Bad Karma

Chapter 7

Eli held a cheeseburger in his right hand and a napkin balled up in his left which he used to wipe the grease off his chin. His eyes sparkled as he smiled thinly at Shannon.

“I had less than an hour between my two meditation classes to uncover what I did,” he said. “If you worked half as fast you’d have the murders of those two students solved by now.”

“Or if I was half as lucky as you,” Shannon said.

“Luck? As my grandma used to say, Feh! There is no such thing as luck, my boy. What you think of as luck is simply the tapping into of your psychic vision.”

“So if I find a ten dollar bill on the sidewalk, I somehow created my luck? That I psychically knew where that ten dollars was going to be?”

“Exactly.”

“Really?”

“Really.”

“Sounds a bit farfetched to me, but fine, enough lectures for now on metaphysics. Are you going to tell me what you found?”

“Such impatience. First let me enjoy the fruits of my labor.”

Eli started to take a bite of the burger but his eyes glanced towards Shannon and he shook his head, sighed and dropped the burger back onto his plate. “How can I enjoy my food when you’re staring at me with those big, sad puppy dog eyes?”

“I’ll close my eyes. How’s that?”

“Won’t help any.” Eli sighed heavily. He pushed his plate a few inches away. “So you want me to tell you how this fercockta cult recruits their members?”

“That’s why I’m buying you lunch.”

“A bargain. Trust me. They do it by running a small yoga studio up on the Hill.”

“You’re kidding.”

“I kid you not. The place is called Vishna Yoga. Notice how close that is to Vishnu, the bastards! Trying to catch the unaware off guard. They have a small storefront on Thirteenth Street.”

Shannon breathed out slowly as he thought about it. “Fucking insidious,” he said.

“It is that. Also a bit ingenious. What better way to find college students who are the most emotionally vulnerable than to set up a business that they’ll seek out. And then you have hours to work on them while they’re putting themselves in your hands. Of course, the so-called yoga classes they’re giving are as fraudulent as a wooden nickel.”

“And how’s that?”

Eli made a face. “The woman I talked with told me what they had her do, and while I don’t know exactly what you’d call it, it’s not yoga. Sounded more like the positions are meant to wear you down more than anything else. So let me guess, after all my attempts over the last five years to convince you of its benefits, you’re finally going to sign up for yoga classes?”

“Well, I guess at least some fraudulent ones.”

The Hill section of Boulder was directly across the street from the university and its businesses catered almost exclusively to students. Cheap to moderately priced restaurants, tanning salons, music shops, clothing stores, stuff like that. Vishna Yoga had a basement location in the heart of the Hill-off of Thirteenth Street, sandwiched between a music store and a nightclub. A sushi bar sat directly above it.

The signs in front of the yoga studio were innocuous enough in the way they advertised new approaches to achieving well-being and stress relief. Several blown-up photos showed classes filled with young women, all seemingly in a state of bliss as they stretched in the same manner and direction.

Shannon walked down half a dozen steps, opened the front door and entered a small vestibule where he was assaulted by a pungent overly-sweet odor. The smell seemed like a mix of musk and marijuana. He wasn’t sure what it was, but it was more powerful than any incense he had ever encountered and the air was thick with it.

From behind a set of curtains he heard people chanting in a low monotone. Something about Vishna being the one and true source. A woman stepped quickly through the curtains to meet Shannon. She was dark-haired, short, petite, in her early twenties and wearing yellow leotards. Her eyes were wide open and expressionless as she stared at Shannon in the same manner a morgue worker might look over an incoming body that needs to be catalogued. Then, nodding to herself as if she had finished sizing him up, she told him Vishna Yoga would not be for him.

“What?”

“What we do here would not be right for you. I am sorry, but it would be a waste of your money.”

“Why wouldn’t it be right for me?”

“Your energy is all wrong. Please leave.”

“Wait a minute.”

Shannon was taken aback by the woman’s reaction to him. To bide time, he picked up a brochure from the counter and started to thumb through it. Inside was a picture of their founder, Vishna the One True Source. He was a few years older than Shannon, maybe forty, with a shaved head, brownish skin and sharp features that were made even sharper by his piercing black eyes.

Shannon tried to act oblivious to the way the woman was staring at him and read aloud the marketing hype from the brochure. “Stress relief, improving my self-image, better sense of well-being.” Smiling, he added, “This sounds like what I’m looking for.”

“I am telling you this would be a waste of your money. There is nothing we can do for you.”

“It’s my money to waste.”

“No.”

Shannon gave her a hard look. “What if I stay to observe a class,” he said.

“Leave now or I will call the police.”

“I think I can stay for one class.”

“I said leave!”

An Asian woman, also very young, poked her head through the curtains and stared at Shannon with the same empty look in her eyes. With reinforcements now in place, the woman in the yellow leotard bent her knees, tensing, as if she were going to spring at him. A vein had started beating along her neck.

Shannon took a step back. “You know,” he said, “this isn’t doing much to help my stress. Or my well-being, for that matter.”

He got no reaction from either woman. Not even a crack of a smile. Backing up, he left the shop.

He tried the music store first. The kid working the cash register shrugged when Shannon asked him about the yoga studio. “I see some nice looking girls going in and out of there.” He scratched his chin, frowned. “I tried talking to a couple of them. Not the nicest experience.”

“How so?”

“They’re kind of spacey, you know, and not that friendly. One of them wouldn’t even look at me. Made me feel like an idiot. Another, it was like she looked through me instead of at me. I stopped bothering after that. But they are nice to look at.”

Shannon thanked him. As he got to the door the kid mentioned the smell from the yoga studio. “Sometimes it gets in here,” he said. “I think they’re smoking pot down there. Although it don’t smell quite like pot.”

Shannon got less information from the night club. At the sushi bar, the only thing the chef told him was that none of the yoga students ever eat at his restaurant.

“I wanted to put a flyer there offering their students a twenty-five percent discount, but they wouldn’t let me do it,” he complained. “Very unfriendly. Very un-Boulder like. Also smells bad.”

