Night Prey

found. They were reading poems down there, and there was a whole bunch of people. It could have been any of them, more’n me.”
    Connell sighed, then looked at the escort. “Excuse me—is there a ladies’ room back there?”
    “Noooo . . .” He had to think about it. “Closest one is out.”
    “I wonder, do you mind? Could you?”
    “Sure.” The escort looked at Price. “You sit still, okay?”
    Price spread his hands. “Hey, these guys are trying to help me out.”
    “Sure,” the guard said. And to Connell: “Come along, girl.”
    Lucas winced, but Connell went. As soon as the door closed, Price leaned forward, voice low. “You think they’re listening in?”
    “I doubt it,” Lucas said, shaking his head. “This is a defendant’s interview room. If they got caught, they’d be in deep shit.”
    Price looked around at the pale walls, as though trying to spot a microphone. “I gotta take the chance,” he said.
    “On what?” Lucas asked, letting the skepticism ride in his voice.
    Price leaned toward him again, talking in a harsh whisper. “At my trial I said I saw another con in the bookstore. A guy with a beard and PPP on his hand. Prison tattoo, ballpoint ink and straight pin. Nobody ever found him.”
    “That’s why we’re here,” Lucas said. “We’re trying to track the guy.”
    “Yeah, well, it wasn’t PPP,” Price said. He looked around at the walls again, then back to Lucas. He was literally sweating, his hammered forehead glistening in the lights. “Jesus Christ. You can’t tell anybody.”
    “What?”
    “I’ve seen the tattoo again. It wasn’t PPP. I was looking at it upside down, and got it backwards. It was 666.”
    “Yeah? What is it—some kind of cult?”
    “No, no,” Price whispered. “It’s the goddamn Seeds.”
    Now Lucas dropped his voice. “You sure?”
    “Sure I’m sure. There are four or five of them in here right now. That’s what’s got me nervous. If they knew I was talking about them, I’d be a dead motherfucker. The 666 comes from Bad Seeds; that used to be the bikers.”
    “Can you describe him?”
    “I can do better than that. His name is Joe Hillerod.”
    “How’d you get that?” They were both talking in whispers now, and Lucas had picked up Price’s habit of scanning the walls.
    “They brought me up here, and after I got through orientation and went into the population, one of the first guys I see, shit, I thought it was him. They looked just fuckin’ exactly alike. The guy even had the same tattoo.”
    “This is the Joe guy?”
    “No, no, this is Bob. The guy in here was Bob Hillerod, Joe’s brother.”
    “What?”
    “See, I started lifting weights, just to get close to this guy. Bob. I find out he’s been in for a while—from way before this chick gets killed. And I see he’s older than the guy in the store. I couldn’t figure it out. But then I hear, Bob’s got a brother, six or seven years younger. It’s got to be him. Got to be.”
    Lucas leaned back, his voice rising. “Sounds like bullshit.”
    “No, no, I swear to Christ. It’s him. Joe Hillerod. And this Joe—he’s been inside. For sex.” Price reached out and touched Lucas’s hand. His eyes were wide, frightened.
    “Sex?”
    “Rape.”
    “Did you ask Bob . . . is it Bob in here?”
    “Yeah, Bob was here, Joe was out. Joe is the guy. Bob is out now, but Joe is the guy.”
    “Did you ask Bob if Joe has the tattoo?”
    Price leaned back. “Fuck no. One thing you learn in here is, you don’t ask about those fuckin’ tattoos. You just pretend they’re not there,” he said. “But Joe was inside. He was one of the Seeds. He’s got it, I bet. I bet anything.”
     
     
     
    WHEN CONNELL AND the escort returned, Lucas was taking notes. “Harry Roy Wayne and Gerry Gay Wayne,” Price was saying, “They’re brothers and they work at the Caterpillar place down there. They’ll tell you.”
    “But that’s all you got?” Lucas asked.
    “You got everything else.” D. Wayne slumped on the couch, smoking a second cigarette. He picked up the pack and put them in his pocket.
    “I won’t bullshit you,” Lucas said. “I don’t think that’s enough.”
    “It will be if you catch the right guy,” Price said.
    “Yeah. If there is one,” Lucas said. He stood up and said to Connell, “Unless you’ve got some more questions, we’re outta here.”

14
    “WHAT DO WE have?” Connell asked as they waited for the car. She was digging into a pack of