“Nope, not going to do that,” she said, showing me a pretty smile I’d not seen on her face before. “So what’s it going to be, Sergeant? Let me go? Because if not, it doesn’t matter to me if Kali bites me or if you shoot me. There’s no difference to me at all.”
A clock ticked on the wall above the stove. I heard Norma Johnson’s breath quicken, and I saw that Conklin’s face was blanched. He was afraid of snakes, deathly afraid, but he stood like a rock within striking distance of Pet Girl’s lunatic idea of a pet. I couldn’t get a clean shot.
“Move aside, Inspector,” Johnson said to Conklin. “Save yourself and let me go.”
“I can’t do that,” said Conklin. And then he snapped out his hand like he was grabbing a fly from the air. He was going for her wrist, but before he could grab her, she launched the snake at Conklin.
Conklin jumped back, but the snake was airborne. My partner raised his hand as it came toward him, wriggling sinuously, batting against his palm. It clung to his hand for an instant, hanging over his wrist – until Conklin shook it off and it fell to the floor.
He stepped back, holding his wrist, then turned his ashen face to me.
“I’ve been bitten,” he said, standing stock-still. “The bastard got me.”
Chapter 98
NORMA JOHNSON BOLTED.
She tried to bulldoze her way past me, but I came out of my horrified trance, grabbed her arm, and wrenched her around.
Her shoulder popped and she screamed, but the pain didn’t stop her. She picked up a coffee mug with her free hand and, gripping it as if it were a rock, hauled back and aimed a ceramic punch to my jaw.
I ducked, kicked at her knee with all I had. She screamed again and dropped to the floor. I rolled the yowling woman onto her stomach and bent her arms back, cuffed her as I yelled to Conklin, “Rich! Lie down on the couch. Lower your arm to the floor so that it’s below your heart. Do it now.”
Conklin walked unsteadily into the next room as if he were already dying. I noted the time, grabbed my cell phone, and called Dispatch, told Kam that Conklin was down.
“We need an ambulance forthwith,” I said, giving the address. “Call the hospital, say that the victim has been bitten by a snake. It’s a krait. K-R-A-I-T. We need antivenin now.”
“Antivenom?”
“Yes. No. It’s called antivenin. And send uniforms to take our collar into custody.”
I walked over to Johnson, who was writhing, squeaking out little yelping cries.
I stooped down and said, “Do you have any antivenin here?”
She mewled, “If I did, I wouldn’t tell you.”
I kicked her in the ribs, and she howled. I asked her again.
“No! I don’t have any.”
I didn’t believe her. I opened her refrigerator and took inventory. Three cups of yogurt, box of eggs. Six-pack of Coors. Wilted radishes. No vials that looked like something that could save Conklin’s life.
I can’t lie. It felt like dozens of eyes were staring at me. I was creeped-out to the ends of my hair, and even though I was terrified for my partner, I still had a little terror left over for myself.
I watched the floor as I made my way to the living room, where Conklin was lying on a blue plaid sofa, his arm lowered to keep the poison from traveling to his heart.
Only a minute or two had passed since he’d been bitten, but I had no idea how long it would take for that bite to paralyze his central nervous system. How long it would be until Conklin couldn’t breathe.
Was it already too late?
I whipped off Conklin’s belt and placed it just below his elbow as a constricting band. “I’ve got you, buddy. The ambulance is on the way.”
Panic welled up inside me like a tsunami, and the tears were working hard to bust down the dam. But I couldn’t let my partner see that. I just wanted to be 10 percent as brave as he was.
I forced my mind off the odds.
And I focused on the distance between us and the closest hospital. I thought about the Amazing Race-style run the paramedics would have to make carrying stretchers from the Twenty-fifth Avenue gate all the way out to the end.
And then there was the antivenin.
How would the hospital get antivenin in time?
The souls of every dead person I’d ever loved visited me as I held Richie’s good hand and listened for sirens: Jill and Chris and my mom – I couldn’t bear it if Conklin died.
I heard the sirens blare and stop.
To my overwhelming relief, twelve minutes after Conklin was bitten, paramedics bearing stretchers bombed through the door.
Chapter 99
I YELLED OUT to the paramedics and the cops. “Poisonous snakes are loose all over the freakin’ floor. They’re lethal.”
“You said a cop is down?” asked a uniform.
I knew him. Tim Hettrich. Twenty years on the force and one of our best. But he and Conklin had a feud going, started when Conklin moved up to Homicide. I thought maybe they hated each other.
“Poisonous snake bit Conklin.”
“A cop is down, Sergeant. We’re going in.”
As Conklin was strapped onto the gurney, I walked to where Norma Johnson lay cuffed on the floor. Her face was puffy and her nose was bleeding, but I had a sense that if a snake crawled out of the pantry and bit her, she’d be ecstatic.
Maybe she wanted to die as her father had died.
I halfway hoped she’d get her wish, but my more rational mind wanted to hear the story.
I wanted to know what Norma Johnson had done, to whom, and why. And then I wanted the State to try her, convict her, and kill her.
I stood over Norma Johnson, and I read her her rights.
“You have the right to remain silent, you disgusting coward,” I said. “Anything you say can and damned well will be used against you in a court of law. You have the right to an attorney, if you can find one slimy enough to defend you. If you can’t afford an attorney, the State of California will provide one for you. We do that even for scum like you. Do you understand your rights, Pet Girl?”
She smiled at me.
I grabbed her arms by the cuffs and jounced her, putting the strain on her popped shoulder, making her scream.
“I asked you, do you understand your rights?”
“Yes, yes!”
Hettrich said, “I’ve got her, Sergeant.” He brought her to her feet and hustled her out the door. I wanted to leave, too. But I had to see what was inside that pantry.
I had to know.
I walked over to the opening and stared at the metal shelves filling the narrow room. I could see the kraits slithering through the remnants of most of the tanks, every one of those snakes loaded with venom.
It was stunning to think what Norma Johnson’s intentions were in owning so many snakes. How many more people had she hoped to kill before she was caught?
