Gridlock: A Ryan Lock Novel (12 page)

At the front door of the house, a member of the SWAT team counted down from five with his hand. At one his thumb folded down, forming a fist, and he stepped back, out of the way of the battering ram. The door flew open on first impact. The SWAT team poured inside, guns drawn, an officer hoisting a pump-action shotgun leading the charge.

Behind them, Hill listened intently but all he could hear were the barks of the SWAT team calling to no one in particular.

Shit.

He’s gone.

We’re too late.

He started walking towards the house. The shouts went on. Then he half caught someone scream, ‘In here!’ and quickened his pace, hope rising with every step, only to fall away as he reached the entry and stepped into the dark stump of a hallway. Helmets off, guns reholstered and shoulders slumped, a couple of the SWAT team stood in what passed for the living room. A TV in one corner crackled with static.

The metallic smell of blood filled the air. At the opposite end of the room, their target, Larry Johns, slumped in an armchair. His trousers and underwear were missing. Hill could see them lying in a heap behind the chair. It didn’t take a genius to work out that Larry hadn’t been watching
Good Morning America
.

His head was still attached to his body but, from the blood patterns on his body, the chair and the floor, he was far from intact. Both testicles and his penis had been hacked off, leaving a gaping wound in his groin. The missing items were nowhere to be seen.

Outside, beyond the front yard, more law-enforcement vehicles were starting to arrive as word seeped out that the main suspect was dead – a victim, one could presume, of the real killer.

Hill glanced back to Larry Johns’s body. The head was attached but the killer had made a pretty unambiguous statement, if in a less graphic way than he had with Cindy Canyon.

A blindfold masked the eyes.

Hill didn’t dare touch it but, skirting the wads of congealed blood on the floor, he moved closer, then leaned down so that his face was level with Johns’s. The gap between the blindfold and the eye socket confirmed his hunch. The killer had gouged the man’s eyes from their sockets before blindfolding him.

The contradiction made no sense. Why remove someone’s eyes and then go to all the trouble of placing a blindfold over the empty sockets?

He pulled his BlackBerry from his pocket and made a note of it, then snapped a few quick pictures of the scene. One thing was clear: the killer wasn’t simply interested in killing Larry Johns. They were sending a message. A screwed-up, garbled, crazy message, but a message all the same.

He walked out of the house and stood on the sidewalk, his gold-on-blue FBI windcheater ensuring he was left alone. People were slowly emerging from their houses, bleary-eyed, in ragged bathrobes or shorts and T-shirts. Local cops were fanning out to secure the area around the house. A couple were beginning to canvass the neighbors Doors were being closed now. In places like this the cops were viewed with distrust and suspicion, and no one wanted to be seen speaking to one.

There was, he thought, an obvious explanation for what had happened to the man inside the house. The motive was one of the most powerful: revenge. Larry Johns had threatened and humiliated Raven Lane at the club. Then he was found dead. And not just dead but mutilated. The cutting off of his genitals emasculated him, rendered him impotent.

That still left the eyes, though. Where did gouging them out fit in? Was it something about the very act of looking? Feminist theory talked about objectifying women, about the male gaze and how it reduced women to objects of desire rather than human beings. Could that be something to do with it?

Removing the man’s genitals and eyes suggested one thing quite strongly to Hill. That the person who had done this was a woman.

But how did Cindy Canyon fit in with it? Was there a link between her and Larry Johns after all? Their bodies had been altered after death, which was significant. But the ways in which they had been altered were very different.

Assuming, for the sake of argument, that the cases were linked, there was one thing that Levon Hill was quite clear about. This was a person with a lot of rage. It was probably well concealed, hidden deep within them, but it was there, it was potent and it was overwhelming. The killer was operating in a frenzy. They might have killed before. They might not. But one thing was a hundred per cent guaranteed.

If this individual wasn’t caught, there would be more bodies.

