Victims (36 page)

“Home sweet home.” He gazed through the window crack. “These two geezers are gonna need medical care.”

A long, sonorous tone issued from the car. Louie farting in B minor.

“Couldn’t agree more, pal,” said Milo. “Unfortunately, Animal Control will have to wait its turn.”

I said, “Time to call in the human cops?”

“That would be proper procedure, wouldn’t it?” He bared his gums. “The question is what constitutes optimal backup in a situation like this? If I call Camarillo PD and explain the situation, they might be cooperative. Or they might figure since it’s their jurisdiction they don’t need to listen and end up doing something heavy-handed.”

“Like bringing in SWAT?”

“And/or one of those hostage negotiators who reads from a script, half the time it turns out bad, because let’s face it you can’t stop someone if they’re intent on checking out. And with a loon like Huggler—if he’s even in there, God I hope he is—no crash-course in sweet-talk’s gonna help, right?”

“Right.”

“They wanna go all military, I can’t stop them and then we’re stuck with one of those long-term standoffs and Huggler ends up biting it just like Harrie did. Maybe a bunch of cops, too, if he’s got firepower down there. With only one way into the tunnel, it’s a nightmare. Tear gas could help if it’s a short passage but if he’s got lots of room to back into, it could get complicated.”

He rubbed his face. “I couldn’t give an iota of rat-shit about Huggler personally but I need to talk to him, find out what Harrie needed a rape kit for, how many DBs haven’t we found. Who belonged to those damn eyeballs.”

He phoned Petra again, updated her on the tunnel, told her to clue the other detectives in then make the hour drive to Camarillo with Reed or Binchy or Biro, whoever was closest.

“But don’t come out here, stay in town, I’ll let you know if I need you.”

“Where exactly are you?” she said.

He told her.

“I know a place not far,” she said. “Decent pizza, Eric and I go there when we shop the outlets.”

“Eric shops?”

“I shop, he pretends not to hate it. Okay, I’ll get there soon as I can, good luck.”

Just as he clicked off, Louie broke wind again.

“What the hell was in that sandwich?”

“Looked like some variant of baloney,” I said.

“We’re stuck here long enough, I’m gonna regret sharing.”

CHAPTER
41

T
he first hour slogged by. The second sloth-crawled.

The dogs alternated among sleep, flatulence, and a mellow, glassy-eyed torpor that evoked a weed-fragrant college dorm room.

Milo said, “Someone’s thinking right,” and closed his eyes.

I was wide awake and I was the one who saw.

Same place, different shape.

Taller than the dogs. Upright. Wearing something brown with a pale collar.

Moving forward. Stopping. Moving again. Stopping.

Facing away from us. So far, so good.

I nudged.

Milo roused, stared. Took hold of his gun, got out of the car, shut the driver’s door just shy of latching. Walked forward silently.

He stood, mostly concealed by weeds, as the man in the brown jacket trudged through the field. The man’s head stayed canted toward
the ground. His pace was deliberate but jerky, broken by frequent stops that seemed to serve no function.

Like a poorly oiled machine.

Milo kept the Glock in his right hand and used his left to part the grass, crouched until he was as high as an average man, and stepped in.

I waited before lowering the car windows a bit more. Not enough for the dogs to get their heads stuck, but sufficient for good ventilation.

They remained drowsy.

I got out.

Backtracking, I mapped out a trajectory that would keep me perpendicular to Milo’s hunter’s prowl, aiming to cross the field in a way that kept me to the rear of the man in the brown coat, placing him at the apex of a human triangle.

As we converged on the target, Milo pushed forward, unaware of my presence. Then he saw me and froze. Shot me a long stare but made no attempt to wave me back.

Knowing it wouldn’t work.

The two of us maintained the same pace. The man in the brown coat kept trudging without an apparent goal. Head down, weaving, lost in some private world. His head was bare, pale, shiny. Shaved recently.

Milo and I got thirty yards behind him, then twenty. I stopped parting the grass and muting the scratchy sound. Making no attempt at quiet.

The man in brown kept pausing, searching the horizon to the north. Maybe because he was looking for the dogs and that’s where they usually headed.

Or he had his own incomprehensible navigational logic.

I picked up my speed, outpaced Milo. Milo saw it and stiffened and that gave me another few seconds of advantage.

I used them to rush behind the man in brown.

He continued to plod, thick shoulders rounded, hands jammed in his coat pockets. I kept coming, trotting now.

He stopped, raised the back of the coat, and scratched his rear.

Still not hearing me.

Then a patch of particularly brittle grass caught on my pant leg and when I pulled away the
zzzip
was audible.

The man in the brown coat turned.

Saw me.

He didn’t move.

I waved flamboyantly, as if meeting an old friend by chance.

The man in brown gaped. His flabby face quivered like uncooked haggis.

I moved in on him, waving, grinning. “Hey, Grant! Long time!”

His jowls tightened. Widening his stance, he planted his legs, flailed the air randomly.

Pudding-faced, snub-featured, unlined by contemplation, problematic abstraction, or any of the mean little demands imposed by sanity.

Terrified.

This was the bogeyman, the nightmare apparition, the cruel messenger in the dark who’d wreaked so much chaos and misery.

Now he was too scared to budge, remained frozen in his too-heavy shearling, fleece collar unraveling, brown suede greasy, mangy as the dogs, a misshapen tent of a garment that drooped over a white shirt and filthy jeans.

I got within arm’s reach. “Grant, my name is Alex.”

Windmilling air with both hands, he stumbled back.

“I’m not out to hurt you, Grant.”

His mouth opened. Formed an O. No sound came out. Then a squeak. The same sound mice made, mired in sticky traps, as my father’s boot rose above them.

Turning his back on me, he ran.

Straight into the arms of a big man with a gun.

