Nemesis (26 page)

Once I was onto the concrete floor, Haxner ordered me to move to my left and then stop. When I complied, I heard him step down and then sidle off in the opposite direction. I made a slow half-turn—would have turned even if he'd told me not to—so I could see where he was headed. On his way to the workbench in a sidewise walk, watching me with the Glock extended back in my direction.

I stood still then except for little head movements and eye shifts. I was a couple of steps from the inner wall and a row of dusty, sagging shelves that stretched along it. The only items the shelves held were a plastic bucket, a pair of rusty hedge clippers out of my reach, and half a dozen topless coffee cans. Inside one of the cans on a lower shelf was what looked to be a jumble of old faucet parts.

Haxner was at the bench now, reaching up for a roll of duct tape hanging on a hook.

I looked at the wall again. And when I saw the electric push-button between the end of the shelving and the doorjamb, I knew what I was going to do. Instant decision: there was no time to consider it and I might never have another chance.

Haxner's fingers closed around the tape roll. He fumbled it a little as he pulled it off the hook; his gaze flicked away from me for an instant. I sucked in a breath and made my move—fast sliding step to my right, hard jab on the push-button with my left thumb. The overhead door mechanism was old and the sudden grinding noise of the gears made Haxner jerk and lose his focus, just long enough for me to snatch up the coffee can and throw it at him as I lunged forward.

He ducked, triggered a round at the same instant the can hit the wall behind him and peppered him with the faucet parts. Wild shot, the boom of it adding to the racket of the door going up. Haxner bellowed something and squeezed off another round that didn't quite miss: I felt the sting of the bullet on my left forearm. And then I was on him.

I got my hand around the hot squared barrel of the gun and tore it out of his hand, but I couldn't hold it; the weapon went banging and skidding across the floor. I wrapped my arms around him, twisted him away from the bench. He had twenty years on me, but I had more experience and the benefit of adrenaline-driven fury. When he couldn't break loose, he tried to rupture me; I turned in time, took the thrust on my upper thigh, and retaliated by stomping down hard on his instep. That ripped loose another yell, hurt him enough to buckle his knees. He pulled me with him when he went down.

That was all right because I landed on top, full weight, slamming his head into the concrete. He grunted, moaned, but the fight didn't go out of him. He bucked me half off, forced me to roll with him—out through the open garage door onto the driveway. I came up on top again, reared back to get leverage, and hit him twice, right fist, left fist. The first was a glancing blow because I was half blind with sweat; the second landed solidly on his knotted jawline, with enough force behind it to smack his head into the pavement again. And that ended it. He went limp under me.

I crawled off him, knelt for a few seconds with my head down to catch my breath. An idiotic urge to laugh came over me. Old man fighting like a school kid … fighting for his life. Damn wonder I hadn't died of a heart attack, if not from one of the slugs he'd pumped at me.

The thought made me aware of the stinging in my arm. I wiped my eyes clear to look at the damage. The bullet had torn through my coat and shirt sleeves, but there wasn't much blood. Flesh wound. My lucky day.

A man was standing on the sidewalk, I realized then, staring goggle-eyed. When he saw me looking at him, he ran off across the street as if he thought I might start chasing him. There was nobody else around except for Haxner, moving his arms and legs now in a series of twitches, his eyes rolled up in his head. Concussion, I thought, and the thought made me happy—but only for as long as it took to go back into the garage, pick up the Glock, and then call 911.

 

EPILOGUE

JAKE RUNYON

It was a long five days after Bill's confrontation with George Haxner before they released him. Bill had to do a lot of explaining, Haxner was in the hospital with a severe head injury and couldn't be questioned, the homicide inspectors had to do a preliminary investigation and then convince a judge to issue a search warrant, and the forensics people had to be prodded into doing a rush analysis of the bloodstains and other evidence found in Haxner's home. Plus there was the weekend sandwiched in between to slow things down even more.

