Muller, Marcia - [10] The Shape of Dread (v1.0) (html) (32 page)

"I'm scared."

"It's only a little farther."

We kept on, to where Soriano's car was parked. Now my own tension
heightened, and I searched the darkness to see if he might be lurking
close to his means of escape. I saw no one, heard nothing.

Beyond the car was a narrow dirt track leading through a grove of
trees toward the lighted house. Amy and I turned in there. The
underbrush was close on either side now. The shifting, sighing branches
created a babble that would mask all but the loudest of sounds. When I
looked around, the phantom-shapes danced and leaped, playing tricks on
my eyes.

I said to Amy, "Let's walk faster now," and hurried her along.

When the track emerged from the grove, it meandered across a large
area of cleared land. The house was perhaps fifty yards away. I waited
until we were well in the open before stopping, then scanned the
terrain on all sides of us. No one was in sight. Over by the house a
dog began barking; it must have been chained up, because it didn't come
running out to see who was there.

Amy stood beside me, silent and motionless. I looked at her and
realized she was no longer afraid. The slickness of her mouth and the
sluggish way she moved her eyes told me she was operating automatically
now, her emotions shut down. She didn't question why we'd stopped, just
waited quietly.

I studied her face, pallid in the moonlight, wondering if she was
enough in touch with her surroundings to do what I had in
mind for her. Finally I decided that her trancelike state might work to
my advantage.

I said, "Amy, I need your help now."

She nodded.

"He's out here somewhere. He may get away if I don't find him. I
need you to go on to that house alone."

She looked over at the lights as if measuring the distance to them.

"I'll be right here," I added. "With the gun. He won't come near you
anyway, not with other people so close."

After a moment she nodded again.

"When you get to the house, tell the people to call nine-eleven."

"Nine-eleven."

"Tell them there's been a homicide, we need the sheriff's
department."

"Homicide. The sheriff."

"Then just stay there."

She looked toward the lights again. Took a deep breath and squared
her shoulders.

"Can you do that?" I asked.

"I can do it." She hesitated a few seconds longer, then took off at
a run.

I watched her go, gun raised, should Soriano suddenly appear. She
ran awkwardly, arms flailing, but she didn't falter. When she reached
the house, she pounded on the door. After it opened and she disappeared
inside, I turned away.

Then I went after him.

I crouched by the right front tire of the Jaguar and stabbed at it
with the Swiss Army knife's largest blade. I'd never slashed a tire
before; it was more difficult than I'd imagined. But after working at
it for half a minute, I made a slit. The air hissed out, and the car
began to settle onto the wheel rim.

Soriano wasn't going anywhere now.

I stood, jamming the knife back into my pocket. He was still
somewhere close by, of that I was certain.

But where?

Not beyond the turnaround; I'd have spotted him if he was. Not on
the property belonging to the salt company; it was fenced in barbed
wire, possibly patrolled. He wouldn't have gone down the road, either;
the houses were too numerous, packed too close together.

So he had to be somewhere behind the Barbour cottage.

I gripped the gun and started off, intent on searching every inch of
ground between here and the river.

I stood at the edge of the grove of pepper trees behind the cottage.
The rush of the river's water was louder here. I strained to hear other
sounds through the sighing of the trees; there were only typical night
noises.

Between the grove and the levee the land was barren and moon washed.
If Soriano was hiding somewhere out there, he would spot me easily when
I crossed it. But if he broke cover and tried to run, I'd have the
advantage.

I ran across the ground and up to the top of the levee.

Moonlight sheened the water. The river moved swiftly, swollen by the
recent rain. The falling-down dock shivered with the strong current.
The wind blew steadily, tossing the branches of the willow tree that
sheltered the derelict fishing boat. I stared at it. Saw a movement in
the shadows. A different sort of movement than that of the tree's
drooping limbs.

Soriano had found Tracy's gravesite.

I stopped close to the willow, stood with my feet apart, gun braced.
It had taken minutes to make my approach, shielded by the hump of the
levee. Another minute to slip down here. By now he knew I'd found him.

