leader. He was about her age, she guessed. Forty or forty-five.
Men of that age sometimes developed a taste for young girls. Ally looked so lovely in that white dress.
It showed a little cleavage. Was that man looking down her dress now, studying the lacy border of her bra, the hint of her white breasts
If he forced her …
“In,” the male thug snapped, shoving her again, and she realized she had hesitated at the threshold of the closet, wrapped in ugly thoughts.
She joined Charles and the Danforths. The closet was as large as a freight elevator, not claustrophobically crowded even with the four of them inside. Several of Charles’s suits hung behind her, cellophane envelopes crinkling as they brushed her hair.
The doors banged shut. Darkness.
Bad to be here in the dark. Images came to her, images of Ally in her white dress-white, a virginal color; her daughter was still a virgin, she was quite sure of that-God, please let her be a virgin after tonight …
Outside, the rattle of a chain, then the click of a padlock.
Footsteps. Leaving.
The killers had gone, but the ugly images remained, and the awful thoughts, and the cold terror …
“He’s going to hurt her,” someone whispered, and with a small shock she realized it was herself. “The look in his eyes …”
Charles, her husband, Ally’s father-he was the one who ought to have comforted her now. He didn’t move.
It was Judy who took her hand in a warm, reassuring squeeze.
Alone with Ally in the dining area, Cain felt the girl’s violent trembling, her helpless terror, and liked it.
Movement in the foyer. Tyler reentered the house. He knelt by Trish Robinson, rolled her over, and unbuckled her gun belt.
Ally watched the procedure with peculiar intensity. Cain tightened his grip on her shoulder.
“In the den,” he said, not harshly.
They crossed the living room together. As they reached the den, Tyler slung the cop, beltless but still cuffed, over his shoulder. Blood trickled out of her hairline, striping her cheek.
He carried her through the front door. Ally watched him go.
“He won’t hurt her,” she whispered. “Will he”
“You don’t even know the lady. What’s it to you”
“She seemed… nice.”
Cain smiled under his mask. “Nice people get hurt sometimes.” He touched the girl’s delicate chin. “How about you You’re a nice person, aren’t you”
Teardrops dewed her lashes. Her mouth worked without sound. Such a pretty mouth.
“Aren’t you. Ally Aren’t you nice”
Still smiling, he led her into the den.
18
Sergeant Ed Edinger hated coffee, all coffee, but he drank gallons of it to stay alert throughout the mid-P.M. watch. In a town with so little criminal activity that the very existence of a police department was optional, there wasn’t much to engage his attention even on a Saturday night.
He supposed he ought to like it that way, but just once a high-speed chase or a hostage situation might be nice.
Just once.
The coffee nook outside his office could have used a decorator’s touch. Its sole ornament was a cork bulletin board plastered with outdated memoranda, many generated by himself. The square of short-nap carpet under the folding table was a mosaic of deeply ingrained coffee stains. Ed was responsible for a few of those, as well.
He tilted the carafe and poured a steaming black arc into a souvenir mug from Palm Springs. His wife collected mugs.
Sugar and cream followed in excessive amounts. Ed would add anything to coffee, in any quantity, to make the damn stuff tolerable.
“Hey, Sarge.”
Glancing up, he saw a tall, big-shouldered woman saunter up to the coffee machine, holding a Styrofoam cup. Louise Stagget, one of the two night-watch dispatchers, known universally as Lou.
Ed nodded by way of greeting. “Radio keeping you busy” he asked, already knowing the answer. He monitored the chatter on and off throughout the night.
“Hardly. Even slower than usual.” Lou drained the carafe into her cup. “Pete Wald sure seems to think so.”
“What’s that supposed to mean”
“Only that he went code seven at twenty twenty-eight.”
Ed found Lou’s habit of using military time mildly irritating. He had to make the conversion to Pacific Daylight Time in his head, and he wasn’t that good with numbers.
“Just a few minutes ago,” he said, doing the math. “So what”
“Seemed a little peculiar. You know, he’d been on duty less than a half hour. Kind of early in his watch to be taking a break.”
Ed sipped his coffee and winced, his unfailing reaction. “Like you say, it’s a slow night.”
“He could at least cruise the shopping district or the motels by the freeway. Not everything comes in via nine-one-one.”
“Well, maybe he’s just not feeling so good.” Ed was reluctant to criticize Pete Wald, a good friend for many years. “Bad chili or something.”
“I don’t think it was him.”
Lou let the words hang in space as she busied herself with a filter bag, preparing to brew a new pot.
The phone in the lobby shrilled briefly, then was answered. Somewhere a police siren wailed, the sound making Ed frown in bemusement until he realized that it came from the detective squad room, where two of the guys were watching a TV cop show while filling out a burglary report.
“I think,” Lou concluded after a sufficiently dramatic pause, “it was that girl.”
Trish Robinson. No surprise.
Ed had suspected that Lou disliked the rookie, maybe because Robinson was twenty years younger and forty pounds lighter, or maybe just for the pure pleasure of spite.
“What about her” he asked, taking another sip and registering another grimace.
“She’s a slacker.”
“A what”
“Slacker. One of these young people nowadays who thinks the world owes ‘em a living. You know.”
“So she’s young. We were too.”
“But we weren’t slackers. It was a different world back then. People still had a sense of responsibility. Way things are going, soon there’ll be nothing but slackers. These damn kids’ll ruin us. No values. No backbone.”
“You’re being too hard on her,” Ed said, but he wondered. Robinson had been late for roll call. Not a good sign.
“Maybe I am.” Lou shrugged. “Hey, when was the last time you got down to L.A. Three, four years”
“More like five. City’s a hellhole. I keep my distance.” He finished his coffee in a noisy slurp. “Why”
“You ever talk to Robinson about the houses there”
“Houses”
“Like in Bel-Air, Beverly Hills …”
“Why the hell would I talk about houses”
“Yeah, that’s what I figured.” Lou turned away without explanation.
Baffled, Ed watched her walk down the hall to the communications room. She shook her head once, and he
