Neil Mcmahon Page 2

  "We can't speculate at this time on why the golf clubs were taken, or how they ended up where they did," Atlanta police spokesman Charles Richardson said. Richardson also declined to comment on a possible motive for the murders. But another source, speaking on condition of anonymity, said that nothing else of value appeared to have been taken from the house.

  The community's residents, shaken by the murders, expressed deep concern at this new development. "You're telling me they killed six people for some golf clubs, then threw them away?" said an outraged neighbor, who also asked not to be identified. "That's crazy."

  Police gave assurances that the investigation was being pursued with every available resource.

  Chapter 1

  Carroll Monks was planning a trip to Ireland. His grandfather had grown up near Kilrush, on the west coast, before emigrating to the States. Monks had seen a photo of the place -- a stone hovel in a barren field, miles from the nearest tiny village.

  But Monks himself had never set foot on Irish soil. Why that was so was a puzzle even to him. The only answer he could give was that his life for the past thirty-odd years seemed to have been one long struggle to stay on top of whatever he was doing, while stumbling toward the next goal -- college, medical school, five years in the navy, getting established in practice. Then marriage, children, divorce, and the thousands of vicissitudes that went with all that. Most of the traveling he had done had either been out of necessity, or vacations that were aimed at pleasing his children.

  But the lapse was still inexcusable, and he was going to rectify it, come next March. He was not in search of his roots -- he intended to make that clear to everybody he met. Mainly, he hoped to drink in some good pubs, walk on deserted beaches, and listen to a lot of rain, while he was warm and dry inside.

  He was warm and dry right now, inside his own living room. It was early December, getting toward dusk, and the northern California winter was starting to settle in. A fire crackled in his woodstove, with cats sleeping in front of it, waiting for him to break out the slab of fresh salmon that they knew was in the refrigerator, ready to broil on a charcoal grill. Meanwhile, to get himself in shape for the journey, Monks had put aside the vodka that was his usual preference and taken up an apprenticeship with John Power whiskey, a working-class Irish malt with a good rough edge. He liked to sip it neat, slowly, sampling various stouts as chasers. The effect was like nectar and ambrosia combined.

  He had been reading up on Irish history and had a pile of maps and guidebooks that he consulted while plotting his course. His main focus was a leisurely trip up the west coast, through Galway to Donegal, staying as close as he could to the ocean. He had no fixed schedule. In early spring, lodging should be easy to find. He would be traveling alone. Ideally, he would have a female companion along, but there was no one on the radar just now. He was starting to wonder if there ever would be again.

  Monks decided to pour one more short splash of whiskey before starting the charcoal for the salmon. He was getting to his feet when a knock came at the front door.

  This surprised him. His house was a good hundred yards off a little-traveled county road, surrounded by redwoods, all but hidden from view. He would have heard a car coming up his gravel drive. So the caller was on foot -- but there were no near neighbors, and no one in the habit of dropping by.

  He stepped to a window that gave a view of the deck outside the front door. His surprise deepened. A young woman was standing there. The evening darkness was closing in, but he was quite sure she wasn't anyone he knew. She was looking around, in a way that suggested she might be nervous at approaching a stranger's house at dusk.

  Monks walked to the door and opened it.

  She was in her early twenties, tall and full-figured; not really pretty but attractive, with olive skin and strong Mediterranean features. Her black hair was pinned with a clasp and worn long down her back. She was dressed as if for business, in tailored slacks and a silk blouse. She smiled but that looked nervous, too.

  "I saw your lights," she said, with a slight stammer. "I got a flat tire, down on the road."

  Monks's heart sank a little. Changing a tire, in the dark, on a vehicle he didn't know anything about, was not an enjoyable prospect.

  "I'll come take a look," he said.

  She murmured thanks.

  He was wearing jeans, a flannel shirt, and well-worn Red Wing work boots -- clothes that would do. He got a powerful Mag flashlight out of the front closet and put on a wool-lined Carhartt jacket. Then, seeing that she had crossed her forearms and was rubbing her upper arms with her palms, he said, "You're welcome to stay here and warm up while I go check it out."

