Shaken (18 page)

I met Shell back at our table. Our drinks still hadn’t come. I spotted them, sitting lonely on the bar, our waitress nowhere to be seen. Shell bent close and said something, but I couldn’t hear anything because we were too close to the speakers. The drinks eventually came. The gravelly-voiced singer bemoaned his cheating woman, his lost job, his dead dog, and his worsening bursitis. I just closed my eyes and let the music take me where it wanted. The wine was cheap and bitter. After two sips, I didn’t want any more.

Shell slammed his martini, smiled, and then pointed at my glass with a raised eyebrow. I shook my head. He raised his hand to signal our waitress, and I leaned over to stop him, to tell him I was tired and wanted to go.

As I leaned forward, the whole bar seemed to rock, like we were on a boat during a storm. I felt as if I was falling. I reached out, trying to stop the world from moving, knocking over my wine glass. My head hit Shell’s shoulder, and he grinned at me, and as he grinned his face got darker and darker until all I saw was a rolling, swirling blackness that swallowed me up.

Present day

2010, August 10

“G
ot a match,” Herb said, hanging up the phone. “The prints, and McGlade’s picture, belong to a man named Luther Kite.”

They were still five minutes from the prison, even with Phin blowing through red lights and stop signs and crushing the accelerator.

“Why does that name sound familiar?” Harry asked.

“Remember the Kinnakeet Ferry Massacre? It made the national headlines seven years ago. Involved that horror author, Andrew Z. Thomas, who went nuts and started killing people back in the nineties. Kite has an outstanding warrant for his connection to the murders, and he’s the prime suspect for a killing spree across North Carolina right before the ferry slaughter. Hung a woman off a lighthouse.”

“Record?” Phin asked, eyes stuck to the road.

“Not much. Arrested for animal cruelty. Resulted in a fine. Seems he skinned some cats.”

Phin waited for Harry to say something flippant, but McGlade remained eerily silent.

“Kite and Thomas have been on the lam for seven years,” Herb continued. “We know there were two people watching the house, and gassing you and Jack while you sleep sounds like something a writer would dream up. Now that we’ve got a solid connection, we should get the media involved.”

Phin nodded. Herb got on the phone again, began making calls. By the time he was finished, everyone in Chicago, Illinois, Indiana, and Wisconsin would be looking for Jack, Andrew Z. Thomas, and Luther Kite.

Phin hoped it would be enough.

Three years ago

2007, August 8

H
erb and I sat in my car, parked outside Dalton’s building. It was going on ten p.m., and he hadn’t come home yet. A team followed him from Spill to Bradstreet’s palatial estate in the neighboring suburb of Evanston.

“I tell you,” Herb said, “that bottle of Jack Daniels is looking better and better.”

I agreed. I could use a drink. Herb and I were both tired, depressed, and discouraged. Nothing was panning out. The boy hadn’t matched any recent missing person reports, and hadn’t been identified yet. We’d even given the picture to the TV stations to air, but so far, no hits.

Tom and a rotating crew of ten cops were continuing to call storage facilities within a thirty-mile radius, asking about locker 515, with not a single promising lead. Hajek, from the crime lab, had done a full workup of the photo, and the only thing he could tell us was it appeared to have been altered somehow. Hajek believed the color and contrast had been enhanced. He had passed it on to a colleague who knew more about photographic manipulation, and we were waiting to hear back.

Still no ID on the John Doe who died on the Catherine Wheel. And after calling four different judges and pleading our case, none would sign an arrest warrant for Dalton or a search warrant for his condo.

Things weren’t looking good for our heroes. Which is why I brightened up when Herb said, “Let’s break in.”

“You serious?” I asked.

“He’s probably playing it safe, spending the night at the lawyer’s. Maybe we’ll find something in his home.”

“Wouldn’t stand up,” I said. Any evidence we found would be inadmissible in court.

“I care about the kid, not a conviction. Besides, the wallet gave me an idea. What if his passport is in his house?”

I nodded, getting it. If we swiped Dalton’s passport, he wouldn’t be able to leave the country. Those things took weeks to renew. That would give us more time to hang something on him.

“First we break into his car, then we try to frame him, then we steal his wallet, now we’re going to burgle his residence. Not our finest day, Herb.”

“While we’re inside, I may also piss on his sofa.”

I had a gym bag in the trunk. I took out my sweats and put the cement-filled milk jug and some yellow tape inside. Then walked across the street to 1300 North Lake Shore. It was a new doorman, and we flashed our badges and took the elevator to Dalton’s condo. As far as disciplinary action went, I doubted we’d get into any trouble for this little action. Dalton wouldn’t be able to press charges from Cape Verde. That is, if he even knew we were the ones who broke in.

We stood outside his door, and I gave it a gentle knock. When no one answered, I asked Herb, “Did you hear a scream coming from inside, prompting us to enter without a warrant?”

“I heard a scream, and also smelled smoke,” Herb said. “It’s our duty as police officers to break in and try to save lives. Plus, the door was already broken when we got here.”

I hefted the milk jug. “Did you notice a burglar alarm when we were here earlier?”

“Nope.”

“Me neither.”

I reared back and swung the makeshift battering ram with everything I had, just to the right of the doorknob. There was a loud
CRACK
and the door burst inward, the jamb throwing splinters. I went in low and fast, drawing my Colt from my shoulder holster, quickly scanning the hallway. Then I made my way through the rest of the condo, Herb at my heels. When we deemed it empty, Herb got started putting some yellow CRIME SCENE tape over the doorway. If anyone walked by and noticed the door, the tape would prevent them from calling the cops, because the cops obviously already knew about it.

