Black Oak 1, page 2
The air smelled of cinnamon and warm wood.
There were questions he wanted to ask, but speaking in this quiet place seemed curiously sacrilegious. What he wanted to know would have to wait.
He took his time, saving what he hoped was the best, for last.
In the rear wall was a niche, which held a glass cylinder some seven feet high and lit from below. It was filled with liquid, and a constant veil of bubbles large and small drifted slowly upward.
He couldn’t read the card taped to its dusty wood base, but he didn’t have to.
“Well,” he whispered. “Well.”
Maggie stood close behind him, and he could almost feel her lips when she whispered in his ear, “It killed my husband, you know.”
TWO
The trio sat at the square dining-room table, staring at a photograph lying in the table’s center. A brass hanging lamp with a dark green shade had been pulled down so far, little of its glow reached beyond them.
The rest of the room was either shapes or shadows, save where the glow was reflected in a picture window in the back wall. There, there were three ghosts.
And outside was the wind.
“He’s kidding, right?” A young man, with long thick hair that drifted in waves to his shoulders. Large dark eyes with extravagant lashes, high cheeks, and smooth skin made him look even younger. He wore a black T-shirt and jeans, his bare feet hooked over the front rung of his chair. “I mean, he’s got to be kidding.”
The woman who sat opposite him made a face but said nothing beyond a grunt that meant nothing. She had straight black hair that didn’t quite reach her shoulders, and straight black bangs that covered her brow. Curious looks. He couldn’t decide if she was Mexican or something else. Not that it mattered; she was twenty years older than he at least, and treated him like a baby brother.
“Well? He’s kidding, right?”
On his left was a lean man in a dark grey tailored suit, maroon club tie with matching handkerchief set perfectly in the jacket pocket. Bald, hook nose, eyes too deeply set to catch the light. “I wouldn’t know.”
Paul Tazaretti raked a hand through his hair. “I still don’t get it. What does Mr. Proctor want me to do?”
The woman held up one finger—pay attention, Taz.
“Gently, oval head.” She pointed at the photograph.
“Okay.”
“Large eyes completely black, almost a teardrop shape. All in all, a classic design.”
“Yeah. So?”
She pointed again. “A very thin torso, smooth, unable to tell the sex. The skin is dull white, maybe light grey.”
Taz rolled his eyes. “I can see that, Lana. Jeez.” He turned to the older man. “Come on, Doc, gimme a break here, huh? This is too weird.”
“Nothing weird about it, Paul,” Doc answered calmly, his hands folded loosely on the table. Only Doc ever called him Paul. A forefinger poked out toward the photograph. “It is, considering the time of day, a perfectly clear, adequately composed, fairly well-lighted photograph. I do not see what you are so upset about.”
Before Taz could answer, Lana said, “Look again.”
He sighed to let them know how put-upon he was, then picked up a small magnifying glass and held it over the photograph. “All right, all right.” He examined the distorted image as best he could. “So he looks like he’s making his way toward those trees in the back. He was looking back where he came from when whoever it was took the picture.”
Doc grunted.
Taz grunted as well, mocking him, but leaned closer, shifting the glass around the photograph. Slowly. Again. When he re-centered on the figure he leaned closer still. As far as he could tell, there were no matte lines or false shadows to indicate that the figure had been superimposed on this field, or pasture, or wherever the hell it was.
He looked up at Lana. “At least I don’t see any zippers on his back.”
She grinned, and pushed a finger across her straight black bangs, nudging them away from her eyes. “Invaders from Mars.”
He winked.
She said, “Don’t be so smug, Taz. It doesn’t prove a thing.”
Tell me about it, he thought sourly. But they really can’t believe this stupid thing is real.
“About five feet tall,” he estimated, turning the photograph slightly, tilting his head as he did.
“Really,” said Doc. “How do you figure that?”
“That fence on the left. He’s not far from it, and not much taller than the top rail. It’s hard to tell from the angle, but I’d say about five feet.”
