“What do you mean?”
“Well, are you gonna keep her around, or are you gonna smack her around a little and dump her, or what?”
“She’s my wife. She’s supposed to live with me.”
“Okay. So tell me this. All these people you’re gonna warn to keep away from her—what do you think they’re gonna do, first thing, when she turns up missing? I’ll tell you what. They’re gonna go running to the man. You were gonna bring the little woman back to your house, right? Where’s the first place the man’s gonna come looking?”
Walt let a few moments tick by. “I see your point,” he said finally.
“You know what I think you oughta do?”
Walt shook his head.
“You snatch the missus and take off somewhere for a while— a cabin or something. Someplace no one knows to come looking. I can keep watch on her for you while you spend a coupla days just going about your business. The man comes, you don’t know nothing from nothing. You’re clean. They go away and then you’re home free. They won’t come knocking twice. They got more important shit to take care of—like grabbing the guy who offed this Baker. You hear it on the radio this morning?” Ted shook his head. “I mean, can you figure it, Walt? Some guy does the man a favor, but they wanna run him down and put him away for it, anyway.”
Walt looked at Alan Haines’s house again. “I don’t like the idea of him just doing what he likes with my woman and not having to pay for it.”
“So where’s the problem?” Ted asked. “Wait a coupla weeks, then we’ll come around his place and play a little footsy on his face. Piece of cake, Walt. So whaddaya say? Are we gonna get serious and put the snatch on your little lady, or are we gonna end up being a coupla pussies about the whole deal?”
Walt started up the Chevy. “I like the way you think,” he told his companion.
“Yeah, well, I’m kinda partial to it myself, you know.” He tapped his head. “You gotta stay smart to stay on top—that’s what my old man used to tell me.”
Walt grinned. “When I’m on top this time,” he said, “I’m never getting off.”
“My old man woulda liked you,” Ted said as the Chevy pulled away from the curb.
THREE
1
JACK WAS WORN to the bone by the time he got home. He’d stopped by to talk with Janet Rowe’s parents after leaving the station and to return his fee; Ned had already called the family. It was the first time Jack had seen either of Janet’s parents since he first took their case. He’d studied them, trying to see what it was about them that let them treat their own flesh and blood so badly.
Whatever it was, he couldn’t find it.
Ed Rowe refused to take back the retainer.
“You . . . you found her,” he said. “You’ve earned it.”
Rowe and his wife sat in the living room of their suburban bungalow, washed out with what appeared to be genuine grief. The man who’d beat his kid until she fled the family home wasn’t there. The woman who hadn’t given her daughter a moment’s respite from verbal abuse didn’t exist in the wan features of Rowe’s wife, hunched beside him on their couch.
You could have done something, Jack wanted to tell them. You could have done something long before it came to this.
And maybe they had. They’d hired him, hadn’t they? Maybe Janet’s friends—going through their own teenage angst—had perceived the relationship to be more negative than it actually was.
Right then Jack just couldn’t tell anymore.
The house had seemed empty the first time he’d come by to discuss the job. It was desolate now.
Like that wasteland.
Jack didn’t stay long.
The twenty-minute drive from the West End back to his own apartment on Fourth Avenue in the Glebe drained the last of his energy. He parked the pickup in the lane and went wearily up the stairs of the small two-story brick building. His apartment took up all of the second floor. He shared the lane and had the use of the backyard along with his downstairs neighbor, a feisty young woman who was training to be a welder. She kept a German shepherd named Frank, who gave a few obligatory barks when Jack entered the building.
Jack was sure that by now the dog recognized the sound of his footsteps. He only barked to show how much he was on the ball.
That strange wasteland was still on his mind when he entered his own apartment—enough so that it gave his own place a disused feeling about it as well. There was a close, musty odor inside, as though it hadn’t been used for weeks, even though Jack had just been in it this morning.
It felt too empty.
Too much like that other place.