True Light’s compound turned out to be only a twelve minute drive from the yoga studio, but the building seemed as if it were in the middle of nowhere. Located off a new road near the southeastern part of Baseline Reservoir, there was nothing for miles around it. And even though Pauline Cousins had described the compound to him, Shannon still didn’t expect what he saw. The place did remind him of a prison. Not that the building didn’t look expensive, and not that it wasn’t loaded with cathedral ceilings, large bay windows and stone chimneys. Maybe it was the gray stone they used, or that it was so isolated, or the six-foot iron fence surrounding the property-with each iron post topped off with a dagger-like spike. Or maybe it was the way the building seemed to be comprised of several unrelated smaller structures, all jammed together making it less like a house than something industrialized. It made Shannon think of a three-dimensional jigsaw puzzle of a gothic mansion gone horribly wrong.

After pulling up to the main gate, he got out and rang the intercom buzzer. A woman’s voice asked him who he was. Shannon identified himself and told her he was there to speak to one of their members, Melissa Cousins. The intercom went dead. After waiting several minutes, Shannon realized the woman had no intention of responding back. He rang the buzzer again.

Angrier than before, the woman told him that Melissa did not wish to speak to him and he should leave.

“I’d like to hear that from her.”

“Too bad because you won’t.”

Again the intercom went dead. Shannon pushed his thumb against the buzzer and held it there until two men with shaved heads came out of the building, both of them wearing white robes and sandals, their faces twisted into angry scowls.

“Stop ringing that buzzer!” one of the men yelled at Shannon.

He was the larger of the two, but other than that they were almost indistinguishable. Both had square-shaped heads, flat noses and small, almost baby-sized ears. As the larger man unlocked the gate, Shannon took a step back. He watched curiously as the two men stormed through it, scowls on both faces deepening.

“Are those silk robes or polyester?” Shannon asked. “My guess is polyester. Doesn’t seem to have the texture of real silk.”

The two men came towards him, stopping only when they were a foot away. Up close, they looked vaguely familiar but not as much alike as Shannon had first thought-it was more of an optical illusion caused by their shaved heads and identical outfits. Maybe they were enough alike to be brothers, but not identical clones. They were both young, probably in their early twenties. The larger man had beadier eyes, while his partner had a more angular face. Shannon realized why they had seemed familiar; the larger one resembled Curly Howard from the Three Stooges, while the other could’ve been a young Shemp with a shaved head.

He couldn’t help feeling angry as he thought of these two pushing Pauline Cousins to the ground. Swallowing it back, he said as flatly and evenly as he could that he was there only to make sure that Melissa Cousins was okay.

“Why don’t the two of you back away from me,” he added with a tight grin.

Lips separated from the Curly look-alike showing small white teeth about the size of corn kernels. He threw both hands outward trying to push Shannon in the chest. Shannon sidestepped it and grabbed Curly by his elbow as he stumbled forward off balance, then swung him head first into the fence. Curly’s forehead clanged off of it and he shot backwards as if he had come out of a cannon. As he lay unmoving on the ground, a gash showed over his right eye and blood from it trickled down and stained his robe.

“I hope you don’t try something stupid also,” Shannon told the other man. “Cause as you can see I’m not a ninety pound middle-aged woman. I’m a little tougher to push around.”

As the Shemp look-alike stared dumbfounded at Shannon, his face screwed into a look of fury. He screamed like a banshee and charged forward, throwing a wild uppercut. Shannon blocked it and, in almost the same motion, grabbed him above his wrist and swung him backwards. The man kept screaming until he tripped over his partner and hit the back of his head against an iron post, making the same clanging noise that Curly’s head had made. Then, his eyes rolling inward, he slumped forward and lay crisscrossed on top of his partner. Shannon checked to make sure they were both breathing, then walked through the unlocked gate to the front door.

Like the gate, the door had been left unlocked. Shannon opened it and stepped down into a marble foyer that had been set up as an altar. Facing him was a life-sized painting of the cult leader, Vishna. In it he wore a long, flowing golden robe as he sat cross-legged, thumbs and forefingers touching, hands resting on his knees, his black eyes just as piercing as they were in the brochure photograph. On both sides of the painting were ornamental tables where candles and incense burned, the odor similar but not exactly the same as the one in the yoga studio. What looked like small offerings-flowers, jewelry, silk scarves-lay scattered on the floor in front of the painting.

As Shannon took all this in, a woman with long black hair reaching to the middle of her back entered the foyer. She was wearing the same type of white robe as the two men who had attacked him. Like Melissa and the women from the yoga studio, she was young, petite and very pretty. Also like the women from the yoga studio, her eyes had an expressionless, almost glazed look to them. Still, seeing Shannon standing there, her jaw dropped, although no sign of her bewilderment showed in her eyes.

“What-who are you?” she asked, stammering slightly.

Shannon recognized her voice from the intercom. “The two thugs you sent after me are lying outside your gate. They probably need medical attention.”

She walked past Shannon and looked out the front door. When she turned to face him again, her eyes were wider but still had the same expressionless, glazed quality to them.

“They attacked me,” Shannon told her. “I could file assault charges against both of them, and maybe you also as an accessory. But I won’t. Not if you let me see Melissa Cousins.”

“T-That’s not a decision I can make.”

“Then talk to someone who can.”

She stared blankly at Shannon for a good minute before blinking and nodding her head.

“I’ll take you to a waiting area,” she said

She led Shannon down a hallway decorated with paintings of different Hindu deities. Shannon recognized Shiva holding his trident, the four heads of Brahma, and many of the others from a book Eli had given him on Hinduism. At the end of the hallway was a marble sculpture of the cult leader. From somewhere beyond that, Shannon heard what sounded like sitar music and monotonic chanting.

The woman put her hand out to stop him. “Wait here,” she ordered as she opened a door off the hallway. Shannon obliged and, as he walked into the room and the door closed behind him, saw that there was no doorknob on his side of it. The click of a lock being turned came from the other side. Not that it mattered-without a handle he had no way of opening that door whether it was locked or not.

The door was solid oak. No chance of breaking it down with his shoulder. Maybe he could kick it down, but not without at least splintering his shin. He was in what amounted to an eight foot by eight foot cell with no furniture, nothing but a small half-moon shaped window on one wall and it wasn’t nearly large enough for him to crawl through if he had to. He walked over to the window and tapped on it. It made the dull sound of Plexiglas. For the hell of it he smacked the glass hard with the edge of his hand. While it gave a little, it didn’t break.

