Jack Daniels Six Pack (15 page)

“So you could put your life on hold to fly out here and take care of me? You think I’d allow that?”

Mary Streng was the queen of self-reliance. Dad died when I was eleven. Heart attack. The day after we put him in the ground, Mom got a job with the CPD. She started in Records, eventually moved up to Dispatch, and by the end of her twenty years she’d risen to detective third class and worked property crimes.

No, she wouldn’t have allowed me to fly out there.

“You still should have called.”

“I saw a show about this on
Oprah
. Adult-age children, caring for their feeble parents.”

“You’re far from feeble, Mom.”

“Role reversal, they called it. There was a woman on who changed her mother’s diapers. I’ll eat my .38 before I let it come to that, Jacqueline.”

“Please, Mom. You don’t have to talk like this.”

“Well, that’s still a ways off. All I did was bruise my hip. I can still get around. It just limits some of the things I can do with that naughty Mr. Griffin.”

“Mom . . .”

“Look, I just wanted to tell you. I have to go now.
Real Sex 38
is almost on HBO. I’ll call you soon. Love you.”

And she hung up.

Sleep was miles away.

I remember my father like I remember old movies; just a few quotable lines and a general impression. He died when I was too young to get to know him as a person.

But my mom . . . my mom was everything to me. She was my best friend, my mentor, my hero. She was the reason I became a cop.

Mothers shouldn’t be allowed to get old and fragile.

I purposely pushed it out of my head to avoid getting maudlin. Instead, I focused on my Lunch Mates appointment tomorrow. They’d be taking a picture, and I still looked like I’d gone a few rounds with Mike Tyson. What guy would go out with a woman with bruises all over her face?

I got up and went to the bathroom, checking the vanity. Maybe a little foundation here, a little concealer there . . .

So the face would be okay, but what to wear?

I mentally ran through my wardrobe. My best outfit was the Armani. I normally couldn’t afford designer clothing, and had picked this up at an outlet store. The price tag was hefty, even with the discount, but it gave me confidence when I put it on. I had several blouses that matched, and wondered if I should go with the loose silk one, or the tighter cotton one.

Only one way to find out.

I went to the closet.

Chapter 19

E
XCITEMENT HAS GIVEN WAY TO FRUSTRATION,
and finally anger. Juices flowing, locked and loaded, he’s only moments away from sneaking out of the closet to pounce on her, when the phone rings.

He endures a syrupy conversation between Jack and her mom, so thick in parts that he feels like gagging. Then he waits stock-still for Jack to go back to sleep.

But she doesn’t.

The little bitch stares at the ceiling, tossing and turning like her panties are a few sizes too small.

For an hour, he waits.

And for an hour, Daniels refuses to snooze.

Every few minutes she’ll close her eyes, and just when he’s ready to move, they’ll spring open again.

The most infuriating part is that her gun is right next to her on the nightstand. He knows that Jack will shoot him before he can even get the door open.

He could try to fire through the closet, but that’s too risky. It’s only a .22, and if he misses, he’s pretty sure that Jack won’t.

He grinds his teeth in rage, then forces himself to stop because it’s noisy. The muscles in his neck and back are cramping. His eyes are beginning to blur from peeking through that tiny hole. And worst of all, he has to piss again.

Then, like an answered prayer, Jack gets out of bed and goes to the bathroom. Away from her gun. The time to strike is now.

He’s about to ease open the closet when the bitch is back again. But instead of going to bed, she’s coming this way.

The Gingerbread Man stifles a giggle. Imagine Jack’s shock when she opens up her closet and he shoves a gun in her face.

Standing erect, he grips the pistol and prepares to spring.

Chapter 20

I
WAS HEADED FOR THE CLOSET
when I remembered my new sweater. It was a brown wool pullover, L.L.Bean, and it made me look soft and feminine. That would work just fine, and then I could save the Armani for the actual date, assuming I get one.

I went over to my dresser to find the sweater, along with a pair of jeans. Satisfied I wouldn’t look like another desperate nine-to-fiver for my picture tomorrow, I turned to go back to bed, when something made the hair on my neck stand up.

Someone was in the closet.

