A huge, black, furry mass, impossibly large, loomed out of the shadows behind a recliner.
I thought it was a wolf, but it was too big. Or maybe a bear, but it wasn’t quite big enough.
A dog. I like dogs a lot. But contrary to General Woundwort’s assertions in Richard Adams’s Watership Down, dogs can be dangerous.
This one was big enough to rip my throat out or crush me. It probably weighed as much as I did and had much sharper teeth.
I was rooted to the spot with surprise and could not have dodged if I had wanted to. But the huge dog didn’t charge, didn’t bark or snarl or foam at the mouth, didn’t even whimper or whine. He just trundled slowly, like a giant tortoise, until he came and rested his massive head on my leg and looked at me with sad puppy-dog eyes out of an old dog’s face.
I patted the dog’s head. He—I assumed it was a he, given his size—closed his eyes and wagged his tail. He was a behemoth. I would have pegged him at seven feet, from nose to tail. I thought this dog must have been hungry, since Strawn seemed to spend so much time out. I stood up, brushing drool and dog hair from my pants. The gentle giant had some degree of limited movement, maybe arthritis or plain ancient age, but when I stood up he sensed food and started bucking and rocking like a horse. He tossed his head and panted and tried to rear, only lifting his front paws a hairsbreadth off the floor. He started off through the house, and I followed until he stopped in a type of mudroom with an old name-brand washer and dryer set.
Nudging a pair of bowls with his nose, the dog looked at me expectantly, hungrily. There was a deep farm sink between the dryer and a door that had been propped open leading into the garage. I filled one bowl with water and had barely set it down before he was slopping it over the floor.
I looked in the garage and found a doggy door that led outside. There were no cars but plenty of junk: fishing gear, sports equipment, some more tools, clay pigeons for target practice. I found a big plastic trash bin full of dry dog food. It looked pretty much the same as most box cereals nowadays, except it smelled more savory.
The big dog was lapping up the last of the water. Poor guy. Going hungry is one thing, but going thirsty is worse.
I refilled the water bowl and then grabbed the one for food. Scooping up a portion from the bin in the garage, I noticed stenciled lettering on the curved face. Max. Max the dog. Not very original, but extremely accurate, given his size. If dogs had surnames, I would have suggested Power. Max Power, like a setting on a blender or a hair dryer.
He slaked his thirst before moving to the food.
I was hungry. Not so hungry that I was going to eat dog food.
Patting Max on the shoulder, I wandered back into the kitchen. Scrounging like a raccoon, I found a cast-iron skillet,
a carton of eggs, and thick-cut bacon.
I turned on the stove, and it hissed and clicked to life as the gas caught fire. Then I adjusted the flame and set the skillet to warm. I am no gourmet, but I get by all right. Cooking is like anything—an application of correct principles with plenty of room for improvisation.
Max ambled back in and flumped onto the floor with an audible expulsion of air.
“Good boy,” I said. And he was.
I think he sensed I was a friend. I like dogs. A lot.
The bacon sizzled and popped, and the eggs were big and scrambled nicely. They weren’t store-bought—probably from a neighbor’s coop judging by the lack of uniformity. I felt bad about the detour, wanting to find Amy as soon as I could, but I figured I would not be of much use to anyone if I fainted from lack of food. And besides, someone had to take care of Max. Switching the stove off, I tossed a couple of slices of bacon to the floor for Max. He scooted and inched like an elephant seal until he got close enough to get his teeth on it.
“Careful,” I said. “It’s hot.”
I ate out of the pan to spare any extra dishes and set everything in the sink. Then I left.
I closed the door behind me, carrying the photo album. Lang’s picture had given me the biggest clue so far, so I figured I might as well peruse Strawn’s mementos.
Lang’s house was next. It took me closer to the station. I hoped everyone was busy and wouldn’t happen upon me snooping. Lang’s house was the most central of all my stops so far but was still at the end of its own street, the six o’clock spoke. No neighbors there either.
The road was narrow, and a sign advised me it was a dead end, which was not encouraging, in a literal sense. But I didn’t take it that way. I am an optimist, after all.
I didn’t know what I would find. Maybe nothing.
