“Can you describe him?”
“White, early forties, nondescript. That doesn’t matter. What’s important is that the police start unearthing this guy’s trail and get on him, asap.”
“They’re on this guy; you know that. Why would they listen to me?”
“The person who disemboweled Kelly Colfax with a carving knife also rammed a dental pick through Ceci Lezak’s eye socket into her brain. Tell that to the police. It will convince them you know what you’re talking about.”
I felt what can only be described as a stabbing pain in the center of my forehead. “How do you know that?”
She gave me a flat stare that said,
Don’t be an idiot
. I turned to the sink and washed my face again.
“They’ll instantly consider me a suspect,” I said.
“You’re smart. You’ll finesse that.”
“Why do you care about catching this guy?”
“Homicide isn’t a sport. Human beings shouldn’t be taken like game animals.”
“Why don’t you tell the police yourself?”
“I can’t talk to them. Honey, I don’t even exist.”
Jax Rivera, the world’s only invisible drama queen.
“If I call Tommy Chang, I’m not going to hold back. I’ll tell him who gave me this information,” I said.
“You can do that, but when he runs my name through VICAP he won’t come up with anything except an expired Texas driver’s license. But he will alert certain people to my proximity, and they would like to talk to me. On an extreme level. And to reach me, they’ll come to you. On an extreme level.”
She turned toward the door. “You have a webcam for your computer?”
“It isn’t hooked up.” Jesse had been bugging me to set it up, but I suspected he wanted it for entertainment, not communication.
“Hook it up,” she said.
“Jax, why me?”
“Start looking, and you’ll find out.”
I was heading for the café’s screen door when the cook called to me.
“Hon, your burgers.”
I grabbed them, paid, and walked out into the heat. Jesse had his door open and was pulling his gear from the backseat, about to get out.
“I was starting to think a scorpion got you,” he said.
I shoved the sack with the burgers into his hands and stood watching the café, hands on my hips.
He looked up. “You know, PTSD is a bitch. But nothing compared to PMS.”
I gave him the death stare.
He raised his hands. “No, of course that’s not it. And I’ll just be crawling under a rock now.”
A moment later I heard a motorcycle start up. Jax pulled out from behind the café and curved onto the highway. We watched her gun the throttle and accelerate into the distance.
“Is that . . . ?” Jesse said.
“None other.”
“Fuck me. With a flagpole.”
I got out my cell phone and called Tommy Chang.
The China Lake Police Department occupied a sleek glass-and-steel building in the Civic Center complex. The atmosphere in the station was crackling. Jesse and I waited at Tommy’s desk. His porkpie hat and an empty holster hung on a coatrack. Jesse gazed at framed photos of Tommy’s five kids, and one of Tommy on a dirt bike, catching huge air. Outside was a white-and-red news van painted with the call letters of a Los Angeles television station. A cameraman was leaning against the back, sipping a Coke, talking to the reporter.
Tommy walked up, accompanied by his boss.
I stood and held out my hand. “Detective McCracken.”
He was a walking side of beef, wearing scratched old eyeglasses. His red hair needed a good cut. His size made Tommy look like a ventriloquist’s dummy.
He shook. “It’s Captain nowadays. How’s that little nephew of yours?”
I told him Luke was great, noticing that he didn’t ask about my brother. McCracken and Brian nettled each other. But then McCracken had, at different times, placed both Brian and me under arrest, which we Delaneys find nettlesome.
He leaned against the edge of the desk. The metal creaked under his weight.
“Tell us more about this former government employee who provided the information about the murders,” he said.
Jax may have overhyped the warning about giving her name to the police, but I knew that if I said the phrases
CIA
or
undercover operative,
I would get laughed out of the station, put on an antiterrorist watch list, or both. I put on my legal journalist’s hat.
“This is a source. They’ve provided me with background for several stories I’ve written. That series on cybercrime, the criminal ring that infiltrated IT companies out on the coast.”
“What’s his name?” McCracken said.
Thank you, bad grammar. “That’s confidential.”
He scratched his nose and huffed out a breath. “Nothing’s ever simple with you, is it?”
