The Thrill of the Chase (Mystery & Adventure) (37 page)

It was the only place left in the house where they could possibly be.

I took another quick scan of my surroundings – just to be certain – but detected nothing more threatening than animal hides and tanning equipment. For a moment, my mind grew vaguely distracted with just how a fanatical hunter like Robbie could live in such an industrial dump like New Jersey, but I forced myself to worry about that later.

I crossed the room cautiously, training the 9mm on the far door as I approached. Black metal shelves guarded the entrance on either side, which would unfortunately provide only minimal cover if Robbie started shooting. To my benefit, however, the door was already open a crack, hanging dejectedly from its rusted hinges. I sank into a crouch, partially sheltered by one of the shelves, and cautiously pulled the door open by the handle – just a little bit more, the better to see what I was up against.

The room beyond seemed to be of a similar layout to the one I in which was crouching. From what I could see, the cold cinder walls within were lined with identical metal shelves and decorated – to my great displeasure – with
guns
. More than I could count with my mind racing as it was. They were all cleaned and shiny, mounted on hooks and probably not loaded, but I knew better than to assume. Besides, Robbie was sure to keep ammunition somewhere on the nearby premises.

So he's anything
but
unarmed,
I thought, trying not to panic.
I've gotta keep him away from the walls – if he's even in there.

I shifted my position to the left to get a better view of the room beyond and caught a fleeting glimpse of a familiar flannel–and–jeans ensemble. Instantly, I knew that Mendoza was standing just inside the room, his back to the door, hunched over a table of sorts, doing only God–knew–what.

Breathing hard, I licked my lips to wet them. I couldn't see Jill at all, although there was plenty of room that I couldn't see at my angle. Yet, I found myself suddenly doubting. Had I panicked without reason? Maybe Robbie wasn't holding her hostage at all and maybe I'd figured everything wrong –

But there was no going back now. Even if I was wrong and about to make the biggest fool out of myself, I had to know for sure. I couldn't just beat a hasty retreat now, only to find out on the Morning News that there had been a murder at 13 Jackson the previous evening – or that a Robert H. Mendoza had skipped town and disappeared into the great American West with a hostage in tow.

So my best bet was to storm in like the cop I was trying to be, demand he put his hands on his head and get on the ground, and pray like hell that he wasn't waiting for me with a Magnum or something even more powerful.

This is it.

This was what it all came down to.

Gritting my teeth, screwing up my courage, I stood in a rush and threw open the door.

Mendoza whirled as I entered – pointing the Beretta at his face – with something like utter panic in his dark eyes –

– and Jill, huddled in the corner just beyond my line of sight, cried out my name in strangled terror and relief –

"
Get on the ground, Robbie!
" I shouted, advancing. Somehow, my voice did not tremble, despite the fact that I couldn't seem to draw breath. "
Put your hands on your head and get on the ground!
"

– as I noticed the bulge of a weapon beneath the flannel, easy for a quick draw –

There was a split second where time seemed to freeze. All of a sudden, it was utterly silent. The deafening thrum of the heater faded into nothingness, even the coldness that had numbed my body seemed to bleed away, and all of a sudden there was nothing left in the room save the three of us.

Jill and Robbie and me.

Jill wasn't even gagged or bound, but it was obvious that Mendoza had roughed her up. Her lower lip had split in the middle and there was dried blood on her delicate chin. There were also bright red fingerprints on her neck, which told me the hunter had manhandled her, probably at gunpoint. Her eyes were terrified, bright and shining with panic.

Robbie didn't look so good himself. Jill had obviously given him a harder time than he'd bargained for. Bloody scratches on his face from Jill's nails told me that she had struggled initially, but he had most likely hit her a few times to discourage further resistance. He also had a blackened eye and a lump building on his jaw: Jill had hit him with something, and hard.

Good girl,
I thought grimly.

However, despite the beating he'd taken, there remained a panicked, livened look in Mendoza's dark eyes – a fiery resolution that told me he was desperate. People only look crazed when they're not ready to die, and Robert Mendoza certainly was not willing. Regardless of his actions, he wasn't going to be put away for life. His reputation as a good citizen would be destroyed and his relationship with his cousin was never going to be the same – most likely with the rest of the family as well – but he had plenty of life left to live.

Perhaps that was what made him act in desperation. He went for the gun, breaking that eternal moment of silence and bringing me abruptly back to the present in his noisy, freezing basement –

– leaving me no choice but to act faster than he could.

The sharp report of the 9mm was deafening in the close basement, and it rang in all of our ears as two of Mendoza's fingers parted from his right hand in a spray of crimson. He crashed to his knees, bellowing in pain as blood sprayed the cement floor –

– and I was already there, using my knee to push him backwards onto the ground. "
Don't move
!" I shouted at him, planting my foot firmly on his barrel–like chest, training the gun between his eyes. "Don't move, Robbie!"

He looked up at me, dazed, but still recognized the cold sincerity in my glare. He nodded slowly, wheezing, holding up his hands in a gesture of defeat. Stooping quickly, I reached into his jacket, yanked the handgun from his belt, and tossed it into a corner of the room – far away from either of us.

"It's over," I said softly, suddenly coming to realize that very fact myself. It was all a blur in my mind – all one big, fantastic, coincidental farce – but it was the truth. It was reality, and they always say that fact is stranger than fiction. Yet, no one would ever believe that I'd accomplished it – not in a million years.

Damn the non–believers. My first big case as a detective with SPD was finally over.

Chapter
Twenty

For a long moment, we stared at each other, perhaps unsure of what to do next.

I could see the shame in Robert Mendoza's eyes, a smoldering pride chewing away at his insides. As a hunter, he had never before been in a situation where his prey had utterly beaten him. Without a doubt he'd lost game plenty of times before and I knew he'd been shot accidentally at least once in his history, but never before had he been rendered so completely helpless.

