THE POLITICS OF PLEASURE (23 page)

Fired on weed and alcohol, the twenty-two year old driver of the Charger cut around the stopped Ford and sped off after Goldman. The Charger's back end drifted sideways on the damp blacktop. Its driver confident police wouldn't be out on full patrol because of the inclement weather. The irate owner of the burning Buick forced himself behind the wheel of the Ford. With a carload of armed men, he too sped off after Goldman, intent on killing the sonofabitch who'd torched his recently paid-for car.

Goldman glanced at the looming headlights in his rear-view mirror. He was going too fast to turn into any side streets. The Dodge Charger was gaining ground. Goldman pushed his car to a reckless speed and approached a green-lit intersection. The lights turned amber and the chemist swerved left without indicating. He narrowly missed a Skyline sedan running the lights from the opposite direction. The Skyline’s startled driver braked hard and swerved to avoid a collision.

Goldman regained control of his slewing vehicle, though not before clipping the rear end of a parked Pontiac with a FREE NELSON MANDELA sticker on its back window. Back in the saddle, he sped along a four-lane street whose wet surface reflected a montage of headlights, taillights and the prismatic colours of electric shop signs. Before long he reached the back end of the street's slow-moving traffic. He looked in the rear-view mirror. The Charger slid recklessly through the intersection behind him.

Jesus Christ!
Goldman pounded the wheel again. He needn't have worried, though, for the red light-running Charger was hit side-on by no less than two cars. Glancing in the mirror again, Goldman saw the driver's side of the vehicle had been heavily impacted. He almost whooped with relief. A carload of gunmen had been taken off the board.

Goldman's other pursuers were more deft in their approach, though no less determined. The Ford powered round the crashed Charger, which blocked two lanes of outbound traffic. With Goldman's receding red tail lights in front of him, the irate driver of the Ford hurtled down the empty stretch of street separating him from his quarry.

While performing the aforementioned manoeuvre, the bronze Ford cut off a motorcyclist riding through the intersection. The motorcyclist braked and skidded on the rain-wet road, resulting in him and his Harley Davidson parting company in an undignified manner. The downed, tattooed biker (who went by the moniker of Spider) wasn't riding alone. The patch on the back of his leather jacket proclaimed him a member of The Devil's Jokers M.C., Baltimore Chapter. His fellow riders swerved sharply to avoid hitting him and his sliding cycle. All up it could have been a lot worse for the compact group of bikers.

Let it be said the bikers weren't in a good mood, now Spider especially.

They'd recently discovered their amphetamine lab had been trashed, with ten kilos of product stolen. Moreover, the young chemist they’d recruited from San Francisco had had his throat cut. Dirty Dave, the club's bearded and tattooed president, looked on with growing hostility at Spider and his cycle sliding along the wet street. One goddamn lousy thing after another. It was shaping up to be one helluva night. The president's legendary anger was close to boiling point. He was ready to fly off the handle, like he had with three Commanderos in an Atlanta barroom brawl a week ago. Now some low-dog competitor had done the Devil's Jokers out of serious paper. Dirty Dave couldn't forget the embossed calling card that had been left on the dead chemist's chest:

YOU HAVE JUST BEEN:

PLEASE TICK 

A: BASHED ( )

B: ROBBED ( )

C: TRULY FUCKED OVER ( )

BY THE VULTURES M.C.

The Devil's Jokers were armed and on their way to have it out with the Vultures. Tempers were high. Though Dirty Dave hoped to hear the Vultures' side of the story. Things didn't smell right. He sensed a third party had done the grizzly deed and left the card on the dead chemist's chest. In the hope the Devil's Jokers and the Vultures would start an escalating war; thereby giving this third party (most likely crooked cops aligned with another bike club) a bigger slice of the booming amphetamine market.

In any case, the pack of Devil's Jokers weren't impressed with the bronze Ford that had forced one of their life members to drop his hog. Traffic from all sides of the street braked and honked as it neared the cluttered intersection. The burble of idling motorbikes drowned out the protestations of bristling motorists.

Dirty Dave gunned his Low Rider and looked on impatiently as Spider got on his feet and hobbled over to his scraped Harley, its engine oil leaking onto the street. Spider slipped on the oil then hoisted his motorcycle into an upright position. He gave a thumbs up and in a slow, dignified manner wheeled his Harley from off the road. His fellow bikers revved their gurgling machines and roared off in unison after the Ford.

