City of Heretics (7 page)

And woke up, feeling an unsettling sort of
holiness
, of dark and ugly
divinity
.

The nightmare shook him up. Crowe had killed men. He’d put many more in the hospital. He had every intention of carrying on in that manner.

But he liked animals. He didn’t like to see them suffer, particularly cats. He’d sooner kill a man than a cat.

He dozed off again pretty quickly. Faith woke him some six hours later, close to eleven in the morning. She’d just gotten out of the shower, and smelled clean and raw as she worked her lithe brown body over his under the blankets.

“Time to get up,” she said, nipping at his jaw and neck with her sharp little teeth. “I’m not quite done with you yet.” He could smell rum on her breath already.

The night before, they’d stopped and bought two bottles on the way, and within an hour they’d finished the first one. He had one drink. In bed, she kept her drink on the nightstand and went often to the kitchen to refresh it. She eventually passed out on top of him.

They had rough, awkward sex after she woke him, and an hour later he was finally out of her bed and in the shower. Her place was in Midtown, near Overton Square, and driving there from the Libre in her Honda Civic they passed about a hundred bars. He wondered why she worked at the Libre, when there were so many other bars to choose from, but he didn’t ask. People just do what they do.

She was in the small and homey kitchen, just setting out plates for eggs and bacon and biscuits out of a tin when he strolled in, tucking in his shirt. The second bottle of rum was on the counter, opened and about a third empty. He ignored it.

“You made breakfast,” he said, more than a little surprised.

She cocked her head at him, grinning. “Uh, yeah?  Breakfast, it’s something people do, you might’ve heard something about it?”

She was wearing nothing but lacy panties and an undersized man’s tee-shirt, and he realized it was the first time he’d ever seen her in the daytime, in natural light. She looked smaller somehow, more vulnerable. From her stance, a little defensive, he could tell she was afraid he was going to be a bastard—the old ‘get-laid-get-out’ routine.

“You have fresh fruit?”

She smirked. “Fresh fruit, he says. You’ll eat eggs and bacon, and like it.”

The breakfast looked great, and she looked great, and he sort of didn’t mind being there so much. He sat down at the breakfast table and ate.

He had six thousand dollars in his pocket, rolled in large bills. Vitower called it a ‘retainer’, and suggested that he use a big chunk of that to buy some good clothes. Between that and the two thou from Jimmy the Hink he was doing okay. Finishing the last of his bacon, he said, “Hey. Get dressed. We’re going shopping.”

Standing at the kitchen counter and drinking orange juice, she said, “You’re pulling my leg, yeah?  You don’t strike me as the type who spends much time at the mall.”

“That’s true. And that’s why I need you along. I’m buying some fresh threads today, and you’re going to pick out three or four dresses you like or jeans you want or whatever. I’m buying.”

She said, “My mama always told me, never say no to a man offering to buy you clothes.”

While Faith was in the bathroom getting ready, he used her phone to make a call. Radnovian picked up on the fourth ring. “Make it important. I’m trying to sleep.”

“You can sleep when you’re dead.”

“Who the goddamn hell is this?”

Crowe identified himself, and Radnovian said, “Ah, Christ. Didn’t I just fucking talk to you?  Like, yesterday?  I swear, you do this shit to me on purpose.”

“I don’t do anything on purpose, Rad,” Crowe said. “Things just sort of happen.”

He snorted into the phone. “Innocent bystander to life, as usual, right?  And I’m going to assume this ain’t a call just to see how shit’s going.”

“At the moment I have some pressing business. I need to know more about Peter Murke.”

“Jesus. What about him?  I already told you everything I know about it.”

“They’re transporting him tomorrow, yeah?  I need to know what route they have in mind.”

Rad said, “What route?  Christ, Crowe. From Memphis to Jackson, you can’t get much simpler than that. You throw the prisoner in the back of the armored van, you start the engine, you drive away. Simple.”

“For a prisoner as high profile as Murke?  They’re gonna be cagey.”

Rad said, “Sounds to me like you’re anxious to get back to prison. That’s not the sort of info someone on parole usually has a hankering for.”

“I’m not on parole, Rad. When all this is done, I promise that if I have to get arrested I’ll let you collar me first.”

“Lucky me. Tell me one thing, Crowe. Why do you need to know this stuff?”

