by Linda Welch
When I could breathe again, I got up on hands and knees. A single bullet hit the trunk of an aspen very near my head and splinters bit into my scalp. I dropped down flat again and crawled forward, using my elbows and toes to propel me along, heading for a clump of undergrowth I could barely see.
You may think you can look after yourself, but being the target of a gun-wielding assassin alters your perspective. Terror tends to numb your brain. Although it weighed heavy against my ribs, I forgot I carried a weapon until another bullet shattered a small rock next my hand. Then I wondered if shooting at the darkness would pinpoint me. Then I thought, stupid, they already know where you are. I rolled on my back, sat up and fired back, popping off half a dozen rounds in a semicircle.
On my knees again, I crawled into the undergrowth, which turned out to be a prickly bush. Spiny twigs ripped at my hair and clothing as I wriggled through and out the other side. My sight adjusted to the darkness; I saw stars almost hidden by cloud, a pale moon and the surrounding trees and wild shrubs. I lunged to my feet and ran.
Royal found me in a little pine cave formed by the drooping branches of a big old tree. When he hissed, “Tiff?” and crept in beneath the branches, I was up on my knees aiming at him. I lowered the Ruger with an internal sigh of relief.
“They’re gone. We can go back to the cabin.”
“You’re positive?”
“I would know if they were still here.”
I signaled for him to go ahead and crawled after him. I staggered upright. “Thanks for protecting me,” I told him sarcastically.
Royal looked disheveled. He combed his fingers through his long hair, pushing it back over his shoulders. Then he stepped up to me and pulled me into his arms. “Thank the Lady you are safe,” he said, and kissed me.
I fought the power of his kiss. I had to fight damn hard, and I managed to extricate myself and smack him in the chest with both hands, shoving him back a couple of paces. “If you’d arrested them… .”
“There were more than two people.”
I started off, stopped. “Gee, thanks. Nice to know more than two of your people are targeting me.” I peered about. “Which way?”
He indicated the direction with one hand. I indicated he should lead the way with a sweep of my hand. I followed him as he went in the opposite direction I would have taken.
“They were your people, right?” I asked in a low voice.
“Yes. And you were right, I should have arrested those two. I am truly sorry.”
I watched where I put my feet. “Sorry doesn’t cut it, mister.” I felt through my hair, pulling out splinters, thankful none of them pierced my scalp.
“I told you, you need protection. The only reason you are with me now is while you raced through this… ,” he angrily threw a hand out at the surrounding forest, “… this jungle, I removed most of them.”
I stopped walking. “Most of them? Did your super-duper sensing thing tell you how many were here?”
He thrust his hands deep in his pockets and calmly told me: “Five. Two got away.”
My mouth gaped. I closed it with a snap of my teeth. “You took out three? And what do you mean by removed?”
He got moving again. “Better you do not know.”
I jogged behind him, trying to keep up with his long strides. “Sure it’s better I don’t know a thing when a hunter digs up a body here and there. What were you—?”
“Which is why I did not kill them. But I hurt them,” I heard him say.
I knew he would not tell me more. As we walked back to the cabin through the silent forest, boots crunching on pine-needles, forest mulch and twigs turned brittle in the cold, questions buzzed through my mind. Why were the demons trying to kill me? Because I could identify them? Because I was useless to them if I couldn’t tell them where Lawrence was, and therefore, in their opinion disposable? Because they didn’t want me to find him? If Royal and the other demons were cohorts, why didn’t he take advantage of the times we were together to get rid of me?
The cabin door was open. I ran for it and burst inside. The single room was empty.
“They took Mac!” I wailed.
“I think I left the door open.”
“You what!” I gasped.
“I’m sorry. I’m not used to dogs. I did not think.”
I turned around and screamed at him. “You moron! You lost my dog!”
Mac was a good distance from the cabin when Royal and I found him. Emboldened by Royal’s assertion the shooters were long-gone, I called Mac’s name aloud. I was almost in tears. I could brave muggers, I could even put up a good front against demons, but the thought of my little dog lost and alone in the backcountry would likely destroy me.
Mac didn’t yelp out his location and gratefully leap into my arms, panting little doggy kisses all over my face. We found him by the sheer volume of noise he made as he rooted and bumbled through the undergrowth. I thrashed through prickly gorse to reach him, hugged his heavy little body tight, and he growled at me! There’s gratitude for you. He was not happy to be dragged back to civilization.
And drag him I had to. I’d left his leash in the car and I couldn’t carry him far—he weights too much - and I didn’t dare take Royal up on his offer to carry Mac. So I walked to the cabin kind of hunched over with my hand on Mac’s collar. I thought I would never get upright again.
I put Mac in the backseat of the Subaru, put the shutters down over the cabin’s windows and secured them, and locked the door. Then I poured lye down the hole in the outhouse and engaged the padlock on the door. All the while, Royal circled the cabin like a big, watchful cat.
I led the way in the Subaru, Royal coming behind in his new truck. As I drove down Pineview Canyon, I wondered what he did to those three men. He hurt them, he said. Did he hurt them bad? Did I care? Hell no. I hoped he hurt them bad enough they had second thoughts about coming after me again.
