Blood Walk Part 33

From his place by the door, Danzig nodded approval.TheGlobe reporter, an attractive brunette woman named Catherine Heier, raised an eyebrow. "You were the one who followed the kidnapper's car without headlights to keep him from spotting you behind him, and then tracked him to that farmyard on foot and faced his gun in the dark. That was very brave."

Garreth shrugged. "It's my job and no more than any other officer would have done in my place."

Each reporter took a turn. Had he realized at all who he was after? Would he have changed his tactics if he had? How had he felt with the kidnapper shooting at him? Predictable questions, he thought. Stupid ones. He did his best to answer politely.

Then theGlobe reporter said, "You seem to have as many lives as a cat when it comes to brushes with death."

Garreth tried not to stiffen. "You mean that incident with the killer archer a couple of years ago?"

"And the one in San Francisco where you were found in North Beach with your throat mutilated and erroneously thought dead."

How the h.e.l.l had she found out about that? He glanced at Danzig, who frowned a denial.

"No, your chief didn't tell me," Heier said. "I came into town before dawn and met one of your fellow officers. In the course of chatting, he made remarks about the circ.u.mstances of your departure from the San Francisco Police Department that piqued my curiosity."

Duncan! It had to be. Garreth held his face expressionless.

Behind the reporters, Danzig did not bother. He stiffened, mouth thinning to a grim line. Duncan would pay for talking to a reporter instead of referring her to the chief, Garreth saw, but that did nothing to help right now. d.a.m.n the man! Garreth said evenly, "Are there more questions about Frank Danner?"

But the reporter was not about to be distracted. "I called a friend of mine who knows someone on theExaminer out there, who in turn knows someone in the police department, and it turns out that your colleague misunderstood the facts. Which delights me, because the true story is much more interesting than the one I thought I'd get. I'd like to talk about that with you, Officer Mikaelian."

"Idon't wish to talk about it," Garreth replied. "It's totally irrelevant to Danner's capture. Now if you'll excuse me, I need to go home and sleep before I come on duty tonight."

Heier tried to follow him. "We have a great human interest story here."

Which would make life in Baumen very awkward if she turned up the difference between his actual recorded parentage and the one he claimed locally. He produced a weary sigh for her benefit. "I don't think much of it, Ms. Heier. I lived it. It was painful; it was traumatic; and I prefer to forget about it."

14

He should have known that that was too much to ask. It was obvious the moment he walked into the office before his shift.

Sue Ann grinned at him over the communications desk. "h.e.l.lo, celebrity."

And Danzig still sat in his office. "Did you see the news?"

Garreth stopped in the open door. "No. How bad was it?"

Danzig smiled. "Not bad at all . . . a minute of KAYS footage on the national news, mostly Sheriff Pfeifer and Chief Oldenburg, but they did mention you as the officer who disarmed Frank Danner, and showed you for a couple of seconds, saying how you'd only done what any other officer would have done. Locally,"-his smile broadened to a grin-"you rated about the same amount of time, but Ms. Heier managed to get herself on with a guest editorial about how people forget what a dangerous job law enforcement can be and how dedicated we cops are to stick with it. You, needless to say, were her prime example."

Garreth groaned.

Danzig shook his head. "I don't understand you. Most people would love a moment of fame."

"I'm not most people."

The saving grace was that tomorrow everyone would forget it. In the meantime there was tonight to survive. Bill Pfannenstiel, the aging officer who worked relief and replaced Nat Toews tonight, teased him every time they pa.s.sed, and everyone else he met wanted details about the incident in North Beach. Why had he ever thought he could hide in a small town? Lane knew what she was doing sticking to cities. In San Francisco only colleagues and a few close friends would have known or cared about his part in the arrest.

Here even Julian Fowler stopped him in front of the hotel. "I saw you on the news. That's fascinating. It'd make a great novel,The Lazarus Incident or some such t.i.tle. May I talk to you about it sometime?"

"I'll think about it," Garreth replied.

Maggie tracked him down, too, at the Shortstop buying a cup of tea. "Hey, TV star. You looked great." She followed him back out to the car and when he climbed in, leaned down to the window. "Very professional."

Her blood scent coiled tantalizingly around him. The smell of it brought back the memory of the girl in the accident. He fought hunger. "Thanks. I wish they'd picked on someone else, though."Her stare showed the same disbelief Danzig expressed. After a moment she said slowly, "What is behind that wall you're so afraid of someone seeing, I wonder."

