Eyes of Prey Read Free

the woman’s head, her pulped features imprinting themselves on his black jacket. The man, Stephanie Bekker’s lover, was up the stairs. It was an old house and the doors were oak. If he locked himself in a bedroom, Druze would not get through the door in a hurry. The man might already be dialing 911 . . . .
    Druze dropped the bottle, as planned, and turned and trotted out the door. He was halfway down the length of the breezeway when it slammed behind him, a report like agunshot, startling him. Door, his mind said, but he was running now, scattering the tomato plants. His hand found the penlight as he cleared the breezeway. With the light, he was through the garage in two more seconds, into the alley, slowing himself. Walk. WALK.
    In another ten seconds he was on the sidewalk, thick, hunched, his coat collar up. He got to his car without seeing another soul. A minute after he left Stephanie Bekker, the car was moving . . . .
    Keep your head out of it.
    Druze did not allow himself to think. Everything was rehearsed, it was all very clean. Follow the script. Stay on schedule. Around the lake, out to France Avenue to Highway 12, back toward the loop to I-94, down 94 to St. Paul.
    Then he thought:
    He saw my face. And who the fuck was he? So round, so pink, so startled. Druze smacked the steering wheel once in frustration. How could this happen? Bekker so smart . . .
    There was no way for Druze to know who the lover was, but Bekker might know. He should have some ideas, at least. Druze glanced at the car clock: 10:40. Ten minutes before the first scheduled call.
    He took the next exit, stopped at a Super America store and picked up the plastic baggie of quarters he’d left on the floor of the car: he hadn’t wanted them to clink when he went into Bekker’s house. A public phone hung on an exterior wall, and Druze, his index finger in one ear to block the street noise, dialed another public phone, in San Francisco. A recording asked for quarters and Druze dropped them in. A second later, the phone rang on the West Coast. Bekker was there.
    “Yes?”
    Druze was supposed to say one of two words, “Yes” or “No,” and hang up. Instead he said, “There was a guy there.”
    “What?” He’d never heard Bekker surprised, before this night.
    “She was fuckin’ some guy,” Druze said. “I came in and did her and the guy came right down the stairs on top of me. He was wearing a towel.”
    “What?” More than surprised. He was stunned.
    “Wake up, for Christ’s fuckin’ sake. Stop saying ‘What?’ We got a problem.”
    “What about . . . the woman?” Recovering now. Mentioning no names.
    “She’s a big fuckin’ Yes. But the guy saw me. Just for a second. I was wearing the ski jacket and the hat, but with my face . . . I don’t know how much was showing . . . .”
    There was a long moment of silence; then Bekker said, “We can’t talk about it. I’ll call you tonight or tomorrow, depending on what happens. Are you sure about . . . the woman?”
    “Yeah, yeah, she’s a Yes.”
    “Then we’ve done that much,” Bekker said, with satisfaction. “Let me go think about the other.”
    And he was gone.
    Driving away from the store, Druze hummed, harshly, the few bars of the song: Ta-dum, Angelina, good-bye, Angelina  . . . That wasn’t right, and the goddamned song would be going through his head forever until he got it. Ta-dum, Angelina. Maybe he could call a radio station and they’d play it or something. The melody was driving him nuts.
    He put the car on I-94, took it to Highway 280, to I-35W, to I-694, and began driving west, fast, too fast, enjoying the speed, running the loop around the cities. He did it, now and then, to cool out. He liked the wind whistling through a crack in the window, the oldie-goldies on the radio. Ta-dum  . . .
    The blood-mask dried on the back of his jacket, invisible now. He never knew it was there.
     
    Stephanie Bekker’s lover heard the