Styx (16 page)

So Styx swung the wheel hard left, bounced across the sidewalk, burst through the gate, and felt the tires thunder onto the uneven wooden surface of the breakwater. His pursuers had slowed down, but they were still behind him. He was getting away from them, but there was one problem: in a few hundred feet, the breakwater came to an end, and all that lay beyond it was the sea.

The headlights in the mirror winked off and on. They were warning him to stop. He
had
to stop, didn't he?

Didn't he?

Something in Raphael Styx kept him flying forward. With less than one hundred feet to the barrier at the end of the breakwater, instead of lifting his battered foot from the accelerator and slamming on the brakes, he pushed harder on the pedal and pinned the speedometer needle to the far right of the dial.

He checked the mirror one last time and saw that the pursuit vehicles had come to a stop. Then, staring out into eternity, he hunched over the wheel and smashed headlong through the barrier at the end of the breakwater.

The car sailed through the air in a sudden eerie silence, straining to hit escape velocity. But gravity had its way, and Joachim Delacroix's cruiser fell crashing into the dark waters of the North Sea.

Raphael Styx sat there, motionless, stunned, as the car filled and sank. A coherent thought formed in his mind: he had to get out before it was too late. He yanked on the door handle and shoved against the
panel, but the outside pressure was far stronger than he was. Panicked now, he scrabbled for the button that controlled the windows, but the salt water had already shorted out the car's electrical systems, and the window stayed stubbornly closed.

Again, he flung himself against the door, but he was too weak. He had no strength left in his arms. His blood had curdled, his muscles were stiff and useless, his body was a tumble-down ruin.

The water level rose past his chest, past his neck, over his chin.

Styx kept his mouth tightly shut. During his time at the police academy, he'd gone through a scuba course, and he'd learned then that he was capable of holding his breath for a surprisingly long time. The doctors had told him he had the lungs of a long-distance runner or triathlete, but there were limits to how long even an athlete could survive before drowning.

He was completely underwater now. The world had gone totally still. He felt the pressure on his eardrums increase as the seconds ticked past.

How long had it been? A minute, at least, maybe two.

He knew that, at any moment, he'd have to open his mouth, and the seawater would fill his body like helium swelling a birthday balloon. Like sand filling the bodies of the Stuffer's victims.

But the moment didn't come, and at last the truth dawned on him.

He didn't
need
to breathe!

When he finally parted his rotting lips and unclenched his blackened teeth, he didn't drown.

He was already dead.

He was, in fact, undead.

He had no idea how it worked—it was enough
that
it worked. He sat tight, letting himself calm down and marshaling his remaining strength. Then he swiveled around and saw that the passenger-side window was still open and swam out of the car like a modern-day
Houdini. When he broke the surface of the water, he was far enough from the sunken wreck that the cops at the railing seemed not to notice him.

After Inspector Delacroix's visit, Isabelle
Gerard went upstairs to say goodnight to Victor, and then went straight to bed. She was at the edge of sleep when the phone rang.

“Rafe?” she murmured, rolling away from his side of the bed.

That was a reflex—late-night calls were usually for her husband, not her. But then she remembered she was alone in the bed. She fumbled for the receiver and got it on the seventh ring.

“Hello?”

“Mrs. Styx?”

“Yes?”

“This is the Ostend police, ma'am.”

She came instantly awake.

“Yes?”

“I'm afraid I have bad news.”

She thought of Inspector Joachim Delacroix, who'd been there only an hour before. Was there something he'd forgotten to tell her?

“Does this have something to do with Inspector Delacroix's visit?”

“No, ma'am, I'm calling in regard to the disappearance of your husband, Raphael Styx.”

“Who are you?” asked Isabelle. “I'd like to speak with John Crevits, please. Can you put him on?”

“I'm sorry to have to inform you that your husband was killed in the line of duty, ma'am. He's dead.”

Isabelle tried to be strong, but, now that the words had at last been spoken aloud, she found herself shaking uncontrollably.

“I know that,” she managed to say.

“Oh? Then I expect you also know that he was murdered in a cabana on the beach?”

“I don't want to hear the details,” said Isabelle. “I'd like to speak with Commissioner Crevits, please.”

“But I
have
to tell you the details, Mrs. Styx,” the voice said. “It's my—”

“It's Mrs. Gerard. Isabelle Gerard.”

“The problem, Mrs. Gerard—and I hope you'll be able to help me with this—”

And suddenly there came a strange burst of laughter.

“The problem is that his body seems to have disappeared.”

“Yes, Inspector Delacroix already told me that.”

Something was very wrong. That gruesome laugh seemed to come from some other plane of existence. It was as if she was on the phone with two different people simultaneously.

“Who is this?” she demanded.

“I'm wondering, Mrs. Gerard, if you might know anything more about your husband's disappearance? I thought you might have some information about the police department's plans.”

“Wait a minute,” said Isabelle. “I thought you were—”

“They've given me a nickname, Mrs. Gerard,” the voice said seriously. “I didn't get to pick it myself, but I suppose I have to live with it. Anyway, if you'll play fair with me, then I'm willing to share the exact circumstances of your husband's death with you.”

“Please, no,” Isabelle begged, realizing at last who was on the other end of the line.

She had never fainted in her life, not even when she'd heard Rafe's death reported on the news. But now all sensation in her legs was suddenly gone, and she felt herself about to keel over.

“Please what?” the voice asked politely.

“I don't want to hear it. How did you get this number?”