"I'll talk to you later," he said, and backed out of the parking s.p.a.ce.

In the rearview mirror he saw her staring after him. Was it imagination that she seemed to be standing at the far end of a bridge going up in flames?

15

A note waited on Garreth's door when he reached home after the shift: Helen Schoning's bold, square handwriting in dark green ink on pale green paper.

Garreth, Your old partner in San Francisco called after you left for work. No wonder you were such good friends. He's a delightful man; great fun to flirt with. He wants you to call him back as soon as possible.

Helen

Garreth pulled down the note and smiled at it as he unlocked the door and went inside. He had opted to keep his phone an extension of the Schoning's instead of putting in a private line, and times like this he never regretted the choice. Having missed Garreth, Harry Takananda had probably found it much more pleasant talking to Helen than he would have leaving his message on a machine.

Only one small chill marred the pleasure of talking to Harry, wondering what he wanted. Call him back as soon as possible did not sound like a social call.

Garreth glanced at the clock. It was too early yet; they would still be asleep.

He changed out of his uniform, showered, and drank a gla.s.s of blood, then settled into the easy chair with a book and read until he knew Harry would be getting ready for work. He punched Harry's number.

Lien Takananda answered. The sound of her voice spread warmth through Garreth and brought a quick image of her . . .

wrapped in her comfortable old terry robe, her black helmet of hair streaked with gray but her face still smooth as a girl's. Her voice also brought back the hours she had spent patiently talking at the wall of misery enclosing him after Marti died, battering through it, forcing food into him . . . dragging him back into life.

"Lien, this is Garreth."

"Garreth?" Her voice warmed even more. "h.e.l.lo! Oh it's good to hear your voice. How are you?"

Guilt stabbed him for not having called more often.

Harry's voice came on another extension. "Is this really Garreth Doyle Mikaelian? So you still remember our number after all. I wondered if maybe you'd forgotten since you never call and now you're a nationally famous cop."

Garreth pictured Harry, too, black eyes glinting with mischief, belt straining to hold in a waistline spread by Lien's excellent cooking and the copious amounts of sugar Harry always added to his coffee. Garreth winced. "You saw that story out there, too?"

"Oh, yes, Mik-san, though I have to admit you were a bit hard to recognize with that funny stuff on your upper lip. When did you grow that?"

"I think you're thinner than you were in the last picture you sent us," Lien said. "Are you taking care of yourself?"

"Lien, you sound like a mother; quit fussing at him," Harry said.

"I'm not fussing. I just want to be sure he's all right. You looked so uncomfortable, Garreth."

"What he looked like, honorable wife, was the stereotype of the hard-a.s.sed cop. Garreth, couldn't you have taken off the dark gla.s.ses? You've sure become addicted to those things."

"Terrific," Garreth said in pretended disgust. "Is this what you wanted me to call you for, insults?"

"Call. Oh. No. I called because after the item about you and the Danner brothers, I thought you might be interested in another fugitive who's surfaced: Lane Barber."

Shock jolted Garreth. Lane! "Surfaced? What do you mean?" That was impossible. Neck broken, burned, buried under roses.

Impossible! He sat bolt upright, fingers digging into the phone receiver. "Has-has someone seen her?"

"Not her personally," Harry said, "but last week we found the apartment she moved into after lamming out of the one on Telegraph Hill. There's been a man in and out and it's only a matter of time until she shows up, too."

Guilt p.r.i.c.ked him again, but this time because he could not tell Harry they were wasting time and manpower. "That's great," he lied.

"Yeah. I wish you were here. You deserve to be in on the kill . . . so to speak."

Garreth started again, prodded by an idea. Time away from here might be just what he needed . . . to avoid the bloodmobile and Fowler and that reporter, to think about his relationship with Maggie. "Maybe something can be arranged. I'll get back to you this evening."

Not until he had already hung up did it occur to him to wonder: if Lane's ghost haunted him here where she had lost to him, what might it do where she had been strong and triumphant?

1

In the morning light San Francisco rose bright and inviting above the waters of the bay. A feel of homecoming enveloped Garreth as he drove across the Oakland bridge, countering day's lethargy and the headache from sunlight sneaking around the edges of his trooper gla.s.ses. At the same time, however, he felt as though he drove into cold and shadow. Lane's laughter echoed in his head and foreboding lay like lead in his gut. Was he wrong to be coming back?

