by C. L. Stone
I wrinkled my nose, my mouth gaping in surprise. “What the hell…”
“Realized the same thing when you were hunting for someone. So I went to go do my own hunting. Luckily, someone in a jewelry store was an idiot and left the cash drawer open while showing someone a set of rings. They clearly hadn’t followed protocol and emptied it when it’d filled with a lot of cash.” He coughed once. “I don’t think they were running a legitimate business. No one pays for diamonds with cash. Not like that.”
I dismissed the idea of the business not being legit. It wasn’t something we needed to deal with. I lifted a brow. “So you didn’t have my back?”
He quickly grabbed me by the front of the shirt and tugged me close. “You didn’t need me,” he said in a whisper. “But I always have your back, and every other part of you.”
My insides tightened and my heart raced. “What do we need all this cash for?” I said, not letting him distract me. “Can we bribe the police to give us information?”
He let me go. “No. We need to get word to Alice where to find us. And without our contacts”—he meant Academy—“in this city, we have to pay other people to help us.”
“Lead her to us?”
“We want her to meet us on our terms, not hers. We want to let her know where we’ll be.”
I raised an eyebrow. “Meeting spot?”
“Yeah. And it’s obvious we can’t rely on the police to catch her. So we’re going to have to get creative.”
My heart was pounding as I sat back on the bus seat, turning to watch the traffic. It was afternoon now. We were taking way too long. “You know they’ve got a needle in all of them by now.”
He didn’t say anything.
It bothered me how things had happened. We were in the only elevator. The stairwell was dark when we got to it. Could they all have gotten down the stairs so quickly?
Maybe with a gun pointed at their heads. But the apartments being empty when we got back and then left again, and the blood on the walls, the explosions and the police showing up… How could they all just disappear without even a police report to follow up on them?
Something wasn’t adding up for me. The whole setup… I just couldn’t quite figure it out yet.
The bus took us only as far as a rundown part of Charleston, the outskirts surrounding the tourist areas where no one came often. We were in a warehouse section where a lot of tall brick buildings constantly shadowed the narrow roads between.
Axel headed right into those streets, and I followed.
“Who are we finding here?”
“Stay close to me,” he said.
I walked beside him, sometimes behind him when he took an alleyway. He kept his head up, those dark eyes focused.
In the front of the large warehouses were office buildings, only these appeared to be reconfigured into some apartments a long time ago. These were run-down as well, with boards over most of the windows. What glass was left was covered by blankets or newspaper taped to the inside. There were rows of these run-down converted apartments on either side of the street for several blocks.
He went to the first one he came across on the left. At the door, he leaned in and sniffed. He reeled back, shook his head and moved on to the next one.
He sniffed that door too, rejected it similarly and then continued.
“What are you doing?” I whispered to him. I couldn’t help but feeling someone might be watching us.
“Finding a clean one.”
I couldn’t even fathom what he meant.
Eventually, he came to a door that he seemed satisfied with and knocked briefly. No answer. He did it again, louder.
The old, peeling door opened slowly, and one tired, bloodshot eye peered out at us. “Who are you?” the guy asked. “What do you want?”
“You don’t do meth?” Axel asked. “No crystal?”
“Hell no,” the guy said, opening the door further. He was shorter than me by a few inches, and lean and wiry. He had a gray beard and was wrinkly from head to toe. “No, I don’t do that shit.”
Had Axel sniffed for places that didn’t have a drug smell? How could he tell when everything in this neighborhood smelled like hot garbage?
“Good,” Axel said. “I’m here to help you.”
His eyebrows went up in surprise. “For real?”
“Did you want to get out of this neighborhood?”
“Sure do.” He took a step back and ushered us in. “Must be my lucky day.”
Axel didn’t hesitate. I tried to, because I couldn’t imagine what the inside smelled like. I only went in as I didn’t want to be alone on this street.
However, besides the dingy wallpaper and the dust layer along the edged, the space was relatively organized. It was dark because the windows were mostly covered in paper and there wasn’t any electricity. It took time for my eyes to adjust to the dimness. The tiny front hall had a side table that held a collection of cardboard signs with different phrases, begging for money. The rest of the single room was a bed on the floor. It was surrounded by books and newspapers, and in one corner stood two metal grocery carts. Each had aluminum cans and other collected dingy items.
The smell was pretty rank, like three-year-old BO and vomit mixed together into the wood rot.
“How’d you get the carts in the door?” I asked.
Axel gave me an eye like I shouldn’t be talking, especially about stealing carts.
But the guy shrugged. “Took the door off the hinge. I’ve got one cart around back for everyday use, but if I leave anything in it, it ends up gone. All that work cleaning the streets wasted…”
“Anyway,” Axel said, finding some room to stand near the bed that wasn’t cluttered with stuff, “we’re here to help.”
“I was just saying yesterday I needed to get out of this place,” he said. He wore a pair of old jeans and a polo that was dingy in the armpits and had holes around the collar from being worn so often. “Are you from that agency I applied to? What’s the name…”
“No, but one connected to it, “Axel said quickly. “To get rental assistance, right?”
