sense it. He had opened up a little already. She was giving him the chance to go further, if only he would take it. She waited.

  “Well,” he said at last, “okay. I mean, why not?”

  She relaxed. “Great. I’ll knock on your door at, say, ten to six.”

  “Sure. Ten to six. No problem…”

  He was already retreating, the laundry basket in his arms. He escaped out the door, and she heard his footsteps on the stairs to the lobby.

  So far, so good. Abby smiled.

  Having started the wash cycle, she might as well finish the job. She hadn’t lied when she told Hickle she had only a few clothes with her. She had brought a total of four suitcases, and the two largest ones had been crammed with electronic gear and other tools of her trade.

  The washing machine rattled and hummed, sloshing its contents against the porthole in the door. She sat and watched her clothes as they were tossed around in a bath of suds. The shifting patterns reminded her of the colored glass fragments in a kaleidoscope. She’d had a kaleidoscope when she was a little girl; her father had given it to her. She remembered playing with it for hours, fascinated by the ever-changing patterns. Now she was an adult, but she still studied patterns—patterns of behavior, of body language, of verbal expression. Some patterns were obvious, like the selection of books in Hickle’s bedroom, and some were more subtle, like the way he had asked if she was an actress when they met. Jill Dahlbeck had been an actress…

  Wait.

  She froze, suddenly aware of another presence in her environment.

  Turning her head, she scanned the rows of washers and dryers, the windowless brick walls, the bare ceiling bulbs suspended from the low ceiling. She saw nobody. Even so, she was almost sure she was not alone.

  She unclasped her purse and reached inside for her snub-nosed Smith, but hesitated. It wouldn’t be a good idea to let one of the other residents spot her with a concealed firearm.

  She left the gun in her open purse, within close reach of her right hand.

  “Hello?” she called out.

  Her voice rose over the rumble of the washer. No one answered.

  Slowly she stood, then turned in a circle, studying every corner of the room. The place was empty.

  If someone had been watching her, he had retreated from the laundry room. Perhaps he had gone upstairs—or perhaps he was hiding in the boiler room next door.

  But who? Was it Hickle? Or her assailant from last night? Or merely the product of an oversensitized ima
gination?

  She decided to find out.

  Cautiously she approached the doorway. On the threshold she placed her hand inside her purse, wrapping her index finger around the Smith’s trigger.

  The stairway to the lobby was on her right. The boiler room lay to her left. The door was open, the overhead light off. Three large water heaters hissed inside.

  She groped for a light switch inside the doorway. Couldn’t find one. She entered in darkness. There was a flashlight in her purse but she couldn’t take it out without releasing her grip on the gun, and right now the gun was more important to her.

  The boiler room was large and musty. Concrete floor, brick walls, cobwebs in the corners. A man could crouch in one of those corners and not be seen.

  “Hello?” she said again. “Anyone here?”

  Nothing.

  She advanced into the middle of the room. The water heaters were straight ahead. Big industrial heaters, gas-fired, probably holding eighty gallons each. She groped in front of her and touched the smooth surface of the nearest water tank.

  She had thought that someone might hide behind the heaters, but as her eyesight adjusted to the gloom she saw that they were nearly flush with the rear wall, actually bolted to the concrete to prevent the gas supply lines from being ruptured in an earthquake.

  There were hiding places on either side of the heaters, though. She took another step forward and something brushed her hair, and for a moment she was in the spa again, a stranger’s hand pushing her down—

  No. Not a hand, not an attack. Only the length of chain hanging from the ceiling. The pull cord for the overhead light. That was why she hadn’t found a wall switch.

  She tugged the chain, and the bare bulb directly above her snapped on, brightening the room.

  She glanced around her, half expecting an assault, but nothing happened. There was no one in the boiler room. There never had been.

  “God, Abby,” she muttered, “get a grip.”

  She must have imagined the whole thing. Maybe it was some kind of posttraumatic reaction to her near-death experience in the hot tub last night. Or maybe she was just going crazy.

  Abby left the boiler room. The washing machine had completed its cycle. Her clothes were soaking wet, but she decided she could dry them in the sink or bathtub of her apartment. She’d spent enough time in the basement.

  Besides, she had to get ready for her big night on the town.

  17

  Hickle hated to miss the six o’clock news.

  In the past year he had seen every one of Kris Barwood’s broadcasts. Sitting in front of the TV each weeknight at six and ten was part of the daily rhythm of his life. When she’d taken a vacation last September, he had been seriously distressed. Yet tonight he was missing the show. He reminded himself that he was taping it and could view the tape later, and he was sure to be home in time for the ten o’clock newscast.

  “Traffic’s not too bad.”

  He glanced at Abby, seated on the passenger side of his VW. “Yeah, it’s pretty light this evening,” he answered, “considering it’s rush hour.”

  “It’s always rush hour in this city.”

  He could think of no worthwhile reply. “Yeah.”

  His face was hot, his palms were damp, and he wished he were safe in his apartment watching Kris on the news—the show would have just started—watching her and enjoying her presence in his home, even if it was only a magical illusion.

  Instead here he was on Santa Monica Boulevard driving into the twilight with Abby Gallagher. She had changed into cotton slacks, a button-down blouse, and a nylon windbreaker. A nice outfit, better than the jeans and sweatshirt he’d thrown on.