Eventually the DA's office dropped the charges, notified the judge of the dismissal, and when the judge in turn dismissed the charge in writing, Runyon was officially off the hook. He signed the release papers, and they gave him back his personal possessions. His laptop, too, which they'd confiscated. When he walked out with Dragovich, Bill and Tamara were waiting. Bryn wasn't there because she hadn't been told exactly when he was being released. No need for her to endure another trip to the Hall of Justice. The one time she'd visited him, she'd been supportive but uncomfortable: too many bad memories of her own time trapped behind bars.

Tamara suggested the four of them go somewhere, have a drink and kick back a little, but he begged off; it would only have turned into a rehash session and he wasn't feeling sociable to begin with. They understood without much being said.

Bill drove him to the AutoReturn offices at 450 Seventh Street, the city's vehicle impound facility, where he had to pay nearly a thousand dollars to ransom his Ford, the police having impounded it to search for bloodstains and other evidence that wasn't there. But their apology didn't include a waiver of the usual towing and storage fees. The city bureaucracy didn't operate that way. Separate agencies, the SFPD and AutoReturn, which in his case translated to separate screwings.

Runyon shook hands with Bill in the storage lot, thanked him again for all he'd done, and they went their separate ways. He drove up over Twin Peaks and down to his apartment. The place had a musty, closed-up smell; he opened a couple of windows to air it out. The police hadn't made a mess in their search of the premises, but then they hadn't been too careful about it, either. He straightened up, put some things back where they belonged. Then he took a long, hot shower, shaved, dressed in clean clothes, and sat down in the living room to call Bryn and tell her he was out.

“Oh, Jake,” she said, “I'm so relieved. Are you okay?”

“I will be.”

“Why don't you come over for dinner tonight? Bobby would love to see you. We'll celebrate.”

Celebrate. Getting sprung from jail when you were innocent of the charge that put you there wasn't a cause for celebration. Bryn ought to remember that; she hadn't wanted festivities last spring any more than he did now.

“Rain check,” he said. “I've got some catching up to do here.”

“I understand. Tomorrow, then, or whenever you'd like. But soon.”

“Soon.”

“Just give me a little advance notice. I'll cook something special.”

“Sure. That'll be great.”

He booted up his laptop to see if any of the settings had been fouled up by SFPD's computer people. No, they were all okay. He checked his e-mail. Not many messages, considering the amount of time he'd been locked up, and none that required immediate attention.

The apartment was cold now; he shut the windows. Then he put on his jacket and went out to the Ford and started driving. Going nowhere in particular, just out of the city—a long way out of the city. Daylight ride that would turn into a night ride, maybe a late-night ride.

Once he was into it, he finally felt free again.

TAMARA

She almost didn't answer the doorbell.

Last time it had rung unexpectedly it'd been Antoine Delman and a big load of trouble. More trouble this time, too, if not the deadly kind, because she had a feeling who was standing out there on the front stoop. Couldn't have said how or why, just that she knew as soon as she heard the bell.

Go away, nobody home.

Bell went off again. And again.

Knows I'm home, she thought. All right, then. Have to deal with him eventually, might as well be now.

She went downstairs, opened the door on the heavy-duty chain she'd had installed. And yeah, there he was. Smiling in the old wistful way he had, those big brown eyes of his round and bright as a stuffed bear's. Big as a bear, too. Hair shorter than she remembered it and starting to recede a little in front (good!). Dressed in a sport jacket and a pair of slacks, as if spiffing up would make a difference to her.

“Hello, Tam.”

“So it's you. How'd you find out where I live?”

“Wasn't too hard. We still have some mutual friends.”

“Tell me which one and it'll be one less of mine.”

“You look good,” he said. Eating her up with those brown eyes, damn him. “You've lost weight, I can tell from your face. Don't mind my saying, it makes you even more attractive.”

“None of your sweet-talk crap. What do you want?”

“Talk to you, that's all.”

“I don't have the Toyota anymore. Told you that on the phone.”

