Shade of Pale (23 page)

“Stay down! Don't fuck with me!”

He was almost to the door and George couldn't do a thing. He wished he had called for backup, but there'd been no time. The movie was almost over; it was getting late. They could have lost him forever.

Red felt the utter helplessness of the kid in his arms and the frailty of her twiglike arm. He wanted to snap it off like a drumstick and howl at the ceiling. The kid was nothing in his hands, just a sobbing hunk of useless crap. In his mind, she deserved to die, but she was his ticket to ride.

George could see the kid clearly now; Red had her by the arm and was using her tiny body as a shield. He backed into the door, and liberation. With his free hand he pushed the lock bar down and put his shoulder into it. Keeping his eye on George, he pushed it out forcefully, nearly ripping it off its hinges. Light exploded into the dark theater, blinding them both momentarily.

It looked like the doorway to Heaven. George had a perfect shot at him, his body clearly defined in the light, but the kid was too close. He couldn't risk it.

Red released the kid, took two steps, and ran directly into Panelli, who was crouched just outside. Panelli was knocked back by the force of the collision, completely surprised. His gun came up too late; Red fired down on the cop at point-blank range. Panelli's body jumped.

George ran to the exit, heard the shot, and paused. On the screen music was playing and the credits were rolling. On the other side of the door his partner was dying.

Red took off down the alley like an Olympic runner.

George cautiously opened the door and peered out. He saw Panelli on his back and cursed.

Sirens were approaching.

George looked up and saw a patrol car come down the alley. He pulled his badge out and shouted, “Officer down! Call an ambulance.”

He ran after Red.

Police swarmed the area. They found a red wig in an alley nearby and used dogs to track the killer through the dense urban jungle. A few blocks away, the trail ended abruptly.

When Panelli died on the way to the hospital, Red became a cop killer and the entire force mobilized against him.

George followed the trail, intent on nailing Red's ass to the wall of justice.

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

Jukes and Fiona held each other like lovers who'd been separated for years, instead of two people who barely knew each other. Jukes knew that the short time of intimacy had changed everything about them. They were inseparable now, as one.

Neither of them had spoken so much as a word since awaking from their parallel dreams. They stared at the ceiling deep in thought.

Finally, Jukes broke the silence. “It's early, only eleven o'clock. We must have gotten back from dinner around seven. That means we've only been asleep for an hour.”

“You mean we both fell out and had the same dream right off the bat? That's unbelievable. This whole evening has been unbelievable. God, I don't know what to think.”

“I don't know about you, but I think I've been working too hard. The stress must've caught up with me. I'm mentally exhausted. There's no way I can go back to the office for a while.”

“I know. I can't concentrate on anything … except you and me … together … and the dream.”

Jukes stretched and sighed. “Yeah, the dream. I can't get it out of my mind. I've been thinking about what she said. I might have an idea.”

“An idea where she said Cathy was going to be?”

“The place of my first failure. I think I know where that is.”

Jukes told Fiona the story of the boy at the lake and how that incident had colored his life. He traced his frustration with Cathy and his own social inadequacies to that moment, the moment the bully challenged him and he backed down.

“God, if I ever had one moment in my life to live over again, that would be it,” Jukes said.

Fiona propped herself up on one elbow. “Let's go there.”

“Now?”

“Yes, exactly. Now. How far is it?”

“Only about an hour-and-a-half drive upstate.”

“We can be there by twelve-thirty. You just told me how much you need a rest, how stressed out you are, so why not do something impulsive and go there? We can make it a three-day weekend. I'll call your answering service and tell them you'll be unavailable till Monday.”

Jukes nodded. “I could get back to the roots of my anxiety. It should be therapeutic.”

“Don't forget what the Banshee said. If you're right, it's where Cathy will be.”

“The more I think about it, the better it sounds. We can have some downtime together.”

Fiona sat up in bed, her naked body pale in the darkness of the room “All I ask is that we stop at my place so I can throw a few things in a bag.”

Before leaving, Jukes called George Jones. The line clicked and he got George's voice mail.

