“Movie stars?”
“He had them pose naked. Do things to each other. Do things to him. The priest put it all on tape and sold it on the Internet. One of the boys? He told his folks what was going on. That takes guts, you know? To tell your parents what this holy man, this great guy, what he's really up to? The cops bust the priest, there's a trial, and pretty soon everybody in town sees the tapes.
“Billy? He toughed it out for three years. Everybody snickering about what that priest did to him. My father? Oh, he was a real champ. Said Billy got what he deserved. Said God, the almighty Father on high, God himself was punishing Billy for trying to run away from his real father.”
Ceepak tightens his grip on the Power Bar foil in his fist.
“My father? He's not a real father, Danny. A real father does everything he can to protect his children. He doesn't terrorize his family because he's thirsty for a drink. A real father risks his life to make the world safer for his sons. My father? He called Billy sissy boy. Porno queen. It's like he put the bullets in the gun and all Billy had to do was squeeze the damn trigger.”
Jesus.
I think Ceepak just told me why he has to kill Squeegee tonight.
I don't know what to say.
So I keep quiet and let him look at the ocean.
The sun is gone. The stars are starting to come out. The waves keep rolling up on the beach.
Finally, I feel I should say something.
“So, where's your dad now?”
Ceepak looks at me.
“Don't know, Danny. We sort of lost track of each other.”
“Yeah. Sure. And your mom?”
“She's safe.”
He bites into his Power Bar.
That's all I'm going to get tonight, probably more than anybody has heard in years. Maybe even more than he told the chief, back when they were hunting down that chaplain in Germany. I see now, of course, why Ceepak was so motivated on that particular military mission.
“Well,” Ceepak says, standing up, dusting the crumbs off his lap. “Guess we've wasted enough time….”
“Yeah.”
“Let's start working the hallways. See if-”
We hear a dog bark.
Then this woman's voice.
“Oh, fuck!” she shouts.
In the shadows I see a figure with frizzy hair. It's so dark, I can't see much of her, except her feet. She uses brown paper sacks for socks.
She also has a mangy German shepherd on a leash made out of twine.
The dog barks again.
“I know, Henry. It's the motherfucking fuzz!”
CHAPTER THIRTY
“Ma'am?”
For an old lady, she's fast.
She and the dog run out a door and up what I guess is a hall.
Right now, they have the advantage. They've been here before; we haven't. We're first-time guests and they appear to be long-term residents. So they know where the hell they're running. We don't.
“Danny?”
“Right behind you, boss.”
We both pull out our flashlights and tear up the tiered terraces to the exit she used.
On the other side of the door, I bang into this rickety old grocery cart loaded down with trash bags, nickel-deposit bottles, an old moving pad, books, and an eyeless stuffed panda bear with dirt on its nose.
We hear the dog barking somewhere up the corridor.
“Leave it, Henry! Leave the fucking rat alone!”
Now that she mentions it, I can hear the scratchy-toed devils scurrying around inside what's left of the plaster walls.
“Put him down!”
Wonderful. Henry's a “ratter.” But his assorted barks and snarls act like a homing beacon, helping us figure out which way they're running.
Ceepak leads us up a long, dark corridor lined with rooms. Like most hotel hallways, there are no windows. That means there's also no light. No moonlight, no nothing. Our tiny flashlights shoot jittery spotlights across the walls as we run. I half expect a rat in a top hat to jump out and tap-dance like that frog on the WB.
The carpet squishes under our feet as we run. Guess the roof leaks. Or the toilets.
After about fifty yards, we come to a landing where the grand staircase swoops up from the lobby. Tall casement windows in the stairwell let in just enough light for us to see a few shadows and dim outlines.
I smell gasoline.
So does Ceepak. He goes to the staircase. Most of the planks have been ripped out and all that's left are the stringers on the sides and the support joists in between. Guess the floorboards, the treads, were mahogany or oak or something worth stealing.
“C-4,” Ceepak says, looking at what appears to be a brick wrapped in black plastic and duct-taped to a crossbeam. His finger traces the red and white and green wires snaking from the plastic explosive up and down the steps to, I guess, more wads of C-4. There's a gas can sitting in the windowsill.
“Arson?” I say.
“Looks like.”
“Why? There's not much left to burn.”
“More like a demolition.”
The dog barks.
“Come on,” Ceepak says.
There's another bark. And another. A whole series.
“Henry? Shush!”
Now Henry tosses in a couple of howls, like he's singing opera. All the noise comes from below.
“Come on! Down the steps!”
We head down the grand staircase, stepping on the crossbeams and stringers because, like I said, there aren't any actual stairs any more. Once again, I have a really good chance of slipping through a gaping hole and landing on my butt.
We make it to the second floor and hear a long, slow dog yawn.
Downstairs.
I grab hold of the banister and try not to look down where the floorboards used to be. It's like running down a steep railroad track, stepping only on the ties. The boards bang my arches and sting like hell. Before this is over, I know I'm going to make some bone doctor a very rich man.
“Henry? Come on! Henry!”
Now she sounds like she's right below us.
“Henry?”
Sounds like he isn't cooperating.
We reach the lobby. She's tugging on that twine leash, but Henry is lying like a lump in the middle of the floor, all flopped out, breathing hard.
“You need a nap? Now?”
“Ma’am?” Ceepak moves toward what I'm guessing is a crazy homeless person. His hand never goes anywhere near his gun. “Ma'am?”
“Shhhh! Henry's napping. Can the noise, would ya?”
“Yes, ma'am.”
“Jesus,” she huffs. “Some people. Yak, yak, yak. Ma'am, ma'am, ma'am.”
In the lobby, I get a better look at our quarry. She's tiny. Not even five feet tall. She has on Converse basketball shoes with the canvas toes ripped out and, like I saw earlier, brown paper bags for socks. She's wearing about three different skirts, plaid and denim, with a petticoat underneath. There's a tie-dyed shirt up top over what I figure, from all the bumps circling her like spare tires, is a goose-down vest. Her silver hair is wiry and dirty and wild and curls around her head like a worn-out scrubbing pad.
“You're not going to shoot me, are you, fuzz?”
“No, ma'am.”
“Good.”
“Is that your dog?”
“No. That's Henry.”
“Yes, ma'am. That's a pretty shirt,” Ceepak says. It's tie-dyed all kinds of colors-just like the one Ashley said Squeegee was wearing when he shot her father.
“My boyfriend loaned it to me. I was cold.”
“Does your boyfriend have a name?” he asks. He's made the tie-dye connection, too.
“Jerry. His name is Jerry.”
Ceepak nods, the way you nod when you're visiting the mental ward and a patient tells you the ashtrays have been saying mean things about them lately.