I wasn’t sure how I knew. A vaguely defined sense. An alarm on an instinctive, subconscious level. But I felt paralyzed, a deer in headlights, and my stomach dropped down to my ankles.

Then, action.

Hoping I didn’t give myself away during my brief catatonic pause, I took two steps toward the nightstand and my gun.

Like a whisper, the closet door rolled open behind me. My intruder yelled, “Don’t move!”

I moved anyway. I dove for the pistol, my hand wrapping around the butt just as the shot rang out. I felt a sudden pressure in my thigh, like I’d gotten kicked.

I belly flopped on the bed and rolled, gun in hand, squeezing off two shots in the general direction of the closet. A shadowy figure ducked the bullets and scurried out my bedroom door.

Keeping my gun trained on the doorway, I felt behind me for the lamp on the nightstand and switched it on.

My leg was covered with blood.

The entry wound was four inches above my knee, on the inside of the thigh. The flow was steady, but not pulsing. There was no pain, only numbness. But the pain would come, I was sure of that.

I picked up the phone to dial 911, but there wasn’t any dial tone.

“Hi, Jack.”

It hit me almost as hard as the bullet had. This wasn’t some burglar, after my cash and VCR. It was him—the Gingerbread Man. And he was on the phone in my kitchen. I hit the disconnect button twice, but couldn’t get a dial tone with the extension off the hook.

“Hello, Charles.”

“How do you—oh, you must have traced the prescription. Clever, Jack. But you have to know I wouldn’t be dumb enough to leave my real name.”

His voice was soft, gravelly.

“Yeah, you’re a regular Einstein. How long were you stuck in that closet, sitting on my dirty laundry?”

“I hope I didn’t hit an artery. I wouldn’t want the fun to end so soon.”

“Maybe you should come in here and check for yourself.”

“I’m not going anywhere. I’ll check on you soon enough. After you’ve lost some blood, and your reactions have slowed down.”

The pain hit. Red and angry, making my vision swim. It felt as if I’d been impaled by a white-hot pickax. I held the phone between my ear and shoulder and clamped my hand down over the wound. Hopefully someone in the building heard the shots.

“I hope you stick around.” Speaking through my teeth. “Cops should be here any second.”

“Why should they come? A few loud bangs? Could have been a television turned up too loud, or a car backfiring.”

“I’m calling from my cell phone right now.”

“You mean this one, in your purse next to the microwave?”

Dammit. I tried to sit up, my bed soggy with blood. The killer was right. If I lost too much, I’d pass out. Then he’d come back and finish the job.

“Ooh, look—pictures. This must be Mom. Maybe when I’m done with you, I’ll take a trip to Florida. She fell, I understand. So sad. But I bet I can get her on her feet again.”

I bit back my response, focusing all my energy into getting off the bed. The pain made me cry out, but I managed to get on my feet and limp over to my dresser. I pulled out a braided belt and looped it around my leg, over the wound.

“What do you think, Jack? Should I pay Mom a visit?”

“You know what I think, Charles?” I jerked the tourniquet tight and winced. The room began to spin. “I think you’re a sad, small little man who didn’t get enough love when he was a baby. Either that, or you were dropped on your head.”

He giggled.

“You don’t know what you’re talking about. People like me are labeled as psychotics. But it’s a cruel world, Jack. Only the strong thrive. And I’m one of the strong. I’m no more psychotic than a shark, or a lion, or any other predator at the top of the food chain. And I’m head and shoulders above you and the rest of the world because I know what I want, and I know how to take it.”

“Dropped down a whole flight of stairs, it sounds like.”

I had to sit, or risk passing out. The pain was a writhing, living thing, full blown and making any movement agony.

“You sound sleepy, Jack. Maybe you should lie back, take a little nap.”

It didn’t seem like bad advice to me. My breath was coming a little quicker, and I was cold, but beyond the pain a kind of peace was settling in. A nap might do me good.

“Shock,” I said aloud.

I wiped some sweat off my face and gave my cheek a slap. I was going into hypovolemic shock, a condition caused by extensive fluid loss. If I passed out, I was dead.

But in my condition, there was no way I could attack him. So what the hell could I do?

