Mind Games (20 page)

“You must be out of your mind if you think anyone enjoys being savaged like that.”

A grave mistake. A swift flash of lightning struck as his closed fist connected with her jaw.

“Don’t you ever learn?”

Good thing I’m on the floor. I won’t have far to fall,
she thought as the room dwindled into a pinpoint and went dark.

* * * * *

W
hen she opened her eyes, she was on the cot, and he stood over her. She wasn’t cuffed.

“There are some things you should never say to me.”

“One by one, I’m finding out what they are, but no need to apologize.” She thought he was going to burst out laughing, but he stared in disbelief at either her gall or stupidity.

“I didn’t mean to hurt you then. I lost my temper.”

Now she squelched the urge to laugh, remembering one of the great sins against Harley Macon. She didn’t think she could laugh anyway. Her jaw felt like a wedge had been inserted into the joint. She tried wiggling it around to find its original place, but pain shot into every canal in her head, like the worst toothache. Words sputtered in raspy croaks.

“You raped me, socked me in the jaw, and you didn’t mean to hurt me? You son of a bitch.” Every muscle in her body tensed, expecting a physical onslaught. Even those imperceptible movements made her wince.

“Every woman wants to be taken. You
want
men to dominate you.”

“I can see you haven’t been around for the last twenty years, but given the circumstances, I don’t see the point of enlightening you.”

“How did you know I haven’t been around for twenty years?”

Damn!
And then she remembered. “You told me, remember? When you said I put you in jail for twenty years.”

“That’s right,” he said. “I forgot.”

“So you know,
I
don’t want to be dominated.
I
don’t want to be taken. And I sure as hell
don’t
want to be raped. Not to wound your overactive ego, Harley, if that’s possible, but I found no pleasure in what seemed to turn you on so much.”

“I don’t know any man who wouldn’t be insulted when a woman tells him she doesn’t enjoy his lovemaking.” Macon held her eyes. “Except me, of course.”

In spite of the predictable repercussion, Diana did laugh, ribs tweaking her insides like needles.
“Lovemaking?
Is that what you call that?”

Unfazed by the insult, he said, “Tomorrow we start our little game. Let’s see how good Diana Racine really is.”

“I won’t play. I refuse to be an instrument of death. You can do whatever you want to me. I won’t play because the game’s not fair.”

“Ah, but what’s fair in life? Not too much. Not for most of us anyway. You’ll play.”

She wanted to wipe that arrogant smirk of his face but decided to put that off for another time. “Make it a fair game and you won’t have to force me.”

“What’s fair to you?”

He was toying with her, but she had nothing to lose. “Don’t kill anyone. Tie her up, hide her somewhere, but don’t kill her. If I tell you where she is, you have to let her go. And you can’t close your mind, otherwise the game’s not fair.”

Macon laughed, his handsome face a constantly-changing drama mask of evil and innocence. “Why should I? She’ll identify me. I can’t very well seduce someone with a mask on, now can I? Besides, the ultimate turn on is the kill.”

His answer confirmed what Diana already suspected. Macon couldn’t let her live, nor his next victim. He’d have to kill her. She had no illusions about her physical toughness. The next assault would break her, and soon her mental toughness would falter as well. It already had to some degree. He was counting on that to win his wicked game. Break her down, break her concentration—dilute her ability to read his mind.
Come on, Ernie. Find me. You have to know it’s Macon. You have to.

To survive, she needed to find a way to delve into his psyche, to make him think he wanted what she wanted, an obvious ploy of reverse psychology. The pounding in the back of her skull gave new understanding to how prizefighters turned punchy after years of constant battering. It hurt to talk, and he’d see through the transparency, but she had to plant the seed.

“I don’t think you want to know who’s superior. You’re afraid it’s me and always has been. I know, and that’s all that counts.” She lay back on the bed. “I don’t care what you do.”

Macon remained silent for a long time before he spoke. “Okay, we’ll play your way,” he said, nudging her. “For a while. To see how it works out.”

