"It is so far," Gina replies. "Watch your ass, Burke."
"You too. I'll get back to you later on."
They break the connection. Burke studies the printed copy. What could a horror author like Stryker have possibly been up to that would get him killed, much less over a set of numbers and images?
"Red?"
Burke whirls, leaps to his feet. Indira stands in the doorway in her bra and panties. She recoils from the look on his face. "I'm sorry. I wondered why you were up."
He calms himself, wraps his body around hers. "I need to leave for a little while," he whispers. "I have to make a few arrangements. Then you and I are going to go run far, far away."
"Jack, I can't just go. I have all of my memories at the house, the pictures of my family, the jewelry and other heirlooms. If I leave them behind, Mo will destroy them once he sees I'm not coming back. That would break my heart."
"You can't go back there. Not ever."
"Well, you can't leave me here alone."
"I have to, just for a bit."
"Please don't go." Indira reaches down, touches the piece of paper containing the printed formula. "Where did you get that?"
Burke covers rapidly. "It's nothing, something I'm working on with Gina."
"It looks familiar."
A chill passes over, perhaps the shadow of a demon. "It does?"
She nods, her eyes still filled with sleep. "Some of it, anyway. I saw something like that on his desk once."
"Your husband?"
"Yes. It was with some other medical papers of some kind. He got upset with me and scolded me for prying."
Mohandas Pal? What the hell?
"Indira, listen to me. I need to get some money together." He looks deep into her almond eyes. "I want you to promise me you'll stay here for a while, and that you won't answer the door."
Burke opens a desk drawer. He removes a small but functional Heckler & Koch .22 caliber pistol. "Do you know how to use this?"
"I suppose."
"You have to be fairly close for it to do much good, but if you have any room I want you to run like hell instead. You understand?"
"You're scaring me."
"I need to." Burke checks the time, hugs her. "There's a lot going on, Indira, and I don't understand any of it yet. I have to assume we're both in danger. It would be foolish to think otherwise. I don't like leaving you, but I won't be gone long, I promise. So just trust me on this and wait right here, okay?"
FIFTY-ONE
"I need the rest of my money, or as much of it as you can get together."
"Is that all?"
"And I need it in cash."
Tony Monteleone grinned like a threatened possum. "Burke, anyone ever tell you what a pain in the ass you can be?"
"You, just the other night." Burke closed the distance and slid into the booth. The plastic squealed. "I'm serious, Tony. Something has come up. I know I said I could wait, but I'm in a bind."
"And I owe you."
"I didn't say that."
"No, but it's true." Monteleone stirred espresso with a tiny, stained spoon. "Maybe you ought to tell me about this." He added two cubes of sugar. "I'm not too busy just now." He drank with an audible slurping, in the Sicilian tradition. "Who you running from?"
"I wish I knew."
"You need some help?" They both know what that means.
Burke shrugged. "I might at some point, but not yet. I'm serious about not knowing exactly who or what I'm up against."
"You want a drink?"
"No, Tony." Burke touched his hand, a personal gesture highly uncharacteristic of their relationship. "Look, somebody with clout has it in for me. There's a girl involved, someone I really care about. I want to get her away from here."
Tony Monteleone scowled. "Anybody with ears knows you work both sides of the street. But you do it without pissing people off, and you're a man of respect. This somebody is fucking with the wrong people when they fuck with you."
Burke shook his head. "The support is appreciated, Tony. But these people don't play by anybody's rules. Whoever they are, they seem to think they're above the rest of us. That's why I need to get her away. I need some time to think."
"And you need some cash."
Burke waited. Tony snapped his fingers. A stocky, muscular man moved noisily through the curtains and into the room. He acknowledged Burke, who didn't recall having seen him before. "Sal," Monteleone barked. "Get this man thirty large against the fifty and change we owe him. Make half of it in small bills. No funny money, the real deal."
"Thanks, Tony." Burke leaned back onto squealing plastic. Thirty thousand would get them far enough away, at least for now. In his mind, he was planning the route: a drive to Vegas and a plane to Denver, then from Denver to New York City and over the border into Canada. Nobody had that kind of power in two different countries. He hoped.
