Fire Lake (25 page)

"Do we have a choice?" she said. "If
we don't go through with it, we'll be in even worse trouble."

"You're getting to be awfully goddamn logical,"
I said testily. But I knew she was right. Not showing up was just
going to invite more visits from Bo.

Karen parked the Pinto by the stairs leading to the
courtyard. After giving each other a nervous look, we got out into
the cold and snow and walked slowly up to the lobby. The dogwoods
were tinkling icily in the stiff breeze. The lobby itself was
empty--just a warm yellow room with its brass mailboxes, its hissing
radiator, its muddy tile floor. The dimly lit stairwell looked empty
too. There was no way to see beyond the first landing, though, where
either Bo or Maurice could easily be concealing himself. As Karen
opened the lobby door, I put my hand in my coat pocket and grasped
the gun.

I stopped Karen with my left hand before she could
start up the stairs. "Maybe you ought to stay down here," I
said to her. "Better yet, maybe you should wait in the car."

I realized I was whispering.

Karen shrugged resignedly. "Harry, what's going
to happen to us is going to happen--whether I'm here or there. I'm
with you now, babe. For better or worse."

I smiled at her impromptu vow, although there was
nothing funny about the situation. She knew it, too, in spite of her
bravado. Her pretty, pouty mouth was set; but her pale blue eyes were
restless with fear.

She'd been right about one thing. Whether she stayed
in the car or came with me, she was still vulnerable to LeRoi. And
alone, she wouldn't have a chance. I decided I wanted her with me.

"All right, Karen," I said, patting her
cheek gently.

She pressed my hand against her cheek and smiled at
me with everything but her frightened eyes.

"Ready?" I said.

She swallowed hard and nodded. "Ready."

I pulled the Gold Cup from my coat pocket and started
up the stairwell, with Karen right behind me. We took the stairs one
at a time. When we reached the first landing, I peeked around the
corner-both hands on the grip of the gun, my finger on the trigger.
There was no one there.

We went up the second flight of stairs, at the same
snail's pace. When we got to the second-floor landing, I put my hand
across Karen's chest, touching her breasts the way I had days before.
We smiled at each other nervously.

"Let me take a look," I whispered.

I peered around the corner and down the second-floor
hallway-the gun still tight in my hands. There was no one on the
landing or in the hallway. I listened for a long moment, but I
couldn't hear anyone moving around on the floor above us, either.

"Let's go," I said, giving Karen a little
push.

We walked quickly down the hall to the apartment. I
fumbled with the keys for a moment, cursed myself anxiously, then put
the key in the lock.

"Stand over there," 1 whispered, pointing
Karen away from the doorway.

Karen took two steps to her right and huddled against
the doorway. She looked terrified, hugging herself tightly, as if she
was trying to hold herself together by main force. I pulled the Gold
Cup out and leaned against the jamb. With my left hand I turned the
key in the lock and gave the door a gentle push, keeping the pistol
at the ready in my right hand.

The door creaked and fell halfway open. From where I
was standing by the jamb, I could see through the crack at the door's
hinges. The living room looked empty. But just to be safe, I waited a
long moment before putting both hands on the gun, easing around the
jamb, and stepping into the living room. If someone had shown his
head at that moment, I would have shot him without hesitating. I was
that keyed up.

"It looks all right," I whispered to Karen.
"Let me check the bedroom before you come in."

I walked down the hall to the bedroom, plastered
myself against the Jamb again, and, reaching around the corner with
my free hand, flipped on the bedroom lights. The room was empty. I
checked the bathroom. Then the kitchen. Then I called Karen into the
living room.

I glanced at my watch--it was exactly twelve.

"We've only got a few minutes before he shows,"
I said.

She nodded and bit nervously at her lower lip.

I went over to the rolltop and unlocked the file
drawer. There was a .357 Magnum inside the locked box--a little item
that Bo and his friends had apparently missed when they'd searched my
rooms. I unlocked the box, took out the pistol, and handed it to
Karen. She held it up by the butt, as if it were a dead animal.

"Wait in the bedroom," I said. "If
there is any trouble, protect yourself with that. Just cock it and
pull the trigger."

She stared at the gun. "Am I supposed to save
the last bullet for myself?"

"It's not funny, Karen," I said, giving her
a look.

"I know," she said. "I'm just scared."

"It'll be all right."

Karen walked down the hall to the bedroom, closing
the door behind her.

I sat down in the armchair
and waited.

***

Around twelve-fifteen, I heard the sound of someone
coming up the stairs. Whoever he was, he was wearing rubber boots,
because I could hear them squeaking like frightened mice on the hall
floor. He paused for a moment at the secondfloor landing. I got up
off the armchair and went through the archway into the kitchenette. I
flipped off the kitchen light and settled in behind the archway wall.
In the darkened kitchen, no one could see me and I would have a clear
shot at anyone coming through the door.

I stood there for a long moment, listening for the
sound of the guy in the boots. A minute later, I heard him start down
the hall. He came up to the door and stopped again.

"Stoner?" a man said softly.

It was LeRoi. I recognized his choir bass voice.

I raised the Gold Cup and trained it on the
door--both hands on the grip.

"C'mon in, LeRoi," I called out.

LeRoi opened the door slowly.

"No tricks now, man," he said as he took
one step into the living room.

I could see him clearly from where I was standing--a
tall, stocky black man with a gentle, big-eyed face. He was wearing
boots, a tweed topcoat, and a navy blue sweater cap. He was not
carrying a gun in his hand, although he could have had anything from
a revolver to a shotgun hidden under the longskirted topcoat. I
was struck again by how healthy he looked compared to his help.

