The Peyton Brooks' Mysteries Box Set, page 169
“I’m sorry, Devan.”
He shrugged. “I told you I was worried about this case.”
“I know.”
“He’s a slippery eel.”
“I know.”
His phone buzzed in his pocket and he fished it out, looking at the display. “It’s Rani. I gotta take this.”
Peyton nodded.
He thumbed it on and turned away. “Hey, sweetheart, how are you?”
Peyton leaned against the wall, watching him. Men, they were so damn flaky sometimes.
“You okay?”
She looked up into Marco’s blue eyes. He was standing in the doorway of the observation room. “Yeah.” She sighed. “Why are all men such asses, Marco?”
He glanced at Devan’s back as he moved down the hallway. “All men?”
“Yeah.”
“That’s painting the brush strokes a bit wide, isn’t it?”
She rolled her head on the wall wearily. “Okay, I guess Jake’s all right. And Cho. He seems like a decent enough guy.”
“Really? Jake and Cho?”
“And Abe, but Abe’s gay, so he’s definitely better than other men when it comes to treating women right.”
“Jake and Cho and Abe?”
“And Pickles, but I think he’s got his eye on the Poodle down the street and then I saw him checking out the Pomeranian next door.”
Marco laughed, leaning on the wall next to her. “Maybe the problem isn’t with the men, but with women.”
“No, that can’t be it.”
“Of course not. But here’s just a thought. When a man reveals himself as an ass, maybe a certain woman should avoid him and not be taken in by his charm.”
“I’m not taken in.” She bristled a little at that. “And I’m not stupid, Marco.”
“I didn’t say you were.”
“What did you say?”
“That Devan’s an ass.”
“Damn straight.”
“A total and complete ass.”
“A gigantic, colossal ass.” She paused and looked at him closely. “Why don’t you like him?”
He narrowed his eyes on her. “What?”
“You’ve never liked him. Even when we were dating. Why?”
“Uh…”
She shifted on the wall so she faced him. “What is it that you don’t like?”
“Brooks…” he started, but her phone rang.
She reached for it and glanced at the display. Mom. “Hey, Mama,” she said, pressing it to her ear. “Is everything all right?”
“Of course, everything’s fine, sweetheart. I’m calling about your birthday.”
“My birthday?”
“Yes, it’s Saturday. I was hoping you’d come to dinner that night.”
“Oh, I’m sorry, Mama. I have plans.”
“Well, what about Friday?”
“Again, I have plans.”
“You don’t have any time for your mother?”
Cue the guilt. Peyton studied Marco’s face. “How about Thursday night? I can come for dinner that night.”
“That’s wonderful. Cliff’s so excited to celebrate with you.”
I’ll bet, she thought, then a brilliant idea occurred to her. “Hey, Mama, would it be all right if I brought my partner with me?”
“Marco?”
“Yeah.”
“Of course.”
“Great. What time?”
“6:00?”
“Sounds great. We’ll see you then.”
“Oh, I’m so glad, sweetheart. See you then.”
The line went dead and Peyton shoved the phone back in her pocket, beaming a smile at Marco. “You know what I want for my birthday?”
“I’m sure I’m not going to like whatever it is.”
“Oh, you’ll love it. I want you to have the whole Cliff Martin Experience with me.”
He sighed. “Is this my punishment?”
She gave him a sultry look. “Not at all. This is your reward,” she said, patting his cheek.
CHAPTER 12
Jake found himself anxious whenever he brought up his email. Today he sat and stared at the message from Jillian Cera. Did he open it? Did he get Peyton? Did he tell the captain? Why was the Janitor focused on him? He had his reporter. Wasn’t she enough?
His hand shook as he reached for the mouse, then he stopped himself, wheeling back from the computer. Why hadn’t he stayed a banker? Messing with people’s money didn’t really bring you face to face with serial killers.
Scrubbing a hand over his mouth, he reached for the mouse again and opened the email, then the attachment. He didn’t allow himself to read it as he printed two copies. While he waited, he reached for his water and took a sip.
There had been times working at the bank when he thought his brain would melt from boredom and ooze out his ears. This job was certainly not boring, but boring wasn’t bad, right? When he got up in the morning to go to work at the bank, he didn’t have to walk through a tangle of cots set up in his living room and fight with a crowd for a few minutes in the bathroom. And most important of all, he didn’t have serial killers sending him cryptical messages about his childhood.
His sister, Faith, had called last night to see how he was. She wanted him to come to Nebraska for a visit. He’d heard himself tell her he couldn’t go, not right now, not with the case they were working. Insanity. He should have been on the next plane out of SFO. He should have jumped at the chance to take a break from the sea of crazy surging around him, but he said no. He said he couldn’t go. What the hell had happened to him?
He gathered the papers and made two separate piles, then carried them to Peyton. She and Marco were working at their desks. She looked up at him with a smile, then her face fell when he held the papers out to her.
Jake swallowed hard and passed the second copy to Marco, then hooked a chair and sat down so he could read the Janitor’s words over Peyton’s shoulder. She didn’t say anything, just sat staring at them without moving for a moment, then she held them up and began reading. So did Jake.
