Hello, Darkness

by Sandra Brown

  Had the breathing inside the closet become more agitated? Or was she imagining it? Or was it an echo of her own breathing she was hearing?

  “I know you’re angry with me for spurning your affections, but until tonight, I didn’t even know you felt that way about me. Let’s talk about it.”

  As she tiptoed across the concrete floor, toward the closet, her ears strained to listen for the merest sound beyond the walls, indicating the arrival of help. Even now, were marksmen taking up positions? Were special tactical officers scaling the exterior walls to get onto the roof? Or had she seen too many action movies?

  When she was still a few feet from the partially open closet door, she paused. “Stan?” Reaching far out in front of her, she pushed the door open all the way.

  No gunshots shattered the stillness. She reminded herself of what he had done to Janey. Now that he knew he was caught, he would be desperate, conscienceless, capable of anything. The situation required training she didn’t have. Dean did.

  Dean. In fear and longing, her heart silently cried his name as she took the final step that placed her in the open doorway.

  At the sight of Stan, she stared in bafflement.

  He was breathing heavily through his nostrils because his mouth was sealed closed with duct tape that had also been used to bind his ankles and wrists. His legs were bent so that his knees were up under his chin, and he had literally been stuffed into the industrial-size stainless-steel sink.

  “Stan! What . . .” She was reaching out to tear the tape off his mouth when his eyes, already wide with terror, looked beyond her and stretched even wider.

  She spun around.

  “Surprise!” John Rondeau said.

  But it was Valentino’s voice.

  chapter 35

  “Fuck it, fuck it,” Dean repeated as he punched the rubberized digits on his cell phone.

  He was steering his car with one hand and using his cell phone with the other. Several times he had redialed the hotline number Paris had given him. She didn’t answer. He dialed the radio station call-in number repeatedly, but kept getting the standard recording saying that Paris would be with him as soon as possible. He called her cell number, but got her voice mail.

  “Why didn’t you tell me about Rondeau?” Curtis, who was riding shotgun, was also on his cell phone. He had been put on hold, awaiting more information on John Rondeau.

  “You heard it when I did.”

  The detective had been standing right beside him when Gavin revealed what he knew about Rondeau. It would be difficult to say who had moved first. Dean remembered shoving Curtis out of his way as he ran for the exit.

  He had gained a little ground when Curtis shouted over his shoulder for units to be dispatched to the radio station. “SWAT, too! Now, now, move it!”

  Dean wasn’t going to hang around and see that the sergeant’s orders were carried out, and apparently Curtis shared his urgency. They burst through the double doors and clambered down the staircase, taking two or three stairs at a time until they reached the garage level. Dean’s car was parked the closest. The way he was pushing it now, they would beat the squad cars to the radio station.

  “You failed to tell me Rondeau had accosted your kid in the bathroom.”

  “It was personal. I thought he was just an asshole.”

  “An asshole with—” Curtis broke off and listened. “Yeah, yeah,” he said into the phone, “what’ve you got?”

  While Curtis was getting the scoop on John Rondeau, Dean dialed Paris’s numbers again. When he got the same result, he cursed lavishly and pressed his foot harder against the accelerator.

  In what seemed like a direct correlation to his stamping on the gas pedal, the car radio went silent. Since his ears had been attuned to listen for Paris’s voice, the sudden static hiss was as jarring as a bloodcurdling scream.

  The implication splintered his control. Viciously he punched the buttons on his radio dial. All other stations came through loud and clear. The radio wasn’t malfunctioning; 101.3 had stopped transmitting.

  “The station just went off the air.”

  Curtis, who’d been absorbed in his conversation, turned his head. “Huh?”

  “She’s off the air. She’s stopped broadcasting.”

  “Jesus.” Then into his cell phone Curtis said, “That’ll do for now.” He clicked off.

  “What? Talk to me,” Dean said as he took a corner practically on two wheels.

  “No father in the Rondeau household. Ever. They’re checking now to see if he died during John’s infancy, or if there ever was a Mr. Rondeau. No significant male role model, like an uncle, scoutmaster—”

  “I got it, go on.”

