Evil Dark (24 page)

  "Nice of the killer to leave us with so much evidence," I said.

  "Yeah, I was just thinking that myself," Karl said. "And get this – I'm pretty sure it's not human."

  "What, then? Dog?" I was pretty sure that Pettigrew didn't keep a dog here. And if he had, it would probably be howling over his body – that, or lapping up the blood.

  "Close," Karl said. "I'd say wolf."

  "Well, fuck me," I said. "You saying our perp's a werewolf?"

  "I'm saying that's what somebody
wants
us to think."

  I turned and looked at him. "And where did
that
come from?"

  "Main reason is, there's no wolf smell," Karl said. "I got a good whiff of it the other night at Nay Aug, so the scent's fresh in my memory. And I'm getting –
nothing
. There's probably some on the hairs, or fur, but the blood is masking it."

  "Anything else you've noticed?"

  "Yeah, no blood spatter or trail of blood drops."

  I glanced around the garage, "Yeah, it is pretty clean, isn't it – apart from the pool he's lying in."

  "And it makes no fucking sense," Karl said. "Think about it, Stan. We're supposed to believe that a great big wolf attacked Pettigrew and tore his throat out. But there's no defensive wounds, no claw marks, nothing like that. Guy like Pettigrew, he'd fight."

  "Yeah, I'm with you."

  "And, shit, you've seen animal attacks before – we both have," Karl said. "Tearing somebody's throat out, even if you've strong jaws and a good set of sharp teeth, is gonna be messy. Blood flying all over, arterial spray, the whole nine yards."

  "In contrast, what we got here is almost… surgical."

  "Fuckin' A. And if our hypothetical werewolf did kill the guy, he couldn't help but get blood on him – all over himself, probably. And yet he ran off without getting a drop of it on the floor, all the way to the door and beyond."

  "So somebody set up a fake werewolf attack for us to find." I nodded slowly. "You wanna say it this time?"

  "What – Whiskey Tango Foxtrot?"

  "Uh-uh. Helter Skelter, man. Helter fucking Skelter."

 

We called Homicide, which was a nice change from them always calling us. Scanlon arrived with a couple of his guys shortly after a couple of black-and-whites pulled in, lights flashing and sirens wailing. They didn't have to hurry – Pettigrew wasn't going anywhere.

  Karl and I had just started to explain to the uniforms how we'd come to discover Pettigrew when Scanlon walked over and said to them, "I'll take care of interviewing these officers. You two secure the scene – the media jackals have police radios, and they'll probably be here any minute. I don't want them fucking up my crime scene by walking all over it."

  
My crime scene
. Scanlon was taking over – good. That's exactly what I wanted.

  "Something I wanted to ask you, Lieutenant," I said. "How come you still show up at these things, while my boss stays back at the office instead of coming to ours?"

  "It's his choice," Scanlon said. "We all have our own ways of doing things. I like to be on the street, and fortunately, I've got a sergeant who stays in the squad room and runs things pretty well when I'm not there." He gave me a quick grin. "From what I hear, McGuire doesn't have that luxury. Now – you wanna tell me about this?"

  Karl and I took turns filling him in on what we knew, and what we suspected. As we were finishing up, an ambulance arrived with the guy from the ME's office. Actually, it wasn't a guy, but a painfully thin woman named Cecelia Reynolds, one of the three pathologists who work for the ME and the only one that I never joke around with. A very serious lady, is our Doctor Reynolds. But then, I hear she grew up in the South Bronx and proceeded to work and study her way out – all the way to a full scholarship at Columbia University's med school. I guess
serious
is her default setting.

  I asked Scanlon to excuse us, and Karl and I drifted over to where Cecelia was pulling on a pair of latex gloves. "Good evening, Cecelia," I said.

  She looked up. "Hi, Stan. Karl."

  She looked at Karl a second or two longer than necessary, something I'd only noticed her doing a few months ago. Maybe she found Karl's new state intriguing. I sometimes wondered if she was a vamp vixen – a human woman who's into the undead – but any vampire who put the bite on Cecelia had better not be looking for a big meal.