Shannon sat on the floor and leaned against the wall. Taking out his phone, he prayed that the cult hadn’t thought enough ahead to have the room insulated with copper. A gnawing in his stomach grew until he saw that he had a signal to call out on. Feeling some relief, he tried Eli’s number at the Center and left a message, asking that his friend call him back as soon as he could. After ten minutes of waiting he considered whether or not to call Mark Daniels. A half hour later his internal debate had grown more serious and as he was making up his mind to try Daniels, his phone rang. It was Eunice Carver asking whether they were going to pay her.

“Excuse me?”

“People magazine. Are they going to pay me for my story?”

It took him a few seconds to remember what she was talking about, “I don’t know yet. I have a call in and I’ll get back to you when I hear from them.”

Within seconds of hanging up on her, his phone rang again. This time is was Eli.

“What’s so urgent?”

“Not much,” Shannon said. “Only that I’m sitting in a cell inside of True Light’s compound.”

“What do you mean a cell?”

“Just what I said. I’m alone in a room about the size of a prison cell. Door’s locked on the other side and the window’s too small even for Houdini to crawl out of. But that’s moot since it’s covered by Plexiglas.”

“Jesus, is there any way for you to get out of there?”

“Not that I can see.”

“I’m calling the police!”

“No, not yet. But do me a favor. Call me back in fifteen minutes. If I don’t answer send the police here.”

“Bill, I don’t like this.”

“Neither do I. Next thing I know they’ll be pumping poison gas into this room.”

“Shit, you’re scaring me.”

“I’m a little scared myself. This place is a fucking freak show. You hit it on the head the other day when you talked about cults in Boulder. The guy who runs this one is a pure megalomaniac. You walk into the compound and the first thing you see is an altar to him. Then the hallway leading from the altar is lined with paintings of Hindu gods, and of course, residing alone at the end is a marble sculpture of this megalomaniac. The one god I saw missing from the hallway was Vishnu.”

“Jesus, the reason for that is because he’s replacing himself as the supreme being. Sonofabitch. It’s no accident he named himself Vishna.”

“My thoughts exactly. By the way, I stopped off at their yoga studio before coming here. Not only wouldn’t they let me sign up for classes, but the girl working there-all five foot and one hundred pounds of her-looked like she was going to try to physically throw me out.”

“That is interesting.”

“I guess I didn’t fit the profile of what they’re looking for.”

“Or the girl could’ve had very good radar and picked up that you were a cop, or at least used to be a cop.” Eli hesitated, added, “Bill, you’ve got me worried. Why not call the police now?”

“I could, but I came here to talk to my client’s daughter. I still want to give that a shot.”

“Bill, if your life is in danger-”

“I don’t want to be too melodramatic about this. I don’t think I can make a claim at this point for false imprisonment since I was asked to wait. And to their credit, they did provide me nice plush carpeting to sit on. Let’s just give it another fifteen minutes. See what happens.”

A loud, unhappy sigh came from Eli’s end. “Alright,” he grumbled. “I’ll wait fifteen more minutes, but if you’re still locked in there I’m calling the police no matter what you say.”

“Deal.”

After talking with Eli, Shannon sat quietly and took deep breaths as he tried to calm the tension squeezing his gut. He had two reasons for calling Eli. First, he really was unnerved about being locked away in the room, which he assumed was the point of them doing it, and second, in case the room was bugged and he was being eavesdropped on, he wanted them to know he couldn’t be fucked with. Or at least make them think he couldn’t be fucked with.

Nine minutes after Eli had called back and almost an hour after being locked up, the door opened and two men walked in. These two were a different breed than the robe-wearing stooges he had encountered earlier. One was dressed in jeans and a polo shirt, the other had on slacks and a light sports jacket. There was a hardness about both men. The one in the sports jacket was in his forties and looked solid, as if he were a weightlifter, his hair cut close to his scalp and scars running down both cheeks. His nose had been flattened a number of times and was now smeared sideways across his face. He smirked at Shannon, his small gray eyes as dull as sand. When he undid the buttons to his sports jacket, he unveiled both a Tony Bahama Hawaiian shirt underneath it and the handle of an automatic that stuck out from his waistband. From the shape of it, Shannon guessed it was a.45 caliber.

His companion was younger, maybe early thirties. He was also taller and lankier, and had the wiry look of someone you didn’t want to mess with. He started laughing an ugly laugh as he pointed towards Shannon’s damaged hand.

“He must be nervous,” he said, wheezing from his laughter as he elbowed his associate. “Look, he chewed his fingernails to bone.”

“Is that right,” the other man asked Shannon. “You nervous?”

“Nervous as all hell,” Shannon said.

Both men had Russian accents. The one in the sports jacket seemed to be in charge. His accent was thicker, coarser, and his voice came out as a deep rumble. He continued to smirk at Shannon, his eyes lifeless.

“Maybe you should not come here to stick your nose where it don’t belong,” he said.

“Maybe, but I think my mistake was walking into a room without checking it out first.”

“Pretty stupid,” the man agreed.

The younger Russian laughed his ugly laugh again. It was muted, but still sounded like something you’d hear in an insane asylum.

“Why don’t you stand up,” the older Russian said.

“I like it down here.”

“Stand up anyway.” He took the automatic from his waistband. As Shannon had guessed it was a.45 caliber Smith & Wesson.

“Nice gun,” Shannon remarked.

The Russian waved the automatic casually at Shannon’s head. “I ask you politely stand up.”

“This is nice carpeting,” Shannon said. “Probably expensive. It would be a shame to ruin it.”

“Carpet can be replaced.”

Shannon started to stand up. Before he got to his feet, the older Russian stepped forward and threw a hard jab. Shannon saw the punch coming but wasn’t able to react fast enough to roll with it and it caught him flush in the eye. He felt like he’d been hit with a chunk of concrete and the punch knocked him against the wall.

“That wasn’t very nice of you,” Shannon said, his hand up against his eye.

“We not nice men,” the younger Russian said, smiling broadly and showing off yellowed, crooked teeth.

“My friend is right,” the other one said. “We are not nice men. But neither are you. It was not nice to come here and make trouble. Beating up devout followers of Vishna. These are holy men here.”

