Serpent's Kiss (24 page)

    Dobyns stood in the door of the elevator car.

    What the hell was he doing? What the hell did he want?

    Andy killed his flashlight.

    Stood there breathing so heavy and so ragged he was getting scared. The old man just pitching over one night on the back porch, dead. With a family medical history like that, it sure could happen to Andy easy enough.

    Andy had to be careful.

    His heart was just as much a threat to him as Dobyns.

    Andy put his head down, seeing the vague outline of Jeff s body on the floor. Andy wanted to be respectful, not brush against the corpse. He took small, precise steps, moving around the body, then starting to walk away from it, toward the elevator door.

    By now his gun hand was twitching badly and the Magnum was as heavy as a bag of cement.

    He raised his head again to glance ahead to the elevator car.

    Still there. Still open. A glowing yellow hole.

    But there was one thing wrong. Badly wrong.

    Dobyns was no longer in the elevator car.

    He had come out here to the garage.

    Given what he'd already done to Petry and Jeff, could there be any doubt what fate he had in mind for Andy?

    It was then that the pain, like a piece of jagged summer lightning, crossed Andy's chest right to left and forced him to slump against the wall.

    My God, he was having a heart attack.

    And a sociopathic butcher named Dobyns was somewhere nearby with a knife.

    And getting closer.

    In the damp darkness of the garage.

    Andy could hear Dobyns breathing every once in a while; hear his foot scraping, scraping against the concrete floor.

    Getting closer.

    Andy rubbed the area just above his sternum, where the pain had last been. The tightness in his chest was beginning to disperse, and the dizziness was gradually leaving his head.

    Andy narrowed his eyes, scanning the gloom surrounding him. He felt as if he were a tiny life raft adrift on a chill, fogbound ocean with no possible hope of rescue.

    He wanted to run to the elevator, but he was afraid that the exertion would cause a heart attack.

    Or he could run out of the garage through the doors at the other end.

    But somewhere behind him lurked Dobyns. Waiting.

    The scraping sound again.

    Dobyns moving.

    Andy started to crouch next to the car and that was when he saw the keys in the ignition of the Dodge. Or thought he saw them.

    Andy was filled-with the happiness of a biblical prophet discovering the light and the way and the truth-with a wonderful idea.

    What if he got in the car real fast-like, locked the door, turned on the ignition, and then drove out of there?

    Dobyns couldn't do a damn thing about it.

    Except get out of the way.

    Andy would be safe. And he could go to a nearby hospital and have them put him on an EEG and see if there'd been any heart damage or not.

    Of course the tricky part would be getting inside the car.

    In this kind of darkness, the dome light would go on like a bank of night lights at Wrigley Field.

    Then he realised he was being ridiculous. He had a Magnum; Dobyns had only a knife. And Dobyns, however murderous he might be, was no superhuman monster. He would pay proper respect to a Magnum.

    Still crouching, Andy put his hand on the door handle, then paused, listening for Dobyns.

    Outside the hospital's fences, he could hear traffic. Thrum of tyre on pavement; honk of irritated driver.

    He eased open the car door.

    Wishing he weighed fifty pounds less, he heaved himself up into the seat.

    The first thing he did was close the door. The second thing he did was lock the door. The third thing he did was start the engine. Or tried to.

    Nothing happened. Not a single fucking thing. Oh, a little clicking noise, if you wanted to get technical. The tiny clicking noise made by the key as it tripped the lock. But other than that-nothing.

    Then he vaguely remembered Schmitty, the man who took care of all the hospital vehicles, telling him that some new cars needed batteries and that he was going to take out all the old batteries and trade them in for new ones.

    That's why Andy heard nothing except the clicking when he twisted the key.

    My God. No battery.

    
Sonofabitch.

    He felt this great urge to cry. To put his head against the steering wheel and just start sobbing. Like a helpless little boy.

    But then he realised that he was safe.

    He could sit here all night and Dobyns couldn't touch him. The car doors were locked. He had his Magnum. Dobyns couldn't possibly harm him. No way.

    Then he saw the headlights come on to his right, the great glowing eyes of an unimaginable monster.

    The headlights belonged to the large truck the hospital used to scrape off the drives in winter and carry heavy loads the rest of the year.

    Now, the driver of the truck stepped on the gas while the gearshift was in neutral. The truck roared like a beast that wanted to be fed.

    The truck roared one more time, and then leapt forward.

    Andy, mesmerised, was blinded by the headlights as they shot closer, closer. The driver had thoughtfully set them on high beam so they'd be sure to be dazzling.

    The driver? Dobyns, of course.

    The first assault caught Andy's car right in the passenger door. There was a great, echoing crash of shattering glass and twisting metal and Andy's screams.

    Andy was knocked clear across the front seat, his head slammed into the window on the passenger's side.

    The pain came instantly back to his chest. This time it started running up and down his right arm, too. He wanted to move, scramble out of the car, but he felt confusion and panic and could not concentrate enough to-

    The second assault caught the front fender on the driver's side and was delivered with such shattering force that Andy's car was spun halfway around and ended up facing the opposite direction.

    Smashed glass tinkled to the concrete, echoing, and Andy's screams were now sobs and pleas for help.

    The truck pulled back, tyres squealing, gears grinding, for one last assault.

    Andy saw this coming. He put both his hands squarely against the dashboard…

    
Holy Mary, Mother of God, pray for us sinners now and at the hour of our-

    The truck backed all the way to the garage door. It was going to come at Andy from behind.

    And then Andy looked down at the Magnum on the seat next to him.

    
Of course, My Lord.

