They got about one block and Donnie laughed and slapped Wes’s arm. ‘Look who it is.’
It was that prick Rashiv. Mrs Dance had mentioned him the other night. Donnie and his DARES crew had wailed on him about six weeks or so ago. Donnie didn’t quite know why, maybe because Rashiv wasn’t even a democratic US citizen and he should go back to where he came from, Syria or India or wherever. But mostly they’d pounded on him and pulled his pants down and launched his book bag into the water off Lovers’ Point because it was something to do.
And here he was now.
Rashiv glanced up and, terror in his eyes, saw Donnie and Wes walking right toward him. They were on Lighthouse, the main commercial street in Pacific Grove, and plenty of people were around so the kid didn’t think he was going to get lashed but he still looked plenty scared.
‘Yo, bitch,’ Donnie said.
Rashiv nodded. He was a way skinny little guy.
‘Whatchu up to, bitch?’
A shrug. ‘Nothing.’ Looking for a place to run, just in case Donnie decided to lash on him even with people around.
Wes just looking at him with this blank expression.
‘Hey, Wes.’
No response from Wolverine.
Rashiv said, ‘Haven’t seen you for a while. I called.’
‘Busy.’
Donnie said, ‘You been busy too, Rashit?’ It was funny how a question could be both friendly and threatening.
‘Sorta. Yeah. You know, school.’
Wes said, ‘What’s that?’ Squinting at a book the boy was carrying.
‘Just some manga.’
‘Let me see.’
‘I don’t—’
Wes lifted it away. He laughed in shock. ‘Japanese edition of Death Note – it’s signed by Ohba.’
Shit, Donnie thought. Holy shit. One of the best, kick-ass manga comics of all time. And signed by the author? Donnie said, ‘I figured you’d beat off to Sailor Moon.’
Death Note was about a high-school student who has a secret notebook that gives him the power to kill anyone just by knowing their name and face. Fuck, this was pure solid, the most righteous of any manga or anime in the world.
Wes flipped through it. ‘I’m going to borrow it.’
‘Wait!’ Rashiv said, eyes wide.
‘I’m just going to read it.’
‘No, you’re not! You’re never going to give it back. My parents brought it to me from Japan!’ Rashiv reached forward and gripped Wes’s arm. ‘No! Please!’
Wes turned to him with a look that sent some ice even down Donnie’s back. ‘Get your hand off me. Or you know what?’ He nodded toward Donnie. ‘We’ll totally fuck you up.’
The boy dropped his hand and stared in pure misery as Donnie and Wes walked leisurely away, sipping their coffee.
And with that – totally fuck you up – Donnie knew that, at last, Wes was one of them.
CHAPTER 60
Dance’s Pathfinder careened along the hilly stretch of Highway 68.
Not a good vehicle to be executing these maneuvers.
And not a good driver to be attempting them. Kathryn Dance had her talents but motoring wasn’t one of them.
‘Where are you, Michael?’
‘Twenty minutes. There’s a cruiser there now. CHP happened to be nearby.’
‘I’ll be there in three.’
Whoa, a faint skid and a blare of horn. You’re allowed to honk angrily at a large Nissan SUV straying over the centerline toward you, even if there is a flashing blue light on the dashboard.
She tossed the phone onto the seat next to her. Get serious here.
Bounding into the lower lot at the inn, the Pathfinder sped up to the Highway Patrol trooper, dressed crisp, as they always looked, standing next to the Pacific Grove cop, whom she knew.
‘Charlie.’
‘Kathryn.’
‘Agent Dance,’ the CHP trooper said. ‘I got the call. This is the Solitude Creek suspect?’
‘We think so. Where is he?’
Charlie offered, ‘Headed inside just after he parked. He didn’t spot me, I’m sure.’
‘Where’s the car?’
‘Follow me.’
They eased along the path, through gardens of pine and succulents. They paused behind a large bush.
The silver Honda was parked near the loading dock of the large hotel, a stone-and-glass structure that featured about two hundred rooms. The dining room was top notch and on Sunday it did a huge brunch business. Dance and her late husband, Bill, had come here several times for romantic busman-holiday weekends, while Stuart and Edie kept the kids.
Two more patrol cars pulled up quietly, filled with three MCSO deputies. Dance waved them over. Another car arrived. O’Neil. He climbed out and hurried along the path, joining his fellow officers.
‘There’s the car.’ Dance pointed.
O’Neil glanced at her, then said to the others: ‘What he’s going to rig, incendiaries, flash bangs, whatever it is, probably isn’t life-threatening in itself. That’s not what turns him on. He wants to kill with the panic, people trampling each other – because they can’t get out. You have to tell people that there’s no real danger. They might not listen. They won’t want to. But you have to try.
‘But, remember, at Bay View he was armed. Nine mil. Plenty of ammo.’
They started to leave and go inside.
Which was when, with a whump, rather quiet actually, the Honda began to burn. In seconds the fire was raging. The device, whatever it might be, was in the trunk. Just above the gas tank. Dance imagined the unsub had drilled or punched a hole into it, to accelerate the blaze.
She then noticed smoke being drawn into the HVAC system, just like at Solitude Creek.
‘The exit doors – he’s probably wired them shut. Get ’em open, now! All of them.’
CHAPTER 61
Always happened, the orderly reflected.
The two elevators in this part of Monterey Bay Hospital were pretty dependable. But what happens, a woman comes in, contractions counting down, and car number one is out of commission.
‘You’ll be fine,’ the thirty-five-year-old career medical worker told her. He turned his kindly face, under a fringe of curly hair, toward her.