Murder In the Past Tense (A Giorgio Salvatori Mystery Book 2) (27 page)

CHAPTER THIRTY-EIGHT

It was after midnight by the time they reached the gravel road that led to the old sanitarium. The sky was clear, and they followed the deeply rutted road as it wound its way through a forest of old oak and eucalyptus trees back into the foothills. As the car bounced along, it was quiet inside. The four occupants sat contemplating what lay ahead.

Giorgio had to slam on the brakes when a deer bounded across the road. A moment later, it was just a fleeting image of bob tail as it disappeared into the darkness.

After six or seven minutes of straining to keep the car on the road, the locked gate in a tall chain link fence blocked their way. Barbed wire topped the fence. The monstrosity of a building, as Ron Martinelli had described it, sat a hundred yards beyond, camouflaged by trees and looking every bit like something out of a gothic horror movie.

Giorgio cut the headlights and the four of them just stared.

“Shit,” Rocky murmured. “Ron Martinelli wasn’t kidding. This place is huge.”

Giorgio turned to his brother.

“Wire cutters?” he asked.

“In the trunk,” Rocky said.

Giorgio sighed deeply. “Let’s go, then,” he said.

He killed the engine and they all got out. The air was crisp and the moon shone brightly onto the ground below.

Giorgio grabbed Fritz Martinelli’s baseball cap off the seat and stuck it into his jacket. He came around the back of the car. Rocky had opened the trunk.

“Do you have a plan?” Abrams asked Giorgio, as he pulled the rifle from the trunk.

Giorgio glanced at Flame, as if she could provide the answer.

Flame was staring at the building, one hand to her ear, a pained look on her face.

“What’s wrong?” Giorgio asked.

She looked up as if coming out of a trance.

“I’m getting images from hundreds of spirits,” she said. “A lot of people have died here. It’s coming across like a buzzing in my ears. I can’t focus on any single one. I need to get closer. I think I need to connect with the building itself,” she said.

Giorgio had no idea what the heck she was talking about, but he didn’t care.

“Okay, let’s go in from the back. They’re less likely to expect that. If she can, Flame

will tell us where to look once we’re in there. We’ll split up and try to come at them from two directions.” He looked from Rocky to Abrams, and they both nodded. “Wait a second,” Giorgio said, reaching in and removing a box from the trunk. The box was wrapped in Christmas paper and a bow.

“What the heck is that?” Rocky snarled.

“It’s Tony’s Christmas present,” Giorgio said, ripping off the wrapping paper. “I just bought it the other day.”

He finished removing the wrapping and quickly opened the box. It held a pair of kid’s night vision goggles. Rocky took one look and snorted.

“Jesus, Joe. First a psychic and now a toy!”

“Just shut up and grab the batteries,” Giorgio said, pointing to the box.

Rocky did as he was told and handed them over. “Joe, those are made for kids.”

“We only have one flashlight,” Giorgio said. “These might help.”

“I doubt it,” his brother said skeptically.

“These will work okay,” Abrams said, looking at the box. “My nephew has a pair. They just might not fit too well.”

Giorgio put the batteries in and adjusted the strap as wide as it would go. When he put them on, Rocky chuckled quietly.

“You’re an idiot, you know that?” he said, shaking his head.

Abrams was smiling. “Here, flip this,” he said, turning the switch to ‘on.’ Then he helped Giorgio adjust the straps so that it fit snugly onto his head.

“Okay, I’m good. Here,” he said to Flame, handing her the baseball cap. “You’ll need this. It belonged to Fritz. Let’s go.”

The four of them moved to the gate. Rocky used the wire cutters to clip the chain holding the gate closed. The heavy chain and big padlock dropped to the ground with a
whack.

Giorgio pushed on the metal gate and it creaked open. As they passed through, an owl hooted somewhere up in the trees. A light breeze picked up the scent of sagebrush and swirled it around them. They followed the pitted road until they reached the circular drive that led to the main entrance.

The Pottinger Sanitarium loomed before them. It was a three-story, C-shaped building, with broken windows and graffiti sprayed across each wall. Its once pristine stucco exterior was chipped and peeling. The red-tiled roof seemed intact, but there were three chimneys, one in each wing of the old hospital. Two of the three had crumbled into piles of rubble.

