Joe Victim: A Thriller (33 page)

Chapter Fifty-Six

The police escorting the empty van are nowhere to be seen. It’s like a ghost being escorted into town. Except it’s not. It’s some kind of decoy van. There must be a crowd of people outside the courthouse. The police must be expecting trouble and are sneaking me through a different entrance. We reach the edge of town. Then we’re closer to the center. We can hear people. Lots of people. We’re on the one-way system heading toward the courts.

“Oh my God,” Kent says.

I look up out the window. I’ve managed to not pass out, which I really think deserves a medal. Protestors are lining the street close to the courthouse. They’re yelling and screaming at the police escort, which I can now see is further up ahead. The escort is swamped by a sea of people. Many of them are carrying placards, but I can’t read what they say. In a way it’s a relief to know all these people have come out here to support me. Nobody wants to see me punished. I’m too likeable. I wasn’t in control of my actions. I’m an innocent man, driven by needs that I’m not even aware of, driven to do things that I can’t even remember. I’m Joe Victim. The justice system is going to save me. A six-foot monkey is waving at everybody going past, a can of beer in his hand with a drinking straw, a big monkey grin on his face. So maybe I have passed out or crossed over because I don’t understand what the fuck is going on. But what I don’t understand the giant panda does, because that’s who I see next, and I guess it’s friends with the monkey because it runs up behind him, throws his arms around him, and starts humping him before the monkey turns around and they touch beers and then both of them are drinking.

“This is going to be worse than I thought,” Kent says.

“You think it’ll end today?” Jack asks.

Kent shakes her head. Are we all seeing the same thing? “Either today or this week,” she says. “University students like this can’t commit to much more than drinking and smoking weed and fucking. I just think committing to dressing up as wildlife and movie characters for more than a week is too much for them.”

I finally realize what’s happening—they’re university students in costumes, all of them have come along to support me. Young people get me, I suppose.

The van turns right. Beads of vomit run across the floor. We get to the end of the block and turn left. Beads of vomit run the other way. Now we’re running parallel to the street we were just on. There are people, but not as many. They are carrying placards. It seems like the entire city has come out to let the world know of my innocence, to let the world know that the real crime is our justice system.

“Just keep driving,” Kent says, even though Jack wasn’t showing any sign of not driving. Just one of those dumb things people say. People are ignoring the van. I practice my big-boy, friendly-neighborhood-retard smile. I need it warmed up and ready for when we get to the courthouse.

Kent turns back and stares at me. “What the hell are you grinning at?” she asks.

“Nothing,” I tell her.

“You’re such a smug bastard, aren’t you,” she says. “You think it’s all going your way. You think the money you earned by showing us where Calhoun was is going to help you, but it’s not. Somehow it’s going to bite you in the ass and people will find out.”

“Detective Calhoun was a killer,” I tell her.

“What are you talking about?” she asks.

“He’s the one who killed Daniela Walker. He went to talk to her and he ended up killing her. Her husband used to beat her up, and instead of helping her, Calhoun took a shot at her too. Then he staged the scene so you would think it was me.”

“You’re full of shit,” Jack says.

“It’s true,” I tell them. “Half the people at the station thought it was somebody else. Well, it was him.”

“Shut up,” Jack says.

“Hey, I don’t care if you believe me or not. I got my money, so what do I care? But you people are worshipping the guy because he was killed in the line of duty, but you’re worshipping a rapist and a killer. You know the difference between him and me?” I ask, and I’m ready for their answers, for the
You got caught and he didn’t,
the
You’re a sick fuck and he wasn’t,
but none of them answer, and I realize they’re all hanging on to every word I’m saying, they’re praying for me to say something they can use against me, something one of them can get up on the stand and tell a courtroom full of people.

“The difference is he was a cop. I’ve only ever been the person I am,” I tell them. “I’ve never pretended to be anything else. Calhoun pretended to be on the good side of good versus evil, he was supposed to be somebody above the law, he’s the one everybody should be hating, not me.”

“You’re full of shit,” Jack says.

“And you’ve said that already,” I tell him, then I look at Kent. “I know you don’t believe me, but give it time. By the end of the day you’ll be thinking more and more about it, and by this time tomorrow you’ll be working on proving it one way or the other. Let me know how it works out for you.”

