The Blade Itself (24 page)

He drove half a mile to the Sunshine Plaza, a strip mall boasting a Jewel-Osco, a tanning salon, one nail place with signs in English and another with signs in Spanish. The parking lot was only half full, but he steered past empty aisles, turned left at the side of the building, and pulled around back. The mall’s Caribbean-fantasy façade was replaced by gritty reality: generators and air conditioners, graffitied brick walls, rows of delivery bays. He backed in beside a Dumpster as she pulled up. Sour milk and old exhaust filled his nostrils when he stepped out of the truck.

‘Okay. What is it?’

She looked at him, looked away. ‘You have a cigarette?’

‘I don’t smoke.’

She nodded. ‘I quit a couple of years now.’

He waited.

‘I’m sorry for jumping you like that. I was trying to find you, and I remembered that we’d followed you there, and
the only other place I could think of was your house. But I thought that would be a bad idea. I figured you wouldn’t want your girlfriend to see you talking to me.’ Her voice sounded sad, like it was a line she had too much experience delivering.

He nodded, trying to keep his voice reassuring. ‘Just don’t do it again, okay? I know it seems like a little thing, but –’

‘– It’s the little things that get you caught.’ She smiled. ‘Evan told me you used to say that all the time.’ Her face suddenly darkened at the name.

‘What is it?’

She looked away from him, staring out toward the road, watching traffic pass. ‘I didn’t know he was going to do it. I should have known, I guess, but I didn’t. Really.’

‘Do what?’ Silence. ‘Debbie, do what?’

She looked back at him, her eyes shot through with red, tears rolling down her cheeks. ‘I didn’t know Evan was going to kill him.’

He felt the ground roll, and reached out a hand to lean against the SUV. Kill him? What did that mean? Kill who?

‘We were out to lunch, I didn’t want to go, but he convinced me that Tommy would be okay. When we finished eating, he said he had a call to make. He got out a matchbook with a number on it, and I tried to stop him from calling, but it was too late, he was already talking to Richard.’ Her words came fast, piling on one another, her eyes wide like a child’s. ‘He said if he didn’t get the money he was going to shoot Tommy in the head, and just then some guy walked out of the bathroom, and I don’t know if he heard or not, but Evan followed him to the parking lot, and, and.. .’ Her voice choked in a sob, and she turned away, then bent over, her hands knit across her stomach.

A bead of sweat ran down his side. Overhead, he could
hear the faint buzzing of a plane. Evan had killed someone.

Oh, sweet Jesus.

‘Debbie.’ He waited for her to straighten up, to take a breath. ‘Where is Evan now?’

‘He put the guy in the trunk of his car and made me follow him to O’Hare long-term parking. He said he’d deal with the body later.’ She shivered. ‘Then we went back to the trailer, and I told him I needed to get out for a couple of hours. That I had to shower.’

‘Good. You go home now.’ He pitched his voice level and even, as if talking to a teenager. ‘Forget any of this ever happened.’

‘What do you mean?’ She looked at him, confused.

‘Walk away. Be done with it.’

She shook her head. ‘I can’t.’

‘What do you mean?’ She couldn’t still have a fire burning for Evan, not after this. Danny had pegged her as a groupie, a smart woman who liked bad men, but it couldn’t run this deep. ‘You’ve got to get clear.’

She looked away. ‘I’d cut off a finger for a cigarette right now.’

He stepped forward, grabbed her by the shoulders. She tried to squirm away, but he held fast. ‘I can’t,’ she whispered.

He stared at her, mute.

‘Think about it,’ she said. ‘If I bail, what’s Evan going to do?
I saw him kill someone
.’

Her eyes were red and tired of the whole world. The punk-rock princess was gone, and what was left was a scared little girl. But she was right. Evan might go after her. Or he might panic and kill Tommy.

He nodded, let go of her shoulders. ‘Okay.’ He stepped back, reached in his pocket for his keys. She winced when she saw them, but he didn’t have time to ask why. He turned
and walked toward the truck. ‘Go home,’ he said over his shoulder.

‘What are you going to do?’

He stopped, the car door open, and turned to look at her. ‘I’m going to end this.’ Then he climbed in, started the engine, and gunned it. The tires squealed as they bit, rocketing the car forward. The speed felt right, clean and pure as anger. He looked in the rearview when he reached the street, and saw that she was still standing there, staring after him, though at this distance he couldn’t tell if her expression was hopeful or despairing. Then he turned onto the street and she was gone.

