Crone's Moon: A Rowan Gant Investigation (34 page)

Ben switched off the engine and yanked the
keys from the ignition to kill the warning buzzer, then tossed them
into the console.

“I’m going to go use the restroom and grab a
coffee,” Constance announced, pushing her door open. “Anyone want
anything?”

“Make that two,” Ben told her, reaching for
his wallet.

“I’ve got it,” she replied. “Rowan?
Felicity?”

“I’ll come with you,” I told her unbuckling
and climbing out of the seat. I squeezed past Felicity, who’d yet
to answer, and put a hand on her shoulder. “Honey, anything?”

“What, oh, yes, a water,” she chirped
absently, intent on studying the faded and torn rectangles of
paper. Then, almost as an afterthought she added, “And maybe a new
map too.”

I gave her a nod that I suspect she missed
entirely, and then skirted around the nose of the van, following
after Constance. Since we were parked along the far outer edge of
the station’s lot, near the street, the store itself was a good
thirty-five yards or better from us. Mandalay waited a moment for
me to catch up, and then we fell in step with one another,
strolling across the near deserted expanse of asphalt.

“Is Felicity going to be okay?” she
asked.

I looked over and saw sincere concern in her
face. “I think so,” I replied. “This case is really the first time
she’s been through this sort of thing from my perspective. I think
we’re both having a little trouble adjusting to the change of
roles.”

She nodded. “Makes sense. Okay, so clear
something else up for me. What was that whole thing with the
whiskbroom? That some kind of WitchCraft thing or just a sudden
attack of Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder”

“It really is a spell actually,” I replied
with a slight chuckle. “It’s meant to get rid of unwanted guests.
Basically you just take your household broom and turn it bristles
up. If the magick works, the unwanted guest will leave.”

“Don’t they get a little suspicious anyway
when you scream ‘goddammit go away’?” she asked with a grin.

I laughed. “Yeah, well, I have to admit that
was my own addition. But I guess there are some instances where
that could work without the broom.”

Traffic was dying down out on the main road.
I glanced at my watch and based on the time figured that it must be
a dinnertime lull. Besides us, there were only two other vehicles
on the gas station lot. One parked on the side of the building, and
another with its lights on and sitting in a space near the front
door.

An undulating breeze whipped along the lot,
weaving its chill around the light standards and gas pumps as we
walked. It swished through as if on a whim, caressing us with its
gelid fingers, and then left as quickly as it had arrived. I found
myself suddenly wishing that I had brought a jacket.

Still, the prickly cold that was running
along my spine remained, even after the calm had returned. I
shuddered at the feeling, my mind beginning to entertain the idea
that it had not been an effect of the wind at all. As the hair on
the back of my neck began to rise, I realized that my mind was
apparently on to something, because it dawned on me that the sudden
chill had come directly from Constance.

“You have got to be kidding me…” Mandalay
said in a soft voice, more than a little incredulity wrapped around
the sentence.

“About what?” I asked, confused.

She didn’t answer, but she was beginning to
slow her pace.

We were a little better than halfway to the
door when I shot a curious glance in her direction. At that same
instant, her arm came out in front of me, extended like a barrier.
Her steadily slowing footsteps now came to a complete halt. Her
expression was deadly serious, and her eyes were locked straight
ahead.

“Go back to the van, Rowan,” she told me in
an even tone.

“What’s wrong?” I asked, confused by her
sudden change of demeanor.

“Go back to the van,” she repeated.

She moved fluidly, and her arm was no longer
in front of me. Following the motion with my eyes, I noticed she
was slipping her hand beneath the folds of her blazer. As it
disappeared under the fabric, I heard a quiet snap. She continued
speaking in a no-nonsense voice. “Tell Storm to get you two out of
here and call for backup.”

Her hand was now filled with a
forty-caliber
Sig Sauer
, and
she was starting once again to advance on the storefront. I looked
past her, through the large windows and at the brightly lit
interior. It took a moment, but my eyes finally fell on the correct
target, and I saw for the first time that which had not escaped her
finely honed attention.