He took out three demons to save little old me. Of course, as an officer of the law, he would do it for anyone.
A few houselights still glowed as I pulled in my driveway, my neighbors watching late night movies. The Frankie’s were away and their teens were having a party; loud music, young voices shouting and swearing. As I got out the car, a youngster stumbled through the Frankie’s open front door and fell on his knees on their front lawn, and vomited. Great. The little hooligans would likely keep me up all night.
Royal’s truck pulled up at the curb and stopped, engine purring. The headlights glared in my face as I crossed to my front door. I knew he would wait till I got inside the house.
I put my key in the lock and got the door open just a crack, and Mel’s voice screeched at me: “It was them!”
“Look what they did!” Jack cried out.
Holding onto Mac’s leash, I kicked the door all the way open.
Holy cow.
The coat-rack lay on the floor, part of the frame broken. My shoes were in the kitchen doorway. The small table where I kept my keys, wallet and whatever had been demolished. My only picture—two bull-moose facing off, with a backdrop of pines—lay against the wall with a cracked frame, the glass in shards. Clothes were all over the stairs.
“It was the demon, the one who came here, and another with red and black hair,” Mel wailed.
“They trashed the place,” I murmured. My gaze kept going back to the same things: the table, the coat-rack, the picture, then back again. I slowly pulled my gun.
Then Royal’s arm went over my shoulders and hugged. It felt really nice, comforting, and I forgot for a moment he shouldn’t hold me, and I should not let him.
The anger came suddenly, like acid erupting up my throat. I shrugged out from beneath his arm. “Your guys did this. Those fucking friends of yours you didn’t arrest.”
His face looked like thunder as he took in the damage, and I could tell he kept his tone level only with effort. “Why would you think so? And please stop calling them my guys.”
A little sanity r
eturned to tell me I should watch what I said. “I don’t have anything worth stealing. They know I took something from Lindy’s place and came looking for it.”
“Breaking and entering is not always about theft. It’s how some get their kicks.”
I knew that. Didn’t make me feel any better. And I knew what he did not: those two demons definitely went through my house.
He looked in the kitchen, and thumped the frame so hard with his closed fist the thing shuddered and I thought it would crack.
“Way to go. It’s not enough my house is wrecked, you want to bring it down around my ears,” I said dryly as I walked past him into the kitchen and saw the chaos in there.
He looked at his fist, moved it from the frame and uncurled his fingers.
“You need to leave now,” I said suddenly as the damage all but overwhelmed me. Others might want someone with them at a time like this, not me. I needed to be alone, or as alone as Jack and Mel would let me.
He stood in the kitchen doorway with one hand braced on the frame. “I think I—”
“No. You should go. I don’t want you here.”
He eyed me intently, a small frown marring the bronzed skin of his brow. He nodded. “But I’m going to call it in, Tiff.”
My mouth tightened. “I think that’s my decision.”
He loomed over me. “I’m a police officer. My duty is to report a breakin.”
I perked one eyebrow. “Like it’s your duty to report what happened at Monchard?”
His mouth went so tight I thought his lips might break his teeth, then he said, “If you expect me to say touche, think again.”
I watched from the window to make sure he did leave, but he pulled over at the Frankie’s house. I don’t think he knocked, he went straight inside. A few minutes later, youngsters left the house as if the Pied Piper of Hamlin led them, swarming down the street like a horde of greasy rats. He came out last with three teen boys in tow. I expect they were too inebriated to make their own way home. He stuffed two in the back seat of the truck and the third in the front passenger seat, slammed the door, got in the driver’s side and slammed that door, and the big red truck disappeared over the brow of the hill.
Chapter Thirteen
Where I live, high on the east bench, clouds often wreathe my house. Out of town visitors and particularly out of state visitors talk about the fog, but it is not fog. This high, you walk in the clouds.
Mike didn’t phone this time. He came in person, looming from the cloud bank, stepping up on my front porch. While I knew it boded no good, I reflected it was nice to have a human male come through my door for a change.
MacKlutzy growled a welcome.
Mike ignored Mac as the small dog hovered, eying Mike’s ankles. A lot of people underestimate Scottish terriers; they don’t know the little monsters have teeth like Rottweiler’s. I kept a wary eye on my stubby buddy.
Mike stood in the hall. “Redecorating?”
He had been in my house only once before, but he noticed a difference. It must be a cop talent. I made a face at the hall. “Threw out a load of junk.”
“It looks more … spacious,” he agreed. He went in my small, rather gloomy living room, which seemed a more appropriate setting than my kitchen for what could be a solemn conversation.
I was exhausted from being up all night putting the house to rights. Everything breakable in the kitchen, they broke. I couldn’t walk through without stepping on the remains of something. You cannot imagine the mess, and in the pantry. Perhaps they ran out of steam when they hit the upstairs. They smashed my monitor, turned my bureau over and pulled out every drawer in the three bedrooms. They tossed everything in my closet all over the room and down the staircase. But they didn’t ruin my clothes, blankets or linens.
I swept up the remains, filling a dozen big plastic trash bags, and kept the washing machine and tumble dryer going all night.
