Psycho Save Us (36 page)

“I do,” he
called down, stepping inside the room.  Many things leapt out at him at once. 
There was a taste in the air.  It was musty.  Like sweat forced out.  He looked
up at the spackled ceiling, looked across at the walls laid bare.  There was a
desk with a copy of
Atlas Shrugged
and
A Game of Thrones
, as well
as a computer, but there were no pictures of family sitting anywhere.  No
pictures of any kind, actually.  Black curtains covered the two windows.  The
floor was clean.  There was no TV in here, which meant if there was one in the
house it was probably in the living room downstairs.  This was as workspace. 

“Sugar?” Tidov
hollered from downstairs.

Spencer smiled
and muttered to himself, “Yes, sweetie?”

“What?”

“Yeah,” he
called back, “I’ll take some sugar.”

Spencer stepped
back into the hall.  If the bedroom had been vacant and utilitarian, then the
room across the hall was its storage counterpart.  He flipped the lights on to
get a better look, and tilted his head in curiosity.  “You keep dogs?” Spencer
hollered at him, stepping inside the room.  The cages were too big for dogs,
plainly.  They were latched cunningly together, one set of solid steel chains
connecting them in a row, with a feeding trough that ran through the bars of
one and into the neighboring cage.  A feeder that looked like what Spencer had
seen used in his uncle’s chicken houses was sitting there beside the farthest
cage, n doubt on an automatic timer.

“What?” Tidov
hollered.

“I said,
do
you keep dogs
?”

The door had
multiple locks added unnecessarily, but from the outside, keeping people on the
inside locked in.  He pulled the door back and forth.  It was heavy.  The
wooden façade hid a solid steel interior, no doubt.  These windows were covered
by more black curtains, and the walls…covered in soundproofing foam, like
musicians would put in their recording studios, and lots of it.  Spencer hadn’t
seen this much soundproofing foam since a musician pal of his and Hoyt’s had
spent all his drug money trying to make it big in the rapping business, back in
the day when Atlanta had been
the
hotspot for hip hop.

Yes, anyone
could see that this room was not meant for dogs.  But it was worth asking to
hear Tidov’s pitiful excuse.

“
Da
.  I
mean,
yes
,” Tidov called up.  His feet were plodding up the stairs.  “I
sometimes train German Shepherds and Rottweilers.  Some pits, too, but not so
many these days.”  Spencer stood at the center of the room, waiting for him. 
When Tidov got there, he stood for a moment with two cups of coffee in his
hand, looking at him.  Spencer looked at his tattoos, saw a bald eagle and a
bear fighting it out, perhaps a symbol of Tidov’s Russian heritage fighting
with his American citizenship?

I’m getting all
“pensive” again
,
he thought with some amusement.

Spencer stood
there.  “Sound doesn’t carry well in here,” he said.

The Russian
nodded, and took a sip of his own coffee.  “The dogs bark a lot until I train
them good.  I didn’t want it to keep my sister and her boyfriend up at all
hours.  It doesn’t totally kill the sound, but it helps some.”

Spencer nodded. 
“I’ll bet it does.  And I’ll bet from outside you can’t hear a thing.”

Tidov took
another sip.  “No, you can’t.”

He’s one cool
customer
. 
Very powerful
. 
Very cocksure that nothing can bring down his house
of cards
. 
I really, really hate this motherfucker
.  “Good coffee?”
he asked.

“
Da
.”

“Sure smells
good.”

The Russian
laughed, remembering himself.  “I’m so sorry.  Here’s yours.”  He stepped into
the room and held out the other cup.  Spencer regarded the cup with more than a
slim degree of humor.  And that’s how the silly game ended.

“ ‘Come into my
parlor,’ said the spider to the fly.  ‘’Tis the prettiest little parlor you
ever did spy.’ ”

“I’m sorry?”

Spencer looked
at the offered coffee, then at Tidov.  “Is this how you do it?”

The Russian put
on the most befuddled face.
Oh, he’s very good
.  “Do what, Mr. Madison?”
Tidov asked.

“What’s in it?” 
He smiled.  “C’mon, you can tell me.  Lorazopam?  You sprinkle some in there?  Heard
about a pedo priest in Jersey used to do that.  Or do you prefer to deliver it
in a cellulose capsule?”

