Mean Business on North Ganson Street (30 page)

The detective carried his wife to the garage and laid her across the rear bench of the compact.

“I'm in,” announced Karen, buckling her seat belt in the front.

The detective closed both doors, walked around the small blue car, and climbed behind the steering wheel. Exhaling steam, he looked at his daughter and said, “It's all gonna be okay.”

Karen nodded her head, desperately wanting to believe her father. Her eyes were wide, and her skin was beaded with sweat.

Bettinger thumbed the garage opener. Chains rattled, and the automatic door rose from the ground, revealing the outermost edge of night. Flakes that looked like ashes fell toward the pavement.

The detective shifted into reverse and pressed the gas, taking the dead and abused members of his family away from the little salmon house.

 

XLI

Ammonia

Headlights turned falling snowflakes into bright white fireflies. Speeding toward the Stonesburg freeway, Bettinger glanced at his hatchback and the charcoal gray pickup truck, both of which were still sitting in front of the empty house. Orchestral hold music sounded in his earplug, clashing with the pop station that he had put on the car stereo to distract his daughter from his conversation.

The symphony stopped.

“Mr. Bettinger?” asked a man who had an especially clear tenor voice.

“Yes. Is this the ophthalmologist?”

“Optometrist. My name's Dr. Edwards.”

“Is there an ophthalmologist?”

“I'm sorry, but Dr. Singh's away on vacation. I promise I'll consult her if I have any questions, but I've dealt with such things before.”

This was said without resentment, displaying a level of professionalism that gave Bettinger more confidence in the eye specialist. “That's fair.”

“What happened?”

“She's unconscious, so I don't know the exact details, but some fabric—underwear—is stuck in her left eye. Deep. Jammed in like a cork.”

Snowflakes accumulated upon the windshield.

“You can't see the eye itself?” asked Dr. Edwards.

“No.”

The wiper cleared the glass.

“What happened before the underwear was put in?”

“Let me ask.” The detective drove onto the freeway and lowered the volume of the stereo. “Karen?”

The girl flinched. “What?”

“Did you see the man in the mask do something to Mommy's eye?”

Karen nodded.

“What happened?”

“When he told us to get naked, Mommy screamed at him, and he took out one of those clicky things they use at the post office.”

Bettinger's stomach sank. “A box cutter?”

Karen nodded. “He went like this—” The girl stabbed the air with her right fist.

The detective felt a phantom pain inside of his eye. “Okay, sweetie,” he said, raising the volume of the stereo. “Listen to the music.”

Karen returned her gaze to the windshield wipers, which were busy erasing snow.

“She was stabbed in the eye with a box cutter,” Bettinger told Dr. Edwards.

There was a moment of silence.

“How far from the hospital are you?” asked the optometrist.

The detective glanced at the upcoming exit sign and made a calculation. “Less than fifteen minutes.”

“I'm heading to the emergency room now. Is th—”

“What're the chances that you can save it? Her eye?”

“I need to see her first.”

The detective decided not to press the doctor for a bad prognosis. “Okay.”

“Is there anything else that requires immediate attention?”

“She's lost some blood,” said Bettinger, glancing in the rearview mirror at Alyssa, whose chest continually rose and fell. “Her pulse is steady, but weak.”

“Do you know what ty—”

“O positive.”

“You're certain?”

“I am.”

“Good. Is she allergic to antibiotics?”

“No.”

“Good. Please drive carefully in that snow—a few minutes probably won't make any difference.”

“I'll drive safely,” the detective said as he switched lanes.

“I'll have a gurney ready—I'm an African American, shaved head, goatee.”

“You sound white.”

“Then the lessons paid off.”

“I'm in a blue compact.”

“I'll look for you.”

“Thanks.” The detective killed the connection and again lowered the volume of the radio. “Sweetie?”

Karen looked over.

Bettinger stomped on his terrible imaginings and forced himself to ask his daughter one of the most loathsome questions in existence. “What did the man do to you?”

