on its aging facade. Alicia could see every poorly textured drywal patch where someone had shoved their fist or someone else's head through the
Sheetrock. She could see where some disinterested handyman had made a cursory attempt at painting over blood splatter. The brownish red streaks had resurfaced through the paint as if something were buried within the wal and stil bleeding. The bul et holes that were simply spackled and repainted.
As little care as had been taken in repairing the dump, even less had been taken in its original construction. She could count each and every stud in the wal where they were bowed or misaligned. The ceiling's lid line dove as much as two inches on one side making the room appear to be leaning. The caulking was uneven and the lead- based paint was peeling, curling up and flaking away like a bad sunburn.
Alicia closed her eyes and tried to sleep while the neighbor's bed renewed its squeak and bump, headboard gouging the drywal as it slammed repeatedly against the wal in rhythm with the sounds of ecstasy and despair. She heard someone cry out with a faked orgasm that sounded to her like a wail of torment. Then the door slammed again and Alicia drifted off, listening to her neighbor's anguished, wracking sobs.
Chapter Thirty-five
A dark blanket of clouds smothered the sky. Fat droplets of rain beat a steady pulse on the roof of the van as the heavens bled out into the city, drowning the citizenry like rats in a flooding basement. The rain was the second thing about his childhood Joe was able to recal with any clarity. It seemed that it had rained every day of his life right up until he'd left Washington. Now he'd brought the rain back with him.
Work boots, sneakers, patent leather wingtips, pumps, rubber boots, and myriad other shoes of every description splashed through the murky puddles as splashed through the murky puddles as the last of the nine-to- fivers hurried off to work, now more than half an hour late.
Everyone in this town seemed to belong here. There were no tourists. The people blended right in with the architecture, the food, and the drab, depressing weather. They were decorative accents added to give the place more flavor.
Joe navigated silently through the somber streets, his thoughts as chaotic as the weather as he looked from face to face, reading their stories in wrinkles and worry lines. Whenever their eyes landed on him he turned away, afraid that they would read the horror story etched into his own features.
Joe drove west on Bridgeport Way to
Steilacoom Boulevard and turned left.
Less than ten minutes later he pul ed up at Fort Steilacoom, where the state mental hospital sat.
It was an impressive complex of red brick buildings, imposing edifices of concrete and steel, four stories high, with windows barred in wrought iron. It was a prison laid out on a sprawling campus dotted with tal evergreen trees and lush lawns. The buildings were old, though, and a hospital this size was bound to have major security leaks. Joe was already searching for them as he pul ed up into the parking lot in front of the main building. The windows were al barred, however, and police cars came and went fairly regularly. Getting Trent out would be tricky.
As expected, Joe passed the cliched drooling patients lounging on lawn furniture and sipping iced tea, their eyes fixed in a vacant stare. Nurses attended to them with pity and casual disdain, as if they were unaware of the crimes most of them had committed in order to be put there, and the danger they stil represented. Even through their vacuous expressions, Joe could sense the hunger stil burning inside them only slightly diminished by the antipsychotics and depressants the nurses were dutiful y pumping into them. Stil, armed prison guards stood close by, just in case one of the inmates had forgotten to take his meds and decided to get a little frisky. Joe continued across the lawn and up to the front of the main building.
Joe wasn't sure exactly what he was going to say in order to gain admittance into the hospital. He was hoping they wouldn't recognize his name as one of
Damon Trent's victims. He was also hoping that Trent's own perverse curiosity would make him eager enough to see his first victim al grown up to go along with whatever lie he came up with. The withered old crone who sat behind the reception desk smiled up at Joe with a mouthful of pearl white dentures as he stepped cautiously into the lobby.
Instinctively his eyes ravaged her, searching for an edible morsel on her hard-worn body, but the meat that sagged from her brittle skeleton had long ago withered and spoiled. She was in no danger of winding up on his menu. Not when there were so many more scrumptious delicacies wandering every street corner and darkened corridor.
'May I help you, young man?'
'I'm here to visit one of your patients.'
'What ward is he in?'
'Uh, I'm not sure. He was pretty violent at one time. They might have him in isolation.'
'If he's in isolation then they won't al ow him to have visitors. What's his name?'
'Damon Trent.'
'Trent? What's your name, sir?' The old crone's eyes narrowed in suspicion.
'My name is Joseph Miles.'
'Are you on his visitors list?'
'I should be. I'm a relative. I'm his cousin. We grew up together.' Joe smiled wide in an effort to reassure her, but her eyes remained hard and distrustful.
'Give me a second to check.'
The octogenarian receptionist turned her profile to him and began tapping her profile to him and began tapping her spindly arthritic talons on the computer keyboard, cal ing up Trent's patient information. As she did so, she cast a glance at the two armed prison guards who stood chatting idly by the elevators. Instantly they stood at attention and began taking notice of the large wel groomed young man with the physique of a professional bodybuilder. Despite the smile he kept plastered to his face, they could sense danger from him.
'Oh, here it is. I'm so sorry, it seems your name is on his visitors list. It was added just two days ago. I'l stil need to see some ID.'
Joe fished into his pocket for his
California driver's license and handed it to her.
'You say it was added just two days ago?'
'Yes. Mr. Trent requested the addition himself. Had his lawyer cal the head nurse.'
She handed him a visitor's pass and directed him through the metal detector and over to the elevators.
'Trent's room is downstairs. Wait a second and I'l have one of our orderlies escort you.'
Joe was stunned. Two days ago he had first left San Francisco. Somehow
Damon had known and was expecting him.
The two corrections officers continued to watch him as he shuffled nervously from foot to foot, waiting for an orderly to come and lead him downstairs. Joe kept his eyes straight ahead. He was used to being stared at, but the thick animal musk of testosterone wafting from the two guards was maddening. They were chal enging him and his alpha-male instincts wanted to take up the chal enge. He was already calculating the number of strikes it would take to bring them down before they could draw their weapons. The elevator doors slid open and a short, fat, black orderly stepped out and ushered him inside.
'You here to see Damon Trent, right?
Step on in.'
He held the elevator door open for Joe, smiling like an idiot. Joe smiled back at him, bristling inside.
Joe stepped inside, casting a furious glance back over his shoulder at the two officers. His lip curled into a snarl as his eyes locked with theirs. They started forward to confront him, unsure of why or what they would do. The doors closed, severing the fierce tension and leaving Joe to focus on the man waiting for him in the basement. He would have felt much better confronting Damon with a stomach ful of meat from a fresh kil, warm blood drenching his skin like war paint. The two toy cops upstairs would have made the perfect prey. Their deaths would have made him feel stronger, better prepared for the coming madness. The orderly would have turned his stomach.
