“Maybe a French dip.”
“Don’t shit me, man, this is good stuff. You want me to check it out, make it worth taxpayer dollars?”
“Absolutely not. Stay away from the Rehbein Building and keep your mouth shut. I’m on my way.”
Remy hung up and finished dressing. The Monster was meticulous and stealthy, and his survival depended on invisibility; the creeper’s actions had been impulsive, too sloppy for an accomplished killer. It didn’t dovetail. He gave it a ten-percent chance that they were one and the same, but it was a thread that had to be followed to its terminus, because sometimes, killers went off script.
* * *
Froggy looked across the street at the graffiti-tagged Rehbein Building. Who knew it had a name? He stepped off the curb and walked toward it casually, like he was just out for a stroll. Things were slowing down on the street, so why not take a look? Maybe do the criminal justice system a favor while he was at it and get a nice payday. The pincushions wouldn’t mind, shooting galleries were the most peaceful places he knew because everybody was usually unconscious.
He jimmied a loose board off a broken window, slithered through, and dropped down into the lower level. It was dark, but he recognized the potent reek of drugs, vomit, shit, decay. The aromatherapy of his life, nothing shocking or new to him.
He turned on his flashlight app, but his phone was almost dead and the light was weak, giving him a view of his feet and not much else. Froggy hated the dark and the things it could conceal, but he didn’t sense any human presence. It figured—the pincushions would choose the upper floors, away from street level, like sick pigeons roosting in the rafters.
He shuffled slowly, kicking away dead rats, spent syringes, piles of garbage and moldering detritus. Then his phone gave up the ghost, and he was submerged in total darkness. Time to get the hell out of here.
As he backtracked, feeling his way along the wall, his nose picked up a particularly foul smell, which sent him scrambling in the opposite direction. When his foot came in contact with a large, unyielding lump, he froze, and that’s when the pain came, blinding and searing, right between his shoulders.
Froggy dropped on top of something squishy and putrid and closed his eyes, absolutely certain he was dead and had gone straight to hell. A moment later, he realized he was still alive and wished he wasn’t.
Chapter Thirty
AFTER A DOUBLE-DOSE OF MELATONIN, SLEEP came fast and hard for Sam. Dreamless for a while, but at some point death crept in as it always did. But it was a different kind of dream—this time he was an observer, not a participant.
He saw Melody stepping into a black Jeep Rubicon and getting beaten, saw Yuki being strangled by a faceless man, saw Rolf nodding off in heroin rapture and turning stiff and pale. Magda from Dead to Rights III made an appearance, too, sitting in her Jaguar in the rain with bloody stab wounds in her chest, and so did Dr. Frolich, standing on Wilshire Boulevard, waving a Colt Anaconda.
There was also an anonymous phantom hovering offscreen, an invisible puppeteer silently manipulating the dream cast of helpless marionettes. The specter materialized for a moment. She had gray eyes, eyes the color of tombstone granite that didn’t seem to match her strawberry blond hair. What did you see? What do you remember? she asked, then disappeared.
He didn’t wake up in full-blown panic, but his body was reacting the way it did after a combat dream, heart hammering against the wall of his chest, sweat drenching his body, muscles taut as piano wire, ready to strike or flee. Most of the details of this night terror were already dissipating, thankfully almost forgotten, but the image of hands squeezing Yuki’s throat was still vivid. He cringed, imagining the choking sounds that would accompany the horrific scene because his dreams sometimes had dialogue, but they never had sound effects. Did anybody’s?
Were the hands choking Yuki yours?
He shook his head, trying to scatter the appalling contemplation. Where had it even come from? She’d wounded him, and sure, he was angry, but even his subconscious couldn’t be so damaged as to be capable of conjuring such an unimaginable vision. Could it?
No, it had just been another bad dream, a warped amalgamation of fear and anxiety his waking mind couldn’t process, and little wonder, considering the way the day had rolled out. But the image was stubborn, insistent, and he would never get back to sleep until he knew she was okay, as irrational as it seemed.
Sam dressed in the dark and crept toward the kitchen. Melody was curled into fetal position on the sofa, her breathing deep and even. He wrote her a note, letting her know he’d be back soon. The digital display on the microwave read 5:17.
He grabbed the keys to the Mustang and let himself into the garage, careful to pull the door closed quietly behind him. By the time he made the drive to Marina del Rey, Yuki would be getting up for work.
Chapter Thirty-one
REMY SQUINTED AGAINST THE BLINDING WORK lights as he watched the crime scene techs collect trace around Froggy and the badly decomposed mound that had been human once. Not Wanda—this person had been dead far longer than two weeks. It was impossible to know if this was an old overdose or the work of the Monster; only an autopsy would tell. He hacked and cut with a heavy, serrated knife, and the bones wouldn’t lie.
Froggy had been stabbed multiple times, but it wasn’t signature work. A necessity, not pleasure. It was possible this was the site of the Monster’s first kill, before he’d established a hunting pattern and perfected his technique, and he’d been defending his handiwork against Froggy. The only problem with that scenario was that serials usually didn’t dwell where they killed.
But there were exceptions to that rule, and maybe the Monster was one of them. If he was, they’d chased him away and he was never going to come back.
One of the techs looked up at him. “How far do you want us to take this, Detective?”
“Wall to wall, bag and print everything.” The tech didn’t roll his eyes or sigh or swear, he just went back to work. Remy didn’t know if he would have the capacity for such restraint, it was a big space.
Bill Turner walked the cleared path and came up beside him, the smell of coffee and cigarettes slightly mitigating the other, more offensive smells in the room. “You think we’ve got something?”
“I’m leaning in that direction. How’s the canvass going?”
“We chased all the cockroaches back into their hidey-holes, so we’re clearing buildings and hitting every fleabag from here to Miracle Mile. If this is the Monster, he wasn’t prepared for Froggy, and he made a damn mess of him, so he’s either covered in blood or naked somewhere.”
“That’s what gets me. Every kill the Monster makes, he’s covered in blood, no way around it, so where is he getting rid of his clothes? We’ve been dumpster-diving for the past three months.”
Bill pushed a square of Nicorette gum from a foil pack and began chewing noisily. “He’s got a stash place we haven’t found, maybe someplace he burns them. Shit, he could be doing collages with them and selling them on Venice Beach.”
“Miracle Mile to here. He has range. What’s his transportation?”
“If he cleans up in the motels like we figure, he could stuff his clothes in a bag and take a bus.”