“What’re you
talking about?”

“Three grams
puts ’em right out, doesn’t it?  They don’t feel a thing.  You can do whatever
you want.  No squealing, no crying, no pitching a fit about all the blood.  No,
‘I want my mommy’ this, or ‘where’s my daddy’ that.  Pretty slick op you got
goin’ here, friend.”  The Russian stared at him, the coffee still extended. 
“But here’s your problem.  I’m not a parole officer any more than you’re a dog
trainer or Laurence Fishburne’s cock.  You’ve got skeletons in your closet and
myself, well,” he laughed, “I’m runnin’ outta closets.”

“I…I don’t
understand your words,” Tidov said, trying to take a step back, but a look from
Spencer indicated that wouldn’t be wise.  He stood there a moment, perhaps
realizing his hands were full, and recognizing his precarious situation.  The
door was three steps behind him.  Spencer still had his hands in his pocket. 
The room was made soundproof.  “I, um…”  He swallowed.  “I just train dogs in
here, Mr. Madison.  I’m a dog trainer…”

“No, you know
what you are?”  Spencer took a step closer to him.  “You’re a careless walker
in the woods.  That’s what they call you people in wilderness survival
training.  Careless walkers.  Traipsing about with no care about where your
foot goes, no consideration for what rabbit’s warren or gopher’s hole you might
be fucking up.  You chop down trees and hunt the shit outta things until they
go extinct.  But then you step on a rattler, and the whole world changes.  For
a moment you stand still, lookin’ at this thing as it rattles, hisses, and gets
ready to bite.  An’ you don’t know what the fuck to do because everyone’s
always been afraid o’
you
.”

The
other wolf lowered his eyes.  “I’m going back downstairs—”

“Fuck you,
Vladimir Putin,” Spencer chuckled.  “I’ve got a gun in my hand an’ you’re three
steps away from the door in a soundproof fuckin’ room with both yer hands
occupied, bitch.  You go where I say you can go.  You got that?”  A few seconds
went by while Tidov considered.  “Stop thinking!  You have no options.  Now,
drink my fuckin’ coffee for me.”  Tidov looked at him.  “What’s in it? 
Lorazopam?  Or something to just make me tired like some valium or some shit?  Go
on, drink up, motherfucker.”  Spencer took the Glock Pocket 10 out of his
pocket.  “I’m waitin’.”

The other
predator’s eyes showed that he had time for one more defiant thought.

Spencer raised
the gun and said, “If the neighbors couldn’t hear all those girls’ screams, I’m
sure the worst they’ll think is that you set off a firecracker over here. 
Drink.”

Only two more
seconds went by before the Russian made his decision.  He sipped at the coffee,
and when Spencer smiled at him and shook his head, he knew he had to empty it. 
Tidov turned it up, emptying it completely.

“Now, turn
around and start downstairs.”  Tidov did as bidden, slowly, sluggishly, like he
was wearing a weighted vest.  “I want the keys to that Buick outside.  You know
what?  Fuck it, I’ll hotwire the bitch.”  Then, something occurred to him.  “Wait! 
Ho-
ho
, man!  Let’s stop inside your sister’s and her boyfriend’s room. 
Whattaya say?  What’s really in there?  Inquiring minds wanna know, bitch. 
Open sesame.”

Tidov took on
the most dejected look.  He blinked a few times, then nodded.  They walked
slowly down the hall.  Spencer wanted to hurry because on some level he knew
their time alone here was limited, but he also knew that rushing things tended
to make a person sloppy. 
And didn’t Dr. McCulloch always tell me to stop
and think about my actions more?
  So he allowed Tidov his heavy-shouldered
walk to the room.  The Russian reached up, tried to turn the doorknob,
couldn’t.  “You’ve got the key,” Spencer said.  It wasn’t a question.

Tidov nodded, and
Spencer watched the Russian carefully as he set one of the coffee cups down and
fumbled in his back pocket.  There were numerous keys on that key chain, not
all of them of the shape for standard doorknobs (no doubt for the cages) and
all of them color-coded.  He found the right key after a moment, and inserted
it.  He turned it slowly and the door opened.  As soon as it did, Spencer
smelled it.  A mélange of formaldehyde and other chemicals.  There was also
that sweat smell again, and decay.

