Текст книги "Evil Dark"

Автор книги: Justin Gustainis

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  "Version? Hell, beats me, Sarge. I don't know there was more than one."

  "It's all right, forget it – you and your partner did good. Now get that van over to Impound, will you?"

  "Already called the tow truck – they're on the way. I'll leave the keys and paperwork in your box, like you said."

  "That's great, Perrotta. Thanks."

  I closed the phone and said, "The uniforms found the guy's ride – Econoline van parked across the street from Rachel's. Wanna guess what was inside?"

  "From the way you're smiling," McGuire said, "I figure it was something along the lines of gasoline and some rope."

  "Fuckin' A," Karl said.

  "You both win the prize, gentlemen," I said, "although the real winner is the DA."

  We'd all been worried that the commando would only be charged with what had actually gone down at Rachel's tonight. We had him on trespassing – which is a misdemeanor – attempted assault, and attempted abduction. And if that was the whole indictment, the bastard might well make bail.

  But since rope and gasoline had been used in both witch burnings, finding it in Mister Commando's van meant the DA could charge him with two counts of abduction and murder, along with the stuff involving Rachel. And since a case could be made that he was motivated to burn the women because they were witches, a trio of civil rights violations might be involved, too – although that's a Federal rap.

  Which means that at arraignment, the district attorney's office could ask the judge either for a remand into custody, or for bail so high that the fucking Rockefellers couldn't pay it. And there was a real good chance that any judge would go along.

  The last thing I wanted to see was the commando released on bond. He'd disappear faster than a politician's ethics – and be just as hard to recover.

  The three of us were grinning at each other when a uniformed officer came into the squad room, looked around until he spotted me, then headed toward McGuire's office.

  "Excuse me, Lieutenant," he said to McGuire, then turned to me. "Sergeant, your John Doe is in interrogation room 2."

  I looked at him. "My what? John Doe?"

  "That's what he is, Sarge. Guy refused to give his name. And since he didn't have any ID on him…" The officer shrugged. "He's John Doe."

  "Jeez," Karl said. "I would have at least expected name, rank, and serial number."

  I stood up. "Well, guess I'll go talk to him. If I can figure out what movie he's got playing in his head, maybe I can tweak the ending a bit."

  Karl said, "I'll get started on the arrest report while you're doing that. Don't want him to get sprung because of a paperwork error."

  "Let me know how your conversation goes," McGuire said.

  "Hell," I said. "You'll probably be able to hear the screams from here."

  "His or yours?" Karl asked.

The interrogation room is about eight feet square, with acoustic tiles on the walls and ceiling. The purpose of the tiles is to block out distractions from outside, but if a suspect wants to think the point is to muffle screams, that's not usually a bad thing.

  Carmela Aquilina followed me into the room, closing the door firmly behind her. Procedure says at least two cops have to be in there with a suspect. Unlike a lot of procedures, that one makes a certain amount of sense. One-on-one, it was just possible that a suspect could overpower the detective and grab his gun. Then all kinds of bad shit would follow.

  Since Karl wasn't permitted in the room, I'd asked Aquilina to back me up. Part of that decision stemmed from the fact that she was available, although I knew that a couple of other detectives from the squad were also in the building someplace. But my other reason for asking her was based on her gender. We didn't yet know what scabs on his psyche our commando was trying to scratch with his witchburning, but I thought hatred of women might come into it somewhere. If so, having an attractive female cop present might get under his skin, with interesting results.

  The commando was seated at the big square table, so Aquilina and I took chairs opposite him. "You and I have already met," I said, "although I didn't get the chance to introduce myself. I'm Detective Sergeant Markowski." I made a nod to my left. "This is Detective Aquilina. And you are…?"

  He just stared at me. He was trying for impassive, but the hatred burned in his eyes like twin bonfires. They'd taken the stocking cap off him downstairs, and I saw that his hair was what my mother would have called dirty blond. He had the blue eyes to go with it, too – a regular storm trooper. Pettigrew would have loved him.

  "I don't know why you're playing cute about your name," I said. "If you've been in the system, your fingerprints will ID you soon enough. Same thing if you've ever been in the service." I pretended to study him. "You're ex-military, aren't you? What were you – special ops?"

  I didn't believe that for a second, but sometimes a little flattery goes a long way. Not this time, though. He just kept that basilisk gaze on me.

  "Maybe he's ashamed to tell us," Aquilina said.

  I cocked an eyebrow at her. "You think?"

