Ukiah - Alien Taste Part 6

Wednesday, June 17, 2004.

Shadyside Neighborhood, Pittsburgh, PennsylvaniaBennett Detective Agency was a silent testimony to how much Max had been worth in his "previous life." It was located a block off boutique-infested Walnut Street in the posh Shadyside neighborhood, in the downstairs of a sprawling five-bedroom Victorian home. The floors were cherry, the walls chestnut burl paneling, and in the entry was a ma.s.sive grandfather clock that filled the house with solemn, even ticking.

When Ukiah started to work with Max, the downstairs and most of the upstairs had been empty.

Once, in a semidrunken state, Max explained that he and his wife had lived for years with broken hand-me-down furniture in tiny apartments. When success finally brought in money, they had bought the small mansion, thrown away the old furniture, and planned to slowly fill the house with beautiful antiques.

The grandfather clock had been their only purchase before Max's wife's death.

Since then desks, chairs, a conference room table, wooden filing cabinets, and other office equipment slowly filled the downstairs. Max's office was in the den with floor-to-ceiling built-in bookcases.

He had a desk once owned by Frank Lloyd Wright (a reference that failed to impress Ukiah until Max drove him down to Fallingwater) and a two thousand dollar "executive" chair. Ukiah's desk was much less impressive, but he usually used it only to stay out of Max's hair while he did the paperwork that ran the agency.

Agent Zheng was standing on the front porch when they pulled up. Her car, identified by its government plates, was a silver four-door Saturn. Ukiah parked the Hummer on the street instead of pulling around to the garages behind the office, since he and Max planned to pick up his motorcycle after the interview. Besides, he wasn't the best at slotting the wide truck into the standard-size garage. He had driven, in part to get in his needed practice, but mostly to let Max search hither and yon for information on Agent Zheng.

Max winced as Ukiah rode over the curb on his last pull forward. "Well, that's all that seems to be on-line about our Agent Zheng. Not much to go on. One smart cookie that gets results-too bad it's our b.a.l.l.s she's trying to break."

"Be positive." Ukiah turned off the Hummer and pocketed his keys. "We haven't done anything wrong."

"Kid, you're just too naive for your own good."

He grinned at Max. "Don't know how, hanging around with you all the time."

Max shook his head, smiling. "Let's get this over with."

Agent Zheng nodded to them as they came up the walk. "Mr. Bennett, Mr. Oregon. Thank you for seeing me."

"You didn't give us much of a choice," Max grumbled, unlocking the front door and leading the way into the house.

Ukiah hung back to let Agent Zheng enter first. She paused to give him a long study, working upward. Without comment, she gazed at his comfortable hiking boots, moss-colored slacks, white linen b.u.t.ton-down short-sleeve s.h.i.+rt, and thick black hair, still damp from his hasty shower but neatly combed. It probably seemed like a drastic change since she had seen him last. When he had gotten home yesterday, he'd discovered he looked like he'd been rolled over most of Schenley Park. Dirt coated all his exposed skin. Dead leaves floated in his hair. The spare clothes from the Cherokee had been full of holes, stained with black cave mud, then slightly shrunk in an attempt to get them clean. His night romp through the muddy park had only made his appearance worse.

Reflecting back on Agent Zheng's undercover blue jeans and torn heavy-metal T-s.h.i.+rt, Ukiah supposed that neither of them had been at their peak at the morgue. This morning Agent Zheng wore an expensive-looking black pantsuit and a white silk blouse. All of her hair was raven black. The one long lock swept like a wing, silky and controlled, down from her forehead to her neck. Her makeup was crisp and her perfume-a musk, warmed by her body heat-was light to the point of elusive.Agent Zheng finished her inspection and brushed past him. His skin tingled with the nearness of her pa.s.sage. She followed Max, scanning the rooms as they moved through them, expressing neither surprise nor pleasure. She was almost impossible to read, and Ukiah wasn't sure if this was good or bad. It spoke to him, though, of being centered, achieving a tight focus that couldn't be wavered.

Max opted for his office, taking the position of power behind the large desk. Ukiah leaned against the wall to Max's right, facing them both. Agent Zheng accepted the visitor chair, a stylishly sleek chair that decorated her well.

"All right, Agent Zheng, you wanted to discuss the case. We're here. What is there to discuss?"

She plunged straight to the heart of the matter. "We studied your disc frame by frame, and we found one frame to be of most interest."

Ukiah glanced at Max, and a name seemed to be shouted between them-Rennie Shaw.

Agent Zheng laid out a blown-up version of the mug shot Max had used. "This is Rennie Shaw. I will be frank with you. This is a very dangerous man. He belongs to a loose organization of motorcycle gangs. These gangs span the country. They are the Demon Curs, the h.e.l.l Hounds, the Devil Dogs, the Wild Wolves, and the Dog Warriors."

"Kind of stuck on the canine motif." Max, as usual, did the talking for the partners.