Apparently, LeRoi was smart enough not to use the
shit that he pushed--or, at least, not to use it regularly. There was
nothing crazed about his eyes. They were wide open and alert-looking.

He glanced around the room without spotting me. Then
he saw the barrel of the Gold Cup, gleaming in the kitchen archway.
LeRoi flinched and took a step back toward the door.

"You keep pulling guns on people, you gonna get
hurt," he said nervously.

"Close the door," I said to him.

He hesitated for a moment. And in that moment it
dawned on me that I was as much of an unpredictable quantity to him
as he was to me. All he knew about me was that I was a violent white
man who had ripped him off and then pistol-whipped one of his best
boys. He must have thought I could be reasoned with, or he wouldn't
have scheduled the meeting. Still, he knew I was dangerous. And he
was treating me with due caution. I figured I could keep him
off-balance by playing it as tough as possible.

"Close the door," I said again, coming out
from the archway and pointing the gun at LeRoi's head.
LeRoi
glanced nervously at the gun, then closed the door by leaning back
against it.

I said, "Stand away from the door. Put your
hands up and clasp the top of your head."

"I thought we was gonna talk," he said,
without budging.

"Do it, LeRoi!" I snapped. "Or I'll
blow your fucking head off."

He scowled at me defiantly, but he stepped away from
the doorway and put his hands on his head.
I
walked over to the door and locked it. Then patted LeRoi down.

"You got some of your friends outside, LeRoi?"
I said as I frisked him.

"Man," he said, giving me an icy look, "I
told you I'd be alone. If I wanted you dead, homes, you be dead. And
your bitch too."

"Yeah," I said with some ice of my own.
"Your boys are topnotch."

I put my hand in the small of LeRoi's back and shoved
him across the room toward the armchair. He didn't like being pushed.
But I didn't care.

"Lay off me, man," he said, turning toward
me angrily. "Don't nobody lay hands on me."

"Sit!" I barked at him.
He
brushed the seat of the chair off with his left hand, then sat. "You
gonna get burned down, fucker," he said, eyeing me with hate.
"You keep pullin' attitudes on people."

I jerked the gun toward the door.

"If I hear anything out there, I mean anything,
you are dead."

"Shit, man," he said, half rising out of
the chair. "You know who you talking to?"

"Yeah, the nigger who's dumb enough to front
crack to Lonnie Jackowski."

"Wha'chu talking about `Front,' sucker?" he
said with outrage. "Your partner give me two grand for the lady.
Say he give me the rest when he score."

"Where the fuck did Lonnie get two grand?"
I said, giving him a disbelieving look.

"From you, homes," LeRoi said, throwing the
same look back at me. "Who you trying to zoom, man? You jive-ass
motherfucker! You fronted him the bread. Now, you lay the other ten
on me, and we be square."

"He owes you ten?" I said.

LeRoi shook his head. "Wha'chu act like you
don't know for?"

"Because I don't know." I sat down across
from him on the couch. "I'm only going to say this one more
time. I'm not Lonnie's partner, LeRoi. I'm just a friend."

"That's not what he say," LeRoi said
coldly. "He say if anything go wrong I was to call you."

I stared at LeRoi for a long moment. I wanted to
think that he was bluffing. But there was nothing about his face that
suggested a bluff. Besides, I said to myself, what the hell would he
be doing in my living room if he was running a bluff.

"Lonnie told you to get in touch with me?"
I said, feeling it fully--the betrayal, the double cross. Feeling it
but not understanding the reason for it.

"Bet, man. He say you be his partner."

"For chrissake," I said, saying it out
loud, "he fucking set me up!"

LeRoi didn't look impressed by my outrage. And it was
obvious that he didn't believe me. I couldn't really blame him. If
I'd been lying, I would have said the same thing. And, thanks to
Lonnie, he thought I was lying.

"You save that shit for somebody else,
motherfucker. Give me the dime, like he say you would, and we be
square. Give me the lady back, and we be square. One or t'other.
Don't matter to me."

"I don't have the lady," I said with
exasperation. "Didn't Jenkins tell you what was going down when
you took him off'?"

"Don't know nothing about that, bro',"
LeRoi said, shaking his head.

I stared at him again, with that same twilight-zone
sensation in the pit of my gut. "You're telling me you didn't
take Jenkins off?"

LeRoi stared at me. "Wha'chu think? I just go
'round killin' folks for no reason?"

"Jenkins had your crack," I said to him. "A
guy named Cal's got it now. They took Lonnie off at the motel."

"Then you better get it back, homes," LeRoi
said, giving me a hard look. "'Cause you be the man I'm dealin'
with. I don't want to hear you tell me that other shit. I don't care.
You get that crack back or you get me the bread. By tomorrow. Hear?"

He got up from the chair.
 

I pointed the gun at him. "What if I shoot you
right now," I said to him.

He blanched, then smiled sleekly to cover his fear.
"You ain't gonna shoot me, bro'. Shooting me ain't gonna do vou
no earthly good. Wha'chu think? I'm the man? Shit." He threw his
hand at me contemptuously. "The man live out in Indian Hill. He
got him a mansion and a Ferrari. You shoot me, and he just gonna send
some other nigger to take you off. And, homes, he gonna burn you down
big. You dig?"

He glanced contemptuously at the gun I was holding on
him, then started walking slowly to the door. I stared at him dully
as he walked by.

"You still got a day, man," he said as he
opened the door. "You get the bread or the flake, and don'
nobody have to get hurt. Just talk to your partner, man."

I laughed dully. "You don't know where he is, do
you?"

LeRoi didn't answer me. "Call me at the chili
parlor when you ready to deal." He stepped out the door, then
looked back in. "And, homes, don'chu make me call you."