Strange Robby (11 page)

Spider turned around to face Carrie. "I had a girl friend in the service, you know."

Carrie laughed. "That's OK, Honey. This may come as a shock, but you're not exactly my first, either."

"No, Carrie, let me finish." Spider swallowed hard. "Becky and I were close. It wasn't like you and me, but at least we thought we were in love, we cared about each other. We were entrenched just outside the heart of Baghdad when a bomb landed in our trench. It literally blew pieces of her all over me. For just a second I thought about just standing there till something hit me, too. It was too horrible to imagine living through. But something inside me, somewhere deep down, some instinct took over and I just kept going. She was my lover and my friend, and I wiped her blood off my face and kept fighting. I never looked back."

"If you had, you'd be dead, too," Carrie said quietly.

Spider looked at Carrie. "Don't you see, Carrie? I never told anyone about her. About what she meant to me. She died, and God only knows who buried her—if anyone. I went on with my life, and I left her there—body and soul—in that trench."

"You want to talk about her?" Carrie asked carefully.

"That would be too weird," Spider said.

"Why? Because she was your girl friend? I'm not going to feel threatened. I am one cocky bitch, and I have an almost too healthy self-image. If you loved her even a little, she must have been pretty special, and I want to hear about her."

Spider hesitated for a second. "Becky had delusions of grandeur; going in, she wanted to be the first woman three star general. Two weeks into basic training she was trying to find a way out . . . "

"For the fifth time, what did you take from the crime scene, Webb?" the lieutenant boomed as he showed the damn comlink video from detective Levits' unit for the fifth time.

"And for the fifth time that is not—technically—part of the crime scene," Spider answered through clenched teeth. "Who says I'm picking up anything? The view is obstructed by a fucking car. I bent over to look at something. I didn't pick anything up . . . "

"Detective York said he saw you put something into your pocket."

"That's called my hand," Spider hissed.

"He makes a strong accusation, Webb. He says he thinks you took evidence. He says he believes you have been doing so all along. Did you take something from that crime scene?"

"No I did not," Spider gritted out. She looked at Tommy then. "Go ahead. Tell him."

"I didn't see her pick anything up," Tommy lied.

"Not that. Tell him about last night. What kind of shape I was in."

He looked at her for confirmation. Did she really want him to tell the lieutenant about the PTS episode? It would mean a trip to the department shrink at the very least—medical suspension at the most. She nodded at him. He looked at the lieutenant, but just couldn't.

"Ah . . . crap, Spider."

"Just tell him!" she nearly screamed.

Tommy took a deep breath and let it out, but still stammered when he started talking. He'd never had another partner, and he didn't want one now. "She, ah . . . she occasionally suffers from a minor form of post-traumatic shock syndrome. She had an episode last night after viewing the crime scene. She wasn't really out, but she didn't really seem to have a handle on present events, either. She wanted to go home, and I told her to do so. She certainly wasn't up for tampering with evidence."

The lieutenant gave Spider an angry look. "Why didn't you report this incident immediately?"

"It's not like it's not a matter of record that I have them. I need to work," Spider said pointedly. "I have debts, and I can't afford any time off. It's more unnerving than anything else. I've never put myself, my partner, or anyone else in danger. I don't think I should be punished for something I have very little control over. Truth is, I might have picked something up—a rock, a piece of broken glass. I don't really remember. But if I had picked anything of any significance up, I'm sure I would have found it by now, and I would have turned it in."

The lieutenant seemed to think about it. He took a deep breath and exhaled. "I'm not going to take your word for it that these episodes aren't dangerous. You'll be expected to go to the department shrink for evaluation and then treatments. If you fail to make appointments you will be suspended without pay. Do I make myself clear?"

"Yes, Sir."

Tommy was surprised to see the relief cross Spider's face. It wasn't like her to give the bastard what he wanted. Then to his dismay the lieutenant turned his attention on him.

"The FBI seems to think that we are mucking up the crime scene. They are blaming this department for the fact that they have no leads . . . "

"They're blaming us because they don't want to admit that they are as stumped as we are," Spider hissed.

Tommy smiled. Now that was the Spider he knew and loved.

"This guy has some kind of weapon he probably stole from Uncle Sam. They know a hell of a lot more than we do, and they aren't any closer to catching him than we are. They're looking for a scapegoat."

"That may be so, but you two have made no bones about the fact that you think this guy is doing a public service . . . " They started to protest and he held up his hand. "You're on too much vid-tape to deny it. God only knows what you say when you've got your comlinks off. My point is this. This guy is breaking the law. He's killing people. He's a murderer. As cops we shouldn't care who he's murdering. If I find out that any of my officers, even one who has been decorated for distinguished service," he glared at Spider, "is tampering with evidence, I'll be the first one to testify against them. Do I make myself clear?"

They nodded silently.

"OK, bugger off then."

Tommy glared across the car at Spider. He couldn't tell what she was thinking, but then he rarely could. He had to look back at the road, because he was driving, after all.

"What did you pick up, Spider?" Tommy more hissed than said. He didn't like being left out to dry when he didn't even know he was wet. Spider started humming and stared out the window as if she hadn't heard him.

"What did you pick up, Spider!" he screamed.

Spider must have known he was about to scream, because she didn't jump even a little. She turned her head slowly to face him. "Nothing."