I passed the house slowly. There was a snow-covered pickup truck nose out in the driveway. It looked like the civilian version of Lang’s police vehicle. It had all trappings too: mag wheels, running boards, a lift kit, and upgraded headlights. There was also a lump of snow on a stick, which might have been a mailbox. The house was a single-story with an attached garage. No lights were on. I turned around and parked. Climbing out, I looked around. Afternoon had worn on steadily to evening, and the clouds and mountains made everything darker.
There were no signs of life. No lamps. No blue glow from a television or computer screen. No sounds.
I climbed a set of steps to an uncovered porch, carrying the photo album with me. I would rather look through it inside than in the Jeep. Anyone could sneak up on me seated in a vehicle. A security light above the garage came on, but that was it. The front door paint was peeling, and the door looked old. I was pretty sure I could have kicked it down.
But maybe I wouldn’t need to. The top third of the door was mostly comprised of a window, which people forget to lock sometimes.
I set the album down.
Since the lip for lifting the window was on the inside, I had to press my palms against the cold glass and push in and up to keep the tension. I was careful not to put my hands straight through. The window gave, stuck, and then came up some more. When I got it far enough to wedge my fingers under, I pried it up, slipped my forearm in, reached the lock, and opened the door from the inside.
I didn’t expect anyone to be home. It was dark inside. And cold. But anything was warmer than outside.
Listening intently, I closed my eyes to heighten my hearing. Nothing. Maybe a faint squeak, like a mouse or a bedspring. But I couldn’t be sure. It was hard to tiptoe in boots, but I managed to walk mostly silently. Heel, toe, heel, toe.
Bumping into what felt like a leather armchair, I held my breath in case the noise alerted any as yet undetected occupants.
Nothing.
Leaving the album on the chair, I kept moving, even slower this time. Reaching out like a blind man for balance, I felt the grainy walls. I resisted the impulse to hit a light switch my finger traced. Only the blind or the very, very brave are comfortable in darkness. I actually don’t mind the dark, but I can’t abide the cold. Nobody likes the cold. People who say they do actually mean they like being able to transition instantly from winter wonderlands into the balmy comfort of roofs and walls with insulation and furnaces and cocoa.
The drapes were drawn on all the windows so only a sliver of dying sunlight seeped in where the folds didn’t quite meet. I kept listening and heard nothing. Every muscle and tendon screamed for silence as I crept forward. Everything seems loud when you’re trying to move furtively. Even the carpet seemed crunchy.
But there was no sound.
I paused again and listened, stretching my senses for any of the tiny vibrations people give off. Lots of people can sense when they are not alone or being watched. I didn’t get that sensation right then. Now I was sure no one was home. But there was something, like
a hum.
I continued with my arms out in front of me like a mummy or a zombie. Except I was alive, which is how I wanted to stay. Technically I was an intruder. But my intentions were honest. Not that good intentions are much of a defense against bullets or lawsuits.
The kitchen was the next room off the front. It was slightly better illuminated by the reflective surfaces of stainless-steel appliances and an uncovered window above the sink. I could make out the shape of plates stacked on the countertops. It smelled like burned coffee and onions.
Delicious.
The linoleum must have been old and unwashed. It was sticky, and my boots made peeling noises with each step. So I stretched my stride to shorten the journey. Beyond the kitchen was a narrow hallway like the one in Agnes’s house. I didn’t think Lang would have been the type to hang portraits and needlepoints on the wall, but you never know, so I kept my hands low as I felt along the walls so as not to knock anything down. Nobody hangs things at hip height.
The house was small. The darkness and the cold made it feel uncomfortably cramped. I realized that during my whole caper, I hadn’t considered the possibility of Lang having a dog as well, which he didn’t, thankfully. I had seen plenty of them during the last two years. In Peru there are thousands of stray dogs. Some form packs. Most have mange. They’d been known to bite missionaries, but they’d never bothered me. They’re man’s best friend, after all. I had two Labrador retrievers as a kid. Maybe the dogs in Peru had sensed I was a friend and unafraid, like Max had.
My left-hand fingertips grazed a doorknob, maybe of a bathroom. Most houses situated the bedrooms farthest from the front door, so I suspected the closed door at the end of the hall must have been to a bedroom.
