Remote (24 page)

Jack thought about that.  How did something as technological, as culturally
void
as multicolored electric lights become part of a religious holiday?  They were like mainstream pornography: a pretty, airbrushed projection of reality, with no depth beyond the glossy surface.  You could add Christmas lights to anything—a bridge, a construction crane, a police station—and suddenly it became
merry
.   Parasitic transvestite architecture, obscuring meaning with sparkly sentimentality and knee-jerk associations. 

The Patron had killed his mother with a string of Christmas lights. 

Meaningless
, Jack thought. 
It has no meaning, except what you attach to it. 

None at all.

C
HAPTER
T
WENTY

“I don’t really have time for this,” Jack told Goliath.

The biker snorted.  “Me neither.  I’m supposed to have high fucking tea with the Queen of England today, and she’s one mean bitch if you stand her up.”

Goliath couldn’t see who he was talking to.  The woman had chained him back up in the trailer, then put a hood over his head.  He’d considered jumping her before the locks clicked into place, but she was faster than he’d expected.

“I understand you were drugged and kidnapped,” said Jack.  “Must really piss you off.”

“Nah, I’m a ray of sunshine.  Ask anyone.”

“Uh-huh.  Well, Sunshine, I’m going to give you a chance to brighten someone else’s day.”

“Yeah?  Whose?”

“His name isn’t important.  But he’s the one who dragged you into this.”

Another snort.  “Yeah, sure.  Let me guess—he’s the big bad guy and you want me to go kill him.  Which I’m gonna do, because you’re obviously a much
nicer
kinda kidnapper, and are being one hundred percent, completely honest with me.  That about it, dickhead?”

“No.  I
am
going to give you a chance for revenge—but I’m not a nice guy.  Not at all.”  Jack paused.  “I know about the people you’ve killed, the women you’ve raped.  If I had more time, you and I would be having a long talk about that.”

“Hey, I got all the time in the world.”

“No, you don’t.  Do you know who I am?”

“I got no fucking clue, and I don’t
want
to—“ 

“Have you heard of the Closer?”

Silence.  Jack wished he could see Goliath’s face.

Finally, Goliath said, “Fuck you.  That guy’s not even real.”

“Oh, I’m real.  Not that it matters.”  Jack took a few steps closer, leaned in beside Goliath’s hooded head.  “Because even if the Closer is just a story, it’s a story we both know.  And even if I’m not the Closer, I know what he would do in a situation like this.  I know what
I’m
going to have to do—to you-- to establish my credibility.  But by the time I’m finished, it won’t matter what you call me, will it?”

Jack reached out a hand, tapped Goliath lightly on the bulge of his nose through the hood.  The biker’s head jerked back in reflex.

“Could be I’m just a wannabe, a copycat,” said Jack.  “You know what they say, though: I may be number two, but I do
try
harder . . .”

“When I get outta here,” Goliath growled, “I’m gonna beat you to death with one of your own goddamn arms.” 

Jack wasn’t fooled.  He’d been in this place before, heard other killers make the same kind of threats, and he’d learned to recognize that almost imperceptible tremor of fear beneath the anger.

“But today’s your lucky day, Goliath.  I’m going to give you a shot at a nice, clean death instead of dying by inches, in agony.  My associate is out making preparations right now.   Once she comes back with the necessary equipment, you’re going to be a free man again.”

Jack gave his prisoner a smile he couldn’t see.  “Free being a relative term, in this case . . .”

***

Nikki rented a car in the LAX terminal and waited for the valet to bring it around.  The Los Angeles sky was a smoggy gray haze tinged with blue, the air warm and damp. 
November
, she thought. 
What season is that in LA--wildfire, riot, mudslide or earthquake?  Pilot, premiere, awards or sweeps?

Not that it mattered.  She was here to shop.

LA had plenty of what she was in the market for, but only one particular brand would do.  Research had given up the company easily enough, but securing the product would take a little more ingenuity. 