Never before had
he
become the prey.

He was bleeding – badly – and trembling violently. The muscles were bunched in his cheeks as he clenched his jaw against the pain, breathing noisily through flared nostrils. His eyes remained lit with fire but he knew he was beaten, and that was why I removed my foot from his chest and backed away from him, breathing hard myself.

I pressed my back against the cold cement wall, keeping the gun trained on his chest. "Jill?" I gasped finally, breaking the long silence. "I need you to go upstairs and see if you can find some towels. Can you do that for me, sweetheart?"

Her frightened eyes met mine from across the room. She hesitated, as though uncertain of her ability to complete the task, but then nodded jerkily and got to her feet. She skirted Mendoza's prostrate form – simultaneously unwilling to be near him and to take her eyes off of him – and backed cautiously out of the room. I heard her footfalls across the adjacent room, and then they disappeared as she ascended the staircase.

Mendoza rested his head on the cold cement. The rapid rise and fall of his massive chest spoke volumes of the pain he was in. "How'd you guess, Stikup?" he asked finally, his deep voice coming out in a rasp.

"You left yourself wide open." I inhaled slowly, held it for a moment before blowing the breath out heavily. "I can't believe it took me so long to connect the dots."

"I'm surprised too," the hunter admitted. "It was all so obvious."

"Not when you look at it from my perspective." I sighed heavily and sank to a sitting position on the floor. "Especially from my perspective. I'm too trusting."

"Not a bad trait, Stikup." He licked his lips, eyes closed. "Shame you chose to trust
me
."

"I swallowed your bullshit story whole," I snapped. The taste of humiliation was souring in my mouth once again, and it made me scowl. I wasn't about to debate morality, and I certainly didn't want to argue with Mendoza just to make him feel better about himself. "I had no reason to suspect you outside of coincidence, and besides you had good alibis. So tell me, how much was Miles supposed to get from homeowner's?"

"Fifty," he replied after a bare moment's hesitation. "It was enough to pay off the thieves we scammed and still give each of us a leg–up." He raised his head to grimly examine his bleeding hand. "It wouldn't last long, but it would be enough."

"What about the Daniels murder?" I pressed.

"I had nothing to do with it," Mendoza croaked, letting his head sink back to the pavement. "Right after I heard about it in the papers, I stopped contacting the crooks for fear that I'd get caught up in that investigation. I have no idea what possessed them to hit that family."

"They told me they wanted more than they were getting," I told him. "Also, there was some type of rivalry going on amongst them – two of them were professionals, the other was a kid. I think that was their way of popping his cherry. Seems they got fed up with him, so they just dumped him in SPD's collective lap."

He coughed and then sighed, sounding exhausted. "Look, I didn't want trouble, Stikup. Obviously, it was illegal, but all we wanted was a little financial boost. We planned on paying it back later when we had the cash."

"That's sweet," I said, making no effort to conceal my disgust. "Try giving that explanation to a jury. See how sympathetic they can be."

He chuckled weakly. "Fuck you, Stikup."

"So let's see," I began offhandedly, working the math in my head. "After paying the crooks their twenty-six, that left you and Rick with… about twenty-four to split evenly. Twelve thousand bucks isn't a lot to build a future on. You guys make other long–term plans?"

Mendoza grunted. "Actually, that was the only thing we didn't think about. We spent so much time agonizing over the act itself that we didn't have time to really plan anything out if we actually got away with everything." He shook his head slowly. "I suppose I just planned on paying off a few of my debts with it. That would bring me that much closer to stability."

"Rick seems to have more debt on his shoulders than you do." I rested my arms on my knees, relaxing my hold on the 9mm and letting it point at the ground. "I guess sending his kid to college ruined him."

"More than I can imagine." Mendoza rolled his head to the side and studied the wall to his right in an apathetic sort of way. "I guess you figured it out yourself that he spoiled his son rotten. Only the best for Rick junior. I guess I should be thankful now that I
wasn't
his favorite 'uncle' – so I didn't have to compete with Rick's generosity."

"Did Rick's son pay anything at all for the tuition?" I asked.

"Not a cent." Mendoza shrugged awkwardly, painfully. "I'm not sure how that was supposed to teach him to fend for himself in the world."

Yeah,
I thought.
Hopefully he won't end up like you guys.

I studied the 9mm, my thoughts elsewhere. It struck me just how conversationally we were discussing these things, and I almost laughed. "I have to say, I'm pretty impressed by the scheme you pulled together. It was actually pretty much…
perfect
. I'm not quite sure just how I figured everything out."

"You're sharp, that's why," Mendoza grunted gruffly. "I don't mind telling you. You think outside the box. See, Rick and I agonized over the minute details, trying to work out a way to make everything less obvious but we neglected the bigger stuff."

"I guess your first mistake was using your own vehicle." I cocked my head to the side. "Good idea in theory – to draw attention away from yourself – but I take it that it didn't exactly pan out according to plan."

Mendoza nodded jerkily. "Right. No one would suspect Rick of robbing his own home obviously. Same with my car – why the hell would I smash my own window and pretend that it had been stolen? If we didn't leave any traces behind, no one would have questioned our innocence."

"But then your goons accidentally knocked the license plate off your car."

"Well, there was more to it than that," he said. "See, we didn't tell the thieves that I'd reported the vehicle to police as stolen. That way, once the 'robbery' had been pulled off, they would be left with possession of whatever they took from Rick's
and
a 'stolen' car. The plan was for the police to arrest them for both thefts, then I would get my car back and Rick and I would both get the money we needed, plus the police could arrest some notorious criminal minds, none–the–wiser. Everybody wins. So in a way, when they knocked the plate off at the crime scene, it actually played into our hands."