Milo used his free hand to spin Huggler so that he was facing me again, twisted Huggler’s left arm behind his thick torso, got a handcuff around it. He’d linked two sets of cuffs together, standard procedure for a broad suspect.

Huggler sniffed. Began crying.

His right arm remained at his side. Milo, one hand on his weapon, struggled to bend the uncooperative limb.

“Behind your back, Grant.”

Huggler’s body sagged, as if ready to comply, but the arm stayed rigid.

I stepped forward.

Milo warned me back with a head shake, repeated the command.

Tears flowed down Huggler’s cheeks. His right arm was steel.

Milo holstered the Glock, clamped both hands on Huggler’s left wrist, twisted viciously.

Huggler’s left arm finally relented, twisting back and up. Milo tried to affix the second cuff but Huggler’s width and the bulk of the coat brought him a couple of inches short of the goal.

He pushed Huggler’s right hand toward its mate.

Huggler cried out in pain.

“It’s okay, Grant,” said Milo, lying the way detectives do.

Huggler said, “Really?” in a soft, high, boyish voice.

“Just a little more, son, here we go.”

Huggler’s right hand was a millimeter from capture when his shoulders shook like those of a rhino rudely awakened. The movement caught Milo off guard, caused his foot to catch.

For a second, his concentration shifted to maintaining his balance.

All at once, Huggler was facing him, had gripped the sides of Milo’s head with huge, soft, hairless hands.

Expressionless, he began twisting. Clockwise.

Milo’s optimal move might’ve been a quick grab of his gun but
when vise-grip hands take hold of your head and try to rotate it and instincts tell you it won’t take much to sever your spine and drain your brain of life-maintaining, thought-engendering nectar, you go for those hands.

Anything to stop the process.

Milo’s fingers dug into the tops of Huggler’s hands, straining, clawing, drawing blood.

Huggler remained impassive, kept twisting.

Patient, dry-eyed.

Comfort of the familiar.

Well-practiced routine with predictable results: one way, then the other, feel the body grow limp.

Lay it down gently. Sit and wait.

Explore.

Milo strained to free himself. His eyes bugged. His face was scarlet.

His struggle had twisted his body just enough to put the Glock out of my visual range.

Could I get hold of it fast enough, find a safe way to shoot …

My own instincts kicked in and I threw myself behind Huggler, kicked him hard behind the knee.

It’s a blow that can reduce strong men to blithering cripples.

Huggler stood there, impassive, managed to move Milo’s head a fraction of an inch. Enough to make Milo gasp.

I kicked Huggler’s other knee. Like butting an oak stump.

Hooking my hands over the fleece collar, I got them around his massive neck, tried to compress his carotids.

His flesh was sweat-slick. I failed to get purchase.

He moved Milo’s neck another tiny fraction of the fatal arc.

I found his Adam’s apple, lowered my thumbs to the front of his neck where he’d been incised years ago and robbed of a healthy gland.

I squeezed.

He screamed. His hands flew to the side.

He fell back, tottered, clutching his neck.

I punched him beneath his rib cage, got one foot behind his left heel and hooked him forward as I shoved his chest backward with all the strength I could muster.

Still clutching his neck, he fell back, spine thudding hard on dirt.

He lay there. Helpless.

Synchrony
.

Milo, panting, green eyes aflame with fear that wasn’t fading quickly enough, fumbled for his Glock, two-handing the weapon, aiming it at Huggler’s prone bulk.

His hands were shaking too hard for one to suffice.

Huggler saw the gun. His hands left his neck. His throat was rosy, swollen.

He coughed.

Smiled.

Sat up and lunged.

Milo fired into his left shoe.

Huggler looked down. A small, almost delicate mouth dropped open.

The toe of one grubby sneaker began seeping red.

Huggler’s cuffed left hand jangled as he shuddered. He watched the blood stream from the spot where his big toe had once been.

Entranced.

Mystery of the body.

Milo rolled him over roughly, yanked Huggler’s right hand hard enough to dislocate, finally got both limbs cuffed.

Huggler lay on his belly. The surrounding earth turned purple as his foot continued to bleed.

No spurt, venous seepage.

Huggler said something. The dirt muffled his words and he turned his head to the side.

Milo sucked in air. He touched the side of his face, grimaced.

Not looking at me.

He walked several steps away.

Another gull soared overhead. Or maybe the same bird, curious.

Grant Huggler said, “Wow.”

I said, “Wow, what?”

“My foot. Can I see it, please?”

CHAPTER
42

P
etra’s pizza had just arrived when Milo called her. She left it behind, arrived nine minutes later. Taking care of business during the drive: calling for an ambulance, making contact with Camarillo PD, and using charm and calm and just enough facts to keep the locals from screaming.

She studied Huggler sitting on the dirt, cuffed, ankles bound, wounded foot wrapped in one of the clean rags Milo keeps in the trunk.

All those years with bodies, it pays to have something for the gore.

Huggler’s neck had swelled and was starting to purple. He coughed a lot but was breathing okay. The finger marks on Milo’s face had faded to ambiguous splotches. Petra knew something was up and I watched her eyes dance as her brain tried to figure it out.

She said nothing, too smart to ask.

Huggler didn’t react to her arrival. Hadn’t reacted to much of anything.

Now he looked at Milo. “Um? Mister?”

Plaintive.

Please, sir, may I have more gruel?

“What?”

Huggler glanced at the bloody rag. “Could you take this off?”

“Too tight?”

“Um …”

“What’s the problem?”

“I want to see.”

“See what?”

“The inside.”

“Of what?”

Huggler pouted. “Me.”

Milo said, “Sorry, you need to keep it wrapped.”

Apologizing to the man who’d nearly sheared his spine.

Huggler said, “Um, okay.” His face settled back into smooth, serene immobility.