She took the freeway to Santa Monica, found a Starbucks with wifi across the street from the building itself, and did a little online surfing while sitting in the passenger seat.  Fortunately, what she was after wasn’t really high-end, which meant they grabbed any publicity they could get as a form of free advertising.  She already had a photo and a name; it took her less than an hour to find out where her target had gone to school, what neighborhood he lived in and what kind of car he drove--but the real shiny treasure at the bottom of the pile was his favorite restaurant.

She kept one eye on the exit to the building’s parking garage while she worked, and wasn’t surprised to see a white convertible with her subject driving leave at around eleven AM.  Time for a two-hour power lunch, no doubt.  She followed him discreetly, formulating her approach in her mind.

In the end she went with a classic, the bump and spill.  It was usually done with a two-man team, one working the spill and the other grabbing the wallet, but in her case all she wanted was the man’s attention.  That, she was pretty sure she could get on her own.

His name was Daniel Erevant, and she spotted him sitting on the patio reading
Variety
.  He was in his early thirties, clean-shaven, with an expensive haircut and clothes that were probably a Chinese knockoff of the most up-to-the-second trend in business casual.  He was handsome in that generic Southern Californian way that gave you the impression you’d seen him in a commercial you couldn’t quite remember.

She timed her move very carefully.  No matter what he looked like, he was a predator in an environment full of them, and his senses would be keenly attuned to anything resembling a set-up. 

She was prepared to wait until he got up to leave, but he gave her an opening when he headed for the bathroom after his second iced tea.  He was still alone; she guessed business wasn’t as brisk as he would have liked.

The drink she’d ordered was in a tall martini glass and full of brightly colored fruit juices.  Her blouse was white.

“Oh!” she said.  She’d been very careful to not get any on him.  “I—I . . . “

“Oh,
shit
,” Erevant said.  “I’m so, so sorry.  Are you all right?”

But even as he was apologizing, he was sizing her up, seeing what kind of shape pinged back on his radar. 

“I’m—no, I’m
not
all right,” she snapped.  “Look at this!”

“Hey, I’m sorry.  I’ll pay for dry-cleaning, okay?”  On the defensive, pulling back a little, still wary.  Waiting to see how she’d react.

“I can’t go back to work like this,” she said.  “My boss is the most anal retentive asswad in existence and he’s just looking for an excuse—do you
know
how tight the job market is these days?”

“Yeah, it’s tough out there—but come on, he’s not gonna fire you for having a little accident—“  A little more concern in his voice, but still cautious--

“You don’t know him.  I’m the third legal secretary he’s had in a year—“ 
There.  That should help establish what I’m
not—“I think he fires them just because he can, like he’s
daring
one of us to launch a wrongful dismissal suit.  He—he thinks he’s smarter than everybody else, the arrogant
prick
—“

She started crying. 

That was the crux point, she knew.  If he bought it, he’d be on her side, trying to comfort her; if not, he’d write her off as just another professional liar in a city full of them.

“Hey,” he said, his voice softening.  “Look, I’ll buy you another top, all right?  There’s a mall right across the street.  And replace your drink—you look like you need it.”

She let herself smile through her tears.

***

Jack walked from room to room in the warehouse, considering the art stockpiled by the man who’d killed his family.

There was a lot of it, all of it valuable.  He stopped beneath one of his favorites, a large chandelier made of suspended shards of broken glass; one side of each shard was a true mirror, the other covered with a crinkled piece of high albedo mylar foil, casting a subtly-distorted reflection.  The shards were densely clustered, like a constantly shifting maze of light; in the very center was the source of illumination, a beautiful sculpture of a nude woman cast in glass.  A bulb that simulated firelight flickered at her base, radiating a glow through her translucent body and outlining every tautly sculpted muscle, every gently rounded curve.  It was hard to see the woman clearly; all you got was glimpses as the shards moved, brief looks that might be distorted or might be true. 

The piece was called
Memory
.

It was the artist’s tribute to his first love, a woman the Patron had killed.  Jack hated looking at it; it was proof that the Patron’s method worked, that sometimes a mediocre artist could be pushed toward genius by a horrifying, transformative event.  Jack had always known true beauty was often wrapped around a core of pain, but the Patron had turned that essential truth into an industrial process—one as inhuman as rendering people down for soap. 