Tall arched windows extended across the central wing, all of them protected by bars. Several large trees hugged the exterior of the building, tall enough to bump up against the eaves of the uneven roofline, while overgrown bushes and sagebrush obscured most of the first floor.

The fence that surrounded the property was set to within six feet of the west exterior wall. The barbed wire extension faced outward, preventing all but the most ardent vagrants from gaining access. Only two security lights played across the front entrance, leaving most of the old sanitarium to sit like a monster in the dark, waiting to swallow them up alive.

“Well, at least the electricity is on,” Rocky said, spying the security lights.

“Yeah, but Martinelli was right,” Giorgio exclaimed, glancing around him. “This isn’t going to be easy. This place is enormous. There are even some outbuildings over there.”

He pointed to where two smaller, single-story buildings sat off to one side.

“He’s not in one of those,” the girl said, holding the cap in her left hand. “He’s in there.”

She still had a strained look on her face, but pointed confidently to the big building. The three men turned in unison toward the direction she pointed.

“Let’s go,” Giorgio said.

He began moving up the driveway, his shoes crunching the gravel beneath his feet. They passed chunks of broken concrete, lumber and rocks. The lawn had been reduced to brown patches of dead grass and weeds.

The building faced south, with the San Gabriel Mountains standing in the background. When they passed the front entrance, Giorgio motioned for them to cross the lawn to get up close to the building. Weapons drawn, they did as he instructed, moving quietly across the front of the east wing.

They rounded the southeast corner and hugged the building, darting from bush to bush. Rocky and Abrams peered into windows as they passed, while they both kept a check on their rear flank.

Each wing of the old building was about half a football field long, so it took them several minutes to traverse the distance, avoiding bushes, broken benches, and a few sections of old fencing that had been thrown into a pile. The once grand building was nothing more than a trash heap now, overgrown and forgotten by all but a serial killer.

At one point, Giorgio stopped them with a finger to his lips.

They froze and listened. There was only the rustling of trees and the occasional whoosh of a low-flying bat.

“This place gives me the creeps,” Rocky murmured.

Giorgio waved them on.

The grass along the building had long since died. It had been replaced with a tangle of weeds, broken bottles and trash. Everyone stepped carefully. Flame’s foot got caught once, throwing her into Detective Abrams’ back. Everyone stopped. He turned and helped her back on her feet.

“Didn’t see that one coming did you?” Rocky quipped.

“You okay?” Abrams whispered.

She flashed Rocky an irritated look and nodded.

“Let’s keep going,” Giorgio ordered.

When the group finally came up to the northeast corner of the building, Giorgio glanced to where the driveway wrapped around to the back. He stopped them with a raised hand and then pointed to where the front end of the blue van poked its nose out from the corner of the building.

Giorgio edged carefully around the corner, his weapon held firmly in front of him. Detective Abrams made a wide arc around the front of the van with the rifle aimed at its interior, while Giorgio advanced toward the rear. Rocky hung back with Flame.

The back of the vehicle had been left open, and Giorgio whirled around the open door, but the van was empty. No sign of Martinelli. No sign of the girl. But the now familiar license plate was in full view. Giorgio lowered his gun and pulled the goggles up. He glanced at Abrams, who had come up the other side and then nodded at the license plate. Abrams nodded back.

The van was parked next to the loading dock, which at one time accepted the delivery of everything from food to pharmaceuticals and medical equipment. It extended for some thirty feet with stairs on both ends.

All was dark and quiet.

Giorgio gestured to the girl. “Okay, Flame, you’re up.”

The breeze played with a wisp of hair at the crown of her head. She turned toward the building and held out the hand with the baseball cap.

“Here,” she said, handing it to Giorgio.

“But don’t you have to…”

She stepped past him without a word and moved to the back of the building, where she reached out and placed both hands on the exterior wall. She kept her hands flat and dropped her head for a moment, as if listening to something. The three men watched her quietly. After almost a minute, Giorgio became impatient and was about to say something, when she nodded once and spun around to face them.

“They’re in the morgue,” she whispered. “In the basement. They showed me a main hallway that leads to the center of the building.”

“They?” Rocky said, his voice filled with sarcasm.

She shifted her gaze to Rocky. “The spirits. As I said, the building is filled with them. Some of them are children. But a few know why you’re here, and they want these men gone.” She turned back to Giorgio. “They’ve done bad things here…things the spirits don’t like. I saw more women…” she stopped and took a breath. “I think they want to help you. But I don’t know how. Just be open to it.”