Jack rubbed his face, then went about opening a couple of windows to let in some air. He could feel the presence of the wasteland flickering just beyond his awareness, licking at his mind with its desolate reaches. Its music. Its angel.
Its fury.
He knew he’d be back there again—he doubted that he could avoid the place even if he wanted to—but this time it was going to be on his terms.
In the kitchen he got a can of Blue out of the fridge and popped the tab. The icy beer seemed to frost his throat as it went down. He drifted back into the living room and shucked off his windbreaker.
Okay. What was he going to need?
He made a list on the back of an unpaid phone bill as he finished his beer. Back in the kitchen, he popped the tab on a second can as he started to get his gear together.
First he changed. Fresh jeans, a flannel shirt, sturdy hiking boots, a brown leather bomber jacket. Fingerless leather gloves went into the right pocket of the jacket. He got an army canteen down from the top shelf of his closet and went into the kitchen, filling it and attaching it to his belt. A packet of beef jerky and a couple of chocolate bars joined the gloves in his jacket.
In the dining room he moved aside the antique pine cabinet that held his stereo. Removing a loose board that had been hidden by the cabinet, he took out a snub-nosed Smith and Wesson Centennial revolver, two holsters, and a box of .38 standard police cartridges. He weighed the two holsters—one was a clip-on that attached to your belt, the other a shoulder harness—and settled for the shoulder harness. Replacing the clip-on back into the cubbyhole, he set the floorboard on top once more and pushed the cabinet into place.
Back in the living room, the can of Blue at hand, he checked over the revolver, then loaded it. Five shots. He didn’t have a permit for it. Ex-cop or not, it was a bitch to get a handgun permit. He’d picked up the weapon on an undercover case while he was still on the force and simply kept it. A lot of cops— especially when they worked plainclothes—had a weapons cache. It wasn’t something planned. It just seemed to happen.
He slipped the .38 into the shoulder holster, then put his jacket back on. The box of remaining shells went into its left pocket, along with a small brass compass. A hunting knife with a ten-inch blade joined the canteen on his belt. Finishing the beer, he checked his list again.
Phone.
He unplugged the phone by the couch, then went into the bedroom and did the same with the extension.
Sleeping pills.
There was a bottle in the medicine cabinet, left over from a prescription he’d gotten when he’d first quit the force. He shook out three and swallowed them with a mouthful of tap water.
Back to the list.
All done now.
I’ve got to be crazy, he thought lying down in the bedroom. Maybe he was crazy. But talking to Ned, hearing about Coffey disappearing from his home and then popping in out of thin air in the gun range. . . . No way that was sleepwalking. He might have put his own experience down to that—Christ knew where he’d picked up the plaster dust that was covering him, but it was still possible that he’d been suffering from somnambulism. Put that together with Coffey, though, and you began to see a pattern emerging.
The wasteland.
The ruined city.
Close as a thought. Just a dream away. All you had to do was
wait and they would reach out for you.
Or you could go to them.
He looked at Anna’s self-portrait sculpture on the night table, then rolled onto his back, adjusting the canteen and knife so that neither was digging into him. He stared up at the ceiling.
Looney tunes.
He closed his eyes.
Here I come.
2
JODY AND KIRK.
“How could you know?” Beth had wanted to shriek at Cathy.
She’d never told anybody about them—not even Anna or her therapist. She sat on her bed, the house quiet around her now that Anna and Cathy had gone out shopping.
Jody and Kirk.
Just thinking of them made her skin go clammy with fear.
It had happened twelve years ago, when she was fourteen. She was in her second foster home, because Mr. Gregoire in the first had started coming into her bedroom when Mrs. Gregoire was out, just like Daddy had. He wanted the same things, he wanted to teach her about love, just like Daddy. Except what they did wasn’t love. It had nothing to do with what love was supposed to be—good feelings between people who cared for each other. It just made her feel dirty. Made her scrub herself after each time until she couldn’t take it anymore.
