Protectors

by Kris Nelscott

  We didn’t either.

  Pammy instructed me to turn off and start looking for a good place on the numbered streets behind the Golden Bear Motel. The houses back here were small bungalows, maybe one or two bedrooms, tiny windows (thank heavens), and postage-stamp yards. All seemed to have been built forty or fifty years before.

  “I thought we were going to be in an upscale neighborhood,” I said as I rounded a corner onto a narrow side street.

  “Not this close to the Bay,” Pammy said. “Although I remember it being nicer ten years ago.”

  Great. We were relying on her older memory for something that should have been more clearly thought-out.

  But I didn’t say that. We were already underway. I had left Eagle, with her truck keys in my hand, not an hour ago. She didn’t look like the same woman. She looked older and almost conventionally pretty, with her dark hair pulled away from her face, and makeup that made her golden skin look like she was just tan.

  She didn’t seem nervous at all, even though I was jumping out of my skin. She just handed me the truck keys, made sure (once again) that I knew how to use a shift on the column, and told me she’d find us.

  I didn’t doubt her.

  I did doubt me.

  My heart was pounding hard as I drove, my hands damp on the rigid steering wheel. Both Pammy and I wore black. I made Pammy tuck her hair under a stocking cap, but that still didn’t help how reflective her skin was.

  I told her she needed to stay away from streetlights, but I’m not sure if she understood why.

  We both had several pair of gloves, some stashed in the truck. Eagle had insisted. No prints anywhere. That would trip us up.

  Pammy had brought the gloves, mostly black leather, curved from someone else’s hands, although she had found some of those newer plastic cleaning gloves made for housewives. Eagle insisted on some of those.

  Pammy had a grocery bag with her as well. She had filled it with items from the lost and found at the gym. Bras, panties, a few female personal items. She planned to put them in the motel room with Lavassier if we didn’t have enough evidence against him.

  I finally found a place to park near a dingy blue bungalow with a weed-infested yard. The place next door had a tumble-down fence and looked like it wasn’t in much better shape. Both driveways were so cracked I wouldn’t have parked Eagle’s truck in them for fear of shredding a tire—not that I planned on parking the truck in a driveway in the first place.

  I looked up, saw that we were only two blocks from the motel, and looked at Pammy.

  “Ready?” I asked.

  “As I’ll ever be,” she said, only this time, she didn’t sound reluctant. There was a hint of excitement in her voice, which I hadn’t expected.

  She didn’t grab any of the bags. We were instructed to lock the truck because of all of Eagle’s medical supplies. So we were going to lock Pammy’s stuff in here as well.

  We’d get the stuff later, after we searched Lavassier’s truck. We might end up driving it all the way to Walnut Creek, which I wasn’t looking forward to. Then we’d have a little parade of trucks, heading out of town.

  Pammy got out, locked her door, and slammed it shut.

  I eased out as well, my shoulders aching from the tension. I locked the door and shoved the keys in my pocket. I took a large macramé purse and slung it over my shoulder. Inside, I had a wire coat hanger, my gloves, and just a little cash.

  Pammy came up beside me. “You take the intersection near Hopkins and Cedar. It’s not far from the New Orleans House. People will think you belong there.”

  “What’s that?” I asked.

  “Rock club,” she said. “Here. Take these.”

  She offered me a thin pack of Virginia Slims and a lighter.

  “I don’t smoke,” I said.

  “You will if someone asks you what you’re doing,” she said. “I have one too.”

  I tucked the cigarette pack and lighter into my purse.

  “Where will you be?” I asked.

  “To start, I’m going to be right across from the Golden Bear. There’s an apartment complex with a stupid little concrete fence and some stairs. I’m going to sit there and watch for him.”

  “I hope we recognize him,” I said.

  “Eagle thinks we will,” Pammy said.

  I’d expressed this worry before. Eagle had promised that if we missed him going in, we’d see him coming out. She was going to walk with him—or she planned to. If we hadn’t found the truck yet, Pammy was supposed to come up to them, act drunk, and figure out how to engage.

  I didn’t like that plan at all. We had a half an hour to find the F-350, and judging by this neighborhood, we were in luck on one thing: that kind of truck would be unusual. Most of the cars here were tricked-out Volkswagens or sedate sedans.

  In theory, either Pammy or I would see what direction he came to the restaurant from. We would then walk in that direction and search for the truck. If he parked in an obvious spot, it would be easy. If he didn’t, it would take us a while.

  I nodded. I wished we had walkie-talkies. I wished we had smoke-signals, for heaven’s sake. I didn’t like the initial part of the back-up plan—that whoever found the truck would fetch the other woman and bring her back to it. It seemed like a waste of precious time.

  I had already made that argument, and I had lost.

  “Good luck,” I said.

  Pammy looked somber. “To both of us,” she said.

  And, bless her, she didn’t mention how much we would both need it.

  56

  Pammy

  Pammy left Val and walked the long way to the apartment complex. Pammy tucked the cigarettes in the pocket of her shirt front, the lighter in her pants pocket. Val had the burglar’s tools. She was the one who was supposed to break into the truck and see if they could find anything they could use against this guy.

