Deja Dead Page 0,101

realization overtook me. Without knowing why I knew, I sensed what was beneath that plastic cover. My legs trembled as I crossed the grass and yanked the plastic upward.

At the sight, nausea overcame me and I turned to retch. Wiping my hand across my mouth, I charged back inside, slammed and locked the door, and reset my security alarm.

I fumbled for a number, lurched to the phone, and willed myself to punch the correct buttons. The call was answered on the fourth ring.

“Get over here, please. Right now!”

“Brennan?” Groggy. “What the f—”

“This goddamn minute, Ryan! Now!”

24

AGALLON OF TEA LATER I WAS CURLED IN BIRDIE’S ROCKER, DULLY observing Ryan. He was on his third call, this one personal, assuring someone he’d be a while. Judging by his end, the call’s recipient wasn’t happy. Tough.

Hysteria has its rewards. Ryan had arrived within twenty minutes. He searched the apartment and yard, then contacted the CUM to arrange for a patrol unit to stake out the building. Ryan had placed the bag and its grisly contents into another, larger bag, sealed it, and put it in a corner of the dining room floor. He would take it to the morgue tonight. The recovery team would come in the morning. We were in the living room, me sitting and sipping tea, Ryan pacing and talking.

I wasn’t sure which had the more calming effect, the tea or Ryan. Probably not the tea. What I really wanted was a serious drink. Want didn’t really describe it. Crave came closer. Actually, I wanted many drinks. A bottle I could pour from until there was no more. Forget it, Brennan. The cap’s on and it’s going to stay on.

I sipped my tea and watched Ryan. He wore jeans and a faded denim shirt. Good choice. The blues lit his eyes like colorizing on old film. He finished his calls and sat down.

“That should do it,” he said, tossing the phone onto the couch and running a hand over his face. His hair was disheveled and he looked tired. But, then, I probably didn’t look like Claudia Schiffer.

Do what? I wondered.

“I appreciate your coming,” I said. “I’m sorry I overreacted.” I’d already said this, but repeated myself.

“No. You didn’t.”

“I don’t usually—”

“It’s okay. We’re going to get this psycho.”

“I could’ve just—”

He leaned forward and rested his elbows on his knees. The blue lasers grabbed my eyes and held them. A fleck of lint rode one of his lashes, like a pollen grain clinging to a pistil.

“Brennan, this is serious. There’s a guy out there that’s some sort of mental mutant. He’s psychologically malformed. He’s like the rats that tunnel under garbage heaps and slink through sewer pipes in this city. He’s a predator. His wiring’s twisted, and now he’s fed you into whatever degenerate nightmare he’s spinning for himself. But he’s made a mistake, and we’re going to flush him out and squash him. That’s what you do with vermin.”

The intensity of his response startled me. I could think of nothing to say. Pointing out his mixed metaphors seemed unwise.

He took my silence for skepticism.

“I mean it, Brennan. This asshole has dog food for brains. Which means you can’t pull any more of your stunts.”

His comment turned me churlish, a swing that didn’t need much of a push. I was feeling vulnerable and dependent and hating myself for it, so I turned my frustration on him.

“Stunts?” I spat at him.

“Shit, Brennan, I don’t mean tonight.”

We both knew what he did mean. He was right, which increased my annoyance and made me even more contentious. I swirled my tea, now cold, and held my silence.

“This animal’s obviously been stalking you,” he drummed on, persistent as a jackhammer. “He knows where you live. He knows how to get in.”

“He didn’t really get in.”

“He planted a goddamn human head in your backyard!”

“I know!” I screamed, my composure developing a major fault line.

My eyes slid to the dining room corner. The thing from the garden lay there, silent and inert, an artifact waiting to be processed. It could have been anything. A volleyball. A globe. A melon. The round object in its shiny black bag looked harmless inside the clear plastic into which Ryan had sealed it.

I stared at it, and images of the grisly contents washed over my mind. I saw the skull rising on its scrawny, picket neck. I saw empty orbits staring straight ahead and pink neon glinting off the white enamel in the gaping mouth. I imagined the intruder cutting the