by Hugh Dutton
Just as well, probably. A little more lighting might chase away his own bogeymen. Much as he loved the dark—and had as far back as he could remember—it was when he missed Angie the most. Seven years now since she left, finally fed up with the boozing and the black moods he brought home from work.
He knew she’d never come back. Though he wasn’t willing to admit he might still be toting the torch, the biting regret he felt for screwing up the best thing that would ever happen to him hadn’t eased through the years. Hell, he would’ve never surrendered the bottle and bagged the job after his twenty if she hadn’t made him take a realistic look at himself by walking out. Amazing how Angie could be good for him even by ripping his heart out. And she’d get a laugh out of this, him pounding a beat again like a twenty-five-year-old rookie and enjoying it.
Kind of an odd job though, the way Burgess had laid it out for him, Gerry mused as he cut through a tree-lined gap connecting Oak and Magnolia streets. His wish list was for Gerry to take the peeper down in the act or to at least be able to identify him beyond any doubt. Failing that, to deter any future incidents with his presence.
The first scenario required sheer luck, the second would take forever and probably still be a guess, and the third could be done for much less than his rates. So Gerry feared he had taken a case where the client would never feel like he got his money’s worth. Bad for business, referral wise. But he’d signed on anyway, partly because Pete asked him, partly good old curiosity. Landing a client with pockets as deep as Leo’s was no minor consideration either, given the number of pencils Gerry had chewed through while doing the books last week.
He followed the pitch-black path by memory, picking up no sounds except the cricket songs and the distant crescendos of the surf, his footfalls now inaudible in the loose sand.
When they had met to go over the particulars of the job, he’d felt intrigued by Burgess’s reaction to any mention of the rape case. The old man, as Pete called him, wanted positively no investigation of the rape, in fact wanted it ignored. According to Burgess, the two crimes were unconnected and—since the rape did not even occur in Heron Point—having his hired man look into it might imply responsibility. No, Big Leo had made his position clear: however unfortunate that the victim was one of his tenants, the police could tend to their own crime-ridden streets while Gerry restricted his inquiries to Heron Point. Leo had also stood adamant that the stalker’s identity be released only to him, allowing him to contact the authorities. It was a common demand, especially from clients with hidden agendas, and one Gerry usually refused up-front. He’d taken a wait-and-see approach this time, due to the unlikelihood of any arrest happening anyway, in a Peeping Tom case where no victim could make a positive identification.
He reached the sidewalk and turned shoreward, shaking his head at the memory of the tension in that meeting. Though immune to physical intimidation by his fellow man anymore, he had felt a little awe at the presence of Leo Burgess. The sheer size of him, a hulking, bear-like man with a huge boulder of a head and hands that could crush a quart can. Top it off with a deep rumbly voice that made statements which would sound pompous from another man seem like this inexorable steamroller of omniscience, and damned if you didn’t want to believe whatever he said. But that absolute insistence was what got Gerry going, got him asking why. Sure seemed like the man had put his blinders on.
Of course, the other thing he just had to know was, what was eating at Pete? The guy’s eyes had been begging Gerry to read his mind the day he had come to the office. Not that Gerry really minded his clients holding out on him. If no one had secrets to protect, no private detective would ever get a job. So, having evasive clients was a good thing, in a twisted sense. But for Pete to be disturbed by something too touchy to tell Gerry, it had to be a live grenade he was juggling. And a lifelong friend was a friend, no matter how infrequent their contact.
Maybe I should get him drunk, he thought, smiling to himself. Get him babbling. Should only take two or three beers. Pete had never been much of a drinker, though Gerry used to pound it down. Stopped just short of alcoholism, stayed dry a while, and now he could enjoy a drink again without falling off the edge. Hadn’t yet, anyway. Okay, scratch that idea.
