Ed Gorman: Cold Blue Midnight

He rang the bell twice more before thinking: She isn't home.

On the phone, in the bathroom, maybe working in the darkroomby now Mitch had eliminated all the likely things that would have kept Jill from bounding down the stairs the way she did when she suspected it was him.

No bounding now.

Just a cold dark front stoop. And a cold dark front door.

And an unanswered bell.

He thought: Where the hell is she?

He wasn't sure why exactly, but his cop instinct told him that something was wrong here. She should be home. Because of the way the press traipsed after her these days, she almost never went out at night.

But now she was gone.

Again that quirky but urgent sense of something wrong. Where the hell was she, anyway?

'So you're taking me with you?'

'That's the plan, Toots.'

'How far?'

'I'm not sure yet. Probably Vegas or someplace like that. Then I catch a plane. Right now, the cops'll be looking for me around here. They'll be watching the airport.' He smiled over at her. 'Meanwhile, I'll be whizzing down the Interstate with a nice new hostage.'

When they'd left the mansion, he'd steered her to his car but when she saw the bloody head of Adam Morrow in the backseat, she went into momentary shock and would not get in. First Evelyn and the maid and now this man's head in the backseat…

Now they were in her car and she was driving. This time of night, this area of the city, traffic had thinned. Buried beneath snow, and tinted by mercury vapor lights, all the working-class houses looked small and shabby and sad.

Peter held a gun on her. He looked quite comfortable and quite content doing so. Every few minutes, she'd glance at his face, at the mask plastic surgery had put there, and think: No, this isn't Peter. This isn't possible. Peter died in the electric chair. But then he'd speak and she'd know it was Peter for sure.

He had given her directions a few minutes ago. She said, 'Where are we going?'

'A storage garage. I need to pick up a suitcase. Got my traveling money in there. A quarter million.'

'I won't be able to drive all night, if that's what you're thinking. I'm drained, Peter, and I'm trembling. My whole body is trembling.'

'Soon as we get my stuff at the garage, I'll buy us something to eat.'

She almost smiled. 'Something to eat? You think that's going to do it for me?'

'It'd better, Toots. Because you are going to be driving all night. Up here, hang a left.'

She turned left.

'Six, seven blocks straight down,' he said.

They passed a block that held three different taverns. On the sidewalk of the second one, an old man was throwing up, his vomit a lurid green from the tint of the neon sign in the window.

Peter said, 'I'll bet he'd go out with you.'

That was one of Peter's old gags. He'd see somebody notably ugly and say, 'Bet he'd go out with you.'

She said, 'Don't you feel anything for what you just did?'

'You mean killing my mother?'

'Yes.'

'That's kind of funny, coming from you.' He genuinely laughed. 'I mean, all those years when you wanted to kill her yourself.'

'No, I didn't. I just wanted to leave.'

'Well, bitch, that's just what you did, didn't you?'

The cold anger. The old Peter. She knew better than to push him past this point.

Even the streetlights in this neighborhood were dim and dirty. Tiny ethnic houses cowered against the night like children trying to fend off a blow. The cars parked along the curbs were ancient rusty beasts.

'You're going to kill me, aren't you?' she said after a time.

'I have to admit the thought has crossed my mind.'

'Will you make it fast? And do it with a gun?'

The smile. 'Still making demands, eh, Jill?'

'Just don'tThe axe. You know.'

'Not to worry, Toots. I left the axe lying at the front of the family manse. And anyway, you don't have to worry about dying until we hit Vegas. Up here, pull in.'

She pulled in.

At the far end of the alley she could see cyclone fencing and powerful thief lights. The storage facility.

She drove toward the light.

She was still trembling badly and trying hard not to.

Mitch called the station and asked the dispatcher to put

Jill's license number out. If anybody spotted it, they should call in, but not stop the car. He didn't want to embarrass Jill if she'd just gone for a ride or something.

It didn't take Peter long to empty out the little garage and pile everything in the trunk of Jill's car. He locked up behind him, making sure he'd left no traces of himself behind. All the time, he kept glancing over his shoulder to see what Jill was up to. He had the car keys in his pocket. She wasn't going anywhere.

He was starting back to the car when they came seemingly out of nowhere, the same two punks he'd run into before, one of whom he'd beaten up.

The black one put a gun, and a damned big one, to Peter's back and said, 'Slide all the way over, man. I'm doin' the drivin' tonight.'

The white boy was just now opening the back door and getting in.

Peter got in. He looked at Jill who started to say something but didn't.

In the backseat, the white kid said, 'I got a gun, too, man. So don't try anything, you dig?'

This was just crazy as hell, Jill thought.

Just crazy as hell.

Mitch sat in his car, punching numbers on his cellular phone. He called Jill's friend Kate. She didn't sound unduly happy about hearing from him, not after the way he'd dumped Jill that time.

'So you haven't talked to her tonight?'

'You really sound upset, Mitch. Is something wrong? Is there something you're not telling me?'

'No. Everything's fine.'

'It doesn't sound fine, Mitch.'

'I'll talk to you laterand thanks.'

They took Peter Tappley down a couple of blocks to a garage in which he could hear growling and barking.

Peter could hear the sounds from the garage even above the cold night winds soughing in the bare trees. Jill, sensing something terrible about to happen, found herself defending Peter.

'He's not a well man. He didn't mean to hurt anybody.'

'Hey, bitch, I don't remember askin' you to talk, you dig?' the black kid said.

They parked and dragged Peter out of the car. The white one hit Peter first, hard enough to drive him to his knees. Then the black one kicked him.

Jill screamed.

The white one reached in the car, grabbed her by the hair and pulled her out into the snow. 'Now I'm gonna make you watch, bitch.' He pushed her up to the side of the garage.

A patrol car spotted a car matching the make, year and color Mitch had described, eighteen minutes after he put out the call. The patrol car pulled closer to check out the license plate.

This was the one they were looking for, all right.

The garage reeked of old, damp newspapers, garbage long left to mold, and wood reeking with decades of rain and rot.

The middle of the floor was empty. Jill wondered where the growling and barking had come from. She'd assumed in here. Now she knew that there was some kind of kennel nearby.

'You gonna travel, man?' the white punk said.

'Travel?'

'Yeah, you know, goin' somewhere.'

'Yeah, I guess so.'

'And you're tryin' to tell us,' the white one said, 'that the only money you got is what we found in your billfold.'

'I'm sorry, boys, that's all I've got.'

The black one kicked him again.

Peter knew he had at least one rib broken now.

'This here's our special place, man,' the white one said. 'Guys like you try'n hold out on us, we start bringin' the dogs in. One at a time.'