Tempted by Trouble (25 page)

She shook her head and took a step away from me.

She snapped, “
Ahora, te vas de mi casa y de mi vida.
”

Her Spanish was firm and crisp, her pronunciation good enough to stop me where I stood. Her Spanish was better than my wife’s Spanish, maybe better than mine.

Each word sounded like agony as I responded “
Te escucho, y te comprendo todo . . . todo lo que dijiste.
”

I fought with my injuries, hurried and limped to my Buick, then leaned against the car and grimaced. Jackie was just as I had left her. She sat up for a moment and looked around, then collapsed again. I took a hundred breaths and saw the sky becoming light enough to reveal the army of mountains that stood around Los Angeles. It took forever for me to open the door and crawl inside. It took another forever to pull out my keys and slide them inside the ignition. Then I made a U-turn and drove away, sped toward Vernon, and turned left, mixed with early-morning traffic that was battling toward I-110, and from there I would hide among thousands and find the I-10, the sun rising over the palm trees, the body that housed my soul dying a slow death.

Dallas, Georgia. It was
a red, white, and blue land inside America’s zip code 30132.

Jackie was waiting. When I called her, she said that she was right off Merchants Drive and parked on Main Street close to Curl’s Pharmacy, a strip that had free parking from post to post and was lined with Christmas decorations and old election campaign posters for the local Republican. The heart of Main Street was simple, a city block long and lined with the Dallas Theater, Beauty Nook, Main Street Sandwich Shop, and sprinkled with one- and two-story buildings. A few of those historic edifices were antique shops that carried this area’s history back into the Civil War. What concerned me had been planted where Main Street turned into North Confederate; at that intersection was the building that housed the local police department.

Jackie was inside Sal’s Pizzeria. She was sitting at a table and eating chicken soup when I walked inside. She was alone reading the front page of the
Dallas New Era.
A
Paulding-Neighbor
was next to her, unopened. For some reason I had expected Eddie Coyle to be there too. I’d expected a setup. I sat down and Jackie reached to her left side and pulled a book out of a Barnes & Noble bag. She slid the book across the table.

I picked it up. It was a heavy book, almost six hundred pages long. I flipped the book over and stared down at a beautiful picture of Abbey Rose’s face.

I slid the book back to Jackie. She put it back on her left side.

She said, “Wanted to make sure we were on the same page.”

“You’re a manipulative woman.”

“I go after what I need and I get it. Same as you, Dmytryk. Same as you.”

“But you don’t care what the collateral damage might be. I do. I care about the damage.”

“You’ll get over it and you can survive this, provided I don’t tell Eddie Coyle or his brother. Eddie Coyle is a murderer and a sociopath and an opportunist and his personality flaws make him good at what he does. That’s why women love him. He’s an evil bastard and evil bastards are irresistible.”

“To someone who is weak and lost and suffers from diminished self-esteem, yeah, he would be.”

Another mild coughing fit attacked me. When I was done, the pain in my back grabbed at me.

Jackie asked, “Do you want to go to the emergency room?”

“I’ll be fine, Jackie.”

“Despite any other deals we make, make sure you pay me back my money.”

“What do you know about the pending withdrawal?”

“They’ve been tight-lipped about it. Rick knew the details. Sammy didn’t know everything. With Rick and Sammy gone, Eddie Coyle pulled you in. That’s the best I can tell you right now.”

“Why don’t you know?”

“Because I don’t care. I just want to do it, get the money, and do what I have to do.”

A moment passed. She’d said Sammy’s name and her face became flushed.

She whispered, “Sammy told me he loved me.”

A pretty waitress named Mo came to the table, brought us glasses of water, and asked me what I would like from the menu. I ordered the same thing Jackie had, chicken soup. She looked at my split lip and bruised face. Some surprise registered in her eyes, but she didn’t ask any questions.

When Mo walked away, I looked down at my left hand, stared at my wedding ring for a moment before I raised my head and frowned at Jackie. She didn’t say anything, just held the arrogant demeanor of a desperate woman who thought that she had the upper hand.

