Snake Skin (3 page)

The pool was only four feet deep and the
algae-choked water barely came to Lucy's ankles. Lucy pushed off
the slimy bottom and rolled her weight on top of Norma who now was
writhing like she was possessed, drool streaming from her mouth as
she spoke in some weird, keening language that made Lucy's ears
wince.

"Cast out this devil, oh Lord!" Henry cried
out, holding his Bible aloft as he knelt at the edge of the pool,
eyes closed, body rocking, lurching, arching to and fro, his face
filled with rapture. The others followed suit, kneeling above Lucy
at the rim of the pool, rocking and rolling and praying.

Lucy tried to get her feet under her and
control of Norma. The floor was slimy, the water murky, and, worse,
there was definitely something moving in it. Fish?

Henry opened his Bible and intoned, "In my
name shall they cast out devils; they shall speak with new tongues;
they shall take up serpents…"

Lucy sat up. Not fish.

The sound buzzing through her bones, setting
her teeth on edge, wasn't solely the product of Norma's keening or
Henry's prayers or even the thudding of boots as her team ran down
the stairs.

Clumps of snakes huddled on a foot-high
ledge that ran around the bottom of the pool. A timber rattler as
thick as her wrist lazily raised his head and regarded her as if
she were lunch. The smaller diamondback beside him wasn't so
sanguine, his fangs showing as he shook his rattles.

A dark streak darted through the murky
water, followed by two more.

Norma's eyes flew open and she shouted,
"Amen!" just as the first of the snakes launched itself at
Lucy.

Chapter 3

Saturday, 7:51 am

Lucy scrambled to her feet and hauled Norma
aside just as the water moccasin charged. The snake was a black
blur, churning through the water, slamming itself into the
retaining wall, then ricocheting into the air. With blinding speed
it changed direction in mid-flight, using its powerful body to hurl
itself at them once more.

Norma plopped down into the water, her grey
dress billowing, algae clinging to the folds, laughing. She
splashed the water as if she wanted the snakes to attack her.
"Hallelujah!"

She grabbed Lucy's ankle, trying to pull
Lucy back down into the water. Lucy lunged to one side, a snake's
fangs whispering against her jeans. Missing.

Adrenalin jolted through Lucy, almost
drowning out the sound of armed men swarming into the room,
shouting, "FBI, hands, hands! Down, now!"

In her periphery she saw her team taking the
other five adults into custody. The women put up a fight, the men
continued intoning prayers, not resisting. Least of her worries.
The ledge the dryland snakes called home completely encircled the
bottom of the pool. Coiled, hissing, writhing mounds of
rattlesnakes and copperheads greeted her as soon as she made a move
in any direction.

Norma wasn't helping. The woman scrambled
for the snakes, Lucy had to haul her in with an arm around her
waist.

With her free hand, Lucy aimed her weapon at
one writhing mass after another, despite the futility of trying to
shoot the snakes. An instinct she couldn't suppress. Shit, shit,
shit. How the hell had this happened? She reined in her internal
monologue, fighting for control.

Another water moccasin churned its way
through the water, aiming at her, a deadly torpedo, but two more of
its own kind intercepted it, the water frothing as the enraged
snakes battled each other.

A copperhead that had tumbled into the
shallow water slithered across Lucy's boots. She forced herself to
hold still, not agitate it. Even as her flesh crawled and her
finger tightened on her trigger guard. Denying every primal
instinct carved into her DNA, she holstered her weapon.

"Throw me some cuffs," she called to her
team. A Statie pinned his suspect, Walter, to the wall with one
hand and threw her a pair of flex-cuffs with his other.

Lucy caught the cuffs and quickly restrained
Norma. The woman still struggled, not attacking Lucy, just writhing
and throwing her weight in one direction, then another, screaming
incoherent words punctuated by the occasional "Amen!"

"Everyone stay calm," she ordered. Tried to
take her own advice, despite the adrenalin skipping stones across
her nerve endings.

The other snake handlers continued their
praying, now droning Psalm 123. Lucy tuned them out. She really did
not want to think about the shadow of death.