Tommy sat down behind the desk. “I know your source wants to stay anonymous. But this is a murder investigation.”
“I’ll give you any other information I have. But not the name.”
“Are you playing games?” McCracken said.
“No, sir.”
“We’re getting pounded with media attention over this. Local newspaper and radio. That Los Angeles TV news van outside with the dish antenna on top. And CNN’s calling. It’s going to be a circus.” He stood up. “So what’s your angle? Is this an ego trip? You want a scoop?”
Jesse rubbed his palm along his leg, which he did when he was tense. Keeping quiet went against his grain, but this line drive was mine to field.
“No,” I said. “I’m simply passing along the information.”
“Then give us the damn information. You tell us we have a killer nicknamed Coyote, but you won’t help us contact the source who might give us something helpful.”
“That’s all I know. If I learn more, I’ll tell you.”
He shucked his slacks up by the belt, jiggling them over his belly. “Fine. But expect a visit from the Bureau.” He eyed Tommy. “Call the resident agent in Bakersfield. I’ll phone Los Angeles. Behavioral analysis and the serial murder group have units there.” He walked away shaking his head. “Shit on a biscuit.”
Tommy rubbed his eyes. “You’d never know it, but he’s actually an engaging guy.”
“Tommy, I’m not trying to pull something. This information came at me like a broomstick being jammed into my spokes.”
“I believe you. But this is all so . . .” He looked up, frayed.
All so grisly, barbaric, and overwhelming. And on his shoulders.
“You okay?” I said.
He gave a tight nod.
Jesse put a hand on the desk. “What worries me? Those other names on the memorial board.”
Tommy looked at him, saying nothing. Outside a fighter jet curved into view and blinked past, trailing thunder.
“And so you know,” Jesse said, “I have a Glock nine at home, and I keep it loaded. But since it’s two hundred miles away, I’m going to tell Evan to put her foot to the floor and not pull over for anything, even a Highway Patrol car with Jesus Christ behind the wheel. You okay with that?”
“Don’t get stopped,” Tommy said. “I’ve got no pull with Jesus.”
I stood up. “Don’t worry. Nothing can keep me from getting out of this town.’
5
The sun was dropping into the Pacific when I rounded the bend and we got our first glimpse of home. The ocean flared gold, as if it were an offering poured out below the peaks of the Santa Ynez Mountains. The view never fails to thrill me. I wouldn’t leave Santa Barbara for ten million bucks.
I dropped Jesse at his house on the beach. By the time I pulled onto my own street the sky had deepened to cobalt and stars were winking in the east. The live oaks and white oleander shimmered in the dusk. Near the corner, neighborhood kids were playing baseball. I pulled up in front of my place and my headlights caught the red Mazda convertible parked in the driveway.
For a second I sat idling the engine, my hand on the gearshift. I had a V-8 under the hood. I could be blazing up the street in a quarter of a second.
The Mazda convertible was empty. Shit on a Southern-fried biscuit. That meant my cousin Taylor was already inside my house.
I killed the engine, grabbed my things, and got out. Pushing through the garden gate, I stalked along the flagstone path toward my door. Across the lawn at my neighbors’, the lights were off. Crud. Nikki and Carl Vincent could have helped me drive Taylor off. My little house was lit up like the Moulin Rouge. I heard the stereo blasting country music. Bad country. My-dog-died bad. Donny and Marie bad. The ivy on the fence was starting to curl.
I threw open the French doors, walked in, and dropped my bags on the hardwood floor. Under the force of the music my shoelaces began untying. In the kitchen the refrigerator door was open. Sticking out behind it was my cousin’s rear end. Her jeans were black-and-white cattle-print with a heart branded on the butt.
“Taylor.” Nothing. “Taylor Boggs.”
I walked to the stereo. Saw the CD case.
Backseats and Backstreets: The World’s Best Cheatin’ Songs
. I turned it off.
Taylor pulled her face out of the fridge. A chicken leg protruded from her mouth. Her eyes went as round as pie and she pulled the drumstick from between her lips.
“Sweetie,” she said.
“How did you get in?”
