Savage Nights

by W. D. Gagliani

  "No, we haven't heard from Kit," he said. "Do you think we should have? Have you heard from her?"

  "No, I just thought..."

  "Why didn't you call the police? My brother said you were planning to."

  Her eyes flashed anger, or some other fleeting emotion. "I tried to do that, but there was the hold, that menu thing, the voice mail. I give up on such things."

  "Give up? Then you weren't very concerned." Brant wanted Ralph to say something, but his brother remained mute, apparently too overwhelmed to make his brain work at all.

  "I am very concerned!" Irina said, her lips curling in a snarl that lasted so little he thought he'd imagined it. "Kit is my friend. I don't know what happened to her."

  Brant hesitated. If she was lying, she had advanced acting skills. Yet, here she was, candles alight in the early morning, looking seductive and not all that concerned — until she needed to. He edged toward the French doors to try and glance inside. If only Ralph would play along, occupy her while he checked. But no, his brother was a slug. As he sidled his way nearer, she slid angelically closer in a blush of shimmery nightgown.

  "I want to check Kit's room," he said. "For any information she may have left behind."

  She followed his sidle. "Yes, but this is my room."

  They met immediately in front of the doors. Her interception was masterful — he would have to maneuver her out of his way physically. "Oh," he said, feigning confusion. "I thought..."

  Before turning away, he scanned the interior of the room from this vantage point. The made bed, covers mussed. The candles. Almost a spotlight blazing down from the ceiling — he hadn't noticed that before. Against a previously hidden wall there was a modern desk which held a brilliant white computer and various peripherals. The tiny white CPU lights were on even though the screen was dark. Maybe she'd been online, and didn't want him to know. If she had a visitor in there, he was either in the closet or under the bed.

  "Kit's room is down the hall that way," she said. "Near the kitchen."

  Brant was close enough that he could smell the musk on her. And a scent of sultry cosmetics, or some kind of skin cream. Her nostrils flared, reminding him of a thoroughbred filly. She wanted him away from her door, and he didn't push it, letting her presence steer him away. He felt her light touch on his elbow and wondered how many men wished they could have even that much. She was amazingly powerful, for a young girl. She reminded him of someone, but for a second he blanked and then lost the connection. Right now, he headed down the hall with her. He heard Ralph follow clumsily behind them, as if he'd forgotten how to walk on bare wood.

  Kit's room was more like what he'd expected. As neat as she was, there were clothes strewn about. The lighting was more utilitarian than artistic, and her computer desk was stacked high with books and papers, cans of Red Bull and caffeinated soda heaped in her trash bin. Her bed was made but not particularly well, and various layers of papers and notebooks lay every which way on a long work table with enough space cleared in the middle for her white Mac laptop, flipped open. The other desk held a small desktop computer as well, a recent iMac. Neither computer was on.

  Brant walked the perimeter of Kit's room and saw nothing to surprise him, nothing that looked like a clue. What does a clue look like? There were no slips of stray paper with scrawled notes or suspect addresses, and there were no blood stains or disturbing signs of a struggle. The shiny wood floor was warmed by several throw rugs, one under the bed and one each under the work areas. One near the door. Her phone and answering machine combination sat on her nightstand along with an alarm clock and a couple books and a bottle of water, half empty. He opened the closet door and saw nothing unusual. Clothing, shoes, a few boxes on the shelves. The clothes were mostly well-organized, though a couple dresses had slipped off their hangers and fallen in tiny heaps onto the floor. There was a shoe rack made out of white particle board that she mostly didn't bother with, as a small pile of stray shoes attested. A half dozen coats, all highly utilitarian, including a couple in leather, hung together at one end. He noticed that his old letter jacket was missing from the line-up, so he assumed that was what she wore to the mall. He asked, and Irina agreed with a bit of a sneer that he was right. Apparently, Kit's style of dress wasn't altogether to Irina's taste.

  Ralph stood just inside the door as if he were afraid to come

  into contact with his daughter's things. Irina stood between them, arms crossed, watching Brant as he poked his head here and there. Mostly she seemed curious as to his method, not particularly upset at his intrusion.