  "So," she said, "looks like we have us a nice, messy homicide here."

  "At first glance," I said, "it looks like a werewolf killing."

  "Do tell. I never worked one of those."

  "Well, I hope you didn't have your heart set on it, because this probably isn't your lucky night."

  "What are you talking about, Stan?"

  "There's a good chance that whoever killed the dude over there tried to make it look like a werewolf is responsible."

  She frowned. "Why on Earth would someone do that?"

  "The answer to that's long and complicated, and I'm sure you've got better uses for your time tonight. I'll tell you all about it some night over a beer."

  Cecelia looked at me, her head tilted a little to one side. "That promise is based on the assumption that I would consent to the behavior in question, Stan – an assumption that has yet to be tested."

  "Could I have that in English, please?"

  "You're assuming that I'd be willing to have a beer with you sometime."

  "Does that mean you won't?"

  "No, it merely means you should be careful about your assumptions."

  "Duly noted," I said. "Now, about the deceased over there…"

  "Yes?"

  "When you're doing the post, you might want to check the ratio of serotonin to free histamines, to see if he was alive, or at least conscious, when he was killed. And while you're looking at his blood, it might be worthwhile to check for poison or some sort of tranquilizing agent."

  The smile she gave me was as bright as it was false. "Goodness me, Sergeant, if I didn't know better, I'd have sworn that you were just telling me how to do my job."

  "Not at all," I said. "And I apologize if I gave offense. But tell me something:
would
you have checked the serotonin-free histamine ratio as part of your regular procedure?"

  One of the things I like about Cecelia is her utter honesty. After a couple of seconds she said, "No, Stan, I probably wouldn't have. The snarky comment is hereby withdrawn."

  "Fair enough. I was–"

  Karl's head lifted a couple of inches, like a hunting dog that hears the far-off sound of geese approaching. He said, "Pardon me," and started walking rapidly toward the open bay door.

  "Something wrong?" I called after him.

  "Think I hear the radio." Can't beat those extra-sharp vampire senses. It was nice to have them on my side, for a change.

  I chatted with Cecelia for another minute or two, then Karl came back in the garage. "Stan."

  "What's up?"

  "Radio call. It's McGuire."

  He turned and went back out, and I followed him. Over my shoulder I said to Cecelia, "Gotta run. Talk to you after the post, OK?"

  I saw her nod and then I concentrated on getting out to the car without quite running. McGuire wouldn't get on the radio personally just to ask us to pick up a pizza.

  As we reached the car, I asked Karl, "Did he tell you anything?"

  "Better hear it from him," Karl said.

  No, definitely not a pizza run.

  I got in, and grabbed the radio. "This is Markowski."

  "This is McGuire."

  "Yes, boss."

  He said, "Sefchik and Aquilina are in the house, but I thought I'd try to reach you first. Figured you might want this one, since it concerns Rachel Proctor."

  "What happened?" I didn't yell, but everything in me wanted to.

  "For starters, she's OK. So cool those jets of yours."

  Guess McGuire could tell that I'd wanted to yell.

  "All right, boss. What's up with Rachel?"

  "Looks like our witch burner may have made a try for her tonight."

  "And…?" I asked.

  "She had a spell of some kind ready, and she zapped the bastard," McGuire said.

  "Good for her – but 'zapped' how?" I already knew she couldn't have killed him. White magic, and all that.

  "Froze him in place, apparently. Maybe you ought to get over there, have her thaw out the suspect, and bring him in. There's a black-and-white on scene already, but I figured you'd want in on this."

  "As my partner likes to say,
Fuckin' A
. Where's 'over there'?"

  "Rachel's house," McGuire said. "I guess the guy made his move on her front porch."

  "We're on the way. Markowski out."

  As I started up, Karl said, "
Fuckin' A
? You stealing my lines, now?"

  "I was only borrowing that one, Mister…?" I let my voice trail off, figuring that Karl would get what I was doing.

