Killer In The Hills (A Jack Rhodes Mystery)

by Stephen Carpenter

  I hear a stair creak. I try to focus, but the pain is blotting everything out and making me dizzy. I drop my head and open my mouth.

  Breathe.

  Karen’s little pink clutch purse is next to me on the floor. I grab it and open it and dig through the lipstick and makeup and—yes—a small black plastic compact. Inside the lid is a tiny mirror.

  Another sound from the stairs—a soft thump—a footstep, coming closer.

  I lie on the floor, on my stomach—pain from my hip…

  I slide the mirror toward the stairway, inching it closer and closer along the floor until I can see the man reflected in it, moving slowly up the stairs—Sal’s short, stout goon from the backseat of the Escalade.

  I draw the mirror back and grip the Glock and reach out around the corner and start firing down the stairs. The goon fires back. Plaster and grit fly into my eyes. I fire until the gun is out, then it’s quiet.

  I hear a sliding, bumping sound. I hold out the mirror again and see the man sprawled on the stairs, holding onto a moulded wooden baluster on the staircase. I drop the mirror and peer around the corner and see the goon’s pistol on the carpet runner, two steps above him.

  It takes me a moment to get up on my hands and knees. My whole body feels weak and my left leg won’t move. I reach back and feel my hip and PAIN shoots through me as I touch what feels like bone through the bloody bullet hole in my skin. I drop to my elbows as the pain overcomes me and my limbs go limp and everything starts to go black. I work hard to keep my eyes open, trying to focus on something. I stare at a floral design on the rug, my vision blurred. I squint at the pattern until it comes into focus and the darkness ebbs a little.

  I rise from my elbows and inch forward, dragging my left leg behind me, toward the stairs. I round the corner and start crawling down the stairs, toward the pistol.

  The man gripping the baluster hears me and looks up and sees me crawling toward the gun. He pushes off of the baluster and moves for the gun, crawling up the stairs toward it, his face twisted in pain. There is blood on his neck.

  I lunge down the stairs, stretching out for the gun—the pain and dizziness reaching a point where everything starts to go black again. I fight back the darkness and stretch out my hand and grab the gun just before the man reaches it. He shoves himself on top of me and grabs the gun with both hands and tries to wrench it away. I raise my working leg and kick him in the stomach as hard as I can and he falls backward, all the way down the stairs, and lands hard on his back, on the parquet floor of the foyer, next to the giant. Blood pools out from underneath his head and his dark brown eyes stare up at nothing.

  I reach for the baluster near me and try to pull myself up but the weakness overcomes me. I lose my grip and bump down the stairs with one hand holding the gun and the other sliding down the base of the balustrade to slow my fall. My hand makes a squeaking sound and leaves a long streak of blood on the polished wood.

  I reach the bottom stair and my knees hit the foyer floor and I stop. I lie there for a moment, trying not to pass out. I turn my head and look around the foyer. Sal and Victor are both down. It takes a minute for me to get up on my elbows and knees, then I drag myself over to Sal. He is dead, his chest concave and filled with blood.

  I look over at Victor, who is on his back, blinking at the ceiling, making choking sounds as blood bubbles from his mouth. The submachine gun is a few feet from him. I crawl over to the gun and grab it. I look down at Victor and think about killing him. I have watched a man die from gunshot wounds, and Victor appears to be well on his way. I watch him become still, then feel his neck for a pulse and there is nothing. I crawl away, picking up Sal’s pump as I go.

  I look up at the stairs and I know I’ll never make it up there.

  “Karen,” I try to call out, but only manage a soft rasping sound. I can’t seem to get enough air in my lungs to raise my voice. I crawl to the front door and reach up and open it a crack and breathe the cold night air, which helps. I sit up, against the wall near the door, and breathe for a moment. The cold, fresh air and the sound of the rain bring me around a little.

  I open the door wider to see if there is a car for Karen and me and I see the Escalade parked out front.

  Erlacher is sitting in the back seat, illuminated by the blue glow of a television screen.

