China Lake (39 page)

‘‘I am lucid.’’

‘‘What’s my name?’’

‘‘Raquel Welch.’’

I couldn’t stand the thought of letting go. I leaned down and kissed him hard. ‘‘I love you too.’’

I was halfway to the door when he said, ‘‘You can’t let Luke go trick-or-treating, Ev.’’

I didn’t look around. He didn’t know and I couldn’t bear to tell him. ‘‘No chance of that.’’

I headed through the door and didn’t look back.

I flagged down a police car on Highway 395, halfway back to China Lake. The cop was flying down the road, lights flashing, and almost didn’t stop. The car braked late, the cop finally deciding to stop for a lone woman waving and hollering from the roadside. Something, I knew, was wrong.

I ran toward the car as it stopped in a surge of dust. It was Laura Yeltow, the blond cop with the linebacker’s thighs. She got out and walked toward me, her hand riding the nightstick in her belt.

‘‘Evan Delaney. Why am I not surprised?’’

I pretended I hadn’t heard that. I told her I needed paramedics to rescue an injured man, and maybe a helicopter to medevac him out of Copper Creek. She pursed her lips. ‘‘He’s disabled,’’ I said, ‘‘and has a broken leg; he’s in serious trouble.’’

She got on the radio. When she finished, she said, ‘‘We already got a call on this.’’ Garrett had to have phoned it in. ‘‘Fire Department Rescue rolled on it, but can’t pinpoint the location.’’

‘‘I’ll show them. Tell me where to meet them.’’

‘‘Not so fast. You know a woman named Glory Moffet?’’

‘‘What about her?’’

Her eyes were stones. She wanted to see my reaction. ‘‘She’s dead.’’

My jaw fell and sweat broke onto my forehead. The wind blew through me.

Yeltow had been at the police station when Shiloh came in. ‘‘The girl was beaten and tearful, big black eye, looked like she’d been rammed in the face with a blunt object. I caught her before she collapsed to the floor in the lobby.’’

I leaned against the patrol car, feeling light-headed.

‘‘She was shaking, real scared,’’ Yeltow said. ‘‘She told me Glory was wigging out. That she had a gun and was holding it on some girls at their church retreat.’’

I pinched the bridge of my nose.

Yeltow kept talking, describing the scene in the police station. She had shouted at the desk sergeant to get Detective McCracken, and then helped Shiloh to a chair. The girl looked desperate, hair half-pulled from a ponytail, blouse ripped. She was stammering, saying that she and the triplets had walked into the cabin and caught Glory taking a pistol out of the freezer.

‘‘She asked what Glory was doing hiding a weapon under the Lean Cuisine,’’ Yeltow said. ‘‘And Glory freaked, started hitting her with the butt of the gun. Shiloh ran out the door, and the next thing she knew Glory was shooting at her. Her truck was parked outside, so she jumped in and just floored it. She was praying for the Lord to protect her when Glory put a bullet through the back window of the cab.’’

I started to shake my head. ‘‘This sounds wrong.’’

‘‘Shiloh drove straight to the police station. She had bits of glass in her ponytail. And the bullet was lodged in the roof of the cab. I pried it out. Glory was definitely shooting at her.’’

Shiloh was lying, I thought. Then Yeltow told me the rest, and I knew I was right.

Two China Lake patrol cars had headed out to Angels’ Landing, speeding through an afternoon suddenly as bright as an explosion. Detective McCracken rode with Yeltow. His bull’s chest strained under his Kevlar vest. They’d barely pulled up to the cabin when the front door burst open and a teenage girl ran out screaming.

A gunshot cracked from the cabin, shattering the front window. Officers ducked and drew their weapons. The shrieking girl dove into the arms of a uniformed officer, who pulled her to the ground behind his patrol car. She sobbed, ‘‘Don’t shoot. My sisters are in there.’’

The air twitched around the officers crouching behind their units. McCracken gestured for patience, showed them a calm face. But radioing for backup, crisis was in his voice.

The uniform who had grabbed the girl was a man three years out of high school, with a broad, shiny face. He asked her, ‘‘What’s your name?’’

‘‘Brandi Brueghel.’’ The girl had big blond hair and a tightly sprung cheerleader’s body. She clutched at his blue shirt. ‘‘Don’t let Glory kill my sisters.’’ Throwing her head back, she shouted at the sky, "Smack down mine enemies, O Lord! Guard my sisters with thy fearsome might and take
down
the unrighteous one who has turned against thee!’’

The uniform shushed her, uselessly. Yeltow scuttled over to them.