“Yes, you do—I saw it parked down the block. But that's not why I'm here. I've got another car now.”

“Thought you didn't have any money. What'd you do, steal it?”

“Borrowed enough from Charley Phillips's folks to buy a junker. They helped me get a job, too. It's not much—waiter in a Pier Thirty-Nine restaurant—but it'll do until I can find a music gig.”

“You think I care?”

“Can I come in? Just for a few minutes?”

“No. Said everything we had to say to each other on the phone.”

“No, we didn't. At least I didn't—there's a lot more I want to say to you. I won't stay long, promise.”

“Both know what your promises are worth.”

He winced. “I know how badly I hurt you and you have every right to tell me to go to hell. All I'm asking is a chance to do some soul-baring first—”

“I don't want to hear it.”

“Please, Tam.”

“No.”

He kept looking at her with those big brown eyes. “Please.”

I hate you, you son of a bitch, she thought.

She closed the door—but only far enough so that she could take off the chain. And dammit,
dammit,
when Horace came in past her, the nearness and the familiar scent of him sent little shivers up and down her spine.

BILL

The bullet wound in my arm was a setback for Kerry. Just a flesh wound, hardly more than a scratch, but I couldn't hide it from her. And I couldn't lie to her about how and where I'd gotten it and the handful of bruises and contusions because the one thing we never did was lie to each other.

It upset her pretty badly. Made her scared and clingy at first, then angry, then borderline hysterical. She kept saying things like, “My God, you could have been killed. Somebody could have rung the doorbell and told me you were lying dead in some stranger's garage. What's the matter with you, going into that house the way you did? Why do you take such foolish risks?”

She was right, and I admitted it. Then I made the mistake of saying it wouldn't happen again.

“You said that the last time, and the time before that, and the time before that. It will happen again if you keep putting yourself in harm's way. You have to stop. You have to stop! If you don't, you'll end up killing us both.”

“… What do you mean?”

“You told me after what happened in July you couldn't stand losing me. Well, don't you think I feel the same about you? If I lost you, I couldn't go on, I wouldn't want to go on. Not even for Emily's sake.”

“Don't say that.…”

“It's the truth. I love Emily, we both do, but it's different with you and me. We're not just married, we're fused together, a single entity. Destroy one half and the other half will die, too. You feel the same, I know you do.”

“Of course I do—”

“Then promise me there'll be no more risks, no more deliberate exposure to violence, that I'll never have to worry about you that way again. Promise me! Swear to me!”

“I promise,” I said. “I swear.”

She looked into my eyes for a long time, as if trying to assure herself that I was sincere. Then she said, “Oh, God, I love you,” and threw her arms around me and started to weep.

She was better after that, but the negative effects lingered. Periods of withdrawal, nightmares, crying jags—not as bad as before, but bad enough to erode some of the progress she'd made before my part in the Verity Daniels fiasco. Inadvertently, I'd made her vulnerable again, fearful again. And it was up to me to undo the damage, work harder to renew her healing process.

So I'm home now where I belong, seeing to Kerry's needs, and Emily's, pretty much twenty-four seven. What little work I do for Tamara and the agency is mostly on a consultancy basis. Maybe eventually I'll go back to South Park a couple of days a week now and then, and maybe I won't. If so, it won't be until after Kerry is completely herself again. One thing is for certain: I'll never do any more field work that has even the remotest possibility of danger.

My sworn promise to Kerry is an unbreakable covenant.

I'm out of harm's way for good.

 

“NAMELESS DETECTIVE” MYSTERIES BY BILL PRONZINI

Nemesis

Hellbox

Camouflage

Betrayers

Schemers

Fever

Savages

Mourners

Nightcrawlers

Scenarios
(collection)

Spook

Bleeders

Crazybone

Boobytrap

Illusions

Sentinels

Spadework
(collection)

Hardcase

Demons

Epitaphs

Quarry

Breakdown