  “Mother worked to support John and his sister, older by one year.”

  “What have they got to say about him?”

  “Nothing. Both are deceased.”

  Dean whipped his head toward Curtis. “He referred to them in the present tense.”

  “They were murdered in their home when John was fourteen. He discovered the bodies. Sister had been drowned in the bathtub. Mother had an ice pick shoved straight through her medulla while she was napping.”

  “Who did it?”

  “Unknown. It’s a cold case.”

  “Not anymore.” Dean’s fingers tensed around the steering wheel.

  “We don’t know that,” Curtis said, reading Dean’s thought. “He was interrogated, but never really considered a suspect. Mom and kids were devoted to each other. Mother worked hard to support them. Brother and sister were latchkey kids. Reliant on each other. Very close.”

  “I’ll bet,” Dean said tightly. “Real close.”

  “You’re thinking incest?”

  “Valentino’s behavior is symptomatic. Why wasn’t all this in Rondeau’s record?”

  “The facts are. APD carefully screens every applicant.”

  “But no one looked beyond the tragedy of his losing his whole family. Nobody was looking for incest. What happened to young John after the double murder?”

  “Foster care. Lived with the same couple until he was old enough to go it alone.”

  “Other children in that home?”

  “No.”

  “Luckily. Did he get along with the foster dad?”

  “No record of any problems. They doted on him.”

  “Especially the wife.”

  “Don’t know,” Curtis said. “But they gave him a glowing review. Said he was an ideal child. Respectful. Well behaved.”

  “A lot of psychopaths are.”

  “He had an excellent academic record,” Curtis continued. “No problems at school. Went to two years of college before he applied to the police academy. Wanted to become a cop—”

  “Let me guess. To prevent other women from dying the way his mother and sister had.”

  “More or less.” Curtis glanced at him. “One tiny detail . . .”

  “Yeah?”

  “When she died, the sister was five months pregnant.”

  Dean risked giving him a questioning look.

  “No,” Curtis said. “They checked. It wasn’t Rondeau’s baby.”

  “I could have told you it wasn’t,” Dean said grimly. “That’s why he killed her.”

  Curtis’s cell phone rang. “Yeah,” he snapped.

  Dean could see the lights on the broadcast tower. What were they, a mile away? Two? He was tailgating the SWAT van. It had caught up with them several miles back and Dean had let it pass them.

  The van was speeding, but Dean willed the driver to move it even faster. They were the two lead vehicles in a motorcade that included several police units. Bringing up the rear was an ambulance. He tried not to think about that.

  Curtis ended his call. “They went into Rondeau’s apartment. Wasn’t much of a place, but he had some fancy photographic equipment. Albums chockfull of dirty pictures. Lots of Janey. Long blond hairs visible on the bedding. He’s our guy.”

  Dean stared straight ahead, clenchi
ng his teeth so hard it made his jaw ache.

  Curtis checked the pistol he carried in a belt holster, and a second one in an ankle holster. “You got a piece?”

  Dean gave him a brusque nod. “I started carrying when he started threatening Paris.”

  “Well enough, but listen to me. When we get there, you’re gonna keep out of the way and let those guys up there do their job.” He nodded toward the SWAT van. “You got it?”

  “I got it. Sergeant.”

  The reminder of their respective ranks wasn’t lost on Curtis, but he didn’t back down. “You go in there half cocked, you’ll do something that would fuck up our arrest and he’d walk on some legal bullshit technicality.”

  “I said I got it,” Dean said testily.

  “So you’re cool?”

  “I’m cool.”

  Curtis slipped the pistol back into his ankle holster, muttering, “Like hell you are.”

  Dean said, “Right. If he’s hurt Paris, I’m going to kill him.”

  • • •

  She gaped at John Rondeau’s grinning face, but her astonishment was only momentary. Then she reacted swiftly. With all her strength she pushed against his chest, but he shoved her against the metal shelving in the closet even as he fired his pistol at Stan.

