Spook Squad (3 page)

If it was a casual hookup looking for a repeat of the action, I couldn’t blame the guy for trying. Except if I were to drop by some casual lay’s shop in hopes of scoring, I’d at least attempt to sound a bit more…flirty. And I don’t have a flirtatious bone in my body.

The knocking turned into banging. “Hello? I really need to—look, I tried to get here earlier but the buses run so bad in the snow.”

I looked to Crash to see if he recognized the voice yet. He shook his head.

More banging, and then the guy yelled, “Your store’s hours fucking suck.”

Crash’s eyebrows shot up toward the dark roots at his hairline. “Sometimes the whole non-violence discipline feels incredibly limiting.”

“You want me to…?”

“No, you’re my guest, not my bodyguard. Keep eating.” He rounded the counter and headed for the door. “I’m happy to provide a refresher-course in manners.”

 
Right, as if I was going to just sit there and keep stuffing pizza in my face while he dealt with this guy. For all we knew, this was the same creep who’d robbed the downstairs neighbor, coming back for round two. As I grabbed the entire stack of napkins and began buffing the grease off my fingers in anticipation of drawing my sidearm, a calm and familiar voice said, “Let Curtis handle it.”

Not that I didn’t value Miss Mattie’s opinion…but I kept de-greasing anyway.

“You care ’bout him, I know, but he still a man. You can’t fight his fights for him. When you let people make their own choices, you show them your respect.”

Darkened store, agitated customer, recent robbery—whatever cop-sense I’d developed over the years was shrilling “danger” at its highest volume. I crept up the aisle, right hand ready…and then I saw the guy who’d preempted my dinner wasn’t brandishing an ice pick or a chain-wrapped baseball bat. He had a can of incense in his hand. “I need to return this.”

Crash flipped on the overhead lights. They flickered to life, and my ominous sense of foreboding ebbed. He took the can from the guy, shook it a few times, and said, “It didn’t light?”

“It lit…but it was wood, mostly wood.” He was a normal-looking guy, but normal-looking guys can carry a switchblade or a pistol in their pocket just as easily as an obvious thug. I kept my eye on his body language, his aggression. Now that he had six feet of tattooed Crash up in his face, he was nowhere near as cocky as he’d been on the other side of the door.

Crash is assertive, but he’s not aggressive. He doesn’t maneuver like a cop—he steers situations with words. “That’s characteristic of this type of self-lighting incense. Anything you get in a canister will be tinted sandalwood infused with oils and resins. The wood is what keeps it burning without charcoal.”

“But it’s awful. All the different types smell the same, like wood.”

I spied movement out of the corner of my eye. Miss Mattie was fanning herself with her paper St. Anthony fan beside me. I wondered if her fanning had anything to do with the hissing radiators or if, since she was non-physical, it was simply habit. “That man is just here for an argument,” she said. “And Curtis happy to give it to him.”

Taking into consideration the posture, the gestures…I’d have to agree. Since I’m the type of person who avoids arguments rather than feeding off them, I wandered back to the counter. “Is he okay?” I said under my breath. “In general, I mean. He’s not…starving or anything. Is he?”

When Miss Mattie didn’t answer, I thought maybe she’d disappeared. She hadn’t, though. She was gazing off into eternity, gently fanning her broad face. Finally, she said, “Curtis grew up with money. Big house, out in the suburbs. Only child. Two parents working, jobs that pay good…jobs they hate. His daddy dropped over dead the day after he turned fifty. His momma fightin’ an ulcer.”

I tried to picture Mattie in this well-to-do suburban scene, and couldn’t quite see how she’d fit in. “And you were their neighbor?”

“That’s just how his momma explained it to him.” She snapped her fan shut. “I cleaned their house.”

“Oh.” If that was a mental shift for me, I couldn’t imagine what Crash would make of it. I sure as hell wasn’t going to be the one to break the news.

Miss Mattie disappeared as the argumentative guy’s voice carried up the aisles. “Aren’t you going to offer me a refund?”

“I might have, if you didn’t barge in here after closing—”

“I told you, the bus—”

“And on top of that, it’s almost gone. How bad could it have been if you used it up?”

“The can was half-empty to begin with. The contents settle. Open a new one and you’ll see.”