The three men looked at each other, an unspoken question between them.

“They showed me several sets of stairs,” she continued. “But I think they want you to go all the way to the other end of the building, because one of the hallways is blocked.” Then she turned to Detective Abrams. “And, they also showed me a tall man with a rifle out front. That seemed very important.”

Abrams gave her a questioning look. “Do you trust what you’re seeing?”

A breeze drifted through the portico, swirling dust and leaves around their feet.

“Yes, I do. These people died of natural causes. This is their home now, and these men have invaded it.”

Abrams paused and turned to Giorgio with a shrug. “Okay, with me,” he said in a hushed tone. “I’ll position myself at the entrance in case either one of them comes out that way. What do these guys look like? I don’t want to shoot the wrong person.”

“Fritz Martinelli is tall, maybe your height, with dark hair and dark eyes. Perry, his son, is shorter with black hair and tattoos around his neck.”

Abrams nodded. “What do you say when you’re about to go on stage?” he asked.

“Break a leg?” Giorgio replied.

He chuckled. “Okay.
Don’t
do that,” he said. “I’ll see you in a few.” He turned and started to leave, when Giorgio stopped him.

“Sean,” he said. “The moment you hear gunshots, call it in. By that time, they’ll know we’re here and we’ll need back-up.”

Detective Abrams nodded and left for the entrance. Giorgio turned to Flame.

“You need to go with him,” Giorgio said.

“I will,” she replied. “But first…you need to know…the boy is here,” she said.

Giorgio’s heart skipped a beat. “He…why can’t I see him?”

“He doesn’t belong here,” she said quietly. “So he won’t come in close. But he showed me a

big tree. The tree is important for some reason.”

“There are big trees all around here,” Giorgio said in frustration. “Okay,” he sighed. “You need to go back to the car. And stay there. No matter what. The keys are in the ignition. If something happens…if you get scared, just leave.”

She gave him a weak smile. “The girl is still alive, Detective, but you need to hurry. Her captors know you’re here,” she said, and then she turned and followed Detective Abrams.

Giorgio and Rocky glanced at each other, sharing a somber moment.

“What boy?” Rocky said.

“Never mind. Let’s do this,” Giorgio replied.

CHAPTER THIRTY-NINE

Rocky flicked on the big flashlight. The metal door to the loading dock was up, revealing a large, dark interior. Everything smelled of age-old dust, with just a hint of motor oil.

Across the room, a metal staircase extended up to a door with a glass window. Directly ahead of them was an old industrial lift.

They approached the lift. The two doors to the lift stood open. Rocky flashed the light down and saw the lift sitting below ground. The ancient electrical box sat on the right wall, and Rocky reached out and was about to push the button, when Giorgio stopped him.

“Wait. He might hear it. Let’s take the stairs to the main hallway, just as we were told.”

They turned and hurried up the short flight of stairs and quietly opened the door, slipping into a darkened hallway. Giorgio pulled the infrared binoculars back down over his eyes.

“Be careful,” he whispered. “Remember, there are two of them.”

The stairwell in the east wing of the old Pottinger Sanitarium was dark and cold, and the air was filled with dust. The stairs switched back and forth, extending up and then down to the basement. Directly in front of them was a door. Giorgio peeked through a small window. A long hallway ran along the first floor of the east wing. Another door to their right led to a hallway that appeared to run the entire width of the building, along the back. So, they had three choices. Take a hallway or go down the stairs to the basement.

“Eeeney, meeney, miney, mo,” Rocky whispered. “Which way do we go?”

Before Giorgio could respond, the door directly in front of them popped open. They both snapped around with their guns out. No one was there.

“I guess we go that way,” Giorgio said, as a chill inched its way down his back.

He stepped into the hallway. The infrared glasses allowed him to see everything bathed in a red light.

The two brothers moved quietly forward, their senses on alert. They passed darkened doors to their left and some old broken furniture stacked against the wall on their right.

Halfway down the corridor, the right wall opened up to a nursing station. An old metal sign on the wall said, “Ward B.” Behind the nursing station was a set of swinging doors. The room beyond was as dark as a coffin.

They kept going.

They turned a corner and entered a hallway that cut off to the right. They passed an old broken gurney and some boxes lined up along the right wall. The hallway extended into the heart of the building, deep enough to swallow the flashlight beam.