Her eyes were the color of grape jam. Her T-shirt said,
Makin’ Hole
. And beneath that,
Carnahan Drilling—we go all the way down
. She skipped toward me, arms outstretched.
“Where y’all been all weekend?”
All weekend—oh, God. How long had she been here? I glanced around.
She clenched me in a hug. “What is going on with your hair? I like this longer length, but it needs some height.” She fussed with my toffee-colored locks. “My gal at the salon can fix you up.”
Her blond mane was hair-sprayed to the size of a tumbleweed. I shooed her hands away from my head.
“I figure you took a house key the last time you were here,” I said. “What I want to know is how you got my alarm code.”
“Don’t be silly. I came by when the workmen were here, and told them I’d lock up.”
I ground my teeth. I was having the bathroom remodeled: new shower, sink, mirrors, window, paint, and tile. I wanted to eradicate the memory of being attacked in there by a homicidal rock singer. Also, I’d shot the old shower to hell. I needed to tell Mr. Martinez and his sons that Taylor was persona non grata. Let her in and she spread over the house like light sweet crude.
She was shaking her head. “You should think twice about that black-and-white tile. It’s awful sterile. I mean, you already have this rugged hiker thing going on in your living room.” She waved toward my Navajo rugs and framed prints of Yosemite. “Your bathroom should say soft and fluffy. You know, feminine.”
“I’m familiar with the concept.” I walked to the living room, spreading my arms. “Please explain this.”
“Don’t get your undies in a bunch. I needed a quiet place to lay out my inventory.”
Draped across the furniture were bras and panties in countless colors and degrees of wickedness. Teddies, G-STRINGS, and . . .
“Is that a codpiece?”
“Saucy, isn’t it? It’s Countess Zara Lingerie’s new collection. His ’n’ hers underwear. It’s called
Fil/Fille
.” She picked up another bit of male attire and jiggled it in front of me. “Get it?
Feel-feel
?”
It was decorated to look like a stallion’s head. I stepped back. “Did you have to give it eyes and a mouth?” Then I stopped myself. “Wait. Just wait. Why my house?”
“Ed Eugene’s old fraternity brother’s here and he didn’t want my dainties fussing up their boys’ weekend.”
I felt like chewing through an electrical cord and ending it all. “Dainties?”
“Our new range—what do you think?” she said.
I turned to the playthings on my coffee table. “That your dildoes look like a missile battery.”
She smiled. “It’s part of the couples theme. We call it Weekend Fireworks.”
“And is
she
part of the Weekend Fireworks?” I picked up the plastic inflatable doll that was lounging on the sofa.
“Suzie Sizemore. For my lingerie parties, you know, when some of the guests feel bashful about trying on our selections. Isn’t she adorable?”
Suzie’s vinyl grin indicated that she’d been getting gleeful with the missiles. I tossed her back on the sofa.
“Please tell me you didn’t lay all this out in front of the Martinez boys.” The last thing I needed was my bathroom contractors seeing these things.
“Of course not.” She clapped her hands together. “Now hold on. I’m mainly here to talk to you about my plans for the book.”
“
My
book?”
Hell, had she spent the weekend rewriting my novel-in-progress? I glanced at the computer. It was off. Thank God.
“Evan, it’s not always about you.” She steepled her fingers in front of her lips. “
My
book.”
Light-headedness was the only word to describe the feeling that came over me.
“See, I’ve developed my business talent. Which is more than just sales. It’s my eye for beautiful lingerie as well as my second eye for making ladies feel exquisite, no matter what their figure flaws.”
Damn if she didn’t look at my chest. Her eyes wandered as though lost on the Great Plains.
“But I haven’t even begun to tap my writing talent,” she said.
The light-headedness worsened. I wondered whether my face was expanding like a helium balloon.
“It must run in the family. Everybody who gets my Christmas letter tells me I’ve missed my calling. I should be an author.”
My eyes crossed. Taylor’s Christmas letter was a three-page essay on Her Perfect Life. It omitted her husband’s jealous streak and her taste for junk food and adultery, but did feature a photo of her riding bareback on one of Santa’s reindeer. Taylor was dressed as an elf. Ed Eugene was the reindeer.