The wind was nearly silent, but not silent enough, whispering just at the fringe of his hearing. It gave him the creeps, sitting here in the near dark.
The picture gave him the creeps too. He didn’t know why, exactly; maybe it was the look on the creature’s face—fear at having been caught, terror at seeing what had caught him. Maybe it was the fact that the people he worked for seldom dismissed such things out of hand.
The funny thing was, even .at the beginning, two years ago, he hadn’t thought they were nuts.
He should have, but he hadn’t.
Lana shifted impatiently, and Doc coughed softly into a fist.
Finally he dropped the glass and sat back. “I don’t know what else to tell you, except that it’s a fake.”
“And what,” said Doc calmly, “makes you reach that conclusion.”
“Because it is,” he insisted.
“That’s no answer, Paul.”
Taz had had enough. He nearly rose as high as his voice: “Look at it!”
“I am looking, Paul.”
“The damn thing’s got fangs, Doc!” He dropped back into his chair, nearly panting. “The son of a bitch is a space vampire!”
No one said a word.
The house was silent save for an occasional creak when a gust of wind pushed at the walls.
I’ve blown it, he thought miserably; damn, I’ve blown it.
Then Doc leaned back, his face pulling out of the light.
Except for thin lips pulled back in a smile. Lana swallowed. And finally giggled.
Taz opened his mouth. “You …” He closed it, and blushed when Lana’s giggles became a laugh she tried to wave away with apologetic fingers. “Oh, funny,” he snarled, and reached for the photograph. “Really funny.” He flipped it over, flipped it back, and shook his head in disgust. “This is one of Delany’s, right? It’s got to be one of his. Who else would want something this dumb.”
The picture window shimmered when the wind slid across it, and the ghosts seemed to ripple.
Doc half rose from his seat, hooked a finger in the ring at the lamp’s base, and pushed it up; the light spread. He reached behind him then to flick a switch, and the room expanded, the shadows became furniture—the table, a breakfront, a serving table beside a doorway that led into the small kitchen.
“Ha,” Taz said. “Ha and ha.” He stood, brushed a hand down his chest, and added, “Ha.”
“Now, Taz,” the woman chided softly.
“Yeah, yeah, I know.” He walked around the table, paused behind her for a moment as if he would touch her hair, then stepped through the wide archway into the living room. A three-cushion couch had its back to him, flanked by a pair of slightly battered end tables, and fronted by a long walnut coffee table on which was a neat pile of manila folders, and a telephone with a built-in answering machine. To his left was an open hallway that led to four other rooms; to his right another hall, closed off by a heavy oak door.
No one but Proctor went through there without specific invitation.
Most of the left-hand wall was taken up by a ceiling-high, glass-door bookcase whose panes were lightly etched with roses and grapevines. Directly ahead was a window half again as long as the one at his back, this one overlooking the Hudson River from the top of the Palisades; on its right was a door that led to a narrow redwood deck. On the right-hand wall was another bookcase, this one used for the TV, the VCR, the stereo system, and dozens of tapes and compact discs, magazines and folders. Two armchairs faced the sofa at angles left and right; a third, a wingback, sat between the coffee table and the window.
Although the room was large, the ceiling high, what little it contained didn’t seem lost. Mismatched and well used, it was comfortable; a place to relax in as well as work.
It ought to be; it was Proctor’s home.
He flipped over the sofa’s back, landed with an insulted “humph!”, and stretched out, hands behind his head, head on one armrest, heels on the other.
“You think I fell for it, don’t you,” he said, staring angrily at the ceiling.
He heard chairs sliding back across the carpet.
“Of course you did,” Doc said, not unkindly. “You—”
Taz waved a hand. “I know, I know, I didn’t take it all in. I didn’t consider all the facts.”
“Including …?”
He mumbled something. “Sorry?” Doc said.
“The source,” he admitted. “Okay? I didn’t ask for and then evaluate the source before I … oh, hell.” Using the rounded back as a grip, he pulled himself up, rested his chin on his folded hands. “Delany’s?”