"What about using a Taser?" Fletcher called
from the edge of the pool. The ICE surveillance tech wasn't a field
agent, but he was the only one volunteering any ideas on how to
handle the snakes. "Stun them long enough for us to pull you
out."

"Won't work, the water will dissipate the
energy."

Norma suddenly dropped her weight, almost
taking Lucy with her. Lucy hauled her to her feet once more.

"You can't fight God's will," Walter called
to Lucy as two Staties propelled him to the door. His words barely
carried over the feverish buzzing the rattlers were producing.

"You must have some way to tranquilize the
snakes." Lucy did not make any sudden movements—not with the space
between her and safety carpeted with snakes. She held Norma in a
bear hug, finally stilling the woman. That didn't stop a baby
rattler from arching up, its body twanging like a wire sparking,
fangs already dripping venom as it quivered, debating.

Lucy stared it down. Its hissing sang along
her nerves, until her own body hummed to the same tune.

"Go away. Scat," she told it in her best
mommy voice, placing herself between it and Norma.

"Snakes don't have ears," Fletcher told her,
not-so-helpfully.

Lucy didn't break her staring match with the
reptile. Finally it shook itself one last time and slid over its
companions to another part of the ledge.

"We prove ourselves to God by facing evil in
its natural form." Walter's voice boomed through the small space.
"We expect to be bitten—God will decide if we live or die. That's
how we lost Norma's daughter. Through God's will. And God's will
brought you and little Katie to us."

"Hate to tell you this, but little Katie is
a mannequin. And if you don't help us out of here, you'll be
charged with assault with a deadly weapon and attempted murder of a
federal agent."

Lucy was bluffing. She had no idea what
charges the assistant US attorney might file—if any. Federal
prosecutors were notorious for wimping out on cases that weren't
clear cut. Lord knew this one qualified. What a cluster fuck. Her
boss was going to laugh his ass off. He loved crazy batshit stories
of ops gone wrong. Right after he ripped her a new one for not
bringing home the bacon, his term for an air-tight case that even a
newbie AUSA couldn't fuck up.

Greally had no right to laugh. She'd only
been here in Pittsburgh leading the new squad for three months and
in that time she'd brought home enough bacon for him to hold a BBQ.
But Nick—how the hell was she going to explain this to him?

Her leg shook. Just nerves—and a need to
pee. Norma's weight, now slack in Lucy's arms, was getting
heavy.

"We'll be judged by God's laws, not man's,"
Walter continued triumphantly, smirking at her predicament.

Great. Big help that was. Lucy surveyed the
situation. Trying to clear her mind, focus. But her gaze skittered
from the pipes on the walls, to the mounds of reptiles surrounding
her, to the light reflected from the water.

Water. Could they open the valves on the
pipes, flood the snakes?

A water moccasin swam towards her, not as
aggressive as the first she'd encountered, but too close for
comfort. She discarded her idea—it would take too long and probably
just piss off the snakes.

Fire. Too bad the FBI didn't issue
flamethrowers as standard weapons.

No. Not fire. Ice.

"Hand me that fire extinguisher," she
ordered one of her agents, pointing to the industrial sized silver
container hanging in the corner behind the door.

He pulled it from its brackets. "Looks
pretty old, boss." He shook it. "Feels like there's something's
left in it, though."

"Have someone gather the ones from the
trucks in case we need more." He nodded and heaved the extinguisher
across the empty air separating their outstretched arms. Lucy
caught it awkwardly with one hand; it was heavier than it
looked.

The area around them appeared fairly safe,
most of the snakes fighting with each other. Norma was now quiet,
muttering to herself. Lucy would have to risk that the woman
wouldn't do something suicidal and agitate the snakes. She sat
Norma down, straddling her to confine her movements as much as
possible.

"Careful with that, Lucy," Fletcher called.
"You might just make them angry."

"Not as angry as I am." She shook the
extinguisher and peered at the faded instructions. Hefted it and
aimed the nozzle. Pulled the trigger.

Nothing.

"Damn." She shook it more vigorously, wiped
the nozzle against her jeans to clear any clogs. Aimed.

This time she was rewarded with a spurt of
liquid. The snakes recoiled, angrily. The ones who took a direct
hit convulsed and fell away from her, frost glittering their
scales.