I had more bullets in my dresser. I half hopped, half dragged myself over to the drawer and replaced the two rounds I’d fired. I had a plan, kind of, but to make it work I had to keep him distracted.

“So what’s the real reason you’re killing these girls, Charles? Did your scoutmaster get too frisky on a camping trip?”

“Cliché, Jack. Everyone wants to look for the reason. Like there’s a switch that can be turned on to make a person a killer. But maybe it has nothing to do with environment, or genetics. Maybe I simply enjoy it. I know that I’ll enjoy giving you my special present. Think I can use that bullet hole in your leg?”

“Possible,” I mumbled, pulling myself to the door. “It’s a really small hole.”

My bedroom led out into a short hall. The kitchen was to the left, out of view. But that wasn’t my goal. It was a straight shot into the living room, and to my window with the view looking out over Addison.

“You little bitch.” Men never took teasing about their penis size well. “I’m going to make you scream so loud, your throat bleeds.”

“Promises, promises.” I held my gun in both hands, took aim, and fired four shots into my window.

The glass exploded outward, hopefully peppering the sidewalk below. It was night, and my neighborhood was always crawling with barhopping kids. If that didn’t warrant a call to 911, I didn’t know what else would.

Apparently my assailant thought the same thing.

“We’ll finish this later, Jack.” His voice was curt. “See you soon.”

And he finally hung up the phone. I cocked my ear and heard my front door slam shut.

I was still on the floor, gun clenched in my fist and fighting to stay awake, when the cops arrived.

Chapter 21

E
VERYONE AGREED I’D BEEN LUCKY.

The bullet entered my thigh at the sartorius muscle and exited through a muscle called the gracilis. The wound was clean, without bullet fragmenting or ricocheting, narrowly missing the femoral artery. I needed three units of blood, but the scar would be minimal. I should be out of bed in a day or so.

Since my arrival at the hospital last night I’d been reconstructing the entire episode in my head, trying to remember every detail of our conversation. Herb helped, taking everything down, asking questions to help jar my memory.

We moved on the leads quickly.

First, my mom was effectively protected. At the onset I’d insisted upon nothing less than moving her to a safe house. Mom would have none of it, naturally. We compromised; she would stay at a friend’s house for a few days. I didn’t have to ask to know that she meant the ubiquitous Mr. Griffin. I met him once last year; he was stooped over, walked with a cane, and had arthritis in both hands. A far cry from the man my mother described as “Insatiable—he’s like a machine.”

Hopefully he’d mind her bad hip.

My door showed no signs of forced entry, nor did the door to the apartment building. He could have somehow gotten a key, or more likely, knew how to pick locks.

Every tenant in the building was questioned, and someone had buzzed in an unknown maintenance man earlier that day to work on the furnace. This was being checked out.

My apartment was gone over with a fine-toothed comb, literally. A great deal of excitement was generated over the discovery of some semen stains on the bedroom carpet, until I reminded everyone that I used to have a sex life.

All fingerprints found were either mine or Don’s. There were enough hairs and fibers picked up to take weeks to sort through, and I wasn’t very optimistic. Even if they did manage to find one of the killer’s hairs out of the several thousand vacuumed up, it wouldn’t help too much—unless he had his name and address written on it.

I installed a burglar alarm.

In a tremendous show of faith in me, or as some saw it, a tremendous lack of ambition, Captain Bains refused to bend to political pressure and kept me on as head of the case. His logic was simple. I was the strongest link to the killer. Chances were high that the Gingerbread Man would contact me again.

A round-the-clock surveillance was begun on me, and I received a cellular phone with their number on speed dial. Three teams would rotate the watch, and I was to inform them of everywhere I went. The code word we’d picked was “peachy.” If I was in trouble, I’d use the code word and the cavalry would come rushing in.

I was picking at a hamburger that tasted like it had been steamed, when Herb came into my room, his fourth visit in twenty-four hours.

“I see I’ve arrived coincidentally at dinnertime.” He pulled up a chair.

“Some coincidence. You’re the one who filled out my menu card.”

“Is it good?”

“I’m not sure. Somehow they’ve managed to drain every nuance of flavor from it.”