If only he could get a look at the letter. He felt undecided on whether the guys at the cop shop had been stonewalling him or if they truly just misplaced the case file. Which did happen, often enough to be believable. That letter could ease his nagging worry over the possibility of the two cases being linked. The fact that window-shade freaks often never graduated to rape—especially longtime peepers—didn’t rule it out and he was not about to ignore the possibility just because Mister Leo Burgess told him to. His conscience also knew, friendship aside, he had to find a way to drag Pete’s suspicions out of him. Did Pete know who their peeper was? And was that guy the rapist?
Nearing the last cross street that would turn him around and point him back inland, he paused at the blue house on the ocean side of Oak Street to check for visitors. Gerry had already caught on to a pattern of too many vehicles coming and going at all hours there. Probably a drug house. Hard to believe, in the middle of this kind of upscale community, but he had a feeling.
He clicked on his flash, shooting the beam up the drive. Yep, another customer. And my, my, it was a nice fancy Porsche belonging to Mister Nick Burgess. He snapped the Porsche with his camera phone. Well, well. Wonder if Mister Leo Burgess wanted to know that he just might have a dope business thriving in one of his homes, and if he already knew that his son was a user? Maybe it was time to talk to Pete again.
An exultant Nick Burgess bounded down the steps of Cameron’s house, fired up the Boxster, and blew a little of the dust off the neighborhood with a roar of acceleration. That Cameron, man, knows everybody. Dude even knew someone to help him with his current problem, getting this Spain guy to see the light. A little pain and fear would make that gomer get his story straight and Nick was taking charge of making it happen.
It would show the old man that Nick knew how to handle problems, every bit as good as King Leo himself. He laughed, slamming the Porsche around a corner, making it squeal. Probably not the way Pops would handle it, but to Nick it was clear that the old man’s style of thinking had fossilized. Not enough action.
He wished he could be there when this action went down. See Spain’s face. Wished his fast-pants sister could see it too. It was obvious she had the hots for the dork, and Nick liked the idea of anything that crapped in her breakfast. Though it would probably be an even better punishment for Spain to just let Lexy have him. She liked to play a man like a cat with a crippled mouse, toy with him until she got bored and then eat him up and spit out the bones. Spain would age at least ten years by the time she got done with him. But no, that would be fun for her, and that would not do. This way was best.
The sweep of his headlights around a turn caught just enough of a walking man for Nick to recognize him. The rent-a-cop, Gerry what’s-his-name. That was a problem, too. Nick had thought he’d talked the old man out of this idea, but here the dude was. Kind of a weirdo, if you asked Nick. Guy spent all his time walking around, talking to everybody. Stupid stuff too, like what do you do, when do you work, what kind of car do you drive? Like he was making friends at a keg party or something, not detective questions. So dude was a loser, more proof that the old man had lost it.
Nick had cooled it on visiting his girls, what with this doofus around, but now that he knew the guy for a moron, he was going to pick it back up as soon as he figured out the timing of the dumbass nightly rounds. The idea of looking in on his girls while the great detective was on the job really appealed to him. Get the reputation of being a supernatural ghost; flit in and see his girls and then disappear again. Good thing that action last week had been enough to hold his hunger for a while. Man, he could still see her shocked expression, the fear in her eyes. Boner city, just thinking about it.
And when his plan brought this Spain putz in line,
he’d finally have the old man’s attention, have him rethinking Nick as a man of action. He looked forward to carrying more status and say-so around here, specifically over Lexy and Cully.
He eased the Porsche up the drive as quietly as possible, hoping to keep the old man from humping it down the stairs to check out his eyeballs. Like Visine was never invented or something. Pathetic.
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
Sara Zeletsky looked up in response to a tapping at the doorway of her hospital room and felt a jolt of surprise to see her landlord.
“May I come in, Sara?” Leo asked, ducking his head under the doorframe to peer in.