Missy stopped meeting me at the bleachers after that. I would wait around outside her classes, but she’d hurry away, keeping her head down and refusing to respond to me no matter what I did.
Clayton cornered me once and begged me to stop. He told me it only made things worse for them at home. Unsure what to do, I went to my mother, but she wasn’t any help. She told me she hadn’t been able to talk to Missy’s mom for weeks.
Then one night Missy woke me up, banging on my window. I told her to meet me at the front door. The minute the door opened, she threw herself in my arms, sobbing. I tried to calm her down, but I couldn’t understand what she was saying.
It woke my mother and she took over, getting Missy to the kitchen and making her a cup of hot chocolate.
What Missy told us that night stripped the last of my innocence from me. I’m sure you’ve already guessed what was happening in that house, and I’m shocked I didn’t know earlier, but I had been pretty much sheltered from the seedy side of life by my mother.
The Nova man had been after Missy from the moment he moved in with her mother. Her mother worked such long hours, she hadn’t been aware of what was happening, until that night. She’d come home from the swing shift and found her boyfriend in Missy’s bed.
The house had erupted in screaming and accusations. In her confusion, Missy’s mother had first blamed Missy, then her boyfriend, ordering both out of her house. Missy had run to our place.
As my mother calmed Missy down, a knock came at our door. It was Clayton and he begged Missy to come back home. Missy didn’t want to go, but Clayton pleaded with her. My mother tried to interfere, but Clayton told her to mind her own business. I came as close as I ever came to decking Missy’s brother that night, but I didn’t because I was afraid that would ruin things with Missy.
A little later, Missy’s mother came to the house and begged to talk to her daughter. She promised she’d thrown the Nova man out and she’d pleaded for her daughter’s forgiveness. Eventually Missy agreed to go home.
Even after a trauma like that, people continue on. Missy and Clayton went to school, so did I. Graduation was coming and for me, I had already decided I was going into the Marines. College just wasn’t in my future. I was barely able to complete high school.
Missy and I would see each other in the hallways of the school, but she didn’t seem to want any contact with me. I was devastated. I was sure I loved her, but she obviously didn’t feel the same. My mother explained that after the trauma she’d experienced, it was probably better if I kept my distance. I tried, but one night I couldn’t help it.
I saw the Nova man’s car in the driveway.
I went to the house and I peeked in at the window. Missy’s mother was talking with him in the living room and beyond him, I could see Missy sitting on the stairs, staring down at them.
The look in her eyes will haunt me forever. Terror, pure and simple. She seemed so small, so fragile, like a puff of smoke that would dissipate in a slight breeze.
I had to save her. I had to protect her. No one else would, no one else cared. I wouldn’t let this man steal any more of her soul. She belonged to me and I would make sure no one ever harmed her again.
The Nova man was my first kill.
Peyton made a gasping sound and lowered the papers. Jake placed a hand on her shoulder. How the hell long ago was that? Shit, how would they search for a murder that happened an indeterminate number of years ago?
Peyton ran a hand across her eyes and pressed her fingertips to her temples. “How many people has he killed?”
“Keep reading,” said Marco, glancing up at them.
Peyton reached for the papers again as Jake took a deep breath and picked up where they had stopped.
The Nova man was my first kill.
It’s surprising how easy it is. To kill, I mean. Once you determine you have no other choice, humans are easy to eliminate. Even though he was big, I was bigger and muscular thanks to football. I knew I had twenty or thirty pounds on him. When he went to get in his car, I was waiting on the side of the house.
I grabbed him around the throat with my forearm. I figured that would keep him from screaming. Then I just squeezed. He fought me, but he wasn’t big enough or else I was more determined than he was. Eventually I think I broke his neck, because he just stopped fighting. I made sure he wasn’t breathing and I threw him in the backseat of his car.
I had a moment of panic then. What do you do with a body?
I went back to my house and grabbed some old baseball gloves, then I took his Nova and drove him into the City. I figured if I left him in Hunter’s Point or the Tenderloin, no one would look too far to find his killer. And they didn’t.
I think they came out once to question Missy’s family, but they didn’t know anything, so the cops went away. Eventually I went to the Marines, but that’s a story for another time.
Right now, I think I’ll take a walk and meet up with a friend who recently got out of jail. Ironic, really, this friend of mine, he was like the Nova man. He liked having sex with sixteen year old girls too.
Well, who knows? It’s always good to get some fresh air, especially at noon. Something about San Franciscan architecture has always fascinated me. So eclectic, so unique. In one spot you have the beauty of an old Victorian mansion and in another Greco-Roman colonnades – such diversity in one city.
What’da ya say, Handsome, interested in round two!
Peyton dropped the letters and jumped to her feet. “The Palace of Fine Arts,” she told Marco. “He’s going to strike at the Palace of Fine Arts.” She reached for her phone and looked at the display. “It’s almost noon.”
Jake’s mouth dropped open as they went into motion. He’d seen them muster out before, but nothing like this. The precinct exploded in a flurry of activity as uniforms were dispatched and the detectives suited up in flak jackets and weaponry.