“Go! Now!” she hissed over her shoulder as
she started to jog, angling toward a blind spot near the front
door.

I
was approaching the van
at just under a dead run. Even though I couldn’t see them, I could
still hear Ben and Felicity bickering on the opposite side of the
vehicle.

“Felicity, that’s not much to go on,” I heard
Ben say as I reached the front corner and started to hook
around.

“It’s better than nothing at all, Ben,” my
wife snapped in return, her voice a mix of frustration and urgency,
both vying for dominance over her tone.

I whipped around the front of the van and
almost slammed directly into her. Her back was to me, and she was
holding a scrap of paper up into the light of the streetlamp above,
animatedly tracing a route with her painted nail as she spoke, “I’m
telling you if we…”

“Whoa!” Ben barked, cutting Felicity off
mid-sentence as he grabbed her arm and yanked her to the side. His
other arm came up in a flash and brought me to an unceremonious
halt as my chest thudded against his outstretched palm. “What the
fuck, white man?!”

The impact had knocked the wind from me, and
I sputtered as I tried to catch my breath. “Constance… Backup…”

“Do what?” he asked.

I sucked in another breath and pointed back
toward the station. “The store’s being robbed,” I blurted.
“Constance needs backup.”

“Oh Gods!” Felicity exclaimed, shuffling to
look past me. “Is she okay?”

“Jeezus!” my friend rumbled at the same
instant, stepping forward and looking over the front slope of the
van as he reached for his sidearm. “Is she inside? Forget that, I
see ‘er. You got your cell phone?”

“Aye,” Felicity spoke up.

“Stay here outta sight and call
nine-one-one,” he instructed. “Tell ‘em what’s goin’ down, and let
‘em know they have two off-duty cops on the scene.”

“What are you going to do?” I queried.

“If we’re lucky, nothin’,” he replied as he
drew his sidearm and began scanning the area.

“What do you mean nothing?” Felicity asked,
shaking her head.

“Just make the call,” he returned quickly,
starting toward the near side of the station, then stopped and
muttered, “Awww, goddammit, not now…”

I peered past him and saw a car rolling to a
stop in one of the spaces at the front of the store. I could see
Constance crouched in a blind spot near the entrance, any view of
her from the inside being blocked by a pair of back-to-back
payphone pedestals. She was trying to motion to the person in the
newly arrived vehicle to stay put but to no avail. Either the woman
had yet to see her or simply wasn’t paying attention, because she
got out of the car and started toward the front door without a
care.

Behind me, Felicity was already speaking to
the 9-1-1 operator, quickly reciting the name and location of the
gas station. Ben started moving, taking off at a fast clip into the
shadows before cutting suddenly to the left and aiming for the side
of the station.

Constance was gesticulating with as much
fervor as she could while still remaining hidden from the interior
of the store. The woman had actually gone several steps along the
sidewalk before looking up, and she now noticed the gun-wielding
federal agent. Of course, having no idea who Mandalay was, she
froze in place and began to scream.

Ben was just hitting the corner of the
building and fell to a crouch at the side of an ice machine, arms
cocked with his
Beretta
firmly
gripped and aimed in front of him.

As the woman’s first fear-filled cry broke
the quiet atmosphere, the old metaphor about ‘hell breaking loose’
was instantly invoked. Her fading wail was punctuated by a muffled
pop, and that was followed rapidly by two more. The woman snapped
her head to the side, looking in what was apparently the direction
of the noise, then stared into the store through the windows. She
immediately broke into a second scream. A fleeting second later the
metal-framed door flew open, and a young man bolted through. I
couldn’t see his expression at this distance, but I could tell
simply by the way he moved that he was panicked. In one hand, he
had a paper bag and was clutching it in a death grip; in the other,
I could see a dark object that I assumed to be a pistol.