I was facing the door directly, so I opened it and found nothing but an empty bedroom. I kept searching, not knowing exactly what I might find. I risked turning on some lights for a minute to see if anything had escaped my initial inspection. The house furnishings were pretty skeletal—no knickknacks, no junk—but it was dirty with neglect. All he had was the armchair I had bumped into, a couch, and a coffee table. Both the couch and chair were aimed at a monstrous flat screen television. There were dust bunnies and cobwebs on all the edges.
I figured Lang lived alone. No self-respecting woman would let Lang get away with an unvacuumed and dirty living space. He was a hunter, so he had to have gear and guns. I didn’t see anything in the hallway, bedroom, or entryway closets, so his stuff had to be in the garage.
I turned off the house lights and felt my way through the hallway to another door close to the bathroom. It opened to the garage. Feeling around, I found a switch that ignited a row of fluorescent lights. Below the switch was a button I guessed opened the garage door. There were all sorts of tools on pegs and a workbench with an electric saw and drill. There was a gun safe, big enough for a dozen rifles, and there were plenty of antlers from deer, elk, other members of the Cervidae genus, and some exotic specimens.
There was a car, too, covered with a tarp, and water from melted snow all around suggested it had been driven recently, which made me wonder how many cars Lang had. His pickup was out in the snow, and of course, he wasn’t here, so he must have had another car, but I would have figured he mostly drove his department-issued vehicle. I pulled the tarp off to get a look at his ride; It must have been a nice one for him to leave his fancy truck outside in the snow.
It was a white Mercury Grand Marquis. Amy’s car.
Not good.
Now I knew for sure Lang was in on Amy’s disappearance. Had he started the fire? Where was Amy?
Continuing my scouring of the garage, I inspected the slab floor. Most of the place was covered in sawdust and metal shavings. On the wall nearest the door to the house was a row of lockers like what you see in a gym or school. There were six total. Each was unlocked, and each held a different set of hunting clothing, camouflage, and reflective orange. Each seemed geared for a different season or different terrain. The only empty one was the last, and the only missing color was white. His winter camouflage, gone. Not a pleasant thought. What would he be hunting at night in the dead of winter?
I looked around a little more and saw that while the floor was mostly clean, it was not unmarked. There was a thin scrape that ran in a perfect arc from the edge of the row of lockers, like it had been dragged across the floor. The arc was uniform, though, a perfect partial circle. I squatted down. The mark was smooth, like whoever had made it had tried to buff it out. I traced it back to the base of the lockers. Looking at the lockers again, I saw hinges welded on one side. I grabbed the other end and tugged. The entire bank of lockers swung open fairly easily. The hinges were well-oiled, but the bottom corner screeched and ground slightly against the garage floor. I didn’t open the secret door the full length of its trajectory, just enough so I could slide into the hidden room. The buzzing I had sensed earlier intensified like a thousand flies around a trash pile.
Inside was not a particularly large room, but it was warm, probably insulated for heat or sound or both. There was a loud hum from motors and stacks of computer equipment I couldn’t have made heads or tails of. It was all far more sophisticated than what I had seen at the station—way more than you would need to connect to FaceChat or Snapbook or InstaTweet. A black box as tall as I was buzzed and blinked with green lights. On a low table was a bank of blank monitors. Stacks of CDs or DVDs rested on the edge, and on a plastic shelf were boxes of miniature cameras and devices.
I hit the spacebar on a wireless keyboard, and the middle monitor sprang to life. It didn’t require a password.
I was unsure where to click or what to do because the screen was blank and blue.
But then something happened. One of the other monitors blinked into activity, and a smaller window appeared. It showed a scene I was familiar with, showed a person I was familiar with: Mary. In her bathroom.
The hidden camera must have been small but expensive. The quality of the feed wasn’t the worst I had ever seen, but it wasn’t high definition. A banner on the top right of the window indicated a live stream, and there was a steady flow of viewers that seemed to be increasing, like in some sort of chatroom. Weird usernames and off-color comments appeared, accompanied by little pictures created from numbers and shapes and symbols. I ground my teeth. Mary brushed hers. It was relatively early, so she wasn’t getting ready for bed. Maybe she was a compulsive dental hygienist. Another monitor blipped into action and showed some electronic transactions, money being deposited into an
account.
Lang was supplementing his income by the seediest of means.