How long was this guy gonna carry on? I swallowed the last of my water, then delved through the beaded curtain to the inner sanctum for a refill. Okay, and maybe to snoop while Crash was occupied, so I could reassure myself that I wouldn’t swing by and find he’d starved to death because I hadn’t thought to bring bread sticks.

The fridge looked pretty sparse. There were condiments on the door, soy sauce and chili paste, and jars of who-knows-what covered in colorful Asian characters. An egg carton with ten eggs left. Numerous packets of McDonald’s ketchup and Taco Bell salsa. I tried not to imagine him living on fast food condiments, but I didn’t see any way to drop off some vegetables without coming off as incredibly condescending. The freezer, in which you could usually find some microwave vegetarian dinners and a big bottle of vodka, now contained nothing but a two-inch layer of frost and a few trays of ice cubes. A package of marked down Halloween cookies, crumbled as if someone had stepped on them, sat on the countertop. The cupboards held a canister of generic oatmeal, a bag of dried lentils, and a stack of ramen noodles as long as my arm. I’d endured the occasional all-ramen menu when I was first sprung from Camp Hell. I hadn’t ended up with diabetes or scurvy, and actually, I didn’t mind the taste. Were they still ten for a dollar? Maybe, in the local bodegas. Nowadays, I wouldn’t dare bring any home for fear of an all-night lecture on the dangers of sodium. I closed the cupboard door before I got caught rifling through Crash’s stuff, refilled my water from the tap, and made my way back through the piles of books, recycling and dirty clothes to the store.

Crash and the disgruntled customer were now standing in front of the incense display. “You’re gonna have to upgrade to charcoal and resin. If you don’t like that wood smell, it’s the only way.”

“You’re probably just trying to get me to buy an expensive incense holder.”

“Absolutely not—a heavy ceramic ash tray will work just fine. If you don’t wanna buy a new one, wash an old one in salt water and say your favorite cleansing ritual over it first.” The guy grumbled a reply, and Crash said, “Tell you what. Try some of the primo stuff, and I’ll throw in your first roll of charcoal, free.”

“Free” must have been the magic word. The guy picked out his incense and Crash rang him up around the now-cold pizza. He even had the decency to look slightly chagrined for interrupting our dinner. Once we heard his footsteps recede down the stairwell, I said, “How much did that encounter net you?”

“Pff. Maybe five bucks. Plus the satisfaction that I didn’t give him a refund for the used up thing he was trying to return.”

“And the charcoal?”

“Costs me a quarter.”

He was a savvy salesman and he knew how to handle a customer, but it seemed like a hell of a lot of effort for a measly $4.75. Especially when he was living on ketchup packets. I didn’t want to come right out and say it—he hadn’t asked for my financial advice, after all, and Miss Mattie’s assertion that too much interference would emasculate him was fresh in my mind. I cared about him, though. I couldn’t just say nothing. I closed the box on the cold pizza and said, “Retail seems like a tough business.”

“You’re telling me.”

“I’ll bet you’d be good at marketing.” This wasn’t necessarily a hundred percent accurate. His flyers were artsy, but also cryptic and vaguely disturbing. Although maybe, for the right sort of customer, that sensibility would be a bonus. Truthfully, I added, “You seem to enjoy it.”

“As a full-time gig? I dunno. I’d need to go back to school. Plus I’d end up having to deal with a lot of corporate dickwads.”

“And how are they any worse than tonight’s charmer?”

Crash pulled a pack of gum out of his pocket and offered me a stick. I shook my head, no. He unwrapped a piece and said thoughtfully, “Maybe I’d be good at marketing, maybe I wouldn’t. It doesn’t much matter. This store is my world. It’s my life. It’s who I am. I’m my own boss, and I make my own rules. I couldn’t close up shop any more than you could turn in your badge and start taking orders from F-Pimp.”

Chapter 3

Trouble shared is trouble halved—that’s how the saying goes, anyway. Unfortunately, describing the bloody truck to Crash brought back the day I’d been working so hard to forget. The ghost was so young, maybe Lisa’s age, not even thirty, and she was still hung up on the guy who’d stabbed her…twelve times, by my count…three of them in the neck. The only reason she’d told me it was him was to ask me—to
beg
me—to help her understand why he’d done it.

And unfortunately, I had no good answer for that.

A Valium might take the edge off my thoughts, but it wouldn’t do anywhere near as good a job at dulling the day’s memories as a Seconal would. Too bad I was fresh out of reds. They’re a hell of a lot harder to score than Valium.