He was heading directly for the car that had
been parked in front of the store when we first arrived. He had
almost made it to the door of the vehicle when he hesitated and
looked back toward the screaming woman.

As the young man stood there, I caught my
breath and felt my pulse beginning to pound in my temples. I
couldn’t have looked away if I had wanted to, so I watched,
unblinking, the fate which was about to be revealed.

Constance came immediately up from her
crouch, weapon stiff-armed before her as she moved forward, closing
the gap. She couldn’t have been any more than twenty feet from the
young man, and she kept her pistol aimed at his center mass. Ben
was stepping out from the shadows, moving in behind her, but still
had quite a bit of distance between him and the situation.

“Stop!” Constance announced in a loud voice.
“Federal agent!”

Startled, the young man jumped and spun
toward her, throwing his arm up at the same instant, pointing it
wildly in her direction. There was a loud pop and burst of fire
from the pistol in his hand, and at the same instant, the front
window of the store sparkled with an instant spider web crack.

Before the report of his gun had even
reached its peak, the first of three bright flashes erupted from
the muzzle of Constance’s
Sig Sauer.
The rest followed in unison with a resounding trio of sharp
cracks. The young man jerked backward with each impact and then
fell, disappearing from my view behind the vehicle.

The bystander was backed against the windows,
crouched down with her hands over her ears as she shook her head
violently. She had fallen silent, apparently too frightened to
scream any longer. Constance advanced forward carefully but
quickly; her sidearm was still in hand, aimed with great purpose at
the ground in front of her. Ben was a few feet behind and to her
right, circling in with his own pistol stiffly pointed at the
downed felon. I watched as they both moved in, Constance all but
disappearing from sight on the opposite side of the vehicle while
Ben’s head and shoulders remained visible over the line of the
roof.

Behind me, Felicity had stopped talking, but
I could hear the thin strain of a tinny voice wafting into the air.
I looked back to see her staring past me at the now quiet scene.
The cell phone was resting against her shoulder and she slowly
pushed it back up beneath her hair.

In a calm monotone, she said, “Aye, I’m still
here.” Then added simply, “Yes… She shot him.”

A moment later, in the near distance, a siren
suddenly began to wail, and I looked over to see flashing red
lights barreling down the thoroughfare, heading in our direction.
Glancing back to my friends, I saw that they had moved back up onto
the sidewalk. Ben holstered his sidearm and then reached into his
pocket. A second later, he carefully slipped a cord over his head
then unclipped his badge from his belt and attached it to the
bottom of the loop.

Constance was now leaning against the
payphone pedestal, her head hanging and her doubled fist pressed
against her lips. I watched as Ben looked over at her, shot a
glance up to the shattered window and then brought his eyes back to
her. He reached up and began rubbing the back of his neck. I could
see his lips move as he said something to Constance. A moment
later, I saw her head slowly bob in the affirmative.

And then, I started breathing again.

* * * * *

Bright white flashes punctuated the
flickering red lights that fell across the front of the convenience
store. The area was cordoned off with yellow plastic tape, and
evidence technicians were snapping photos and setting out numbered
tent cards next to shell casings on the ground.

A handful of local officers were now on the
scene, from those in uniform, to plainclothes detectives. At
present, one of the uniformed officers was directing a white SUV
toward a parking place. As it passed us, I could see that it was
emblazoned with the words SAINT LOUIS COUNTY CORONER.

Constance was locked in conversation with one
of the detectives, occasionally motioning toward the pay phones or
the suspect’s vehicle. Felicity and I had been told to wait with
the van. Initially, one of the officers had asked us some cursory
questions and then said that we would eventually need to give
statements since we had been witnesses. That had been a little
better than thirty minutes ago, and lag time was not sitting well
with Felicity.

The longer we were forced to wait, the more
agitated my wife became. So, I wasn’t at all surprised that when
Ben finally broke away and walked over to check on us, she greeted
him with a hand cocked on her hip and an attitude to match the
pose.