The money arrived quickly, already neatly packed in bundles, perhaps for some other nefarious purpose. It was a surprisingly small package, wrapped in brown butcher paper. The man called Sal dropped it on the table and moved away, face blank as a slab of granite.
Monteleone chuckled. "Hey, do you want fries with that?"
Burke tucked the package under his left arm, got out of the booth. "Now I owe you one."
"Damn right." Monteleone stood. "So stay alive, you hear?"
Burke nodded, looked behind him. He backed away out of habit, wary eyes fixed on the man called Sal. For some reason Tony Monteleone found that funny. "Look at this hard-ass, he don't even trust his best friends."
Burke cased the gloomy parking lot. The stash of money seemed like a flashing red light that could attract unwanted attention.
He opened the trunk of his car, removed the cash bundles and packed them into the wheel well, around the undersized spare tire; ripped the brown paper and buried the money as best he could. He covered everything up with tools, a grimy beach blanket, and an earthquake kit, slammed the trunk and got into the vehicle. He started the car and drove away, with one wary eye on the rearview mirror, but he was not followed.
As Burke approached the freeway, his cell phone vibrated. Gina sounded upset.
"Burke, I tried to call Doc."
"Why? I told you he was catching heat."
"I figured I'd say hello, maybe ask him to stop by my place for a drink. Then if he did, just as a friend, he could maybe look over what came in the mail without any hassle."
"And he said no."
"Burke," Gina's voice cracked. "Doc is dead."
Burke felt punched out of air. "What?"
"When I called I got that friend of his, the guy he plays chess with, a kid named Frank Abt? He said the meat wagon had just picked Doc up. The homicide dicks were on the scene, but Abt heard the cause of death was an overdose."
Burke was racing up the freeway on-ramp now, heart slamming like a wooden gate in a wind storm. "No other details?"
"No. This guy, he was figuring Doc did himself by accident. Doc liked his drugs. I guess it might be that simple, huh?"
"Not if the homicide boys were there. Something stinks."
"Yeah."
"Damn it to hell. Gina, I need to know the whereabouts of Professor Mohandas Hasari Pal. Right fucking now. Get on it. I'll keep this line open."
"Sure, but what's he got to do with this?"
"Do it, Gina."
"Okay, okay."
Burke dropped the cell phone and floored the gas pedal.
FIFTY-TWO
Red won't be gone long, he promised . . .
Indira Pal, still in panties and a bra but wearing one of Burke's oversized robes, is half-watching some ridiculous old black-and-white Mexican horror film on the giant screen television. She is curled up on the couch with a tall white wine cooler, lost in thought. When the station cuts to a histrionic car commercial, Indira sets down the glass. She gets to her feet, somewhat unsteadily, and walks to the bathroom. She drops the robe, sits down on the toilet to pee. She thumbs through
a magazine.
Something rustles in the bushes outside the bathroom window.
Indira huddles forward, instinctively clasping her knees with her forearms. The gun is back on the couch. She does not flush the toilet. Tense, she waits for another sound. Nothing comes. After a time she cleans herself, then grabs the robe and walks on her toes, moving back into the now cavernous and desperately lonely living room. She slips into the robe, tucks the small Heckler & Koch .22 into her pocket and curls up again. After a moment she sees her cell phone on the coffee table, drops it into the other pocket.
"Hello?"
The voice is scratchy, weak, and yet its very presence startles Indira. Her nervous system reacts badly, tears spring to her eyes. She jumps to her feet and stands between the couch and the coffee table.
Knocking. Again: "Hello? I know you're in there. Answer me!"
There is something surreal about the experience; standing half naked in someone else's home, cringing at the presence of a stranger at the door. Something about the voice is feeble, non-threatening. Indira moves closer to the door, the peephole. She looks out, sees features elongated and distorted as if in some funhouse mirror. It is the face of a little old woman. She steps back, perhaps sensing she is being watched. The Granny wears a neat blue sweat suit and carries a small paper shopping bag. Her make-up is smeared and the blue-gray hair mussed.