  He had no method. That was the joke, if he'd been interested in humor at the moment. He had no method — but maybe a method had him... Brant opened himself up to the blue haze, the strange blue that often clouded his vision. The same strange blue that became the lush green treeline of the jungle that surrounded him in the worst of his nightmares. Cu Chi lived on in him, inside some cranial hard drive that accessed itself every so long. The dreaded Iron Land seemed to call to him, to squint in his direction and snag him back into the foliage, where he and his squad pursued men who were more like demon moles than humans. Where he had often pitted himself and his men against these demons and won, but also lost.

  A tingle in his spine alerted him to something. It was the same sort of tingle that had saved him so many times, warning him that a booby-trap someone had missed lay in waiting for his soft flesh. He turned, confused for a second, and saw Irina and Ralph staring at him.

  His breathing had quickened, and he knew from experience that his face had been drained of all color even though his body temperature had shot up.

  "What is wrong?" Irina asked, her eyes widening.

  Probably wondering if she'd have to peel him off the floor, he mused.

  Quietly, without answering, he followed his instinct and left Kit's room. His face seemed about to burn off. Sweat ran in rivulets down his neck and back, chilling his hot skin. He could see that treeline, the gnarled branches reaching out to him and the vines and creepers calling his name, beckoning him to his death. His hands shook slightly, as if he were taking a "dousing rod" and probing a trap door again, actions he hadn't performed in decades.

  He motioned for silence and his brother and Irina followed him softly into the hall, where he headed for the apartment door.

  In one smooth motion, he snatched the doorknob and pulled the door wide open, releasing the heat in his arms and finding himself in a split-second grasping the shoulders of the man who had been about to turn the knob in the hall. Using his surprise momentum, Brant flicked the tall man into the wall and held him there with a solid straight-arm, his fingers grasping black overcoat material and possibly skin.

  "What do you want here?" Brant whispered into the furious man's face.

  The intruder sputtered, his eyes skipping from one to the other of his three spectators, then settling on Brant's and focusing with malevolent rage. Brant felt him gathering his strength for a countermove and pulled the man off-balance, then shoved him violently back into the wall, rattling the guy's teeth hard enough to hear.

  "Bruised shoulder blades tomorrow, my friend," he said. "Now, what do you want? Last chance."

  There was no answer but for stale tobacco breath expelled through hairy nostrils.

  The intruder snarled and feinted with a leg. Brant bit and loosened his grip, and suddenly the man's hand was filled by a bulky semi-automatic.

  Brant recovered quickly, sidestepping the leg and throwing a jab at the exposed neck which connected with a satisfying smack. He had the vague sense of bright color on that neck, and a flash of gold at the earlobe.

  As the intruder gagged and gargled, his windpipe bruised, Brant easily snatched the gun from his fingers and whipped him around toward the door.

  But the man was alert enough to feel Brant's grip loosening on his clothes and he tore his overcoat away and managed to stagger through the open door and into the hall, where he collided with the opposite wall before running f
or the stairs.

  Brant still gripped the intruder's square pistol, a Glock, and lined up the fleeing man in its sights.

  His finger caressed the trigger and for a second he felt control slip from him like liquid. He felt the heat of the jungle, the crotch-clenching fear of death, and the hatred that oozed from the landscape itself. His head swam as he started squeezing the trigger to shoot the running man in the back.

  In one swift motion he lowered the gun.

  He felt his finger still stiff on the trigger and meticulously moved it until it lay outside the trigger guard.

  He'd nearly shot the man in the back.

  One more second, and he would have. He'd learned all too well that if you didn't take the opportunity when you could, you'd pay for it later.

  But a neighbor would likely call the police after the noise.

  He swore, then closed the door and turned back to Irina. "Who's your friend?"

  Her eyes were open wide in shock, her hand trembling a little as she held it up. Her glance went from the gun to Brant to Ralph in quick succession, then back again.

