Shiver (46 page)

Click.

Come on, come on.

She had time for one more try.

Her index finger flexed once.

The shock of recoil nearly threw her off the beam. The gunshot rang in her ears like an explosion. Rood staggered, blood blossoming on his chest.

She fired again. Another bullet slammed into Rood’s chest and sent him reeling back. He collapsed on the floor, the shotgun flying from his grasp to boomerang into a corner, and then he just lay there, his glasses canted at a ridiculous angle, groaning and rolling his head from side to side like a child in the throes of a nightmare.

His raincoat fell open. Tucked in an inside pocket was a small clay gryphon.

* * *

Rood lay on his back, breathing hard. He tried to rise, couldn’t. The bitch had won this game, God damn her, and now there was nothing in his private universe but pain, and he found he didn’t like pain very much when it was his own.

The ceiling panel was kicked loose, and a moment later Wendy dropped down onto the desk. She hopped off and stood looming over him. The wind from the shattered window tossed her hair.

She aimed the revolver at him with both hands. The hammer snapped back.

“No,” Rood whispered, forcing speech like paste through frozen lips. “Don’t.”

“Why not?” Her voice was ice. “Give me one reason.”

He could think of no reasons, none at all, except that he couldn’t die this way, as the loser of the contest, as a failure. A failure.

“Please,” he moaned, hating to beg but afraid not to.

“I’ll tell you what.” She was smiling now, a smile like knives. “I may not shoot you again. I may let you live ... if you’ll say some words for me. Some very special words. Will you?”

Fury seized him. This was his game she was playing. His ritual, not hers.

He almost refused. Almost told the bitch to go to hell.

Then dimly he became aware of sirens blaring in the distance. And he knew he had to go along, because if he could hold her off a little longer, the police would be here, and she couldn’t kill him then.

“All right,” he croaked.

“You’re most cooperative, Mr. Rood. I like that. Your chances of surviving this rendezvous are improving all the time. Now repeat after me: I have no power.”

“I have”—he winced as something tightened up inside him—“no power.”

“I’m not a god.”

“I’m not ... not ...” The words were hard to say. His tongue wouldn’t work right. He swallowed and tried again, tasting copper at the back of his mouth. “Not a ... god.”

“I’m nothing. Nothing at all.”

A spasm rippled through his body. He coughed. Blood bubbled down his chin.

“I’m … I’m …”

His head reeled. The floor seemed strangely spongy, and he was sinking into it while the ceiling receded, the walls moving apart, everything turning white with an unreal shine. He closed his eyes, going away, not wanting to be here, not wanting to recite any more of these lies. If they were lies. Of course they were. They had to be. Had to be ...

Abruptly something cold was pressed to his forehead. The gun, its muzzle chilly against his skin. Blinking alert, he saw the bitch leaning close to him, her face horrible to see, lips skinned back in a feral smile, eyes bright with fever.

“Say it,” she commanded.

With a last trembling effort, he obeyed.

“I’m ... nothing. Nothing. Nothing.”

Life and strength and energy drained out of him. He was weak, so weak. Weak and helpless. And he was ... He was ...

“Nothing,” he said again, but he barely heard his own voice over the rising hum in his brain.

A moment later he no longer heard even that.

Wendy watched Rood’s chest rise and fall once more, and then his breath stopped and his wide, glassy eyes were staring not at her but at whatever it is the dead see.

His autopsy, she knew, would conclude that the cause of death had been two gunshots to the upper body. But the autopsy would be wrong.

Saying those words had killed the Gryphon.

Epilogue

A cold wind kicked up a swirl of snow, misting the windshield, as Wendy steered her car through the wrought-iron gates of the cemetery.

It had taken her all of yesterday and most of today to drive here, to this graveyard on the outskirts of a small town in Idaho. Delgado had offered to go with her, but she felt the need to make this pilgrimage alone. He seemed to understand; and that was strange, because she wasn’t sure she understood it herself.

Franklin Rood was dead. She knew that. She had shot him and watched him die. She had seen his body zipped into a plastic bag and wheeled away on a gurney. And yet at times she’d found herself wondering if his last spree of violence had been merely a vivid fantasy. There were nights when she woke up short of breath, having been chased through corridors of dreams by a man with a knife or a shotgun, a man whose glasses flashed with amber light. And whenever a prison break or a manhunt was reported on the news, she would think: He’s loose, he got out of jail, he’s after me again.

Many times in the seven months since Rood’s death, she had visited the graves of his victims, often laying flowers there. But she had never stood before Rood’s grave. And gradually she came to realize that she would be free of him only once she saw where he lay buried.

