Infected: Freefall (45 page)

He drove up to Seattle, listening to the indie station Roan loved so much, and wondered about the fear and weariness he’d heard in Dylan’s voice earlier. Was something wrong with Roan, no matter what he actually said? That must have been it. Gruff old Roan liked men who wore their hearts on their sleeves, men who were the opposite of stoic, butch him. He felt bad for Dylan. Roan was a bit like a rickety carnival ride: you thought you were prepared for the trip you were about to go on, but no one ever really was. He wasn’t for the fainthearted.

Holden had lost all sense of time. He couldn’t remember when he’d started this day, and now it was night, the sky a black blanket, headlights blinding and taillights molten. When did he last sleep or eat? He was overdue for both, but he was wired right now. He had something to do first, miles to go before he could sleep.

He parked his car a block over from Jessie’s home and walked the rest of the way on foot. It gave him time to do a little reconnaissance, stake out the place. The neighborhoods were supremely quiet, and he seemed to be the only person walking on either street. He pulled on his gloves before he was in view of the house.

Jessie had a modest—for the Newberrys—two-story house with a peaked roof and a well-landscaped front yard. He had a high fence around the backyard, blocking it from view, and Holden was willing to bet his left nut he had a pool back there, perhaps a hot tub, and even a pony wasn’t out of the question. If you assumed a Newberry had more money than sense, you were generally on firm ground.

Jessie was just as he looked in his Facebook photos: grotesque. Less handsome in person, which seemed impossible, Holden wasn’t sure if the steroid abuse was ravaging him or if he’d had his photos touched up first. His pores looked too big on his gaunt, angular face, which still had the counterintuitive puffiness that suggested HGH use. It didn’t help that the look on his face was so sour and aggressive, making him look even more hideous.

Jessie looked around before holding the door open, making sure Holden was alone, but he didn’t say anything until Holden was inside and he’d shut the door. “Where’s the fucking drive?” he snapped.

“We talk business first,” Holden countered, still oozing friendly charm, giving him a toothy smile. “Then I’ll give you the drive if you’re not interested in what I have to say.” Sometimes his own ability to lie shocked the hell out of him. It was so easy, so natural to him that the truth was actually hard. Lying was second nature, and considering his preacher dad, he wondered if it ran in the family: a bullshit gene. Carried by all successful evangelists, politicians, and con men everywhere.

“I’m not interested,” Jessie snarled, pale blue eyes narrowed to slits. Even as he growled, he jerked his head toward the living room. Jessie’s growl struck Holden as comical. It was a Human noise, pathetic, meant to be tough and scary but actually the exact opposite. After having heard Roan growl—really growl, not a Human noise, but a shit your pants lion wants to kill you and eat your entrails growl—any attempt by anyone else made him want to laugh. They had no idea what a real growl was and how scary it could be, especially when accompanied by the sounds of breaking bones and snapping joints. “Why the fuck you wearing gloves?”

“I’m a bit OCD, I’m afraid. Do you know you mostly get colds from shaking hands or touching doorknobs? It’s disgusting the amount of germs that are everywhere.” He’d deliberately talked in a higher octave, playing up a natural inclination to lisp. He wanted to sound the stereotypical interior-decorator fairy you could find on any sitcom, the harmless queen who screamed bloody murder if he saw a spider. Let Jessie believe he was harmless. Let him believe he could never be any threat to a brawny he-man like him.

Jessie’s room looked like a Best Buy display. All the latest electronic toys that a boy could want were sparkling new and ready to go, from the big screen HD TV to the home theater system, the stereo with enough bass to rattle your fillings loose, a Wii and a PlayStation of some sort (Holden just didn’t know video game systems) sitting side by side, a skeletal-framed metal desk with a computer with its own wide flat-screen monitor, perhaps in case he got bored of watching porn on the big screen. “Your name isn’t Marco,” Jessie said, his aggression naked in his voice.

So he knew who he was. That confirmed that either John had told him about the detective he’d hired to look into Joel, or he’d found out in another way. Holden turned and fixed him with one of his seductive half smiles. “I said for you to call me that. It’s one of my names—I have three. Which one do you know me by?”