  Pammy hoped they would, because she didn’t like the look in Eagle’s eyes. She was planning something, and she hadn’t told Pammy the extent of it.

  As Pammy rounded the corner onto Virginia, she glanced at her watch. Ten minutes to eight. She let out a small sigh.

  Right on time.

  She hurried up the block. The sun was low on the horizon, and the day’s wind was dying down. Long shadows were starting to appear around the buildings across from her.

  She thought she could hear the rush of cars on the freeway a few blocks away, but it might have been the traffic noise from San Pablo Avenue.

  She reached San Pablo faster than she expected and waited at the intersection for cars to go by. She shifted from foot to foot.

  There were a lot more pedestrians than she expected. Hippie kids from the university were heading toward the New Orleans House half a block away from her. Some stood outside, near vehicles that looked like they’d been parked in the small lot forever.

  Some older adults were sitting outside a small restaurant across the street. A small group of tables had been clustered together near the sidewalk, almost a makeshift outdoor space.

  Pammy turned her back on all of them and headed toward the apartment complex. She tracked the motel out of the corner of her eye. Most of the windows were closed, the curtains drawn. There didn’t appear to be any lights on inside the rooms, but she couldn’t really tell yet. The sun hadn’t gone down far enough to give her a sense of whether or not the rooms were occupied.

  When she reached the crumbling concrete stairs, she pulled the cigarette pack from her shirt front. She leaned against the concrete barrier, so that she wasn’t quite sitting, and tapped the cigarette pack on her left thigh.

  She figured tapping the pack would cover her own nervousness and give her an excuse for looking up and down the street as if she were waiting for a ride.

  Val had found a car to lean on half a block away. She played with her macramé purse, as if she were looking for something lost inside it. Every now and then, she would glance up as if she were waiting for someone as well.
>
  A couple other people were standing around on various parts of the street, and more than one person was outside smoking, staring at the setting sun.

  Val was concentrating mostly on Cedar, but she would occasionally look farther down San Pablo than Pammy could see. There were more nightclubs in that direction. The parking lots there would probably be full as well, but they would suit a one-ton pickup better than the neighborhoods behind the motel.

  Then, as if she had conjured it out of thin air, the truck drove by her. It was dark blue and shiny clean, as if someone had just washed and waxed it that morning. The truck was heading toward Virginia, away from both Pammy and Val.

  Pammy squinted, catching just enough of the license plate to know she had seen the right truck.

  She didn’t want to look away from it and possibly lose it, but she needed to signal Val. Pammy glanced back toward Cedar.

  Val was not leaning against the car anymore. Instead she was standing on her tiptoes, leaning into the street, looking about as conspicuous as anyone could.

  Clearly, she had seen the truck.

  Pammy stuck out her arm and waved her hand, pointing after the truck. Then she started to walk that way, keeping the cigarette pack in her hand.

  The truck had disappeared from view when she’d been looking back at Val. Pammy hoped that meant he had parked it just out of her range of vision.

  She walked faster, trying not to stare at everyone walking in the opposite direction. No trucks parked near her so far, but lots of small cars she couldn’t identify, covered with smiley faces, peace signs, and bumper stickers that read Hell No! We Won’t Go!

  A couple of the people sitting outside that restaurant watched her walk past. She smiled at them and kept going.

  She didn’t see him. She didn’t see the truck. Maybe he had parked on a side street after all.

  Her heart was pounding hard. She glanced both ways when she reached Virginia—and then she saw him to her left, walking purposely down the sidewalk that intersected with hers.

  He was taller than she expected, with rust-colored hair. It wasn’t too long, but it wasn’t military short either. It made him look hip, but not too hip. It simply gave him camouflage—he wouldn’t stand out in counterculture Berkeley, but he would be all right in more conservative areas because, it could be argued, the length of his hair simply meant that he needed a haircut.

  His clothes straddled the line between hip and square as well. He wore navy blue pants that did not look like they were part of a suit, and a white linen shirt that would have seemed dressy if paired with some kind of coat. His sleeves were rolled up, revealing tan arms that, even from this distance, looked like they were made of muscles.

  She made herself look away, tapping the cigarette pack against her hand. She didn’t want to seem like she was studying him.

  But she was. She wanted to see his face. She wanted to commit it to memory.

  When she looked west, he was nearly to the intersection. His gaze met hers and he nodded. She cursed silently. She hadn’t wanted to make eye contact.

  She couldn’t make herself smile, but she did nod back.

  Then she looked away as if he didn’t concern her at all.

  Out of the corner of her eye, she watched him cross the road. He stopped when he reached her.

  Her heart was pounding. Did he know she had targeted him? Had he figured out what they were planning? How could he? He hadn’t met any of them. He probably had forgotten all about Eagle by now.

  He leaned toward Pammy just a little. Her mouth went dry.

  “Looking for a light?” he asked, nodding toward her cigarette pack.

  He was a half-step too close, the kind of man who used his physical presence to intimidate and charm. Right now, she figured, he was trying to charm.

  And maybe it would have worked if she had no idea who he was.

