“Mmm. You know if I had your talent my job would be a lot easier.”
Betty laughed. “But your life would be a whole lot harder.”
“That’s true,” Jacob smirked. “Less complications. I’m a simple man with simple tastes.”
“Hardly,” Betty laughed again.
“I’m going to Ima and Aba’s for dinner tonight. They’ve invited Adina and her parents. Trying to show support for what they’re going through, although I have to admit, my mother’s opinion of her as the perfect ‘beryeh’ for me has severely dimmed since she found out about this entire mess. Adina’s own parents are devastated, of course. Barely speaking to her, from what I hear. It will take a long time to move past a scandal like this. If they ever do.”
“And your father?” Betty asked. As a young girl, she had always found Abraham Lawrence to be a kind man, the sort of father she wished for herself as her own brought the stench of violence and alcohol home each night after taking care of Donny’s business.
“Aba? He believes that good people make mistakes,” Jacob sighed. “I don’t think anything could surprise him anymore, after his years on the force. He’s just glad I got out of that basement with only a bullet to the arm.”
“And I’m the one that put you in there,” Betty paled, imagining an outcome very different to that which had come to pass. Jacob, George, Sam, even Georgie could have died at her own hand. Guilt weighed heavily in her heart. “Does Aba know about me?” she asked. “I wouldn’t blame you if you told him and I really don’t mind. In some ways, it might be nice to stop hiding. From some people, at least.”
“Nice, but dangerous. Especially now that Donny knows. No, I’d rather keep it quiet for now. Donny hasn’t mentioned you yet, but I don’t doubt he’s working on some diabolical plan from his cell. I don’t think we’ve seen the last of him, but at least we have a reprieve – for now. Besides, Aba knows enough to know you never really died, for me, at least. I think his nerves need a break. He was so keen on me courting Adina, too. It’s hard to believe it’s only been a few months since I met her. It seems like a lifetime ago.”
“I’ve rather scuttled your life, Jake. I am sorry.”
“I know.” Jacob looked critically at Betty. “You know I’m not sure you ever needed my help though anyway,” he said. “With Donny. You certainly never wanted it. So, why? Why did you leave that trail of Avon Calling cards for me to trace? You had to know I’d find you eventually.”
“Well, I needed to return Donny’s contraband to the authorities somehow,” Betty said.
“Any officer could have picked them up and dealt with them.”
“You were already working on the military heists.”
“And Sergeant Frakes was working on that case before I was appointed. You never contacted him with the cards. You said yourself, you dumped those early crates.”
A slight smile twisted on Betty’s lips.
“You wanted me to find you, Susie.”
“Betty.”
“Sorry. Betty.”
Betty sighed heavily. There was no point beating around the bush. It was time.
“I needed you to know what I was doing,” she began, uncertainly, “in case it all went horribly wrong. I mean, if something happened to me and – well, I just thought you deserved to know. About my family. Your family – as well, I suppose. You have every right to know, Jacob and I’m just sorry I could never tell you before. It was far too dangerous.”
“My family? What do they have to do with –?”
“No, I don’t mean your family. I mean –” Betty took a deep breath. “Our family. Nancy.” Betty’s dark blue eyes dropped. Her hands twisted nervously in her lap and her heart skipped a beat. For twelve long years, she’d held the truth of Nancy’s birthright locked away so tightly inside, she felt as though she might explode simply saying it out loud. But now that she had to tell him, she couldn’t find the words.
“Nancy?” he said. “What do you –?” The confusion in Jacob’s eyes drifted into something else, a memory far away. From another time. Another life. And Betty remembered too.
He was all of seventeen, smashing his boxing rounds into a dusty punching bag that hung in the community hall, his trainer shouting instructions from behind. Nearby, two dozen teenage boys paced their routines under the watchful eye of a strong-jawed cornerman.
With sweat stinging his eyes, Jacob looked up to the clock on the wall. Fifteen minutes left. The thought of escaping the fetid, stale air of the hall imbued him with enthusiasm, and he punched the bag with renewed effort.