No.  Not this one.
  He moved on.  He wasn’t sure why; it just didn’t feel right.

The next room was full of monsters. 

Gigantic, elaborately constructed sculptures, looming horrors that reached out with grasping fingers made of butcher knives. 

Jack stopped in front of a large painting, ten or so feet high by six feet wide, by an artist named Salvatore Torigno.  The Patron had sent a photo of it to Jack when they’d first started corresponding over the Internet; Jack had been wondering why the Patron had picked this particular piece.

It depicted a man collapsed in a heap on the ground, his hands clasped in prayer, while angels with demonic faces hovered over him, brandishing lances tipped with bloody hearts.  The central image, though, was of a white-bearded deity towering above the man, looking both malevolent and triumphant.  His broad smile revealed a mouth full of sharpened teeth, a carnivorous god considering his next meal.

Jack thought he understood now.   The cruel, uncaring God in the painting was the author of all suffering, and Torigno was the worshipper begging for mercy. 

But God wasn’t responsible for Torigno’s pain.  The Patron was.  And in his monstrous arrogance, he saw the depiction of an uncaring Creator as a portrait of himself.

Jack wished he could tell the artist that the inhuman being he’d conjured out of oils and canvas was dead, that he’d never torment anyone else again—but he couldn’t.  Salvatore Torigno had taken his own life shortly after the Patron had died in Jack’s chair, no longer able to bear the burden of his own memories.  Remembering what the Patron had done to Torigno’s mother, Jack couldn’t blame him. 

The painting had already doubled in value.

Jack sighed.  He hated to do it . . . but Remote had to be stopped, and the plan Jack had come with required an immediate and substantial influx of funds.

He took a snapshot of the painting with a digital camera, then started making the arrangements to sell it. 

***

Jack made a call.

“Hi.  Chris?”

“Yeah, who’s this?”

“It’s Jack Salter.”

“Jack?  Wow, man, long time no talk.  What have you been up to?  You still in Vancouver, or somewhere else?  I didn’t recognize the area code.”

“I’ve been doing some traveling.  Working on some new pieces.”

“Hey, that’s great!  I always loved your stuff—I’ve still got that sculpture you made me on a shelf in my study.  Look at it all the time.  And it’s great that you’re—well, that you’re working again.”

“Thanks.  I need some assistance, actually—that’s why I’m calling.  You still in the biz?”

“Yeah, I still do the odd project—you know this town, there’s always something happening.  What do you need?”

Jack told him.  “It’d take a day of your time, no more.  But it’s kind of time sensitive—it has to happen by tomorrow.”

“Is this a paying gig, or a favor?”

“Definitely paying.”  Jack gave him a figure. 

“For one day?  Sure, I can do that.  Where do you want me?”

“Vancouver.  Tomorrow.  I’ll get you an address and what we’ll need.”

“I’m on board.  Hey, it’ll be great working with you.”

“Looking forward to it, too.  I’ll see you then.”

***

Jack knew who Remote’s next target was. 

It was the catalog file of antique clockwork devices that told him.  No matter how advanced his methods or esoteric his psychopathology, Remote was still a serial killer, one the FBI would classify as highly organized.  There were a number of traits commonly shared by killers of this type: above average IQ, careful planning, an obsession with following their own crimes in the media.

And the taking of trophies.

Jack hadn’t seen any evidence of physical trophies in Remote’s house, and at first he simply assumed that the encrypted files on Remote’s computer must contain images that fulfilled that purpose; after all, he would have live footage of the actual crimes being committed. 

But then he noticed something:  the number of wind-up collectibles in the house was exactly the same as the number of victims Remote had claimed. 

Jack had memorized as many details as possible about Remote’s crimes, and the catalog file revealed that he’d ordered one of the devices at the successful conclusion of each of his projects.  They weren’t mementos, they were the physical representation of an accomplishment—an award, not a keepsake.

But the very last piece of automata listed in the file, a clockwork devil that actually breathed fire, wasn’t anywhere in the house.  It was no doubt destined for one of the empty cases in the hallway downstairs, but the really interesting thing was that the day of its arrival had already been established: December the first.  Beside the date were the initials SA.