Shannon didn’t bother to respond. The area under his eye had already started to swell. He stood in a half crouch as he held a hand over his eye and tried to decide whether he had a chance of wrestling the gun out of the Russian’s hand.

The older Russian held his free hand out and snapped his fingers sharply. “Your wallet,” he ordered.

Shannon shook his head.

He trained his gun on Shannon’s chest and slid the safety off with his thumb. “You do not give me your wallet then this is the way it will happen,” he said, his voice calm, methodical. “You come uninvited here, and when asked to leave you beat up people. Then you charge inside and jump on poor innocent girl.” He turned to his partner. “You know her name?”

The younger Russian made a show of thinking about this while he tapped his skull. “Blonde girl, right? Meliza Coozan, I think.”

“That’s right.” The older Russian clapped his partner on the back. Smiling grimly at Shannon, he said, “Meliza Coozan. Unfortunately you beat poor girl to death. I shoot you, but too late.”

“That’s insane,” Shannon said. “No one would believe that.”

“Why not? Thirty witnesses, more even, will claim that is what happened.”

Something flickered in the Russian’s eyes. While Shannon wasn’t sure whether he would shoot him, he had no doubt that this man was a stone-cold killer. He handed him his wallet.

“William Shannon,” the man read slowly from his license. “It is nice to know where you live, William Shannon.”

“If you ever come anywhere near my home -”

“What?” He laughed as his partner grinned wickedly. He slipped Shannon’s wallet into his pocket. “What would you do?”

Shannon’s cell phone rang. “This is a friend of mine,” he said, holding up the phone. “He knows I’m here, and if I don’t answer he’ll be calling the police.”

The grin disappeared from the Russian’s face. He trained his gun again on Shannon. “Answer it. And don’t be stupid.”

Shannon told Eli to call him back in five minutes and hung up before his friend could ask any questions.

The Russian waved his gun at Shannon. “Get moving,” he ordered.

The two men escorted Shannon out of the room and back into the hallway lined with Hindu gods. The place was quiet-no sitar music or chanting coming from within the compound. As they walked to the marble foyer, there were no signs of any of the cult members. From behind, the Russian poked Shannon in the back a couple of times with his gun, his associate chuckling softly with each poke.

“See what happens when you stick your nose into other people’s business,” he said. “No good comes of it. Vishna is a great, great man. People here because they want to be here. So why you have to come and bother them?”

“Not a bad question,” Shannon said. “A better question is why are a couple of Russian mobsters involved with some half-assed cult?”

The gun was poked hard into the base of his spine, making him stumble.

“That is not smart thing to ask,” the older Russian said. His associate laughed his soft wheezing ugly laugh.

When they got to the foyer, the Russians followed Shannon outside. The older one slipped his gun back into his waistband and buttoned up his sports jacket. The younger Russian unlocked the gate and turned to Shannon with his hand held out.

“No hard feelings,” he said, a big smart-alecky grin etched on his face. Shannon could see in his eyes what he was intending. He took the hand that was being offered, and when the Russian jerked him forward and sent his knee heading towards Shannon’s groin, he stepped aside and swung his right leg around and behind the Russian, sweeping his one supporting leg out from under him and sending him hard on his tailbone. The Russian let out a loud “oomph” as he hit the pavement. Shannon, still locked in a handshake, was dragged down with him, landing with his knee on the man’s chest. Any sign of the Russian’s smart-alecky grin was gone. Using his free hand, Shannon threw quick rabbit punches to the Russian’s nose until the man let go of the handshake.

Shannon heard scuttling noises from behind and was halfway to his feet when he took a hard shot to the side of his face. The punch knocked him to the pavement, and he took skin off his damaged hand using it to break his fall. He scrambled backwards, turned and saw the Russian approaching, his shoulders squared away and fists and feet positioned in a manner that showed he had boxed at a professional level. He shuffled forward quickly, throwing a combination, the first punch exploding as it hit Shannon in the chest, the second glancing off his skull.

Shannon was knocked to his knees. The Russian stepped forward again, a thin smile playing on his lips, his eyes completely dead. He threw a straight right hand at Shannon’s jaw, but this time Shannon blocked it with his left and at the same instance drove his right fist into the man’s groin. He could hear the explosion of breath coming out of the Russian as he doubled over in pain. Without giving him a chance to recover, Shannon grabbed him by his ears and slammed his face into the pavement. As the man lay still on the ground, he retrieved his wallet, then kept searching until he found the Russian’s. The driver’s license identified the man as Dan Smith and listed a Los Angeles address. Shannon handled the license by its edges and tossed the wallet on the ground. He stood up slowly, his body stiff, his head and chest aching. He felt like he’d been worked over with a baseball bat.

He turned towards the gate, a sharp pain sucking his breath away. The younger Russian had pushed himself up into a sitting position. Blood streamed from his nose and, like his associate, it was now pushed more to one side. He looked woozy but as he stared at Shannon, his eyes shrunk to small black dots. Slipping a switchblade from his pocket, he opened it and started to get to his feet, swaying as if he were on a ship in bad weather.

A string of Russian words were barked out from behind. Shannon turned. The other Russian had gotten onto his elbow while still clutching his groin. His face was a bloody mess, his nose looking like hamburger meat. With his voice breaking into a hoarse whisper, he barked out more commands to the younger Russian, who Shannon guessed was named Dimi since that word was used more than any other and with urgency. The younger man stared sullenly into space as he closed his switchblade with his thumb and slipped the knife back into his pocket.

“You were lucky today,” the older Russian yelled at Shannon in the same hoarse whisper. “You come here again, you won’t be so lucky. Trust me. Maybe you lose more fingers. Maybe you lose more than that.”

Shannon ignored him and continued through the gate to his car. When he got there, he went through his trunk and found a plastic bag to put the license in, then got himself seated behind the wheel. He watched while the younger Russian helped his partner to his feet and the two men hobbled back into the compound.

His phone rang. It was Eli asking what the hell was going on.

“All over now but the crying.” Shannon winced as he touched his eye and as his fingers traveled down to the area above his jaw where he’d been hit. He resisted the temptation to look at himself in the rearview mirror. “I’m in my car now. And mostly in one piece.”

“What do you mean mostly in one piece?”