  What the hell?

  CHAPTER FORTY-TWO

  I watch Erlacher for a moment, letting the cold, fresh air bring me around some more, until I can pull myself up to my feet. I lean against the door jamb, half-hidden, gripping the pistol and watching Erlacher, wondering if I’m hallucinating. I look down at the gun I’m holding and try to figure out how to release the clip. It’s an unfamiliar gun and I can’t seem to focus on the mechanism to figure it out—

  “Jack,” Erlacher calls from the car.

  I look outside. Erlacher is looking at me from his opened backseat window, about twenty feet away.

  “Come here, I want to talk to you,” he yells over the rain.

  I step back and let him see the gun in my hand.

  “It’s okay, man,” he says, and holds his hands out so I can see them. “I don’t have a gun.”

  I move behind the jamb and figure out how to release the clip on the gun. Two rounds. I replace the clip and lean out and aim the gun at him.

  “Hands out,” I say. My voice is stronger but I’m slurring and there’s a coppery taste in my mouth. He keeps his hands out the window as I stagger out into the rain, the gun aimed at him. The rain feels good.

  I stop about ten feet away.

  “Is she dead?” he says.

  “Get out,” I say. “Open the door from the outside…both hands out.”

  He gets out, then stands there, his hands raised, the rain coming down on him.

  “Fucking Jack,” he says, shaking his head. “Four guys…and you’re the one who walks out. Balls, man.”

  I limp closer, half-dragging my leg. The pain from my hip is unbearable, but the dizzying weakness is clearing as the cold rain brings my senses back.

  “Just tell me, is she dead?” he says. The rain seems to beat him down.

  I hear a police scanner crackling inside the car, through the open window.

  “Cops,” he says. “Idiots. They lost the signal on your phone. They tracked it to Eagle Rock and now they’re crawling all over the area like a bunch of assholes. Can’t put a chopper up in the weather. They got roadblocks on both ends of Colorado, so what the hell.”

  He smiles and shrugs.

  “I’m done, man,” he says. “I took off, but when I saw the roadblocks I turned around and came back. There’s no way I’m getting out of here tonight.”

  “You’re never getting out of here.”

  “Gonna shoot me, Jack?”

  “Trying to figure out why I shouldn’t.”

  “Well, then,” he says.

  He turns away and stares off at nothing. He looks tired. Whatever was coiled in him seems to have uncoiled. His face sags, his shoulders slump.

  “I just need to know if she made it,” he says.

  “What do you care?”

  He points to the video playing inside the car, in the DVD player in the back of the passenger seat.

  “Take a look,” he says. “I won’t move.”

  “Turn around,” I say. “Lean against the car. Grab the rail on top.” He leans against the side of the Escalade and grabs the luggage rail on the roof. I limp to him and hold the gun against his head and search him. All he has is a phone, which I pocket.

  I press the gun against the back of his head and glance down through the open car window and look at the video.

  On the screen I see Erlacher sitting on the daybed in the apartment on Sawtelle. Karen stands near the daybed, before him, removing her clothes. When she is naked, Erlacher reaches out to pull her to the bed with him and I look away.

  I grab the top of the car to steady myself and press the gun barrel harder against the back of his head.

 
; Shoot him now, before you pass out.

  “I knew—the first time I saw her site—that I loved her,” he says, his back to me, the gun barrel digging into his scalp. “She was so beautiful, so vulnerable…”

  Just pull the trigger.

  “I paid Sal ten grand for that first night with her. I didn’t even think about there being a camera in the apartment, but I didn’t care, man. I just wanted her.”

  I stare at the back of his head, tightening my finger on the trigger as the rain washes over us.

  “You gonna shoot me, Jack? If you are, just do it, man.”

  He stands up straight and stiff, ready for the shot.

  Just do it.

  “I’m not going to jail,” he says. “No way.”

  He’s begging for it. Do it.