Jessie was wired. Sweat beaded on his broad forehead, even though he was only wearing a sleeveless red muscle shirt and navy jogging shorts, and the muscles in his arms and jaw seemed to tense and flex according to their own rhythms, a visible symphony of anxiety and barely suppressed rage. He wanted to rip Holden’s head off. Good thing he came prepared to take on an angry gorilla. “Holden somethin’. You’re the fag whore that used to get with Uncle Joel.” He didn’t even try and hide his sneer of contempt. “You know Colt? Was this a setup or somethin’?”

“Hardly. All us fag whores know each other.” He said that with a certain amount of sarcasm, but he was sure it sailed far over Jessie’s head. “After having seen you in action, I must admit, I thought you’d be perfect for this new venture I’m launching with a friend of mine. We’re getting into porno, web content only, and with your body, you’d be perfect for our muscle category. I’ve put out some feelers toward Kyle, he’d be more of a frat-boy-style guy, but he seems to insist on anonymity. If you have no objections about wearing a slave mask while fucking, I think we can swing anonymity for both of you. Now, it’s going to be a subscription-only deal, so not everyone will be able to access it—”

“Are you fucking insane?” Jessie roared, stomping toward him in a menacing way. Holden didn’t react—to back up was to show fear, and to show fear was to invite death, so he held his ground and met his gaze straight on. “I’m no faggot! And I certainly ain’t no fucking—get out of my house! Get out!”

“And take the drive with me? Sure.”

He glared at him, a muscle jumping in his jaw, his thin, cracked upper lip curled up as if caught by an invisible fishhook. God, what an ugly man. “I listened to your disgusting fucking pitch. Now give me the drive.”

“Have you actually seen the footage, Jessie? It’s interesting.”

Jessie’s eyes were so narrowed they were almost gone. His hair was slicked back, as if he’d just gotten out of a shower, but he still smelled like rank sweat, and combing his dull brown hair back so sharply only revealed his receding hairline, making his forehead look like it was creeping up his skull. “I wouldn’t watch that disgusting—I was drugged! Kyle did that, he… he’s sick! I ain’t no sissy fag!”

“Of course not,” Holden agreed, all too aware he was lying. He was dying to ask if they gave him roofies laced with Viagra (the special kind that didn’t make your face flush) since he was so visibly hard and obviously came, but he wasn’t here to provoke a fight. He was here simply to dispense a little justice. “In fact, what I caught on the recording might be actionable.”

Big word, too big for a muscle head like Jessie. He scowled, making a vein throb in his forehead. “What?”

“There’s a part where Kyle and Colt say something to each other, and you’re not visible. They’re whispering, but it does seem like Kyle is setting you up, from what I can hear.”

Holden was counting on ’roid rage’s bastard cousin, paranoia, to step in here, and it did. The expression on his face was as naked as any child’s. He was buying it. “Setting me up for what? What did he say?”

“Advance to time code 18:23 and see for yourself,” Holden replied, pulling the jump drive out of his pocket.

Jessie glanced at it briefly before ripping it out of his hand and stalking over to his computer, plugging it into the USB port and waiting for his computer to acknowledge it. He was muttering to himself angrily, “Fucking Kyle, I fucking knew he was up to something. He’s always fucking me over, egotistical bastard—”

While he ranted, Holden pulled the hypodermic syringe out of the velvet bag, and since it seemed Jessie was left-handed, he adjusted his target to his right arm.

Jessie had pulled up the file and was advancing to the time code. “I see what you mean about poor lighting.” A brief pause. The living room had hardwood floors, but the center of the room was taken up by a large, fluffy white carpet that Holden couldn’t imagine owning because it would have been hell to clean. But since Jessie probably cleaned up none of his own messes, he could probably afford it. It muffled footsteps very nicely. “Hey, this isn’t us.”

The good thing about a muscle head? Veins were visible at all times. Holden jammed the needle in one in his right upper arm and depressed the plunger. Jessie reacted, a yelp and a smack that sent Holden flying across the room until he hit the brown leather sofa, but it was too late. “What the fuck?” he roared, getting out of his chair so fast it tilted and hit the floor. “What’d you do to me, you fucking faggot?”

He was coming for him, but Holden was barely dazed. He used to be a street kid. He’d been beaten by bigger guys than him, and in greater numbers too. He reached behind him and pulled out his gun, leveling it at him. “One more step and we go for violent suicide, Jessie.”