It was dark
until Tidov reached over to flip three light switches.  He didn’t even wait for
Spencer to ask, he knew the score now.

The room was
bathed in sickly fluorescent lighting, that unflattering kind that brought out
every pimple, boil, scar and sweat molecule on the skin.  Other than the sad
lighting, though, the room was decorated with various rainbows on the ceiling,
a playground at the center with a seesaw, and a twin bed at the far corner with
plush pink pillows and big, brown, fuzzy teddy bears sitting happily alongside
an old Tickle Me Elmo.  One of Elmo’s eyes was falling off to one side, giving
the creature a deranged look.  There was a pair of handcuffs beside Elmo, and
they were currently open, which to Spencer meant recently used.

Along the walls
were setting lights, no doubt activated as needed for greater picture quality. 
And of course, there was the soundproofing foam double-layered on all of the
walls.  There was recording equipment everywhere, including a Sony HVR-Z1U
camcorder, which Spencer happened to know went for around $2,000 because he’d
stolen a car a couple years back with one of those in the trunk and had pawned
it.  “Classy set-up,” he said.  “What’s in that room?”  He pointed to a door at
the far side of the room that he suspected led to what would be a bathroom, and
something else, too.

“If you’re going
to kill me—” Tidov started.

“I haven’t
decided that yet.  I told you, I’m a monster, just like you, and I don’t care
what you have in that room.  I’m not here to rescue the children.  I’m here
because of that fuckwad who stared daggers at me earlier.”

Tidov regarded
Spencer for a moment before he stepped over to the bathroom door and opened
it.  He flipped on the lights again without being asked, and when he did,
Spencer found yet another soundproof room.  Two large plastic tubs, big enough
for bodies, were stacked against one wall.  Hanging from the opposite wall was
a shelf filled bottles of hydrofluoric acid.  The toilet remained, but the
bathtub and shower had been removed to make room for a waist-high steel table. 
On top of the table was a child-sized black bag, with a child-sized object
inside it.

“Open that up.”

Tidov hesitated,
but obeyed.  He moved lethargically, stumbling once.  Whatever he’d put in the
coffee to drug Spencer was now coursing through him. 
He tried to play it
too cool
. 
Should’ve come at me guns blazin’, but then I guess he still
wasn’t sure about me
. 
He wasn’t listenin’ to his instincts
.

The Russian
moved sleepily over to the table and unzipped the bag without ceremony.  He
parted the black plastic covers, and Spencer waved him to back off then peered
inside.  A young girl, no older than nine, half black, half Hispanic, just
lying there, eyes opened and rolled back.  Her lips were dried.  The aroma
coming out of the bag was that of urine and feces.

The room
required another look.  The hydrofluoric acid was smart, as were the plastic
tubs.  Hydrofluoric acid would melt through pretty much anything, but not
plastic.

“Looks like you
bagged another one,” Spencer said, laughing.  Tidov didn’t seem to get it. 
“That’s called a double entendre.  It’s clever shit, motherfucker,
you
didn’t think of it.”

Tidov shrugged
helplessly.  He didn’t know what Spencer expected of him.

“You know,”
Spencer said, “I’ve done a lotta shit in my life, and I’ve learned the various
ins an’ outs of all kinds of work.  But I wouldn’t have the first idea how to
run an operation like this one.  Looks like you cats have given this some
serious thought.”  He looked at the Russian.  “Can I ask you somethin’?  Do
their screams ever keep you up at night?  I mean, when you think back on them,
when you’re remembering how they sounded, does it mess with your head or do you
still get off on it?”  Tidov didn’t answer.  Spencer smiled.  “You get off on
it, don’t you?  You sly dog.  C’mon, where do you keep the recordings?”

It didn’t take
any more convincing.  Tidov tilted his head to one side to pop his neck, then
led Spencer back into the playing room.  Beside the recording equipment were a
few mics, and connected to those mics was a soundboard.  “Cue one up,” Spencer
said.  “I wanna listen.”  He thought to himself,
Need to hurry up, Spence
ol’ boy
. 
The five-oh is gonna be here any minute, you know this
. 
But he had to hear.  He had to.