The Heart Heist

by Alyssa Kress

  Kerrin slowly lowered her hand, noting with relief that Gary seemed to be buttoning his shirt. She looked around the room, taking in the double beds, set of drawers and television set. "Um. Where's Marty?"

  "Went to get something to drink. Close the damn door, would you?"

  Kerrin stifled a whimper of dismay. She'd sooner cross the river Styx than step over the threshold into a room alone with this man. On the other hand, he was likely to slam the door in her face if she didn't do as he said. Gritting her teeth, she stepped through the doorway. An automatic spring closed the door behind her with a final-sounding click.

  Kerrin's heart thudded with inconvenient vigor as Gary turned to face her. The room seemed to grow suddenly miniscule.

  His eyes, the color of a dark, strong beer, settled on her. He's been without a woman for five years, Kerrin remembered the female prison guard warning her. It's amazing what they'll try.

  And then, even as she watched, his hands calmly went to the waistband of his brown trousers. He unfastened the top button. Kerrin's eyes locked downward in horrified fascination as he lowered his zipper. Time halted.

  Time started up again when Sullivan began stuffing the tails of his shirt into his pants with economical grace. With like fluidity, he raised his zipper and twisted closed the top button of his waistband.

  Kerrin felt the skin of her face flame. She flicked her eyes away, but unfortunately the place they landed was the mirror on the side wall of the hotel room. In that mirror, squarely meeting her embarrassed gaze, was Gary Sullivan.

  She expected mockery, a twisted smile of superior sophistication. What she got instead was something serious, intent, and elemental. He was concentrated on her, not the situation.

  Everything in her body seemed to drag down into her lower belly. She felt like she was simultaneously drowning and burning. In him.

  Whoa. Kerrin had been attracted to a myriad of men over the course of her life but never, she now realized, had she experienced a physical response to a single one of them. No, nothing even close to this inadvertent, inappropriate reaction to a man who was a criminal, for crying out loud.

  Gary looked at the woman staring at him in the mirror and felt as though he'd been slammed in the gut with a baseball bat.

  It wasn't fair. Why'd she have to look like this? So goddam young, so friggin' innocent. He could practically see her heart pounding with fear of him, making the shirt over her chest flutter in terrified little jumps.

  Good, he told himself with cynical satisfaction. She should be scared. She should be so damn scared she'd keep herself far, far away from him. The woman had gotten him into enough trouble as it was, tipping the balance the way she had. He'd gone and said he would take the screwy job. What did he think he was trying to prove, and to whom? The girl wasn't about to thank him for invading her town. She wasn't about to change her opinion of his character. Besides, why should he care if she did?

  He turned away, a bitter taste in his mouth, just as Marty came through the hotel room door.

  "Oh good, you're here." Marty had a friendly smile for the woman. "Sit down, sit down."

  The little girl mayor, Gary saw, responded instantly to Marty's kindness. Never in a million years could Gary have put the girl at her ease ‑‑ or received that brief, unshuttered smile.

  The two of them took seats at the small round table by the window. There were only two chairs in the room, which left Gary standing; a fact neither one of them seemed to notice. He supposed he could have sat on the corner of the bed right by them, but there was no point pretending to be a part of the conversation they were having. It would be, of course, about him.

  But Marty stalled. "Have a Coke?" He offered the little mayor woman the soda he'd gone to buy for Gary.

  "Why, no, thank you." Kerrin flicked a glance in Gary's direction. Somehow she realized that Coke was his.

  Inside Gary something softly pinged. Something strange, unfamiliar. He immediately shoved the odd sensation aside. At the same time, he didn't make a move to claim the unwanted soda, but leaned his hips against the bureau and picked up the pack of cigarettes he'd left there.

  Gary had a good idea Ms. Mayor didn't approve of smoking. He shook a cigarette out of the box and lifted it to his lips. Sure enough, her eyes watched him over Marty's shoulder, darkening critically.

  Then she turned her attention back to Marty. "There's something about this situation I still don't understand. For example, security."

  "Yeah?" Marty popped open the top of his own soda. "What do you mean ‑‑ security?"

  "Well." The girl mayor's skin turned an interesting shade of ripe peaches. "I mean, well, how are we to...control Mr. Sullivan's behavior, once he's on his own in Freedom?"

  "Oh." Marty chewed his lower lip. This was, of course, the biggest problem of the whole lunatic plan. Gary's parole officer turned to shoot him a dirty look. Gary knew that look; he'd been getting it ever since the first time he'd been hauled back to prison for breaking parole. Not only had he left town, which had been against the rules, but he'd left it in order to burglarize a plum residence in a nearby city.

  Turning back to Kerrin, Marty lost the dirty look and boldly stated, "Gary is going to behave himself for two simple reasons."

