Blood Rites (25 page)

“Shut up, damn it! Lowell’s word would have been enough. The pictures . . .” Haiti fought to keep from continuing but the impulse to talk had become too strong and he blurted out, “The pictures, all of them, would have earned him a bonus.”

“How would Lowell have killed Richard?”

“Jesus, Stephen! We don’t have to hear . . .” Wells stopped midsentence, his attention drawn to his partner’s fingers lightly rubbing the side of Haiti’s neck. “Don’t get impatient,” he warned in an anxious tone Halli didn’t understand.

Halli shuddered from the touch, as if these thin fingers were a knife blade or the barrel of a gun. “Just tell me one thing—was Russ crazy or are you really Stephen Austra?” he asked.

“I am.”

“I don’t get it. What’s the point of hiding up here?”

“You’ll understand soon, I promise you,” Stephen said in a voice so soft it sounded gentle. For the first time since the kidnapping, Stephen’s expression revealed all the hunger he had been deliberately holding back. Though Halli couldn’t see it, he noticed Dick watching him with pity.

In the next few hours, Halli lost all will to fight. He still didn’t know exactly what he faced but he didn’t have to. The pounding in his head was enough, the way the questions flowed one into another was enough. Through the hours, he’d managed to slide into the corner of the shed, where he sat with his knees pulled against his chest. Each time Stephen asked a question in his soft, lilting voice, Halli shuddered as if someone had him wired and had switched on the power. But he always answered, quickly, nervously, as if he believed he still had a future and would someday have to face Carrera and confess this weakness. Dick wanted to tell him that he had no choice but Stephen would not have allowed it, and Dick reluctantly admitted, he had no desire to do so.

As one of Carrera’s closest advisers, Halli was able to reveal details of the family’s crime operation that the combined law enforcement agencies in Cleveland could have scarcely imagined. Then he talked about Russ Lowell, the man’s sadism, his intelligence, his crimes. And each new fact about each bloody crime only served to justify and increase Dick’s fury.

These monsters had Helen and their sons!

One fact Dick found more chilling than all the others—someone with the Cleveland police had informed Carrera of Dick’s paid leave, his potential independent flight. Of course, Stephen had asked for a name. Halli said he didn’t know it. When the pounding in Halli’s head forced tears down his face and he still didn’t answer, Stephen seemed satisfied.

Without a name, they could trust no one. Stephen’s words the night Dick had first arrived suddenly took on a new meaning—they were completely on their own—here and everywhere.

Finally, Stephen repeated the question Dick had been dreading, “Now tell both of us how Lowell would have killed Richard?”

“With fire. A good killer can stretch an execution over hours, maybe even days, though Russ wouldn’t have had that kind of time.”

“You have done this, yes?”

“I have.”

The air in the room seemed to have grown thicker, charged. “I know a great deal about fire, Jason Halli,” Stephen said and brushed a finger down the back of Halli’s hand. Halli screamed and looked down at the place Stephen had touched as if expecting to see the burn. “A great deal.”

Dick left the shed without a word and sat outside, waiting for the sounds he expected to hear. But there was nothing-no screams. No moans. Not even any motion.

Dick recalled the friendly argument over loyalty oaths that he’d had with Hillary. Alan had looked embarrassed at his response and rightfully so. Children didn’t compromise. They hadn’t yet learned how. But Dick would, hell, he’d do whatever was necessary to hold his son, alive and well, once again. He sat on one of the logs surrounding the fire pit and listened to the birds singing in the late afternoon sun, to the breeze curling through the pine trees, to the chatter of an anxious squirrel on a branch far above him. This was not a time for killing, not even of killers. This was a time he should be making his peace with God.

The air near the ground grew hazy, the lines of the trees less distinct as the shadows of the mountain spread. The sky turned to white, to rose. At dusk, Stephen joined him. He carried a bundle wrapped in Halli’s shirt. Though Dick wanted to ask what was in it or take a quick look inside the open shed, he decided he didn’t want to know. He looked up at Stephen and one of his hands automatically began to move to the top of the scar running down his side. He pulled it back, embarrassed by what he’d just revealed.