  "I do not know any- I can't..." Her voice faded and she suddenly seemed unsteady, so Brant stepped forward and took her arm. She recoiled from his other hand, the one that held the Glock. Facing away from it, she sniffled and continued. "I have never seen that man at all."

  "So it wasn't the weird guy you told Ralph ran into you at the mall?"

  "No, I do not think so. It was all so fast."

  Brant felt her tremble through the nightgown. "You'd better sit down."

  He led her to an armchair, then turned away and checked the Glock. He

  jacked the slide and palmed the round that had been in the breech. His breathing normalized, now he could feel the tingle around his neck. He shook it off and tucked the gun into his belt.

  Ralph leaned weakly against the wall, eyes half closed. Brant saw no help there at all.

  "Any reason somebody might be after you?"

  Irina thought for a few seconds, then shook her head in tiny jerks. "No, I don't think so."

  "Think hard."

  "I am!" she burst out, then started crying.

  "Nice."

  Ralph's whisper was almost too soft, but Brant heard it. He made a fist, then unmade it. "Shut up, Ralph."

  They looked at each other for a minute, as if waiting for something to happen.

  "Tell me about Kit, how she disappeared," Brant said finally.

  She eyed the gun in his waistband. "I don't know, I did not see much. We were separated a little by the crowd, you see, Christmas shopping. She ran into this guy, some guy. He tripped on her, or she stepped on him, or something. He gave her a very mean look. But nothing happened. Well, she said something angry, you know Kit, and then we just kept going. I was ahead and she was following, and then suddenly I became aware that Kit was not behind me any longer, and so I called her name, I looked all around, then I went into all the stores we were walking past, and she was nowhere. There were so many people, I thought I lost her in the crowd, you know. Or maybe she stop to talk to someone. Oh, wait, I almost forgot. I think we were going to the bathroom. That was when she disappeared. And then I think I went back to check the stores."

  "So you were walking down a hallway and she disappeared from behind you?"

  "No. Yes. I think so. When I turned around she was gone, but I don't know how long."

  "Were you close to the bathrooms?"

  "I think right outside."

  "And you're sure you never saw this guy before." Brant gestured at the door. "He had his hand on your doorknob."

  "It was Kit's doorknob too!"

  "Was?"

  "Is. Was. She lives here!"

  Her nostrils flared and Brant smiled tightly.

  "Yeah, she lives here. So where is she?"

  "I don't know." It was a tiny whisper, full of sadness and hurt.

  Brant believed her. Or she was a good actress — he believed that, too. She looked like one. Maybe she was one.

  "Okay." Brant's sudden declaration made her jump. Was she jumpy?

  "Okay," he repeated. "What do we know?"

  Silence from Ralph and Irina.

  "We know Kit disappearance is not an accident, or we wouldn't have had a visitor armed with this." He waved the Glock in front of her face. "This makes it serious business, definitely something for the cops to deal with."

  Ralph looked up sharply, then aimed his eyes to the side. "You said you know this Zimmerman."

  "Yeah," Brant sighed. The sweat had begun to dry on his skin and he shivered. "Bad deal, getting him. He's no friend of mine."

  Irina eyed the Glock. "I'm frightened."

  She trembled, and Brant saw goosebumps appear up and down her arms. His gaze lingered over her form-fitting lingerie. It was the middle of the night, yet she looked ready for a special visitor. He slid the Glock into his belt again. "You sure that wasn't your boyfriend just now?"

  She sputtered, nostrils flaring again. "I telling you the truth!"

  Brant wondered if anger hardened her accent and worsened her grammar. She seemed suddenly less eloquent.

  He turned back into the apartment, throwing her off balance. She threw up her arms and followed him noisily as he reentered Kit's room. The tingle had died when he'd caught the intruder, but he still felt the effects. As if he'd entered a tunnel, almost stifled. His breathing, suddenly labored. Chest constricted. Pain jabbing his shoulders.

  He cast his mind out. It had to be Kit, not trying to contact him, but needing him. Calling out for help. His vision blurred and, for a second, it was like Cu Chi again, and what happened to him wasn't happening to him, but to someone else. To Kit.