I was angry. I liked Mary a lot. And it incensed me to know
she was being seen in her most private moments by perverts across the globe. I found a yellow cable connected to a tower unit under the table and pulled it out. An error message popped up and advised me that Internet connectivity was lost. The camera feed did not stop, though, maybe due to a separate wireless connection. I didn’t want to see anything Mary wouldn’t want me to, so I moved a wireless mouse until the arrow came into view, and I found an icon to minimize the window.
My face was hot. I’m not a prude, but I have standards and scruples, and I felt angry and a little embarrassed. I didn’t know how I would tell her about this development in the case. What reason would she have to believe I hadn’t watched her? I figured I would burn that bridge when I came to it.
Periodically other windows popped up, showing feeds from more hidden cameras. They appeared to be motion-activated. I closed out each in turn.
I laughed darkly to myself at the idea that some freaks had logged on last night in the hopes of seeing Mary and had instead seen me showering—an unpleasant surprise. There is nothing provocative about me.
I clicked around the screen until I found an icon of a file folder. I opened it, squinting my eyes to blur my vision just in case there was something I didn’t want to see, but it was safe. There were just file names. Some were starred. Each was listed by last name, first name, and date. I found a search window and looked for Kirk. I found several files for Amy and Agnes.
I clicked on the most recently uploaded file. I did the squinty thing with my eyes again, just in case something sensitive popped up. It didn’t. In fact, the file showed a variety of angles from a variety of rooms. Amy’s house. None of the feeds indicated a live stream, and the cameras were rolling without being activated by movement.
Like French, maybe Lang was weirdly obsessed with Amy. I could see why he might have been as soon as she came into view. She was quite simply the most beautiful girl I had ever seen.
She was like Helen of Troy, whose face launched a thousand ships. Amy had, through no fault of her own and by simply being beautiful, incited a war.
She was tall, blonde, lithe, and perfectly proportioned. She was in sweatpants and a T-shirt but couldn’t have looked any more spectacular in a designer dress. She moved around the house
like a dream; even while performing routine tasks she looked elfin.
Mary was right up there with her in terms of beauty, just in a different way. She was strong where Amy was delicate, soft where Amy looked firm. It was the difference between green pastures in Ireland and sculptures in the Louvre, beautiful and matchless in completely different ways.
I scrolled through the recording until something changed. Amy stood up from a bowl of soup and opened her front door. Three people stood on her step. I recognized two of them: Lang and the dead FBI guy from the car. The third guy was also an agent. He and his partner showed their badges. Lang was in uniform, and Amy knew him, presumably. She shook their hands and showed them in. Lang looked directly at the cameras. The four of them sat down in the living room.
It reminded me of my missionary service. We’d like to share a message with you.
Then the other agent, the one who hadn’t been in the car, stood up and asked Amy something, maybe for the bathroom. Amy pointed, and he went down the hallway to the restroom. From a different camera angle I saw him as he looked at himself in the mirror and then turned and stopped. He looked up, noticing something. The camera. He looked right into the lens, put his fingers to it, and pulled it. That feed died. Another angle picked him up returning to the living room. He held up the camera.
His partner stood up.
Amy stood up.
Lang stood up. And shot the FBI agents. He was quick, like a western gunslinger.
The video screen whited out with each muzzle flash. There was no sound, but I was sure Amy was screaming. Lang stepped in and grabbed her roughly. I had misjudged her. I had taken her for delicate, but she didn’t wilt like a flower. She fought like a lioness. She clawed and kicked and bit at Lang, but he was strong and backhanded her across the mouth. She fell and tried to get back up, but Lang kicked her in the head.
She was unconscious.
Lang bent down and grabbed Amy by the heels and began dragging her to the door.
Then something else happened. The door opened, and before Lang could straighten back up, he himself was knocked unconscious with the butt of a rifle, wielded by none other than the driver who had hit me over the head. He seemed to have a propensity for thumping people on the cranium.
He lifted Amy up in his arms and carried her out. A moment later he came back inside and checked the FBI guy who had found the camera. Dead. But the driver found a set of car keys. Then he turned and noticed the other agent, who was still alive but only just. He half-carried, half-dragged him out.
So he wasn’t a bad guy. And he was no friend of Lang’s, not anymore. But what had he been doing there?