Stephen sat beside Dick. Reaching out he rested four fingers against the top of the long broad slashes his brother’s hand had left on Dick’s body. Dick shuddered, forcing himself not to be the first to pull away.

Stephen lowered his arm. “The family resemblance is too obvious now, yes?”

“Hell, you don’t have to read my mind to figure that out. The way you sat. The way you moved. And when you touched him, all of a sudden I was that two-bit killer and you were your brother. In the last three years, I’ve managed to force the memory back but sometimes, if I sleep the wrong way, the scar pulls and I dream about him.”

“I never asked if you wished the memory dulled or erased. Should I have done so?”

“I would have refused then. I refuse now. Considering what we’re facing, Charles’s memory is kind of reassuring. You’ll make a hell of a partner, Stephen.”

Stephen looked toward Halli’s car, thinking of the kind of partner he would make. He’d been thorough with Halli, learning everything the man had known about Carrera and Lowell. How they moved. How they talked. Their friends. Their enemies. How they would react in a crisis. The compulsive habits they needed to convince themselves they were still human.

Stephen knew them as he knew himself. His past and their present were so much alike but he and Carrera were in control. Stephen wasn’t so certain about Russ. Yet he knew that both men abhorred weakness and respected those they feared. Well, they would learn to respect him soon enough. “Let’s go home,” he said to Dick. “We’ll start our hunt in Dawson tomorrow. If Russ has left no word for us, we will fly to Cleveland and wait for him, yes?”

Dick nodded. He could think of no better plan to deal with the tragedy.

“And when it’s over, I will understand if you never wish to see any of my family again.”

“You think you’re that vicious?”

“You’ve seen the beast in me, Richard. Before we are through with this hunt, I expect it to be well fed.”

Dick had seen the darker side of his friend; nonetheless, he responded truthfully, “Well, I’m ready to help you rip them apart.”

“I know. But when we are through, you will think about what you have been forced to do. Then, whatever your decision, I will understand.”

II

The next morning, Donna dressed Dickey so she could drive into Dawson with the men. There, Stephen checked their mailbox. Finding it empty, he and Dick decided to contract a private plane to fly them to the major airport in Edmonton where they could catch a commercial flight to Cleveland.

They all went into the dingy one-room airport that serviced Dawson and the surrounding towns. “I have to call New York,” Stephen said to Dick. “Do you want to talk to Judy?”

“I’m tempted to wait until it’s over to tell her anything. Otherwise she’ll want to be in the middle of the battle and I won’t be able to stop her.”

Stephen responded with a quick smile, an affectionate comment, “You never could before.”

“Yeah, and look what it got us.” He took a deep breath and added, “Yes, I would like to talk to my wife.”

A pull on Dick’s jacket drew his attention to the toddler. The boy had been standing upright at his side, his eyes darting from one unfamiliar sight to another. Now he pointed out the window to a dingy biplane rolling from the storage lot to the unpaved runway.

“I guess that’s our ride,” Dick said and lifted the boy so he could see the landing better. “Hey, little nipper,” he said to the toddler. “When Patrick gets home you’ll have a lot to tell each other, won’t you?”

At the mention of his brother, Dickey looked up at him and started to grin, then caught himself and remembered to keep his lips together when he smiled. “Good boy,” Dick said and put the toddler down so he could take the phone from Stephen.

Their conversation lasted only a few minutes and when he hung up, Dick looked relieved. “Judy took the news pretty well. And she didn’t even ask to meet us in Cleveland. That’s one of the advantages of having you for a partner,” he said to Stephen.

They went outside and got their bags. After Stephen said good-bye to his son, he handed the boy to Dick, wrote two phone numbers on a slip of paper, and gave them to Donna along with an envelope containing a letter and some money. “There should be enough money to see you through any emergency while we are gone. If you have problems with the authorities, the letter explains that we are on vacation and you are visiting to take care of my son. If you need to reach me or need any help with Dickey, phone one of these numbers. Speak to Judy Wells, Paul Stoddard, or Elizabeth Austra, no one else. We shouldn’t be gone more than a week. While we’re away, take good care of my son.”