Lana nodded. “It came Saturday. He got it in Kentucky, at the Barlow Creek Space Repository.”
He grinned. “The what?”
“The Barlow Creek Space Repository. Apparently the owner spends his vacations in spaceships.” A pause. “He says he’s their tour guide.”
“Well, hey, whatever turns him on.” He let himself slip onto his back again, sighing when Doc came around the sofa and slapped his feet off the armrest. “Sorry.”
“Don’t be sorry,” Doc said, taking the chair on the left. “Just don’t do it.”
Taz swung his feet to the floor and sat up. Doc spooked him when he acted like this. He’d rather the man yell, which is what he usually did. Then he wasn’t so unnerving.
“Now,” Doc said. He picked up a folder and opened it in his lap. A glance at his watch, but no visible reaction. “You’re sure about this?”
Taz nodded. “He makes out tow tickets every time he talks the customer into paying cash. He gives one to the customer, who pays. He gives the other to the boss, showing a smaller amount, and pockets the difference.” He rubbed the side of his head vigorously. “As near as I can see, he does it maybe five or six times a month. He’s not outrageous with the prices and stuff, and doesn’t seem to be greedy, so no one complains. The customers, I mean.”
Doc nodded. “So he’s taking away … what?”
“Four, five hundred a month that I can be sure of.”
The older man frowned.
Taz shifted. “That’s not out of line, Doc. A busy place like that, you’ve got cars and trucks coming in all the time. It also does school buses for a couple of towns. Fender work, door work, stuff inside, upholstery and stuff like that….” He shrugged. “The guy’s the super. He’s been there just about eight years, so the boss, Lozario, doesn’t watch him. Doesn’t watch anyone else, for that matter, that I can see. I took a ton of breaks, and nobody seemed to care as long as I did the work.”
“If you say so, Paul.”
Taz looked at him steadily. “I say so, Doc.”
Doc closed the folder with a snap. “Then I think Mr. Proctor will be very pleased.”
Taz resisted the temptation to preen. This hadn’t been his first case, but it was the first without direct supervision. He didn’t know if they had deliberately given him an easy one or not, and he didn’t care.
What mattered was, he had pulled it off without suspicion.
Doc checked his watch again. “Nine.” Two fingers adjusted his pocket handkerchief. “I do not think he’s coming soon. Lana?”
She poked her head out of the kitchen.
Doc tapped his watch face and shook his head. She shrugged. “Okay. I’m kind of tired anyway.”
Taz didn’t know exactly how to react. He was, on the one hand, pleased he would be able to get home early. Yet he had hoped to have spent some time with Proctor. The man was strange, no question about it. But he knew so much damn weird stuff, Taz didn’t think he’d ever get to learn half of it.
Doc rose stiffly and massaged the back of his neck. “I’ll lock up.”
Taz glanced at the locked door that led to the other wing as he slipped his feet into his trainers. “Are you sure he’s not coming?”
Doc didn’t bother to answer.
The air was damp, and Taz rolled his shoulders against a faint chill. The back of the house faced the road, but no one could see it—a dense row of tall evergreens lined the three-acre property from one end to the other, then marched down the sides to the edge of the Palisades cliff. Not even the closest neighbors could see through the heavy boughs.
They stood on the back porch, the only light a small yellow bulb over the lintel. A moth slapped against it repeatedly, barely audible.
Lana held the neck of her light sweater closed, gave a quick wave and hurried down the steps. The driveway was at the end of a short brick walk, her sedan last in line. A flash of her headlights a moment later, and she backed out into the street, flashed the lights at them again and was gone.
Taz was next, but he didn’t want to go.
He slipped his hands into his jeans pockets, thumbs out, and hunched his shoulders. Stalling. Glancing over his shoulder at the moth, and the yellow bulb that was supposed to repel it.
“It’s all right,” Doc told him quietly, taking his elbow and leading him down the steps. “I understand.” At Taz’s more rust than metal Jeep, he added, “It rather takes the wind from your sails. Him not being here, that is.”