He had refused to think about it until yesterday, and the question was easily shoved aside in the rush of preparing to leave Baumen, in the strain of trading shifts with Maggie and working a day shift on Sat.u.r.day in order to leave that evening. Certainly he had no time to doubt while driving cross country, not with watching the rearview mirrors and road ahead for cars with light bar silhouettes. The vast open stretches of I-70 and I-80 had been too tempting to resist and he turned the ZX loose, slowing down only for the mountains and when instinct suggested troopers might be around.

Which had brought him rolling into Davis and up to his parents' house early Sunday evening, and to his surprise, into the middle of an unexpected family reunion.

"Hey, we couldn't waste this chance to celebrate the current family hero," his brother Shane said, and dragged him from the car into the crushing hug that always made Garreth pity anyone meeting Shane on the line of scrimmage.

Not only had Shane come from Los Angeles with his wife and daughters to join their parents and Grandma Doyle-Shane looking content and healthy, obviously satisfied with giving up playing end for the Rams for a position on their coaching staff-but his ex-wife Judith was there, too, with his son Brian and her husband. The scents of blood, and sweat from the inevitable Sunday family scrimmage, washed around him, making Garreth glad he had taken a long drink from his thermos before reaching the house.

Phil Mikaelian wrapped a beefy arm around his shoulders. "That was a d.a.m.n fine piece of police work catching Frank Danner, son. I'm proud of you."

No praise meant more than those few words from this cop Garreth had grown up worshipping. He grinned happily. "Thank you, sir."

"But it doesn't look like you're taking time to eat," his mother said. "Or can't your Maggie cook?"

"Mom, I eat enough."

"His sport is running, remember, not football," Grandma Doyle said.

"Not football?" Shane's wife Susan pretended shock. "Esther, are you sure you brought the right baby home from the hospital?"

Judith and Dennis greeted him less boisterously, Judith with a light kiss, her husband shaking hands. Brian, so tall and husky now that he looked twelve instead of ten years old, held out a hand, too. "h.e.l.lo, sir. Congratulations."

Such formality from his own son stung, even as Garreth recognized that he could hardly expect more when he saw so little of the boy. Judith had been right to have Dennis adopt Brian.

Still it felt like-it felt like someone had tossed a match on his bridge. Suddenly all pleasure drained from the evening. Even at home surrounded by laughter and chatter, he stood alone.

By the end of dinner the swirl of blood scents and the strain of playing with his food to hide the fact he ate none of it left him feeling suffocated. He fled to the dark and peace of the back yard. Sitting down in one of the lawn chairs, he breathed deeply. Out here the air smelled wonderfully of nothing but flowers, gra.s.s, and earth.

Presently the back door clicked and footsteps moved across the porch. The scent of lavender drifted to him on the night air.

He looked around. "h.e.l.lo, Grandma."

She crossed the lawn to sit in the chair next to his. "It's a lovely night."

That was all she said for a long while. They sat in silence, not the strained one there would have been with his father or Shane, who both treated silence as a void to be filled, but a sharing of solitude, each wrapped in separate thoughts and reluctant to intrude on the other. If he had to be alone, Garreth reflected, Grandma Doyle was a comfortable person to be alone with. If she felt any horror at what he had become, she was careful never to show it, yet she did not appear to be afraid of mentioning it either.

She broke the silence by mentioning it. "You handled dinner very well. I hardly noticed meself that you weren't eating anything."

He smiled wryly. "Thanks. I'm glad I don't have to keep it up for more than a couple of meals in a row, though."

"You're going on to San Francisco in the morning then?"

"Yes."

She reached out to lay a hand on his arm. "Don't."

Cold slid down his spine. "Do you have a Feeling about it, Grandma?" Grandma Doyle's Feelings had been a source of amus.e.m.e.nt for friends and neighbors over the years, but no one with any experience with them ever laughed, not even tough cop Phil Mikaelian. "What kind of Feeling?"

"There's danger waiting there, and maybe death."

He smiled wryly. "I thought you said I'm already dead."

Age had not slowed her hands. She thumped him on the head with her knuckle just as fast and hard as she had when he was a boy. "I won't be taking backtalk from you even if you are grown anddearg-due. Perhaps you're dead, or it's as you say and just a different kind of living, but there is a true, final death for even your sort, and it's waiting in San Francisco."

"From what? Can you see?" He rubbed the sore spot on his head.