Early yesterday morning she started out from L.A., heading northeast on Interstate 15. She made good time racing through the desolate stretches of the Mojave and the sagebrush desert of Nevada. Then last night, as she slept in a motel outside Cedar City, Utah, a blizzard hit, the first of the winter, icing the roads. The rough driving conditions slowed her progress today, delaying her arrival until evening. As she guided her Honda along the narrow lane winding like a dry streambed among rows of marble headstones and bronze markers, the last of the sun was vanishing behind the bare skeletons of trees, leaving the bleached earth brighter than the sky.

From newspaper accounts of the funeral, Wendy knew where to find Rood’s burial plot. It lay far from the other grave sites, on a lonely hill unsheltered by trees and unshielded from the wind.

She parked at the foot of the hill, got out of the car, and trudged up the whitened slope, trailing plumes of frosty breath. She came up short before the grave marker half-hidden in the snow.

Crisp letters were carved in the polished marble, spelling out two words: FRANKLIN ROOD.

Wendy looked at that name for a long time. Then slowly she stripped off her gloves, reached into the pocket of her coat, and removed the last clay gryphon.

She had taken the statuette from Rood’s body, the clay still soft and pliant, and hidden it on her person only moments before the police arrived. At the time she hadn’t known quite why she wanted it, except that, after all, it had been meant for her.

Thoughtfully she turned the model between her fingers, studying the crude suggestions of beak, wings, and claws. The clay was hard and brittle now, dusty and dry, reminding her of old bone.

Wendy brought her hands together, pressing the statue between her palms. She twisted her wrists in a slow grinding motion, crushing the gryphon to powder, to dust. She thought of Jeffrey, of Jennifer, of Sanchez and Porter, of Elizabeth Osborn and Rebecca Morris and Julia Stern. She thought of Kathy Lutton, a waitress in Twin Falls who was Rood’s first victim, and of the other women he killed before he became the Gryphon. She thought of the deputies, the security guards, the random office workers—all the people whose lives ended in his final, pointless rampage. She mourned for them, for every one of his victims.

Opening her hands, she let the dry flakes of the crumbled statue settle like ashes on the grave.

“It’s done now,” she whispered. “It’s finished.”

As she walked down the hill to her car, she knew Rood would not haunt her any longer.

At the gates she parked and got out to take a last look at the cemetery. Even from a distance the solitary headstone was visible, high on the hillside in the drifted snow, alone in the gathering darkness.

She gazed at the small monument that stood over Franklin Rood’s grave, the grave to which his every choice had led him. She went on looking at it until the twilight had deepened and the stone was lost to sight.

Then she climbed back into her car, pulled through the gates, and retraced the route she’d traveled, gliding past frozen fields and leafless trees under the cold, friendless stars. The dark back roads were poorly marked, the signposts hidden in shadows, and as she searched for the highway that would take her home, Wendy got lost several times.

It was late, but not too late, when she finally found her way.

Author’s Note

As always, I invite readers to visit my website at
www.michaelprescott.net
.

Shiver
was first published in 1992 under the pen name Brian Harper, which I would use for a total of six books. It sold well, going through four editions. A television producer wanted to use it as the basis for a TV-movie, but the deal didn’t work out. Shortly afterward, the movie rights were optioned by Robert D. Weinbach of Cyclone Productions, who held the option for more than a decade and finally succeeded in making an independent film based on his own screenplay adaptation. By that time, the book was out of print, so I decided to bring it back in both ebook and POD (print-on-demand) editions.

In proofreading the new edition, I had to fight the urge to make extensive revisions. There are many things about the book that I would do differently now, but I limited myself to minor corrections.

Shiver
had already gone through many changes back in the early ’90s. Kevin Mulroy, senior editor at Penguin Books, carefully guided the novel through several drafts, shaping and focusing the story. His perceptive comments and continuing enthusiasm were invaluable. John Paine, Michaela Hamilton, and Elaine Koster provided additional editorial assistance and kept the process moving forward smoothly.

Spencer Marks of the Los Angeles Police Department reviewed the manuscript with painstaking care, pinpointing errors in my depiction of LAPD procedures and suggesting more authentic ways of handling the material. Thanks to his efforts, the police scenes have a ring of truth they otherwise would have lacked.

My agent, Jane Dystel, diligently looked after my interests at every step of the publishing process. Her professionalism, courtesy, and continuing belief in the merits of the project made my work much easier.

Finally, mystery writer Ed Gorman kept my spirits up with good advice and positive feedback.

To all these people I offer my sincere gratitude.
Shiver
benefited immeasurably from their contributions.

I also want to remember my friends in Los Angeles who tolerated my newfound interest in serial killers, and my parents, who provided support, encouragement, and love. 

First Printing, December, 1992

Copyright © Brian Harper, 1992 All rights reserved

Without limiting the rights under copyright reserved above, no part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in or introduced into a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form, or by any means (electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise), without the prior written permission of both the copyright owner and the above publisher of this book.

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.