Though Dalton’s condo was massive—far bigger than my house in Bensenville—it was pretty easy to search because there wasn’t anything there. Even though it was fully furnished, there were no personal items of any kind, other than books. No letters, or bills, or photo albums. No computer. No clothing. No passport.

“Fridge is empty,” Herb said.

I went back to the hallway, staring at the pictures on the walls. Dalton had said he’d taken those photos. I didn’t have much of an artistic eye, but they seemed a bit drab and lifeless to me. Even the shot of his house on the beach made a tropical paradise seem rather bland.

There were six pictures total, three on each side. Besides the house, there was a shot of an empty cornfield, a shot of the Chicago skyline, one of some trees in the winter, and one of a sunset over a lake. The only one with a human figure was of a house, with a woman sitting on the porch. The picture was taken far enough away that the woman’s features were tough to make out, beyond the fact that she had long, dark hair and was Caucasian. She could have been anywhere from eighteen to fifty, and the clothing she wore—a blouse and shorts—didn’t lend itself to being dated.

On a hunch, I took the picture from the wall and then spent a minute removing it from the frame. The back of the photo had something written on it.

“What do you think?” I asked Herb, who was peering over my shoulder.

“No idea. Maybe it’s one of his victims?”

“If Dalton is Mr. K, he’s too careful for that. He wouldn’t ever let anything lead back to him.”

“A girlfriend? Relative?”

“Not a very personal photo. Normally, if you take a picture of someone you care about, don’t you move in for a closer shot?”

Herb shrugged. “Maybe the woman doesn’t matter. He’s got the whole house in the frame. Maybe the house is what’s important. Or maybe it doesn’t mean anything, and is no more personal than the cornfield or the sunset.”

I frowned. My subconscious was nagging at me, trying to tell me something, but I couldn’t get it to come forward. While I was thinking, I began to liberate the other photos from their frames. Herb joined in. We didn’t discover any more writing, or anything else that would have been useful, like a signed confession, or a map showing where bodies were buried.

My cell rang. I slapped it to my face.

“Daniels.”

“Lieut, it’s Tom Mankowski. We may have a hit on the storage locker.”

“What did you find, Tom?”

“National Storage. They’ve got a unit rented out to John Smith. Unit 515.”

Smith was the name Dalton had used for his victim at the U-Store-It on Fullerton.

“We’ll meet you there,” I said.

Then Herb and I hurried for the elevator.

Present day

2010, August 10

I
had no idea how long the digital countdown clock had been blinking 00:00:00. It may have only been for a few seconds. It may have been several minutes. I was so totally absorbed in trying to get free that I’d blocked out all other fears, thoughts, and senses.

So it was quite a shock when I saw Mr. K standing there, staring down at me.

“Hello, Jack. It’s been a while.”

My wrists—bleeding profusely now—still weren’t free.

I didn’t make it. I was too late.

Then Mr. K pulled something out of his pocket. Small and white, and possibly the most horrifying thing I’d ever been shown.

My pregnancy test.

“Isn’t this delightful,” he said. “Now I get to kill two for the price of one.”

Twenty-one years ago

1989, August 17

I
woke up groggy, disoriented, nauseous.

I didn’t know where I was, didn’t remember how I got there. The floor beneath me was cold, concrete, suggesting a basement or garage. It was too dark to see anything. My hands fluttered around me, trying to judge the size of the area, and I realized with a start that I was completely naked.

This was bad. Real bad.

What the hell happened to me?

I filled my lungs, ready to shout for help, and then stopped myself right before any sound came out.

Maybe it wasn’t a good idea to let whoever had me know I was awake.

Though I’d been in some hairy situations during my rookie years, I couldn’t say any of them was life and death. Once, my partner Harry and I had been shot at, but the perp had been so far away there had been no real danger. Another time, a suspect took a swing at me when I asked to see some ID. I’d slipped the blow, and what followed was the only time I’d ever used my police baton, hitting him in the knee hard enough to break it.

But neither of those were as nerve-jangling as waking up naked in some unknown basement.

I listened, hearing some machine hum in the background. Sniffing the air, I detected something foul. Beneath the mildew and dampness there was a cloying, rotten meat smell that reminded me of the morgue.

Thinking of the morgue made me remember the last time I was there, with Harry and Herb and Shell.

Shell.

It came back in snatches, like short movie clips. Sitting in a theater, watching Jeroen sing along with the show. Driving in the limousine. Walking down the street and getting into Shell’s car. Listening to blues.

Did I drink too much? Pass out?

My head felt big, stuffy. Not a hangover feeling. More like when I was young and had a bad cold and Mom kept spooning cough medicine into me.

Drugged. I’d been drugged.

I got on all fours, began to crawl in the direction I was facing, moving slowly and reaching out ahead of me so I didn’t bump into anything. My arms and legs felt heavy, and they didn’t respond well to my mental commands. After traversing a few feet, I came to a wall. Concrete again, confirming my suspicion this was a basement.

Bracing myself against the wall, I managed to get onto my feet. My head didn’t want to stay upright on my neck, and my eyes didn’t want to stay open. I forced myself to hyperventilate, thinking the influx of oxygen might help make the drug wear off faster. Once I was confident I wouldn’t topple over, I began to follow the wall to my right, toward the machine sound. I was cautious, afraid of hitting my head or tripping over something. My fears were unwarranted; the basement seemed to be completely empty.

I reached a corner, getting my fingers snared in the world’s largest spider web, rubbing my palms together to get it off while trying not to imagine black widows jumping into my hair. Adjusting my direction, following the new wall, I closed in on the mechanical hum.

The sound was familiar. I was pretty sure I knew what it was.