That last night she had run screaming from the Gregoires’ house, out into the street. Collapsing on the neighbor’s lawn in just her nightie. Head tilted back, tears streaming down her cheeks. Arms hugged tight around her chest. Cramps in her stomach. A painful fire spreading from between her legs. Her check still burning from where Mr. Gregoire had hit her.
The Children’s Aid Society had taken her away. Weeks in the hospital followed. Then the second foster home.
And Jody and Kirk.
She’d been living with the Halpins for almost a year and a half by then. The past wasn’t forgotten, but it could be wrapped in an old box and stored behind the slow build-up of better memories. The Hatpins were good to her, not physically demonstrative—they’d been warned about how she’d react to any kind of physical contact—but still very kind.
They had a daughter of their own. Cassie was one year Beth’s senior and, after some initial coolness, seemed to accept Beth as, if not a sister, then at least a confidante. Beth started to feel better about herself. She learned to hope again. Started to believe that there could be good things, even for someone like her.
Then the night of the prom came.
Jody and Kirk.
Why had she ever gone?
It was a double date, Beth and Jody, Cassie and Kirk, the two couples both riding in the new Oldsmobile that Kirk’s father had loaned his son for the big night. After the prom they went for burgers, eating them in the car. And after the burgers they went parking. Out by the sand pits. And someone had the idea of going for a swim. They took a couple of blankets out of the trunk and brought them down to the edge of the water. The boys stripping down to their briefs. Cassie in her bra and panties. Only Beth still dressed. Not wanting to join them. Protesting the whole time, quietly, but trying to be firm.
The moon was out, not quite full but bright enough to show the scars on her back where Daddy had burned her with the glowing tips of his cigarettes. Cassie knew. She’d seen them. So why was she going along with the guys, egging them on? Why couldn’t they just leave her alone? Why couldn’t they just go have their stupid swim and let her sit on the blankets?
“Oh, don’t be so prissy,” Cassie said.
There was something different about her tonight, Beth realized. Something dark grinning at her from behind Cassie’s eyes. Beth started to back away from this sudden stranger, but Cassie was too quick for her.
“No you don’t, Little Miss Perfect.”
Her grip was painful on Beth’s arm. “Cassie, please . . .”
Cassie turned to the guys. “Cassie, please” she mimicked. When she looked back at Beth, the transformation from familiar foster sister to stranger was complete. “I’m so sick of you,” she said. “Always in on time, always doing what you’re told. So fucking neat. Such good marks. Did you ever think of how that makes me look? Some little slut who was banging her father when she was—what? Seven? Six years old? You can’t take off your pretty little prom dress because we might see too much of your hot little bod?”
“Cassie—”
Cassie spat in her face. “Take it off or I’ll rip it off.”
Beth tried to pull away again, tears brimming in her eyes.
“Jesus,” Jody said. “Maybe we should just forget—”
Cassie turned sharply toward him. “I promised you guys a good time. Are you backing out on me now?”
“Yeah,” Kirk said. “Lighten up, Jody. We’re not going to hurt her—just fuck her brains out. For chrissake, it’s not like she’s a virgin or something.”
Beth gave a desperate tug, but the grip on her arm was too firm. When she started to lift a hand, Cassie slapped her. Hard. And again. And Beth just folded in on herself, dropping to her knees on the blanket. It was just like with Daddy. Or with Mr. Gregoire. The same thing. That’s all anybody wanted. . . .
She barely felt Cassie’s fingers unbuttoning the back of her dress, the dress being pulled off over her head. It was Kirk who tore off her bra, then her panties. Who pulled off his own underwear, his hard penis standing at attention, and pushed her down on the blanket.
“Take it in your mouth,” he told her.
He crouched on top of her, his penis pressed up against her lips, his rear end heavy on her breasts, the weight of him making it hard to breathe. When she opened her mouth, he thrust in. Hard. Choking her.
“The other end’s yours, Jody, boy,” he said.
Whatever doubts Jody might have had, had long since vanished. He got down between her legs and thrust his own swollen penis into her, arms on Kirk’s shoulders as he started to pump.