‘‘
Fling
her down. Head-butt her into the depths of hell!’’

‘‘Miss,’’ he said. ‘‘Brandi. Help me out here. Tell me what happened inside.’’

‘‘We found Glory disturbing Pastor Pete’s mortal remains,’’ she said. ‘‘At first we thought she was stealing Miz Wyoming’s Tribulation supplies. She had a bunch of Reddi-Wip canisters set out at her feet, and the maraschino cherries. But she was reaching under Pastor Pete, half turning him over—oh, man, she had him lifted by the buttocks!—and she was pulling out a pistol from underneath him. Shiloh says, ‘What are you doing?’ and Glory goes after her, whacking her on the face with the gun.’’

Yeltow nodded, hearing the girl confirm Shiloh’s story.

‘‘My sisters are in there trying to protect Pastor Pete, but they can’t, not with Glory holding them at gunpoint. You have to get inside!’’

‘‘Calm down, Brandi.’’

She squeezed his arm. ‘‘You don’t understand.
She unplugged the freezer.
’’

The uniform was frowning, baffled, when they heard an engine racketing to life in the barn. After that, Yeltow told me, it happened very fast.

A red pickup skidded out of the barn, tires throwing up sand. Brandi popped to her feet, clawing her hair, yelling, ‘‘Candi! Randi!’’ The officers swung into firing position across the trunks and roofs of the patrol cars.

McCracken held his arm up, called out, ‘‘Hold your fire!’’ The officers were tracking the pickup with their weapons. Yeltow squinted at the vehicle, saw three people in the tight cab, two blondes and a brunette in the middle. Brunette the hostage taker, she thought, positioning the triplets as bulletproofing, making a run for it.

The passenger door swung open. The blond passenger jumped out, a quick, powerful leap, no hesitation, and hit the sand like a pancake. Shaking off the landing, she started crawling for the police cars.

‘‘Randi!’’ Brandi called. ‘‘Hurry!’’

The girl scrambled along the ground. The pickup swung around, did a one-eighty, and charged toward them. The brunette held her arms out. Yeltow saw her bracing against the dash—no, couldn’t be . . . pointing where to ram them—

The driver’s door flew open and now the blonde behind the wheel sprang free and fell hard, rolling, making lots of noise. A second later there was a loud
bang
from inside the truck, and a spray of white mist.

Grenade
, Yeltow thought. Suicide bomber, strapped to blow, heading straight for them. The young uniform, standing next to her, must have had the same fear.

He pulled the trigger.

His shot dissolved the windshield, and then the others opened up. The truck kept coming, looking with its open doors like a great sick bird, and the brunette screamed, threw her arms up to shield her face. Bullets popped and cracked against the truck, until it hit a patrol car and stopped.

McCracken shouted, ‘‘Cease firing!’’ He heaved himself to his feet, both hands on his revolver, and inched around the patrol car toward the pickup. Brandi Brueghel raced past him to the girl who had jumped from the driver’s seat, sobbing, ‘‘Candi!’’

The triplet stood up, spitting sand. She said, ‘‘Did they get her?’’

Yeltow stared into the pickup. They had most definitely gotten her. Glory drooped on the seat, her eyes wide, blood pouring from gunshot wounds in her face and chest. The blood running down her rib cage mixed with the white foam splattered inside the truck. It dripped onto the gun stuck in the waistband of her cargo pants, a nine-millimeter Beretta. Next to Yeltow, the young uniform looked nauseated. Death smelled sweet and creamy, he mumbled. What was that stuff?

Behind them Randi Brueghel was chattering to McCracken. ‘‘I heated it up on the stove,’’ she said, ‘‘got it
so
hot. The can says ‘Warning, contents under pressure,’ so I thought, if I can make it burst it’ll so totally distract Glory. . . .’’

Yeltow saw the exploded canister, made out
-Wi
on the side. The uniform said it sounded like a bomb. It did. How could he have known it was a can of Reddi-Wip?

Yeltow continued staring me down. She said, ‘‘That girl Randi put the can in an oven mitt under her shirt. In the truck she shook the canister just to the bursting point, right before she jumped. Very gutsy.’’

My chest felt tight. ‘‘It makes no sense. Glory was scared of those girls, the triplets and Shiloh. Not the other way around.’’

Yeltow squinted at me. ‘‘I guess you’re not part of this after all.’’

‘‘What?’’

‘‘You’re not hearing what I’m telling you. This Glory had a gun on her, a nine-millimeter Beretta. Same kind that killed Peter Wyoming. Considering that your brother is down for the murder beef, you should be taking this as good news.’’