  The report deafened her. Or maybe it was her own scream.

  Rondeau slapped her. “Shut up!” Grabbing her by the hair, he dragged her from the closet and kicked it closed with his foot. Then he pushed her with such impetus that she pitched forward onto the concrete floor.

  “Hello, Paris,” he said in the chilling voice she now knew well.

  “Did you kill him?”

  “Crenshaw? I hope so. That was the point of firing a bullet straight into his heart. What a loser. But stronger than he looks. He actually gave me this,” he said, indicating the bleeding scalp wound. “He was obliging at first. Showed me how to stop transmission. At gunpoint, of course. Then he made this ridiculous but very valorous attempt to protect you by hitting me with a bottle of Snapple.” He was still speaking in Valentino’s voice.

  “The voice . . . that’s quite a trick.”

  “Isn’t it? On the outside chance that any of my cop buddies were also Paris Gibson fans, I didn’t want them to identify my voice when I called in.”

  “You were Valentino from the start.” Her mouth was so dry, her tongue was sticking to the roof of her mouth on each word.

  “Yes. That takes us back to . . . Let’s see.” He scratched his cheek with the barrel of his pistol. “Sometime before Maddie Robinson came along.”

  “So that makes two women you’ve killed.”

  He smiled indulgently. “Actually no, Paris.”

  “More than that?”

  “Un-huh.”

  Keep him talking. The longer he talks, the longer you’ll live. “Why did you kill them?”

  Resuming his normal voice, he said, “Because they didn’t deserve to live.”

  “They cheated on you like Janey did.”

  “Janey, Maddie, my sister.”

  “You murdered your sister?”

  “It wasn’t murder. I meted out justice.”

  “I see. What happened? What did your sister do to you?”

  He laughed pleasantly. “Everything. We did everything to each other. I slept between them, you see. Between her and my mother. Get the picture?” He bobbed his eyebrows up and down.

  He’d wanted to shock her and he had, but she tried to keep her expression impassive. She wouldn’t give him the satisfaction of seeing her revulsion.

  “We kept it all in the family. Our little secret,” he said in a stage whisper. “ ‘Don’t tell,’ Mommy warned us. ‘Because if you tell, they’ll take you away and lock you up where they keep bad little boys and girls who play with each other’s pee pees. Promise? Good. Now suck Mommy’s titties and she’ll do something extra-special nice to you.’ ”

  Nausea rose in Paris’s throat.

  He continued in his blasé manner. “But then we begin to grow up. Sis gets an after-school job at a record store. She’s there every afternoon instead of at home with me doing what we loved doing best. She starts staying later at the store so she can be with one of the guys who works there. She doesn’t have time for me anymore.

  “She’s never in the mood. She says she’s too tired, but it’s really because she’s fucking him all the time. And Mommy thinks it’s grand, the way Sis has fallen in love. ‘Isn’t it romantic and aren’t you happy for her, Johnny?’ ”

  He lapsed into a brooding silence, then his chest heaved as though he were about to cry. “I loved them.”

  Taking advantage of his preoccupation, Paris glanced toward the door, gauging the distance.

  His laughter brought her eyes back up to him. “Don’t even think about it, Paris. This little stroll down memory lane hasn’t distracted me from what I came to do.”

  “If you kill me . . .”

  “Oh, I am going to kill you, but it’ll be blamed on Stan Crenshaw.”

  “He’s dead.”

  “As a doornail. I had to kill him. See, when I got here, I found you already dead, choked to death by Crenshaw, who’d been a twisted, sick fucker from the time he was a kid. It’s all there in his file, the recipe for a sexually deviant psychopath.

  “Anyhow, I sized up the situation and tried to apprehend him. During the ensuing struggle, he managed to get in one good one on my noggin, which, by the way, inspired that little trick I played on you. Clever, wasn’t it? You were completely taken in, weren’t you?”

  “Yes,” she admitted.