His touch ignited a flash. A mere nanosecond inside the mind of Harley Macon. The flash rekindled the horrific tableau of the broken body of an innocent young girl in the town where she and Macon grew up. Had he been testing her even then?

Chapter Twenty-Four

Matlock in Snakeskin Boots

B
oth Beecher and Cash were on their phones when Lucier got to the station. His men were working 24/7, and he knew they were as tired as he was. Sunday wasn’t a day off this week. But murders had been committed and a woman had been kidnapped. No time off for anyone until they caught Harley Macon.

Beecher was talking to the Saint Mark Parish Sheriff’s Department about Joey Dree. Cash immediately hung up and followed him into his office.

“Listen to this,” Cash said. “Those unsolved murders in the area where Macon grew up? They all have a few things in common: all teenage girls, all sexually assaulted with no sign of semen, all either strangled or with broken necks. And no discernible trace, at least none they picked up twenty-two years ago. Before he slipped up, the locals had no reason to connect Macon to any of the crimes.”

“What about his mother? Did you get anything on her?” Lucier asked.

“Not much. When Macon was eleven, mama brought a man into the house. They never married. At first, he and the boy seemed to get along fine, but then something happened. Macon changed. I couldn’t find any proof the man was abusive. From all reports, an ordinary mill-worker type. Macon still did fine in school, but uncontrollable bouts of anger outside the classroom plagued him. Nothing that caused problems with the police, though.”

“Hmmm. Wonder what that was about. Maybe he didn’t like mama sharing her affections. Who told you this?”

“The sheriff who tried to pin the other three murders on him. The boy adamantly maintained his innocence on all four. The mother was outraged they even considered him. Said he was being set up. Her man took off before Macon’s arrest. Disappeared, and he’s never turned up. No job history, nothing.”

Beecher came into the office. “The Saint Mark sheriff said they’ve picked up Joey Dree. He’ll hold him until we get there, but we’d better make it fast ’cause he hasn’t got reason to keep him, and I didn’t tell him much. Dree’s already lawyered up.”

“That’s what I call cooperation,” Lucier said. “So, listen up. We’ve established Macon was here during Mardi Gras last year using the name James Randall. He asked for the route to Baton Rouge to tour the river. My guess is he’s stashed Diana Racine somewhere up north, maybe in a secluded cabin or houseboat. And I bet Dree knows where.”

“We’re talking hundreds of miles of swamp and wetlands, Ernie, and…”

“Things that go bump in the night,” chimed Cash.

“Yeah, I know. My father used to travel the rivers treating people who’d never see a doctor otherwise. When we narrow down our options, I may have a way to give us an edge, but first I want to talk to Dree.”

“Do you want me to release a picture of Macon to the media?” Cash asked.

“Not yet. I don’t want him to know we’re on to him. He might spook into accelerating his plans, and I don’t want that.”
No, I don’t want that at all.

* * * * *

“M
an, he’s fit to be tied,” said Saint Mark Parish Sheriff, McCoy Jenrette, when Lucier and Beecher arrived to interview Dree. Jenrette looked like Rod Steiger’s double from
In the Heat of the Night
: shirt arcing from button to button, chewing on an unlit cigar that looked like it was rolled before the revolution.

“Joey wanted to know what we thought he’d forged. Course I couldn’t tell him because you guys failed to clue me in when you called. He asked for a lawyer and I had to let him call. Something called civil rights, ya know. The mouthpiece ain’t here yet.” Jenrette leaned back in his chair and folded his arms over his impressive girth. “Now, you wanna tell me what this is all about?”

“We think Dree may have knowledge where a suspect is holding Diana Racine.

“You mean the psychic that was kidnapped?”

“That’s the one. We think he’s the same guy who murdered two women in New Orleans last week and stabbed one of my men.”

“And you think that little ratty-ass goober Dree helped him? Jesus.” Jenrette motioned the men to sit. “This guy’s such small potatoes you couldn’t even make a french fry outta him.”