Shouts and cheers suddenly hailed throughout the large room. Jacob spun around, catching his bag in one arm as it rebounded toward him. Down below, a sparring match between a new recruit and a well-known trouble-maker had turned into a brawl. Spit, blood and gangly limbs were tangled in a mess on the wooden floor of the hall.
“Hey, you two! Knock it off!” Jacob’s trainer jumped the ring ropes and pushed his way through the cheering crowd of boys to pull them apart.
Glad for the moment of relief, Jacob wiped his brow with the back of his glove and looked out of the dirty window ahead of him. He grinned and waved. As always, Susie was watching from the opposite side of the road, perched outside the general store, waiting for him to finish. She waved back at him with a smile that seemed to suck the foul air from his lungs and fill them with a cool breeze instead.
Jacob snuck a look behind him to his trainer, but the man was still preoccupied rebuking the boys. He pulled off his glove and held up his hand, fingers wide, three times to let her know he was nearly done. Fifteen minutes. He couldn’t stand the boxing lessons that his father had insisted he take. If it weren’t for the fact that after each session, he taught all he had learned to Susie, he would have asked to give it up already.
At first, she’d been awkward and uncoordinated, unsure how to direct the speed and strength that seemed to be growing inside her week by week. They spent hours after school down by the docks practicing, with Jacob recounting all the lessons he was afforded as the promising eldest son of a police sergeant. Lessons that only boys were invited to join. Boxing, fencing, gymnastics, even the karate lessons he took at the scout hall with Mr. Iwate, the greengrocer. And Susie absorbed them all as if her life depended on it. She didn’t just memorize the moves, she was good at them. For fun, as they talked afterward, Jacob and Susie always played flick-knives too, hitting chalk targets on empty grain barrels left down by the water. She was a crack-shot.
Using Jacob’s old gloves, Susie had already progressed far beyond his own skill in boxing. A dozen stolen pillows had exploded in a blizzard of duck down in the alley before Jacob realized Susie’s strikes were much harder than his own. For a time, he wouldn’t admit that his pride was bruised by how quickly a girl had out-skilled him. There was no competition. But then again, Susie wasn’t just any girl.
She was faster and stronger than any boy in his classes. As she learned the strategies to direct her movements, so Jacob had finally realized that she still needed him despite her strength, as an instructor and encouraging friend. After all, it was Roy, Susie’s father, that she was really fighting against in her heart, and Jacob wanted her to win that fight.
So, he kept up with his own lessons to help her learn. It was nearly three years since they’d begun training. Susie now moved with the fluidity of a ballet dancer and an unnatural speed that almost seemed like precognition, which of course, Jacob had come to realize over time, it was. She was almost unstoppable.
Jacob beat the next five minutes half-heartedly into his punching bag willing the time to pass quickly. With one eye on Susie out of the window, and the other on the trainer who was now berating the scrapping boys in the nearby storage room, he saw Susie’s smile drop. A loud catcall had caught her attention. Someone was approaching her.
Instantly, Jacob’s shackles raised. His ears grew red as he imagined some sheik schoolboys trying to sweeten her up while he was stuck in his lessons, wa
tching from afar. They’ll try to take advantage of her, Jacob told himself, drop her a line and try it on. A swell of jealousy hit him. The part of his brain that knew Susie could read any boy’s intentions better than they could themselves, and the knowledge that she could easily defend herself if she needed to, refused to be acknowledged. It wasn’t the first time that she’d caught the attention of admirers. In fact, it happened far too often. The truth was, that every day saw Susie grow prettier and more desirable. Even with her well-worn dresses and plain, old shoes, she was undeniably attractive. Susie’s shiny eyes and quick mouth revealed a lively mind, and although she never seemed interested in letting any of the boys court her, she had a curious ability to send them on their way without bruising their egos, as so many other girls did. Deep down, Jacob could no longer lie to himself that it was simply brotherly protection that kept his nerves on edge.
He was in love with her.