"Lying bitch," Tommy swore. "This isn't a game anymore. This guy is killing more and more people. Some of those gang members were just kids . . . "

"They were all hoods, every last one of them . . . "

"They didn't deserve to die like that. I'm not sure anyone does. This has got to stop; it's gone too far. At first I was right with you. Hell, it may have even been my idea. But we can't keep covering for this guy. We're going to have to start looking for him. Now, what did you pick up?"

She started humming again and continued staring out the window.

"Goddamn it, Spider . . . "

She spun on him, fast and hot. Tommy jumped at the fury in her voice when she started to talk. "I saw what he did last night. I saw it, too. It dredged up shit I thought I'd put to sleep. But that doesn't change the fact that everyone who got slammed had it coming. If they hadn't already raped, mutilated, or killed, they would have. He knows that. Somehow he sees men's souls. I understand that you don't want to cover for him anymore, and I won't ask you to, but don't ask me not to."

Tommy pulled the car over and parked so he could safely glare at her across the car. "Are you going to tell me what you picked up?"

Her silence answered his question.

"Damn it, Spider! You could burn us both with this shit. This guy is a loaded cannon. A man with a very powerful weapon he probably stole from the government. He is not some avenging angel sent to do God's work. Get that through your head."

Spider didn't look at him as she answered. "When I was in the military it was easy. We had one kind of uniform; they had another. We were the good guys, we knew who the bad guys were, and we killed them, even though we didn't really know why they were shooting at us or we were shooting at them, it was easy. All black and white—no grays. Now I'm here in the streets and I don't know who the good guys are any more. Everything is in shades of gray."

Spider turned to look at Tommy then, and the look in her eyes scared him more than a little.

"But not to this guy, Tommy. This guy
sees
evil. He sees it like you and I see color. I'm not going to do anything to stop him. I'm not going to do anything to help them stop him. I'll go through the motions, but that's it. It wasn't that long ago that you agreed with me. Sometimes the ends
do
justify the means. The end isn't a room full of mutilated corpses. The end is good kids that will be alive tomorrow because those bastards didn't live to turn them on to drugs or kill them outright."

Tommy nodded, not because he was sure he agreed, but because he knew there was no changing her mind, and no sense in trying.

"OK, but I'm not playing anymore."

Spider nodded back. "I wouldn't ask you to."

For some reason her answer bothered him. He got the idea that what she was really saying was that this was out of his league.

It had been a week since Robby had managed a good night's sleep. The scene in the crack house still haunted him, and the news and every paper was filled up with it. Everywhere you looked you saw something about it. Everywhere he went people were talking about it, and there were cops and G-men all over their part of town asking questions of every gang-banger they came across.

Evan had never done his chores so quickly or completely. Never been so eager to please. Robby blamed himself for Evan's short trip into trouble. He should have been watching him closer; he shouldn't have dropped his guard even for a minute. You couldn't afford to do that with teen-aged kids. Worse than the guilt and the fear was the knowledge that his brother now listened to him, not out of any sense of love or loyalty, but out of fear. Because he knew now that Robby harbored some terrible power.

Robby loaded the old air conditioner into the bed of his truck and collected his money from the man. The man smiled and thanked him, and Robby smiled back and thanked him for his business. He got in the truck and headed for his next pickup. Normally the pickup of an air-conditioner would have put him in a really good mood. Old conditioners could almost always be fixed and resold for good money. But today he couldn't stop thinking about how close he had brought the cops to his own door. He had let his anger get the best of him, but then what else could he have done? Written Evan off? Worse, let him bring that scum into his house to infect the other children? He had to stop it; he just wished he could have found another way. He frowned then. The evil never gave you any other way. They backed you into a corner where you could either kill them, or let them live to do what you knew they were going to do. Let them repeat the crimes of their past. And it seemed that lately there had been more of them than ever before.

He was sure that some people might call what he had a gift, but it was a double-edged sword. On the one hand, he had the power to make the world a better place. On the other hand, it meant he constantly had to make decisions he'd rather not make, and he lived in constant fear of being caught.

His family relied on him. He had a responsibility to them, a duty to feed, clothe, house, and love them. He couldn't do that if he was in jail. Every time he killed someone he ran the risk of being caught.

Mankind needed him. He had a responsibility to free them from fear, to protect them from the pestilence that would prey on them. To remove from their midst a danger only he could truly see.

He didn't take either responsibility lightly.

The Fry Guy hadn't killed anyone in three weeks, and things at work were getting more relaxed. Tommy and Spider were even able to work on some of their other cases.

Tommy drove at break-neck speed through traffic, the light on top flashing, the siren whaling.

Spider was eating a hamburger, not without some effort, and they were talking about the Fry Guy.

"So, why did he stop?" Tommy asked.

"He had to. He knew he'd pushed the envelope on that mass killing, and he knew it was time to back off. Maybe he made himself sick, or scared himself," Spider answered, breaking the rule about talking with your mouth full.

"So will he kill again? Or have we seen the last of him?"
"Oh, he will undoubtedly kill again," Spider said. "He won't be able to stop himself. Imagine that you had the ability to look at a man and know that he had killed and would kill again if given the chance. Could you let him walk away?"

"I don't know," Tommy said truthfully. "I wouldn't want to, but I might to save my neck."

"What if you realized that the person he might rape or kill was you or Laura?"

"I'd have to kill him," Tommy said without hesitation.