Goldman cursed as the cars in front suddenly braked. Giggling teenage girls dawdled in the middle of a pedestrian crossing. Dressed up and out on the town, keen to dish out their particular school of teenybopper mayhem. Goldman saw the Ford skid to a halt behind him. A hard-faced man with black hair pulled back in a ponytail drew a handgun and climbed from the front passenger seat. Goldman was at first fearful.

Then he saw a chance.

He reversed back and crunched the front bumper of his pursuers' vehicle, which caused the alighting gunman to bump his head and drop his weapon. Better positioned, Goldman wrenched his steering wheel anti-clockwise and cut around the tittering teenage girls on the crossing. The gangly youngsters openly insulted him. Once past them and their name-calling, he veered right (much to the relief of the driver of the first stopped car on that side of the street) and returned to his lane, which was now empty of traffic a good distance ahead. He stomped the gas pedal, enlivened by the success of the manoeuvre. His elation, however, was short-lived, for once again the Ford loomed menacingly in his rear-view mirror.

Damn!
He punched the inside roof of his car. No sooner had he vented his frustration than several bikers swarmed the vehicle that had stuck strenuously to his tail. A flicker of hope flared inside him.

Dirty Dave moved in closer to the bronze Ford. He tilted his bike to counteract the force of kicking in the driver's door. He put the boot in twice and the door crumpled inward, offering token resistance. Wielding a weighty chain with an attached padlock, another biker smashed the car's rear left window. The same biker accelerated his FXE Super Glide and slammed the chain across the car's windscreen. The gunman with the ponytail put his arm out the window and fired a warning shot in the air. Bringing a gun into play only made matters worse. The outlaw bikers were only too keen for a little warm up before making mince meat of The Vultures.

Dirty Dave slowed his '80 Low Rider until he came alongside the back end of the Ford. He whipped out a sawn-off Remington shotgun from his motorbike's custom leather holster. With an expertise garnered from similar encounters, he braced himself and shot apart one of the Ford's rear tyres. The gunmen panicked as the back of their car lurched violently to one side. The exposed wheel-rim spewed a brilliant stream of orange-white sparks as it engaged the roadway.

Goldman heard the Remington's thunderous discharge as he executed a move as daring as Dirty Dave's shotgun assault on the Ford. Stuck at the back of the street's slow-moving traffic, Goldman, without indicating, performed a riotous left-hand turn. Cars in the lanes he cut across braked sharply. Some momentarily skidded, while all drivers involved cursed the chemist's nerve-racking move.

Dirty Dave shot apart another of the Ford's tyres. The gunmen in the car lost sight of Goldman and much else as they careened out of control. Their car's slanting angle and dramatic shower of sparks only highlighted their desperate plight. The maimed sedan plowed into a retractable Cyclone fence fronting a used-car lot. A span of flapping red and white pennants broke part and spilled across the crumpled hood of the crashed and steaming Ford, only adding further humiliation to the gunmen in the car.

Goldman sped down the side street he'd brazenly claimed. He'd never been so happy to see a pack of outlaw bikers, and couldn't imagine similar happiness should he again encounter any of their kind. After some arbitrary turns into nondescript back streets, he knew he was out of harm's way. Several minutes later he drove into the multi-storey parking lot of a late-night shopping centre. After finding a secluded spot, he parked and killed the engine.

He closed his eyes and leaned back in his seat, his body thrumming with nerves. His hands were still locked about the wheel as he imbibed the parking lot's relative tranquility, quiet but for a faint squeal of tyres on a down-below level and the creaks and pings of his own embattled car. He couldn't believe the obstacles he'd bettered during the hair-raising escape from his apartment. He wiped his clammy brow and breathed a sigh of relief. Though his heartbeat had returned to normal, his parched mouth and unsteady hands betrayed the adrenalin still flooding through him. He tried to picture the final confrontation between the bikers and the gunmen in the Ford. Whatever the outcome it couldn't have been pleasant.