It had hit him two years ago, before he even understood what it truly was. That first, bone-crushing, unrelenting, all-consuming ache that takes hold of a young person’s heart and never quite leaves it again. As each day passed, it grew stronger and he, more protective of her. Jacob pushed his feelings as far from his conscious mind as he could, terrified Susie would read them and feel betrayed. After all, Jacob was her best friend, her only real friend, and the only person she could trust. He couldn’t bear the thought of losing her if she didn’t feel the same.
As the catcallers came properly into view, Jacob’s stomach flipped. But not for the reason he’d anticipated. They weren’t local cats trying to sweeten her up as he’d first thought. The opposite in fact. Susie’s older cousin Marco and his stocky cohorts, Ernie and Mack, were well known bullies in the neighborhood. Unlike the other boys, they loved to torment her.
Without warning, Marco shoved Susie backward, hard. She crashed onto the concrete pavement.
“Hey!” Jacob yelled. A few boys training in the hall stopped to stare at him, but outside, Marco and his thugs didn’t hear. Susie did though. She scrambled to her feet, stony faced and red. Her arm was scraped and bleeding. She glanced across the road and through the window, directly into Jacob’s eyes and shook her head minutely. A warning.
“But –!”
She glared at Jacob, then turned away from him. Theirs was a hidden friendship, even from her own family. Especially, from her own family.
Jacob clutched the punching bag, seething.
Marco was saying something to her, a smarmy look on his face. He gestured up the road and shoved a packet into her hands. Quickly, Susie shoved the packet into her satchel. He pushed her once more in the direction he’d pointed, then turned away and left, laughing and jostling his friends.
Susie looked back across to Jacob. He didn’t need an explanation. Jacob knew what this was. A job from her father. She offered a humiliated wave and walked away. There would be no training tonight.
Jacob slammed the bag with every ounce of anger inside him and it swung violently on its hook. He smashed it again and again as it rebounded, beating his hatred and frustration into every inch of the canvas. His ears burned, and his heart pounded. The sweat that had stung his eyes, only minutes before, now dripped unheeded. His whole body was aching for justice.
Despite her abilities, Susie still let her father beat her and use her as a drug mule. She still let her cousins torment her into submission. And she still let someone else, that unnamed man she worked for each night, keep her tethered to the life of crime and violence she so desperately hated. It was stupid. It wasn’t fair. And there was absolutely nothing he could do about it.
“Good form, Lawrence!” barked his trainer, springing back into the ring. “That’s what I like to see, no pulling punches. Give me five more minutes of that!”
*
It was the following day, after school, that Jacob had managed to track Susie down at the docks. It was an easy guess to find her there, at least for him. This was their training ground, a largely ignored spot on the edge of the Hudson which had become a jumble of timber cast-offs and decaying barrels, old fishing line and concrete pilons rising from the water like ugly birds. Behind, derelict warehouses served as storage areas for the freighters whose cargo spilled over from the newer modern buildings up river. By day, only the poorest fishermen moored here and on rainy afternoons, the dim warehouses made the perfect place to practice fighting. Now, at dusk, it was deserted. Except, of course, for Susie.
She was sitting alone outside on the dock, flicking knives. A crude target had been chalked onto an empty mooring post. It had a man’s face.
“Why do you let them do that?” Jacob growled, plonking himself down on to the concrete beside her. “You could beat the blazes out of those fat-heads if you wanted to. You’re dead stronger than any boy, and faster with a punch. Teach them a lesson, or at least, let me do it!”
Susie cocked her head to the side, seriously. “Can you imagine what would happen if Pop found out how strong I was? Can you imagine what he’d make me do? Or, that man he works for –”
“Who is –?”
“You know I can’t tell you,” Susie muttered, angrily. “It would only put you in danger, Jake, especially with your Aba being who he is. If they even knew we were friends –”
“But this is stupid.”
“I can’t fight back,” she said, definitively. “You know he already uses me to read the minds of the filthy criminals that work for him. Not to mention the poor sods that end up on the wrong side of them.” Susie shuddered. “He takes my gift and turns it into something cruel and terrible. Something I’m ashamed of. What do you think he’d make me do if he knew how strong I was, or how well I could fight?” She looked expectantly at Jacob, who just scowled back. “He’d use it, that’s what. He’d turn me into something that he could hurt people with. My body wouldn’t be my own anymore. It would be his, just like everything else.” She looked away, staring across to the dirty water through the eyes of someone far older than her fifteen years. “So, I can never let them find out.”
