The Sleeping Doll

back and forth from Kellogg to O’Neil.
    Please, she thought. No more deaths . . .
    Had they structured it right?
    Had they recognized the patterns?
    Kellogg got to the door first, giving a nod to the MCSO officer carrying a battering ram. The big man swung the weighty tube into the fancy door and it crashed open. Kellogg pitched in one of the grenades. Two officers rushed into the room beside Pell’s and others pulled the maids behind parked cars. When the flash-bang detonated with a stunning explosion Kellogg’s and O’Neil’s teams raced inside.
    Then: silence.
    No gunshots, no screams.
    Finally she heard Kellogg’s voice, lost in a staticky transmission, ending with “ . . . him.”
    “Say again,” Dance transmitted urgently. “Say again, Win. Do you have him?”
    A crackle. “Negative. He’s gone.”
    •    •    •
    Her Daniel was brilliant, her Daniel knew everything.
    As they drove, fast but not over the limit, away from the motel, Jennie Marston looked back.
    No squad cars yet, no lights, no sirens.
    Angel songs, she recited to herself. Angel songs, protect us.
    Her Daniel was a genius.
    Twenty minutes ago, as they’d started to make love, he’d frozen, sitting up in bed.
    “What, honey?” she’d asked, alarmed.
    “Housekeeping. Have they ever called about making up the room?”
    “I don’t think so.”
    “Why would they today? And it’s early. They wouldn’t call until later. Somebody wanted to see if we were in. The police! Get dressed. Now.”
    “You want—”
    “Get dressed!”
    She leapt from bed.
    “Grab what you can. Get your computer and don’t leave anything personal.” He’d put a porn movie on TV, looked outside, then walked to the adjoining door, held the gun up and kicked it in, startling two young men inside.
    At first she thought he’d kill them but he just told them to stand up and turn around, tied their hands with fishing line and taped washcloths in their mouths. He pulled their wallets out and looked them over. “I’ve got your names and addresses. You stay here and be quiet. If you say anything to anybody, your families’re dead. Okay?”
    They nodded and Daniel closed the adjoining door and blocked it with a chair. He dumped out the contents of the fishermen’s cooler and tackle boxes and put their own bags inside. They dressed in the men’s yellow slickers and, wearing baseball caps, they carried the gear and the fishing rods outside.
    “Don’t look around. Walk right to our car. But slow.” They headed across the parking lot. He spent some minutes loading the car, trying to look casual. They then climbed in and drove away, Jennie struggling to keep calm. She wanted to cry, she was so nervous.
    But excited too. She had to admit that. The escape had been a total high. She’d never felt so alive, driving away from the motel. She thought about her husband, the boyfriends, her mother . . . nothing she’d experienced with any of them approached what she felt at this moment.
    They passed four police cars speeding toward the motel. No sirens.
    Angel songs  . . .
    Her prayer worked. Now, they were miles from the inn and no one was after them.
    Finally he laughed and exhaled a long breath. “How about that, lovely?”
    “We did it, sweetie!” She whooped and shook her head wildly as if she were at a rock concert. She pressed her lips against his neck and bit him playfully.
    Soon they were pulling into the parking lot of the Butterfly Inn, a small dump of a motel on Lighthouse, the commercial strip in Monterey. Daniel told her, “Go get a room. We’ll be finished up here soon, but it might not be till tomorrow. Get it for a week, though; it’ll be less suspicious. In the back again. Maybe that cottage there. Use a different name. Tell the clerk you left your ID in your suitcase and you’ll bring it later.”
    Jennie registered and returned to the car. They carried the cooler and boxes inside.
    Pell lay on the bed, arms behind his neck. She curled up next to him. “We’re going to have to hide out here. There’s a grocery store up the street. Go get some food, would you, lovely?”
    “And more hair dye?”
    He smiled. “Not a bad idea.”
    “Can I be a redhead?”
    “You can be green if you want. I’d love you anyway.”
    God, he was perfect. . . .
    She heard the crackle of the TV coming on as she stepped out of the door, slipping the cap on. A few days ago she’d never have thought she’d be okay with Daniel