  He did. He gave a laugh, then said, in his best Sean Connery imitation, "Renfer. Karl Renfer."

 

The black-and-white unit, red and blue lights flashing, was parked in front of 1484 Stanton Street, and I slid our car in behind it. Rachel's front porch light was on, and under its illumination I could see Rachel, two uniformed officers – and a strangely posed mannequin. At least, it
looked
like a mannequin.

  As we approached the porch, I could see that one of the uniforms was talking to Rachel, his notebook and pen in hand, while the other one stood next to the thing that looked like it belonged in a display window at Boscov's, or maybe in Madame Tussauds wax museum.

  We mounted the creaking steps and went over to Rachel, who looked like she'd had a shock but was holding herself together pretty well. Karl probably would have said that she appeared shaken, but not stirred.

  I nodded at the uniform who'd been talking to her. His name was McHale, and I'd been seeing him around for the last five years or so. He was tall and broad, the dusting of freckles across his nose an odd contrast to his King Kong physique. He took a couple of steps back as I approached Rachel.

  "How you doing, kiddo?" I said to her.

  "I'm not bad, considering, and stop calling me 'kiddo'."

  I tried not to smile. Same old Rachel.

  "Wanna tell me what happened?"

  "As I was saying to Officer McHale, I got home about half an hour ago. I was standing in front of the door, sifting through my keys to find the right one. I heard a sound off to my left. I looked, and he–" she pointed with her chin toward the still figure "–was coming at me quite fast, his arm extended the way you see now."

  "You didn't notice him before that?" I asked. I glanced around her porch. "There isn't anyplace to hide up here."

  "The porch light was off – I only went inside and turned it on after the excitement was over. He'd been hiding in the shadows over near the side railing."

  "Gotcha. So you look over your shoulder and see him coming at you. Then what?"

  "As I told you when we talked last, I had a spell ready, the kind I could invoke with a single word – and the proper gesture. So I made the gesture, said the word, and
voila
– instant statuary."

  "Nice casting," I said. "I'm glad you were prepared."

  "Me, too." Her lips compressed grimly. "Especially considering the fate I would probably have suffered, if this
motherfucker
had been successful in abducting me."

  Rachel rarely swears. The fact that she'd done so meant that she wasn't feeling quite as calm as she looked. Not that I blamed her.

  "So then I went inside," she said, "turned on the outside light and got my phone out. I called 911 and reported the attack, then realized that I probably should have called 666 instead. So I did."

  "Never hurts to cover all the bases," I said, then turned to Karl. "Keep Rachel company for a few minutes, will you? I wanna check out our perp."

  "Sure," Karl said, stepping forward. "Hey, Rachel. How's the witch business?"

  "Not bad, Karl. How the vampire business?"

  "It kinda sucks, but that's not always a bad thing."

  I left those two to trade bad puns and went over to the human statue.

 

If this was a museum, the exhibit could be titled "Cat Burglar – Early Twenty-first Century". Or maybe the guy had Googled "Commando", then clicked on "Illustrations" and copied the results – to the letter.

  His wiry build was right for the role, anyway. He looked flexible and strong, but without a lot of bulging muscles. Rachel's attacker seemed to be around thirty, and that was all I could tell about him, apart from the outfit.

  He was dressed completely in black – pullover sweater, gloves, jeans, and shoes. I'd have to check later, but I was betting he wore black socks, too. To top it off, he even had the black stocking cap pulled down low over his ears. Put some black camo paint on his face – the one part of the look he'd passed up – and this role-playing asshole would be all ready for a raid on some Nazi ammo dump. He was perfect.

  His posture now looked like what you get when you hit Pause on your DVD player. His feet were well apart, one in front of the other, as if he'd been moving fast when the magic hit him. His right arm was extended, fist clenched. He was holding something white in his clenched hand, so I stepped close for a look and saw what appeared to be a folded handkerchief. Then I stepped closer, and took a whiff. Chloroform.