Since the objective was to knock myself out completely, I turned to over-the-counter sleeping pills instead. Slumber came not on a gentle wave of barbiturate euphoria, but with a sickening lurch. Still, it was better than seeing the victim every time I closed my eyes, her stabbed throat working as she wailed her husband’s name.

Jacob got back from the range while I was dead to the world. I surfaced from the tar pit of chemically-induced sleep to the feel of a tongue sliding over the nape of my neck, a hard-on prodding the back of my thigh, and the faintest ballistic whiff of metal. I’m always up for a nightcap. Too bad my drugged body was so sluggish, so numb, it felt like it wasn’t even mine.

“Can’t,” I managed to say. “Tired.”

Jacob settled against me and allowed his hand to drift from my crotch to my thigh, stroking absently while he ground his head into the pillows searching for just the right spot.
 

I checked to see if my body might rally and rouse itself for a quickie, but moving wasn’t just difficult. It was nearly painful. “Jerk off on me,” I slurred.

He exhaled a silent laugh. “It’ll keep.” As he breathed a lingering kiss into my neck, he pushed his knee into the crook of my legs, and now it was perfect, with all of our hills and valleys pressed together, like a puzzle piece that’s just snapped into place. “It’s not nearly as fun without you in on the action.”

That was probably for the best, otherwise I could be replaced with a porno.

 
“I couldn’t stop thinking about how angry Carolyn was tonight,” he said softly. “We used to train together. It was weird without her.”

I made a sympathetic noise.

“She would’ve been crazy about this range, all the latest stuff—indoor, outdoor, simulators, the works…but I don’t think it matters. It’s as if joining the FPMP would be like picking sides, Psych versus NP. And she’d rather not be a Psych at all.”

Imagine that.

He said, “I used to understand why you’d rather just get rid of it. If there was some kind of switch you could flip—a procedure, a surgery, whatever. I could see you doing it, even if it was permanent, and even if it meant you’d be out of a job. Maybe it would be easier, not having to see all of it, all at once. All the ‘stuff’ most people don’t need to see. But after PsyTrain, seeing what little I did…now I know ignoring it won’t make it go away. Trying to switch off psychic ability is like turning off the lights when a burglar’s in the house so you don’t have to look at him.”

What he didn’t understand, and what I couldn’t articulate with over-the-counter lethargy surging through my veins, was that I totally agreed that knowing was better than ignorance. Yet, the analogy fell apart if you drilled down too far. The burglar wasn’t just swinging by to relieve me of some valuables and then hustle off to the pawn shop. He lived with me…and then he followed me to work. And to the store. And the diner. And anywhere else I might care to go. There’s bound to be a saturation point, a point at which I give up and say,
Fine, take what you want. You will anyway, and I’m sick of the sight of your ugly face.

Jacob said, “Carolyn was right about one thing—I did make a difference to more people on the force. But it’s not a numbers game, not when it’s about us: you, Crash, Lisa, Carolyn too. Our families. All of us.” Sleep was dragging me into its leaden embrace, but just as I teetered at the brink, he added, “Now it’s personal.”

*
 
*
 
*

The next morning, I woke to the sound of the downstairs toilet flushing. Jacob’s side of the bed was cool. He’d already left—he put in some long hours as a Fed—so I knew it was Lisa puttering around down there. I felt relieved. And then a bit guilty, but mostly relieved, because if Carolyn’s relentless truth had been hard for me to hear, it must have been way worse for Lisa. She must’ve come in pretty late, so I was surprised to find her watching the coffee drip when I came downstairs to shower. Jacob had stopped drinking his customary jumbo-sized cup. I’m guessing our home coffee tasted like swill compared to the stuff at the FPMP. Out of habit, though, we always brewed a full pot, then ended up staring at it, wishing it would hurry up and happen already. Her eyes looked strange. She’d been wearing makeup the night before, and the smudginess around her eyelashes made her look a lot girlier than usual, and a bit younger, too.

“How’s Crash?” she asked me.

“Broke.”

Lisa frowned. “Okay, I think I need a haircut.” We both watched the dripping slow down, and finally she couldn’t take it anymore and snatched out the pot. A long stream of coffee dribbled onto the heating element with a burnt-smelling hiss. “So, you’re still doing that exorcism for Agent Dreyfuss, right?”