Psycho Save Us (26 page)

Another dead
body was in the kitchen, and another splattered all over the wall in the
bedroom.

“God damn,” he
laughed, lowering his gun.  “If I’d known you guys were gonna have
this
much fun tonight, I would’a followed you assholes.”

At the very end
of the hall, he found a room that was mostly empty except for a space heater
and a scattering of small children’s toys tossed helter-skelter on the floor. 
A ceiling fan blew lonely for no one.  A Marilyn Manson poster adorned one
wall, but the rest of the walls were naked.

Spencer walked
back to the bedroom and approached the body of the man lying on the other side
of the bed.  Beside him was a paper bag.  He guessed there was one of three
things inside: booze, drugs, or money.  It was the latter.  Four grand in
hundred-dollar bills.

He shoved the
money into his hoodie’s belly pocket and knelt by the body to check it, laying
the shotgun across his knee.  It looked like a twenty-year-old skinny gangsta
wannabe.  He wore gold chains and a long silver necklace with a dollar sign
wreathed in diamonds.  A single bullet had entered his chest.  He wasn’t
bleeding that much on the inside, which meant it was a very bad story for his
insides.  Or was it?  Spencer reached out to check for a pulse.  Just as he was
realizing that he might be feeling a faint beat, the eyelids parted, and
Spencer pressed the shotgun to the kid’s forehead.

“Help…” the
wannabe whimpered.  His facial expression never changed.  If he didn’t have
enough energy to move his body or face, then he didn’t have long.  “Help…help
me…I…”

One of the
chains on the thug’s chest held a cross. 
Of course, because what sort o’
gangster would he be if he didn’t worship the Almighty?
 Spencer reached
down and lifted the golden cross, held it up to his face so the thug could see. 
“Any sins to confess, my son?”

The eyes were
pleading.  Drool fell from his lips, drool that was slightly red.  In the
faintest of whispers, he said, “Help me…just…please…”

“Nuh-uh.  Don’t
work like that, son.  I need me some sins confessed.  Now, you’re shot pretty
bad and you’re probably gonna be meeting Tupac pretty soon.  You can confess
your sins an’ meet him with a clear conscience.  Or, you can take your chances
and end up in hell with only Insane Clown Posse fans to keep ya company.  An’
those
are some dumbasses.”

“Please,” the
thug whimpered.  His eyes glistened.  There was perhaps enough moisture for
tears.  Perhaps.

“The Bible says
we’re all bound in error, homey,” Spencer said.  “You won’t be the first fella
to confess somethin’ he ain’t proud of.”

“Please…just…”

“What’s it gonna
be, nigga?”

The eyes closed
for good.  Yet still, the lips moved.  “Rainbow…Rainbow Room…don’t
know…talk…Yevgeny…Yevgeny…” 

“Yevgeny?  I’m
hearing Yevgeny?”

“Yeah…yeahhhhh…”

“Yevgeny who?”

“Served
time…with Yevgeny…my boy…he’s my boy…”

“I’m sure you’re
good friends,” Spencer said hastily.  “What’s Yevgeny’s last name?”

Nothing but a
faint hiss came from the man’s teeth, but then the lips moved a little.  Spencer
leaned in, put his ear right next to the dying man’s lips.  He heard something
so low it could scarcely be called a whisper.  Something like
Tiddov
or
tits
off
.  There was a last breath.  Then a loud, low groan passed from the
thug’s nether regions, and the room was filled with an acrid odor.

There were three
sharp, violent spasms from the thug’s body, and he went silent.  Spencer held
his nose and stood to leave, but paused to watch the body go through two more
sharp spasms. 
Somebody taught him how to walk, how to talk, how to read and
how to write
. 
They taught him how to add, subtract, multiply and divide
. 
Probably taught him how to apply for a job, too
. 
And now he’s here
. 
He gave his last words to me
. 
I breathed in the last breath that he
breathed out
. 
An’ who the fuck am I?