Jackie said, “Now you know about your loyal wife and your buddy Eddie Coyle.”

I nodded. My eyes were on the ghosts standing in the middle of the street. “Let Los Angeles be the topic of this sub-rosa meeting, not Cora and Eddie Coyle.”

Jackie sipped her soup.

I asked, “What’s your bottom line?”

“I want my money repaid. Plus another ten thousand to keep Abbey Rose between us.”

I smiled my father’s “you’ve gone too far” smile. He gave that smile to men and never hesitated to extend that same smile to a woman like Jackie.

“Me, you, Cora, and Eddie Coyle.”

“And Bishop.”

“And Bishop.” A moment passed. “Jackie, you played me.”

“No more than Sammy and Rick played you. We all have roles and I’m playing mine.”

“You’re blackmailing me, is that what this is?”

“Dmytryk.”

“What?”

She took a deep breath. “Sammy used to give me this formula. Zinc, fructose, potassium, vitamin C, protein, and free amino acids. It clears up my skin.”

“That’s good to know.”

“And now I need a fresh supply.”

“You’re joking, right?”

“Sammy understood all of my problems and he didn’t judge or try and ridicule me.”

“Zinc and protein. That’s what you wanted from me in Texas.”

“At first.”

“You were in the bathroom for an hour.”

“I did what I had to do. At first. I’ll admit that. That was all I wanted. But . . . you’re different. I was thinking, if the guy I had a child with were someone like you, then I wouldn’t have the problems I have now. Your wife, she took you for granted, Dmytryk.”

“You played me big-time.”

“I felt for you and wanted to console you the best way I could.”

“With sex.”

“It was better than sending a text message.”

“What is up with you and this soft attitude, Jackie? This isn’t you. You’re an alcoholic who sleeps with married men, has sex with the bedroom door wide open for everyone to see, kills people for fun, and shoots innocent televisions to make a point.”

“If that’s all you see when you look at me, then I wish you were dead, Dmytryk. You’re nothing to me and you’ll never be anything more than a nerd in an insurance man’s shoes.”

“Now, that’s the frantic, inconsiderate, self-centered Jackie I know.”

“I’m a good woman. Sammy was going to leave his wife and be with me.”

“I wouldn’t take bets on that one.”

“He was. Sammy was a man of his word. Everything that Sammy did for me, every promise Sammy ever made, you messed that up for me and now you owe me.”

My attention remained outside. For a moment I saw Rick and Sammy.

Jackie gave me a one-sided smile. “You have to make good on Sammy’s promises.”

“I’m not kidnapping your kid.”

She paused. Frowned. Then she smiled again and said, “Cora knows we slept together. She didn’t look too happy about it.”

“Why did you tell her?”

“Because I don’t like her. I’ve never liked her. Eddie Coyle doesn’t need her in his crew.”

“Because she’s prettier than you. She’s prettier and has the kind of skin you wish you had.”

Jackie threw her frigid water in my face. I picked up my glass and returned the gesture. Water crashed against her face and she howled and choked. I picked up a napkin and wiped my face, then I smiled.

Jackie picked up a fork. I picked up a knife.

The waitress had seen the double assault and hurried our way with her mouth open wide.

Jackie snapped, “Mind your own business and go away.”

The two customers in the room looked at us, then turned their eyes away as the mumbles began.

I wanted to put my knife in Jackie’s throat. I wanted to feed her some lead.

Jackie put her fork down. I put my knife to the side.

She said, “You’ve changed.”

I coughed a bit and tasted my own blood before I answered her. “Have I?”

“You’re acting like you’re one of us now. All it took was for someone to beat you to Death’s doorstep and for Cora to break your heart. But I think what Cora has done to you is the greatest injury.”

“Say her name again and I’ll break your neck.”

“Cora. Cora Knight. Cora, Cora, Cora. You don’t like it? Cora, Cora, Cora.”

“Grow up,” I said as I picked up my spoon and began eating my chicken soup.

Pain coursed throughout my body. I wanted another Vicodin. I wanted two more. I told myself to ride it out. The side effects of the medicine were getting the best of me. Jackie picked up napkins and wiped water from her face, trying to dab her dress and stop the water from soaking in. In this weather, stepping outside in wet clothing could be instant pneumonia.

