Step to the Graveyard Easy (18 page)

The Corvette was another trap.

Distinctive, conspicuous. And D’Anzello had the plate number. How much time before every cop in California and Nevada had it on a hot sheet? An hour, two hours? Maybe not even that long….

But he had to stay mobile; on foot his chances were zero. He was no car thief—it was the Vette or nothing. Just keep driving, keep moving. Stay off the major streets and roads. Use the backstreets.

And go where?

No place to run, no place to hide.

The wetness kept running down from his forehead. More than just sweat—a salt taste at the corner of his mouth. Blood. From a deep gash in the skin over one eyebrow; probing fingers brought awareness of stinging pain. Of other hurts, too, on his face and neck and hands. All torn up from his flight through the woods.

Have to do something about that right away. Blood made him even more vulnerable, more conspicuous.

Service station ahead, not crowded, not too well lighted on the side where the restrooms were. He pulled in there, parked in as much shadow as he could find. First-aid kit in the glove box. He took it to the door marked
Men.

Inside, he locked the door and looked at himself in the cloudy mirror. Scratches, scrapes, the one gash; his face a streaky mess of sweat, dirt, blood. He washed in cold water, covered the gash with antiseptic and a bandage. His clothing wasn’t too bad—a couple of tears in the shirt, another in the jacket. He used paper towels to clean off smudges of dirt, a crimson splotch, clinging twigs and pine needles.

Better. Not so much like an accident victim.

Back into the rolling trap.

Side streets, hunting now for a bar with dark, off-street parking. Found one: the Buckhorn Tavern. The name was familiar—one of the places he’d been in earlier. Dark inside, handful of customers and a bartender who minded their own business. Cape ordered a double shot of Jack Daniel’s, tossed it off. Its heat steadied
him. He ordered another shot, single this time. The last thing he could afford to do was muddy up his thinking with too much liquor.

He asked about a public phone. The bartender pointed him to an areaway that led to the restrooms. Phone but no directory. Most taverns had a bar copy, so he went back there and asked. The bartender said maybe they had one, maybe they didn’t, he didn’t have time to go hunting. Cape slapped down two singles, his change from the drinks. That bought him a cheapjack grin and the immediate appearance of a dog-eared local directory.

He moved over to where the light was better, flipped the book open to the yellow pages. Scanned through the listings under Gardeners.

Small boxed ad on the second page: R. T. Landscaping Service.

RTLDSCP. R. T. Landscaping Sendee. R. for Rollo?

No individual’s name in the ad, no address—just a phone number, and the words “Complete Lawn Care and Garden Maintenance. Residential/Commercial.”

Cape leaned his forehead against the wall. No place to run, no place to hide, no place else to go. Think. Think!

Short, dark, pudgy like Boone Judson. R. T. Landscaping Service… residential/commercial. Lakepoint Country Club. Lakepoint, Lakepoint… something else about the country club…

My son Gary… he works part-time as a caddy…. Lilith works there, too, in their payroll department…

Justine.

Justine what? What was her last name?

Breakfast buffet waitress Friday morning, saying the name in a stiff voice, saying—

Blank.

Saying—

Come on, Cape, think! Saying—

“Will there be anything else, Ms…. Ms….”

President’s name. Dead president’s name—

Coolidge.

He tore into the directory again, this time to the white pages, the C’s.

J. Coolidge, 2294 Lakeview, S. Lake Tahoe.

He didn’t have far to drive, just a mile or so back toward State-line and then across Lake Tahoe Boulevard, but it seemed to take a long time to get there. Every car, every set of headlights, was a potential threat. So far, his luck was holding; none of them belonged to the law.

Lakeview Drive curled along a short section of shoreline in the middle of town, private homes and a few motels on the lakefront side, small apartment complexes and a scatter of houses on the inshore side. Two-two-nine-four was one of the complexes, a dozen units in two facing rows on one level; a lighted sign in front said Rest Haven Apartments. Cape parked in tree shadow down the block, returned on foot.

Behind the sign was a bank of mailboxes, each one labeled with the tenant’s name. J. Coolidge was number 5. That unit was toward the rear, and when he got there he found the front window curtained and no light leaking out at the edges.

He went up onto a tiny railed porch, thumbed the bell. Empty echoes inside. He thumbed it again, hard and long, in his frustration. Nothing, nobody home.

Justine wouldn’t still be working at the Grand, not this late. Out
somewhere for the evening. Wait around until she came home? What else could he do?

Cape came down off the porch. And then stopped, swinging his head around, when he heard the crunch of approaching steps on the path.

Kid, fifteen or sixteen, wiry build, dark brown hair in a buzz cut. The path lights were bright enough to limn his features as he neared: high cheekbones, distinctive almond-shaped eyes.

The kid slowed to a wary standstill a few feet away. “Hi. You looking for somebody?”

“Gary? Gary Coolidge?”

“That’s me. Who’re you?”

“My name’s Matt. I’m a friend of your mother’s. No, that’s not right. An acquaintance of your mother’s. We met at the Lakeside Grand the other day. She didn’t mention me?”

“Uh-uh. She invite you over?”

“No, she didn’t.”

“So how come you’re here?”

“To ask her for a favor. An important favor.”

“Yeah?” Suspicion in the almond-shaped eyes. “You look kind of messed up. Like you were in a fight or something.”

“Not a fight. Running around in the woods where I should’nt’ve been,” Cape said. “When’s your mother due home?”

“Before midnight, she said. She and Lilith went to dinner and a flick. You know who Lilith is?”

“Yes.” Midnight. Long, long time.

Gary said, “Mom tell you about me, too?”