The girl looked down at her little fingers.

“Karen?” prompted the detective, unable to breathe.

“He told me to take off my clothes and get on the bed or he'd make Mommy go blind.”

“Did he do anything else to you?”

“He tied me up and put undies in my mouth.”

“Anything else?”

The girl shook her head. “No.”

Relieved, Bettinger leaned over and put a kiss upon his precious daughter's forehead. “You're being very brave.”

Karen watched snow gather on the windshield.

A new song that sounded exactly like the previous cut began, and the detective raised the volume. “Do you like this one?”

The excitable little girl who loved or hated most things shrugged.

*   *   *

Twelve minutes later, the blue compact landed in front of a big tan building that was the Salvation Hospital of Stonesburg. Bettinger killed the engine, and twenty feet away, the doors of the emergency room slid apart, admitting a white male nurse and a man who fit the description of Dr. Edwards. Directly between the hastening fellows was a steel gurney.

“Stay here,” the detective said to his daughter as he stepped outside. “I'll be close.”

“Okay.”

Bettinger walked to the back of the vehicle, scooped up his wife, and set her on the gurney. The optometrist glanced at the girl in the passenger seat.

“She was there?”

“Yeah. And my son is—”

Bettinger's throat constricted. Tears filled his eyes as everything that he had suppressed for the last thirty minutes rushed to the surface. Silently, he pointed a trembling finger at the trunk.

“Your son…?” asked Dr. Edwards.

The detective nodded his head.

“I'm sorry,” said the optometrist, whose sympathy seemed genuine.

Bettinger knew that he could not break down in front of his daughter, and so he dammed the powerful flood of emotions. “Can … I … leave my car here?” he asked, wiping his eyes with a fist.

“It's fine.”

The detective retrieved his girl, and together, they followed the rolling gurney past the sliding doors into a bright beige waiting room that had five vinyl couches, some magazines, and a high-definition television.

“Stay here for now,” Dr. Edwards said without slowing his progress toward the emergency-care area. “The receptionist has your paperwork.”

Bettinger nodded his head.

“He'll send for the diener when you're ready.”

“Fine.” The detective was not yet ready to deal with a morgue attendant.

“We'll get you when we know something,” the optometrist added as he and the nurse rolled Alyssa Bright through a double door.

“Thank you.”

Bettinger took Karen's right hand and walked her toward the couches, where a Mexican woman who looked like a tall midget mopped the linoleum.

“Smells like pee,” the girl said to her father.

“It's ammonia. Keeps things sanitary.”

Karen avoided a collection of wet tiles and covered her nose. “Smells like pee.”

“Agreed.”

The girl sat on the couch that faced the television, which was showing a replay of the local news broadcast from the previous night. Suddenly, the anchorwoman's solemn face was replaced by an obese cartoon cat who had an impressive mustache and a very snug vest.

“Thank you,” Bettinger said to the janitor, who was holding a remote control in her right hand.

“The news isn't for kids.”

“It isn't.”

The tiny woman employed her mop as if it were an oar and rowed herself to port.

Bettinger faced Karen. “Want me to take off your jacket?”

Staring at the television screen, the girl shook her head.

“Need to go to the bathroom? It's right here.”

Again, his daughter declined his offer.

“Do you want something to drink?”

Karen shrugged.

“Apple?” suggested Bettinger. “Cranberry?”

“Cranberry.”

“I'm going right there—” The detective pointed at the vending machine that was located on the other side of the waiting area. “Okay?”

The obese cat fell off of his tricycle in an extraordinarily complicated manner, but Karen did not in any way respond to his antics. It looked like her trauma was turning into psychological shock.

“I'll be right back.”

Bettinger kissed the top of his daughter's head and proceeded toward the vending machine. On his way over, he withdrew his cell phone, highlighted the name of his partner (who had called him four times during the last hour), and thumbed the connect button.