“Detective Jones, this is Dr. Jukes Wahler. I'm driving to my family's cabin upstate at Lake Pierce. I have a hunch that Cathy may show up there, and I want to be there if she does. I'll leave directions with my answering service if you need to get in touch with me. There's no phone up there, so I won't be reachable until Monday.”

Jukes hung up and felt strange, as if he'd just put another ball in play in the pinball game of life.

The words of the Irishman came back to him: “
They will appear to be a series of unlikely coincidences.
”

Tom Rayburn was cooking some of the catfish he'd caught that morning when the phone rang, which surprised the hell out of him. He hardly ever got phone calls, especially in the off-season.

Tom wasn't the most popular guy in the world. In fact, he was downright cantankerous. The people in town stayed away from him in droves. They didn't like him and he didn't like them.

He spent the winter baby-sitting the cabins on Lake Pierce. He spent the summer fixing people's boats and running the only bait shop on the lake. Summer was a time to try to enjoy what few pleasures life still held for his seventy-six-year-old body. Winter was a time to do some serious drinking.

The fall was a transition period. He checked the cabins, pulled the boats out of the water, and went to the liquor store to stock up. With nobody around, he didn't have to keep up the charade of sobriety. If he wanted to get falling down drunk and piss in his pants, he did it. And fuck the world.

Tom Rayburn knew how to cook catfish, though. The smell of it filled his cabin and stuck to his skin like a lightly breaded, aromatic sweat.

Heaven's Glen, the next closest town, had a population of around two hundred people, most of whom were pissed off at him.

The phone jangled his nerves.

“Hello?”

“Hello? Mr. Rayburn?”

“Yeah, Tom Rayburn here. What can I do you for?”

“Mr. Rayburn, this is Jukes Wahler.”

“Harumph.…” There was a pause and Jukes could hear something sizzling. A moment later, “Little Jukey Wahler, the kid with the braces?”

“Yes, except I'm grown-up now. I'm a doctor, as a matter of fact.”

“A doctor? Well, bless my soul and kiss my hairy balls! A doctor! Well, don't that beat all! Say, I've got this pain in my leg that keeps gettin' worse; maybe you could look at it sometime,” the old man said.

“Actually, I'm a psychiatrist.”

Tom worked the spatula expertly, flipping the fish and a glob of greasy burnt cornmeal. “What is that, a headshrinker? Well, I'll be damned! I guess I spoke out of turn, Doc. I may be old, but I ain't crazy. What's the occasion?”

“Well, Mr. Rayburn, I'm coming up to the lake tonight. Could you get the cabin ready?”

Goddamn city slicker. Don't he know anything? The weather's changing; everyone is gone now
.

“Well, ahh, I don't think you understand; the season's over. There's nobody here. The place is all shut down, for Christ sake!”

Tom removed the fish from the pan and turned off the burner. He was about to hang up when Jukes Wahler spoke again.

“I'm driving up anyway, Mr. Rayburn. I'll be there in about two hours. Do you know which cabin I mean?”

Rayburn squinted at the phone. His mood was not good. He had been looking forward to a quiet evening of catfish and bourbon. He coughed directly into the receiver. Rayburn imagined a big hunk of spittle flying out and hitting Jukes on the side of the head.
Serves him right
, he thought.

“Of course I know which cabin you mean! What do you think I am, an idiot? Your sister damn near tore the place down last summer! Say, you're not plannin' any kind of wild sex orgy, are ya?”

Jukes laughed. “No. No orgy. I just have a little family business I have to tend to.”

“What the hell for?”

“It's personal.”

“Yeah, I'll bet it's personal. What are you, some kind of a drug dealer?”

“No, Mr. Rayburn, I told you; I'm a doctor. Can you do me a favor and get the place up and running for me? Your fee is twenty-five dollars, right?”

“It's a hundred now,” the old man grumbled. “That includes turning on the 'lectric, gas, firin' up the heater, checkin' it out for critters, gettin' the water pump runnin'. You sure you want all that?”

“Yes,” Jukes replied firmly. “By the way, have you seen anybody up there in the last twenty-four hours?”

“Haven't seen a soul.”