Evan had killed someone.

What had happened to Evan? What had he become? He’d always been reckless and too hard. But this took things to a new level. Maybe it was prison. Maybe it was desperation. Something had turned Evan into the kind of man who could decide a stranger needed to die and then kill him.

Jesus.

And the call! Why had he made the call from the diner? Why make it at all? To impress Debbie, to show his independence? Why call Richard for that?

Wait a minute
. More important than why was how. In order to make the call, he would have needed the phone number. Danny thought back, trying to replay Debbie’s fractured monologue. She’d said something about him taking out a matchbook with the number on it.

Which meant that after the first call two days ago, Evan had taken the trouble not only to remember the number, but to write it down. Not exactly brain surgery. But also not the kind of thing Evan did. Unless he’d already been planning, even then, to act without Danny. The thought sent a chill down his spine, immediately followed by a flush of furious heat.

Maybe it shouldn’t have surprised him. But it did.

In front of him, traffic slowed, a sea of brake lights. Everyday people trying to get home. At this rate it would take him twenty minutes to make ten blocks.

He swerved over to the shoulder, ignoring the honking, and jammed his foot to the accelerator, half on, half off the road. Cars blurred by. Farther down the shoulder became parking, so he turned into a diner, slowed enough to engage the four-wheel drive, and then rolled right over the grassy embankment separating it from the southbound street. It was a quiet road that took him six blocks before dead-ending in one of the small parks that dotted Chicago. He didn’t even slow down, just took the curb at speed, the wheels jamming into it before catching, jerking him forward till the seat belt bit. Two black teenagers sharing a cigarette on top of the playground equipment spun to watch him, their mouths open, but it didn’t matter, because on the other side of the park lay Pike Street, just down from the site.

He was running on anger, never the smart play, but right now, he didn’t care. All the lethal thoughts he’d entertained the other night were bubbling to the surface. He covered the last two blocks and pulled up to the construction fence. The gate was closed but unlatched, and he nudged it with the front of the truck and drove right through. He was out of the car before the engine had even fully stopped.

Evan sat on the cinder-block steps of the trailer, a cigarette in one hand. He rose, his shoulders back, and flicked the half-finished smoke to one side. ‘Hey, partner.’

Danny didn’t speak, just let the momentum carry him the four paces to the steps, his eyes on Evan’s, his arm snapping back into a swing that caught Evan off guard, Evan’s hands coming up too slowly to keep Danny from connecting with his jaw, a hearty, dead-on smack that left Danny’s hand throbbing with shards of pain. Evan fell, caught himself
against the side of the trailer, and came up in a lunge, his fists quick, forcing Danny back. He blocked one, stepped away from a second, but a brutal right caught him in the temple, the world leaping and resettling, and then it was on, the two of them scrabbling and fighting like kids from the old neighborhood. Danny managed to bring a knee up into Evan’s gut but took two quick jabs to his side in the process, both men breathing hard, gritting teeth, murder in their eyes. It was all coming out in Danny now, every stress of the last month, every setback and failure and lie and calculation he’d sworn he’d never make again, and it burned hot as gasoline. He landed a cross that spun Evan’s face and bloodied his nose, but in the process overreached and left himself open. He saw the mistake too late, Evan’s fist coming round in a hurtling uppercut, all the strength of his body behind it, and then suns exploded behind Danny’s eyes as the force of the punch lifted him off the ground. He fell back, the gravel rushing to meet him, slapping his back. A steel-toed boot slammed into his kidney, and he jerked to his side, at once gasping for air and gagging viciously.

Evan stepped away, breath coming hard, blood trickling from his nostrils. For a moment they eyed each other, glares hard, and then Evan gave a little laugh. ‘So the dumb cooze found you, huh?’ He wiped the blood from his face with the back of his right hand in a childish gesture. ‘Thought she might. I figured that whole thing about a shower was bullshit.’

Danny took air in long gulps, willing the pain to die. It took more strength than he expected to stay propped up on one elbow. He kept an eye on Evan, watching his boots, trying to prepare for another attack. ‘She was scared.’

‘Yeah, well, I’m not going back to Stateville over some fat-ass citizen.’

Danny reached deep, trying to picture a calm place, an
underground lake, cavernous and cool and dark, where the pain was far away. When he had it, he pushed himself up to his knees, and then his feet. Evan backed away, on his guard.