“Surely they’ll guess though, at some point? You’re not exactly… an ordinary girl.” Jacob’s face flushed with pink.
“They’ve got no reason to suspect me, as long as I don’t fight back. Mom never had this gift, the strength or the speed, or the, whatever it is that I can do. So, they aren’t expecting it from me, either. Just the mind-reading. And it’s years too late to keep that a secret.”
“Well, how long are you going to put up with them treating you like rubbish?”
“Not forever. Just, as long as it takes.”
Jacob’s eyes narrowed, critically. “What does that mean?”
Susie just shrugged, her lips tight.
He sighed and let his eyes follow Susie’s out to the Hudson. “Well, when you’re ready to fight back, let me know. I’ll be glad to give that cousin of yours a box around the ears. Dirty, rotten git that he is.” Jacob nudged her shoulder and was pleased to see her frown drop slightly.
There was a pause in conversation as they sat, both lost in their own thoughts, watching the dark tide draw away from its concrete pilons, leaving a gungy stain where it had been.
“I want to be an ordinary girl, you know,” Susie said, quietly. “A normal girl. With a nice house, one day, and some pretty things – not lots of things –” she quickly quantified, “just a few things. Like, lace curtains and maybe a red dress with fancy shoes. The things other girls have. Ordinary, pretty girls.”
Jacob raised an eyebrow. Pretty girls? Susie rarely spoke like this, even to him. She was proud, never indulging herself in resentment toward the other girls at school for having what she so clearly did not. Jacob looked at her, frowning. Besides, how could she be so blind? Shabby clothes and scuffed shoes couldn’t hide what the world saw every day she stepped out of her door. Did she really have no idea? He suddenly wished she would read his mind for once, if only to save him having to speak the words aloud. His skin tingled and he rubbed the back of h
is neck. Hesitatingly, Jacob found his voice, despite himself.
“You’ll never be ordinary, Susie,” he muttered, now staring intently at his own hands. “Or even pretty –”
“Gee, thanks –”
“– because you’re already the most beautiful girl in New York City. And you don’t need fancy dresses or shoes to show it. Everyone can see. All the boys at school are keen for you, and Edwardo, the grocer’s son, and Jimmy at the pier. And it’s not just the boys, either. Grown men call out as you pass. You don’t even seem to notice.”
Susie looked up at him, her eyes unreadable. “And do you – notice?”
“The other boys looking at you?” Jacob’s face burned. He ran his hand through his hair self-consciously. There wasn’t a part of his body that didn’t notice the way other boys puffed up as she walked by, boasting and dropping lines in her wake. “Of course I do,” Jacob scowled. “And I want to knock their blocks off!”
Susie tipped her head, amused.
“Not just – I mean to say – well, they’re just preening heels, aren’t they?” Jacob said. “I mean none of them really know you. Not like I do.”
“So, if they really knew me they wouldn’t try?”
“That’s not what I mean,” Jacob said, his face growing redder. When he realized Susie was smirking at him, he glared. “You’re just trying to razz me up.”
“Sorry, Jake. I can’t believe you think I’d take notice of any of them though,” she said smiling, “When I have you.”
“You’ll always have me,” he promised.
“I know that.” Susie looked away, out at the water again.
Jacob watched her. Her dark blue eyes seemed to suddenly lose their humor. Now, they reflected the tempestuous mood of the river as it caught the late North-Westerly wind. Her brow was furrowed, imperfecting the youthful lines of her face. Susie’s shoulder-length hair, whipping in the breeze, was rolled off her forehead and pinned on one side, falling away behind her, as was the latest fashion. Shabby clothes and scuffed shoes had never stopped Susie looking as put-together as those girls in her glossy magazines. But Jacob knew the haunted look that so often stole her smile could never be rid of entirely. He wished, more than anything, he could save her from it.
Avon Calling! Season One Page 37