  "Could be. If we knew his name, we could look into his background. I wonder what we'd find?"

  "Maybe he was a war hero," I said. Aquilina and I had slipped into good cop/bad cop without even planning to. That's another reason why I'd wanted her in the room. She's smart as hell.

  "No, I don't think so." She ran her eyes slowly over the prisoner. "Anybody trying that hard to look tough is probably overcompensating for something."

  "That's not fair, Carmela," I said. "We don't know anything about him."

   "We know what we can see. I mean, look at the size of his nose, and those short fingers. I think he dresses like a tough guy because he's got a teeny weenie, and he's afraid somebody will find out."

  "Oh, come on – you've got no call to say stuff like that."

  She gave the prisoner a nasty smile. "Betcha ten bucks he's hung like a hamster."

  "How do you figure to win that bet?" I asked. "I'm sure not gonna make him undress in front of you."

  "Wait until he's been in the county jail for a couple days – and nights." The nasty smile became an evil grin. "Then we can ask his cellmates."

  "All right, Carmela, that's enough," I said, making myself sound irritated. "Take a walk. Go get some coffee, or something."

  "All right, Stan." Aquilina stood up slowly, as if it had been her idea all along. "I'll leave you and your new boyfriend alone for a while, if that's what you want."

  We were violating procedure now, leaving me alone in here with a suspect. But I thought the payoff might be worth it.

  When the door closed behind Aquilina, I said, "I'm sorry you had to put up with that. She's not my regular partner. But he's undead, and not allowed to participate in interrogations. That Influence thing, you know."

  I was about to offer him a cup of coffee when he spoke for the first time since I'd entered the room, his voice quiet, but filled with contempt. "Bloodsuckers, and witches, and– " He looked toward the door where Aquilina had exited. "–stupid cunts who don't know their place. With those for pals, how does a human like you look at himself in the mirror?"

  I shrugged, and tried for a sheepish expression. "Sometimes it isn't so easy."

  The smile he gave me matched Aquilina's for nastiness. "Well, don't worry about it, Markowski. You won't have to do it much longer."

  "What's that supposed to mean?"

  He just shook his head. "I want a lawyer."

  "How about you explain what you meant, first?"

  The headshake again. "Lawyer. Court-appointed lawyer."

  "Uh-uh. You only get a court-appointed lawyer if you can't afford to hire one."

  He gave me a shrug of his own. "Fine – so I can't afford one."

  "Your wallet, which I'm sure had its contents inventoried downstairs, contained $440. Less than half of that will buy you an attorney to represent you at your arraignment."

  "And how am I supposed to hire this cheap lawyer from in here?"

  "Just a minute," I said. I got up and left the room. A few minutes later, I returned with a landline phone and a telephone book. Cell phone reception in here, I knew from experience, was terrible. I plugged the phone into a jack in the wall.

  "I'll leave you alone for a while," I said. "You can find yourself a lawyer in the phone book. Here's a tip – look under 'A' for attorneys, not 'L' for lawyers. And if you need to take notes – here."

  I tossed him a pad of paper and one of those four-inch pencils we give to prisoners. They're supposed to be too small to use as weapons.

  He stared at the phone as if I had dropped a fresh warm turd on the table in front of him.

  "You'll listen to the call," he said.

  "No, I won't," I said. "One, because it's against the law, and two, anything we heard would be inadmissible in court, anyway. What passes between you and your lawyer is privileged."

  He chewed on that for a couple of seconds. "You'll still have the number I called."

  "So what? We'd be able to figure that out based on what lawyer showed up to rep you. We know 'em all, believe me."

  He seemed to deflate a little. "How much time do I have?"

  "Twenty minutes is customary. Should be plenty of time – all you need to do is hire the guy. You can tell him your story when he gets here. Maybe," I said, "you'll even tell him your name."

  He nodded solemnly. "All right – thank you."

  Thank you. That was the first thing he'd said that surprised me.

  Back in the squad room, I saw Aquilina at her desk, with a cup of coffee. When I walked over, she gestured with the mug. "It seemed like good advice," she said, "so I took it, although the coffee's as bad as ever."

  "Thanks for your help in there," I said. "You played the son of a bitch perfectly."

  "Did it do any good?"

  "Actually, no – but that's not your fault." I looked at her for a second. "Remind me never to do anything that'll get you talking to me like that."

  Aquilina took a swig of the terrible coffee. "Pretty unlikely, Stan," she said. "You don't look a thing like my ex-husband."