‘It was a stupid move.’

‘Why?’ Evan sneered. ‘Because it wasn’t part of your plan? I got news for you, Danny-boy. I don’t fit into your plans.’

Danny nodded, his vision grainy, his head sore. ‘I’m learning that.’

The remark seemed to please Evan, like it had been a compliment. Like he hadn’t understood the real message. ‘About time.’ He lowered his fists, then reached into his jacket to fumble for his cigarettes.

‘Evan. This changes things.’ He straightened his back, feeling the vertebrae pop, each of them a sharp twinge. ‘We need to rethink.’

‘Nothing,’ Evan paused, lit a smoke, blew a thin stream of gray, ‘changes.’

‘We’re talking murder. The police are going to be looking for you.’

Evan shrugged. ‘So what? Tomorrow we’ll have a million bucks.’

Could he really be so cold about it?

You know the answer to that one, kid. You learned it the hard way. Don’t ever forget it again
.

Still. ‘I know you don’t like to think about it this way, but hear me out. The smart play is for you to leave tonight. You killed this guy in a parking lot, right? You know how much evidence you probably left? Fingerprints, footprints, tire tracks, his blood, your blood. This isn’t a pawnshop we’re knocking over, man. You stick around, they will find you. And if we’re sitting on the kid at the same time, we’ll both go down. Maybe for good.’

Evan stared at him, a sneer on his face. ‘Ahh, Danny.’ He took a long draw on the cigarette, shook his head. ‘Come with me.’ He turned and started to walk toward the trailer.

Danny didn’t move. ‘What for?’

Evan had a hand on the door. He stopped and turned around with exaggerated patience. ‘I want to show you something.’

Every nerve in Danny’s body tingled. Something in Evan’s easy manner scared the hell out of him. It could be a trap. Evan didn’t need his help any longer. He didn’t think the guy would just shoot him casually, but he could hardly be sure.

He pictured Karen. If something went wrong now, she’d never know the truth.

Evan held the door wider and smiled. ‘After you.’

On the other hand, it could be nothing. If he wanted to get out of this, to see Karen again, to try and find a happy solution, he didn’t have much choice. His bruised face throbbing with every beat of his heart, Danny stepped into the trailer, his ears straining for warnings.

The television lit the interior in flickering shades of blue and white. Cardboard packages from microwave dinners littered the counters. The air smelled dank. Tommy moved on the couch, struggling to sit up. His hands and feet had been duct taped to the arms of the couch. There was a strip of tape over his mouth, and another across his eyes. What skin was visible shone pale white and freckled.

‘You taped him?’ Danny couldn’t keep the disgust from his voice.

Evan just smiled as he walked over to the couch.

Then he pulled the gun from his belt and pressed the muzzle against Tommy’s forehead.

It happened so fast Danny couldn’t believe it. One minute no gun; the next, gun. The kid’s struggles ended
immediately, replaced by a soft whimpering like a kicked puppy.

Horror and adrenaline coursed through Danny. His fists clenched, and he could hear the roar of his heart. He took a half step forward, and then caught himself as Evan cocked the hammer back.

‘Now you see. Now you’re starting to get it. All that crap you were spinning out there? You were right about one thing.’ Evan smiled at him, a mocking look. The cold light from the television carved his features from granite. ‘This isn’t a pawnshop.’

‘Wait –’

‘No. Enough talk.’ Tommy whimpered as Evan pushed into him with the gun. ‘It’s time you understood something, amigo. You walked out on me once. It won’t happen again. Not without consequences.’ Evan pushed the gun harder, the kid burrowing into the cushions to get away. Danny could see sweat marks on the fabric.

Then, holding a cocked pistol to a twelve-year-old’s fore-head, Evan winked.

Everything had gone wrong.

And there was nothing Danny could do about it.

Everything hurt.

It had been a lot of years since his last fight, and he’d forgotten the layers of aches that followed a serious scrap, the symphonic balance of pain: a dull soreness across his body, a wobbly necked pounding in his head, a blood-warm throbbing at his swelling left eye, a sandpaper raggedness on his knuckles. None of it was overwhelming, but it all put him in mind of his age. When he’d been eighteen, man, you could hit him with a locomotive and he’d just bounce. But bodies in their thirties weren’t built for street fighting.