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  He filled a glass with water. As he sipped it, he entered the hallway. Scott and Lacey were asleep on the floor, holding each other. He carefully stepped around them, and entered the bedroom. From its window, he spotted another man with a rifle.

  At least they’re not assaulting the place, he thought. Containing us. Maybe waiting for reinforcements. That would explain why the car hadn’t shown up again. One of them must’ve taken it to alert others.

  If the girls got away all right, they’d go for the authorities. An army of cops might descend on the place any time.

  Interesting to see which army arrives first.

  Setting down his empty glass, he went into the hallway and shook Scott’s foot. The man woke with a start. Lacey moaned, but didn’t awaken. Scott gently untangled himself from her, and followed Dukane into the living room.

  “I want you to take over the watch. They’ve got snipers stationed on both sides and the rear. Maybe one in front, but I haven’t spotted him.”

  “All right.”

  “I don’t think they’ll rush us, but we can’t rule it out.”

  He left Scott by the front window, and went into the kitchen. He searched a utility closet, a cupboard under the sink, and wasn’t surprised at not finding what he wanted. People don’t usually store combustibles in the house.

  He returned to the living room.

  “I’m going out for a second,” he said, unholstering his automatic.

  Scott frowned.

  “We’ve gotta get the paint off Hoffman.”

  “What for?”

  “Have to make him disappear in case the cops show up. That’s assuming you’re still hot to get his story for yourself.”

  “I am. But I don’t like the idea of you going outside.”

  Dukane slapped his shoulder. “Buck up, boyo, I’ll be back.”

  He led Scott to the window over the couch, and pointed out the rifleman. “I don’t expect you to hit him at this range, but put a few rounds close enough to worry him if he starts tracking me.”

  With a nod, Scott opened the louvered window.

  “You have the keys?”

  Scott fished Jan’s key case out of his pocket. Dukane took it. He went to the front window.

  Scanning the area in front of the house, he saw no one. He pushed open the door and stepped out. Back against the wall, he searched the barren terrain. Odd if nobody was covering the front. If there were only four, though, and one had to drive for help…Well, the two at the sides could easily pick off anyone trying to break from the front.

  He stepped off the edge of the stoop. Pressing his back to the wall, he made his way toward the corner. Prickles stung his legs, and he looked down to see cactus spines clinging to his trousers. The girls had apparently planted “jumping cactus” along the wall, a variety that seems to shoot its quills into anyone venturing too close.

  Nice of them, he thought.

  At the corner, he blinked sweat from his eyes and crouched down. The spines dug into his calves. Ignoring the pain, he peered around the wall’s edge. He glimpsed the sniper, saw the rifle aimed his way. Two shots blasted at once. As a bullet whined off the wall inches from his face, he sprang up and dashed for the garage. Gunfire erupted from both the house and sniper, a roar that seemed to jolt the air around him as he ran.

  A bullet tugged his sleeve near the shoulder.

  Abruptly, there was silence. He threw himself against the side door of the garage, and shoved a key at the lock face.

  Didn’t fit.

  He tried another. This one slid in. He turned it, threw open the door, and burst into the stifling heat of the garage.

  There were no windows.

  Feeling along the wall, his fingertips found a light switch. He flicked it. A single bulb came on.

  No car.

  But he smiled as he saw what he wanted.

  Lacey, shocked awake by the shooting, grabbed her revolver, scrambled off the makeshift bed, and rushed into the living room. She saw Scott kneeling on the couch, aiming through the open slats of a window.

  He glanced around at her.

  “Come here,” he said.

  She hurried to the window.

  “See that guy out there? Dukane’s in the garage. He’ll be coming out in a minute, and the guy’ll try to nail him. Take my place here. I’ll go to the front. When Dukane comes out, start shooting.”

  “It’s too far.”

  “Doesn’t matter. With fire coming from two angles, he won’t know whether to…”

  “Shit or go blind?”

  “Exactly.”

  Lacey nodded, and Scott ran out the front door. She cocked the revolver. She lined up the distant man in the sights, glanced away at the garage door, then back to the man. From his location, it looked as if the garage would give Dukane shelter for the first two or three yards. Then he would be in the open.