"Please, open the door, honey. Talk to me."
Indira drops her right hand to the .22 in the pocket of the robe. She palms it, swallows. "I think you have the wrong house." Her left hand strokes the little cell phone as if it were a lover.
"Gretchen, I do not. Now open up."
Gretchen? "Ma'am, you have the wrong house. There is no one by that name here." She backs away from the door.
A long silence, fraught with tension. And then a muffled, whooping sound. Indira cringes and steps back to the door, peers out. The old woman, seemingly dazed and confused, has begun to sob. "Please don't send me away. I have nowhere else to go."
Indira, still looking through the little peephole, opts to test her. "Would you like me to call the police?"
The old woman nods furiously. "Maybe that would be best. I'm very lost, you see. My memory is not what it once was."
"I'll call 911, then."
"Yes, please. Would you call them for me, dear? Perhaps they might help me to find my Gretchen." She leans forward and one blue eye enlarges at the peephole. A conspiratorial whisper follows. "You see, my husband is trying to take me back to the home."
"The home?"
The woman twirls around like Cinderella at the ball, a chubby little octogenarian in powder blue sweats. "There's nothing at all wrong with me, mentally or physically. I can still dance up a storm and my mind is sharp as a tack." She pauses to thump the fingers of her right hand against her temple. "Sharp as a tack," she repeats. "Sharper, even." She taps those fingers on the door and whispers. "And I know perfectly well it's you, Gretchen. So stop playing around and let me in."
She's not afraid of me calling the cops, I've got a gun, and she's eighty if she's a day. Indira doesn't know if it is the wine, a whim, or her loneliness, but she figures the thick screen door will protect her. She cinches up the robe and opens the front door. Indira looks out into the night at the foolish old woman and smiles a bit sadly. "As you can see, my name is not Gretchen."
The old woman looks her up and down. Her lower lip begins to tremble and her eyes fill. She seems hopelessly depressed and baffled. "Oh, dear. My, my. Perhaps there is something wrong with me after all, then."
"You just have the wrong house."
"Oh, I'm sorry to have disturbed you, then."
"It's all right. I wish I could help you."
"Perhaps you should call the police to report that I am here with you. I do seem to be lost."
"Certainly," Indira says, gently. "What is your name?"
That lower lip, those eyes. "Oh, dear. This is awful. I can't seem to remember my name, either."
"Perhaps you have some identification on you."
The woman searches her bag, and her heartbreak is achingly visible. "There's nothing in here but candy and some tampons. Imagine that! I haven't had a period in many, many years. Why do you suppose I bought tampons?" She looks up. "I think I may be ill, dear. May I use your phone?"
Indira opens the screen door slightly. "You can use my cell." She is about to offer up the phone when the old woman grabs the screen door and opens it. Indira steps back, startled. The old woman breezes by her, chattering up a storm, calling out: "Gretchen? Gretchen? Come out and talk to me!"
Indira keeps her hand on the gun. "Ma'am, you need to leave."
The old woman moves from room to room, ignoring her, calling out for the invisible Gretchen. Finally she ends up back in the living room, that hollow look in her eyes again. "Who am I, dear? What is my name?"
Indira takes one arm and steers her to the door. "You need to leave." Surprisingly, the woman allows herself to be led, although Indira finds a startling amount of muscle in the arm and elbow she holds. She moves the chattering crone out onto the porch again. Once she has her back to the house and the screen between them again, Indira realizes how terrified she has been for the last several moments. She holds up the cell phone.
"One last chance to use this, or I am going back inside."
"That won't be necessary."
Another voice startles Indira; it is a man's voice, this time. A distinguished looking man of about the woman's age comes striding up the walk. His features are stern. The old woman crumbles against the porch railing. "Don't let him take me back there, dear."
Indira reaches down to close and lock the screen door. To her horror, the man steps up onto the porch, whirls the old woman around and slaps her across the face. Hard.
