The Stupidest Angel: A Heartwarming Tale of Christmas Terror Read online

  "No!" Lena snapped. "No Santas! We can do a snowman or something, but no friggin' Santas."

  Mavis reached over and patted Lena's hand. "Santa played a little grab-ass with a lot of us when we were little, darlin'. Once your mustache starts growing you're supposed to let go of that shit."

  "I am not growing a mustache."

  "Do you wax? Because you can't see a thing," said Molly, being supportive.

  "I do not have a mustache," said Lena.

  "You think it's bad being a Mexican, Romanian women have to start shaving when they're twelve," Mavis said.

  Lena took that opportunity to plant her elbows squarely on the bar and grip two great handfuls of her hair, which she began to pull, slowly and steadily, to make her point.

  "What?" said Mavis.

  "What?" said Molly.

  And there was an awkward moment of silence among the three — only the muted jukebox thumping in the background and the low murmur of people lying to one another. They looked around to avoid talking, then turned to the front door as Vance McNally, Pine Cove's senior EMT, came through it and let loose a long, growling belch.

  Vance was in his midfifties, and fancied himself a charmer and a hero, when, in fact, he was a bit of a dolt. He had been driving the ambulance for over twenty years now, and nothing gave him pleasure like being the bearer of bad news. It was the measure of his importance.

  "You guys hear that the highway patrol found Dale Pearson's truck parked up in Big Sur by Lime Kiln Rock? Looks like he was fishing and fell in. Yep, surf coming up from that storm, they'll never find him. Theo's up there now investigating."

  Lena stumbled back to her bar stool and climbed up. She was sure everyone in the bar, all the locals anyway, were looking at her for a reaction. She let her long hair hang down by her face, hiding in it.

  "So, lasagna it is," said Mavis.

  "But no fucking Santa pans!" Lena snapped, not looking up.

  Mavis pulled both of their plastic cups off the bar. "Normal circumstances, you'd be cut off, but as it is, I think you two really need to start drinking."

  Chapter 9

  THE LOCAL GUYS, THEY HAVE THEIR MOMENTS

  Thursday morning it became official: Dale Pearson, evil developer, was a missing person. Theo Crowe was going over the big red truck parked by the pounding Pacific at Lime Kiln Rock in the Big Sur wilderness area above Pine Cove. This was the area where half the world's car commercials were filmed — everything from Detroit minivans to German lux-o-cruisers was filmed snaking around the cliffs of Big Sur, as if all you needed to do was sign the lease papers and your life would be an open road of frothy waves beating on majestic seawalls, with nothing but leisure and prosperity ahead. Dale Pearson's big red truck did look carefree and prosperous, parked there by the sea, despite the crust of salt forming on the paint and the appearance that the owner had been washed away in the surf.

  Theo wanted that to be the case. The highway patrol, who had found the truck, had reported it as an accident. There was a surf-casting rod there on the rocks, conveniently monogrammed with Dale's initials. And the Santa hat he'd been wearing was found washed up nearby, and therein lay the problem. Betsy Butler, Dale's squeeze, had said that Dale had gone out two nights ago to play Santa at the Caribou Lodge and had never come home. Who went fishing in the middle of the night while wearing a Santa hat? Granted, according to the other Caribou, Dale had done "some drinking," and he was a little wound up from his confrontation with his ex-wife the day before, but he hadn't lost his mind completely. Negotiating the cliffs by Lime Kiln Rock to get down to the water during the day was risky business; there's no way that Dale would have tried it in the middle of the night. (Theo had lost his footing and slid twenty feet before he caught himself, wrenching his back in the process. Sure he was a little stoned, but then, Dale would have been a little drunk.)

  The highway patrolman, who had a crew cut and looked to be about twelve — an escapee from one of the hygiene films Theo had seen in sixth-grade health class, Why Mary Won't Go in the Water — had Theo sign off on his report, then climbed in his cruiser and headed up the coast into Monterey County. Theo went back and looked through the truck again.

  All the things that should have been there — some tools, a black Mag flashlight, a couple of fast-food wrappers, another fishing rod, a tube of blueprints — were there. And all the things that shouldn't — bloody knives, shell casings, severed limbs, evidence of bleach from cleanup — were not. It was like the guy had just driven up here, climbed down the cliff, and washed away. But that just couldn't be the case. Dale could be mean-spirited, crude, and even violent, but he wasn't stupid. Unless he knew the exact topography of these cliffs, and had a good flashlight, he'd never have made it down in the dark. And his flashlight was still in the truck.