I fast-forwarded the video until Lang stirred and stood, shaking his head. He looked around and stomped about. He seemed angry and unsure as to what to do next. He left and came back in, started digging around, took something from a drawer, and left again. Nothing else happened on the video. I scrolled along the timeline. The only changes were in the lighting. Darkness came, and the camera adjusted to a greenish gray—a ghostly, washed-out, illuminated view. I kept scrolling, and then the next day dawned. The light changed, and the shadows moved. Eventually Lang came back, this time in his policeman’s uniform. He carried a can of gasoline, sloshing it all around. He poured plenty over the dead agent and left a trail out the door, and a minute later fire spread along the gasoline path, licking its way up the walls. Soon the whole place ignited. The flames spread, the brightness whiting out my view, and soon the video died.
So Amy was alive and presumably safe, which meant her savior wasn’t out to kill Agnes.
But then, why had he run from me at Agnes’s house?
And what had the FBI been doing there with Lang in the first place? What was Strawn’s hand in all of this, if any?
I didn’t think the computer could give me any more insight, so I unplugged everything and resisted the urge to smash it all to
pieces.
I felt sick. I had just witnessed two people shot to death and had stumbled upon an evil enterprise. At least Amy was alive.
For now.
Prayer is not magic. There is no such thing as magic. It’s not like rubbing a lamp to conjure a genie. It’s not casting spells with rote incantations. There is no hocus pocus. Prayer is, however, an expression of the soul’s most sincere desires. Some people have decried prayer as a form of begging, but it isn’t that either.
I’ve prayed a lot in my life, for all sorts of things. And I’m happy to say, God has given me everything I’ve ever asked for, which sounds nice, but I’ve always tried to be humble in prayer. God might not give everybody what they want or what they deserve, which is good, because I deserve much worse than what I’ve got. But He always gives people what they need.
Prayer doesn’t necessitate closing eyes, folding arms, or kneeling. That certainly helps eliminate distractions, but you can pray anywhere and any way.
Right then I certainly was praying. Hard. All I could think was, God, help me. Not because I was scared—I wasn’t—but because I wanted to fight crime. I wanted to break every bone in Lang’s body.
But he was armed. He was a police officer, after all. He had looked like he would have shot me when we first met. That certainly would have saved him and me some trouble. Not that I was overly eager to die, but I wasn’t planning on making a big deal about it when the time came.
I exited the hidden room and breathed more easily. The garage itself was a lot colder; it was refreshing.
Then I heard a car’s engine rumbling along. Not my Buick. Who was behind the wheel? Lang?
Not good.
He would see the Jeep.
I wouldn’t get the chance to surprise him. Hustling back into the house, I peered out the gap in the curtains without moving them and without pressing my face up against them. The way to look out a window without showing yourself is to stay well back in the room. With the lights off inside, it is even better. You can see from a dark place into a light place but not from a light place into a dark place.
It was Rock and French.
I sat in the armchair, made myself comfortable, and waited.
I closed my eyes. Whenever you expect a drastic change of illumination, you should close your eyes until after the change. It helps your eyes adjust quicker.
They knocked on the door. I heard them talking. They waited but got impatient and tried the handle. It opened.
“Lang?” Rock called. “Where are you? What’s Mary’s Jeep doing here?”
They found the light switch and flipped it.
I stayed seated but raised my hands to show them I was unarmed. “Welcome,” I said. It sounded lame.
They stopped, reeling back in surprise, but they recovered fairly quickly.
Rock spoke first. “What the devil are you doing here?”
“Same as you—trying to catch a criminal,” I said.
They came into the living room. I sat, looking at the album on the low coffee table, trying to look as nonthreatening as
possible.
“We might have just caught one,” Rock said. “You’re breaking and entering.”
“Not at the moment. And maybe it was open when I
got here.”
“Doesn’t matter,” French said. “We’re taking you in. We just came to see where Lang is, and here we find you sneaking around.”
I just sat there and waited for them to make the first move, which I don’t often recommend. It is a good standard practice to not let someone else keep their own timetable. You want to mess up the narrative they have in their head, ideally by busting them in the head. But they seemed in no great hurry to start something, so I just sat there.
“Sit down, guys; let’s be civilized. We’re on the same side, I hope.”
They sat side by side on the couch, which was a plus, since there is no quick way to draw a gun from your hip when you’re sitting in a soft sofa, with your knees higher than your waist.
“I thought Chief wanted you to butt out,” Rock said.