I said, “No wonder they took your kid.”

She pulled her lips in, swallowed, then sat there in silence. She was in her own kind of pain, an inner pain that made her irrational. Her suffering made her reckless, taking risks that could have everyone in jail or dead at the scene of a crime. Sleeping with Sammy had been a calculated risk, a means to an end. And now she needed me to put on a dead man’s shoes.

She whispered, “When this is done, Dmytryk, will you help me get my kid?”

“Are you deaf or just stupid?”

“Please? My kid is in Chattanooga. That’s two hours from here. Go with me, help me out. Just be the driver. You won’t be seen. I’ll cancel the debt. You can keep the four grand and I’ll throw you five more. How does that sound? It won’t take more than an hour. I just need you to drive us back toward Mexico.”

The tables had turned. When she was done I shook my head as my final answer.

I looked out the window and said, “Yeah, Sammy knew how to pick his women.”

“Is that tone and look supposed to scare me? Save that look for Cora. My bad. She’s with Eddie Coyle. That’s where she’s bouncing up and down. That’s the pole she’s swinging from these days.”

“You’re slipping off into the deep end of the pool.”

“You want me to apologize? I mean on my knees, mouth wide open, apologize.”

“You’re filthy.”

“Did you enjoy our time in Texas? Did that mean anything, or did you just use me?”

There was no light inside Jackie, only darkness. She was disgusting and lewd. And the carnal dirtiness of a woman always appealed to men, no matter how clean they were. Maybe because no matter how many showers we took, no matter how long we bathed, we were all made of dirt and would forever be creatures of dirt. Jackie had a filthy, arrogant, and dark demeanor that angered me. And her darkness appealed to the resentment inside me, the part that had taken control. Jackie was a powder keg of trouble. But then again, to a thinking man, all women were.

Jackie asked, “Well, in that case, are we going to have sex again, or was Texas one shot?”

That was when I saw the Paulding County sheriff stop out front.

I told Jackie that law enforcement had pulled up outside and double-parked.

Jackie wiped water from her face and whispered, “FBI or local?”

“Local.”

“How many cars?”

“One car.”

“How many officers?”

“Two.”

“We can take them if we have to, Dmytryk. I’ll never let a small-town cop take me in.”

“Sit still. Sit still and act like a lady. I know that’s difficult for you, but do it.”

Two young officers brought the cold inside. They looked at us in a way that told us they were there on business. They didn’t greet us, just went directly to the waitress, then came to us and asked us what was the problem. The waitress had called and reported the disturbance. I smiled, said that everything was fine. Nothing to worry about.

Jackie said, “It’s called foreplay. You’ve heard of foreplay, haven’t you, or don’t they do that in Dall-ass, Georgia? You should see what we do at ice cream parlors or in the whip cream section of Kroger. Whip cream on breasts like these, can you imagine that, officer? Well, we used water, but maybe we should’ve ordered some honey. Imagine that, officer, me butt naked, on this table with honey smeared over all God gave me. Now, that would have been a reason for the waitress to call all the men in town.”

The officers turned red, swallowed, looked at each other, then asked us to leave their city. Their stares said that it was that or we’d take a short walk to the police station on the next corner.

The men who guarded this Republican and Christian haven knew what I knew. Jackie was cynical. Jackie was evil, and evil had to be run out of town before that disease spread.

We stood up to leave, the gun inside my coat pocket weighing more than five years in jail, and as we left Jackie told them all to have a merry Christmas, only she added a curt and powerful word that started with the letter
F
and ended with the eleventh letter of the alphabet, that singular word to give a deeper and more personal meaning to that clichéd and overbearing yuletide expression.

Eddie Coyle’s murderous brother
was inside the safe house when I arrived. Eddie Coyle wasn’t there. Neither was Cora. Bishop was dressed in jeans and boots by Harley-Davidson, his heavy coat open wide as he smoked a Marlboro and maintained a firm grip on a loaded .38. He was keeping guard.