22

When Lock walked into the kitchen, Kevin was slumped over a bowl of cereal, still upset over the fallout from Wendy’s unscheduled appearance. Wendy’s mother had not appreciated her daughter sneaking out to see him – especially not when she had turned up to a house surrounded by cops. Lock had brokered a deal that meant Raven and Wendy’s mother agreed that Kevin and Wendy should take a break from each other for a few weeks. Neither Wendy nor Kevin had seemed thrilled at the prospect and Wendy had had to be practically dragged into her mother’s car. It had taken both Lock and Ty to restrain Kevin, who had eventually retreated to bed in a sulk. This was one situation that even Superman didn’t have an answer for.

Lock grabbed some water from the fridge dispenser. Raven, dressed in sweats and with her hair pinned up, was wiping down the counters.

‘Do you have a moment?’ he asked her.

‘Sure.’ Raven followed him out of the kitchen and out of Kevin’s earshot.

‘I had a call earlier about the guy in Arizona, the one who hassled you inside the club.’

‘They caught him?’

The early-morning sunlight was streaming in through the french windows at the rear of the house. The temperature had dropped by a couple of degrees – the Santa Anas had died down, at least for now. It was the kind of mid-seventies-perfect day that drew the huddled masses west to California.

Lock took a deep breath. Delivering bad news was like ripping off a plaster: best done swiftly. ‘They found him dead this morning at a house in Tempe.’

Raven’s shoulders slumped. ‘But the guy who was here last night?’

‘They think the person they found in Tempe had been dead for a while, possibly since the night he approached you in the club. The guy last night might have been the one from the parking lot. You said they looked different, right?’

‘I think so… The guy in the lot looked a lot taller. But it wasn’t well lit out there and it happened so fast.’ She sighed. ‘So we’re back at square one?’

Lock took a moment to think her question over. ‘It ups the stakes for all of us, which means more manpower and more attention from the cops, so that’s positive. But we still have to keep our guard up. The more your stalker thinks that people are after him, the more dangerous he’ll be.’

Raven checked her Cartier watch. ‘And what will that mean?’

‘If it brings him out into the open, we’ll be waiting for him. Until then you try and go about your business as best you can.’

Raven shot him a tight smile. ‘I did have a meeting scheduled for later this morning with the old production company I used to work for. And something out of town this evening. But I’m not sure it’s a good idea with all this attention.’

Lock waited.

‘Can we go outside?’ she asked.

‘Sure.’

She stopped at the edge of the deck, resting her elbows on the edge and staring out over the cityscape. ‘When I told you I wasn’t seeing anyone, I wasn’t being entirely truthful.’

She turned to face him, then went back to staring at the view. ‘There is someone I see from time to time, but it’s more of a business arrangement – if you know what I mean.’

Lock squared his shoulders. Anyone who followed the news knew that women in Raven’s line of work often supplemented their income by partying with high rollers, whether they were Hollywood A-listers or sports stars or just guys with more money than sense. ‘You don’t have to draw me a picture.’

‘He called me this morning,’ Raven said. ‘He wants to see me in Vegas tonight. He said he was worried about me.’

‘You want to go to Vegas tonight?’ he asked her, momentarily taken aback.

‘It’s a lot of money.’

Lock nodded reluctantly. ‘Whatever you want to do. Ty can keep an eye on Kevin here and I can come with you. You shouldn’t travel alone.’

Raven turned to him with a sad smile. ‘I’ll have to clear it with my client first. He has his own security. He said there would be a private jet waiting for me at Van Nuys at four o’clock.’

But an obvious question was troubling Lock. ‘You know, if this guy has his own security, and a private jet on standby, does it not occur to you that he might have something to do with’ – he gestured to the house and garage – ‘all this?’

Raven shook her head. ‘Believe me, if he wanted me dead, I wouldn’t be here talking to you.’

‘So why isn’t his security here now?’

‘He pays me well for my time, and I make sure he gets value for money, but that’s as far as it goes. He’s not someone I want to be indebted to.’

‘Well,’ Lock said, raising his hands, ‘it’s up to you. If you want me on that plane, I’ll be there.’

‘Thanks,’ Raven said. ‘I’d better go get changed for my midday meeting.’

He watched her leave. Through the glass he could see Ty mussing Kevin’s hair. With every new revelation about Raven’s tangled life, the gnawing sense of unease grew. But it was too late now to pack up and walk away. For better or worse, he was in for the ride all the way to the finish.