Jessie stopped, clearly trying to figure out if he had a chance of taking him before he could fire, and he realized the needle was still in his arm. He pulled it out, helpfully getting his prints on the syringe, and the drugs must have been starting to take effect, as Jessie got this funny look on his face. “What—what is this? Did Kyle—”

“You know when the penny dropped for me? Today I was looking into both Kyle and you, and I came across an article that mentioned Kyle was living at the family estate—you know, dad’s house. Joel’s house. The buyout had nothing to do with any of this, did it? It was personal. You meant to kill Kyle, but somehow Joel ended up taking the hit. I assume you drugged some juice, water, booze? Something you thought only Kyle would drink, but Joel ended up drinking it instead.”

He was starting to breathe harder now, and he was shaking his head as sweat left slime trails down his face. “I don’t—no, no—”

“I have friends in the drug trade, Jessie. I also have friends amongst the gym rats, and they always have the best drugs, as well as the best questionable nutritional supplements. You know, the kind never approved by the FDA, the kind that might be toxic in certain doses. Such as ones really high in potassium. And I’m sure you know some people who can get ahold of some really bitchin’ elephant tranquilizers.”

“I don’t—you’re making this up. I don’t—” Jessie dropped to his knees and grabbed his head. “What the fuck did you give to me?”

“You wanna live? You’d better start confessing now. You’re running out of time.”

“Kyle’s a motherfucking asshole!” he suddenly shouted, falling back onto his butt. He looked really dazed now. Holden probably could have put the gun away, but he decided not to. Let Jessie still think he had a chance. “He—it was his idea. I was just a kid… I didn’t know what we were doing….”

“He molested you?”

“Yes! And he… I didn’t… he just tossed me aside like I was nothing. He’s my brother, y’know? The closest thing I have to a brother, and he treats me like that. He’s a fucking pig. He deserves to die.”

Oh god—did this crime spree boil down to a jilted lover? “Do you love him?”

“Yeah. But not like that! Not in some sick, perverted—” Jessie fell on his back, making little choking noises, his arms spasming slightly like he was trying to get up but couldn’t control his limbs.

“Gay way? No, I’m sure it’s more of a family way, since you are family, and that’s what makes it truly icky. You thought the gay thing was what was wrong with it? Please.”

Holden tucked the gun back into his jeans and stood up. “Just so you know, this wasn’t about Joel. He was a client, a client who tipped really well, but he didn’t mean anything to me. It was business, nothing more. This is about Roan. See, if he was here, he’d tell you that people only get one shot to kill him, but he’s not here, not because you killed him, but because there’s something wrong with him. Which is fine, because it gave me the chance to even the score. You had your shot, you failed. And ultimately, you tried to kill the wrong man. Roan would have turned you over to the authorities. He would have let your cadre of lawyers fight it out with the state’s lawyers. But I don’t trust the justice system. I don’t trust cops. I just knew I wasn’t going to give you the chance to hurt him again.” Holden retrieved the jump drive from the computer and shut it down, pulling the chair back upright. He went over to Jessie’s stereo system and turned it on. “If you killed yourself, you’d be listening to music, right? I would be, I think. Did you know steroid abusers are statistically more likely to commit suicide? Too much of that shit alters your brain chemistry. Drugs are bad, Jessie. But then again, that’s your preferred method of murder, so you know that.”

He picked up the needle and moved closer to Jessie. His eyes were open, staring at the ceiling, but it wasn’t clear if he was dead yet. “But drugs have their good points. For instance, I’m going straight home, and I’m dosing myself with roofies, so when I wake up tomorrow I’ll have no memory of killing you. I will pass every lie detector test in the world, because I will genuinely not know what the hell I did. You won’t even be on my conscience, Jessie. But don’t worry about Kyle. I’m sure his fall from grace will be spectacular when the sex tape hits YouTube in, oh, about five minutes ago. The world we live in, huh? Well, I live in. I think you’re gone.” Holden closed Jessie’s eyelids and then put the needle in his left hand, curling his sausagelike fingers around it like it was the last thing he held on this Earth. Which it was.

Holden gave the room a visual once-over, just making sure there were no signs of a struggle or anyone else being here. There wasn’t. His lower lip was mashed from Jessie’s hit, but the only bleeding seemed to be inside the lip where it hit his teeth. He licked the blood away, the copper taste of it lingering in his mouth as he left the house. He was glad he hadn’t eaten for a while, because he was pretty sure he’d have puked if he had. He had a cold, hollow feeling in the pit of his stomach.