“This must be the main hallway,” Giorgio whispered.

They passed another nurses’ station and stopped to listen for any revealing sounds. But all they heard were the occasional knocks and pings of a huge empty building.

It took them a couple more minutes to make it to the main entrance and lobby, where moonlight streamed through the front windows, illuminating a few old benches and a central staircase in the rear. To the left of the staircase were the main elevators. Across the room was an old, oak reception counter. To the right of the counter was another set of double swinging doors.

“What now?” Rocky whispered.

“I think we’re supposed to cross through,” Giorgio replied.

“Okay, let’s go,” Rocky said. “You take the left. I’ll take the right.”

They hurried through the open space of the lobby. Rocky covered the front half of the large room, while Giorgio took the back half.

When they got to the door, Giorgio flattened himself against one side of the wall, while Rocky did the same on the other. Giorgio nodded and Rocky used his left hand to swing open one door. He slipped through, with Giorgio coming through behind him.

They found themselves in the west wing. Halfway down the hall, they passed a door marked ‘Stairs.’ Rocky started to turn for the stairs, but Giorgio stopped him and waved his hand forward. Giorgio moved to the end of the hallway and glanced to the right. This hallway mirrored the one in the east wing and extended to the rear of the building, where the windows allowed moonlight to bathe the area in light. He signaled to Rocky and they turned the corner and crept forward.

They stopped when they got to the hall that ran along the back of the building.

“Now what?” Rocky whispered.

“I’m not sure,” Giorgio replied, looking around.

Metal doors stood at each end of the long hallway. The door to the right was positioned near the center of the building, probably near the main staircase, and each door was marked for a stairwell.

“Flame said the morgue was in the basement,” Giorgio said.

“Then either staircase will probably take us there,” Rocky whispered.

“But she also said to go to the far end. That would be to our left,” Giorgio said, turning in that direction.

He flinched back. A weird glow had appeared through the window in the door to their left. Giorgio felt a full blown chill run the length of his body. He nodded toward the door.

“Who needs a bloodhound?” he said.

“I guess we won’t be putting this in the duty report,” Rocky murmured, staring at the light.

“C’mon,” Giorgio said, moving into the hallway and towards the far left door.

They traversed the distance quickly. When they passed through the door, the glow evaporated.

They descended the stairs as quietly as possible, their weapons held out before them. At the bottom was one more metal door.

Giorgio slowly reached out and grasped the door handle, turning it carefully. The door was locked.

“Shit,” he murmured.

He was about to turn around, when a faint light appeared through the window, and the door handle began to silently rotate.

Giorgio backed up, bumping into Rocky. His heartbeat thumped wildly.

“Grab it,” Rocky hissed.

Giorgio reached out, just as the door quietly clicked open. He grabbed the doorknob and pulled the door wide. They slipped through as the light on the other side faded.

Rocky caught the door behind him, not allowing it to close all the way or to make any noise. Giorgio nodded.

The rear basement hallway extended away from them. An electrical light emanated from a door halfway down the hall. A small sign on the wall said, ‘morgue’ and an arrow pointed forward.

Giorgio signaled to Rocky to move quietly.

They inched forward until they reached an intersecting hallway to their right. Giorgio glanced around the corner and pointed to a stack of gurneys and chairs that blocked the space. Rocky nodded.

This was the blocked staircase Flame had mentioned, the same one they’d passed above. Add to that the locked door they’d just come through, and Giorgio understood the current game plan. The men they were chasing didn’t want anyone coming at them from this end of the building. They’d blocked the hallway and locked that door. That could only mean one thing – they had planned an ambush.

Giorgio glanced past the morgue.

The door to the central staircase was propped open down here, and he could just barely see the last step of the staircase leading up to the next floor.

As Giorgio watched, a brief flare lit up the stairwell. Someone had just lit a cigarette.

He alerted Rocky, who nodded that he’d seen it, too.

A faint sound of movement came from that direction, confirming his belief. Someone was waiting for them.

Giorgio signaled for Rocky to pass in front of him and move towards the other stairwell. Rocky tip-toed forward, ducking under the windows of the morgue door. He stopped on the other side, ready to engage whoever was waiting for them in the stairwell.