Jack has to swerve around somebody who walks out in front of him, the vomit on the floor starts moving in a new set of directions, and so does my stomach. Then we take a left, coming in behind the courthouse. I once stole a car from this street. I once kicked a homeless man in the nuts and threatened to set him on fire on this street—though of course I was only kidding. I’m not sure if he got the joke—that’s the thing about people, they don’t get irony.

“Are you enjoying this?” Kent asks.

“I’m just trying to do the best I can.”

There are a few people behind the court—a few dozen at the most. Jack pulls up outside a gate and waits for a few seconds for it to roll open. There are office buildings opposite us and lots of parked cars and people walking to and from work. There are road cones in the intersection. I can see some of the signs now. They don’t make sense.
An eye for an eye. Slow Joe must go. Kill the fucker.

What the hell is going on? Kent sees my confusion and my smile disappears and now she’s wearing one. “Did you think these people were here to support you? Oh, Joe,” she says, “you truly are dumber than we all thought.”

The gate opens and we drive through. The gate rolls closed behind us. My stomach suddenly constricts and I lurch forward a little. Jack brings the van to a stop. I’m still confused by the signs.
An eye for an eye
for who?
Kill
who?
Slow Joe must go
—well, that one makes sense, it means Slow Joe must be allowed out of jail. There are other cars, an ambulance, a security guard. I can tell I’m not the only one feeling sick now, the stench of vomit churning everybody else’s stomach. Jack and Kent get out of the van and walk around to the back and open the doors. I stare at the ambulance, just wanting to climb into the back, just wanting somebody to take care of me. There’s a sharp pain going across both sides of my stomach, but more so on the side where Cole punched me. I start retching, but all that comes out are a few flecks of vomit.

It takes me a minute, but eventually I get out of the van and onto my feet.

Chapter Fifty-Seven

Melissa tenses up when she sees Joe. Her heart quickens. Last time she saw him for real was the Sunday morning he walked out of her apartment. They’d spent Friday night and all of Saturday and Saturday night in bed together. They had ordered pizza and watched romantic comedies on TV, and she hated romantic comedies, but with Joe they were funny. He liked them. He laughed. She laughed. Joe was a romantic guy. He was supposed to come back that afternoon. He was only going home to feed his cat. He even left his briefcase with her. It had some knives in it. He left and didn’t come back and she was angry at him. She felt used. Angry. Angry enough to go looking for him and maybe take a knife to him. But she didn’t. If Joe didn’t want her, then fuck him. It was his loss. Only that’s not what happened. She saw Joe again on TV that night. He’d been arrested.

Right now Joe is on his feet. He doesn’t look good. He looks pale. What have the prison people been doing to him? Any second now the plan will either work or it won’t. It all depends on how good a shot Raphael is under pressure.

Joe collapses.

He falls into a ball on the ground. Yet there wasn’t a gunshot, was there?

The people who were in the van with Joe stand around him, then help him to his feet, and they’re not panicking, so no, there’s been no shot. They move Joe toward the courthouse, half carrying, half dragging him, and she knows from Raphael’s viewpoint there is no way he can get an accurate aim on him.

Joe is whisked away into the courthouse. No screams and no blood.

“Why are we here?” the paramedic asks. “I mean, why did you want to come along?”

“Shut up,” Melissa says. “I’m trying to think.”

“Do you know him? The Carver? Listen, I understand if you’re here to kill him, I do, and Jimmy, he’ll understand too. Please just don’t hurt my kids. I’ll do what you ask.”

Melissa stares at her. She’s never killed a woman before, but she’s starting to think it’d be worth it just for the life experience. It would be character building. “I said shut up.”

“Please, please, you have to let us go.”

Melissa turns and points the gun at her. “Listen, if you don’t shut the fuck up I’m going to stick a hole in you. Okay?”

The woman nods.

Melissa pulls out her cell phone. Calls Raphael. He answers after one ring.

“There was no clear shot,” he says, and he sounds panicky. “No shot.”

“I know,” she says. “Listen to me carefully,” she says. “You need to stay calm. We still have time. In fact we have all day. They’ll be bringing him back out. I’m not sure when, but it will happen later this afternoon. It has to. Just stay calm and stay put.”

“You want me to wait around until then?” he asks, sounding incredulous. “Up here in my police uniform?”

“Yes,” she says.

“What? Up here in the office?”

“Where else would you wait?”

“What if somebody comes in?” he asks.

“Nobody is going to. Listen to me, you need to stay calm. It’s going to work out, I promise you.”