“He did, but I kind of got swept back in. Credit is all yours, though, once we solve this thing. I just want to get my car and get out of town.”
Rock looked like he might have been genuinely pacified toward me until he remembered something. “What are you doing driving Mary’s car?”
“She let me borrow it.”
He glowered. “You’d better leave her alone. We should just arrest you for B and E and car theft too.”
“You really shouldn’t,” I said flatly, not like I was begging him or anything, not like I was scared—just like it would be mutually beneficial to avoid all the hassle.
“Why’s that?” Rock asked.
“Because I have new information,” I said.
“About what?” French asked.
“What can you tell me about Amy Kirk?” I asked.
French folded his hands, shifting his impressive weight.
“She’s dead. We found her body, burned in her house,”
Rock said.
I shook my head. “I just talked to the doctor. Those bones weren’t hers. They were another FBI guy, like the one I found at the crash. And there’s video proof of the bad guy. It’s Lang.”
They exchanged glances.
French asked, “Really?”
“You bet,” I said. “So let’s help each other. Let’s help Amy. Her car is in the garage right here, along with the footage.”
“I guess you could help; you’ve gotten further than us, anyway,” Rock said.
I nodded.
Rock nodded, too, like he was seeing the light. I hadn’t expected such a quick conversion.
We all stood up slowly, in a truce, an alliance, really. Truces are temporary. I didn’t want any more problems with them.
I remembered Mary. You shouldn’t have picked on them.
“Where do we start?” I asked.
But whatever local knowledge and support they were about to impart was cut short by a crackle of static from the radio on Rock’s left shoulder.
The voice came through a little garbled and muted, but there was no mistaking whose it was—Strawn’s.
“What’s going on?”
Rock crossed his right hand to his left shoulder and pressed a button. The motion made his bicep bulge through his uniform.
He looked at me. “Sawyer’s here.”
More static. The voice, garbled and muted, said, “Arrest him.”
We all looked at each other, the truce broken, alliance null.
Then we all started moving, pretty much simultaneously. I could see French’s hesitancy and Rock’s indecisiveness plainly on their faces. French didn’t look like he was in love with the idea of arresting me again, and Rock looked like he couldn’t make his mind up about what to grab first: his gun, his handcuffs, or me. It gave me a split-second’s advantage.
I remembered Mary. You shouldn’t pick on them.
But they were picking on me.
I wanted to throw the entire table at them, but I couldn’t hoist it and hurl it fast enough, so I opted for the photo album, which was substantial enough to slow them down a little. French was the lesser of the two evils and the smaller threat, but he was more in line for the tactical album strike. So I grabbed it by a corner and flung it like a Frisbee, hitting him in the face and sending four-by-ten photographs all over the place, like confetti at a New Year’s Eve party.
Rock, by this time, was well on his way to catching up, forgetting his gear in favor of getting ahold of me. I went to boxing basics. Don’t back up—your attacker can always move faster forward than you can backward—so I made it easy on Rock and dove at him, tumbling over the armchair and knocking it down. We got tangled up in a weird embrace, like we were the best of friends, reunited at long last. My sudden lunge took him off-balance, and we toppled over, tipping the couch over onto its back in our fall.
Rock was bigger than me, a distinct advantage on the ground, especially with reinforcements close at hand. If he had gotten on top of me, it would have been over, but we stayed on our sides, still tangled up in a horizontal replica of our vertical bear hug. There is really no good way to hit someone while lying down on your side, but there is really no bad way either. So I just lashed out, smacking him in the face and head while I flailed and wiggled away. I scrambled back to my feet and checked on French to see if he needed further persuading to stay out of it.
He didn’t. He was holding his hand over an eye and bleeding from his nose, which I thought was a bit of an overreaction, but some guys bleed easily. Maybe he had gotten hit with a hard corner.
I didn’t care.
Rock was coming back to his feet and dropping a hand to his belt. Not good. Or very good, as it turned out. Because even though Rock was about to unholster a fight-ending trump card, he sacrificed his shield to do it. As soon as his hand was down, his chin was wide open and unprotected. I snapped a short left hook that sent spit from his mouth and then cracked his jaw shut with a right uppercut. He staggered but stayed on his feet.