  I stopped by McGuire's office and told him what we'd gotten out of commando boy, which was exactly zip.

  "Can't say I'm surprised," McGuire said. "Maybe his prints will get a hit – FBI, DOD, something like that."

  "I hope so. Although there's millions of people who've never been printed by anybody, anywhere."

  "Yeah." McGuire gave me a crooked grin. "What kind of police state is this, anyway, where we can't even make people get fingerprinted?"

  "Maybe we'll get his name in court," I said. "He can't be arraigned as a John Doe, can he? At least, I've never seen that happen."

  McGuire raised and lowered his eyebrows. "Why not? What are they gonna do – threaten to put him in jail?"

  "Guess we'll find out in the morning," I said.

  I was sitting at my desk, describing for Karl how Aquilina and I had unsuccessfully tried good cop/bad cop on the suspect, when Karl's head came up suddenly.

  "What's up?" I asked. Even though I'd been feeling pretty damn tired, I was suddenly very alert.

  "Blood," he said. "There's fresh blood close by, and a lot of it."

  It took me two heartbeats to realize what that meant, then I was out of my chair, through the door, and racing down the hall.

  A second later, a blur went past me, and I knew my vampire partner would get there first. When I arrived at interrogation room 2, Karl was pushing at the door and meeting a lot of resistance, by the look of it. The door was open about four inches and didn't want to go any farther. This close, even I could smell the blood inside the room. Commando boy, it would seem, had done something rash.

  "He's got furniture braced up against it, somehow," Karl said. "It's a pretty tight fit."

  "Fuck it," I said. "Can you tear the door off its hinges?"

  He studied the frame for a second. "Yeah, probably," he said. "The gap where the door's open will give me some leverage."

  "Then do it."

  "One thing, Stan. Once the door's down, I've gotta get the fuck out of here. That much fresh blood around… I could lose control, and that'd be pretty embarrassing."

  "Fine," I said. "Yank out the door, then take off. I'll see you upstairs."

  "Right."

  Karl reached into the gap and got a grip on the edge of the door. His hands were wide apart, with one set to push while the other pulled. He strained against the door, and after a few seconds the top hinge tore out of the wall. That gave Karl even better leverage, and a moment later the door pulled free with a banshee screech and slammed into the opposite wall. Karl said, "See ya," and was gone before the door crashed onto the carpeted hallway.

  Cops – uniformed and not – came running from all directions, drawn by the noise. They were all asking their own versions of "What the fuck happened?" but I didn't answer at first. I was staring into the interrogation room through the empty space where the door had been.

  It was pretty clear that commando boy wouldn't be needing a lawyer, after all.

• • • •

"They searched him down in Booking," I said to Karl. "They emptied the fucker's pockets, then checked him for weapons and contraband. He didn't have anything on him when he was brought into that interrogation room. He was clean, Karl."

  "I believe it."

  "Then I had to go and give him a pencil."

  "Don't beat yourself up over it, Stan. Sure, you gave the guy a pencil – that's standard procedure. That's why they keep that box of pencils down there. And they're special pencils, too."

  "Four inches long," I said. "With a sharp point."

  "Hell, it's got to have a sharp point, or you can't fucking write with it."

  "Yeah, I guess so," I said. "But still…"

  "'But still' my ass," Karl said. "They give the prisoners those dinky little pencils for a reason – they're supposed to be too small to be used as a weapon, for either homicide or suicide."

  "The motherfucker managed it, though."

  "I don't figure whoever ordered those pencils had in mind a guy so determined to off himself that he would dig the thing into his neck, and keep pushing until he opened the carotid artery."

  "That does seem to call for a certain amount of determination, doesn't it?" I said.

  "Determination? It calls for a fucking psycho, that's what. It's like… cutting off your arm with a pocketknife."

  "A guy did that, though, didn't he? There was a movie made about it."

  "Sure," Karl said. "And the reason they made a movie about it is because ninety-nine point nine percent of human beings would never have the guts to do something like that – even if the alternative was dying of thirst in a fucking cave."

  "I guess commando boy belonged to that one-tenth of a percent," I said. "Maybe he was special ops, after all."

  "I doubt it," Karl said. "He was just nuts. How'd he manage to barricade the door, anyway?"

  "He pushed the table against the wall," I said. "Then he wedged a chair against it, and then another chair behind that – which brought the whole fucking Tinkertoy setup within a few inches of the opposite wall."