Lucier chuckled at the analogy. “Joey and the man we have pegged for the snatch, Harley Macon, were cellmates for a while, and Dree’s the only one from Louisiana we’ve found with a connection. We want to ask him a few questions. We’re not saying he knew what Macon planned, but we think he forged a driver’s license for him and set him up with a hideout.”

The door opened, and one of Jenrette’s deputies poked his head in. “Sheriff, Clayton’s here.”

“Show him in, Clyde. Then get Joey in here, will ya?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Who’s Clayton?” Beecher asked.

“Clayton Dree. Can you believe this loser’s brother is a lawyer? But before you start worrying, he’s an idiot, just like Joey. Mostly does ambulance chasing, but ever’ now and then he goes to trial. Usually loses.”

If Lucier weren’t so anxious about Diana he would have laughed at the sight of Clayton Dree’s Matlock impersonation: off-white suit, white shirt and light blue tie. But the resemblance ended there when he shifted his eyes from the Panama hat to the silver-toed snakeskin boots. Jenrette peered over his half glasses and chomped on his cigar to hide the smirk. Lucier kept his gaze away from Beecher but caught the expectant look on Jenrette’s face after his introduction when Clayton Dree spoke his first words in the high-pitched voice of a lisping twelve-year old girl. Lucier put his hand over his mouth and bit his bottom lip. Beecher feigned a yawn, followed by a cough to keep from laughing outright.

“Well, gentlemen, seems like you’ve got a client of mine here under false
pre
tenses,” Clayton Dree said. “McCoy, you pick on my brother, that’s what you do. You know he’s innocent of all charges.” He shook his head and blinked a few times, furrowing his brow. “By the way, what are the charges and have they already been filed?”

“Not yet, Clayton. Don’t get your britches all in a wad. Sit down.” He introduced Lucier and Beecher. “They want to talk to Joey, but they insisted on waiting for you.”

“That’s a load of crock, McCoy. Joey asked for me as soon as he got here. After all, what’s family for if not to help each other out? Ya know what I mean?”

“Clay, am I glad you’re here,” Joey Dree blurted upon entering the room. “This is a joke. They got nothing on me ’cause I didn’t do nothin’.”

“
Anything
, Joey. You didn’t do
anything
. Tell that to the good men here, okay? Answer their questions and they’ll let you go home. Isn’t that right, Lieutenant?”

Ignoring the lawyer’s question, Lucier turned to the bony, ferret-faced man. Standing five-three and weighing maybe a hundred pounds stark naked, Joey Dree bore a skull and crossbones tattoo on his puny arm. Seemed the Dree brothers decided that perception substituted for substance, but Joey’s tattoos didn’t make him look any tougher than his brother’s getup made him look the high-priced lawyer.

“Joey, do you know a man named Harley Macon?” Lucier asked.

“You know I do,” Joey said, fidgeting in his chair. “We shared a cell for five years. What’s he got to do with anythin’?”

“You forged a Louisiana license for him last year in the name of James Randall. You remember?”

Joey jumped up out of his chair. “That ain’t true. It ain’t true, Clay. I swear. I ain’t never forged nothin’ for him. I don’t do that shit no more. Tell ’em, Clay. I done served my time. Got me a real job and keeping my nose clean. Tell ’em, Clay.”

“Sit down, Joey.” To Lucier: “You heard my client. He doesn’t do that anymore. You don’t have any proof or else you’d have arrested him by now. And since you haven’t, we’re finished here. I’ve got an appointment.”

“Not yet, counselor,” Lucier said. “We think you did, Joey, and I’ll tell you why. Harley Macon came to New Orleans last year with a phony ID, and we have a witness who saw the two of you together.”

“That’s baloney. I ain’t never seen him in New Orleans. He came here—” Joey stopped dead on the last word and flicked away a bead of sweat that crawled down the side of his flushed face. “You tricked me. No one seen us together. You tricked me. Clay, they tricked me. You heard them. Ain’t that against the law? Entrapment or something?”