“They sent a couple of goons to put the fear of God in me.” Shannon opened his mouth wide and moved his jaw from side to side, making sure it was still hinged properly and nothing broken. “As we were saying our goodbyes, they tried giving me a beating as a warning. It didn’t quite work as they’d planned.”

“Jesus, Bill, are you sure you’re okay?”

“Mostly. A little bruised and banged up, maybe some cracked ribs but nothing broken that I know of. Are you at the Center?”

“Damn it, Bill-”

“Sorry, Eli, but I’m rushed for time right now. I’ll tell you more about what happened when I see you. No more than an hour.”

After hanging up, Shannon called the Boulderado Hotel. There was a cancellation and the reservation clerk could let him have one of their suites until next Thursday, but that was all she had. When she told Shannon the price, he winced a bit harder than when he’d touched his bruised eye and jaw, but told her he’d take it. Then he put the car in drive and headed back towards downtown Boulder. On the way he called Susan.

“What’s wrong, Hon?” she asked, her voice uneasy, sensing something was not quite right with him.

“Probably nothing,” he said. “I booked us a suite at the Boulderado for a few days. I’ll explain more when I see you, but for now pack what you need and go to Emily’s. I’ll pick you up in fifteen minutes and tell you more then.”

“Hon, you have to tell me what’s going on.”

“I will when I see you.”

“I’ll wait here for you,” she said, an iciness edging into her voice. “We’ll discuss then whether we’re going anywhere.”

“Susie, you have to pack and leave now. Please, do as I say and let me explain when I pick you up.”

“You’re making me nervous,” she said.

“There’s no reason for you to be nervous. Everything will be fine, but we need to leave the apartment for a few days. Trust me on this, please, Darling?”

There was a long silence where Shannon imagined Susan holding her breath, her face white with worry, her brow one big wrinkle, her beautiful brown eyes welling up with tears. He felt lower than he had felt in years, hating himself for exposing her to more danger, something he swore he would never do after they’d survived Charlie Winters. He wanted to drive back to that cult and find a way to put the fear of God in those two Russians, make sure they knew what would happen if they ever came to his apartment and bothered Susan or him. But those two were beyond fear. They’d just take it as a challenge, if they weren’t already planning on it.

Finally Susan told him she would wait for him at Emily’s. Her voice sounded so fragile it brought a lump to his throat. For the next few minutes he drove with his lips pressed hard enough together to make his jaw ache even more than it should given the punch he had taken. When he trusted himself to talk in a calm and rational tone, he called Daniels and asked if he could check on Melissa Cousins at the True Light compound.

“Now why would I want to do that?” Daniels asked somewhat drily.

“The place is bad news.”

“Nothing I can do about that.”

“Maybe not, but I have a gut feeling something happened to her. That that’s why I’m getting so much resistance.”

“You’re getting resistance, huh?”

Shannon hesitated and Daniels let out a loud, annoyed sigh. “Can you give me anything concrete?” he asked. “I need some reason for showing up there.”

Shannon told him how he had gotten locked up inside True Light’s compound when he tried to see her. “Some professional muscle came an hour later and threatened to kill Melissa and frame me for her murder if I didn’t leave,” he added.

“You’re shitting me.”

“Nope.”

“How about coming in and giving a statement?”

“Wouldn’t do any good. They’ll manufacture dozens of witnesses with an alternative story.”

“Which would be?”

After clearing his throat, Shannon said, “That I assaulted a couple of them.”

“Any truth to that?”

“Anything I did was in self-defense.”

“Why don’t you tell me what happened.”

Shannon told him about the two robed stooges.

“Fuck. So you went there and beat up two of their members. Goddamit, Shannon, you were supposed to be a smart guy.”

“They swung at me first. I just reacted.”

“By bouncing their heads off an iron gate?” Daniels asked, exasperated. “I’ll check things out alright. See if I need to bring you in on assault and battery charges.”

Shannon ignored the latter part of his statement. “Just check that she’s okay. I’ve got a picture of Melissa I can give you if you need one,” he said.

“Don’t need it, her mother faxed one over months ago and it’s still in her file.”

“Can you call me after you check on her?”

“You bet I’ll call you,” Daniels said somewhat disgustedly. “Especially since I’ll be bringing you in in handcuffs afterwards if they file charges against you.”

“I’ll give you odds they don’t.”

Daniels only grunted and hung up without giving any indication whether he cared to take that bet.

When Shannon arrived at his apartment, he found that Susan had already left for Emily’s which he was grateful for-especially after he saw his reflection in the bathroom mirror. The area under his eye was puffed out and already a dark bluish-purple, and his cheek and upper jaw were badly swollen and discolored. He looked almost like he was wearing a mask on half his face. The older Russian must’ve wore a ring because he had left him cut up pretty good where he’d been hit. There were other cuts along his face which he couldn’t account for. He cleaned up as well as he could, gritting his teeth when he applied antiseptic, and using bandages where he could. Still, it didn’t help much. He looked even worse than he felt, and he felt like crap.

After finishing with his face he worked on his hand, cleaning out the long stretch of raw flesh where his skin had been scraped off, then wrapping a bandage around it. He noted with grim humor how the bandage obscured the fact that he was missing two fingers. When he was done, he slowly removed his shirt, which was torn and had been left with an interesting pattern of blood splattered across it-something that would’ve made many a modern artist proud. Squinting, he could make out a grinning demonic face in the pattern, complete with two reddish streaks that served as horns. Most of the blood had come from the younger Russian, but he was sure some of it was his own. A bruise the size of a large grapefruit showed on his chest. He methodically tested the area, pushing his fingers against each rib. It was painful, but not enough to make him think any of them were cracked or broken. Most likely just bruised. After slowly chewing several aspirin, he held onto the rest of the bottle.

When he was done he put on a clean shirt; also changed his pants which had gotten a fair amount of blood smeared on them. Then, taking a deep breath and trying to ignore the butterflies fluttering around his stomach, he set off down the hallway to Emily Janney’s apartment, Susan’s best friend in Boulder. When Susan saw him and her face started to crumble, Shannon felt his heart turn to sludge.

“It’s not as bad as it looks,” he told her, his voice sounding to him as if it were echoing from within a chamber. “I’m really okay.”