“The internet's a beautiful thing, Mrs. Gerard. You're sure you don't want to know what his last words were?”

“No, don't, I can't—”

“I don't mean to be rude, but your name was alas not mentioned. He knew he was looking down the barrel of the gun that was about to send him to hell, and he stood there and pissed his pants. That was all. He didn't say a thing. I'm telling you the truth.”

“Stop it,” Isabelle choked.

But she couldn't bring herself to hang up the phone. She stood there with the receiver in her hand, shaking.
What am I waiting for
, she thought. Why couldn't she just put the thing back in its cradle?

“I need to know what they're up to!” the voice yelled.

“I don't know anything,” she whispered.

“Bullshit! Where is he? Where is that fucking bastard? I have to know! I have to finish my work!”

Isabelle closed her eyes and thought of Victor, sound asleep in his room. And of Joachim Delacroix, the young man in the garish suit who had offered her comfort.

“You tell the cops I won't fall for their trap, you hear me? I'll find out what they're up to. I'll find him. And if it turns out he's in the morgue, I'll go in there and get him. I'll get him, and I'll split him open, head to toe, and cut everything out of him. His goddamn heart, his organs, his muscles, everything, so there's nothing left but one big gaping empty hole, ready for the sand. Do you hear me?”

There was more, but the receiver finally dropped from Isabelle's numb grasp.

It took a full minute before she remembered where she was.

“Victor!” she cried.

She raced down the hall to her son's room and threw open the door. She gathered the sleeping child into her arms, the little boy who from a distance looked so much like his father, the handsome young
man the girls were already beginning to notice. He struggled up from sleep, frightened by her sudden appearance.

“What's wrong?” he mumbled, his dark eyes only half-open.

“Nothing,” she said, stroking his hair tenderly. “Nothing's wrong, sweetheart. Go back to sleep.”

It took till late that night before they were able to winch the crashed Opel out of the water. Commissioner John Crevits and Inspector Joachim Delacroix stood side by side at the railing as the rescue crew operated the huge crane. When the car finally broke the surface, Delacroix, a poncho draped over his shoulders, leaned forward, staring, as if he expected to see Styx still sitting behind the wheel.

The crane deposited the car, gushing seawater from its open passenger window and door seams, on the breakwater, and uniformed patrolmen threw the doors open and popped the trunk.

The vehicle was empty.

“Well?” Crevits demanded.

“I swear,” said Delacroix. “It was him. Styx.”

“Styx is dead,” Crevits said flatly. “We saw the photos. Even if he
isn't
dead, the person you described can't possibly have been him.”

“I talked with him,” the rookie insisted.

“Let's say you had a little too much to drink, Inspector. If you have any ambition whatsoever, if you want to make anything of yourself on the Ostend police, then I seriously advise you to shut your mouth.”

“With all due respect, Commissioner, I saw him and talked with him. He was dead, but he wasn't.”

“He was dead but he wasn't? What kind of bullshit is that?”

“I can't explain it,” said Delacroix. “I didn't believe it either, at first—”

“Look, Delacroix. I don't care what clothes you wear. I don't care what you do on your nights off. But I'm not going to let you turn the murder of one of the best cops this police force has ever had into a fucking voodoo sideshow.”

Crevits nodded at the ruined Opel, which hulked there like a prehistoric beast.

“You say you saw Styx, dead or alive or both or whatever. I say you didn't. Goddammit, you were just at his apartment, offering your condolences to his widow. So don't hand me this line of crap.”

“He was eye to eye with the Stuffer!”

“Stop it!”

“He described him to me. A yellow oilskin slicker and a sou'wester. A James Ensor mask.”

“I said
stop
. If that was Raphael Styx who drove off in your car, then why isn't he there now?”

“Because—”

But Delacroix had no explanation. Because the dead can't die? No, there was no way Crevits would accept it.

“Raphael Styx may have been a shit,” the commissioner said, “but whatever else he was, he was a cop. A cop who'd do anything to solve a murder.”

Delacroix saw that his commissioner was about to lose it. He understood that Crevits and Styx went way back. They'd kept each other's secrets, stood by each other through thick and thin. Till death. So why, then, had Styx come to
him
, and not to Crevits? Why didn't he trust Crevits?

“Whoever stole your car,” Crevits snapped, “it wasn't Styx. You ask me, it was some random carjacker, and right now he's at the bottom of the sea.”

But Delacroix wasn't asking John Crevits anything.

“It's night, it's dark, you were tired,” Crevits went on patiently. “Some crackhead jumped in your car and took off with it. You only saw him for a second, and you thought he looked like somebody you used to know. That's completely understand—”

“I'm telling you I
talked
with him,” Delacroix said tightly. “We sat next to each other in the car. I saw him.”

He wanted to tell Crevits the whole story, starting in front of Styx's apartment, but Crevits grabbed him by both lapels and pulled him close.

“Listen to me, you stupid bastard. I'm not going to let you fuck with the one molecule of respect Styx still has in this city. Did you not hear what I said? It was a carjacker. He knocked you out and stole your car. There's no shame in that. But it would be a
big
mistake for you to try to blame it on somebody else, especially a dead man. We don't speak ill of the dead around here, and I'm not going to ask you if you got it. I'm
telling
you you got it, you got it?”

“But—”

“One more word and you're on your way back to Brussels,” Crevits spat. “I'm giving you a chance to move up, Delacroix. Don't
fuck
it up by turning the whole department into a laughingstock. Styx did enough of that while he was alive. Can you imagine what the media would do with
this
story, if it got out?”