  "Shit, no wonder I couldn't force it open."

  "I did find something kinda interesting down there, though – after they carted commando boy off to the morgue."

  "Interesting how?"

  "Well, I gave him a pad of paper along with the pencil."

  "Also standard procedure," Karl said. "So?"

  "So, he'd thrown the pad into a corner – a corner where the blood pool didn't reach."

  "I don't suppose he wrote out a confession, did he?"

  "No, but he did write something on it."

  Karl sat up a little straighter. "Don't keep me in suspense, Stan."

  "It looked like it wasn't intended for us. God knows why he bothered to write it down at all. Maybe he found it comforting, because it looks like he wrote it over and over."

  "Hope do you know it wasn't for us?"

  "Because he tore off the sheet he was writing on, and shredded it before he started digging into his neck with the pencil. The pieces of paper were so small, they look like confetti."

  Karl smiled a little. "But he forgot that the pencil would leave the impression of what he wrote on the sheets underneath, huh?"

  "No, he seems to've remembered that, too. He not only shredded the top page – he tore out the next three or four and did the same. Like I said – confetti."

  Karl rubbed the bridge of his nose. "OK, so why're you telling me about it, then?"

  I produced a little smile of my own. "Because he didn't tear off enough of them."

  "Aha – the light dawns," Karl said. "Although I probably should stop using that expression, haina? So, what did you get?"

  "I got another pencil and gently shaded all the places where the writing had been. It came through pretty faint, but it was there. He wrote the same thing, over and over, about twenty times. McGuire's got the original, but I copied down the words for myself. Here."

  I took a sheet of paper from my jacket pocket and handed it to Karl. He looked at it and frowned. He kept looking, and the frown only got deeper. Looking up at me, he said, "Well, Whiskey Tango Foxtrot, and like that. Latin?" Karl handed the paper back to me.

  "Looks like it," I said. "Ad verum Dei gloriam."

  "You're the one who knows the lingo – what's it say?"

  "For the true glory of God."

  Karl blinked a couple of times. "And what the fuck is that supposed to be about?"

  "Beats the shit out of me," I said. "But in a few hours, I'm pretty sure I can find out."

The man I wanted to talk to wouldn't appreciate being awakened at 5am for something that wasn't an emergency, and I figured about 8 o'clock was about the earliest I could get away with calling about something that wasn't urgent. I said goodbye to Karl as he left for his day's rest at about 5.30am, but remained at my desk.

  I could've gone home and called Garrett from there, but depending on what he told me, I might want to make additions to the case file, and I had to do that here. McGuire said he'd OK a couple of hours of overtime, and there was always paperwork for me to catch up on while I was waiting for 8 o'clock to roll around.

  I called Christine to let her know that I wouldn't be home in time to say goodnight to her. I got her voicemail and left a message saying I hoped to see her when she got up.

  I was writing my report on the suicide of John Doe, aka commando boy, when Thorwald and Greer, the Bureau's finest, came in to see McGuire. They both looked at me as they passed through the squad room en route to the boss's office, but neither one spoke. Greer glared at me, as I would've expected, but the look Thorwald gave me was… harder to read. Maybe she was letting her imagination create a Spanish Inquisition fantasy, with me as the star attraction. That would've surprised me a little, since no one expects the Spanish Inquisition. Or so I hear.

  I'd reached the point in my report where I was trying to describe the way that commando boy had barricaded himself in the interrogation room when I heard footsteps approach from behind me – just one set, and by the sound, I figured them for Thorwald's. A couple of seconds later, I found that I was right.

  She was wearing a navy-blue blazer over a pair of khaki pants that might've been a little tighter than regulation. Female law enforcement officers don't wear dresses or skirts on the job – not if they're street cops. Skirts make it hard to run, and even harder to fight.

  Her black hair was cut in front into bangs that went about halfway down her broad forehead. Beneath them, the ice-blue eyes were looking at me without the glare I'd started to get used to.

  "Long night," she said.

  "For both of us, I guess."

  "I thought your shift ended a half hour before sunrise," she said. If there was anything in her voice besides mild interest, I didn't catch it.

  "It usually does," I said, "for the sake of my partner. But I'm putting in a little overtime."

  "Did something new break in the case?"

  "Nothing you don't already know about." If she thought I was holding out on her, she'd raise the roof. "There's a guy I need to call," I said, "and he won't be available until about 8am."