She shook her head hastily, fighting to hold back the tears. “I thought when we left Massachusetts we were all done with this. I didn’t think I’d ever have to see you like this again.”

Off in the background Emily scowled angrily at him. He turned his focus back to Susan.

“Darling, I promise you this is nothing. In a few days it will all be forgotten.”

“I don’t think I’ll be forgetting you looking like this anytime soon,” she said. “And we have to leave our apartment!”

“Just for a few days.”

“Tell me what happened.”

“Later, when we get in the car.”

“No. You tell me here and now!”

One look at her and he knew there was no sense arguing. Emily stood behind her with her square jaw jutted out as she shot daggers his way. As much as Shannon loved Susan, he knew Emily was a close second. Fiercely protective, he had no doubt she’d throw her body into a line of bullets to protect Susan, and he knew right now she wanted to kick his butt for upsetting his ex-wife.

He told them everything: about Pauline Cousins, her daughter, the Vishna Yoga Studio, the True Light cult, the Russians.

“Oh my God,” Susan said, her eyes beseeching Shannon’s. “They know where we live? How could you do this to us?”

“They probably don’t even remember the address,” Shannon mumbled, barely able to meet her eyes. “Anyway, this will all blow over in a few days.”

“What if it doesn’t?”

“It will. Please, Darling, trust me. All they wanted to do was scare the hell out of me. Make me decide it isn’t worth my time looking for Melissa.”

“But you’re not going to stop.”

Shannon swallowed, shook his head. “How can I?” he asked, lowering his gaze. Then looking up until his eyes met hers, he asked, “You wouldn’t want me to stop, would you?”

She stood motionless for a long moment before shaking her head. Then she bit her lip as she gave him a brave smile. “We’ll have fun spending a few nights at the Boulderado,” she said. “And if we have to, we’ll find a new apartment. Or leave Boulder.”

“That’s not going to happen,” he insisted with as much bravado as he could muster. But the thought was still out there-if these Russians were willing to beat him up as a first warning, what would they be willing to do for a second? Susan turned to Emily and the two women hugged, with Emily briskly rubbing Susan’s back. “You take care of my girl,” she warned Shannon. He nodded that he would, then got Susan’s bags, and brought them down to his car. When he went back for her bike, Emily sidled up next to him.

“You know who you look like now?” she asked. “Mickey Rourke from ‘Sin City’.”

“Thanks.”

She walked behind him, adding, “Don’t worry about nothing. I’ll keep an eye on your place.”

“If you hear anything, call the police. Call me also. But don’t get involved.”

“Maybe, or maybe I’ll go in and knock some sense into them myself.”

He stopped and gave her a hard look until she agreed to simply call him and the police. She was a character, from Oklahoma originally, and as tough as she talked, all five foot six and a hundred and thirty-five pounds of her, Shannon would probably choose taking on one of the Russians again than a fired up Emily. He lifted the bike to his shoulder and started down the steps. Emily followed, telling him how she passed by the Vishna Yoga Studio every day when she went to work and had at one time thought of signing up for classes. The last part came out more as a question. He turned to her, gave her a wary eye. “Don’t,” he said.

When he joined Susan in the car, she gave him a pensive smile. “You think something happened to that girl?”

He nodded. “I think so. Otherwise they would’ve let me talk to her instead of going through all the trouble they did.”

They drove in silence after that. When they got to the Boulderado Hotel’s parking lot, Susan took hold of his bandaged hand and brought it to her lips. He looked over, felt a hollowness deep inside as he caught her somewhere between smiling and sobbing. Tears started to run down both her cheeks and he wiped them away with his thumb.

“Look at us,” she said, sniffing, trying to hold back more tears. “We’re both a couple of messes. Do you think they’ll let us check in?”

“Darling, the way you look right now there’s not a person alive who could turn you down for anything.”

She put both hands behind his head and brought him to her, kissing him hard. When he winced, she pulled back, alarm in her eyes. “Oh God, I’m sorry,” she said. “I hurt you!”

“I’m just a little banged up, that’s all.” He took hold of her chin with his thumb and forefinger and kissed her gently, tasting the saltiness of the tears that had made their way to her lips. The last thing he wanted to do was pull away, but after a minute or so he forced himself to. “I guess we should check in,” he said.

“I’m sorry I gave you such a hard time earlier,” she said.

“What? You had every right-”

She put a finger against his lips, cutting him off. “No I didn’t,” she said. “I blamed you for this. Which is crazy because if you were the type of person who’d be willing to abandon that poor woman and her daughter, I probably wouldn’t love you as deeply as I do. I guess after what happened with Charlie Winters, and our time here in Boulder being as peaceful as it’s been, this hit me pretty hard.” She paused, her voice softer as she added, “Memories from that day started flooding back.”

Shannon removed her finger from his lips and kissed her long and hard, ignoring the throbbing that radiated from his jaw and cheek. “Darling, we’ll get back to what we had, and I swear I’m not letting any of this stuff get close to you.”

“I know you won’t. I also know if you could handle Winters, these Russians will be a piece of cake.”

Shannon nodded, but in his gut he knew she was wrong. Winters had been insane, a murderous madman, but these two Russians were detached cold-blooded killers. Shannon knew that the moment he saw them. As cunning as Winters was, he was driven by bloodlust and made mistakes because of it. These two Russians were no less ruthless but were driven solely by expediency and need, which made them far more dangerous.

Forcing a laugh, he mentioned how pissed off Emily had looked. “For a minute I thought she was going to mop the floor with me,” he added.

Susan joined in with a sad laugh. “For a minute, I thought so too,” she said.

When they checked in, the desk clerk appeared flustered as he glanced uneasily at Shannon, but in the end took his credit card and gave them the keys for their suite. After their divorce Susan had gone back to using her maiden name, Kerry, and they used that when registering in case anyone tried calling hotels looking for Shannon. The clerk took Susan’s bike and stored it in a back room for her.