He snapped his fingers. “My lucky day. I thought I was on an eight-year waitlist. It’s only been three.”
“You’ve been moved up,” he said. “I’ve been working some loopholes in the system for certain candidates.”
The guy beamed at this. “You magnificent person. Doing the Lord’s work.”
“Do you have some paper and a pen or something to write with here?” Axel asked. “I was supposed to bring stuff with me, and I forgot.”
The guy quickly found a working pen and paper, and Axel used a couple pieces of his cardboard signs for something stable to write on while kneeling on the floor.
I kept my arms folded at my stomach, waiting. There was no clue why we were here bugging this guy when we needed to go find Alice or the others.
The old man looked at me while Axel was quiet. “You’re helping him?”
“I’m new to this,” I said, trying not to sound too sarcastic. “What’s your name?”
“Carl. You?”
“Susan.”
Axel made a half snort that I took to be choking down a laugh.
Carl held a hand out to me. “Nice to meet you. Doing the Lord’s work. Bless your soul.”
I shook his hand shortly and made sure to let go and take a step back. “How’d you find this place to live?”
“Got lucky,” he said. “Technically, I don’t live here. But no one else does and I’m pretty sure there’s squatters rights, no one can really kick me out…” He turned to Axel. “Right?”
“If you really want to stay here…” Axel said without looking up.
Carl blinked a few times and then shook his head and put a palm to his cheek. “What am I saying? My brain doesn’t work as well as it used to. A little slow. No, I don’t want to stay here. I just didn’t get rental help yet…Not to mention my pension is on hold. My caseworker was supposed to be sorting it ou
t.”
Axel stood up, handing him two sheets of paper he folded neatly. “This one.” He held it up, showing him a big number one on the front. “The one means do this first. You need to walk into the police station…”
Carl’s eyes went wide. “What?”
Axel coughed once and then shook the folded paper at him. “I’m giving you cash to take a cab and go to the police station. I need you to take it to Roger. The woman behind the counter at the station will know who I’m talking about. I wrote the precinct number on the back. Hand it to her, tell her it’s for Roger. It’s part of the process.”
Carl seemed surprised. “Really? I never heard of this part.”
“Next,” Axel said, holding up the second paper. “I need you to take the cab again and go to the address on the back. They’ll be the ones to get you the new house. You should pack anything here that’s important to you to take with you. You might not be back for a while as they get you set up.”
Carl blinked rapidly, bewildered. “I thought I had to…the paperwork…”
Axel shook his head. “Like I said, it’s a different department and you’ve made the shortlist. It’s your last day in a place like this, if you want it.” He held the folded papers toward him. “If you don’t take it, I have to go to the next person on the list.”
I imagined the next person was probably another apartment down, someone else Axel would pick out at random. It’s why he needed someone clean. Not only someone who would do what we asked and not just go buy drugs with the cash, but also someone who wouldn’t freak out walking into the police station.
Carl nodded slowly and took the papers from him. “Okay. Okay…right. First, police station. Second, go to address.”
“Right. Hand them the papers.” Axel went over it again and again until Carl could recite the whole process. He was slow on the uptake, but he wasn’t stupid. Once he had it, he repeated it to himself under his breath while he went around trying to figure out what to take.
“What about my cans here? My carts?” he asked.
Axel motioned to them. “I’ll give you enough cash for what they are worth. You can leave them with me.”
“You’ll get them to recycling?”
Axel smirked and nodded. “Sure.”
He blew out a breath between his lips. “I hope so. It takes a lot of time to clean up the streets. Would be sad to see it go to waste.”
Axel gave him the cash after Carl collected his things into a couple of plastic grocery bags and carried them to the door. “We’ll stay behind and get that recycling out.”
“If you wait until Wednesday, Larry works the shift and he’ll often slip in another dollar into my take. He’s a nice guy.”
“I’ll look for Larry,” Axel said and patted him on the shoulder. “Remember the routine. Go up the road to a phonebooth and get to it.”
I lingered, not knowing what to do next, while Axel watched from the door as Carl ambled up the road with his few belongings.
“We stole all that money just to give it to him?” I said to him.
“Sometimes cash is enough to get people to believe something.” Axel closed us back into Carl’s little apartment. “And now we have our space to hide until he gets things rolling.”
I groaned, looking around the room, the collections of various trash. “Oh, you’re kidding. We’re staying here?”
“We need to rest,” he said. “This next part, we’ll need all the energy we can get.”
HOMELESS
We spent the next hour tidying up Carl’s spot as much as we could. I had no idea where Carl used the toilet, because it had been removed from the very small bathroom. Someone had removed the sink, too. There were just pipes in the open, broken wall. The shower’s plumbing had been removed, but the dingy tile and the doors remained. There was no kitchen, either. Just the one room.
For some reason, when living in the motel with my brother and my father, I’d pictured living in the street but never considered a place like this. This could have been us, the next step after they kicked us out. One room like this, with a bathroom that had been pulled apart, the water turned off, no electricity at all. Just a bed on the floor. Maybe we’d even collect cans and beg like Carl.