  I keep my finger tight on the trigger. I have wondered if I could ever shoot anyone like this—just execute them—and as I hold the gun against his head I realize how easily I could do it. I want to do it.

  Without a second thought…easily… A little more pressure on the trigger and the bullet is in his head…just like that… I want it, he wants it... So easy…

  “Do it, Jack.”

  …too easy.

  For him.

  I ease some tension on the trigger. I keep the gun against his head as I fumble in my pocket for the phone and take it out.

  He hears the beeping sound as I dial.

  “No,” he says. “No, put the phone away…”

  I raise the phone to my ear and listen to the ring.

  “Jack, put the phone down and I’ll tell you something,” Erlacher says. “You were right about me not telling you the whole story. Put the phone down and I’ll tell you.”

  The phone rings and rings.

  Answer…

  “You were right,” Erlacher says. “Karen wasn’t just some girl.”

  There is a click on the phone and I hear a woman’s voice.

  “Nine one one, what is your emergency?”

  “There’s been a shooting…in Eagle Rock,” I say. “On Dahlia.”

  “Penelope was one of Sal’s whores when you met her,” Erlacher says. “I told you, that’s how I knew her. I was fucking her the same time you were, except I was paying for it. You had no idea. You were wasted 24/7. I freaked out when she got pregnant…”

  The 911 operator says something but I’m not paying attention.

  “I paid Sal to take care of it but sure enough, I find out later she had the kid.”

  A horrible feeling stirs in me. I lower the phone.

  “What are you talking about?” I say.

  “Starting to get the picture?” he says. “That’s why Penelope went so nuts when she found out about me and Karen.”

  God, no.

  “All those years, I knew she was out there,” he says. “It was the last thing I wanted to think about. A fucking kid right? I paid off Penny and Sal for years to keep it quiet, and then I saw her one night. I was just messing around, surfing porn, and I saw her site, and I knew it was her—Penelope showed me a picture once, when she was, like, ten or something. I recognized her—I knew she was mine. I started going to her site and chatting with her and…I fell in love with her, man. She was a part of me and I just…loved her. I know you don’t understand. No one would. But it was the first time I ever really loved anybody. Like you said, I’m a heartless prick—never felt anything for anybody. But she had my blood running through her. I could see myself in her.”

  A wave of nauseating dread is rising in me and I focus on the cold, clean rain on my skin to push it back.

  “Does Karen know?” I say.

  “I never told her,” he says. “I thought I could take her away and we’d be together. I would’ve never told her, man. I never would have hurt her. How could I? She was part of me.”

  Far away, down the hill, I hear sirens over the rain.

  Erlacher hangs his head down. I keep the gun pressed against the base of his skull.

  “I’m not going to prison, Jack,” he says. “Not like this, with people finding out all this shit. Just tell me if she made it. Tell me if my daughter’s alive, then fucking get it over with, dude.”

  I back away from him, keeping the gun aimed at his head, and I hear the shot and Erlacher slumps forward against the car and slides to the ground and I turn and see Karen behind me, in the rain, the little automatic in her outstretched hand.

  CHAPTER FORTY-THREE

  Joel Fischer, my attorney in New York, was in LA within 24 hours after my arrest that night in Eagle Rock. He scrambled a defense team for Karen and me, and I was remanded to the custody of the good people at UCLA Medical Center, who sewed me up and reset my wrist. My hip was intact—the bullet only grazed the bone—but I would require weeks of physical therapy.

  Karen was placed at a pay-to-stay juvenile facility near Thousand Oaks, while the lawyers worked on our release. Until then, I was not allowed to see her or communicate with her.

  Melvin was at Cedars for a month before he could speak—the bullet had passed between his skull and the protective tissue around his brain without doing irreversible damage. As soon as he could talk, he swore out a statement from his hospital bed and corroborated my story. I was allowed to see him a week later.

  He was propped up in bed, his shaved head half-swathed in bandages. When I walked in he looked at me under heavy-lidded eyes, then looked back up at the television hanging from the ceiling. I sat next to his bed and waited.

