Crone's Moon: A Rowan Gant Investigation (5 page)

“Yeah.” I gave him a nod. “I need to
have Patrick order me some more
CAO
MX Two’s
anyway. It’ll save me a
call.”

“You and those damn double maduros,” my
friend muttered.

“What’s wrong with MX Two’s?”

“Too strong, white man,” he told me.

“Hey, I like what I like.”

“Yeah,” he said as he tugged open the door to
the glass enclosure and motioned for me to go through. “I just wish
you’d like somethin’ else.”

I shook my head as I entered the somewhat
air-conditioned waiting area. “What does it matter?”

His matter-of-fact reply came as he followed
me through the door. “‘Cause I don’t like ‘em.”

“So?” I queried, stabbing the call button for
the elevator then looking at him with a puzzled expression. “You
aren’t the one smoking them.”

“Exactly,” he replied. “So if you don’t smoke
the ones that I like, then it makes it kinda hard for me to bum
them off ya’ now doesn’t it?”

“Ohhh, now I get it.” I nodded slowly. “You
want me to smoke something you like so you don’t have to buy
any.”

“Damn straight,” he chuckled. “Cigars are
expensive.”

“So quit.”

My friend looked back at me like I had
suddenly grown an extra head. “Yeah, right. I already told ya’ once
today ta’ quit yankin’ my chain.”

A sickly electromechanical ding announced the
arrival of the elevator car. The signal was followed by the scrape
and groan of the doors parting down the center with a moment’s
hesitation then sliding laboriously open. Looking through the
widening gap, we could see the car still in motion as it rose the
last few inches and then halted with a clunk and a shudder.

“Oh yeah,” Ben announced. “This looks real
safe.”

“You want to take the stairs?” I queried.

“I’m thinkin’ maybe yeah,” he replied.

“The stairs are outside.”

“Yeah, so?”

I held my arms out and glance around. “Hot
out there, cool in here. Well, cooler anyway.”

“Lemme see… Hot or splattered? Hot or
splattered?” He motioned with his hands as if he were physically
weighing the two options. “Considering the conversation we just
had, I’m not all about splattered if ya’ know what I mean. Elevator
or not.”

“I’m with you on that one.”

He stepped back toward the glass door of the
waiting area and tugged it open. At that moment, as if cued by some
unseen director, our ears were met with what had to be the single
most panicked scream I had ever heard in my life to date.

T
raining and experience
instantly became the primary driving forces behind my friend. With
a quick jerk, he flung the door wide and propelled himself through
the opening, each of his motions deliberate and purposeful. His
head twisted from side to side as he scanned the area. His right
hand shifted immediately to his hip and rested on the grip of his
nine-millimeter sidearm.

In the few seconds that followed the initial
cry, time seemed to expand. Adrenalin injected into my system, this
time for reasons wholly unrelated to heights, and in that instant,
I experienced a complete lack of coordination. My brain began
issuing commands that my body wasn’t ready to accept but was forced
to execute anyway. In a series of half-stumbling steps I twisted
away from the elevator, aiming myself toward the exit. I reached
for the door just as it was swinging shut, only to completely miss
it with my hand and drive my shoulder against the metal frame
instead. Before I could elicit my own surprised yelp of pain, a
second scream echoed through the parking structure.

I had believed that the first wail was the
most panicked I had ever heard. Without a doubt, the second one
made that assessment null and void.

“Gotta be down!” Ben declared, bolting for
the stairs at the opposite end of the elevator enclosure.

I ignored the stab of pain in my shoulder and
ran after my friend. I apparently hadn’t struck the doorframe hard
enough to do any actual damage to myself, so it was really nothing
more than an annoyance anyway. Ben was already rounding the first
landing and taking the stairs in fours by the time I arrived at the
top of the flight.

I was coming down from the initial adrenalin
rush, and my coordination, while far from perfect, was returning.
Still, not being possessed of the expanded stride of the giant
Indian in front of me, I grabbed the rail and took the stairs in a
more manageable two-at-once pace. I heard him come to a stop below
as I quickly rounded the landing and shot down the second flight,
hitting the bottom just as a third, more muffled scream
sounded.