  He risked conversation. “I guess it’s a lot different here from Riverside.”

  She raised her voice over the drone of the motor and the rattle of the dashboard. “LA’s so big. I can’t even find my way around. I’m lost.”

  “You’ll get used to it.” He forced himself not to retreat into silence. “I did.”

  “You’re not from LA originally?”

  “I moved down from the central part of the state a long time ago.” He was no good at small talk. He decided to dare a more direct approach. “Mind if I ask you a question?”

  “Go ahead.”

  “You said you were running from your problems…” He was sure she would tell him it was none of his business.

  “Boyfriend problems,” Abby answered, as unperturbed as if she’d asked his opinion of the weather. “Well, more than boyfriend. Fiancé. We were supposed to be married in May. Then I found him cheating on me. When I say found, I mean literally found. I walked in on him when he was banging her. In our bed. At one o’clock in the afternoon.”

  Hickle didn’t know what to say, but for once he felt no awkwardness because surely no one would know what to say in this situation.

  “So I screamed and threw things, the usual mature reaction of the woman wronged. Next day I drove out of town. Had to get away.” A shrug. “That’s my sad story.”

  The word sad cued him to the appropriate response. “I’m sorry.”

  “That’s life.”

  “But it’s awful, what he did to you.”

  “I guess you can’t expect long-term commitment anymore. Even so, I really thought we were meant to be together. You know how that is?”

  Hickle kept his voice steady. “I know.”

  “To find somebody who’s everything you want, everything you’re looking for—and then they go and do something like that…” Abby let her statement slide away unfinished.

  “I know,” Hickle said again, more firmly. “I know exactly what that’s like.”

  “So it’s happened to you?”

  Because the car was stopped at a red light at Beverly Drive, Hickle could turn in his seat and look directly into Abby’s eyes. “It’s happened to me,” he said. “Just recently, in fact—just within the past year—I found the perfect woman. Perfect. And she…” Abby watched him, no judgment in her expression. “She tore my heart out. She killed my soul. She murdered the best part of me.”

  There. It was said. Probably he should have stayed silent. The words had come out in a rush, desperate and angry. He was afraid Abby would think he was some kind of nut.

  “I’m sorry, Raymond,” she whispered.

  Raymond. She had called him by name.

  A horn blatted behind him. The stoplight had cycled to green. He was holding up traffic.

  He motored through the intersection, continuing west, afraid to speak again and risk damaging whatever fragile intimacy he’d established.

  Raymond. His first name. Spoken with such gentle understanding.

  Raymond.

  The parking lots that served the Venice promenade were filled to capacity this evening. Hickle navigated the maze of narrow side streets and alleys until he found an open slot at a curb two blocks from the beach. By the time he maneuvered the Rabbit into the space, the last of the twilight glow was gone, and darkness lay thick and smooth on all sides.

  After his blurted confession in Beverly Hills, he had said little, and Abby hadn’t prodded him. Although the present excursion was perhaps not technically a date, it came close enough to raise his anxiety level dangerously high. Once they were in the restaurant, he would loosen up, and she would learn what she had to know.

  On every case Abby started out with a mental checklist, questions about the person whose threat potential she was assessing. The questions were simple and specific, and the more of them she answered, the nearer she came to a final evaluation. Already she had checked off several of the most serious questions about Hickle, each time with an answer in the affirmative.

  Did he feel a deep personal connection to Kris Barwood? Yes. His unguarded comments in the car had confirmed it.

  Did his obsession go beyond writing letters and making phone calls? Yes. After searching his apartment, she knew he had devoted enormous energy to researching Kris’s life, tracking down her addr
ess, and photographing her from a distance.

  Did his obsession show signs of escalating into violence? Yes. The books on stalkers and combat tactics were proof.

  Had he obtained a weapon or weapons? Yes. Guns.

  Two items on the checklist remained unresolved.

  Did he believe he could successfully carry out an attack? Without that belief, he might fantasize and rehearse and plan but never act.

  Would he be deterred by fear? Often fear functioned as a conscience of last resort.

  Hickle struck her as a timid man. Possibly it was fear that had stayed his hand so far. Possibly the same fear would serve as a permanent brake on his most violent ambitions.

  Hickle shut off the Volkswagen’s motor and headlights, then fumbled the key free of the ignition slot. “We’re here,” he announced. “Well, not at the restaurant—we’ll have to walk there—it’s not far.”

  He was stammering like a high school kid. She would have felt sorry for him had she not seen the rifle and shotgun, the secret photos of Kris. “It’s a nice night for a walk,” she said cheerily. “The ocean air feels good.”

  They got out of the car, and Hickle locked it. “Yeah, it’s one thing I’ve always appreciated about LA. Where I grew up, we were fifty miles inland. Not much chance for an ocean breeze.”

  “Desert country?”

  “No, hills and farmland. My folks ran a grocery store. It was—what’s the word? Bucolic.”

  “But boring.”

  “Yeah. Not exactly bright lights and big city.” They started walking. “I guess you didn’t see much of the ocean out in Riverside,” Hickle said.

  “Only in the form of a mirage, usually induced by imminent heatstroke. It gets to be a hundred-ten in the shade, and there is no shade. Sometimes I’d drive to the coast to get away from the desert heat. Never came to this part of town, though.”

  “It’s…colorful.”