Jody and Kirk.
And Cassie standing by, watching it through those stranger’s eyes. As they did it to her, again and again. Getting rougher each time. Cassie egging them on.
It was a long time before the guys went down to the water to wash themselves off. Cassie knelt by Beth’s head, stroking the hair from Beth’s brow, grinning as Beth flinched at each touch.
“You tell,” Cassie said softly, as though they were talking about homework, “and I’ll kill you. Don’t think I won’t, you little slut.”
The Halpins were already asleep by the time they got home, but they noticed the sudden change in their foster daughter the next day. The sunken eyes. The way Beth had drawn in on herself again—just as she’d been when she’d first arrived.
“Jody dumped her last night,” Cassie explained. “I guess she’s taking it pretty bad.”
“Don’t worry, honey,” Mrs. Halpin had said. “There’ll be other boys.”
Never, Beth had thought then. Never again.
When Mrs. Halpin touched her shoulder, she flinched. She kept her eyes downcast. She didn’t tell. At school her grades went down. As soon as she was legally able, she left the Halpins’ home and moved to Ottawa. But she didn’t tell. Because she knew then that she was just what Cassie had said she was. A slut. Why else would people treat her the way they did?
It took Walt to bring her out of it. Walt, who was so kind when they met, always looking out for her. Who changed after they married, just as Cassie had changed. Treating her like dirt. Because that was what she was. Dirt.
Walt.
Jody and Kirk.
Mr. Gregoire.
Her own daddy.
She wept against her pillow. When they were hidden away, she could pretend that the box of bad memories didn’t exist. But the box was old and swollen with too much remembered pain. And when it broke open . . .
Last night’s dream. She’d been feeling so good, remembering it. But then Cathy had to mention that graffiti. And those names.
Jody and Kirk.
Cathy had to go and open all those unhealed wounds again. Why couldn’t the past just go away? Why couldn’t everyt
hing and everybody just leave her alone? Why couldn’t she be like she was in her dream last night?
Strong.
In control.
The memory of her flight across the dead plains helped to quiet the pain she felt. It was so peaceful there. She could have just flown there forever. And she knew . . . if that place was real, if Jody and Kirk were there . . . She’d know how to deal with them. She’d teach them all about pain.
She sat up slowly, hearing something, but not sure what it was. Then she realized that it was the front doorbell.
Go away, she thought.
She couldn’t see anybody looking like this. Her eyes red and puffy from crying. Her throat so constricted, it was hard to breathe. But the doorbell kept ringing. Finally she got up and quickly ran some water, dabbing at her eyes. Throwing on a pair of jeans and a sweatshirt, she went downstairs. From a table in the living room she picked up a pair of Anna’s sunglasses to hide her eyes. But first she looked through the peep-hole.
A deliveryman.
She put on the sunglasses and cracked open the door,
The delivery man looked up at her. “Ms.—” he glanced at a waybill in his hand “Green? Elizabeth Green?”
Beth nodded. By the man’s feet was a large cardboard box. “I didn’t order anything,” she said.
The deliveryman looked down at his waybill again. “Elizabeth Green. Harvard Avenue. This’s gotta be the place, lady. Want me to carry this in for you? It’s kinda heavy.”
“No. I. . . that is . . .”
“Suit yourself.”
Beth suddenly realized how stupid she was being. It was broad daylight. What was he going to do? She opened the door a bit wider.
“I’m sorry,” she said. “I’d appreciate the help.”
The deliveryman bent down to pick up the package, grunting as he took up its weight. Beth stepped out of the way as he brought it in. A shadow fell across the sunlight coming through the door, and Beth looked over. Her heart seemed to stop in her chest. Walt.
“Hi, babe,” he said. “I’ve come to bring you home.”
3
FLICKER.
And Jack was there. In the ruined city. He wasn’t sure if he’d fallen asleep and was dreaming the place, or if the flicker had just pushed him here—as it had a couple of times last night. All he knew was that he was back.
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