He wallowed in the serenity of long, uneventful minutes. But it wasn't the time or place to rest. There was no escaping the fact he was on the road with no place to go, save for his tenuous meeting with Michelle – though he supposed it was better than nothing at all.

Slumped behind the wheel, he came up with a viable course of action. He climbed out of his ticking car, opened the trunk and rummaged through his tool box. After grabbing spanners and screwdrivers, he studied the sea of parked vehicles about him. He brightened, hardly believing his luck. A Saab 900, the same model as his own, was parked several rows over. After waiting for some elderly shoppers to pass, he walked casually over to this other vehicle.

Several testy minutes later, he started his own Saab and drove out of the multi-tiered parking lot. In the patchy light of a tree-lined side street, he fitted his car with the registration plates he'd stolen. He was too concerned for his own survival to give much thought to the owner of the other Saab should he or she come under the scrutiny of the law for bearing the wanted chemist's plates.

He started his car, which looked to have finished a gruelling cross-country rally. After studying a Baltimore street map, he plotted a backstreet course to keep his appointment with Michelle.

                            TWENTY-ONE

Belize Cheraz and a police officer screeched to a halt in a blue and white Baltimore Police cruiser. Its revolving roof light competed with the blaze of the burning cars blocking Goldman's street. A cacophony of approaching sirens filled the air. Emergency personnel and police units would claim the unattended crime scene.

After leaving Goldman's apartment Belize had gone straight to authorities (Manuela had genuinely warmed to the prospect of being left at a police station. Belize knew her sister would feign a lack of English while waiting in whatever hallway or room, while nursing whatever lukewarm coffee or drink; all the while winding down from her harrowing experience with the gunmen). Belize had involved the law because she wanted to get to the heart of the matter. Had those
pistoleros
burst in because of what Scott had stolen from his work? Or was it another matter entirely? She hoped the gunmen were still unconscious on the apartment floor so police could ID them. She had to know what kind of trouble had befallen her Australian boyfriend. Whatever kind, she believed Scott had brought it on himself.

Groups of onlookers spilled about the destroyed vehicles. Local dogs were embroiled in a barking contest, while sirens moved closer from all points of the compass. To human and animal alike, urban propriety had been laid to waste.

'Christ.' The swarthy young police officer moved from the patrol car and stopped beside Belize. He held up an arm to stave off the heat of the burning vehicles. Scrunching his face, he studied the shot-up panels and the sparkling pellets of window glass littering the street. 'Shoot, looks like we just missed the second Battle of Baltimore.'

'
Si
,' Belize said, not knowing what he was on about. She looked about her, then sprinted down the short cul-de-sac leading to Goldman's apartment. She reached the top of Goldman's driveway and saw his garage was empty. Her heart lifted and she bolted up the apartment block's front steps. It dawned on her as she reached Goldman's upper-floor apartment (a shaft of pallid light spilled from its open door and did little to disperse the overall gloom of the walkway) that it would have been wise to have the policeman with her. Who knew what crazy
pistoleros
were still afoot?

She pushed caution aside and peered through the open doorway. Rooker was no longer on the living room floor. 'Damn.' She pulled back and leant against the outside brick wall. She was tense and wired, from want of cocaine and from the thunderous pace of recent events.
Madre del dios.
What a night. The apartment seemed still and quiet, as if miraculously cocooned from the pandemonium outside. She took a deep breath and another look down the carpeted hallway. She half-expected Rooker, bloodied and livid, to jump from the shadows and pin her against the wall.

A hand grabbed her shoulder.

She gasped and spun about. 'Sorry, it's me.' The dark-haired police officer with a fresh shaving nick on his chin readied his revolver and entered the apartment. Belize followed. No one was inside. The gunmen were obviously made of tough stuff. She slid open the balcony door and walked outside, peering across the treetops at the burning cars blocking the street. She was confident Scott had used the
pistoleros'
guns on the gutted cars. A flaming signature she'd proudly deciphered.

She watched police cars and a Baltimore City Fire Department truck skid to a halt in a fury of competing sirens and flashing lights. Police moved onlookers back. Firefighters swarmed about the truck, readying to douse the flames belching from the destroyed vehicles. A second fire truck parted the crowd and only added to the colour and commotion of the newly claimed crime scene. Uniformed men jumped down from the truck before it came to a standstill.