"Soriano!" I shouted. "Come on out."

Silence. Then a faint, unidentifiable sound from the boat.

"Soriano!"

He was waiting for me to try to take him.

I stayed where I was, listening for sirens. Nothing. More than half
an hour now since I'd left Amy. How much longer would it take?

A scraping sound from the boat. A thump.

It was probably a ploy to get me onto the boat, into close quarters
with him. Perhaps he underestimated me, thought I didn't know how to
use the gun properly. That was a common fault of men like Soriano—to
underestimate others, particularly women.

Slowly I started toward the boat.

A few of the planks had been tossed on the ground by the lab crew
that removed Tracy's remains, but otherwise it looked the same as when
I'd first seen it. I climbed carefully onto its side.

"Soriano, save us both a lot of trouble and give up."

No reply. No more telltale sounds.

I moved forward toward the collapsed pilot house, testing my footing
with each step. The hatch cover was back over the opening in the rotten
planking. I was certain the lab crew would not have replaced it.

I went closer. Studied it. Extended my right foot and nudged it.

It didn't budge.

I braced myself against one of the pilot house's support beams,
worked the toe of my boot under the cover's edge. Kicked upward.

The cover fell back with a crash. The musty odor of the grave rose
to my nostrils.

Extending the gun at the opening, I leaned forward. Looked down at
Rob Soriano.

He looked back at me, unspeaking. Something seemed wrong with one of
his eyes; then I realized the lens of his glasses
was cracked. Blood trickled from the gash in his cheek. His mouth
twisted violently, and he recoiled.

I'd expected Soriano to crack eventually, and he had. Now he was
terrified.

As I stared down at him, I felt nothing but the rage—cold and steady
again.

I could shoot him point-blank, I thought. The way he shot Emmons.
Should shoot him. No sense in letting this evil man live. No sense in
going through the motions of arrest, trial, imprisonment, even
execution, because it won't make any difference.

He moved a fraction of an inch. My hands tensed on the .32. I'd
claim self-defense.

I could hear the sirens now, distant but clear in the still night.
Dogs began to howl in imitation of them.

Soriano moved again, farther back into the boat's hull. Moonlight
filtered through the wind-whipped branches of the willow, rays glinting
coldly off the cracked lens of his glasses.

Self-defense, I thought again.

The sirens came closer.

Give me a reason to pull this trigger. Any reason.

Sirens down near the railroad bridge now. Screaming along the row of
cottages. I moved closer to the opening in the planking, gun extended.

Sirens cutting off, back at the Barbour cottage. Men's voices
shouting.

Soriano moved frantically, slipped on the exposed rib-work.

I raised the gun and fired a single shot.

Into the air, so they'd know where to find us.

The visiting area at San Quentin seemed more cheerful on a Saturday.
Perhaps it was the fact that so many children were there; dressed in
go-see-Daddy finery, with freshly scrubbed faces, they imparted an air
of normalcy and hope. Or perhaps it had something to do with knowing
this would be my last trip here—for a long time, if not forever. It
certainly had a lot to do with the joy on Leora Whitsun's face as we
waited to see Bobby.

I hadn't wanted to come; I didn't want to hear thanks, and I didn't
want to answer questions. But Leora had insisted, and there I was.

This time there wasn't much of a wait, and the desk officer actually
smiled at us when we identified ourselves. The guard who led us to the
small, spare visiting room said to me, "Nice going." The case had been
featured prominently in both local and national news; anonymity would
be in short supply for a while.

After the guard locked us in, Leora sighed and looked around. "How
many more times do I have to sit here and stare at
these four walls?"

"Not many. Maybe none. There are legal formalities, but Jack's set
them in motion. There's been too much media attention for anyone to
drag his feet."

"It'll be good having my boy home again." She sat, smoothed her
denim skirt. "Home won't be the projects, either."

"No?"

"Nope. I found me an apartment. Near the clinic. Not much of an
apartment, but it'll be home." She nodded emphatically, gold earrings
bouncing to reinforce her words.

