Cold Summer Nights (12 page)

“Detective Rodriguez, Des Moines PD,” he said, holding up a shiny silver badge attached to a black leather wallet. “I’d like to ask you a couple questions if you’ve got a minute,” he said firmly, returning the wallet to his back pocket and looking past Rusty to Nick.

“Join the club,” Rusty smirked, turning back for the couch. “This is Nick Foley. You probably want to interrogate him too.”

Rodriguez shut the door and studied Nick. “As a matter of fact I do,” he said, proceeding to tell them about Detective Hubbard’s horrific car accident.

Nick went slack-jawed, his brow folding into creases. “What?” he gasped.

Rodriguez nodded solemnly. “Looks like the accelerator got stuck,” he told them, resting his hands on his hips and exposing a black handgun, tucked inside a shoulder holster, beneath his brown leather jacket. “That’s what it looks like anyway.”

Rusty looked to Nick and back to the detective. “I thought they fixed that problem on those hybrids.”

A noise in the bathroom caused their heads to snap in unison to the bathroom down the hall.

“Someone else here?”
Rodriguez asked, nodding towards the closed door.

Rusty peered at the door with suspicious eyes. “That wasn’t closed before,” he
muttered.Rodriguez
looked at him funny and approached the door. They grew quiet as he gently put his ear to it, listening for any movement on the other side. He pulled away and glanced at Nick and Rusty before lightly knocking. No one answered. “Hello?
Police Department.”

Silence met his warning.

Nick watched him grip the worn brass knob and slowly turn it.

Rodriguez eased the door open, his right hand instinctively disappearing beneath his leather jacket. Light from the living room windows cut into the dark bathroom. Hesitantly, he stepped inside and flipped on the light switch.

Rusty and Nick exchanged glances in the living room as the sound of the red shower curtain whipping back along the metal bar whizzed out of the tiny room.

The detective laughed. “Just a bottle of shampoo,” he yelled, returning it to a shelf and coming back out with a sheepish grin. He sat down on the couch and chuckled, looking a bit pale. “Sorry, guess I’m a little jumpy.” He pulled his electronic tablet from an inside coat pocket and told them about the traffic accident with the teen in the pickup truck that Detective Hubbard had witnessed on his way back to Nick’s house yesterday.

The color drained from Rusty’s face. “What’d he say?”

“He said the kid told him, quote ‘she was the one he wanted’,” he repeated, reading from the tablet.

Rusty swallowed loudly and shot a sideways look to Nick. “And the kid…died?”

Rodriguez slowly nodded.
“Skull fracture.”

“Who’s the
one
he wanted?” Nick asked.

Rodriguez shook his head. “No idea, but the kid also said that ‘many will die’.”

Rusty got up from the couch and went to work wearing out the carpet with his frantic pacing.

“I know,” Rodriguez snorted. “It sounds crazy but what’s even crazier is that my friend is now dead.” He paused, staring at the coffee table with glassy eyes. “He was a good man and I can guarantee
ya
one thing, we’re going to figure out what the Santa Maria is going on here,” he said, his Hispanic accent breaking through.

Rusty stopped pacing and looked at Nick. “It’s his girlfriend.”

Rodriguez followed Rusty’s glare. “Summer Parker?”

“Yes.” Rusty shouted.
“Whatever her name is!”

Nick frowned and cocked his head at Rusty. “Who’s the snitch now?”

Rodriguez then hit Nick with the same questions Hubbard had and Nick gave him the same answers. Nick also told him about
Summer
stopping by the night before and leaving in a huff.

Detective Rodriguez punched the information into the tablet and looked up. “So you have no way to contact her?”

Nick shook his head.

The cop stared at him thoughtfully. “How is it possible you don’t know where your girlfriend lives?”

Nick told him the same thing he had told Hubbard, sweat beginning to glisten on his upper lip.

Rodriguez stared off into space, formulating his next question.
“The mob, huh?”

Nick nodded, wiping his lip with the back of his hand.

“Under normal circumstances, I would think you’re both lying. But there’s nothing
normal
about any of this,” Rodriguez sighed, giving them each a card. “Call me as soon as she shows up again,” he told them, heading for the door. He opened the door and turned back around. “And don’t leave town.”

Rusty and Nick nodded in unison. Rodriguez studied them for a moment longer and then left.

Rusty leaned against the door and traded a long stare with his friend. One that said what the other was thinking.

“I can’t believe it,” Rusty whispered.

Nick dropped his eyes back to the newspaper.

“They’re all dead now,” Rusty said softly.
“Your grandma, Amy, the gangbanger and now Detective Hubbard.
You couldn’t write this shit.”

Nick leaned back and massaged his drawn face.

“That dude was in here just yesterday, sitting right where you are,” Rusty said, staring blankly at the chair Nick was sitting in.

Nick looked down to the chair and a knock at the door made Rusty yell.

With one eye closed, Rusty peered through the peephole, sighed and opened the door.

“What the hell was that?” Dallas asked, waddling inside. “Were you guys having sex?”

