Eyes Wide Open Part 30

I'd let things go way beyond where they should've.

I glanced at my watch-it was going on seven P.M. I thought about calling home but didn't want to worry anyone. I figured I'd shower and change and head over to Charlie's. Check out the protection Sherwood had arranged for them.

A nervousness ground in my stomach, and it took maybe thirty seconds until it hit me just what it was.

What Dev had said as he walked away. See you around, doc.

My head suddenly throbbed. I wasn't sure, but I couldn't recall ever telling him I was a doctor.

I sat there, going back over my three interactions with him. The first time we met, in my first few days of being there, he had come up to me, asking for a handout. For Veterans Day. Every day is Veterans Day when you're looking for something to eat! You're in my office, brother.

"Brother," "doc" . . . Maybe they were both just similar expressions of familiarity.

The next time he'd been cozier, asked what I was reading. End of Days, huh? Now there's a book I can surely relate to. My life's resembled the End of Days for years!

Or had I asked him how things were going? I couldn't recall.

But if he had wanted to find me, I wasn't hard to spot.

If he'd been somehow interested in Charlie.

I was taking my brother around, getting involved with the police. I'd even accompanied Sherwood when we went to see Susan Pollack.

And then to Pelican Bay!

Suddenly my heart started racing. I ramped back to all the things Dev had said to me. One in particular hit home: Days ago, when I gave him the thirty bucks and joked about his getting out of town, he'd come back that he had been recently.

Out of town.

This time my heart jumped like a needle indicating a seismic tremor.

Michigan. That was where he said he'd been. Seeing an old friend.

In Michigan.

Where Sherry Ann Frazier had been killed.

Suddenly that tremor rocketed around inside me like an 8.0!

I put my hands to the sides of my head, desperately trying to recall the voice I had heard on the phone in my hotel room, the man who had threatened me. The one who had left the lit cigarette outside my door. My heart was pounding now. Yes, it could be. I'd never even thought in that direction. Why would I have? But there was a similar sort of accent. It was possible.

Oh my G.o.d. It was all right there in front of me.

I was leaning forward, elbows on my knees, my head throbbing, and I realized I was looking directly at the walk path.

At the b.u.t.t Dev had just put out.

I scanned down the pathway, searching for him, but there were only a few stray pedestrians in sight, not him.

I bent down and picked it up between my fingers.

My stomach started to climb its way up my throat.

Salem. Salem was the same brand as the one left outside my door!

I started to feel the sweats come over me, recalling those horrible images of Sherry Ann Frazier in Michigan. The police pictures of Walter Zorn strangled. The eye carved gruesomely into his tongue.

Could Dev be the one who had called me? Allied with Susan Pollack?

With Houvnanian.

Jesus, I told myself, calm down. This could all just be your own crazy paranoia, Jay. Dev could have just as easily b.u.mmed that b.u.t.t from someone down the road. I stood up and looked down the path again. I almost felt him watching me, observing me coming to the conclusion. Enjoying this! I wasn't quite sure what to do next. Call Sherwood?

It would just be another of those countless uncorroborated fears: Susan Pollack at the rock with Evan; the black or dark blue Kia outside Charlie's apartment; my brother's thirty-year-old lyrics echoed by Houvnanian.

This time I needed something more. Something real.

And suddenly I realized that I might have something more. Something that could pin Dev to this.

I wrapped the b.u.t.t in some paper and headed back to my room.

I hurried, my heart beating rapidly now. I looked back around, like he was watching me out there. Toying with me.

I got to my wing of the motel and bounded up the outside flight of stairs. I hurried down the hall and jammed the card key into the lock. It took a couple of times for it to open and I let the door shut behind me, switching the metal bolt, just to be sure.

I went over to the bed and took the book off my night table.

Greenway's book.

I flipped it open, skimming to where I wanted to go. My blood certain that this was it.

I located the insert of photographs. All the shots of Houvnanian and his other conspirators. The evidence photos: the guns, the knives, b.l.o.o.d.y clothing. Their VW van.

I'd been through them all before.

I searched until I found the photos taken on the ranch. There were two or three of the "family" all gathered around-drifters, hippies, outcasts, as they were in their days there. Making music. Working the farm. Gethsemane. Their paradise, before their world collapsed.

One shot was of a group sitting out on boulders they had cleared from a field. The same one I had searched for my brother's face only days before.

I recognized a younger Susan Pollack. She was there.

As were Sarah Stra.s.ser and Carla Jean Blue, who had partic.i.p.ated in the killings.

And some other names I recognized.

But no Dev. He wasn't there!

I skipped a few photos ahead. There was another group shot of them, this time clearing brush for their vegetable garden. I'd read that there was always a lot of work that had to be done there. Two of the gals were raking soil. Carla Jean again. And Tel. And another guy in a long ponytail, planting, who looked vaguely familiar. But when I checked, his name was Scott Oulette.

It wasn't him.

Three or four others were standing around holding tools. None of them even resembled Dev.

d.a.m.n.

I was about to give up when behind them I noticed someone perched on a small, dilapidated tractor.