He nodded. “Yeah. I was, you know, hoping.” He squinted over the hood, at the way the long ranch stretched into the dark. One man, or an army, could be out there, and he wouldn’t know it. “Oh, well, no big deal.”
Doc grunted; it might have been a laugh, but it definitely called him a liar.
Taz grinned. After two years working for Black Oak Security, he should be used to it by now. He wasn’t. He didn’t think he ever would be. The office is in a house, not some bigass building in the city across the river; they meet mostly in the evening because their investigative work takes up their days; and when they do meet, half the time the talk’s about the weirdest damn stuff, the kind of off-the-wall stuff he liked to watch on TV or in the movies—vampires, space guys, people who talk to the dead, people who talk to people who don’t exist, ghosts.
If it wasn’t for the money he needed, he’d be hard-pressed to explain why he stayed around.
Liar.
He scratched behind one ear. “Doc, what about that Blaine guy?”
“What about him, Paul?”
“Well, he keeps calling. Don’t you think you should have talked to him?”
Doc adjusted his topcoat’s collar. “That’s not our job.”
“Yeah, but—”
“No buts. Mr. Proctor will talk to him if he wishes. You know the system. You know how it works. The message will be passed on. That’s all we can do.” Doc touched Taz’s arm with a stiff finger. A warning. “That’s all we’re supposed to do.”
Yeah, maybe, he thought, but it’s a hell of a way to run a business.
“Paul. As much as I enjoy the company, truly, I really have no intention of spending the night in this driveway. I have a long day in the city tomorrow, and I need my rest.” Doc nudged him until he slid in behind the wheel. “Tomorrow’s Thursday. End the job Friday morning. Make it loud, so Mr. Lozario can fire you, as arranged, then come around for lunch on Monday. Late. Mr. Proctor will want to hear all the gory details.”
He smiled briefly, slapped Taz’s shoulder, and walked away.
Taz backed into the street, grimaced when the gears refused to mesh cleanly, and sped away, heading south toward Fort Lee.
Gory details.
He laughed aloud.
Only Doc would think the exposure of a simple scam—even one that had probably cost Lozario over thirty, forty grand—would have gory details.
Weird, he thought; I got some weird people here.
It wasn’t until he was halfway home that he realized they’d forgotten to turn on the answering machine.
Within seconds after Doc Falcon’s car left, the neighborhood was silent.
Except for the wind as it passed through the trees, softly hissing.
Except for the moth battering itself to death against the yellow bulb.
Except for the muffled sound of a telephone ringing inside.
THREE
… it killed my husband.
Delany bit down on the inside of his cheek, trusting the sharp pain to keep him from snickering. Or from jumping when the woman laid a palm on his back and eased around to stand beside him.
“Killed him, you say,” he said evenly, nodding politely.
“Oh, yes.” Still whispering.
Delany, m’boy, he thought, this had better be a damn good story, or you’ve got a nut here and you’ll have to lock the doors and windows.
He glanced at her sideways, watching as her left hand reached up to the cylinder and trailed fingertips down the smooth glass.
Slowly.
Almost caressingly. “Oh … yes.”
Her hip brushed against him as she reached out again, rising up on her toes, not quite able to reach the top. She looked at him with a one-sided smile. Mocking or seductive, he couldn’t say.
It didn’t matter; he didn’t like it.
The dim light gave her face planes and angles in the wrong places, and the bubbles that rose lazily from bottom to top rippled shadows across it. Her lips were too dark; her skin much too pale.
“Forgive me for saying so,” he said, watching those fingers move, “but you don’t sound too broken up about it.”
“A long time ago, Mr. Delany. A long time ago.”
“Sloan.”
She nodded, just once.
He touched the cylinder himself, and shuddered. It was cold.
Her fingers wrapped over his hand and gently eased it away. “It’s fragile, Sloan,” she told him. “I’d rather you didn’t.”