  She looked up at him. His face was square and long, his eyes a greenish-gray. He had a small scar on the side of his mouth, which was twisted into smile. If she hadn’t known it, she never would have thought of him as a man who had grabbed a woman by the hair and slammed her head into his truck.

  He clearly expected an answer.

  She couldn’t smile in return, so she went full jittery and a little cold.

  “Thank you, no. I’m trying to quit. Just bought these and I’m trying to change my mind.” She held the pack up, almost like a shield between them. “You want them?”

  His gaze flicked down at them. His smile grew wider. Full-on charm, and yet that smile chilled her.

  “Thank you, no,” he said, repeating her phrase, inflection and all. It wiped out all of the South that had been in his voice, an accent she hadn’t even realized he had until now. “Not my brand.”

  She let out a nervous giggle. She would like to think she had planned it—she hadn’t giggled in years—but she hadn’t. He made her that uncomfortable.

  “I’m not sure they’re anyone’s brand,” she said. “I don’t like them much. My concession to trying to quit.”

  He touched her shoulder lightly, in a manner she would have thought both flirtatious and comforting in another context.

  “Quitting’s overrated,” he said, and walked past her.

  She waited until she heard his footsteps recede, then she let out a slow breath of air, as quietly as she could.

  Son of a bitch. She hadn’t expected him to actually see her or notice her or talk to her.

  On some level, she hadn’t expected him to be real.

  She didn’t let herself turn around. She didn’t want him to see her gaze following him. If he had no idea who she was (and how could he?) then he would think her some foolish woman, intrigued by a passing flirtation.

  Instead, she looked east, as if she were still waiting for someone. She grabbed the lighter out of her pocket. It was silver and heavy. She turned it over and over in her fingers, then tapped the cigarette pack against the back of her hand.

  As she did that, she looked west.

  And saw the truck.

  It was parked halfway down the block, in the lot reserved for the Franklin Elementary School. He knew the neighborhood better than she did. On a weekday night in July, that was a great place to park. No one would notice the vehicle. If she had been thinking, she would have had Val park there as well.

  Pammy was glad she hadn’t. He would have seen Eagle’s truck. He might have made some kind of connection.

  Pammy finally turned around in time to see him cut across San Pablo Avenue in front of the Golden Bear Restaurant. Her stomach tightened. She couldn’t see where Eagle was from here. Pammy couldn’t see the front door or the main windows.

  And she couldn’t have him see her watching either.

  She took one quick glance at the sidewalk behind her and didn’t see Val. Had he talked to Val as well? Or had she hidden from him?

  It didn’t matter.

  They knew where the truck was—or Pammy did—and he was going inside the restaurant.

  They were on the clock now. Thirty minutes, if they needed that. He had given them a gift by parking far away from the restaurant. He couldn’t interrupt them, and he couldn’t see from inside.

  Yes, he had seen her, but he wouldn’t remember her. And even if he did, he wouldn’t think of her as the person who broke into his truck.

  Pammy let out another long breath and tucked the lighter back in her pants pocket. She kept playing with the cigarette pack, though, as she moved a little farther down the street.

  Val would come to her. That was the agreement. Then Pammy would point out the truck, and they could begin.

  57

  Eagle

  A shadow went by one of the large plate-glass windows in the front of the restaurant. The shadow shouldn’t have caught her eye, but it did.

  Eagle felt an incredible calm come over her. She hadn’t felt like this in months, not since she went onto the street during the People’s Park melee, wearing her Army-issued gas mask and helping wh
omever she could find.

  She had had a purpose that day; she had a purpose now.

  She removed her gloves and set them on the table. Not quite the way that a well-dressed society matron would behave, but this wasn’t a restaurant that a society matron would frequent, at least, not without her husband and family. Eagle stirred her coffee, even though she had put nothing in it, and set the spoon on the saucer. Her fingers tapped the laminate covering the menu.

  The manager walked past the doorway, stopped, and then went behind his little podium, grabbing menus as he did so. A waitress hurried by with a tray balanced on one hand, the smell of turkey and gravy trailing behind her.

  Once the waitress had gone past, Eagle had a clear view of the door. She feigned a nervousness she no longer felt, letting her fingers fidget with the spoon and the menu itself.

  The door opened, and the manager moved slightly, clutching the menus. A man entered, scouting the room. He was tall, with russet-colored hair and a long face. Eagle’s heart sped up.

  Lavassier.

  His gaze met Eagle’s.

  Eagle’s back remained rigid. She picked up her gloves, then flapped them just a little so that he could see they existed, then set them on the other side of her coffee cup. Then she picked up her spoon again and stirred the coffee once more.

  He broke the eye contact, turned, and grinned at the manager. They spoke to each other quietly. Eagle hadn’t realized that Lavassier was quite that tall. He had looked large on Saturday night, but she hadn’t registered him as over six feet, which he clearly was.

  His linen shirt pulled over his broad shoulders and muscular arms. His hair needed a trim, but he probably kept it that way on purpose. He wasn’t wearing jeans, but his slacks were casual, without the usual crease that a businessman would have.

  He nodded to the manager, then rounded one of the tables in the center of the room and headed directly for Eagle.

  It only took him a moment to reach her.