"Yes they are. As a collective, they call themselves the Pack. Rennie Shaw is believed to be the leader of the Dog Warriors, perhaps of the entire Pack. It is a tight-knit group, rigorously exclusive and extremely cunning. Authorities rarely can arrest a member, and they never stay in custody long. The Pack has a reputation as extreme escape artists. They have been known to vanish without a trace from maximum-security holding cells. Authorities have tried to cut deals with captured members-reduced sentences and such for inside information-but no offers have ever been taken."

"Could be they knew they could get out without taking a deal," Max stated dryly.

"Yes. But it is unusual that in a group of this size, no disgruntled members have ever come forward.

Despite the apparent lack of communication between the various gangs, not a single undercover agent has ever been able to penetrate their society. Everything we know about the Pack comes from extensive interviews from eyewitnesses. Another unusual aspect of the Pack is that many of the members are untraceable. No birth certificates. No Social Security numbers. No official records."

Ukiah squirmed. This sounded uncomfortably close to himself three years ago. "So how does the Pack link in with Janet Haze?"

"We don't know." She indicated the photo. "This is the only clue we have that they are involved. If Doctor Haze, however, was given some type of dangerous drug, it could have easily come from the Pack."

"So the Pack gives her drugs," Max ticked off points on his fingers, "watches her freak out, and checks to see if she's dead in the woods, and later steals her body. Murdering escape artists fit the bill to what went down yesterday."

"Yes, it does." Agent Zheng said. "After finding this photo, we started to investigate the possible link between Doctor Haze's work and the Pack yesterday morning. Within an hour, one of our agents vanished without a trace." She flipped a second photograph onto the table. A solemn man in his thirties with "I'm the FBI" stamped invisibly on his forehead. "Wil Trace was one of the best agents we had; an agent with ten years of organized crime and gang experience. He was quick on his feet and level-headed."

Had. Was, Ukiah noticed. She is already using past tense.

Max leaned far back in his chair, almost as if he was trying to distance himself from the missing FBI agent. "I think I can see where this is going, and I don't like the destination."

"In the past," Agent Zheng went on, "the Pack held law officials they'd captured for several days.

Usually, the Pack either subverts them or simply makes them vanish. If they have Wil Trace, and he's still alive, we have to find him before they try either.""No." Max made defecting motions with his hands. "This is a case for the FBI and police. Not for us."

"He has a wife and three children."

Max tapped his finger on the FBI seal on the file folder that had held the photographs. "He's an FBI agent who knew the risks."

"Max," Ukiah interrupted quietly, "shouldn't we at least hear what she wants?"

Max shot him an angry glare. "Don't fall for that wife-and-three-children bit, kid. She's got the whole FBI organization behind her. They don't let their agents fall through the cracks. Every law agency in the state, in the country, has been brought to bear on this."

"You're right," Agent Zheng admitted. "They have. But we're desperate, time is running out, and we're not even sure if it is the Pack that took Special Agent Trace."

Ukiah frowned-he'd thought Pack involvement was a given. "What do you mean?"

Agent Zheng turned to him. "There's no logical tie between Doctor Haze and the Pack. Nor was Wil Trace even investigating the Pack. He was searching Doctor Haze's home for some clue to her death.

His car is still parked outside the house. Neighbors remember him going in, but didn't see him leave. We've turned the house upside down and found nothing. We've searched the neighborhood and Schenley Park.

Nothing. Mr. Oregon has proved that he could find a trail where no one else can. He's our last chance to find out what happened in that house."

Ukiah glanced at Max.

"Don't give me that look." Max made a rude noise. "Okay, okay. But we aren't doing this for free."

"You will be paid. What are your rates?"

"If I read this right, this is a tracking job," Max explained. "We charge a flat rate of one thousand dollars a day on normal tracking jobs. Since this case has proved to be unquestionably dangerous, we'll want two thousand dollars a day."

Agent Zheng tilted her head slightly. "That seems high."

Max snorted. "If you wanted us to do a background check on a guy before dating him seriously"-her records had listed her as single-"it would be one hundred dollars an hour plus expenses. It would take a couple of days. We'd present you with a detailed report of exactly who you were about to sleep with and a bill for easily over one thousand dollars."

Her eyes jumped to Ukiah. She s.h.i.+fted slightly in the chair as if uneasy and then relaxed, gaining her center again. "I see you've been doing your homework."

"We like to know who we're dealing with, Agent Zheng." Max flashed her a roguishly pleased smile. "Tracking is a different ball game with a different rate chart. It's quick, it's dirty, it's dangerous, and we're the best in the business. Much as we like to help people, this is a business. Because of yesterday, our insurance rates went up another notch, and we'll need a lawyer to make sure that, in all this chaos, Mr.

Oregon isn't charged with Janet Haze's death just to neaten things up."

She nodded slowly. "I can authorize your fee."

Max reached into his desk drawer and pulled out their standard tracking contract. He wrote FBI in the client's blank and noted the danger rate of $2000. He signed the bottom and pushed it across to Agent Zheng.

She signed in a controlled neat cursive. "You'll start immediately and I'll be coming with you."

Max shrugged, sliding over to the copier to make her a copy. "I'm curious, though, Agent Zheng. I got the impression yesterday that you didn't trust us.""I didn't." There was no apology in her gaze. "You were complete unknowns acting in a suspicious manner. Since then I have had a chance to do a background check."