  She shook her head. "That's okay."

  "You want a coat?"

  "That's okay," she said again. "I've got one down there. I didn't think it was this cold."

  Monks switched on the flashlight, illuminating their path down the gravel drive toward the county road. The woods were still. A few brave tree frogs emitted hopeful croaks in the chilly damp air, trying to strike up the usual evening chorus, but apparently most of their comrades were bedded down in amphibean comfort, exercising selective deafness.

  "I can't promise I can do this," Monks warned. "Is there somebody around here who could come pick you up?"

  "No."

  She didn't live nearby, then, and wasn't visiting someone who did. He wondered what she was doing on a narrow, out-of-the-way road that ran from noplace to noplace else. Probably she was just lost.

  "Do you know where the jack and spare are?" he asked.

  "No."

  "Do you have an owner's manual?"

  "I'm not sure."

  His lips twisted wryly. There was nothing like traveling prepared. But he reminded himself that at her age he had been pretty feckless, too.

  "We might have to call a tow truck," he said.

  She nodded, still clasping herself.

  Monks thought about trying to keep up small talk, but it seemed clear that she wanted to get this done and get out of here. He could hardly blame her. He probably seemed harmless, but he was still a strange man that she was alone with, in a lonely place. And given the age gap, she was doubtless bored to tears, just on general principles.

  "By the way, my name's Carroll," he said.

  "Marguerite. Hi."

  He left it at that.

  When they reached the road, the canopy of foliage overhead parted, revealing a streak of sky. But clouds had thickened into a solid cover during the afternoon, obscuring the little daylight that was left.

  "It's down that way," Marguerite said, pointing to the right. They walked in that direction, Monks searching with the flashlight's beam until it glimmered off the chrome bumper of a vehicle that was pulled into a turnout.

  He almost groaned. It was one of those huge, bloated SUVs, a Yukon or Expedition or something on that order, and brand new. He had unconsciously pictured her driving something small and sassy. But this monster, as his friend Emil Zukich was fond of saying, was as heavy as a dead preacher. That was going to make it tricky and maybe dangerous to jack up, working off the soft and uneven dirt surface of the turnout -- assuming he could even figure out how to operate the jack and find the proper lifting point. For all he knew, the system might be computer-operated. He had a heavy-duty bumper jack in his Bronco, but he wasn't at all sure that bumpers on the newer vehicles were designed to handle that kind of weight.

  "How about taking a look in the glove box," he told her. "If there's an owner's manual, that might be where it is."

  She walked to the front passenger door. Monks flashed the light beam on the tires. The two that he could see, on the driver's side, looked fine. The flat must be on the other side, although the SUV didn't look like it was listing.

  He started to walk around it. The flashlight's traveling beam caught something pale and round inside -- a face. Monks was surprised again. He had assumed that she was alone.

  Then he realized that she had disappeared.

  A second later, what his eyes had told him caught up to his brain. He flicked the flashlight beam back to the face inside the SUV. It was a young man's, pale and tense, staring at him.

  Monks stared back, not believing what he thought he saw:

  His son, Glenn, gone from Monks's life for almost five years.

  Glenn reached to the window and rapped on it sharply with his knuckles.

  Something hard and blunt rammed into Monks's lower back, forcing an unhhh of breath from him and shoving him forward a step.

  "Turn off the light and drop it," a man's voice said behind him.

  Monks did. A second man stepped into view on the left. He was big, squarely built and cleancut, wearing a business suit complete with necktie. But he was aiming the kind of short-barreled shotgun used by SWAT teams -- a 12-gauge with a five-round magazine, capable of cutting a human being in half.

  "Walk into the woods," the voice behind him ordered.