The door on the other side of the grille opened. Bobby entered. His
stiff, defensive posture was gone, replaced by a long, loose stride. He
was free—almost.

"Sharon," he said, "I'm so happy Mama talked you into coming. I got
to thank you for everything you done." He came up to the table that
bisected the room and placed the palms of his hands flat against the
grille.

I leaned forward and placed my hands on my side of it, so we could
touch. "You don't have to thank me."

"Well, I do."

He sat in his wooden chair, and I sat in mine.

For a moment there was an awkward silence. Bobby's eyes clouded and
he said, "That motherfucker Emmons killed her."

Beside me, Leora clicked her tongue in disapproval.

"Right name for him, Mama."

"Maybe so. I got no call to correct you, anyway. You went in here a
child, you're coming out a man."

He nodded brusque thanks at her, trying not to show how much her
words pleased him.

I said, "Emmons killed her, I think, because he had really envied
and hated her for some time. She had everything he wanted: talent and
the ability to make her own opportunities."

"That what you call what she did to me and Lisa and Jay—makin' her
own opportunities?"

I'd thought a good bit about Tracy over the past day and a half. Now
I said, "She was young and greedy, and she used very poor judgment.
That's a reason, Bobby, not an excuse."

"Ain't they the same thing?"

"I don't think so, not really. An excuse removes blame; you realize
a person's not guilty of wrongdoing, and you forgive them. A reason
just tells you why they did what they did; then you have to work at
forgiving."

"Never thought about it that way." He stared at the scarred tabletop
for a moment. "Guess I do forgive her. I had a lot of time to work on
it in here."

There was a silence. I sensed all three of us were entertaining
private thoughts about Tracy Kostakos, about what was forgivable and
what wasn't. Finally Leora said, "What about Rob Soriano? Jack Stuart
says there's no way to prove he set that fire and killed Jay and all
those other people."

The death toll from the fire had climbed to seven; Larkey was among
them. The arson squad had found fragments of what might have been a
simple, timed incendiary device in the club, placed in such a position
as to take advantage of the persistent gas leak from the furnace line.
Soriano had probably counted on the blast destroying the apparatus
completely, and that had nearly happened. There was not enough left to
reconstruct it, and no evidence as yet that the fragments had ever been
in Soriano's possession. Had his past in Florida not come to light, he
would possibly have escaped suspicion; too many people were aware of
the gas leak and PG&E's seeming inability to repair it properly.

Soriano, of course, had admitted nothing.

I said, "It's a long shot. And the Florida arson can't be used as
evidence, because other charges pending against a defendant
aren't admissible. They could allow extradition to Florida, but the
case there isn't all that strong, either. But they've got him for
murdering Marc Emmons. Amy Barbour and I are eyewitnesses."

"What about his wife?" Bobby asked. "She know anything?"

"Quite a lot. Kathy's willing to testify to him being an accessory
after the fact to Tracy's murder, in exchange for immunity from
prosecution."

I'd visited Kathy that morning at the clinic where her personal
physician had had her admitted—more to satisfy my curiosity about
certain things than out of charitable impulse. She'd already spoken
with the district attorney and talked freely to me about how she and
Rob had helped Emmons fake the kidnapping in exchange for his silence.

At first, Kathy said, they had only intended to create confusion
around Tracy's disappearance, patterning the ransom note on the wording
in Bobby's notebook to make it seem the kidnappers were poorly
educated. The idea of framing him occurred to Rob the next week when
Kathy relayed what Lisa Mclntyre knew about Tracy's relationship with
Bobby. But Lisa's knowledge also had the potential to cause all sorts
of complications, so they decided it was best to pay her way out of
town.

Kathy also admitted to helping Emmons move the Volvo from the
cottage to the mountains about two weeks after the killing. Her switch
of the dental records on New Year's Day, the bogus phone calls to
Laura, the marked-up book that Emmons planted in the apartment—all of
those things were last-ditch ploys to preserve the fiction that Tracy
had disappeared of her own volition.