23

But before any private flight to Vegas there was the matter of Raven’s first business meeting. Lock wasn’t sure what to expect from the head office of the world’s richest porn production company (dozens of toga-clad supermodels? scenes of debauchery to equal the last days of Rome?) but this sure wasn’t it.

The company’s headquarters was a two-story windowless concrete bunker two blocks east of Van Nuys Boulevard. It was flanked on one side by an industrial unit housing an aircraft-parts maintenance company and on the other by a low-rent Mexican restaurant. Like good bodyguards, wealthy adult-movie producers clearly recognized the wisdom of blending into the background.

Lock parked the Range Rover in back, and took a quick scan of the nearby cars before walking round and opening Raven’s door. She stepped out into the blazing heat, black hair frizzing at the ends with the humidity. They walked to a door at the back of the building, and Raven hit a buzzer. A camera whirred round towards them. A second later there was a click.

Lock pushed the door open and ushered Raven inside. They found themselves facing a reception area. An obese middle-aged woman, who looked as if walking upstairs would make her sweat gravy, came out from behind the reception desk and enveloped Raven in a hug.

On the way over, Raven had explained to Lock that, after she had started out in the business, she had been one of the first ‘contract girls’ for Vixen Entertainment, meaning she had made movies exclusively for them. They operated at the higher end of the industry with a revenue stream from distributing their movies via the Internet, cell phones and hotel chains that would have pleased the head of any major Hollywood studio. One thing was for sure, though: they hadn’t spent their money on their head office. Looking around at the faded linoleum and bare walls, Lock wondered what the low-end places were like.

‘Oh, honey,’ the receptionist was saying to Raven, ‘we’re all so glad you’re okay. After what happened to you yesterday, we were so worried.’

‘Thanks.’

The receptionist seemed to notice Lock for the first time. ‘New boyfriend?’ she asked Raven.

‘Security,’ Lock said, then put out his hand. ‘Ryan Lock.’

‘Cherry Brandowski,’ the receptionist said, scanning him from top to toe. ‘You ever done any acting, Ryan?’

Lock smiled. ‘The people in these things act?’ he asked her, waving at the movie posters that lined the walls. They looked like real movie posters, except they all featured naked women and the titles ranged from the comedic,
Sheepless in Seattle
, to the more straightforwardly graphic,
I Own Your Ass VI
. Clearly
I Own Your Ass I
through
V
had been sufficiently successful to merit a further sequel.

Raven frowned. ‘Believe me, it’s the women who have to do the acting most of the time.’

‘Just like real life,’ Lock observed, drawing a snort of a laugh from Cherry.

‘Is Dimitri around?’ Judging by Raven’s body language, and the way she was lifting up and down on her heels, she seemed eager to cut the conversation short. ‘He did say it was important.’

‘Yeah,’ Cherry said. ‘He’s in his office.’

Raven led the way down a long corridor off which there was an array of doors. Some were open and a variety of people sat behind desks, working on computers or on the phone, or filling in paperwork. If you took away the women on the posters, it appeared like any other business. The employees looked like those in any Hollywood production company: young, tired from the long hours, a little more casually dressed than in other parts of the corporate world, with more than the usual share of tattoos and piercings. Other than that they could have been making movies with Keanu Reeves.

The final door was unmarked. In fact, Lock had noted a complete absence of signage on any of the offices as he’d walked by. Raven knocked and, without waiting for an answer, went straight in.

From the name and the job title, Lock had been expecting a burly Greek-American with lots of chest hair and a gold medallion, puffing on a cigar. But Dimitri appeared to be in his mid-thirties, an LA fashion victim dressed in an understated combo of designer jeans and a white shirt. There were no medallions, or any other jewelery, in sight.

Raven made the introductions. Dimitri was the CEO of the company.

‘You want me to wait outside?’ Lock asked.

‘No, we’re good,’ Raven said, aiming a smile at Dimitri, who shrugged that he didn’t mind either way.

Of course he had to be with Raven right now. She couldn’t have gone to the meeting unescorted. He also sensed that not only did she and Dimitri have a history but that he was being used. As he saw it, Raven had hired help, and not the kind of dumb meathead who usually turned up as boyfriend or manager. She had brought the real deal: a man who had killed.