‘Detective Striker?’ she said, surprised.
‘Mrs Ostermann.’
She looked down at herself – at the revealing kimono she wore – and her cheeks blushed. She gestured upstairs, to the west side of the house. ‘I’m sorry . . . I was getting into the bath . . . I thought you were Dalia coming back . . .’
‘Do not speak to him,’ Dr Ostermann said, coming up behind them.
Lexa’s face took on a confused look.
Striker ignored the man. He nodded to Lexa, then moved to the front door. Once there, he turned around and looked at them. Dr Ostermann stood in the forefront, his face hard as rock, his fingers curled into fists. Behind him, on the first step, stood Lexa. Her cheeks were rosy with blush and her deep brown eyes looked uncertain beneath the long, blonde curls of hair that fell across her brow.
Shingles? Striker thought.
He thought of how he and Felicia had almost burned up in that fire. And he remembered the camera set up outside the window, facing in through the iron-barred panes of glass, capturing their demise. It angered him, and he felt like grabbing the doctor right there. Snapping him in two. Instead, he gave the man a long, hard look and smiled. ‘One last thing you might be interested in, Dr Ostermann . . . I know all about your videos.’
The angry, smug look fell from Dr Ostermann’s face and was replaced by a pale sick expression.
Lexa looked at her husband. ‘What videos? What is he talking about?’
Dr Ostermann said nothing. He reached out, and with a trembling hand opened the front door. ‘Goodnight, Detective.’
‘Not for you, it won’t be.’
Striker walked through the front door and never looked back.
Seventy-Two
The Adder was sitting on the cold concrete floor, in his Place of Solace, thinking of nothing when he heard the loud angry shrenk! of the hatch being opened. Had he not locked it? He turned around oddly from his seated position, surprised by the familiar sound, and slowly slid the DVD – his most precious of all the precious videos – into the inner pocket of his coat. Then he looked back up towards the hatch.
Clambering down the ladder was the Doctor.
This surprised the Adder, for no one ever came down here. No one. Not in ten years. This room had always been his, and his alone. Having the hatch opened at all was an intrusion.
He climbed to his feet and turned around.
The Doctor reached the bottom of the ladder. ‘You taped it? You taped it, didn’t you? You stupid, stupid fool!’
‘I don’t know what you’re talking about.’
‘Don’t lie to me !’
SMACK!
The Adder felt his head jolt to the left and he reeled backwards, his cheek hot and stinging. For a moment, he did nothing. He just stood there in the centre of the room and felt the air hum about him. Felt that feeling wash over him once more. And suddenly he was fading again. Melting away into that other place. And the sounds started to come back, starting with the high-pitched laughter.
‘I need some space,’ he found himself saying. ‘I’m losing control.’
The Doctor paid him no attention and instead found the box of DVDs on the floor. With one quick swoop, they were taken away.
And just like that the Adder couldn’t breathe.
‘No,’ he managed to get out.
‘You can’t have these.’
‘They’re mine.’
‘I’m destroying them.’
‘No, they’re mine! They’re mine!’
The Adder felt his entire body begin to shake, so hard the room wobbled and vibrated all around him.
As always, the Doctor paid him no heed. Just ignored him. Climbed back up the ladder. And took away the videos of everything the Adder held precious in life. Everything the Adder loved. Everything the Adder needed to calm the frantic voices in his head and keep himself rooted in the reality of this cold and horrible world.
The hatch slammed shut.
And then he was alone again.
Just him and the voices.
‘No,’ he said softly, and then there was a desperation in his voice even he could hear. ‘NO!’
The voices came at him in waves. Thunderous, overpowering waves. And the Adder did the only thing he could do. He gave in and let the voices take him away. And after that he remembered nothing.
Seventy-Three
Striker exited the front walkway of the lot, rounded the corner on to the sidewalk and continued east until he was out of view. He then ran back down the side of the neighbour’s lot, climbed the wall and dropped down next to Felicia under the dark shadows of the plum trees.
‘I could kill you,’ she said.
‘I had to go in, we were getting nowhere.’
‘You should have waited for me!’ she whispered angrily. ‘You always do this.’
‘It wasn’t planned.’
‘Bullshit. Are we a partnership here, or not?’
Before Striker could respond, loud yelling noises came from within the residence. The words were impossible to make out, but the voices were definitely male and female. And Striker knew he had done his job well.
Dr Ostermann and his wife were fighting.
‘What did you do in there?’ Felicia asked.
He shrugged. ‘I just cornered a dog.’
Felicia gave him a hard look. ‘What else?’
Striker shrugged. ‘I bluffed him. Told him we knew about the videos.’
‘You what?’
‘Let him think we have more than we have,’ Striker said. ‘It worked, Feleesh. It connected. Like a friggin’ home run. You should’ve seen the look on his face. He damn near had a coronary right there in the foyer.’
‘But at what cost? Now he might destroy the evidence.’
Striker shook his head. ‘Never. If he’s making videos, then you know as well as I do what they are – his goddam trophies. He’ll keep them forever, even at the expense of being caught. But he will try to hide them.’
‘Probably immediately.’
‘Exactly, so get ready to motor.’
Striker focused back on the house. He’d barely lifted the binoculars to his eyes when a table lamp smashed out through a front-room window. Shards of glass littered the front lawn and driveway, and the lamp came crashing down on top of Dr Ostermann’s X5, denting the hood and cracking the windshield. Almost immediately, the car alarm went off and the street was filled with long, undulating wails.
‘Jesus Christ,’ Felicia said.
They both got up. Striker got on his phone and called Central Dispatch. Sue Rhaemer told him they were already getting a call from a frantic neighbour.
‘We’re already on scene,’ Striker told her. ‘And we’re going in.’
He hung up the phone and they headed for the house.
Felicia ran beside him. They crossed the lawn, reached the roundabout, and were just nearing the front door when Striker’s cell went off again. Thinking Sue Rhaemer was calling back, he snatched it up. But instead of hearing Sue’s scratchy voice, he heard the hardened tone of Jim Banner.
‘Noodles, I’m going into a domestic here.’
‘The Ostermann house?’
‘Yeah.’
‘Then be careful. We got the prints back on the can of varnish. And we got a perfect hit on them.’
‘Who do they come back to?’
‘Who do you think?’ Noodles replied. ‘None other than the doctor himself. Erich Reinhold Ostermann.’