Jake didn’t even have a chance to warn Peyton to be careful before she was running toward the front doors. He followed behind in a haze as they spilled out into the parking lot, sirens blaring in the foggy August day. At the door, she paused and looked back, giving him a lift of her hand, then she was gone. Jake sagged against the counter, his heart pounding a frantic tattoo beneath his ribs, wondering again why he hadn’t jumped at the chance to go home to Nebraska where things moved at a comprehendible pace.
* * *
The man was about thirty, African American, dressed in a navy blue hoody and a pair of baggy jeans. His hair was combed out in a huge afro and he had a tattoo on his neck. He stood beneath the dome in the Palace of Fine Arts, both hands in the air, but in one he held what looked like a Colt revolver.
Peyton and Marco crept up next to Holmes and Bartlet. They were hiding behind a large planter box on the edge of the trail leading up to the dome. “What’s going on?” she said.
“He’s been like that for fifteen minutes. Calls started coming in from civilians, and when cops arrived on scene, he threw up his hands and started shouting. He gets quiet for a while, then he starts shouting again. Whenever they try to get close to him, he puts the gun to his temple,” said Holmes.
“Who is he?”
“I don’t think anyone’s asked.”
Simons ran over, keeping his head down. “Defino wants you to try talking to him, Brooks.” He handed her a megaphone. “See if you can talk him down.”
“I’m not a hostage negotiator, Bill.”
“They’re more than an hour away, Brooks. You’re all we’ve got right now.”
Peyton glanced around. They were on the path leading into the Palace of Fine Arts, just off the parking lot. There was plenty of cover, but there were also plenty of places for a gunman to be hiding. She surveyed the houses around the reflecting pool. They were a distance away, but that didn’t mean the Janitor wasn’t watching from one of them.
Her eyes caught on Cho, shielding himself to her left behind a colonnade. A number of uniforms were positioned around the reflecting pool, all with their guns drawn and pointed at the man pacing beneath the dome.
“We need to search every single house,” she said, nodding at them.
“We gotta get a lot more backup in here for that. Cho’s requested a helicopter.”
Bartlet was also looking around, his young face anxious. “Do you think the Janitor’s watching us right now?”
“Probably,” said Peyton. “Keep your head down.” She glanced at Marco. “This is just like Alcatraz.”
“And yet it’s not. Get him to put the gun down, Brooks, and maybe we end this without him dying.”
Peyton nodded and took a deep breath, then she lifted the megaphone to her lips. “This is Inspector Peyton Brooks from the San Francisco Police Department,” she said, her voice echoing back at her. “Put down the gun and we can talk.”
The suspect wheeled around toward her voice, both hands pressed to the top of his head, the gun pointing upward. “I don’t want to shoot anyone! I don’t want to shoot!”
“Okay, put the gun down and no one gets shot.”
“I can’t! I can’t! He’ll kill me!”
Peyton shared a look with Simons. “Who? Who will kill you?”
“Don’t shoot me! Please, don’t shoot me!” His voice was pitched at a level of absolute panic. Peyton could tell he wasn’t going to be able to stand this much more.
“We won’t shoot you if you put the gun down.”
“I can’t! I can’t put it down!”
Peyton closed her eyes. She didn’t know what to do. He was beyond the point of actually listening to her. Panic had taken over and he was in flight or fight mode. Either outcome would get him killed.
Suddenly her phone rang in her pocket. She grabbed for it and glanced at the screen. Defino’s number flashed at her as she pressed it on. “Captain?”
“Peyton, it’s Jake.”
“Jake, not a good time right now!”
“Peyton, Handsome is Marco.”
“What? What the hell are you saying? Handsome is Marco?”
Marco looked over.
“The letter. The Janitor’s letter said what’da ya say, Handsome…”
“…interested in round two,” Peyton finished. Oh God, it was Alcatraz. She met Marco’s eyes. For some reason, she couldn’t draw enough air into her lungs. “How do you know? How do you know he means Marco?”
“That’s what he called him when he talked to me at Pier 39. I’ll never forget it. He was surprised Marco had thought up the sting and he called him Handsome.”
Peyton shook her head. This couldn’t be happening again.
Marco’s jaw hardened and he lifted his gun, checking it. Peyton reached over and grabbed his shirt sleeve.
“No,” she managed to get out.
“Brooks, this has to end. He’s either going to shoot himself or the Janitor will. I’m sick of picking up his dead bodies.”
“Marco, no!”
“I’m not going to take any chances. I promise you.”
“Marco!” She started to grab for him, but Holmes stopped her, then she felt Simons’ hand encircle her upper arm, holding her back.
Marco rose to a half crouch and moved around the planter box, then he ran over to the first colonnade and slipped behind it. Peyton grabbed Simons’ hand and tried to push it off. “Let me go!” she ordered.
“Brooks, think! Talk him down. Get him to lower the gun!” hissed Simons in her ear.
She watched as Holmes followed the same path as Marco, moving toward the dome, and a moment later Bartlet went after them, fanning out to cover more area.
Peyton lifted the megaphone, her hand trembling. “We want to help you! Help us! Tell me your name!”