The motel was luxury, compared.
Axel removed Carl’s bed and put it up against one wall. He laid out our bedroll on the floor and brought out a small lantern, he left it unlit for now while the sun was still up. He made a pillow out of his bag.
I took off my shovel and pack and joined him. I didn’t like being this close to the floor and kept thinking it wouldn’t take much for the creepy crawlies to come scurrying out.
“Keep your shoes on in case we fall asleep,” Axel said. “We may have to leave in a hurry if someone comes around.”
He didn’t have to tell me again. “Wouldn’t mind leaving now. A park bench is more appealing.”
“Too public. This is private.” We were nearly on top of each other sharing the bedroll. Since it was on a hard surface, it wasn’t very comfortable.
“I don’t think I can sleep here,” I said.
“Just close your eyes and don’t move for a bit. Resting is enough if you can’t sleep. We need to conserve energy.”
“What are we doing? Why did you send him to the police station?”
“That was for Alice,” he said. “It’s the only place we know she’s got a contact. We need to get a message to her to meet us later. The person I sent it to will make sure anyone who is a traitor in the station will see it. At least they’ll get a lead on who this person might be. And we get Alice’s attention.”
“And the second location? Where did you send Carl?”
“Emergency contact,” he said. “Sort of like you-know-what, but not connected. I know the woman who runs it. If he’s actually willing to stick to it, he’ll get mental health treatment and a place to stay for free while they try to figure out what to do with him.” He rolled over, facing away from me. “This is where we’ll have to agree that I’ll meet Alice alone.”
“I thought I told you we’d stay together.”
“They aren’t going to give up the people they’ve caught for just me, and we can’t risk anyone else going in. You might be the last person they need to capture, and it’s better if they don’t have us all.”
“Then this is a very bad plan.” I got up on my elbows. “So your plan is to get caught and let them needle you?”
“Someone needs to so we can figure out where they are. That’s the plan.” He pointed two fingers at my chest. “You want to help? Follow wherever they take me. Find out where they’re keeping us. Then go back to the police station, ask for Roger and help us escape. I’ll be working from the inside, helping people to escape or at least trying to keep everyone alive until you can get there.”
I relaxed again, putting my hands on my stomach. I didn’t want to let him get captured, but his plan was making sense. We couldn’t just arrive and expect anyone to give us the people that they took. “Where are the others supposed to be waiting for us?”
“It’s not a known address, so I have to draw you a map,” he said. “It’s just outside of town off an old highway no one uses anymore. You follow where they take me and then wait a few hours to make sure they don’t take me somewhere else. When you’re sure, write it down, give it to Roger and then follow the map just in case anyone did get away.” He leaned closer to me again. “Don’t get caught, or it’s over.”
I swallowed thickly and then breathed slowly, feeling my lungs fill up completely before I let out a long breath. “We should have left ages ago.”
“We were told to go,” he said. “We didn’t. Because we knew if we left, you’d be left behind…” He shifted onto his back next to me, an arm stuffed under his head and he gazed at the ceiling. “And now I don’t think I made the right decision.”
“Were they asking you to leave me behind?”
“Yes. And not asking but telling us to. No one wanted to.”
/> I fumbled for something to say. I didn’t want to be happy they stayed behind for me, because it was clear the threat had been hovering closer than I thought for a long time. I’d just been kept in the dark. They could have left a while ago, and maybe Alice would have chased them. All this could have been avoided.
I tried to appear to be resting for the moment, but mentally, I was fuming and working out all the angles where this could have been avoided. As worthless as it was to bother with, I was in a cycle of overthinking things that didn’t matter anymore.
We were here now.
Axel’s palm slowly moved over my body, resting at my stomach.
“I don’t regret staying behind,” he said. “I should have made the others leave.”
“And then what?” I said. “We would have been the ones she took.”
“We might have left right from the hospital,” he said. “I should have done that.”
“We’re past what we should have done,” I said.
He grumbled a little. “I’m considering doing that now.”
“Leaving the others with Alice?”
“I can’t help but wonder if bringing you with me like this isn’t going to get us both killed. We could just be chasing ghosts. Jumping in without looking…that’s not how they do things, but it’s how I’ve been doing things. Look where it’s gotten us.”
“We’re not caught,” I said. “We’re alive. And maybe we can get them back. Maybe they aren’t dead. If they aren’t, we can’t leave them.”
He didn’t say anything, but turned away, looking up at the darkened, stained ceiling.
Something shiny and round that I thought was a quarter fell out of his jeans pocket, but he didn’t seem to notice and remained still. I scooped it up out of the bedroll folds to look at it.
A diamond ring.
My brain was confused by the sight of it, a shiny, expensive object in my fingers, in this place. There was a crazy moment of thinking this was just a nightmare, a sign of odd things happening and I should wake up.
Axel caught my hand, holding it. Not looking at the ring, but at me.