“She talks a lot about you. Proud of you.”

“Well, I’m proud of her, too. We watch out for each other.”

“That’s the way it should be.”

“What’s this favor you want from her?”

“Her or Lilith. Or you.”

“Me?”

“She told me you caddy at the Lakepoint Country Club. So you know some of the other employees.”

“Some.”

“A landscape gardener named Rollo?”

“Rollo? Nah.”

“You sure?”

“None of the gardeners is named Rollo, I’m sure of that.”

“R. T. Landscaping Service,” Cape said.

Blank look.

“Short, pudgy, dark-skinned man. Brown eyes, thinning black hair. Drives a white Chevy Suburban with a personalized license plate—RTLDSCP. Uses drugs.”

“Oh, man… Stickface. That asshole.”

“Stickface?”

“That’s what we call him. If he ever smiled, his face’d crack in two. He tried to sell me some speed once. Right there at the club.”

“What’s his real name?”

“Torres, Targes, something like that.”

“Think, Gary. I need to know for sure.”

He thought. And shook his head. “I don’t remember.”

“First name, if it isn’t Rollo?”

“If I ever heard it, I forgot it. We just call him Stickface.”

“Any idea where he lives?”

“No. How’d I know?” Suspicion showed again in the kid’s expression. “How come you’re so interested in this guy? If it’s drugs—”

“It’s not.”

“I hate that stuff, man. I don’t want anybody uses drugs messing around my mom.”

“I swear to you, my needing to find him has nothing to do with drugs. It’s personal, and it’s urgent.”

“How come urgent?”

“Because I’m in a bad spot, and he can get me out of it,” Cape said. “Would you recognize his name if you saw it written down?”

“I dunno, maybe.”

“I’ll give you fifty dollars if you check the phone book for me.”

“Fifty! No sh—no kidding?”

“In cash.”

The kid said, still wary, “You can’t come in with me. You’ll have to wait out here.”

“No problem. Just make it fast, okay?” Cape fished a twenty and a ten out of his wallet, pressed them into Gary’s hand. “The other twenty when you come back.”

“Even if I don’t have his name?”

“Yes. But I really need it, name and address both.”

“Well, I’ll try.” Gary gestured toward a public area—lawn, benches, a tiny playground for kids—that stretched between the two rows of apartments. “You can wait over there.”

The kid was gone more than twenty minutes. Cape, sitting tensed on one of the benches, had begun to sweat and fidget by then. When he saw Gary appear from inside the lighted unit, he was up and over there in a hurry.

“No listing in the phone book, Matt. But I got his name another way.” Grinning, pleased with himself.

“Good man.”

“Lilith’s computer,” Gary said. “She works at home sometimes, she’s got all her Lakepoint files stored here. And I know her access code. She wouldn’t like it if she knew I tapped in, but for fifty bucks…”

“What’s his name?”

“Tarles, T-a-r-l-e-s. Some first name—Rolando.”

Rolando Tarles, Rollo for short. “Address?”

“Four-sixty-five Columbine Road.”

“South Lake Tahoe?”

“Yeah. I don’t know where Columbine Road is.”

“I’ve got a map in the car.” Cape handed over another twenty, added an extra ten. “Thanks, Gary. You may have just saved my ass.”

“What’d Stickface do to you, anyway?”

“Helped steal something from me that I’m going to get back, one way or another.”

“Money?”

“More important.”

“What’s more important than money?”

“Something that damn well does exist,” Cape said. “Freedom.”

Columbine Road.

Short residential street, lower-middle-class neighborhood like the one off Black Bart Road. Number 465 was the last house in the block, butted up against the fenced perimeter of a cemetery. Shake roof, redwood siding, at least fifty years old. Screened-in front porch and plenty of shrubs, flowers in neat rows—advertisement for R. T. Landscaping Service. Driveway on the fenced side, pickup truck pulled in close to a detached garage.

All of it was dark, not even a night-light showing. And no sign of the Chevy Suburban anywhere in the vicinity.

Cape said, “Shit,” between clamped teeth. He made a U-turn, cut off Columbine on the nearest cross street, and went looking for a place to abandon the Corvette. Took him fifteen minutes to find one: grammar school, teacher’s parking lot behind an ungated chain-link fence, pocket of darkness under a big acacia tree. Safe enough there until morning. By then it wouldn’t matter one way or another if it was spotted.

He found his way back to Columbine Road. Three sets of headlight beams picked him out of the dark; he walked through them and past them without hesitation, the way a resident would. None of the cars was official. Nobody hassled or paid attention to
him. A middle-aged guy walking his dog even said hello as they passed each other.

Rollo’s house was still dark, deserted. A porch light was on at the house next door, but the windows there were all black rectangles. Lights burned in the houses across the street; a woman moved behind an undraped picture window in the last one as Cape passed, but she neither glanced out nor paused. A TV set in there was tuned loud enough for the sound of canned laughter to reach all the way to the street. The woman’s attention was on the screen.

Cape climbed the steps to Rollo’s screened porch. There was a bell; he didn’t touch it. The screen door was locked, so the one behind it to the house would be, too. He backed down the steps. The undraped window across the street showed him the TV blaring away, to an empty room now. He moved quickly to the driveway, followed it back to where the pickup sat. Black lettering on the driver’s door read R. T. LANDSCAPING SERVICE. He tried the handle. Locked.

The backyard was another, smaller advertisement, cemetery-fenced on one side, tree-fenced on the other two. Dark, private. He checked the rear door to the house. Secure in the jamb, probably by a deadbolt. The window next to it was also secure; so were the windows set into the far side wall.