    He'd been so frightened, so disoriented, so worried about heart attack that he'd completely forgotten his own best defence.

    Quickly he unlatched the seat belt, turned around so that he was facing the rear of the car, and set the Magnum on top of the seat.

    He aimed directly at the windshield of the truck.
You sonofabitch Dobyns. You psycho sonofabitch.
Andy was ready.

    And Dobyns was more than happy to oblige.

    This time the truck's tyres created so much smoke, the rear end of the truck appeared to be on fire as it came piling toward Andy.

    Andy opened fire.

    It was like target practice on the range.

    Even above the screaming tyres, you could hear the Magnum explode, each time Andy's hand and arm jerked back with the recoil.

    Indeed it was like target practice.

    The closer the truck got, its huge yellow eyes searching mercilessly inside Andy's car, the oftener Andy pulled the trigger.

    By the time of the great crash, by the time the truck pushed Andy all the way to the back of the garage and smashed him into the rear wall… by that time, Andy was out of ammunition.

    Nothing would have helped Andy in this situation. Not even a seat belt.

    When the car met the wall, Andy was thrown upward into the skyliner. To him, it felt as if the impact broke his head apart in three ragged pieces. Then the impact hurled him forward against the dashboard, the edge of which came against the centre of his spinal column with the force of'a well-delivered karate blow. Even as he continued to tumble through the air, Andy could feel his legs go dead and he thought of a terrible word: 'paralysed.'

    Then he drifted into blessed unconsciousness.

    What he saw next gave him a curious peace. From somewhere high overhead-some unimaginable distance, really-he looked down on the scene in the garage. The smashed up car. The roaring truck. Dobyns racing from the truck now, bloody knife in hand.

    And then Andy saw himself. He looked terrible. Covered with his own blood, and at least as smashed and broken as the car he was in.

    Then Dobyns was in the car, checking out the body named Andy to see if it was still alive. When Dobyns found a pulse, he took his knife and slashed both of Andy's wrists so that blood flowed freely.

    Then Dobyns took his knife and cut Andy's throat. He was very good at it by now, Dobyns was quite efficient. Just one downward cutting slash dragged across the Adam's apple, and the job was done.

    Andy watched all this with a growing feeling of peace and security. He was glad that the body named Andy was unconscious because otherwise he'd be panic stricken beyond imagining. Gagging, trying to stop his throat from bleeding- No, the body named Andy had no understanding of the peace that awaited it. But the Andy that watched it all knew it well.

    When Dobyns had cut Andy's throat, the fat man had sprayed blood all over himself and Dobyns.

    Now, withdrawing from the car, Dobyns wiped blood from his eyes and mouth.

    He ran back to the elevator again. It would take him to the floor nearest the tower.

    

    

    "DID YOU NOTICE anything about his stomach, Marie?"

    "His stomach?"

    "Yes. Anything strange?"

    "No, I'm sorry. I guess not." Marie hesitated. "But there was a weird smell."

    "Oh?" Emily Lindstrom said. "Can you describe it?"

    Marie shrugged. "Well, I guess I don't know what to say except that it was-it smelled like rotten meat or something."

    Chris Holland and Emily Lindstrom had been in the Fane apartment for fifteen minutes now. While Marie had looked and sounded remarkably good, Chris now saw that the girl was still in the throes of shock. Soon, she would come in direct contact with her feelings about the slaying tonight and then-

    Right now, the girl was instinctively using this interview as a way of avoiding her feelings. Chris had seen this following many traffic accidents, how badly injured people suddenly developed this great need to talk-this was just another manifestation of their shock-before they came crashing down.

    "Please think back to his stomach," Emily was saying.

    
Too intense
, Chris thought.
I've got to get her to ease off the girl or Marie will break for sure.

    Kathleen Fane was starting to watch Emily, too. The beautiful blond woman sounded as if she too were on the verge of snapping.

    Chris said, "Did he say anything to you while this was all happening?"

    Marie's cheeks flushed. "Dirty words."

    "I'm sorry."

    "The same dirty words over and over again."

    "And then he just grabbed Richie?"

    "Yes. And-"

    And Chris (so worried about Emily's insensitivity) saw that she'd asked exactly the wrong question at exactly the wrong time.

    The question forced the girl to confront the images of her friend's murder again.

    With no warning whatsoever, she began crying very softly, and then sobbing so hard that her entire body shook

    Her mother was up from her chair in moments, and then sitting next to the girl and holding her with great tenderness.

    "Please," Kathleen Fane said, "I think it's time you both leave."

    While there was no malice in the woman's tone, there was certainly steel. This was not a request; it was an absolute command.

    "I'm sorry if I made you mad back there."

    "You got pretty intense."

    "I just had to know about his stomach."

    "I got the message."

    "I'm sorry."

    "I was just concerned about Marie."

    Emily Lindstrom's voice softened. "The poor girl. She'll probably never really get over it."

    

    

    Chris was headed back to the station. The harsh wind was blowing litter across the lighted drive of a service station. At a 7-Eleven people were getting knocked around by the same wind as they tried to run to their cars. For a moment Chris felt snug and warm inside her car, even if it was rocking slightly with every other gust.

    And that was when, over the rock station that Chris was playing low in the background, they first heard about the killings at Hastings House.

    "Two, perhaps as many as three employees of the mental facility have been killed tonight. This is all the information we have right now. But please stay tuned. We'll be updating this story every few minutes."

    "To repeat-"

    Emily snapped off the radio. "He went back to the hospital."

    "But why? I thought he was trying to escape."

    "There's only one reason I can think of."

    "What's that?"