  Theo wished that he had better training in crime-scene investigation. He'd learned most of what he knew from television, not at the academy where he'd spent a miserable eight weeks fifteen years ago when the corrupt sheriff who had found his personal pot patch had railroaded him into becoming Pine Cove's constable. Since the academy, almost every crime scene he'd encountered had been turned over to the county sheriff or highway patrol almost immediately.

  He went over the truck cab again looking for something that might be a clue. The only thing remotely out of order was some dog hairs on the headrest. Theo couldn't remember if Dale had a dog.

  He put the dog hairs in a sandwich bag and dialed Betsy Butler on his cell phone.

  She didn't sound that broken up about Dale's disappearance. "No, Dale didn't like dogs. He didn't like cats either. He was kind of a cow man."

  "He liked cows? Did you guys have a pet cow?" Could it be cow hair?

  "No, he liked to eat them, Theo. Are you okay?"

  "No, sorry, Betsy." He had been so sure that he didn't sound stoned.

  "So, do I get the truck? I mean, are you going to bring it here?"

  "I have no idea," said Theo. "They'll tow it to the impound yard. I don't know if they'll release it to you. I'd better go, Betsy." He snapped the phone shut. Maybe he was just tired. Molly had made him sleep on the couch last night — saying something about him having mutant tendencies. He hadn't even known that she liked the salad shooter. He was sure that she could tell that he'd been smoking pot.

  He flipped the phone back open and called Gabe Fenton.

  "Hey, Theo. I don't know what that stuff is you brought me, but it's not hair. It won't burn or melt, and it's damn hard to cut or break. Good thing it was torn out by the roots."

  Theo cringed. He had almost forgotten about the crazed blond guy he'd run over. He shuddered now, thinking about it. "Gabe, I have some more hair I'd like you to look at."

  "Oh my God, Theo, did you run over someone else?"

  "No, I didn't run over anybody. Jeez, Gabe."

  "Okay. I'll be here all day. Actually, I'll be here all night, too. It's not like I have anywhere to go. Or anyone who cares whether I live or die. It's not like —»

  "Okay. I'm coming over."

  * * *

  There were two men and three women, including Lena, in the offices of Properties in the Pines when Tucker Case came through the door. The women were immediately intrigued by him and the men immediately disliked him. It had always been that way with Tuck. Later, if they got to know him, the women would dismiss him and the men would still dislike him. Basically, he was a geek in a cool guy's body — one feature or the other worked against him.

  It was an open stable of desks and Tuck went directly to Lena's desk at the back. As he went he smiled and nodded to the realtors, who smiled back weakly, trying not to sneer. They were beat from showing properties to Christmas vacation be-backs who wouldn't move here even if they could find employment in this toy town. They'd just failed to plan any vacation activities and so decided to take the kids out for a rousing round of jerk off the realtor. Or so went the party line at the MLS meetings.

  Lena met Tuck's gaze and instinctively smile
d, then frowned.

  "What are you doing here?"

  "Lunch? You. Me. Eating. Talking. I need to ask you something."

  "I thought you were supposed to be flying."

  Tuck hadn't seen Lena in her business clothes — a sensible skirt and blouse, just a little mascara and lipstick, her hair pinned up with lacquered chopsticks, a few strands escaping here and there to frame her face. He liked the look.

  "I flew all morning. There's weather. The edge of a storm coming." He really wanted to pull the chopsticks out of her hair and throw her down there on the desk and tell her how he really felt, which was somewhat aroused. "We could get Chinese," he added.

  Lena looked out the window. The sky was going dark gray over the shops across the street. "There's no Chinese place in Pine Cove. Besides, I'm really swamped here. I handle vacation rentals and it's Christmas Eve eve."

  "We could go to your place for a quick lunch. You have no idea how quick I can be if I put my mind to it."

  Lena looked past him to her coworkers, who, of course, were now staring. "Is that what you need to ask me?"