  She nodded, as if this was actually interesting to her. Then she said, "It looks like Greer and I got off on the wrong foot with you and your partner. The two of us came into town very focused on nailing the people behind this butchery, but we may have pushed a little too hard. If we did, I apologize."

  I didn't change my facial expression, but I fancied that I could hear the Hallelujah Chorus being sung by angels in the background. An apology from Thorwald, as far as I was concerned, was right up there with that old trick involving the loaves and fishes.

  "It's not necessary," I said, "but thanks. Having to watch this stuff on video, over and over, would put anybody on edge."

  "Yes, on edge," she said. "And with damn few ways of blowing off steam."

  "Yeah, I know," I said, just to be saying something. What was I going to do – suggest she take up bowling?

  She looked past me for a moment, I assume at McGuire's office, where her partner was still yakking with the boss. Then she glanced at the big clock on the wall. When she brought her gaze back to me, there was something in her face that hadn't been there before. I couldn't have said what it was, exactly, but she looked softer, somehow.

  "It's almost 7.30am," she said. "After you talk to your guy at eight, are you going off duty?"

  "Yeah, I was planning to," I said, "unless he gives me something I have to act on right away, and I don't think it's gonna be that kind of conversation."

  She nodded again. "We're going off duty, too – as soon as Greer gets done whining to your lieutenant about interagency cooperation. We're staying at the Hilton, downtown. I'm in room six-oh-four."

  I gave her a nod of my own. I kept my poker face but my mind was going Whiskey Tango Foxtrot?

  "If you're not too tired, why don't you swing by after you get off – shift, I mean?"

  "To discuss the case, you mean?"

  The look she gave me said she thought I'd probably be able to tie my own shoelaces after a few more months of training.

  "No, dummy – for a couple of hours of good hard fucking. It'll do us both good, and I'll spring for breakfast after. The Hilton's room service is pretty good. We can discuss the case then, if you want."

  I won't claim that I was incapable of speech – it's just that I couldn't think of anything to say that wasn't going to get me in some kind of trouble with somebody.

  So I decided to go pragmatic. It seemed safest, and would buy me a little time.

  "What about your partner?" I managed to keep my voice level, I think.

  "What about him?" She shrugged. "His room's down the hall. And if you were thinking of having him join us, don't bother. Greer's as gay as San Francisco – couldn't you tell?"

  Before I could reply to that bit of news, she held up a hand, palm toward me like a traffic cop.

  "Don't say anything more. You'll either show up, or you won't. If you do, fine. If you don't, it's your loss" – then her voice returned to the tone I was familiar with – "and this conversation never happened."

  "What conversation?"

  She nodded one last time and walked back to McGuire's office. As for me, I remained at my computer, but I can't claim that I got much more done on my paperwork.

I waited until 8.05am before I picked up the phone. I won't say the past half hour had gone by fast, exactly – but time passes quicker when your mind is occupied, and I hadn't exactly lacked for stuff to think about. And I only spent a small portion of that time imagining Thorwald naked.

  I tapped in the number I'd looked up, and it was answered on the second ring.

  "This is Father Garrett."

  "Morning, Dave. It's Stan Markowski from Occult Crimes. Hope I'm not calling too early."

  "Not at all, Stan – how've you been?"

  "Can't complain, I guess. How about yourself?"

  "Reasonably well, I like to think. I haven't seen you since that messy business over on Spruce Street last summer."

  Garrett is a Jesuit who teaches theology at the U. He's also a volunteer member of the city's SWAT – Sacred Weapons and Tactics – unit. And not the prayer team auxiliary, either. When there's a SWAT call-up, Garrett straps on his body armor, grabs his weapon, and kicks supe ass with the best of them. The order not only says it's OK – they actually encourage him. Warriors for God, and all that.

  "Yeah, it has been a while, hasn't it?" I said. "Dave, I've got what is going to sound like a dumb question for you."

  "I always tell my students that there's no such thing as a dumb question, Stan. What's really dumb is not asking what you need to know. Fire away."

  "OK – what's the motto of the Jesuit order?"

  There was a pause. He said, "Well, that's not what I'd expected, but the motto is 'For the greater glory of God'."

  "And in Latin?" I asked.

  "It's Ad majorem Dei gloriam. What's this about, Stan? You thinking about joining up?"

  "No, not yet. I'm asking because in a case I'm working, I came across a phrase in Latin that sounded familiar."

  "And that's what it was? The Jesuit motto?"

  "Almost, but one word's different. It's ad verum Dei gloriam – for the true glory of God."

