convinced two cops that the drugged, naked guy in handcuffs wandering around the streets was his drunk lover.
So the officers dropped the guy off at Dahmer’s apartment, where he promptly killed and then ate him. Another time some cops came to his place to investigate the smell seeping through the walls of his apartment, and Dahmer convinced them that it was just the aquarium he hadn’t gotten around to cleaning. They didn’t bother to check his bedroom, or they would have found the rotting corpse on his bed.
So.
Confidence.
Creighton set both beers on the brunette’s table. “I need some advice.”
She looked at the bottles of beer and then gave Creighton a slight grin. “Oh yeah? What kind of advice?”
Over the years Creighton had discovered that people are more suspicious of you if you offer them something for nothing. The kinder you are, the more they think you want something from them. People trust need, not charity.
He leaned his hand against the chair beside her. “I’m new around here. I need someone to show me around the city.”
A raised eyebrow. A little sarcasm. “Do I look like a tour guide?”
“You look like someone who’s tired of all the scumbags in this hellhole leering at you. You look like someone who knows you could do better for tonight, if only the right guy wandered into your life.”
So.
Now.
Wait.
Just wait.
She’ll respond somehow, she has to respond somehow.
Confidence. That’s the key.
Creighton took a swig of his beer.
She might just blow him off. Yes, she might.
But maybe.
“Well,” she said at last. “You’re right about this place. And I do know the city pretty well…” She stood and slipped her arm around his elbow. “All right. Tonight, I’ll be your guide.”
“I can’t wait,” he said, and led her to the door.
9
Since I’m six-foot-three, I was thankful yesterday when Avis up-graded us to a full-size car. At least this way I could steer with my hands and not my knees.
I turned off a street peppered with tattoo studios, car dealer-ships, and small ethnic restaurants and then cruised past a group of homeless immigrants who stared blankly at our car from the curb.
“Patrick,” said Tessa. “We can go back to the hotel now if you want to. I mean, I don’t mind. Just so you know. It’s OK with me.”
“Don’t worry, it’s all right. The neighborhood we’re going to isn’t so bad.”
“How do you know?”
“This is what I do.”
We drove for another ten minutes and then I said, “So earlier you asked if I could tell where the next fire would be, right?”
“Yeah.”
“Well.” I let the car roll to a stop beside a series of brown stucco homes lining one of San Diego’s many sagebrush-covered hills.
“This is it.”
“Here?” She sounded excited, like I’d just suggested we move back to New York City.
“Yes. If I were going to predict the future, I’d say the next fire is going to be somewhere right around here.”
We stepped out of the car, and she looked around the desolate neighborhood. Not much to see. A small tobacco store stood on the corner at the end of the block. The hills were fringed by palm trees and dotted with quiet homes now fast asleep. The traffic on the Five murmured to us through the night. A commuter train, which they call trolleys here, roared down the tracks in the distance.
It wasn’t the worst neighborhood in the city, but I didn’t want to keep Tessa here too long, either.
“Do you really think there’s going to be a fire here?” she asked.
“Of course not. I already told you I can’t predict the future.
It’s just that if I were going to… that is-based on the arsonist’s pattern; if I were him, this is where I’d choose.”
She looked around expectantly. “So, when is it supposed to happen?”
I looked at my watch. “All right, let’s see… three… two… one.”
She turned slowly, eyes wide. “Are you sure?” she asked.
I noticed a transient Hispanic man lurching across the street at the end of the block. He wore a tangle of scraggly clothes, and when he arrived at the curb he began to walk in odd circles around one of the murky streetlights. “Tessa, I already told you I can’t do this. What, do I look like Nostradamus?”
She nodded, still scanning the neighborhood. “That’s a good line. I’d hang on to that one.”
“Thanks.”
“I don’t see a fire.”
“Of course you don’t.” The homeless man was about thirty meters away. He appeared to be mumbling to himself. He looked our direction and then began to stumble toward us.
“I think it’s time to go,” I said.
Nearby, I could hear the rattle and hum of the trolley coming closer.
Tessa slid into the passenger seat. “So, how much did you say graduate school cost you?”
“Apparently, way too much.”
As I pulled away from the curb, the vagrant began staggering down the center of the road toward us. He stopped directly in front of the car. I couldn’t safely pass him so I let the car idle. He stood only a few meters from us, frozen, staring into the headlights.
“What’s he doing?” Tessa asked.
“Probably just wants some money.”
I was about to get out of the car and tell him to kindly step out of the way, when he let out a wild screech and rushed screaming toward our car, clambered up the hood to the windshield, and stared at us through the glass. I threw open my door. “Tessa, stay in the car. Lock the door.”
She did.
He looked at me menacingly, eyes wild in the night. “Brraynn,” he screamed. Before I could stop him, he slammed his face against the glass.
Tessa scrambled back as far as she could. “Patrick!”
Drugs. He’s probably on drugs.
I grabbed his arm. “Sir, you need to settle down. Come on. Let’s get you off this car.” He pulled away, shook his head violently, and smacked his forehead against the windshield, sending an array of cracks flying across the glass. Then he looked at me with a crazed, twisted expression, his nose now bloodied and broken. His teeth were rotten nubs, his breath a putrid cloud.
He was incoherent. High. Maybe drunk, although his breath didn’t smell of booze.
“Ssslllleee,” he screeched. “Mergh. Whikl!”
Restraining people high on crack is never fun. Inhuman strength.
Combative. Out of control.
But I needed to protect him from himself.