He shook his head and came right back at me. He faked an overhand right and came in with a left hook. I ducked underneath and smashed a right to his kidney, using the energy from that punch to spin off, getting a better angle on him. He grunted and swung a quick right at me that glanced off the top of my skull. The punch sent a ringing through my head. It hurt; that was for sure. I straightened up fast, fetching him a right uppercut to the chin again. As his head snapped back, I launched a jab that turned into a left elbow to his right temple. Rocking backward, he bounced off the wall. He was big and strong, but the lights were going out upstairs. I helped him along by skipping forward and rocking a head-butt to the center of his face. That did the trick. Like biting into a farm-fresh carrot, there was a satisfying crunch.
He sank to his knees and fell face-first onto the floor. I checked on French, who was backed up against the wall, just trying to stay as far out of the way as possible. He was holding his nose and stumbling around. He bumped the television, and it wobbled unsteadily. I watched as it tipped onto its face just like Rock and crashed down with another satisfying crunch.
French stepped back from the broken appliance, leaning forward with his hands on his head like he was nursing a migraine. I rolled Rock onto his side, positioning him between the fallen couch and the wall. His nose looked bad and was swelling fast. Corners of his mouth had blood in them, but he would live, no doubt about that. I relieved him of his pistol, putting the two spare magazines into my pocket where they clicked and clinked together. I kept hold of the pistol in case I needed to keep French compliant. But he just looked up at me, blinking.
“What did you throw that book at me for?”
I motioned with my head to Rock. “So I didn’t have to do that to you.”
He said nothing.
“You want me to?” I asked.
“No.”
“Then stand up.”
He stood.
“Turn around.”
He turned.
I helped myself to his sidearm and ammunition as well, stuffing them into my pockets until I must have looked like Rambo.
“Now, handcuff Rock.”
He frowned at me but didn’t argue. He didn’t seem to have any stomach for a fight, which was fine with me. My knuckles were a little sore from Rock’s hard face, and the head-butt had brought back echoes of my old headache. You have to be careful punching things without wearing gloves. Hands are very, very fragile. But Rock had only needed a couple combinations. Elbows are usually the way to go but I hadn’t wanted him too badly damaged. All’s well that ends well.
He snicked the cuffs on less tightly than I would have. Some drops of blood fell onto Rock’s inert form. I motioned with the gun for French to sit down, making sure to keep my index finger well away from the trigger. I didn’t want to shoot anyone.
He sat down heavily, still blinking, still bleeding. Looking up at me, he asked, “Have you ever been in love?”
“Not with you, not even close,” I said.
“No, I mean like with a girl.”
“Once upon a time,” I said.
“Me too,” he said, pushing a toe through the fallen photos.
“Good to know,” I said.
“With Amy, man.”
That got my attention. I lowered the gun.
He continued. “In high school, I got called names. It made me want to be a cop. I don’t like bullies.” I frowned and gestured from him to Rock and back to him.
“I know, I know,” he said. “But it wasn’t always like that. Amy was nice to me. From the day I met her I was head over heels for her. When kids took my sandwiches, she would share.”
“Did your love go unrequited?” I asked.
“What’s that mean?”
“Did she love you back?” I asked.
“I don’t think so, not so you’d notice, anyway. But we were friends.”
“A couple of questions,” I said. “What do you think happened to her?”
“All I know is she’s in trouble. I thought she was dead, and then you told me she’s alive, so I got real hopeful. That’s why I didn’t mess with you. I don’t want you locked up. I want you to find her. You didn’t have to throw anything at me.”
He was starting to make me feel bad, like I was one of the schoolyard tough guys that took his lunch.
“I’m sorry,” I said, and I meant it. “So all that before was just playacting?”
He shrugged. “Strawn told us to ride you pretty hard, make you feel unwelcome, stuff like that.”
“Did you know about her mother?” I asked.
“Not until just recently. She never talked about her mom, and I never asked. Too shy. I never really said much of anything. I got all tongue-tied. But when you showed up, Strawn got really agitated, angry almost, but more worried. I had never seen him like that.”
“Where did Strawn come from?”
“I don’t know.”
But I didn’t need to ask. All I had to do was look down. There were old photographs everywhere, and newspaper clippings. I fished one off the floor and looked at it more closely. The color was fading with age, but it wasn’t a good photo to begin with. Poor lighting. It was of a young Strawn with his arm around Amy. No, not Amy. Arlene. They were almost identical.