  Another pause. "Really? Well, now, that's interesting."

  "Interesting how?" I asked. "Have you heard it before?"

  "Oh, yes – far too often. Don't you know what that is? It's the motto taken on by that bunch of heretics who call themselves the Church of the True Cross."

  This time, the pause was mine. "No, I didn't know that. It is pretty interesting, now that you mention it."

  "They haven't been trying to recruit you, have they?"

  "Not exactly, no," I said. "I met a guy recently who, I guess, was one of their members."

  "Give those people a wide berth if you can, Stanley. They've got some rather… disturbing ideas. And some of them, I think, may be flat-out crazy. The way fanatics are."

  "Looks like I need to find out some more about these guys," I said. "All I know about them is what I've read in a couple of their flyers. They seem to hate practically everybody."

  "Not a bad description, really. Listen, Stan – the guy you want to talk to about this so-called church is Pete Duvall. He's our comparative religion expert, and I believe he's written a book – or a series of articles, I forget which – about those people."

  "Sounds like a man I ought to see," I said. "Where can I find him? Please tell me the order hasn't sent him to Peru, or someplace like that."

  "No, he's a little closer than that," Garrett said. "When I said 'our expert', I meant here at the university. You can find him in St Thomas Hall, three doors down from my office."

  "He teaches at the U? Well, that's good news. When's he likely to be around?"

  "I can check his office hours for you on the university's webpage," Garrett said. "I know you could do that yourself, but I'm already online, so it's quicker for me. Hold on."

  He wasn't away long. "Stan?"

  "I'm here."

  "Since you're a night owl by necessity, this should work to your advantage. Pete teaches an evening class that meets three nights a week from 7pm to 7.50pm. He's got an office hour posted for right after class, from eight to nine. You won't even have to stay up past your bedtime to see him. Feel free to use my name, although you shouldn't need to."

  "That's great, Dave – thanks a million. Now I've got just one more dumb question."

  "Only one? You're a lucky man. Go ahead."

  "What day is it?" I said.

  "Today's Wednesday, Stan. And I recommend you spend a good part of it getting some sleep. Sounds like you've been pushing too hard, as usual."

  "Yeah, I know. I'm going home as soon as we finish here. No, wait – I think I have one more stop to make, first."

The Hilton has its own parking garage, but I prefer to park someplace I can get out of in a hurry. I was able to find a space on the street, not far from the hotel's main entrance. And the main entrance was what I sat there looking at, for several minutes.

  I tried to remember the last time I'd gotten laid – not the day, but the year. I revisited my fantasies about Thorwald's naked body, and she looked fine indeed. I thought about my wife, dead these last six years, and found that didn't help at all. Finally, I let go a sigh and reached for the door handle.

  And then "Tubular Bells" started playing in the car.

  I got my phone out and looked at the caller ID. Lacey Brennan.

  "Markowski."

  "Hi, Stan – it's Lacey." No dumb supe joke this time, I noticed. Her voice had a raspy quality I hadn't heard before. A lot of crying will do that to you.

  "Hi. How're you doing?"

  "I'm assuming that's a rhetorical question." Her tone was about as light as mercury.

  "Yeah, sorry."

  "I want to talk," she said.

  "I'm listening."

  "No, I mean face-to-face. Can you meet me at the Skyliner on Route 315 outside Pittston? That's about halfway for each of us."

  I hesitated, but only for a second. Maybe two. "Sure, no problem. When do you want me there?"

  "Five minutes ago."

  Morning rush was in progress, so it was about twenty minutes before I pulled into the parking lot of the diner/truck stop/motel/local landmark that is the Skyliner. It's the only eatery – if I can call it that – around that's open twenty-four hours. I used to go there when I was a teenager sometimes, and the place was an area fixture back then. The food's pretty good diner chow, but you'd be a fool to stay in one of the motel rooms, and an even bigger fool to patronize one of the hookers who sometimes worked out of the place. Both were known to have bugs.

  It occurred to me that I didn't know what Lacey's personal car looked like, so I just went inside. A quick look around satisfied me that she hadn't arrived yet.

  The place is self-seating, so I took a booth that gave me a clear view of the door. When a waitress, who looked like Regis Philbin, asked if I wanted coffee, I said, "Absolutely." I had the feeling I was going to need a lot of coffee today. The doctors say that caffeine's no substitute for sleep, and they're right. But sometimes in my job, sleep's a luxury – and I can't afford many luxuries on my salary.