  "Oh, no, no, of course not. I wouldn't — that would be, well, yes — but there's something else." Now Tuck was feeling the realtors watching him, listening to him. He leaned over Lena's desk so only she could hear. "You said this morning that that constable guy your friend is married to lives in a cabin at the edge of a ranch. It wouldn't be the big ranch north of town, would it?"

  Lena was still looking past him. "Yes, the Beer-Bar Ranch, belongs to Jim Beer."

  "And there's an old single-wide trailer next to the cabin?"

  "Yes, that used to be Molly's, but now they live in the cabin. Why?"

  Tuck stood back and grinned. "Then white roses it is," he said, a little too loudly for the benefit of the audience. "I just didn't know if they'd be appropriate for the holidays."

  "Huh?" Lena said.

  "See you tonight," Tuck said. He leaned over and kissed her on the cheek, then sauntered out of the office, smiling apologetically at the exhausted realtors as he went.

  "Merry Christmas, you guys," he said, waving from the door.

  * * *

  The first thing that Theo noticed when he entered Gabe Fenton's cabin was the aquariums with the dead rats. The female was scampering around the center cage, sniffing and crapping and looking rat-happy, but the others, the males, lay on their backs, feet shot to the sky, like plastic soldiers in a death diorama.

  "How did that happen?"

  "They wouldn't learn. Once they associated the shock with sex, they started liking it."

  Theo thought about his relationship with Molly over the last few days. He pictured himself in the dead-rat display. "So you just kept shocking them until they died?"

  "I had to keep the parameters of the experiment constant."

  Theo nodded gravely, as if he understood completely, which he didn't. Skinner came over and headbutted him in the thigh. Theo scratched his ears to comfort him.

  Skinner was worried about the Food Guy, and he was hoping that maybe the Emergency Backup Food Guy might give him one of the tasty-smelling white squirrels in the cages on the table, now that it appeared that the Food Guy was finished cooking them. This teasing was as bad as when that kid at the beach used to pretend to throw the ball, then not throw the ball. Then pretend to throw the ball, but not throw the ball. Skinner had to knock the kid down and sit on his face. Boy, had he been bad-dogged for that. Nothing hurt like being bad-dogged, but if the Food Guy kept teasing him with the white squirrels, Skinner knew he was going to have to knock him down and sit on his face, maybe even poop in his shoe. Oh, I am a bad, bad dog. No, wait, the Emergency Backup Food Guy was scratching his ears. Oh, that felt good. He was fine. Doggie Xanax. Never mind.

  Theo handed Gabe the sandwich bag with the hairs in it.

  "What's the oily substance in the bag?" Gabe said, examining the specimen.

  "Potato-chip flotsam. The bag is from my lunch yesterday."

  Gabe nodded, then looked at Theo the way the coroner always looks at the cop on TV — like: You numbskull, don't you know that you're contaminating evidence just by continuing to draw breath and I'd be a lot more comfortable with you if you'd stop?

  He took the bag over to the microscope on the counter, removed a couple of the hairs, and put them on a slide with a cover, then fitted it into the microscope.

  "Please don't tell me it's polar bear," Theo said.

  "No, but at least it's an animal. It seems to have a distinct sour-cream-and-onion signature." Gabe pulled back from the microscope and grinned at Theo. "Just fucking with you." He gave Theo a gentle punch to the arm and looked back into the microscope. "Wow, the medulla is absent and there's low birefringence."

  "Wow," echoed Theo, trying but not really feeling the low-birefringence stoke that Gabe was.

  "I have to check the hair database online, but I think it's from a bat."

  "There's a database for that? What, Bat Hair Dot-Com?"

  "That was supposed to be the whole purpose of the Internet, you know. To share scientific information."

  "Not a Viagra- and porn-delivery system?" Theo said. Maybe Gabe was going to be okay after all.

  Gabe moved to the computer at his desk and scrolled through screen after screen of microscope photos of mammal hair until he found one he liked, then went back to the microscope and checked it again.

  "Wow, Theo, you've got yourself an endangered species here."

  "No way."

  "Where the hell did you get this? Micronesian giant fruit bat."

  "Out of a Dodge pickup truck."

  "Hmm, that's not listed as their habitat. It wasn't parked in Guam, was it?"

  Theo fished his car keys out of his pocket. "Look, Gabe, I have to go. Meet at the Slug for a beer tonight, okay?"

  "We can have beer now, if you want. I have some in the fridge."