Dominic picked up on the first ring. “You okay?”

“Somebody was waiting for me at my house. I killed him, but my son's dead and my wife's in bad shape.”

“Motherfucker.” The big fellow broke something. “How's the little one?”

“In shock, but physically okay.”

Bettinger arrived at the vending machine.

“You at the hospital?”

“Yeah. What's the situation in Victory?”

“Bodies turnin' up all over—missin' cops and some people who're probably witnesses.”

“Perry and Huan?”

“Executed. Badges and dicks gone like the rest.”

The detective felt empty. “I'm praying all this is a fucking nightmare.”

“The dude who works the front desk at the Sunflower is missin'.”

Bettinger remembered writing his address on the form that he had given to the clerk, and it was suddenly obvious how the killer had discovered the little salmon house in Stonesburg.

“Then he's dead,” stated the detective. “That killer didn't have compunctions.”

“Learn anythin' from him?”

“No, but he left behind a pickup truck I'll search when I can.”

“Those homo faggots in Stonesburg P.D. get involved?”

“Nope. The tableau was quick and quiet.”

“Don't call them.”

“I didn't intend to.” There was a dark implication in Bettinger's reply.

“So then you know how this needs to go?”

“I know.”

“You won't get squeamish?”

“My daughter's traumatized, my wife's gonna lose an eye, and my son's in the trunk of a fucking car,” hissed the detective. “I'm not gonna get squeamish.”

“Neither are me and Tackley.”

Bettinger slid a dollar bill into the vending machine and typed in the number of the prison cell that contained cranberry juice. “Got anything new on Sebastian?”

“Me and Tackley been leanin' on people since we left Zwolinski's, but nobody knows nothin'.”

“Zwolinski turn up?”

“Still missin'.”

The crimson bottle was taken from its cell by a whirring robotic claw.

“Anything with Slick Sam?” asked Bettinger.

“The cadet's still at the chop shop—I just talked to him—but Slick Sam ain't showed yet.”

The robot flung the bottle into the nether chamber.

“I'll get to the killer's pickup as soon as I can.” The detective bent over, slid aside a clear panel, and claimed the beverage. “But I'm not leaving until I talk to my wife.”

“A'ight. Call when there's somethin'. Even one of your maybes.”

“You do the same.”

“I will.”

The line went dead.

Bettinger traversed the waiting room, gave the bottle of juice to Karen, and approached the front desk, behind which sat the receptionist, a young fellow who had glasses, acne, and short blond hair. Near a half-eaten muffin on the table lay a big art book that was open to a painting of a rotund fellow in fancy dress who gripped a yellow parakeet in his right hand as if it were a bonbon. The bird looked worried.

“Pardon me.”

The receptionist slid a black clipboard across the table.

“Thanks,” said Bettinger, claiming the paperwork. “Do you have on-site day care?”

The young man looked at Karen. “For her?” A dislodged crumb bounced upon the fancy fellow's ascot.

“Yes.”

A blue clipboard slid across the desk.

Bettinger claimed the second collection of papers and cleared his throat. “I need to see the diener.”

“You have a body?”

The detective nodded his head and received a white clipboard.

Somebody said, “Jules Bettinger,” and he looked over. Standing at the doorway that led to the emergency-care area was the male nurse who had been with Dr. Edwards.

“Please come with me.”

“One sec.”

Bettinger hastened across the waiting room and placed the black, blue, and white clipboards on the sofa beside Karen. “I'll be gone for a couple of minutes.”

The girl did not respond.

“I'll keep her company,” said the little janitor.

“Talk to the nice woman or the man at the desk if you need me.”

“Okay.”

The detective hugged his daughter and jogged across the waiting area. As he neared the portal, the nurse flung the door.

“She's awake.”

A sickness spread throughout Bettinger's guts. Inhaling deeply, he proceeded through the doorway, toward his single favorite person in the world, whom he would soon tell the worst news that she would ever hear.