“Goddammit!” Ben exclaimed. “With the fuckin’
echo, I can’t tell for sure where it’s comin’ from!”

Again, a tortured voice cried out, this time
with distinguishable words appended to the dire scream. “HELP!
Somebody help me, please!”

Ben immediately cocked his head to the side
then whipped around and flew by me, shouting, “Next level!”

I stepped back onto the lowest step for a
split second to allow him past and then threw myself forward while
keeping a firm grip on the handrail, using the momentum to swing me
around to the next set of stairs.

Our frantic footsteps were thumping in the
stairwell, inciting a disjointed rhythm that resounded through the
concrete parking structure. Ben was well ahead of me, and I heard
him hit the next level before I even reached the landing. I could
hear him shuffling around as he searched for the source of the
commotion. A pair of seconds later I bounded off the stairs just in
time to see my friend wrapping his large fist around the grip of
his pistol and sliding it out of the belt rig.

“Nine-one-one, Row.” He called to me over his
shoulder as he started across the yellow-striped concrete. “Tell
‘em officer needs assistance, code one.”

By the time he got the second sentence out of
his mouth, he had broken into a dead run.

I pulled my cell phone from my belt and
thumbed off the key lock then stabbed in the emergency number. I
could hear an immediate click from the device as I placed it to my
ear.

“Nine-one-one, what is the nature of your
emergency?” came a tinny, female voice.

It occurred to me that at this point that I
wasn’t exactly sure what the emergency was. I looked up and in the
direction Ben had run, looking for whatever he had spied. My friend
had covered a fair amount of distance in the few seconds that had
passed and was still barreling full tilt up the inclined parking
lot. Well beyond him, near the opposite corner, I could see an
intense struggle going on between a young blonde woman and an
individual who was bear hugging her from behind. They were
positioned near the back of a vehicle that was parked in the
traffic lane with the trunk lid and driver-side door wide open.

They spun in a circle as the attacker slammed
the woman against the side of the car, slipping slightly out of
view, so I bobbed and shifted to see around the support pylons. The
aggressor in the altercation was nondescript enough to defy
identification, but based on stature and what few details I could
make out, such as hair length, I assumed the person to at least be
male.

They made a half-spin outward then back,
bouncing against the rear quarter of the sedan. As they turned, I
caught a quick glimpse of the woman’s face. For some reason, she
looked familiar to me, but at this distance that didn’t really mean
anything.

“Nine-one-one, what is the nature of your
emergency?” the woman at the other end repeated, capturing my
attention.

“I’m… I’m not sure,” I stuttered and then
began spilling the information as quickly as I could. “I’m calling
for Detective Benjamin Storm with the city homicide division. He
said to tell you ‘officer needs assistance, code 1’.”

“What is your location, sir?”

The old adage about not being able to look
away from a train wreck passed through my mind as I continued
staring, frozen in place and mesmerized by the crime playing out in
front of me. I forced myself to quickly shift my glance to my
friend, checking his progress, and then leveled my gaze back on the
fight.

Due to the design of the structure, a low
wall and cable barrier separated Ben from them. He was still
running up the incline and would need to hook around the end before
he would be within close enough proximity to confront the
situation. He still had several feet to go before he could even
make that turn.

My mind raced as I wondered whether or not we
should have come at this from the next level up, but it was too
late for that now.

“Sir, your location?” the voice barked from
the phone.

“I’m sorry… The old Peerless-Cross department
store parking garage, orange level,” I replied.

“Is the detective injured?” she asked.

“No. He’s trying to stop a carjacking, or a
mugging or something, I’m not…”

I was interrupted by yet another scream that
sounded vaguely like ‘help’, and I watched as the young woman broke
partially free and suddenly lurched forward. Her attacker managed
to maintain a grip on her arm and yanked it hard, knocking her off
balance. She fell backward against the car, and as she came to rest
against the fender, the man swung around in front of her. Without
hesitation, he drew his arm back and landed a fist square into the
young woman’s face. Her head snapped back, and even at this
distance, I could see crimson blood running from her nose.