It took a couple of breathy attempts at groping for a voice, and her, “Yes, please do,” sounded like a croak when she did get it out. As flattered as she was by his visit, she felt horrified by how she must look. She still carried the raccoon-eye bruises from the broken nose her rapist had given her—for no reason, since she had obeyed his demands—and she knew that the neck brace made her resemble a girl Frankenstein. Then she realized she didn’t care. Though she’d never been quite able to think of herself as pretty, looking her best and being at least attractive had been important to her. But the monster had taken that, too.
“I was very distressed to learn of you still convalescing this long,” he said, passing her bed to deposit the spray of roses he had brought onto the window table. “But I must say, you look much better than I feared. We have been worried about you.”
“Thank you,” she whispered, eyes filling with tears. Since her nightmare began, she had become prone to fits of uncontrollable crying and unfocused bursts of anger, especially when someone did or said anything kind to her. She couldn’t understand it, couldn’t stop it, and it all just made her want to cry more.
He turned away from her, making an obvious show of reading the cards on the other flowers while she swallowed her misery.
“I’m sorry,” she said finally. “Please sit.”
He did so, settling into the chair that was usually occupied by her mother, who had thankfully taken a break from her bedside marathon of constant fussing over every tiny detail of Sara’s existence.
“No need for apologies, my dear.” He held up a hand as if pushing away her words. “It’s a terrible thing you have had to endure. How are you feeling?”
She stared at him for a beat, thinking, how the hell do you expect me to feel? I’ve been strangled, beaten and raped. I’m alive by an inch. Even if I survive all this, I feel filthy and dirty and it won’t wash off. I’m beginning to believe I’ll never get out of this hospital. How do you think I should feel? But voicing it would make her cry again, something she did not want. So she just dropped her gaze and murmured, “I’m alive.”
“When will you be released?” he asked, scaring her a little that maybe he could read her mind. Probably just the normal next question, she decided.
He looked so kind and genuinely interested that she launched into the description of internal injuries that were all gobbledygook to her and the spinal fractures they wanted to monitor in hopes of avoiding surgery. She wound down when she saw he wasn’t really listening; his eyes had assumed a faraway, glazed-over look. Because he’s a damn man, she thought with a violent flash. Just like the damn shrink they send in here. She’d asked that guy if he’d ever been raped, and when he said no, she knew that all his sympathy and questions about her feelings were just so much bull. Bet he didn’t stop every time a woman told him no. Burgess either; she wished he would just leave.
“Well, I am pleased to hear the prognosis is so promising,” he said with a smile. Proving he hadn’t heard a word. “I would like for you to know, as a way of offering our sympathies for this tragedy, we are waiving your rent payment until such time as you can return to a normal life. You may also be interested to know we have engaged a private investigator to help apprehend the person responsible for this heinous attack as well as to prevent him from repeating it.”
Big deal, was she supposed to thank him for that? How was an investigator supposed to help her? It was too late for her, though she felt a fierce stab of hope that he was sincere about making sure no other women went through what she had. As for the rent waiver, nice as it was, it meant nothing. She wasn’t ever stepping foot in Heron Point again. She was going home with Mama.
“Thank you, that’s very kind,” she said anyway. Her voice sounded sarcastic even to her, though she did think it a generous gesture, considering he didn’t owe her anything.
She expected him to go now, but he leaned toward her, elbows on his knees, his eyes getting a metallic shield-like gleam to them. “Did you recognize the man who attacked you?”
She shook her head, gently against the brace. Did he really think someone she knew would do this?
“Can you describe him, then?” he asked. The metallic eyes watched her without blinking, reminding her of a giant owl she saw at a zoo once. It was the same focused, unblinking stare.
“No, I can’t.” She shook her head again. Except that he has hot breath and drinks beer. Every horny male in America. “The police asked the same thing, but I can’t.”
“Not even a general description?” He placed his palms together, leaning in further.
She had forgotten how big a man Burgess really was, having only seen him at Christmas parties and the like, but him looming over her that way was scary. And big forceful men were not high on her warm fuzzy list right now. She found herself tilting back against the bed, retreating from his intensity. She wanted the man in her nightmares caught as badly as anyone could, but this was starting to feel eerie. “Mr. Burgess, I didn’t see him, I wouldn’t recognize him, I don’t want to remember it, and I’m not going to think about it, okay? Sorry.”