My breath stopped. It was like a hand had put its icy fingers around my heart-and squeezed. I bore in on the face.

And I felt my blood about to explode.

It was the same person, except his hair was long then, a thin dark beard on his chin, wearing a bandana. He was grinning innocently, one arm on the wheel, but I could see it, as clearly as I could see the faces of my own kids when they were young.

I looked among the credits for a name.

And I read it twice, just to make sure I had seen it correctly.

Devin Dietz (on tractor).

I put down the book and just sat there for a while, everything slowly sinking in. I knew I had to call. I fumbled in my pocket for my phone. I located my previous call-to Sherwood-and pressed Redial.

He answered on the second ring, sighing when he saw who it was from. "What's going on there, doc?"

"Susan Pollack's accomplice," I said, trying to hold my voice together. "I know who it is!"

Chapter Sixty-Eight.

Sherwood grabbed his gun off the kitchen counter and strapped on his holster. He'd made a vow, a few days back, he wasn't sure precisely when. Maybe it was after Pelican Bay. Or when he'd heard about the lyrics to Charlie's song. Or maybe it went all the way back to that dollar bill in Thomas Greenway's stomach.

Or maybe back to the doc asking what that new liver had been for . . .

If it was going to end in a fight, he'd be the one to end it.

He put on his jacket and touched the picture of Dorrie good-bye, pressing his fingers to her smile, just as he did every time he went out on the job.

"The guy's a panhandler," the doc had said, excited. "Near my hotel. He's pushed his way into my life. I didn't realize it-but for the past few days, I think he's been stalking me."

"Stay where you are," Sherwood had instructed him. "Whatever you do, don't leave. I'll be right there."

It was time to end this thing-and now.

He headed out the kitchen door. His Camry was parked in the drive outside. He had about a fifteen-minute ride from where he lived to the Cliffside Suites motel. He needed to warn the patrol car he had stationed outside Charlie's apartment to be on alert, but he decided he might as well do it from the car, on his way.

He crossed around to the driver's side, this weird sensation flashing through him: how Jay Erlich had wormed his way into his life, past his defenses. It had been a long time since he had let anyone in. One day there would be very little he would miss in this life. His friends had all moved on, down to San Diego or Arizona. The people he really loved were gone. But this past week . . . He chuckled. Something had awakened inside him. Something he hadn't felt in a long while. Something vital. Over people he had never even heard of or given a rat's a.s.s about just a week before.

Funny, he thought to himself, how these things go. You never know what's really important to you, until- As he reached for the door handle, he heard a rustle from behind him.

Then he felt the most excruciating shock of pain cleave deep into his back.

The next thing he knew he felt the pavement, cold and firm against his face. Something sharp and body-splitting deep in his back. The air rushed out of him. He didn't know what had happened, only that he couldn't move and that it was bad. He tried to inhale, but it was like there was a hole in his air sac, his breaths leaking out of his back.

Turn over.

Before he could, he heard a loud grunt and felt another bone-splitting blow bury into his upper back. The pain almost sheared him in two. He tried to reach for it. He tried to power his brain through the pain-What had happened? What was there to do?-with whatever clarity he still possessed.

He had to warn the doc. He was in trouble too.

That was all.

But he couldn't move. A warm, coppery taste was on his tongue and he saw blood trickle down the driveway past his face into a growing pool. d.a.m.n. He tried to force himself up, like an animal fighting for one last breath-one last rush-but then another cracking jolt cleaved through him, his spine splitting in two.

"Ahh . . . ," he groaned deeply. He reared back around and saw, almost with a glint of amus.e.m.e.nt, what appeared to be the wooden handle of an ax.

Chickens, he thought, and lay his head back down. d.a.m.n.

"Don't . . ." He heard a woman's voice. It was more of a plea than a command. His mind was fuzzy. "Please, don't. We told you to stay out, you dumb b.a.s.t.a.r.d. If you had . . ."

There was another, spine-splitting blow. No longer pain, just numbness and cold. All the air sucked out of his body from his back.

He felt sad to have let the doc down. Not to have finished what he vowed to complete.

He knew it was time to let go, but as he did, something else came into his drifting mind.

He struggled forward, like a snake cut in half continuing to slide on his belly. His fingers gripped the pavement, now like sand. Each small measure forward consuming most of what was left of his strength.

And he crawled, down the driveway, every inch labored and life-emptying, like a strong current fighting against him, keeping him away.

No, not this time, it wouldn't . . .

He looked up to the shining, sunlit sight. He could almost touch it. Just a few more feet.

Please . . .

Sherwood opened his eyes. The driveway was gone, and instead of asphalt, soft leaves and moss brushed against his face. Green and cool now. The soothing tide of the river felt good against him.

Just stay with me, son. I'll be there.

Through the haze he saw the blue craft up ahead. He kept forcing himself, pushing against the current, against the dissipation of everything inside him. To get there. "Please, please, please, son, please . . ."

He reached out, desperation in his voice.

He made it. He felt the smooth, slick exterior of the fibergla.s.s hull. The bright white stripe. His heart in panic, he turned it over and looked inside.