It was one of
those thoughts that had Dr. McCulloch write down a word in his file that
Spencer thought rather interesting:
pensive
.  Dr. McCulloch might’ve
been onto something there.  At such moments when others would be shocked or
sickened, Spencer was dreamy, wistfully thoughtful, and often found humor.

Spencer broke
the spell on himself and moved quickly through the rest of the house, checking
cupboards for any extra cash or drugs that would be easy to sell later.  He was
constantly looking out the windows for the headlights he knew would be coming,
and listened for the sirens he knew would be blaring. 
Or maybe not
. 
Not
if they come silently like they did at Hillside
.  Even knowing this might
happen, he didn’t immediately leave.

In the kitchen, Spencer
removed a few suspicious-looking metal containers.  He found a blue Folgers
Coffee can containing five hundred dollars and a bag of what looked like the
ol’ aurora borealis (PCP), if he was any judge, and he was.  He dropped the
cans on the floor after he’d gathered their contents and was headed for the
back door.

Then, he heard
the front screen door open.  Someone was stepping inside.  “APD!” they
shouted.  A woman.  “If anybody’s in here come out with your hands up!”  A few
seconds passed while Spencer waited beside the refrigerator in the kitchen.  He
knelt, shotgun at the ready.  “Call an ambulance, I’ve got more bodies inside
the house,” she called back to someone else, probably her partner.

The distance
between Spencer and the back door was maybe five steps when he’d first made out
the woman’s voice.  There was a straight line-of-sight through the living room
to the kitchen, where the back door was.  If he stood up right then and went
for it, there was a better than excellent chance that the officer would see
him, especially if she had already dared to step inside.

“Anybody in
here?”

“ ‘Step into my
parlor,’ said the spider to the fly,” Spencer called out.  “ ‘Tis the prettiest
little parlor that you ever did spy.’ ”  If they had him surrounded and he was
going to die (and he
would
fight to the death to keep his promise of
never returning to the pen), then he would at least have some fun with it.

There was
silence for a moment.  Then Spencer heard the lady officer mutter the word
shit
. 
Then she mumbled something low, probably into her radio.

“Come
out of the house, walk backwards with your hands up where I can—”

“No, no, silly! 
Why do
you
come
in
?”

No response.

“C’mon, live a
little!”

No response.

“You know, they
say a coward dies a thousand deaths!”

No response.

David knew they
were supposed to wait for backup, but the body in the front yard had changed
things.  If the man lying facedown was still alive then he obviously needed
medical attention very soon.  There was no guarantee that he wasn’t an innocent.

They approached
after calling in the body and requesting an ambulance.  David had paused at the
sight of black Nissan sedan.  He registered it mentally, realized it was
Hulsey’s, but discounted that little weirdness right away as he took the lead,
moving by cover around the Expedition until he and Beatrice came to the body. 
Beatrice had moved wordlessly up the porch and pressed up to the wall beside
the door. 

David checked
the man in the yard.  No breathing, no pulse.  David had just stood up when
Beatrice had called out, identifying herself as APD.  He winced when he heard
her do that.  He wished she hadn’t, but perhaps she had felt it necessary to
keep the heads down of anyone who might be inside and thinking of taking a
potshot.

“Call an ambulance,
I’ve got more bodies inside the house,” Beatrice hollered at him.

David had his
radio out and was doing just that when his partner hollered for anyone inside
to identify themselves.

That’s when he
heard the challenge issued.  “ ‘Step into my parlor,’ said the spider to the
fly.”  David’s blood went cold for a second.  He looked up at Beatrice on the
porch, and she looked at him with an “oh no” look on her face.  A cowboy.  They
had a God damn cowboy on their hands and he was willing to die.  “ ‘Tis the prettiest
little parlor than you ever did spy.’ ”  The voice was sweet and taunting, like
a little girl teasing the person who was
it
in a game of
hide-and-go-seak.