“Some questions are better left unasked. Especially for guys with certain illegal habits.”

There was a brief flare of silence on the line, before Rad puffed air through the headset and said, “There
is
some concern about Murke’s safety on the trip. We had a tip-off a few days ago that some fringe group yahoos might be planning an ambush on the transport van. I mean, it’s a long shot, right, but the D.A. really wants to see this come to trial, and he’s not willing to risk it.”  He paused, and Crowe could hear him swallowing hard, weighing things in his head. He said, “You, uh… you wouldn’t happen to know anything about said fringe group, would you?”

“I’m a moderate. What route are they taking, Radnovian?”

He huffed and puffed, but in the end he spilled.

Crowe said, “One other thing. There’s this Sheriff’s dick named Wills. Eddie Wills. You know him?”

“Ah, Christ, don’t tell me you’re gonna involve yourself with Wills, man.”  Crowe could hear him shifting around; his bedsprings creaking. “Crowe, I won’t lie to you, man, you really stress me out.”

“I don’t have any immediate plans involving Wills. But what’s his story?”

“His story is one that’s seriously screwed up. You probably already know he’s targeted Marco Vitower. Wants him to go down in a big way. His job, basically, is to keep tabs on Vitower’s org, you know, watchful eye and all that. The D.A.’s been trying to build a case against Vitower for a couple years now. They don’t wanna take any chances until they know they’ve got him on something big.”

“But this Wills guy isn’t the patient sort, I take it.”

Rad said, “Wills thinks Vitower killed the Old Man.”

“Why should he care?”

“That, Crowe, is a source of never-ending speculation. Maybe Wills had some kind of arrangement with the Old Man. Maybe they were old drinking buddies, who knows?  The point is, Wills has been dangerously close to losing his badge over this. At this point, there’s no telling what the crazy bastard will do. I’d advise you to steer clear of him.”

“Noted,” Crowe said.

He was standing by the window while talking to Rad, and happened to glance out just then. A kid was standing in the parking lot, not far from Faith’s car. He looked somewhere in his mid-twenties, wore a hoodie that Crowe recognized.

Rad was saying, “Hey. Assuming you survive whatever crazy shit you’re about to pull, you should swing by and have a few beers. Catch up, yeah?”

His brief flare-up of anger at being compromised yet again had dissipated. Even what Crowe had told him the day before about their new status quo didn’t seem to sink in. That’s the way of the heroin user, Crowe thought. After a while, they lose their sense of outrage.

The kid in the parking lot glanced up at the window, and Crowe saw the strong jaw and glittering eyes in a smooth brown face. It was the kid from Jimmy the Hink’s neighborhood, the one he’d kidney-punched and head-butted yesterday. Garay, his name was Garay.

Rad was still talking. Crowe hung up.

He was leaning against Faith’s Honda but stood up straight when he saw Crowe coming across the parking lot. He looked confused for a half-second, but gathered his wits quickly.

“You,” he said. “I thought it was you. Sonofabitch.”

“What are you doing here?”

“I was gonna ask you the same question. Motherfucker, you are just about the last fucker I expected to see today.”

Both his eyes were puffy and he had a bandage across the bridge of his nose. Anger simmered in his eyes and he jammed his hands into the pockets of his hoodie and did an agitated little shuffle. He shook his head, kept shaking his head, as if he couldn’t think of quite what to say and could only marvel at it. “Motherfucker,” he kept saying.

Crowe said, “Remember, Garay, how I told you yesterday. If I saw you again, I’d slice you open.”

“Naw, man. You said if you saw me in
that
neighborhood. You didn’t say nothin’ ‘bout no place else.”

He looked happy with that, like he’d gotten Crowe on a technicality. Crowe almost had to laugh. “Okay,” he said. “I’ll ask you one more time. What the fuck are you doing here?”

“I was gonna ask you the same—“

“I’m asking
you
, Garay.”

He looked sullen, took a deep breath and spat out, “What the fuck you doin’ with my sister?”

“What?”

“My sister. You were up in her apartment. What the fuck are you doing up there?”

“Your sister. Faith is your sister?”

“Ever since I was born, motherfucker. What are you doing with her?”

That time Crowe did laugh, and Garay said, “Ain’t no laughing matter. That’s my big sissy you fuckin’ around with.”

“Okay,” Crowe said. “Well, you answered your own question. You
know
what I’m doing here.”