The Boulderado, a Victorian-style turn-of-the-century hotel that in the eighties had been restored to its full grandeur, anchored the downtown mall area. They’d eaten at the hotel’s restaurant a few times on special occasions and Susan would always comment then about how fun it would be to stay there for a night or two. As she stood in the lobby taking in the spectacular stained glass ceiling and the Victorian-style furnishings, her mood brightened. By the time they got to their suite, she was almost her old self again, lively, excited, like a kid in a candy store as she took inventory of the antique cast iron bed, the Victorian furniture, the white lace bedspread and the old Western-style paintings of open prairies. She stopped briefly to run her fingers along the surface of an antique walnut table that had an inlaid chess board carved into it. As Shannon watched her he breathed easier, grateful for her change of mood.

She ended up by the window where she stared out at a view of the Flatirons which was even more spectacular than the one Paul Devens had from his office. “This is going to be nice,” she remarked. Shannon joined her, putting an arm lightly around her back. She leaned closer to him and rested her head against his shoulder. They stood still like that for several minutes, doing nothing more than feeling the contact of each other’s bodies while soaking in the mountain view. Sighing, Susan broke the spell, asking Shannon what his plans were.

“I promised Eli I’d stop off at the Center and prove to him I’m still alive and in one piece. I’ve got a few other loose ends I need to tie up, but I should be back in an hour. How about going out for a nice dinner then?”

Susan nodded, showed Shannon a guilty smile. “I’m meeting a patient at eight. I told her she could come to the hotel. I hope that’s okay? We should be finished by ten.”

Shannon waved it away. “Of course. Anyway, I should go back to that condo complex and talk to more of the neighbors. We’ll have dinner, go our separate ways for a few hours, then meet back here at ten.” He hesitated, then added, “I had plans to fly out to Wichita tomorrow, but I can reschedule that for another day if you want.”

“Aren’t people expecting you?”

“They don’t even know I’m coming. Ah, if I were still giving my lessons in being a private eye I believe this would be number seven: don’t give suspects a chance to coordinate their answers.”

“They’re suspects?”

Shannon arched an eyebrow as he looked at her. “Everyone’s a suspect, my dear.”

“Well, what if they’re not home tomorrow!”

“Then it will be an uneventful trip. But I’ll get a chance to see downtown Wichita.”

Susan frowned at that. “Private eye lessons or not, I think its foolish flying there without calling that family first. Don’t cancel your flight for me, though. I have appointments scattered throughout the day. In between I’ll do some shopping and spend enough of our money to make you think twice about tangling with Russian mobsters in the future. Just try to be back by tomorrow night?”

“I’ll make sure of it. Tomorrow evening we’ll be watching the sunset together from this window. And I’ve got news for you, I think I’ve had my fill of Russian mobsters.”

They kissed, her hands wrapped lightly around his neck, his lingering on her small hips. On his way out, a collection of what looked like first edition Zane Grey westerns caught his eye. He opened one of them, told Susan that it had been published in 1908. “They must’ve bought all these new when they came out. Damn.” He opened more books and saw publishing dates of 1910, 1914, 1915. “Before we check out, I’m spending a whole day in this room,” he told Susan. “And I’m spending part of it reading these books!”

She laughed, told him he had a date.

He called Pauline Cousins from his car and told her that the cult had refused to let him talk to her daughter but that the Boulder Police were going to check on her and make sure she was okay.

“I’ll call you after I hear from them,” he said. “And I want you to know I’m not giving up on this.”

“Should we meet? I’d like to pay you a retainer.”

“That’s not necessary, but I’ll talk to you soon.”

At the Boulder Mind Body Center, some of the people he passed in the hallway stopped to ask whether he’d been in an accident, others averted his eye. When Eli saw him, he stared deadpan for a long ten-count, then shook his head sadly.

“I sweated off ten pounds while you were locked in that compound,” he complained.

“You’ve been telling me for months how you need to drop some weight. Just thought I’d help out.” Shannon lowered himself into a chair and swung his feet onto Eli’s desk. He froze for a moment, feeling as if someone had gripped his lungs and squeezed the air out of them. When he could breathe again, he took the bottle of aspirin from his pocket and popped several tablets into his mouth.

“Are you okay?”

“Yeah, just some muscles tightening up. I’ll be fine.”

“You don’t look fine.”

“Yeah, well, I am.”

Eli gave him a cautious look, then asked if Shannon was going to tell him what happened, a mix of worry and impatience edging into his voice. Shannon leaned back in his chair and told him all of it. As Eli listened his long face grew somber.

“I’ve got a question for you,” Shannon asked. “Dimi, is that a Russian name?”

Eli nodded briefly. “Short for Dmitry.” He nodded again, this time slower and to himself. “You’ve had a lot of violence in your life,” he said after a while.

“I guess you could say that, but I couldn’t help what happened all those years ago with Winters.”

“No, you couldn’t. But you knew when you rang that buzzer what was going to happen. You knew those two cult members were going to come out and try to push you around. Do you think at some level your motivation was to pay them back for what they did to your client?”

“I don’t think so. You’re right, I did know what was going to happen, but I was thinking more that I’d be able to use it as leverage to see Melissa. After all, they did assault me first.”

“Very Machiavellian of you.” Eli smiled thinly. “And when you let yourself get locked into that room…”

“I didn’t let myself get locked into any room-”

Shannon’s cell phone rang, interrupting him. According to the Caller ID it was Mark Daniels. Eli’s smile turned peevish, but he indicated he wouldn’t be overly offended if Shannon took the call. He then picked up a book and peered at it with heavy eyelids.

When Shannon answered the phone, Daniels broke in, stating in a defensive tone that he had talked to Melissa Cousins over an intercom. “She claims she’s there because she wants to be. She also wants you and her mother to leave her alone,” he added brusquely.

“You didn’t see her?”

“They preferred that I didn’t enter their premises.”

“They could’ve had any woman there pretend to be Melissa. Or even some high-pitched guy.”

“Look, I had no legitimate cause to enter their compound, and after the way you botched things up I couldn’t get a warrant now to save my life.”

Shannon didn’t believe that was true. When he was on the force, he would’ve had more than enough to get a warrant. He decided not to push it and instead asked if they wanted to file charges against him.

“No. They didn’t mention you. I also checked the local hospitals. No head injuries or concussion cases brought in today. They’re trying hard to keep a low profile.”

“So that’s it.”

“Yeah, that’s it.” Daniels sounded exasperated. “I feel the same as you. Something about that place stinks, but there’s not a damn thing I can do about it. Except keep my eyes open.”