I knew then what was going on. Glory had been found out. Chenille and Shiloh had discovered that she was my informant and had set her up. I rubbed my forehead. Had they seen me and Garrett running from the cabin? Had Glory told them what we had discussed? Had she told them that I knew Jesse was being held captive?

I straightened. ‘‘Oh, my God. Jesse. We have to hurry.’’

The Fire Department Rescue Squad met me at the turnoff to Copper Creek. We got to the fallout shelter fifteen minutes later, and we knew it had all gone bad. Both doors hung open. Smoke wafted out, and the mural on the blast door was scorched. A firefighter said, ‘‘Stay back.’’ I stood in the sand, shuddering. He came out shaking his head. ‘‘Burned out. It’s empty. Whoever was in there, he’s gone now.’’

Two days later Brian walked out of the jail, staring straight at me but not seeing me at all, wholly engaged in putting distance between himself and confinement. Sky, sunlight, air—he consumed them without appreciation. He swept me under his arm and kept walking.

The murder charge against him had been dismissed. The Beretta pistol found on Glory’s body was his missing service automatic, and ballistics tests had proved it to be the weapon that killed Peter Wyoming. Glory’s fingerprints had been matched to those at the scene of Mel Kalajian’s murder, and the police had decided that she was to blame for both those deaths. Brian was free, exonerated.

It was victory, and it was hollow. Glory was dead. Luke was somewhere in the thin, brittle air. Jesse had vanished again. I had let him down.

‘‘Commander!’’

Detective McCracken was lumbering toward us across the parking lot, his beefy chest humping up and down as he trotted, scratched eyeglasses bouncing on his nose. Brian grunted.

McCracken hitched up his trousers and wheezed in a breath. ‘‘I wanted to assure you this department is committed to finding your son.’’

Brian just stared at him.

‘‘Committed a hundred and ten percent. We’ll do everything in our power to bring your boy home.’’

Brian said, ‘‘The same way you brought Glory Moffett home?’’

McCracken shoved his hands in his pockets. After a second he said, ‘‘You’re a free man. There’s no hard feelings on our part.’’

‘‘Really? I’m suspended from duty, NCIS is trying to tie me to these thefts from the base, and the FBI is treating me like I’m dog shit on the bottom of a shoe.’’

McCracken said, ‘‘In time, I hope you’ll get some more perspective. Everyone’s just doing their job.’’

‘‘Sure.’’ Brian walked away, pulling me with him. McCracken watched us go.

Brian said, ‘‘Asshole. He didn’t even apologize.’’ He looked back at the detective. ‘‘Gung-ho idiots pumped a twenty-two-year-old girl full of bullets. You think I’ll leave Luke’s safety to them? No fucking way. If they bungle a rescue . . .’’

He held out his hand. It was shaking. ‘‘Give me the keys. I’m driving.’’

We roared away, heading for his house. He said, ‘‘You think Glory really killed Peter Wyoming?’’

‘‘I have my doubts.’’

‘‘Ice Paxton set her up to take the heat off of me.’’

He had told me about Paxton demanding a BW warhead, and claiming he could get him released from jail. He thought that Paxton set Glory up to accomplish that goal.

I said, ‘‘I wouldn’t put it past him.’’

We hadn’t shared this suspicion with the police. I had told them that Glory provided me with information, and about the warning drawn on the blast door mural. McCracken and the FBI agents had looked at me severely. With the mural scorched I had no proof. ‘‘Warn the Santa Barbara police,’’ I’d said. ‘‘Tell them that crackpot Evan Delaney is threatening mayhem, but call them.’’ McCracken did. Then I phoned the superintendent of Santa Barbara schools, and Kevin Eichner, and Sally Shimada. Told her, ‘‘Shut it down, Sally—get the word out, Halloween is
off
.’’

There was a breathtaking silence on her end before she said, ‘‘all right.’’ Then she said what I knew: Publication wouldn’t stop the Remnant from attacking a schoolyard, or movie theater, or any public event.

‘‘Do it anyway,’’ I told her.

Brian said, ‘‘Paxton had my weapon all along, the cocksucker. He sent Shiloh into town with this story about Glory attacking her and holding the triplets hostage, and McCracken’s boobs took it from there.’’

From what we could gather, the police never actually saw Glory pointing a gun at anyone. Everything they heard, they heard from the triplets. What had really happened inside the cabin? Had the triplets told Glory it was a police raid, and scared her into crawling through the tunnel to the truck in the barn, saying they were going to escape?