  Monks did that, too, for ten or fifteen yards, until he was hidden from the road. He couldn't see what was prodding him along, but he had no doubt that it was the barrel of another gun. The thought of running flitted through his mind, but the way the men were positioned, he could not possibly escape their fire.

  "Lay down on your belly. Hands behind you."

  He got facedown in the scratchy redwood duff. The musty scent of damp earth filled his lungs.

  The big man strode forward and put the shotgun barrel to the side of Monks's face, just in front of his left ear. The other man knelt on his back and pulled his wrists roughly together. Monks felt restraints tighten around them, and heard the ratcheting clicks of handcuffs. It started to filter in that they probably would not bother to cuff him if they intended to kill him -- at least, right then and there. But the fact that they had let him see faces was not a good sign.

  "Taxman! Car!" Marguerite's voice hissed from the road. Monks felt the man who was kneeling on his back jerk in response. Then he felt cold steel laid against his cheek -- a knife blade. It turned so that the edge rested lightly against his flesh. Monks could just see that it was a survival knife with a blade at least six inches long, serrated along the back edge to leave ragged, hard-to-close wounds. The other man stepped behind a tree, gun barrel pointing upright, ready to fire.

  Monks could hear the approaching vehicle now, coming southward on the county road, driving at a modest speed. It slowed into the nearest curve, then accelerated again. If it stopped to check out the distressed vehicle, the assailants might flee. Or they might gun down the occupants and cut Monks's throat.

  He lay absolutely still, not breathing, trying to gauge the car's speed and position. It slowed as it passed the SUV.

  But it kept going, the whoosh of its tires growing fainter, until the night was quiet again.

  The knife was lifted away from his face. The one called Taxman bound his ankles together with several wraps of duct tape, then kept taping up to his knees, swathing his legs like a mummy's. He jerked Monks up into a kneeling position, and wrapped his upper body from shoulders to waist, pinioning his arms. Then the two men together rolled Monks into a sleeping bag and zipped it shut. They picked him up as if they were carrying a stretcher, and loaded him into the SUV's rear compartment.

  Taxman bent close to Monks. It was the first glimpse of him that Monks had gotten. He was also well dressed, his hair short and blond, giving him the look of a prematurely balding accountant. But his lean face was etched with intensity. His age was hard to guess -- somewhere between thirty and forty. His breath smelled of mints, but Monks caught a hint of a harsh smell that he recognized from the ER -- methamphetamine.

  "Tell me you'll stay quiet, I won't gag you," he said. This time, the twang of Texas or the South came through clearly.

  Monks nodded.

  They quickly threw more sleeping bags over him, covering his face, then piled other stuff on and around him. They closed the rear door and locked it. Other doors opened and closed, and the engine started. Gasoline sloshed in the tank underneath him as the SUV lurched across the rutted turnout to the paved road.

  He knew that they were heading northeast. In another twenty-five or thirty minutes, he felt the vehicle go through a series of stops and turns, then accelerate to a steady high speed. They had turned onto Highway 101 -- north, he guessed, although he couldn't be sure of that.

  Right this second, he was almost certainly surrounded by other vehicles driving alongside, literally close enough to touch. But they might as well have been on Mars.

  The ride smoothed out, with the quiet drone of the drive train beneath his ear and the faint reek of exhaust and gas in his nostrils. Monks lay still, cramped and uncomfortable. By now, anger was rising in him to join his fear, although there was still plenty of that. Outwardly, these people looked like a church group -- maybe fundamentalists of some stamp. But they operated with military precision. And that brief look into the eyes of the one called Taxman had chilled Monks more than the guns.

  He knew he'd made enemies over the years, dangerous and violent ones. The possibility that he or his family might become victims of sadistic revenge was never far from his mind.

  But what tore at him more than anything else was the young man he had seen inside the van: his son. Who apparently had identified Monks by rapping on the window -- a Judas kiss.

  What the hell was Glenn doing in on this?