“Good. Well, keep an eye out; there may be somebody else. If you see them, let me know.”

Aha! So that's it. Must be some kind of secret rendezvous. Maybe Jukey Wahler is one of them homosexuals now
, Tom thought.

“No problem. I'll just give you a holler on my cellular phone.”

“What?”

Tom realized his sarcasm was lost. “You don't get it, do ya? It's late, and I'm not goin' up there tonight. I'll get over there when I get the chance, probably tomorrow. That's the best I can do. My truck's been actin' up lately; I don't even know if it'll start.”

“Mr. Rayburn, it's really important that you do it tonight. I'll pay you 200 bucks.”

“Two hundred? Christ, you're the one that needs a psychiatrist.” Tom looked at the catfish and pondered the offer.

The fish'll keep; the booze ain't goin' anywhere. That's good money. Too good to turn down
.

“OK, I'll do it, but I still think you're crazy.”

“Thanks. I appreciate it. I'll be up in a couple of hours.”

Tom Rayburn slammed the phone down and cursed. “Goddamn city slicker. Crazy as a shit-house rat.”

Jukes rented a car and drove north toward Lake Pierce. The weather was cold and clear. His fatigue faded from him like a streak of bad luck. With Fiona at his side, he was full of the strongest resolve he'd felt in years.

He was going back.

It was nearly one o'clock in the morning when they arrived at the lake. Shafts of silver light sliced through the tall pines, bisecting the road with the moon's waxing radiance. He'd taken a few wrong turns, which was to be expected after so many years, but for the most part he knew where he was going. The area had changed very little since he was a young man, and except for a few housing developments and convenience stores, it was still a quiet rural drive.

Tom Rayburn was right: the place was deserted. They drove past the tiny supply store and one-pump gas station and took the lake road into the resort. Built in the 1950s around what was then a thriving fishing spot, the rustic cabins were clustered on the periphery of the small lake like prehistoric wooden beasts gathered around a watering hole. Modest, even funky by today's standards, the Lake Pierce Vacation Paradise and Travelers Club Approved Campgrounds held the charm of another era. Boating was now the major attraction here, and the lazy canoe pace of his youth had been replaced by the much faster and noisier pace of the water-ski rigs that now dominated the summer scene.

The serious fishermen had gone elsewhere, but the old-style family-oriented recreational atmosphere still existed. The modern world had taken its toll here, as everywhere, but Lake Pierce fought back valiantly. Jukes liked it; it was a solid and soulful reminder of simpler times.

Jukes hadn't seen another car for miles.

Fiona had fallen silent as soon as they left the main highway. She stared out the window, deep in thought.

The road went from two-lane blacktop to one-lane blacktop to dirt to ruts. The closer he got to his destination, the faster his heart beat. He felt as if he had a rendezvous with destiny up ahead, in the moonlight, among the pines. He rounded the lake where the ghosts of his youth still dwelled.

There was his father, waving from a rowboat, his fishing tackle in his hand, wearing a plaid flannel shirt rolled at the sleeves. A hat with a collection of fishing lures jabbed into it sat jauntily off the side of his head.

Jukes watched with his mind's eye as the old man rowed slowly out into the center of the lake and disappeared.

Jukes rounded the next bend and came face to face with the bittersweet memory of his mother. There was a picnic basket at her side, and she sat on a red-and-white checkered tablecloth in a moonlit meadow. He could hear the singing of cicadas in the tall grass of his memory. His mother looked as fragile and delicate as china, a reflection of beautiful desperation.

The rising moon shone full on her face Its icy fluorescent colors gave incredible depth to the scene, making her stand out like she was in his old stereoscopic View-Master, the one he had spent hours playing with as a child. Jukes wondered what she had in the basket, some of his childhood favorites no doubt: fried chicken, peanut butter and jelly sandwiches, homemade pickles, a slice of blueberry pie, maybe some potato chips.

The images of his early years tugged at Jukes's heart like a hooked rainbow trout on his old Zebco fishing rod.

He knew he would see his sister next, paddling a canoe past the boathouse with all the skill and cunning of Hiawatha. God, it hurt to think of her with Bobby.