  “Sorry, but I couldn’t resist. Especially the bit with your ankle,” he said, chuckling. “Where was I? Oh, yes, the way I’ll tell it is that I was finally able to subdue Crenshaw and was binding his ankles and hands with duct tape I found in the closet when he attempted to escape. Sadly, I had no choice but to shoot him.”

  “Very tidy,” she said. “But not perfect. The crime scene experts will find discrepancies.”

  “I’ve got answers for any questions that could arise.”

  “Are you sure you’ve thought of everything, John?”

  “I’ve done my research. I’m a good cop.”

  “Who preys on women.”

  “I never ‘preyed’ on them. My mother and sister were hardly victims. They were my coaches. Every woman I’ve been with since has benefited from what they taught me, and all were willing partners. I wasn’t even particularly attracted to Maddie at first. But she kept after me. Then she was the one who wanted to break if off. Go figure.” He shook his head with disbelief.

  “And if you’re referring to the girls in the Sex Club as prey, you haven’t been paying attention. They’re whores looking for adventure. I have no inhibitions. They love me,” he whispered, waggling his tongue at her.

  Again, she swallowed her nausea. “Apparently Janey didn’t love you.”

  “Janey didn’t love anybody except Janey. But she loved what I did to her. She was a heartless little bitch who used people’s emotions for target practice. And you sympathized with her, Paris. You put her on the radio to complain about me. Do you know why? Because you’re exactly like her.

  “You play with people’s emotions, too. You think you’re hot shit. You’ve got Malloy, even Curtis, panting after you, begging for any crumb of attention you might toss them.”

  Suddenly he checked his wristwatch. “Speaking of Malloy, I’d better get down to business. You’ve been off the air for five minutes.”

  Five minutes? It seemed like an eternity.

  “Folks are going to start noticing, and I’m sure your psychologist friend will come charging in here like the cavalry and—”

  From the front of the building came what sounded like an explosion of breaking glass, followed by shouting voices and running footsteps.

  Paris kicked Rondeau in the kneecap as hard as she could.

  His leg buckled beneath him and he screamed in pain.

  Paris scram
bled to her feet and made a dash for the door.

  She didn’t hear the gunshot until after she felt the impact of it.

  It was more forceful than she could ever have imagined. The searing pain that followed stole her breath and almost caused her to black out instantly, but adrenaline kept her running, through the door, out of his line of sight, where she collapsed.

  She tried to cry out and alert the police to her location, but she was unable to utter more than a faint moan. Blackness closed in around her, until the dim corridor elongated and narrowed, like the tunnel of a nightmare.

  Dean would be leading the charge. Even Rondeau had said so. She must warn him. She tried to pull herself up, but her limbs had turned to jelly and she wanted badly to throw up. She opened her mouth to call out, but her well-trained, carefully cultivated voice failed her completely.

  Rondeau was coming nearer the door. She could hear his groans of pain as he hopped across the cement floor of the storeroom. Soon he would reach the hallway. He would have the advantage over anyone coming around the blind corner at the end of it.

  “Dean,” she croaked. Once more she tried to stand. She made it as far as her knees, but she swayed unsteadily, then collapsed against the wall, hard. The resultant pain was like a branding iron burning through flesh, all the way to the bone. She left a blood trail on the wall as she sank to the floor.

  Though her ears were ringing, she could tell that the shouting voices were coming closer. Flashlight beams crazily crisscrossed on the walls at the end of the hallway.

  But hearing another sound, she turned just as Rondeau appeared in the storeroom doorway. He grunted with pain as he braced himself against the doorjamb. She took satisfaction from the odd angle at which his right leg was bent. His face was bathed in sweat and twisted into an ugly mask of rage as he glared down at her.

  “You’re just like them,” he said. “I’ve got to kill you.”

  “Freeze!” The shout ricocheted off the walls like the beams of the flashlights.

  But Rondeau didn’t heed the warning. He raised his pistol and aimed it directly at her.

  The barrage of gunfire was deafening and filled the corridor with smoke.

  As she fell forward, Paris wondered vaguely if she was just losing consciousness, or dying.