  “DA’s office not fond of you,” he said, looking at the TV. His speech was clear but even more spare than usual. “Heads already roll.”

  “How’s yours?” I said.

  His eyes moved from the TV to me.

  I nodded. Stupid question. He looked at the TV again.

  “Lawyers pushing self-defense, defense of another person. Looking at weapons charges, reckless endangerment. Wait and see about the rest.”

  “That’s what Joel tells me,” I said.

  “Every man you shot a size-large felon. Homicide, drug and sex traffic. People wondering why they’re on the street. Hard to push a case against the man who did what DA’s people supposed to be doing.”

  I nodded.

  “Bureau’s on the bomb scare,” he said. “Do what I can.”

  “I appreciate that,” I said. “What about Karen?”

  He took a sip of juice. I looked at the pattern of surgical scars in his scalp, where black stubble had begun to grow around the new tissue.

  “Taking a long time to get a full statement from her,” he said. “Gonna drop murder charge for the mother. Salerno says Erlacher paid Victor Kaloff to do it—Russian you hit. Shot Penelope in the tub, moved her to the bed.”

  “Salerno made a deal for Zach’s murder?”

  “Yeah,” he said. “Rat his mom to clear the death penalty. Lot of people going down now Salerno’s talking. Including the pedophile in DA’s office who had Cyber track my car to the Bowl. Starting to share your distaste for this town.”

  “So what’s the holdup with Karen?” I said. “The prints on the gun?”

  “No, they like Victor for the mother,” he said. “Don’t know about the prints. Maybe Sal smarter than everybody thought. Figured another set of prints on a weapon not a bad idea. ‘Specially if they belong to a minor.”

  “So what is it?” I said. “Why won’t they release Karen?”

  Melvin took a moment before he spoke.

  “Some guys at the Bureau wondering about some things,” he said.

  “Such as?”

  “Gun they found in Erlacher’s hand night he was killed,” he said. “Some wondering why no other prints on it besides his.”

  “That’s not so hard to explain—” I said, before Melvin interrupted me.

  “Best if you don’t say anything.”

  I shut up.

  “They find only one set of prints on a gun, they ask questions. Like could the gun have been wiped clean, placed in Erlacher’s hand.”

&nbs
p; He looked at me. I waited.

  “Plus her statements are inconsistent,” he said. “Where she was standing when Erlacher about to shoot her, where you were standing when you shot him to protect her… Told ‘em I’d talk to you, see if you had anything to say.”

  I shook my head. After a moment he gave a small nod.

  “I’ll call ‘em tomorrow,” he said.

  “Alright.”

  “Anything you want to tell me? Off the record?”

  “Just that I’m sorry I got you into this.”

  He closed his eyes and rested his head back on his pillow.

  “Thought about what you’re gonna do with the girl?” he said.

  “Nicki was talking about foster homes,” I said.

  “Had a friend grew up in a foster home,” he said. “Ten kids, mom and dad don’t work, pick up checks from the state for all of ‘em.”

  “Yeah,” I said.

  “So you finally talk to Nicki,” he said.

  “She called when I was at UCLA,” I said. “She was glad I was okay but she’s done. It was just too much for her, being with me through all this.”

  “Can’t say I blame her,” he said. “Sucks being with you.”

  “We’re still friends.”

  “Sucks being your friend,” he said.

  “You still my friend?”

  He laid still, his eyes closed.

  “Working on acquaintance,” he said.

  CHAPTER FORTY-FOUR

  After months of legal wrangling, the charges were formally dropped against Karen and she was allowed to go home—to New York—where she would stay with me.

  I was, after all, her father.

  By summer I had enrolled her in a boarding school in upstate New York—a small, leafy campus with ivy-cloaked buildings and discreet administrators—and I got her started with a therapist. We spent the summer fixing up my guest room and exploring the city and preparing for school in the fall. We didn’t talk much about events in LA, and when we did it was brief and superficial—and only when she brought it up.