Relentless (15 page)

Milo was chronologically six, intellectually twenty-something, and emotionally maybe ten or eleven. Expressions of affection at times embarrassed him but did not yet offend him.

Without looking away from the computer screen, he said, “I’m never gonna think you’re an idiot.”

“Just wait. You’ll see.”

“Never,” he said, and chewed on his lower lip.

“Love you, Milo.”

He nodded. “Yeah.”

When I discovered I was chewing my lower lip, too, I changed the subject. “Where’s Lassie?”

He pointed to a pair of cabinet doors to the right of the big plasma screen in the entertainment center.

“She’s in the cabinet?” I asked.

“Yeah.”

“Did you put her there?”

“No.”

“Your mom didn’t put her there.”

“No.”

“She got in there herself?”

“I think so. She likes it.”

I went to the entertainment center and opened the cabinet doors to which Milo had pointed.

Lassie sat in the deep cabinet, facing out, grinning, wagging the tip of her tail.

“Why would she want to sit in a cabinet?” I asked Milo.

“I think she didn’t like this thing.”

“What thing?”

“This thing on the computer that I don’t know what it is.”

“So she hid from it in a cabinet?”

“I don’t think she’s hiding.”

“Then what’s she doing?”

“Maybe meditating,” Milo said.

“Dogs don’t meditate.”

“Some do.”

To Lassie, I said, “Come out of there. Come on, girl.”

She would not move.

“Okay,” I said, “I’m going to leave her in there, but I’m not going to close the doors on her.”

“Whatever,” Milo said.

Before I had crossed half the room, the stunning harbor view drew me once more to the windows.

Between the near and farther channels, scores of sailboats and motor cruisers were tied up at midwater moorings. To board and disembark, an owner needed a smaller craft to use as a tender.

Beyond the far shore of the harbor, hills rose to the Pacific Coast
Highway. Beyond the highway, other hills ascended, and over all, the sky loomed dramatic, bruised and swollen and scarred, and full of threat.

No one could know where we were, but prudence—and my paranoia—required that before twilight I would have to put down the motorized shades encapsulated in the first of the two air spaces in the triple-pane windows. After dark, the interior house lights would make clear targets of us to anyone on the seawall or aboard one of the boats in the harbor.

Behind me, at the entertainment center, the cabinet doors thumped shut.

When I looked back, Milo remained at his computer, but the dog was nowhere to be seen.

   In the study, which had no water view and which had been staged with furniture too contemporary for my taste, I sat in a steel-and-leather chair, at a steel-and-glass table that served as a desk.

Earlier, I had activated the disposable phone. It came with prepaid minutes, so I didn’t have to give my name or a credit card.

Now I took a deep breath and phoned Penny’s parents. Grimbald— formerly Larry—answered. “Boom.”

“Hi, Grim, it’s me, Cubby.”

Grimbald had a formidable voice with a resonant timbre that made him sound like I imagined a hearty Viking would have sounded. “Hey, Cupcake,” he called out to Clotilda, “it’s our fair-haired boy, the famous writer.”

“I’m not that famous, Grim.”

“You’re a damn sight more famous than me, in spite of the fact I’ve been blowing up stuff all my life.”

“Listen, Grim, I wanted to get to you before you saw it on the news later today.”

“You know we don’t watch news, Cub. Last time we watched news, Cupcake shot the TV. Too damn expensive, buying TVs all the time.”

“Well, someone else might see it and call you. So I wanted you to know we’re all right. Penny, Milo, me, and Lassie—we all got out just fine, not a scratch.”

“Got out of what?”

“The house. Our house blew up, Grim.”

“Cupcake, they’re all fine, but their house blew up.” I could hear Clotilda in the background, and then Grimbald said, “Cupcake says isn’t that ironic, considering your in-laws’ profession. What the hell were you doing that your house blew up?”

“Nothing. They’ll probably decide it was a gas-line leak.”

“Not terrible damn likely.”

“Grim, I’d like you to call the fire department, tell them you just heard about the explosion and you want them to know we weren’t in the house, we’re traveling in Florida, by car, a long road trip.”

“Where are you in Florida? I’ve blown up a bunch of things down there.”

“We aren’t in Florida. That’s just what I want you to tell them—to explain why we aren’t there dealing with the aftermath.”

After a hesitation, Grimbald said, “Cub, tell me you didn’t blow up your own house.”

“Of course I didn’t. I’m not a criminal type, Grim. I don’t do insurance scams.”

“I didn’t mean on purpose. I meant like maybe you were using the vacuum cleaner the wrong way or something.”

“Even I can’t blow up a house with a vacuum cleaner.”

“Like if you thought you could use it to clean the burner rings on the gas furnace, but you didn’t turn the furnace off—”

“It would never cross my mind to clean the burner rings.”

“That’s good. Because they don’t need to be cleaned. Or maybe you thought you could use the portable barbecue indoors.”

Staring down at my reflection in the glass tabletop, I thought my faint smile was a remarkable testament to the affection that I had developed for my in-laws over the years.

“Grim, I didn’t blow up the place. Someone else blew it up, and he knew what he was doing, so I suspect the fire has been so intense that no clues are left, it’ll look like a gas leak.”

Astonished, he said, “You know people who’d want to blow up your house?”

“I think I know one.”

“Who?”

“It’s a complex story, Grim, and it’s got a big you-must-be-pulling-my-chain factor, so I don’t want to get into it now. I don’t have time, I’ve got a lot on my plate right now.”