  Her hand was sweaty on the walnut grips.

  Too bad the man’s so far away, she thought. If he was half that distance, she’d stand a much better chance of hitting him.

  Just as well, maybe. She didn’t need another killing on her conscience.

  The garage door opened. She sighted on the man and held her breath. Then she glanced again at the door. Dukane stepped out, a large metal container in each hand. But he didn’t run. Instead, he set them outside the door and vanished into the garage. Moments later, he reappeared. With a ladder!

  He spread the ladder’s legs, climbed it, and boosted himself onto the roof of the garage.

  He was gone.

  Seconds passed. Lacey licked her parched lips.

  Then a single gunshot roared in the stillness.

  The distant figure of the rifleman lurched as if kicked, and dropped flat.

  Dukane climbed down the ladder. He made a thumbs-up gesture toward Lacey, then carried the ladder back into the garage. He picked up the two containers, and strolled across the open area.

  He and Scott came into the house, beaming like boys who’d just won a no-hitter.

  “Nice play,” Scott said.

  “The bastard came too close, first time across. I chickened out of the return run.”

  “Wonder if we can get his rifle.”

  “Not worth the risk. The rear man would pick us off. But I got what I wanted.” He raised the cans: a two-gallon tin of gasoline and a gallon container of turpentine.

  Lacey frowned. “Turpentine? You’re going to take the paint off Hoffman?”

  “Right.”

  “Don’t.”

  “Could come in very handy. Lacey, you stay out here and keep an eye on the situation. Scott, get your recorder. No time like the present to get his story.”

  CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX

  Statement of Samuel Hoffman July 20

  Okay. You want me to talk, I’ll talk. Give you everything you need to know for your fuckin’ book that’s gonna get you killed.

  I’m Sammy Hoffman. You guys know that, right? Okay. So I’ll start with something you don’t know. How about this? I banged my English teacher way back in high school. She was a cunt. That’s what you do to cunts, bang’em.

  The one I really wanted, it was Lacey. Used to spend all my time looking at her, thinking how she’d look naked, thinking how her tits’d feel, and her ass and her puss. Now I know, now I know. Only wish I’d got her then. She was just sixteen. Should’ve took her someplace and kept her. But I was chicken-shit. She was too damn beautiful. Scared me off. Yeah, well, got her at last. Well worth the wait, I tell you that. You guys oughta have a sample, if you haven’t already.

  Okay, so I had this hard-on for Lacey but I was scared to touch her and this English teacher bitch pissed me off so I did her instead. Right on top of her desk after school. It was a kick.

  I was dumb, then. If I was smart, I’d of turned the bitch’s switch off so she couldn’t put her mouth on me. But I didn’t, and she did.

  Adiós, Oasis.

  So I’m on the road, here and there and everywhere, doing
people every chance I get, always on the move. Shit, I’ve probably got kids from one end of the country to the next,’less all the hons got themselves scraped. Yeah, well, plenty were probably on the pill.

  Left lots of graves, too. Dead men don’t yap. Learned my lesson from the English teacher. See, she taught me something, after all. Thought I was stupid.

  Stupid, all right. I should’ve stayed on my own. That was my big mistake.

  Klein. Harold Klein. Met him in LA. A bar on La Cienaga. Tiny’s Place. We tipped a few, and he saw my piece and we started jabbing and he figures I’m up for some action. Says he needs a driver and he’ll pay me a thousand. That sounded good, only he didn’t level. Told me he was hitting a Wells Fargo. I park in front of the bank, only he goes in next door to this TV station and blows the face off this anchor gal, Theresa Chung. Remember her?

  Okay. We get the fuck out of there and he has me drive up in this canyon and stop. Only instead of pulling out the bucks he owes me, he pulls a Colt automatic. Dead men don’t yap, right? Only he didn’t figure on Sammy Hoffman, and guess who winds up in the ditch?