Though he said the words kindly, Donna sensed a warning. She nodded and, to demonstrate her responsibility, picked up the boy and cuddled him in her arms.

Donna waited for the plane to take off so Dickey could wave good-bye to the men. Then, after much swearing at the heavy spring on the clutch, she made the long trip back to the house.

They reached it by midafternoon. Dickey ran into the house ahead of Donna as if he expected Mother to be home and ready to scoop him up into her arms. Finding no one he sat in the center of the room, his huge eyes desolate with misery. When Donna tried to comfort him, he ran into the nursery, stripped off his pants and shirt with so much force that he ripped them, then crawled into his bed for a nap. Donna, hoping that he’d feel better when he woke, bolted the outside and lay down on the platform bed Stephen shared with Helen. She smelled a musky scent on the pillows and sheets that reminded her of places far from home. For the first time in months, she closed her eyes and slept without dreaming.

I

Russ Lowell placed three conscious restrictions on his nature—he never picked up a girl anyone would be looking for or one who wasn’t a long way from her hometown and he never let pleasure interfere with business. He thought of his girls as he drove east toward home, concentrating longest on Jennifer Potts and how she’d stood dripping wet at the side of the road looking so thankful when he’d pulled over. He’d asked how far she was going, how far she’d come, how many rides she’d had, before he gave any indication, any hint at all that he was more than just some faceless driver she could entice and abandon at the next main crossroads. She’d lasted weeks longer than the others because her terror had been the best until the end when she could not stop crying. He’d taken to gagging her then because he hated the noise of her constant sobs. He hadn’t killed her, he guessed she’d choked, but he buried her like the others, far back in the hills where she’d never be found.

And Donna? He hadn’t even been looking for his next girl when he ran into her. Then he saw her eyes, and the way she’d been ready to bolt from the diner. She’d been on the run. She’d been running a long, long time. He wondered if she knew that the shots he’d fired at the campsite were just to scare her, that he never chased after her because he wanted her to escape and join the handful of others that he just let go. And he wouldn’t even miss her, not now when he had such a prize stretched across his back seat.

When he’d taken Helen Wells, he had ignored all his restrictions. Given what he’d gained, he didn’t care.

As he’d been doing for the last fifty miles, Russ glanced in the rearview he had aimed at Helen’s face, partly just to look at her but also to try to catch her faking unconsciousness, watching him. But she only slept; hardly breathing, never moving. The boys were almost as cooperative. Alan Wells sat beside him with his hands and feet tied, looking out the window as if everything in the car had ceased to exist. Patrick had nursed from his unconscious mother, then wrapped a blanket around himself and, completely concealed in his makeshift cocoon, had lain on top of her and fallen asleep. Though the toddler had proven to be no trouble at all, Russ considered the boy’s intelligence and strength and decided he’d taken too many chances with the woman already.

He pulled the car onto an access road. A quick trip to the trunk gave him the items he needed, and without waking Patrick, he managed to handcuff Helen’s arms behind her, closing and locking the door closest to her head before walking to the opposite rear door so he could tie her feet. Then, trying to disturb Patrick as little as possible, he pulled Helen from the car, sat on the ground, and stretched her across his thighs.

Her shirt was still open, milk leaking from one of her breasts. Russ tasted it as his hands moved down her body, under the elastic waist on her pants, lower yet. He didn’t want to take her now. No, he wanted her conscious the first time, trembling like the others. But her skin was so smooth, her body so perfect, he’d get acquainted with it while she slept.

As he had when he’d first seen her, he grabbed her hair, pulling her head back. She didn’t wake not even when, noticing a metallic glint in the center of her chest wound, he used his knife to dig out the bullet. The wound began bleeding. He tasted the blood as he had the milk, laughing as he alternated between them, relishing what her body had to give.

“Don’t worry about what I’m stealing, Helen Wells,” he said, pressing his fingers deep inside her. “You’ll have your share of me when you wake. Dream about that.”

Russ arranged Helen as she had been, then covered her with a blanket so no passing trucker could glimpse how she’d been tied. His erection pressed hard against the seam on his jeans and every time it faded, he would glance at her in his rearview or reach under the blanket to brush the side of her breast and feel himself harden again.