“Shit,” Beatrice
hissed.

They waited a
moment.  David moved up slowly to the other side of the door, his pistol at
ready-low.  Beatrice called out another order, but halfway through it they
received a fresh taunt from the maniac inside.  “No, no, silly!  Why don’t
you
come
in
?”  David looked at his partner.  Beatrice looked unnerved. 
They’d seen some shit in their time, but this scene, this taunt, the genuinely
humored voice—even David had to admit it was a bit much.  “C’mon, live a
little!”

With his right
hand, David silently signaled for them to stay put.  They were dealing with a
volatile individual here.  Beatrice nodded her agreement.

Where’s that God
damn backup?

“You know, they
say a coward dies a thousand deaths!”

Where is it?

David did
exactly what he’d been trained to do at the academy, in all his pistol courses,
and in all his stress courses.  He breathed in for a count of four, held it for
four seconds, and then exhaled for four seconds.

The doorframe
exploded a few inches above his head before he ever arrived at a completely
calm state of mind.  Splinters ripped into his face, causing him to fall back. 
The size of the explosion and the sound that came from the house left no doubt
in David’s mind that it was a shotgun.  A second shot ripped through the center
of the screen door.  Steel pellets slammed into the porch and sent more
splinters at his face.

David peeked his
gun around the corner with one hand and fired blindly, hoping that if the
maniac was charging then he’d either hit or stall him.  He fired several times,
never counting the rounds he let off.  When he finished, he touched his face
with his left hand, and it came away with blood on it.  The pain was like
intense wasp stings all over his left cheek, and he worried that bits of his
face had been torn off.  He wouldn’t know until he checked a mirror.

“Beatrice!” he
yelled.  “You hit?”  No response.  “Bee?”  Specks of wood had gone into his
eyes, he couldn’t keep them open, and what he could see was blurry.  “Bee, talk
to me!  Are you hit?  You with me, Bee?  Bee!”

“
Ffffffffffuuuuuuuuuuuuck!
”
someone shrieked.  He knew it had to be Beatrice, but the voice wasn’t familiar
at all.

David rubbed at
his eyes profusely.  His heart was hammering in his chest.  “Beatrice!  You
hit?”

“
Shit yes!
”

“Where?”

“My fucking
hand!  My fingers are gone, Dee!”

In all the
craziness, David had forgotten what ought to come next.  He touched his radio
and shouted into it.  “Officers down!  Repeat, officers down at 12 Townsley
Drive!  Send more ambulances!”

David wanted to
walk over to Beatrice, but if he crossed the doorway (what many LEOs called the
“fatal funnel”) then he’d be exposing himself to any gunmen inside.  Beatrice
was moaning, but said nothing else.  He told her to stay calm, to keep taking
deep breaths, that it would all be all right soon.

Then, from
somewhere in the woods to his right, David caught words on the wind.  They came
from someone retreating.  “Fast as fast can be, you’ll never catch me!”

“
Fuuuuuuuck
you
!” Beatrice screamed.

When the vehicle
stopped, Oni was the first one to get out.  No one else moved.  Kaley sat
perfectly still with only a glance back at her sister, who still hadn’t opened
her eyes.  The last street sign she’d seen read Umway Street.

We’re on Umway
Street
,
she thought.  Though again, she didn’t know of it, and what she would do with
this information was quite beyond her.

Directly ahead
was a large brick house, one that looked like it had once been impressive but
was now as run down as the rest of the neighborhood they had passed through.  A
number of deciduous trees just starting to lose some of their leaves were lined
on each side of the street like sentries, all of them evenly spaced, watching
to make sure Kaley and the other two girls did not escape.  Probably once,
there had been great order in this neighborhood.  Those trees had been planted
in just such a way.  But the neighborhood was now likely leagues away from what
it had been.  Trash along the gutters told Kaley that it had been quite a while
since this area had been on a city street sweeper’s regular route.