Rusty shut the door behind him and locked it.

Dallas’ curly hair and beer belly bounced when he plopped down onto the ratty couch. He kicked his worn Adidas up onto the coffee table and turned to Nick. “Hey man, sorry to hear about your grandma. How’d the funeral go?”

“Long,” Nick moaned.

Dallas snorted. “I bet. I hate funerals.
Weddings too.
They’re basically the same thing,” he said, pushing his glasses back up his bulbous nose.

Rusty sat down on the other end of the couch and traded another glance with Nick. Then they slowly turned their eyes to Dallas.

Dallas looked at both of them and frowned. “What? Do I have
Cheetos
on my face or something?” he asked, brushing around his mouth.

Rusty and Nick each took a deep breath and told him everything, from the remote control and toaster, to the warnings and deaths. They filled him on
Summer’s
missing persons flier and the rounds of questioning by the two detectives.

Dallas stared at them with glassy eyes, his mouth hanging open. “Holy shit, I just came over to play some
Call of Duty: Black Ops
.”

“Yeah well, you may have to settle for
Resident Evil
,” Rusty said, going into the kitchen and grabbing three cold beers.

“Fuck that, I hate zombie games,” Dallas said, picking up Detective Rodriguez’s card again. His eyes narrowed as he examined it up close. “Maybe they were fake cops.”

“They’re not fake cops,” Nick said, taking a beer from Rusty. “And one is a dead cop now.”

“Well then your girlfriend is obviously the killer,” Dallas said, dropping the card onto the coffee table and cracking his beer. “It doesn’t take a rocket surgeon to figure that much out,” he snorted.

Rusty and Nick scrunched up their faces.

“You know what I mean,” Dallas said. “You don’t have to be a brain scientist to know that
Summer
is a cold-blooded murdering bitch,” he said, taking a long drink and belching loudly.

Nick shook his head and looked at Rusty. “And this guy couldn’t help you pick up chicks?”

“Fuck you, Foley,” Dallas said, pushing his glasses up again. “I’ve banged more chicks in the last six months than you could ever dream of.”

“Yeah, if you count Taiwanese hookers,” Rusty quipped.

Dallas and Nick both laughed.

A noise in the bathroom cut their laughter short.

Dallas frowned, staring at the closed door. “Who’s in the bathroom?”

Rusty’s face dropped when he saw the door
was closed
again. “What the hell?” he mumbled, rising from the couch.

Nick’s jaw hung in the air as he watched Rusty cautiously approach the bathroom and put his ear to the door.

Suddenly, Rusty darted back to the couch and reached down between Dallas’ legs.

“What the hell are you doing?” Dallas asked, flinching and going wide eyed when he saw Rusty pull the gun from beneath the couch. “Wow, you guys are really taking this shit all the way, huh?”

Then something dropped into the bathtub.

Their heads whipped over to the bathroom door. It sounded like the same shampoo bottle had just fallen into the tub again.

Dallas swallowed. “Okay, who’s in there?”

“No one,” Rusty whispered.

Nick’s eyes doubled in size, and he pointed to Rusty’s mouth.

Rusty looked down and noticed the cold breath tumbling out of his gaping orifice. Then he felt it in his bones, chilling him to the core. His heart began pounding wildly.

“She won’t stop,” Dallas said flatly.

They turned to see Dallas staring at the TV with foggy eyes. His glasses had slid down his nose again but he
made no
attempt to correct them.

Nick glanced to the TV, which wasn’t even on.

Rusty’s face turned white as a ghost, cold air rumbling from his gaping mouth. “Dallas?”

Nick leaned forward and put a hand on Dallas’ knee. “Hey,” he said, shaking it gently.

Dallas continued staring at the TV with unfocused eyes.

“Dallas,” Nick shouted, shaking his leg harder.

Rusty took a couple languid steps towards Dallas and something rammed against the bathroom door from the inside. A framed picture of Rusty and his dad high atop the snow covered Rocky Mountains crashed to the ground, shattering into jagged shards on the cheap silver carpet.

Rusty stumbled away from the door. “What the fuck, man!”

Nick looked down and realized he could also see his breath. His teeth began chattering as a chill suddenly swept over him.

“You’ll be next,” Dallas said tonelessly.

Their eyes snapped back to him just as someone smashed into the bathroom door again, shaking the wall.

Rusty flipped the gun’s safety off and crept to the closed door. He stood off to one side as Nick took the other, cold breath rolling out of their mouths like it was a snow covered January day. Nick was confident he would get frost bite soon.

Rusty placed his free hand on the knob and looked up to Nick, who nodded.

Listlessly, the door swung open and they stared into the darkness. Rusty slipped a shaking hand inside and flipped on the light switch. The room was empty, so they moved to the shower curtain. Rusty took one end of it and glanced at Nick, who nodded again. Rusty inhaled a deep breath and whisked the curtain back along the metal pole. Their eyes fell to the shampoo bottle lying in the tub. Slowly, they turned to each other.