People speak of feeling violated when their home is invaded and their property destroyed. I can understand this, because the destruction is unnecessary, an act of vandalism and vindictiveness. But it’s not as if someone laid hands on their bodies. I didn’t take having my things destroyed lightly—a few times during the night I got so angry I wanted to throw something myself—but nothing had sentimental value and the rest could be replaced.
I happened to look out of the upstairs landing window at two in the morning, and spotted a big pickup parked way down the street. It was there every time I checked thereafter, but gone when the sun broached the mountain peaks.
Mike stood in the middle of the room with hands plunged deep in pants pockets, as if studying the decor, but I knew he was giving himself time. I let him take in the small wood-burning stove in its brick alcove, the faux-paneled walls, the mangy old flocked wallpaper and the few pieces of old but solid furniture. The small bay window didn’t permit much light and turning on a lamp wouldn’t help much.
Jack hung over my shoulder. “This does not look good.”
I agreed. I think, from what I told Jack about the Lieutenant, he knew Mike almost as well as I did, and he correctly read Mike’s posture. The man was unhappy and uncomfortable. I perched on the arm of the overstuffed couch. “Okay, Mike, give.”
He kneaded his chin and looked at me sidelong. “You’re not going to like it.”
I made a noise in the back of my throat. “Let me see. You come to my house instead of phoning. You stand here looking like it’s the last place you want to be. You tell me I’m not going to like it. What a surprise.”
He pulled in a reluctant breath through pursed lips, blew it out, and looked down at me. “I want you to see if you can get anything from the other victims.”
“What victims?” Had I missed something? Did we have another murder case on our hands?
“The bodies we could recover. The children.”
My heart plummeted to my gut and sat like a lump of cold oatmeal.
I shook my head. “Nu-uh. You put me on looking for Lawrence. No mention of me and dead children.”
“His disappearance and these others, they have to be linked. Sure, a tiny percentage of the missing children sharing the same birthday could be coincidence, but too many were born on the same day. This is massive, Tiff. We will put a stop to it. I’ll use any advantage we have.”
“Like me.” I worried at my lower lip with my teeth. “What about Lawrence? He’s more than just a case, Mike. He’s a little boy in deep trouble.”
“We’re not giving up on him, Tiff.”
I wished I could offer a solid excuse to refuse Mike. Having to talk to children … it would be tough. Mike didn’t know what speaking to a dead child did to me.
But although I protested, I didn’t really have a choice. I could see no way out. Nope, I’m not going to help you solve your multiple abduction case. I’m not going to help you discover who murdered little boys. No more cases would come my way. My only income would be gone, along with my reputation. Not to mention my self-esteem.
“Mike, I doubt you realize how … painful trying to talk to dead children can be,” I offered. I realized, too late, I said talk, but he didn’t notice.
His eyebrows almost met as he frowned. “I never thought about it.”
“And they don’t communicate well. When they’re so young, and afraid, they have little or no composure. All we’d probably get would be something like ‘it was a big man with black hair,’ if we’re lucky.” I offered him a weak smile. “But if you really want me to try, of course I will. I just don’t think it will help.”
He rubbed the back of his neck, rolled his shoulders. He looked as tired as I felt. “How about we check out a couple. Colorado and Wyoming, right in our backyard. We could do it in a day.”
“This close? My god!”
“This close, Tiff. Practically all around us.”
So I agreed, pointless as I felt the exercise would be.
“Tomorrow morning, bright and early. You, me and Roy. First stop Saratoga, then
on to Granby if we have to.”
“Were they killed at the scene?”
“We don’t know.”
Great.
I was not looking forward to it. Not one tiny bit.
I drove down to the credit union after Mike left and withdrew two hundred dollars from my savings account. Two hundred buys a lot from the Salvation Army Thrift Shop.
Leaving Mac grumbling on the other side, I latched the gate and walked through the trees to the apartment block. I ambled along with hands deep in my pockets, thinking about relationships. About my relationships.
I had not had many.
I had always been solitary. My first memories are of a Division of Child and Family Services children’s shelter, only the state-run agency had a different name back then. When I was eleven, my caseworker told me a groundskeeper found me on the steps of a Presbyterian church on a hot July night. My cute little wicker basket was actually a dog bed. My blanket and clothing were made in Canada. Was I born in Canada? Did my parent or parents come all the way to Providence, Utah, to dump me?
I don’t remember all the foster care placements. I can think back to when I was maybe two, but nothing beforehand. They were not good places. There were always a lot of other children and the foster parents were more interested in the money they got from the state than caring for their charges. I kept to myself as much as I could because I just didn’t like being with people. I left Utah before I was legal.
In Omaha, Nebraska, I worked fast-food restaurants. In Iowa, it was telemarketing. In South Dakota, an auto dealership. I worked as a field surveyor for an oil company in Wyoming for a year. I attended an office occupations school in Minnesota and got a secretarial job at the headquarters of a software manufacturer. Then I found myself at Lake Superior. Canada.
Did something inside want the parents I never knew? Did my subconscious lead me? I couldn’t bear to think I unconsciously craved a family who didn’t want me, so I skedaddled out of there and ended up in San Francisco, and stayed six years.