  Chapter 2

  When the SUV finally stopped for good, Monks guessed that they had been driving for close to six hours. It was sometime around midnight, and the only thing he was sure of was that they were in the middle of nowhere. The first two to three hours had been on freeway, uninterrupted, strengthening his sense that they were heading north, probably on Highway 101. Then came another hour and a half of increasingly slower, curvier roads. The rest was gravel or dirt, rutted and rough. His body had taken a beating. He had started to lose circulation, particularly in his tightly cuffed hands. His wrists were chafed from twisting, trying to keep his fingers from going numb. His bladder was ready to burst. He had spent a lot of time during those hours grappling with his disbelief at what was happening, and racking his brain for an explanation. He had strained to listen over the vehicle's noise, but could not hear any conversation. If his captors had been talking, they had done it very quietly.

  But Glenn kept coming more clearly into focus in his mind as the center of whatever this was about.

  Monks and his son had had a lot of trouble with each other, starting when Glenn was still very young, and getting worse as he reached his teens. Glenn had finally dropped out of high school and left home at seventeen; he had last been heard of living on the streets of Seattle, panhandling, doing drugs and God knew what else. His IQ had been measured in the 160s. He was a natural math whiz and able to do anything with computers. But he was also diagnosed as moderately antisocial, psychology's euphemism for sociopathic -- not overtly violent himself but seeing others as pawns to be used for his own purposes.

  The other side of the story had to do with Monks himself, who had done a poor job of controlling his own impatience with the insolence of youth. It hadn't helped that his anger had often been fueled by alcohol.

  Still, it was hard to believe that Glenn had a strong enough thirst for vengeance to harm him. It seemed more likely that he had gotten in with criminal companions, and they had cooked up an extortion scheme -- treating Monks roughly to show that they meant business, betting that he would cough up money and stay quiet about it rather than prosecute his own son. He admitted that they were probably right.

  The vehicle's doors opened and closed as the passengers got out. The same two men came around to the rear and lifted Monks out, laying him on the ground. The sky was thick with faintly luminescent fog, allowing him to see a little in spite of the darkness. The men had changed clothes at some point, into the uniform of the backwoods: logger boots, jeans, and wool shirts. Monks glimpsed a couple of patches of light -- windows in a nearby building -- before the thin-faced one named Taxman knelt on his back, pressing his face into the earth.

  "Hammerhead," Taxman said commandingly. "Go tell Freeboot we're back." The bigger man trotted away, carrying his shotgun like a toy in one hand.

  Monks felt Taxman's knife slicing the duct tape free. It just grazed his skin, moving with smooth precision.

  Then a woman's voice cut the air.

  "Where've you been, pet? I thought you were just going to be gone a couple of hours."

  This was not Marguerite, the young woman who had come to his door, Monks was sure. The voice was older, sharper, its tone sweetly cool -- the tone of a woman who suspects that she has been deceived.

  Taxman stopped his knife work and turned toward her. But it was a younger man, standing farther away, who answered:

  "On a mission." He inflated the word mission with importance, but his voice had a nervous, blustery edge.

  Monks recognized it, deep in his bones, a voice that he had heard make its first newborn squall -- Glenn's.

  Monks quietly turned his head toward the talkers. He could just make out the figure of a small slender woman, walking closer with folded arms. Glenn was standing beside the SUV, fidgeting.

  "So, you lied to me?" she said, still with that dangerous sweetness.

  Taxman answered this time. "Stay cool, Shrinkwrap. It was Freeboot's call." His voice was quiet, but hard-edged and authoritative.

  "Really? Something too important for me to know about?"

  Taxman hesitated, then said, "Freeboot decided to get a doctor. So we got one. Coil's old man."

  "What?" Her voice rose sharply in disbelief. "You brought his father here?"

  Then she seemed to realize that there was someone lying on the ground. She took three or four quick steps toward Monks and bent forward to stare at him, arms held away from her body in a posture of shock.

  "Oh, my God," she breathed. She whirled and spoke furiously to Glenn. "Why didn't you tell me, you little shit? I could have stopped it."