  Next thing I know, I wake up in the middle of the night with a muzzle up my mouth. Friends of Harold, right? Wrong. Co workers. They figure, if I’m good enough to put the dark on Harry, I’m good enough for them. Smart fellas.

  Too bad I wasn’t that smart. I’d of kissed them off.

  But I went along, and pretty soon I’m a hotshot assassin for The Group. They don’t want people snooping into their business, you know? Blowing the whistle on them? Snatching off some of their converts for deprogramming? That sort of shit. They set up the hits real good and paid me through the nose and took good care of me. I was living like a fuckin’ tycoon.

  Who’d I hit? Senator Cramer, for one. Guy was calling for an official investigation. Seems his son got mixed up in the SDF. That’s The Group, you know. The Spiritual Development Foundation. Anyway, that’s what got me into this piss soup, that bastard from People catching a shot of me in the crowd.

  Before Cramer was that nigger mayor in Detroit. Jackson? The LA city council explosion, that was me. The New York police commissioner, Barnes. This ain’t necessarily in order, you understand. I can give you guys all the details later, when you get me out of this rat trap and take me someplace safe. Give you something to shoot for. If I tell you everything now, you might just let those bastards have me, right? I’m no fool. I’ll just whet your appetites a bit, okay?

  Remember Dickinson? Heart attack in his office while he was dickin’ his secretary? That was me. Tricked up his rubbers. Chavez, the investigative reporter? He put his nose into the SDF. The o.d. that put him away, it wasn’t selfinflicted: it was Sammyinflicted.

  That’s just scratching the surface. There’s plenty more. Shit, I worked six years for The Group.

  Anyhow, it was that People shot that put me away. They figure I can’t show my face around, so I’m the perfect sucker for their experiment. They’re gonna make me invisible, they say. Sure. Invisible. And shit smells like Chanel, right?

  Only they do.

  Lacey knocked on the door.

  “Come on in,” Dukane said.

  Lacey opened it, and stepped into the bathroom. The air was pungent with the smell of turpentine. Scott and Dukane, kneeling over Hoffman, were scouring him with washcloths. The small cassette recorder from Scott’s attaché case rested on the toilet seat.

  Scott smiled up at her. His face was sweaty, damp hair clinging to his forehead. “How’s it going?” he asked.

  “One of the men changed positions. He went over to the body. He’s still near it.”

  “They had to correct their field of fire,” Dukane said. Tipping the turpentine can, he dampened his washcloth and started working on Hoffman’s shoulder. Most of the back was clear, now. The arms, still painted, remained cuffed behind him. One leg was gone, as if it had been amputated below the rump. Scott was busy cleaning the other.

  “How about joining the party?” Hoffman asked. “I been entertaining these guys with my exploits. Great stuff, I hate you to miss it.”

  She ignored him. “There’s plenty of food,” she said. “Shall I make some breakfast?”

  “I’m starving,” Scott said.

  “Bacon and eggs all right?”

  “Can’t eat that shit,” said Hoffman. “Get me some beef, and don’t cook it.”

  “What about you, Matt?”

  “Bacon and eggs sound fine. I could use some coffee, too.”

  “Gonna get me that meat?”

  “It’s frozen,” she said.

  “So unfreeze it.”

  She left the bathroom, never mentioning why she had come in. She couldn’t ask them to move out, and she certainly had no intention of using the toilet in front of them. In a kitchen cupboard, she found a plastic pitcher. She lowered her pants and squatted over it. When she finished, she flung its contents out the front door. Then she washed her hands, and set about preparing breakfast.

  Guess she didn’t want to hear, huh? I get the feeling she don’t like me.

  Anyway, The Group’s got this lab. It’s out in Iowa, looks just like a farm. Even grow stuff there. The lab’s underground, all kinds of security. Make up all their shit there: potions, amulets, stuff like that. Witchin’ shit.

  Okay, they take me to the lab. I figure I’m in for it. I mean, how they gonna make a guy invisible, you know? I figure I’m in for shots, at least. God only knows. You don’t make a guy invisible with food coloring.

  But they don’t put me in a cell or a dissection room or nothing, they put me up in a nice room aboveground. I’ve even got my own little enclosed garden right outside my door. This isn’t so bad after all, I figure.