The air whooshed out of him like a punctured beach ball. “Quite all right, Sara. I hope my questions have not upset you.” He patted her hand and stood. “Please tell us if there is anything we can do for you.”
She managed a feeble nod and let her shoulders slump back against the pillow once he’d gone, wondering why she didn’t feel good about his visit and wishing Mama would come back and sit with her.
CHAPTER NINETEEN
Brady Spain flicked his phone dark and with the same motion tossed it into the passenger seat. Maybe he shouldn’t have called her, but he felt ready to get it over with, see if they could move past this thing hanging there between them. Lexy, however, had refused to talk about it on the phone. Said she would stop by after he got home. No chance of this being a pretty scene.
Pulling up to the house, he parked at the curb to let her use the driveway. If she was cool with his answer, he wanted to ask her to stay. As he switched off the ignition, he noticed a gray-haired man in an aloha shirt striding down the drive. Brady opened the door and stepped out, leaning around the corner of the windshield to ask the man what he wanted. He never got the words out. The man circled the front of the Jeep with a sudden burst of speed and slammed full tilt into the door, pinning Brady against the frame.
Stunned, wind knocked out of him, Brady’s knees gave and prompted a wrenching pain through his left shoulder and collarbone. He struggled to straighten back up against the pressure of the door, laboring for the breath to tell the guy there must be some mistake.
Another man, younger, brown haired and wearing a bright yellow golf shirt, sauntered up from behind the Jeep. He reached out and grabbed the middle two fingers of Brady’s left hand, which was trapped dangling outside the door. With an easy, practiced twist, the man bent the fingers back, almost touching the wrist. Had he gotten his wind back, the scalding pain in his knuckles and forearm would have ripped a scream out of Brady’s guts.
“Shit hurts, don’t it?” said the man holding the fingers. He winked and smiled cheerfully at Brady. “Can’t answer yet, huh? Don’t worry, you’ll get your breath back in a minute. But save it, okay? This here is gonna be a one-way conversation, got it?”
Must be the pain making me hallucinate, thought Brady. The jolly buddy-
buddy approach from a man tearing his arm in half while a human bulldozer crushed him to death was too surreal to be anything else. He didn’t know whether to cry or join the lunacy and laugh.
“I need an answer, Brady.” The man rotated his forearm slightly, and the fresh jolt of pain made Brady’s knees buckle again until the resultant agony in his chest shot him upright. “Just nod, okay? Remember, no talking.”
So Brady nodded.
“Good, good.” The man eased the pressure on the fingers and broke out another affable smile. “I’m Frank. The big ape leaning on your door there is Art. Do you know why we’re here, Brady?”
Brady shook his head. His wind was back, and he sucked in his diaphragm, lessening the grind of the door into his abdomen. So much for the big mistake theory—the smiling madman knew his name.
Frank patted Brady’s shoulder. “That’s all right, that’s all right, I can tell you. What I understand is you got a little amnesia. Notice we ain’t hit you in the face or head, right?”
Brady nodded energetically, the price of slow response still fresh in his mind. Of all the days to not see a single neighbor out and about, wishing him another day in paradise.
“That’s so you can remember better, see?” Frank beamed at him as if they had just discovered gold. “All this visit is for is to help you remember whatever it is you forgot that’s important to someone else. Got me?”
Brady nodded again. This had to be about the alibi thing. He just couldn’t let himself believe Lexy was in on it, no matter how impatient she’d seemed. So who, Nick? Daddy Burgess?
“Now, you seem like a nice fellow, Brady,” Frank continued. “I’m really impressed with how smart you are, the way you’re handling this. I got a son not much younger than you, he wouldn’t do half as good. What you don’t want is for us to have to come back. Show him, Art.”