“Are you in danger, Cub? Is Penny, Milo?”

“Yes, Grim, we are.”

“Then you’ve got to go to the police.”

“Not a good idea,” I said. “I don’t have a shred of proof. The cops couldn’t do anything. Anyway, they wouldn’t believe me. They might even suspect me of blowing up the house myself, like you did.”

“I never thought you did it intentionally.”

“Plus I’m a little bit of a celebrity. The story would be all over cable news, my face all over TV. Suddenly I’d be a lot more recognizable than I am now, and it would be harder—maybe impossible—for us to move around anonymously and hide out.”

“It’s so bad you’ve got to hide out?”

“Yeah. And another reason I called is—I don’t think this guy will come after you, ’cause you’re not
my
parents, you’re Penny’s folks, you’re probably safe, but take some precautions.”

“Don’t worry about us, Cub. We’re ready for anything.”

“I know you are.”

“We were ready for the country to fall apart back in the seventies, when the crazy government was running seventeen percent inflation and wrecking the economy. We were ready for the AIDS epidemic to wipe out civilization. Then Y2K, all the computers were supposed to crash and send off nuclear missiles. After 9/11, Cupcake and me were for sure ready for the crazy Islams, but they haven’t showed up yet, either. Say … this isn’t the Islams blew up your house, is it?”

“No, Grim, it isn’t.”

“You say precautions. Do we look out for anyone in particular?”

“He’s about forty-one, white hair, stands five feet eight, built like a tank, may or may not be wearing a bow tie.”

“He tries to come in here, he’s toast. You should come here and hide out with us.”

“I don’t want to draw him to you guys.”

“Hell, let’s draw him, Cub. Let’s lure him in and squash him like a bug.”

“Maybe we will, Grim. When I know more about him. When I have a better handle on him than I do now.”

“I like the way you sound, Cub. You sound together.”

“Well, I might not be as together as I sound.”

“Cupcake, she’s always worried in a crisis you’d be useless.”

“I won’t hold that against her, Grim. I can see where she might get that idea.”

“But me,” he said, “I always suspected there’s a secret you, and the secret you has the right stuff.”

“I appreciate that.”

“More than once, I’ve said to Cupcake, he can’t be the milksop he seems to be, ’cause his books have a toughness in them.”

“One more thing, Grim. You can’t reach me by phone. I’m using a
disposable, and it’s probably the first of a series, until this thing is done. But Penny or I will check in from time to time.”

“We won’t miss a call. We’ll be right here. I think for the duration, we’ll go into lockdown. You know what that means?”

“Yes, I know.”

“Remember what the Lord said.”

“He said a lot of things, Grim.”

“He doesn’t want us harming the innocent, but he gave us ‘the power to tread on serpents.’ This man blows up your house, he sounds like a serpent to me. What do you think?”

“Definitely a serpent,” I agreed.

“Then don’t you hesitate to tread on him if you get a chance.”

In the glass table, the image of my face was like a reflection in a pool of cloudy water, disturbing because its character remained indeterminate. It might have been the face of an earnest pilgrim or that of a fetal demon not yet born to his potential.

   Olivia Cosima, my editor in New York City, was still at lunch when I phoned. I left a voice mail preparing her for the news of our exploding home.

I also dictated a statement for Olivia to give to my publisher’s publicity department, with which to respond to media inquiries.

Thankfully, Penny’s editor was also at lunch, so I didn’t have to answer any questions, and I left her a similar voice mail.

When I returned to the family room, Milo had taken a break from whatever arcane project he pursued on his computer. He stood at the glass wall, staring at the harbor.

Lassie had emerged from the cabinet. She stood at Milo’s side, also gazing out of the floor-to-ceiling window.

Neither of them responded when I said that lunch would be in thirty minutes. They seemed to be entranced by the vista of harbor and hills.

In the kitchen, Penny remained at the secretary with her laptop.

“I made a complete list of the phrases Waxx used in your review and in John Clitherow’s.”

The list lay on the kitchen island. I picked it up from the black granite countertop.

Before I could begin to read, Penny said, “And I found another review … another novelist he savaged in a similar way, not exactly the same language but the same criticisms, and extremely vicious.”

“Who’s the writer?”

“Thomas Landulf.”

“Vaguely familiar. But I’ve never read him.”

“He published his first novel just fourteen months ago.
The Falconer and the Monk
.” She consulted a notepad. “Waxx called it ‘a triumphant example of idiot logic, an incandescent work of puerile nonsense that will be a shining beacon to perpetual juveniles and the terminally sentimental for generations to come.’”

“Better syntax than usual,” I said, “but ouch.”

“I wondered if Landulf wrote anything since, so I googled him.”

Penny turned, glanced toward Milo at the family-room windows, then rose from her chair and came close to me.

Lowering her voice, she continued: “Eleven months ago, three months after the publication of his book, Tom Landulf tortured and killed his wife, tortured and killed his three-year-old daughter, and committed suicide.”

Her piercing blue gaze had never been more compelling, and I was constrained to meet her eyes as long as she required.

“That’s why the name rang a bell,” I said. “Must have been a two-day sensation on the news, so I heard a little about it.”

Because I am squeamish, my custom is to avoid watching or reading news about mass murders. More than a custom, it is a rule.

Penny said, “His wife, Jeanette, loved to play the piano. He cut off her ears. Then her fingers, one at a time.”

The history of literature is replete with colorful monsters that come from netherworlds and other worlds and laboratories.