To The Bone

Chapter 32

Monks drove somberly along the last stretch of narrow deserted road to the D'Antons' house. He was starting to realize how much he had wanted to find out that all his suspicions about Gwen Bricknell were empty – that this nightmare would end, and maybe, just maybe, the good parts of what he had felt with her would touch him again.

He passed the eucalyptus grove where he had spent the night, and saw the Bronco's tire tracks across the field, outlined in the morning dew.

That part, at least, had been real.

He stopped at the rise that overlooked the property, as he had last night. The vista was the same – the picturesque Victorian house in its secluded valley, surrounded by wooded ravines and ridges that led down to the pale blue Pacific – but now it was quiet, with only one vehicle parked there, Julia D'Anton's white SUV. Monks had called from Larrabee's office to tell her he was coming; she had not answered, and he had left a message on the machine. But it looked like she was still here.

He reached under the seat and unlocked the metal box that held the Beretta. There was still an outside possibility that Julia D' Anton was dangerous, and he had promised himself that he would never again walk into a situation like that alone and unarmed. He made sure that the clip was full, jacked a round into the chamber, and slipped the pistol into his back pocket. Then he drove on down the hill.

As he was parking, the door of the sculpture studio opened and Julia leaned out. Monks recognized her long red-brown hair. She waved to him, beckoning him to come in, then disappeared back inside. A friendly enough reception, he thought, as he crossed the gravel drive. Apparently she'd gotten his phone message and was expecting him. Maybe she'd be willing to talk.

The studio's door was slightly ajar. Now he could hear the sound of a small engine coming from inside, a steady, low rumble like an idling motorcycle. He knocked and peered in.

"Julia?" he called.

He pushed the door open and stepped into the high-ceilinged room. It was just as he had seen it last night, with Gwen, except filled now by the ambient sunlight filtering through the old windows. The rumbling sound was coming from a small air compressor in a corner of the room, its coiled hose lying beside it on the floor. He had never thought of a compressor being used for sculpture; he supposed that she used it to operate an air hammer or blow away dust as she worked.

Monks raised his voice over the engine's noise. "Julia. Listen, I need-"

The compressor shut off abruptly, startling him with the sudden stillness. A few seconds later, he let out his breath, realizing that he had frozen along with it. The assemblage of unfinished sculptures – some bare, others draped with tarps – seemed eerily caught in mid-pose, and brought a sharp twinge of the fear he had felt last night. The phrase still as a statue flitted through his mind.

"Is anybody here?" he said. Now his voice was too loud. There was no answer, no movement or sound.

He stepped farther into the room. A door at the far end was also slightly open. Perhaps she had gone into the main house, expecting him to follow. He started toward it.

Then he saw a light, a bright cone from a lamp, illuminating a workbench littered with tools and chips of stone. It was partly blocked from his vision by the canvas-draped statue of Eden Hale. He took another two steps, and Julia's figure came into view.

She was sitting with her back to him. Her hands were at rest on the workbench. She was upright, stiff, and Monks's apprehension came back. She might have waved him in a moment ago, but his strong sense now was that she had taken up a hostile posture, and she was not going to cooperate after all – had called him in only to vent anger on him.

"Julia, I need help finding your husband." Monks tried to keep the tension out of his voice, to sound nonthreatening, even placating. It was not easy. "You have to talk to me."

She did not move. Monks exhaled impatiently and stepped to her, his hand rising to touch her shoulder. He imagined suddenly that there was a sweetish smell in the air.

That was when he saw the blood seeping down the side of her face and neck.

Monks registered instantaneous bits of visual information in an insane, impossible collage. Her left eye, the one he could see, was half-closed, filled with congealing blood. Her chin was propped on a stone block. The bleeding was profuse and seemed to be coming from under her disarrayed hair.

His hand went to the hair instead of to her shoulder. He gripped it and tugged. It came away in his hand. He reared back, shaking the bloody scalp from his grip. Her body seemed to lean slightly, sliding away as though avoiding his grasp, but then she kept sliding, unchecked, until she crumbled to the floor.

There was a sudden rustling behind him. He started to turn, and caught a glimpse of something like a giant gray bat unfolding its wings and lunging forward. A rough, blinding weight closed over his face and body. He lurched, batting at it with his arms, realizing that it was a canvas tarp, draped over him like a tent. He stumbled around, tripping on it, trying to shake it off. But it seemed to have no end. He managed to grab a handful of canvas and started pulling it off himself, hand over hand.

A searing slash of pain ripped across the back of his right wrist.

Monks screamed. He let go of the canvas as if it were red-hot and clasped his hand close to his body. He could feel blood welling from the cut, wetting his shirt.

Another slash ripped down his back. Then another.

He took two running steps before his feet caught up in the canvas and he fell, crashing onto the floor. His fingers pulled at the pistol in his pocket, but they were slippery with blood. He managed to get the gun free, lost it in the bloody slick, found it again.

The pain ripped through him again, this time down the left side of his head. Monks lashed out with his legs, swinging them, clinging to the gun with both hands.

He felt his feet connect with something solid but yielding. Flesh.

He pointed the gun at it and pulled the trigger four times, starting low and moving up, crisscrossing from side to side.

He heard a cry, a roaring sound of rage and pain.

One of the slashes had slit the canvas near his face. He thrust his left hand into it and forced the blood-soaked edges apart, peering through. His panicked gaze took in a man's upper body lunging forward, a patch of blood above the abdomen-

A large scalpel in the surgically gloved hand, slashing down at him.

The charging weight closed his canvas window. Monks shot point-blank, again and again, all the five rounds that were left in the clip. He felt the body slam down on top of him, and he cried out as the scalpel sliced down across his hip. He tried to roll, but he was hopelessly entangled in the canvas, with the weight pinning him down.

He closed his eyes and waited for the next stabs or slashes that would open him and bathe him in his own blood, wrapped in his canvas shroud.

Then he realized that the visceral groan he was hearing was not his own. The weight on top of him shifted slightly, in a sort of writhing. Nothing was cutting at him anymore.

Monks started working his way free. He was losing blood – could feel the wetness down the side of his face and neck, seeping from his back, and below his waist into his pants. He was already weak and getting weaker fast. The canvas had him wrapped tight as a cocoon, with no end or opening. It was like fighting some giant soft thing that patiently absorbed his struggles, flexing but never giving ground.

Finally, his groping hands found an edge. He wormed his head and shoulders under it, forearms pushing the weight away, feet scrabbling wearily on the floor as if he were climbing a hill of loose sand.

When he got his head free, he could see that the attacker was lying on his side facing Monks, motionless, curled into himself. There were more expanding patches of blood on his shirt. His face was contorted with pain and rage, but Monks recognized him instantly:

Todd Peploe, the clinic's maintenance man.

His hair and forehead were smeared with blood, too, but that, Monks knew already, was not Todd's. It had come from Julia D'Anton, when Todd had worn her bloody scalp like a wig, to lure Monks in.