  And it was bad. Very bad.

  Brant grabbed hold of the dresser to keep from falling. As soon as his hand touched the wood, he was in a room —

  a cell

  — a room with three cots and a toilet, and one of the other cots was occupied by someone under a blanket, someone whose head was covered with lank blond hair. And he was —

  Kit was

  — in the other cot, manacled right wrist inhibiting movement, metal gouging into soft skin and drawing blood, a feeling of dread turning to terror as the door opened and —

  they

  — were upon her, grotesque masks grinning and distorted faces gashed open with blood and laughter and her sobs were like razor blades under his —

  Kit's

  — nails, and he-she turned away and then it all went black.

  Kit fainted.

  Or somebody fainted.

  Brant staggered onto the dresser. He felt rather than saw his brother and Irina converge, trying to hold him up and shake him as if that would help.

  He felt Irina's soft and yielding flesh as she used her body to hold him upright, and then Ralph shook him awkwardly until he thought his neck would crack, and slowly the vision faded and he was himself, here in Kit's room again.

  The shudders began, but he brought them under control. What had he seen, exactly?

  Irina's hands grasped his arm, or one of them did, and he felt the other grope him...

  No, she was withdrawing the gun from his waistband.

  "Here," she said to Ralph, whom he couldn't see, "take this before he shoot himself, or one of us."

  Brant felt the hardness of the gun leave his skin.

  "I don't want—" his brother whined.

  "Just take it away," Irina said, her words crackling. "Put it anywhere."

  Brant was too drained to argue. Or move aside.

  Had he seen what was happening to Kit? Or was he seeing through Kit's eyes? He shook his head. Or was it all symbolic? He just wasn't sure.

  Jesus God, all he knew was that they had to keep moving.

  Brant swallowed dry-throated. He wouldn't tell Ralph what he'd seen. No one knew about Brant's visions, and no one would believe. Besides, it was too horrible a vision to share with a grieving father, even if he was the useless lump of shit Ralph h
ad become.

  He turned to Irina. "We're going to the cops now. I recommend you be ready to tell your story when they ask. But I'll be back, too. I want to hear more of what you have to say." Brant paused, fixing Irina's doe-eyed glare with his own. "I think there's more to hear. A lot more."

  She frowned first, then quickly reshaped it into a pout. Her violet lips were made for pouting. And more. Brant couldn't help noticing. That was her game plan, surely as the musk that floated off her skin. What else was her plan?

  "I will be here, hoping for Kit to come home soon. Maybe nothing has happened to her after all. Maybe she is okay, maybe with a boyfriend."

  Brant snorted. Why change her tune now, after raising the alarm?

  He retrieved Ralph like a piece of forgotten luggage and dragged him out the door as Irina watched them leave, silent. Her nostrils flared a little, and Brant remembered how she'd looked like a long-limbed filly. He pulled the door shut on that image and shushed Ralph's mumbled questions.

  At the car, Brant took the Glock from his brother's limp grasp.

  "Zimmerman," he said. "Let's get it over with."

  Brant stashed the gun under his seat. They drove downtown in silence born of discomfort.

  KIT

  This time, when they opened the door, Kit managed to lay still. She had slept and fake-slept for a couple hours at least, according to her internal clock. Her watch was gone. She smelled Clorox – somebody had cleaned up her vomit again. She swallowed, but her throat was a raw, open wound. The acid in her vomit had irritated the rawness caused by her screaming. Now it all hurt.

  "Hi!"

  It was Marissa's perky voice, apparently greeting whoever had entered their room.

  Cell.

  All right, then, cell.

  There was no answer, and Kit just faced the wall, her back tingling. Maybe both Marissa and the visitor were watching her.

  After a rattle and some indefinable sounds, Marissa thanked the boot-wearing visitor — who still hadn't spoken — and she sensed that he had now approached Kit's bed.

  Jesus.

  Kit tensed, and her breathing hitched. She was sure he must have noticed she wasn't really asleep.