"I told you to wait in the car, damn you!"
The redness on the woman's cheek is clearly visible. She covers her face and her shoulders quiver beneath the blue jogging suit. The man raises his hand again. His eyes are murderously angry.
"Stop that. Let her go." Indira steps out onto the porch. Confident it will stop him, she raises the Koch .22 waist high. The man's hand freezes in mid air and he looks down at the little gun. Before Indira can react the old woman whirls, a lithe dancer again, and her two small hands grab the gun and the wrist that supports it; they twist and turn. Indira cries out and the pistol is no longer hers.
The sobbing old woman is smiling now, a wickedly satisfied expression of disdain. Indira gasps as the gun is wedged under her chin. "Twenty-two shells rattle around in the skull a lot, dear. One has to use them in close for them to be effective. Now get back in the house."
Indira floats on her anxiety, backs into the living room thinking Oh, Burke I've screwed up, I'm so sorry as the old man opens his coat and removes a hypodermic needle. He squirts a drop of clear fluid from the tip. He is making an annoying, condescending clucking sound with his tongue. "Hold her, Mrs. Farnsworth."
The old woman grinds the gun into her chin and Indira finds it painful to swallow. She manages to speak. "No. Please don't kill me."
"Oh, sit down, you silly little bitch," Mrs. Farnsworth says. "We're not going to kill you."
"You see, we are also Shahr-e-Khamosh," Mr. Farnsworth chortles. "Mo is going to kill you."
Indira sits. She is the one crying now. The old woman yanks the robe down and grips her arm tightly. The needle slides home with a bitter sting.
FIFTY-THREE
Burke came through the open front door already knowing in his heart that she was gone. He swept the rooms anyway, 9mm at the end of one extended arm like an accusing finger. The throw rug was bunched up near the wall, the coffee table slightly out of place. Infuriated, he slammed the screen and locked it. He kicked the front door shut and put the cell phone to his ear.
"Where the fuck is Pal?"
"He's not home, that's for sure," Gina said. "In fact, he's left town."
"What the fuck?" A cold wave of sadness r
an through Burke. He sat down on the couch. "Explain."
"The home phone was disconnected, so I did a quick search. He's history. Pal has even cut off his utilities."
"When?"
"First thing this morning. His e-mail addy is no longer in service and the website says he has resigned his position at the university for health reasons."
"Shit. Indira is gone."
"Which means?"
"Pal took her, or had somebody else do it." Burke closed his eyes. "Let me think for a minute." The last few days had been frantic. He worked to bring the disparate pieces into a cohesive whole. "Gina, we need to know if he went to Mexico."
Gina's fingers busily clacking on the keyboard, a small intake of breath. "Son of a bitch."
"I'm right? What have you got, Gina?"
"I just hacked the school's system and I found an e-mail between two other instructors. It says that he's gone there, supposedly for some kind cancer treatment he can't get here in the states. It doesn't say where in Mexico, though."
Burke opened his eyes. "I think I know," he said, with a sinking feeling. "Leave that for now. Have you got anything else on what happened to Doc?"
"Not yet. But get this, Jack. I started fucking around with the name Stryker registered under at the Sheraton. Dan Ira Palski. It sounds weird. I got to thinking it was in code, or it meant something, and you said Stryker liked word games. So I started doing some anagrams, shit like that."
"Damn it. It's her name. He knew she would talk."
"That's right. Dan Ira Palski is an anagram for 'ask Indira Pal.'"
Burke rocked sideways. "Peter Stryker was leaving clues behind. He probably checked in to meet somebody from Pal's cult, and was pretty sure he wouldn't be checking out again. What about the letter that came to Nicole, anything from Cary?"
"He wants to talk to you."
"Yeah," Burke said, quietly. "And that's a damned good idea. Did he say where he wants me to meet him?"
"Online." Part of Gina's mind was elsewhere, the magic fingers still occupied. "ASAP, the man said. He told me via the emergency route, whatever that means to you two."
The Pressure of Darkness Page 28