“You using her to get to me?”

“Don’t flatter yourself, kid. As far as I’m concerned, any business you and I had was finished with yesterday.”

He sneered, huffed air out through his bandaged nose, and then winced. Crowe gave him a moment to get used to things. Finally, Garay said, “You telling me that, just by coincidence, you hooked up with my sissy?”

“We’ve known each other a long time.”

“She didn’t mention no old white dude.”

“She didn’t mention a thug younger brother, either.”

“Shit, motherfucker, you know you’re old enough to be her daddy.”

He was right about that—Crowe was more than twenty years older than her—but he said, “Jesus, kid, how old do you think I am?”

He smiled unpleasantly. “Old enough,” he said. “Old enough to know better.”

He couldn’t argue with that one either, so he let it go. Instead, he said, “You don’t have to like it, kid, but that’s the way it is. Did you have something you wanted to say to Faith?”

“Whatever I have to say to her I can say without you around.”

“Suit yourself.”

He shook his head again and reached into his pants pocket for car keys. He started toward a pimped-out silver Grand Prix parked a couple slots away from the Honda, said, “This ain’t over, man. This ain’t fuckin’ over.”

He got in his car, pulled out and drove away. Crowe watched him until he turned off onto the street.

He didn’t mention anything to Faith about her brother. He wanted to mull it over for a while first. And besides, he had things to do.

He bought four suits, European cut, all in muted conservative colors, one a pearl gray number similar to the one Vitower had on the previous night.  He liked that suit. He waited while they were being tailored, and in the meantime bought four expensive white shirts and some silver cufflinks. Underwear, tee’s, the whole nine. Faith picked out five neckties for him, three of which he put back because they had patterns on them. He only ever wore solid colors, especially in neckties. Finally, he spent a wad on a warm Burberry overcoat in gray wool, and two pairs of comfortable black Italian shoes.

They found so many dresses and blouses and sexy underwear for her that it actually required a clerk to take it all to the car. They split up for about an hour and when they met up again she smelled like booze. He was spending money like a fiend.

And the whole time, he was working it out in the back of his head; not a fool-proof plan, exactly, but a plan anyway. What would he need?  Guns. A heavy, durable vehicle. Two men with him, Chester and one other, someone who could double as a driver/gunman. Two other men as back-up, in a separate vehicle, driving about ten minutes behind them.  What could they expect?  The driver and four Sheriff’s Deputies, all armed, according to Rad.

What else?  No killing the deputies. That would bring down entirely too much heat. Not that the rest of it would be forgiven with a wink and a nod, but shooting down cops, well. No thanks.

So the guns would be just for show—and just for Murke—and they’d need some non-lethal gear. Tasers?  Too unreliable. Tranq guns. Vitower could probably get his hands on two or three of those. Duct tape, the all-purpose crime product. Rope, or handcuffs or something. Yeah, that would do the trick pretty well.

The situation with Faith and her gangster brother took up some space at the periphery of his thoughts, but only a little. He knew he’d have to deal with it more directly before too long, but for the moment he had bigger things.

He was a regular four-star general. Had it all worked out, no worries. He’d pull this job for Vitower, collect a massive amount of money, and then, well… then he would pay himself. Chester and Vitower, and then whoever the hell got in the way.

They had dinner at a Japanese place in Germantown. It was dark when they got back to her flat, both of them pleasantly exhausted. He lay on the sofa and she modeled her new wardrobe for him until he couldn’t take it anymore and threw her on the floor, ignoring the sweet tang of rum sweat that came off her body, peeling off all her new things one by one.

They had some fun. He never even bothered to find out her last name. She’d be dead before the month was over.

The front steps of the courthouse swarmed with reporters, people carrying signs of protest, and curious onlookers, just waiting for Peter Murke to be escorted out and into the waiting transport vehicle. At exactly 10:30, they burst through the doors, ten armed men with the prisoner buried in their midst. Flashes went off. Reporters started yelling questions, shoving microphones and TV cameras in various faces, trying to bulldoze their way closer to Murke. On the periphery, the protestors shouted things like, “
Die, Murke!
” and “
Remember Patricia!
” and “
Give ‘em the chair!
”  As far as Crowe could recall, there wasn’t even a death penalty in Tennessee, but that didn’t stop them from wishing.