Giorgio approached the morgue doors. There were double swinging doors with small windows in each. He lifted up onto his tiptoes to peek through.

A battered, old wooden desk, with an L-shaped counter behind it sat just inside the doors. A floating retaining wall stood behind the desk. The room opened up on either side of the wall, revealing old metal gurneys in various states of disrepair.

To the left of the center wall was the end of a gurney with someone on it. Bare feet twitched as a moan echoed through the room.

Giorgio flinched, his nerves on fire. He pulled up his goggles. He wouldn’t need them in there since there was a light.

As he contemplated his next move, a man’s elbow came into view, and suddenly he was looking at the back of Fritz Martinelli, who was just about to lift something above a bare leg.

Giorgio tapped Rocky and pointed towards the man in the stairwell. Rocky nodded and began to inch that way.

A moment later, Mia Santana’s pained scream cut through the silence, forcing Giorgio to push through the swinging doors.

He broke to his left, making a wide circle to come around so that he could see the gurney.

Fritz Martinelli was gone.

Two shots rang out from the stairwell. Rocky had encountered Perry.

Giorgio crouched down. He was near the end of the gurney. A drain in the floor was awash with blood, and Giorgio’s insides churned.

A few more shots in the hallway. And then it was quiet.

Giorgio moved further into the room, glancing around, looking for Martinelli.

A metal sink and counter stood on the other side of the room. Metal shelving hung on the wall above.

In the far left corner was a huge door that led to the cooler, the room where they would have laid the dead bodies.

Giorgio’s eyes roamed the walls. There were no windows in the morgue, just the way Martinelli would want it. No prying eyes.

The cooler door was open and the light was on. Giorgio guessed that Martinelli hoped he would move in that direction. But something told him it was a ruse.

Instead, he moved further into the room along the left wall of counters.

A noise made him jerk to his right just as a bullet whizzed over his head, slamming into the wall.

He leapt forward and behind the end of the counter.

The only light was directly above Mia Santana. The rest of the room was cast in shadow.

There was no movement. And Giorgio couldn’t see anything that resembled a human form other than the woman on the gurney.

He took a chance and scuttled into the center of the room, and then towards the back wall, where there was a long counter that ran horizontally. As he was about to turn the corner and hide behind the counter, his foot rolled over an old test tube on the floor. He was thrown off balance and toppled awkwardly into the counter just as a loud crack shattered the silence.

A second bullet ricocheted off the countertop, just missing his shoulder.

He hit the floor, rolling behind the cabinetry.

Giorgio glanced up and took a deep breath. To his left was the cooler door. To his right, an alcove disappeared into a black well of darkness, like a hallway, making him think there might be a second door back there.

But the bullet had come from the nurses' station by the front door. Martinelli had probably slipped around the far side of the floating wall and behind the L-shaped counter when Giorgio burst into the room. If there wasn’t a second door, he was trapped in here.

Giorgio heard a faint shuffling of feet, and then a bullet took out the fluorescent light bulb above Mia’s gurney, raining shards of glass onto the floor and onto her.

The room dropped into complete darkness.

Giorgio pulled down his goggles again and the room came alive.

“C’mon, Martinelli,” Giorgio shouted. “You’re not going to get away.”

He crouched around the edge of the counter. A human form appeared from around the corner of the floating wall, on the other side of Mia’s gurney. Giorgio watched him in the goggles’ crimson light. Martinelli lifted his right hand and discharged another bullet. It hit the metal shelving and glass beakers on the wall behind Giorgio. Shards of glass sprayed out, forcing him to duck.

Then suddenly, there was a loud crack and gun flare from Giorgio’s right.

Giorgio spun in that direction.

Rocky had come in low from the darkened alcove and had taken a shot at Martinelli.

Giorgio heard the sound of running feet and a hand hitting the swinging door. Martinelli had fled into the hallway.

Giorgio got up. A moment later, Rocky was by his side with the flashlight on.

“What happened to Perry?” Giorgio asked.

“He won’t be a problem,” Rocky replied.

“Okay, take care of the girl,” Giorgio said, gesturing towards the gurney. “Get her out of here. I’ll take care of Fritz.”

Giorgio ran for the double doors.

He came into the hallway and scanned both directions. A sound to his left made him turn that

way. Martinelli had gone up the stairwell they’d just come down.

He sprinted in that direction, just catching the door before it close and ran up the first set of stairs.