“There is something else you could do. True Light operates Vishna Yoga Studio up on the Hill, directly on Thirteenth Street. They use it for recruiting new members. The place smells like they’re smoking pot in there.”

“If they’re distributing it…” He let the sentence die, then grumbled that he’d check into it. “That would be enough to get a warrant,” he admitted.

Shannon showed a grim look as he hung up the phone. Eli tossed his book back on the desk and commented how it sounded as if the police didn’t have any better luck.

“No, they didn’t.”

“It doesn’t sound good.”

“It doesn’t,” Shannon agreed.

“You think something happened to this girl?”

“I think so.”

“But she could be fine,” Eli said. “It could just be the cult leader’s megalomania shining through. Refusing to let anyone enter his sacred ground or talk to one of the flock. Playing God and all that.”

“Anything’s possible.”

Eli gave Shannon a long, pained look. “Jesus, talking to you now is worse than pulling teeth,” he said. “Still, I’d like to ask you to think about why you let yourself get locked in that room.”

“It’s just something that happened.”

“Nothing just happens. As what has long become a mantra of mine, at least when arguing with you, there’s no such thing as an accident.”

Shannon shrugged. “Maybe I thought they might lock me in, but the worst I was expecting was for them to call the police which would’ve given me a chance to get things hashed out with Melissa. I don’t believe at any level, subconscious or otherwise, that I expected muscle to be brought in.”

“But you knew the place wasn’t kosher.”

Shannon nodded weakly. “That’s a long stretch from expecting a couple of Russian mobsters to walk into that room.”

Eli shrugged and admitted that was true. “Still, it raises an interesting question. Why are a couple of Russian gunsels involved with a cult?”

“Gunsels,” Shannon said, repeating the word slowly. “That’s an interesting word choice for you.”

“Hey, I read the classics. Hammett, Spillane, Chandler. So how about it-why are a couple of gunsels hooked up with a cult?”

Shannon shook his head, frowning. “That’s what I have to find out.”

After leaving the Center, Shannon went back to his apartment where he tried without any luck to get fingerprints from the Russian’s driver’s license, then checked his email and found another note from Professor White. This time White tried to clarify his previous email, stating that he at no time suspected Taylor Carver was in imminent danger or at any risk of being harmed, simply that he thought his ex-student was an extraordinarily callous individual who, borrowing from the Dylan song All Along the Watchtower, acted as if life were but a joke. He apologized for not being able to give Shannon names of other students to talk to, but as far as he could tell Carver was a loner who didn’t socialize with fellow students. He ended the email by adding that Shannon’s initial correspondence had gotten him thinking about Carver’s Masters thesis and if Shannon sent him his home address, he’d have his office make him a copy.

Shannon emailed his address, thanked him for his help and asked if he could provide examples of Carver’s callous behavior. After that he sent Kathleen Tirroza an email telling her that he was finally calling in the favor she owed him. Kathleen worked as a forensic investigator for the FBI and had spent hundreds of hours with Shannon in the aftermath of Charlie Winters. Their work ended up tying Winters to over a hundred other killings. In his email, Shannon told her he needed information about a cult leader operating in Boulder and also a Russian mobster who had tried with only partial success to rearrange his face. He told her his guess about the Russian having boxed professionally, and also described his associate who he was fairly certain was named Dmitry. He faxed her the Russian’s drivers license and Vishna’s photograph from the yoga studio’s brochure.

He was in the bedroom packing up a few items Susan had overlooked when he heard the front door open. For a moment there was dead quiet, then the creaking of someone moving across the hardwood floor of his living room. He moved silently to the dresser, took a roll of quarters from his sock drawer and made a tight fist around it. Then opening the bedroom door, he saw Emily standing in the middle of the living room as she gripped a Louisville Slugger, her knuckles almost as white as her face.

Shannon stepped into the room and asked her what the hell she was doing. The bat clattered out of her hand as she took a step back and clutched her chest.

“Goddamn it, Bill, you damn near gave me a heart attack!”

“I’ll ask you again. What the hell are you doing?”

“I was walking by and heard noises. What do you think I was doing?”

“I thought we had an agreement. That if you heard anything you’d call me and the police?”

“Well, if I had done that you probably would’ve gotten yourself shot up when the police came,” she argued, her jaw pushed out as she challenged him to say otherwise.

“Do we have an agreement or not?”

She looked away, kicked at her bat.

“Emily, these are dangerous people. I don’t want you getting involved.”

She met his eyes and smiled defiantly, “How am I supposed to know it’s you coming back here and not one of those others if I don’t look inside?”

He had to admit she had a point. “Next time I come back here I’ll knock on your door first,” he said. “In the meantime, give me your key.”

“Damn it, Bill-”

“I mean it, Emily.”

Shannon stood patiently and waited while Emily handed over the spare key to his apartment. After he slipped it into his pocket, he asked her what she was doing with a Louisville Slugger. She grumbled that her pop had given it to her for protection when she left home.

“Not the best thing for that,” Shannon noted. “You hit someone with the wrong part of the bat and that handle will snap, leaving you holding splinters. If you want a bat for protection, you’re better off with something aluminum.”

“Can’t get myself to buy an aluminum one,” she said with a half-smile. “I’m too much of a traditionalist.”

Shannon got a laugh out of that, then turned serious as he warned her again about not getting involved. “These are people who’d just as soon cut your throat as look at you,” he said. “I’m not exaggerating. If they come here, keep away from them. Okay?”

“Damn it, Bill, you’re a pain in the ass.”

“Just tell me you’re not going to do anything stupid like this again.”

“Alright, already, you don’t have to bite my head off.” She manufactured an injured look, added, “If you’d asked, you and Susie could’ve stayed at my place.”

“Susie and I both know that, and I’m sure she appreciates it as much as I do.” He hesitated, added, “It’s better that the two of us get away from here in case they end up watching the building.”

“I figured it was something like that,” Emily said, nodding. She gathered up her bat and grudgingly promised Shannon she’d behave herself. After she left, he finished packing then took out a couple of toys he had bought for his business-motion activated spy cameras. He set one up in the living room, the other in the bedroom. Satisfied that they were hidden well enough, he grabbed his suitcase and headed back to the hotel.