"And?" Max looked up with intense interest.

"Your highest praise was-'If my kid was missing, I'd want them on the case.'"

"And the lowest?" Ukiah asked, getting a scowl from Max.

She looked at him for a silent minute before answering. "'The kid is creepy to work with, but he's always right.'"

She wanted to ride with them in the Hummer. Max motioned Ukiah into the back so she could sit in the front, away from all the gear Max had in the back. Not for the first time, Ukiah wondered if all the military hardware Max had was totally legal.

Ukiah leaned forward and noticed that her hair was scented with honeysuckle. Her one long bang swept down to the white curve of her neck. She noticed that he was staring at her and turned to meet his gaze. He expected her to say something, but she merely looked back at him silently. Her eyes were somber and still, moonstones of gray.

Max noticed her turn in her seat, then glanced at Ukiah in the rearview mirror. "When Ukiah looks at you, you stay looked at."

"I've noticed."

Max glanced again in the rearview mirror and turned onto Janet Haze's street.

"What was that all about, kid?"

"What was what?" Ukiah checked his .45 and slipped it into his kidney holster. The day was hot and the flak jacket uncomfortable, but he knew Max was too edgy to let him go without.

"The looking." Max snapped shut the chamber of his gun and put it into his shoulder holster.

Ukiah shrugged and slipped on his headcam. "I don't know. I was just looking at her and she looked back."

"You-I understand." Max shook his head. He flicked on his handheld tracking system and checked the signal. "I've got you." He slipped the tracking system into his pocket. "I'll leave the deck on the Hummer. I mean, you look at people. That's what I remember most about the first time I met you-the look."

"What do you mean?"

"Kid, you've got a look that-like I said-one stays looked at. That first day, I came up the tree-house ladder and was eye to eye with your look. Pow, straight to the core. I almost climbed back down and dropped the case."

Ukiah shook his head, giving Max a grin. "Max, I have no idea what you're talking about."

"Of course not. People don't do it back to you. Check it out sometime, though-you make a lot of people d.a.m.n nervous by it, especially the guilty ones."

"She wasn't nervous. She just looked back."

"Which has me d.a.m.n nervous."

Max slotted a new disk into the Hummer's deck. "Max VOX test. Testing. Testing." He tapped the colored signal strength bar on the monitor. "I'm coming through loud and clear. Give me a test.""Ukiah VOX test. Test 1-2-3-4."

"That's lousy-you're barely in the yellow." Max reached up and tugged on Ukiah's headset. "Try it again."

"Ukiah VOX test." Ukiah grinned. "Hey diddle diddle, Max jumped over the moon."

Max shook his head, laughing slightly. "You're in the green. Let's go."

Max slammed the Hummer's door and locked it by his remote. Together they went up the steps to join Agent Zheng by the door. She had unsecured the police barrier tape and pushed open the broken door.

As she stepped cautiously inside, Max caught Ukiah by the shoulder. "Just because Agent Zheng is with us, that doesn't make her an automatic good guy, kid. Remember that. Don't rely on her, don't expect her to cover your back."

Ukiah nodded. "Okay, Max." A thought occurred to him and he smiled. "Not one of the good guys?

Max, haven't you noticed? Agent Zheng is a girl."

Max cuffed him on the shoulder and went on into the house.

The bodies had been removed. The bloodstains remained. Ukiah crouched in the threshold as he remembered doing the day before. Slowly he scanned the entry. His memory skipped back and forth between his normally laser-etched recall and his slightly fuzzy regained memory. "Lots of people been in here since the day before yesterday, things are s.h.i.+fted around, not by much, but enough."

"Like what?" Agent Zheng asked, pulling out a PDA to take notes.

"That piece of carpet." It was a two- by three-foot carpet sample used to catch dirt at the front entrance. It was stained a rust color by blood. "It had been under the one girl when I first arrived. It's over there beside the stairs now."

He tilted his head sniffing, suddenly aware of a draft and a familiar smell.

"What is it?" Max asked.

He stepped inside and swung the door shut. Behind it was an obvious bas.e.m.e.nt door. He cracked it slightly and the strong odor of animal musk swept up from the bas.e.m.e.nt.

"You weren't in the bas.e.m.e.nt," Agent Zheng commented behind him.

Ukiah glanced back at her. "They kept mink in the bas.e.m.e.nt?"

"Ferrets." Agent Zheng scrolled her PDA file backward and read. "There were three ferrets found in cages in the bas.e.m.e.nt, one male and two females. According to friends, they belong to Janet Haze, and normally she kept them in the attic with her. A day prior to the murders, she asked her roommates if she could move them to the bas.e.m.e.nt, complaining that they made too much noise. The ferrets were removed the evening of the murders by the Allegheny Animal Control Department and taken to the humane shelter on the North Side."

"And they're still there?" Max tried to sound casual while he gave Ukiah "the look."

"I checked on them yesterday afternoon," Agent Zheng admitted.

Ukiah shut the door uneasily. "Too much noise? She seemed really bothered by noise."