  "You need to get out. I need to get out. Okay?" Theo was backing out the door.

  "Okay. I'll meet you at six. I have to go pick up some Super Glue solvent at the Thrifty-Mart."

  "Bye." Theo jumped off the porch and loped to the Volvo.

  Skinner barked at him in four-four time. Hello? Tasty white squirrels? Still in the little box? Hello? You forgot?

  * * *

  When Theo pulled up to Lena Marquez's house, there was a generic white economy rental car (A Ford Mucus, he thought) parked out front. He looked for the bat he'd seen hanging from the porch ceiling, but it wasn't there. He hadn't even filed the experience of running over the apparently indestructible blond guy, and now he was facing the possibility that he might actually be about to confront a murderer. Just in case, he'd stopped at home and gotten his gun off the shelf in the closet and his handcuffs off the bedpost where Molly had last imprisoned him when they had still been speaking. (She'd been in the yard out behind the cabin, working out with a bamboo shinai kendo sword she'd been using since breaking her broadsword — he'd snuck in and out without confrontation.) He unsnapped the Glock's nylon holster that was clipped to the back of his jeans and rang the doorbell.

  The door opened. Theo screamed and drew his gun as he jumped back.

  On the other side of the threshold, Tucker Case screamed and dove backward also, shielding his face with his hands. His hat made a little yelping sound.

  "Hold it right there," Theo said. He could feel his pulse beating in his neck.

  "I'm holding, I'm holding. Jesus, what the fuck is this about?"

  "You have a bat on your head!"

  "Yeah, and for that you're going to shoot me?"

  The bat, his huge black wings wrapped around the pilot's head, gave the impression of a large leather cap with a Mohawk crest of fur that culminated in a big-eared little dog face that was now barking at Theo.

  "Well, uh, no." Theo lowered the gun, feeling a little embarrassed now. He was still in his shooter's crouch, though, which now, with the gun lowered, made him look like he was posing as the world's skinniest sumo wres
tler.

  "Can I get up?" Tuck asked.

  "Sure, I just wanted to talk to Lena."

  Tucker Case was exasperated and his bat had fallen over one eye. "Well, she's at her office. Look, if you're going to get high, maybe you ought to leave the gun at home, huh?"

  "What?" Theo had been careful to use some Visine, and it had been hours since he'd hit his Sneaky Pete pot pipe. He said, "I'm not high. I haven't gotten high in years."

  "Yeah, right. Constable, maybe you'd better come in."

  Theo stood and tried to shake off the appearance that he'd just had about five years of life scared out of him by a guy with a bat on his head. He followed Tucker Case into Lena's kitchen, where the pilot offered him a seat at the table.

  "So, Constable, what can I do for you?"

  Theo wasn't sure. He'd planned on talking to Lena, or at least the two of them together. "Well, as you probably know, we found Lena's ex-husband's truck up in Big Sur."

  "Of course, I saw it."

  "You saw it?"

  "From the helicopter. Tucker Case, contract pilot for the DEA, remember? You can check me out if you want to. Anyway, we've been patrolling that area."

  "You have?" The bat was looking at Theo and Theo was having trouble following his own thoughts. The bat was wearing tiny sunglasses. Ray-Bans, Theo could see by the trademark in the corner of one lens. "I'm sorry, Mr., uh — Case, could you take the bat off your head. It's very distracting."

  "Him."

  "Pardon?"

  "It's a him. Roberto. He no like the light."

  "Pardon?"

  "Friend of mine used to say that. Sorry." Tucker Case unwrapped the bat and put it on the floor, where it spidered away, walking on its wing tips into the living room.

  "God, that's creepy," Theo said.

  "Yeah, you know, kids. What are you gonna do?" Tuck dazzled a perfect grin. "So, you found this guy's truck? Not him, though?"

  "No. It was made to look like he was washed into the ocean while fishing off the rocks."

  "Made to look? So, you suspect foul play?" Tuck bounced his eyebrows.

  Theo thought the pilot should be taking this more seriously. It was time to drop the bomb. "Yes. First, he never came home after the Caribou Christmas party Tuesday night, where he played the joke Santa. No one goes surf-fishing in the middle of the night, wearing a Santa suit. We found the Santa hat still in the truck, and I found hairs from a Micronesian fruit bat on the headrest."