The swoosh of the fire extinguisher mixed
with the hiss and rattle of furious snakes. She splashed through
the water, jostling the extinguisher from one side to the other,
her fingers clutching the nozzle burning with the cold. A cloud of
white powder and smoke filled the air before her.

Blinded snakes flung themselves at her, at
each other, at the wall. Some sank their fangs into their own
flesh, others launched themselves at Lucy. The water churned with
frenzied movement as Lucy fought to clear a path.

Fletcher waited at the edge of the pool,
watching anxiously. Two burly men joined him, one FBI and one State
trooper, reaching their arms to her.

The spray sputtered and died.

She threw the extinguisher onto the concrete
ledge. Turning back, she dragged Norma through the path, to the
ledge. The men hoisted her out of the water and onto dry land.

Then they reached for Lucy. Just as the
stunned snakes began to stir. Lucy grabbed onto the men's arms and
leapt.

A snake tried to follow, landing on her boot
with a heavy thud that rocked through her. She kicked it free and
rolled onto the pool's edge. Out of reach of the snakes.

She sagged there for a moment, just long
enough to cast her own quick prayer into the heavens. Hoping
He
really wasn't a big fan of snakes since she'd just
freeze-dried a couple dozen of them.

"You okay, Lucy?" Fletcher asked. "Did they
bite you?"

"Someone check Norma and get EMS." Lucy
checked herself for injuries. Just a bruised left shoulder where
she'd landed in the pool. No bites that she could find. Relief
washed over her. "Did someone call animal control?"

She flexed her fingers, numb from the CO2.
Probably got frostbite. Better than snake bite.

The bad joke was the product of fear and
adrenalin. She stalled for time, scraping her boot heels clean
along the ledge, regaining control.

"Hey, boss," one of the ICE agents called
from the rear room. "You're gonna want to see this."

Glad to have an excuse to move and work off
her residual adrenalin, Lucy rushed past the pool to the room. It
was decorated with everything a kid could want—bean bag chairs, a
wii console, toys, stuffed animals, footballs, a mini-basketball
hoop...more swag than a Toys R Us.

Huddled together on a twin sized racecar bed
were two identical blond boys. Maybe six years old. They were
scared and crying, terrified by the men with guns.

Lucy scattered her people with a jerk of her
chin. They backed away from the boys and watched from outside the
open door.

She smoothed a hand across her slime and
hair-spray shellacked hair, hoping she didn't look too scary, and
knelt before the boys, her eyes level with theirs.

"Hi guys. I'm Lucy. What's your name?"

One of them, the smaller by a hair,
swallowed hard then spoke up. "I'm Hank and this is Teddy. Can we
go home now?"

"Sure you can. That's why we're here." She
sat back on her heels, giving them space. "Do you know your last
name? Can you tell me where home is?"

"My dad is David Jankowsky and my mom is
Nancy and we live at 712 Pennsacola Drive, Monroeville,
Pennsylvania," he said, intoning the information in a singsong.

"Jankowsky, that's the pediatric dentist on
trial for fondling his patients," Fletcher told her from the
doorway. "His kids were kidnapped four months ago—taken from the
wife while she was grocery shopping."

Even though it was before her arrival in
Pittsburgh, Lucy knew the case—her second in command, Isaac Walden,
had been working with the Monroeville PD and Allegheny County
Sheriff on it. So far they'd had no leads, just frustration and a
media frenzy.

She smiled at the boys. "We're going to call
your mommy right away. I think she'll be very happy to see
you."

Hank nodded, sniffing hard, being a big boy
and not crying. Teddy did the same but his tears escaped.

"Walter said their church was actively
recruiting," Lucy told Fletcher as they walked out to the parking
lot, leaving the evidence recovery techs to their business. Child
services was on the way to pick up the twins who were being treated
by the state troopers to law enforcement's universal anecdote:
orange juice and Snicker bars.

"You sure you're okay?" Fletcher asked. The
ICE surveillance tech looked like he'd been the one almost killed,
his glasses were askew, shirt half untucked, face flushed and
sweaty. "Where the heck do you think they got all those snakes
from?"