  And it gets even better. These two gals come in, and they’re both fantastic knock outs. One of them, the gal in charge of the project, she’s…you’d have to see her. Give you wet dreams. But man, I know right off I’d be in deep shit if I crossed her. It’s her eyes. She has this look like she wouldn’t mind eating your heart. Well, that wasn’t what I wanted eaten so I figured I’d keep off her.

  The other, her assistant, wasn’t any slouch but she didn’t have that wicked look so I was hoping to get a piece of her.

  Okay, they’re in charge. They’re witches, and the gorgeous one turns out to be the leader of the whole ball of wax. Laveda herself. I’d worked six years for her, never seen her. Keeps herself a low profile.

  They come in one morning before dawn, it’s a Wednesday, with a sack. Laveda tells me to open it. I do, and inside is this guy’s head. Nothing else, just his head. A fresh one.

  “What am I supposed to do?” I say. “Eat it?” They don’t even crack smiles. Instead, Laveda hands me these black beans and tells me what to do.

  I’m not a squeamish guy, you know? I was okay, sticking the beans in his mouth and ears and nose. Then it came to the eyes. You oughta try it sometime. I’ve gouged a few eyes in my time, but I never stuck around to inspect the damage. Anyway, okay, I popped this guy’s eyes and stuck the beans in and shut the lids. Made my skin crawl.

  Then they give me a shovel and we go out in my little garden and I have to dig a hole. It only has to be a foot deep. When I’m done, we all get naked. I figure, this is getting better and better. Maybe next is an orgy, who knows? I’d heard plenty about Laveda and her orgies.

  Okay, the three of us are standing there bare-ass in the dark, with Coral hanging onto the head. Laveda’s wearing this gold chain belt with a dagger at one side and a gold flask on the other. She takes out the dagger. Coral gets on her knees and holds out the head.

  What Laveda does then, she starts carving a design on the guy’s forehead. Looks like a figure-eight with x’s in the middle.

  Okay. After she’s done with the cutting, she takes the flask off her belt and opens it and holds it up at the sky. “The river flows,” she says. “Its water is the water of life. All powerful is he who drinks at its shore.” She takes two drinks out of the flask, and some of i
t runs off her chin and I see it ain’t Scotch, it’s blood. Then she takes a mouthful of the stuff and gets the guy’s head from Coral and spits it right into his mouth.

  Coral does the same thing. Two gulps for her, one for the goddamn head. Then it’s my turn. I’ve done a lot of shit, but I’m no fuckin’ vampire. You oughta try a swig of blood, sometime. Put you off your appetite for a week. But that wasn’t the worst, the worst was putting my mouth up to this guy’s mouth. I didn’t want to shut my eyes, you know, and have the gals think I couldn’t take it. So I stare the poor dead bastard right in the face and hold his mouth open and try to spit in the blood without touching his lips. But I touched them, all right. And his mouth couldn’t hold all this blood, you know, so it came slopping back like he was puking.

  Shit. Enough of that. So much for my goddamn orgy. We plant the head face-up, and that’s it. The gals slip into their clothes again. Adios, see you tomorrow.

  I brushed my teeth so hard my gums bled and I figured it was more of his blood, and the harder I brushed the more blood came out. I figured the only way to get all the blood out was to upchuck. Didn’t do that. It might break the spell, or whatever, and we’d have to go through the whole thing again. So I finally quit brushing, and gargled a lot with Irish, and spent the rest of the day killing the bottle.

  The next morning, Coral comes in alone. She’s got a bottle under one arm, and I’m hoping it isn’t blood. It’s Remy Martin. Not for me, though. It’s for our pal in the garden. She has me water the fuckin’ head with it. A whole fifth of cognac. I suggest we save some for ourselves—I mean, is he gonna miss a couple of shots? But she doesn’t go for it. Doesn’t go for me, either, when I try out a few moves on her.

  Okay, we keep this up for a week. Every morning, she wakes me up and we go out with a fresh bottle to dump on the ground.