“You promise? How the hell—”

She interrupts him. “I’ll stay down here the entire time,” she says. “Don’t overthink it. Just stay calm and do what needs doing.”

She hears him sigh. She can imagine him up there in his police uniform, running his hands through his hair, maybe covering his face with his hands.

“Raphael,” she says.

“Suddenly all of this is seeming like a bad idea,” he says.

“It’s not a bad idea. It was just a small piece of bad luck. Or bad timing, really. There’s something wrong with him. He’s sick. For all we know they might bring him right back out. For all we know you’ll get another chance in five minutes.”

He doesn’t respond. She can hear him breathing into the phone. Can hear him wondering if this may end up being true. Trish is staring at her. Within the last minute the crowd outside the back of the courthouse has swelled as people have figured out Joe came this way. The signs don’t mess around—
Die fucker die
is a good litmus test for how the crowd is feeling. And what the hell is it with all these stupid outfits some of them are wearing?

“Are you still there?” she asks.

“I’m here,” he says.

“We can do this. If not now then at the end of the day when Joe comes back out. It’ll be just as good then. Maybe even better,” she says, not really believing that last bit.
Better
would be if Raphael had taken a successful shot already.

“Okay,” he says, “I’ll wait and get him on the way back out. I promise,” he says, and he hangs up and Melissa stares at the back door of the court building and tries to figure out how long is too long when it comes to waiting for a guy like Raphael, and hopes he can keep his nerve long enough to stay where he is.

Chapter Fifty-Eight

They drag me toward the holding cells until somebody decides that it’s a bathroom that I need dragging to, at which point they start me in a different direction. When I try to use my legs I find I just can’t get them to grip the ground beneath me. The organs squashed earlier aren’t bouncing back into shape. Instead they’re getting tighter. I’m placed in front of a toilet and the view of a chunk of shit caked above the waterline is better at helping the purging process than jamming my fingers down my throat.

I have never in my life felt this sick. Sweat is dripping off me. I throw up again, then topple forward and somebody catches me before I lose my front teeth against the porcelain. They get me up and I don’t see much of the journey except for some blurry walls and sometimes my own feet, but I’m taken into a first-aid station and I’m laid down on a cot, but none of the chains are removed. The room smells of ammonia and ointments and recently wiped-away vomit. It smells exactly how the first-aid station back in school used to smell, and for a moment, just one brief moment, I’m back there, I’m eight years old and I’m feeling sick and the nurse is soothing back my hair and telling me I’m going to be okay. That doesn’t happen this time.

“Joe,” somebody says. I open my eyes. It’s a nurse. She’s attractive and I try to smile at her, but can’t manage it. She’s looking down at me. “Tell me how you’re feeling,” she says.

“I feel sick.”

“Can you be more specific?”

“Real sick,” I tell her, being real specific. She hands me some water and tells me to drink and I manage a few sips, then roll onto my side and start gagging.

Hot Detective Kent, Jack, and the other two officers are in the room with us. The nurse is chatting to them, but I can’t focus on what she’s saying. Then Hot Detective is making a call somewhere. The nurse comes back, Hot Nurse, and I must be sick because as much as I try to imagine Hot Nurse making out with Hot Detective, my mind just won’t go there. It wanders off to other things. I think about my mom’s wedding. I think about Santa Suit Kenny. I think about my nights spent with Melissa.

“Joe, what have you eaten over the last few days?”

“Shit food,” I tell her.

“Can you be more specific?”

“Real shit food,” I tell her, being real specific again, wondering if this woman needs everything in life explained.

“Does this hurt?” she asks, then pushes her fingertips into the side of my stomach. I can hear fluid moving in there. We all can. It doesn’t hurt and I don’t tell her it doesn’t hurt so therefore she doesn’t ask me to be more specific. She pushes a little harder and I have to tighten my ass muscles to stop a huge mess from happening.

“Yes,” I tell her, wanting to push something sharp into her stomach and ask her the same thing. “It’s a sharp pain,” I tell her.

“Where exactly?”

“Everywhere.”

Kent comes over. She’s shaking her head. “Nobody else at the prison is sick,” she says.

“He’s faking it,” Jack says, but it sounds like even he doesn’t believe it.

The nurse shakes her head. “I don’t think so,” she says. “I think we need to get him to a hospital.”

“There’s an ambulance out in the parking lot,” Kent says, then turns toward the security guard. “Go get the paramedics,” she says, “and let’s hope we can get this sorted out so we don’t have to delay the trial.”