“Damn!” I exclaimed and then remembering that
the phone was still to my ear added, “He just hit her in the
face!”

He drew back and hit her a second time then
grabbed her by the hair and dragged her to the back of the vehicle.
In a rough motion he rolled her into the trunk then slammed the lid
shut and raced back to the open driver-side door.

“Sir, can you tell me what is happening?” the
operator asked.

The audible thunk was still fading as Ben’s
authoritative voice boomed outward, ricocheting from the angular
surfaces of the garage. “POLICE! STEP AWAY FROM THE VEHICLE NOW!”
He was just reaching the corner and beginning to make the turn as
he shouted, running with his weapon hand extended and trying to
draw a bead on the man next to the vehicle.

“Sir, are you still there?”

“Gods! I think it’s a kidnapping!” I
exclaimed aloud, making the statement to myself as much as to the
9-1-1 operator.

The attacker had been pre-occupied with the
struggling woman and only now noticed Ben barreling around the
corner. He ducked quickly into the driver’s seat, audibly wrenching
the vehicle into gear and gunning the engine even before closing
the door.

Tires squealed as the car sped forward,
climbing up the incline toward the level above us. Ben slipped out
of view behind a support pylon then reappeared on the opposite
side, pistol stiff-armed before him and taking aim at the vehicle.
I saw him snap his head in disgust as he realized it was too
dangerous to take a shot with the victim in the trunk. He followed
the tail of the car with his eyes as it screeched into the turn
then whipped his gaze around and darted to his right toward the
downward corkscrew of the exit lane on the corner of the
building.

“Sir?!” I heard the faint but frantic voice
issue from the cell phone and realized that I had allowed my hand
to drop away from my ear.

I brought the device back up and began
speaking, “He just shoved her into the trunk and sped off. Ben is
chasing after them.”

“Are you still in the parking garage,
sir?”

“Yeah,” I responded, realizing suddenly that
I had to be her eyes. “Yeah, he was heading up, so Ben took off for
the exit spiral. He’s on foot.”

“Sir, we are on the line with dispatch, and
they have units responding to your location. I need you to stay
with me.”

I could hear the roar of the vehicle crossing
above me on the next level, revving up then fading as it passed. My
view of Ben was obscured by a row of cars occupying the spaces near
the center of the level, so I began running up the incline. I was
moving slowly at first then began increasing my pace as I tried to
get in a better position to see the exit ramp. There was a squeal,
another roar, and then the crunch of metal against concrete.
Following that, there was nothing.

I broke past the line of cars and stumbled to
a halt, directing my gaze through an empty parking space. In the
distance, I could see Ben’s form in a three-quarter silhouette as
he stood at that level’s opening to the exit, weapon at the
ready.

I started to wonder if the vehicle above had
crashed into one of the dividing walls, but then the relative
silence was punctuated by the protests of its overtaxed engine as
it started down the spiraling ramp.

The car suddenly came into view at the
opening, and the tortured wail of scraping metal filled my ears. A
pair of bursts from Ben’s pistol abruptly punctuated the grating
noise as he fired into the windshield of the vehicle.

I watched in horror as the front fender
clipped my friend and sent him flying backward. The scrape of sheet
metal against concrete began to fade as the vehicle continued down
the ramp.

“He’s been hit!” I shouted into the cell
phone as I began moving once again, breaking into a run toward my
downed friend. “Ben’s been hit!”

I knew the operator was asking me something
because I heard her voice issuing from the speaker, but I no longer
had the device to my ear. I pumped my legs and arms as hard as I
could, pushing myself up the incline and hooked around the parked
vehicles at the end of the row. I had a lot of distance to cover,
and I wasn’t going to be setting any records for sprinting. By the
time I was within forty or so feet of the arc, the exit came once
again into view.