  This oughta be good. Gary raised a butane lighter to his cigarette.

  "The first reason is that he knows his term won't be reduced if he does the slightest thing out of order."

  Not bad. It might convince someone who didn't know him too well. Unfortunately, Gary's record showed that he couldn't keep in mind the consequences of his actions while he was doing them. From the extensive reading he'd been doing in the prison library these past five years, Gary knew this kind of behavior had a name. It was called 'compulsion.'

  He'd come to a few other conclusions about his career over the past five years as well; conclusions he'd yet to share with anybody, least of all with someone as likely to shoot them down as Marty. This little time he was going to be allowed out on his own would tell. He'd find out if his conclusions had any validity. In the process, he'd find out a whole lot more. Gary closed his eyes and took a heavy drag on his cigarette, stilling a nervous tension in his stomach. He might find out a whole lot more than he ever wanted to know.

  "There's one more reason Gary won't turn into a problem," Marty went on, sounding remarkably confident. "You see, we made a deal ‑‑ "

  Knowing where this was going, Gary cut Marty off. "Never mind about that. That's personal. She doesn't need to know."

  Kerrin turned to regard him. Those were crazy eyes she had, couldn't make up their mind if they were brown or green, wary or curious. "I appreciate your right to privacy, Mr. Sullivan," she said. "But in this case I think I have a right to know everything I can."

  So soft and polite her voice was, even while she was insulting the hell out of him.

  "Why, of course you do, sweetheart." Though he tried, Gary couldn't make his voice anywhere near as soft as hers. "But this isn't any of your fuck ‑‑ excuse me, darn ‑‑ business."

  Marty sighed to his feet. "Gary, can we talk?"

  Gary scowled as Marty pulled him to the opposite corner of the room from the girl.

  "I'm not getting something here," Marty said. "Why can't I tell her?"

  Gary had to speak through his teeth because he couldn't unclench his jaw. "She'll think I'm Willie's bitch." Why he cared if the girl thought this when it hadn't bothered him that the entire population of Level Four thought so wasn't entirely clear to him.

  Marty's jaw dropped. "Gary, the lady isn't in the slightest danger of thinking you're gay. So let me explain the situation to her. It'll ease her mind a hell of a lot. You got a problem with that?"

  Yeah, he had a problem with it, but what difference did that make?

  "You're going to do what you want anyway," Gary bit out. "Why even bother asking me?" It wasn't as if he had any rights. Shrugging out of Marty's hand-hold on his shoulder, he made for the door.

  "Where are
you going?" This from the little girl, her eyes wide.

  "A walk." Gary twisted the knob of the door. It was still something of a miracle to him to be able to walk out into the open, to be outside, but right then he was too mad and frustrated to pay much attention to his blessings.

  Kerrin watched Sullivan walk out the door and slam it behind him. She wondered with a flutter in her breast if they'd ever see the man again.

  "He'll be back." Marty seemed to read her thoughts. Returning to the table, he took the seat opposite her and shook his head. "He's just embarrassed, though for the life of me I can't figure out why."

  "What was it he didn't want me to know?" Kerrin asked, casting aside a lifetime of respect for other people's privacy.

  Marty tapped a finger on the table. "Gary has this friend, Willie, see, who's getting on in years. He'll be up for parole in another three, but Gary's afraid he might not make it that long. The fellow has some health problems. So we made this deal. Gary keeps his nose clean, and we'll release his friend as soon as he comes back to Chino."

  Kerrin didn't say anything. It was hard to match the hard, brutal man who'd met her at the hotel room door with the person Marty was describing.

  Marty now regarded her with concern. "I guess Gary didn't think you'd understand."

  Kerrin raised her brows. "I don't."

  Marty leaned forward and patted her hand. "Oh, but you will."

  She would? Kerrin pondered what Gary's parole officer could mean while he proceeded to discuss how he expected her to monitor Gary's progress over the course of the DWP project. He wanted phone calls twice a week, and of course she should call Marty immediately if any problem turned up.

  "I, uh, when do you think we can expect to see Gary...arrive?" The very thought of it made Kerrin's stomach knot again as she rose from her chair by the table.

  Marty smiled broadly. "Tomorrow."

  "That'll by the Fourth of July." Despair sapped Kerrin's strength. The Independence Day celebration was something she'd been working on for months. She'd gone to great effort to encourage participants in the parade, organize crafts to be sold, and contract kiddie rides. Citizens from the surrounding small towns would be coming too. It was not a day she wanted Mr. Disaster to blow into town. "There's going to be so much going on in Freedom. Lots of activities for the holiday," Kerrin explained, hoping Marty would understand the problem and delay Gary's arrival.

  "Good," Marty pronounced instead. "That'll cover a lot of the natural curiosity he might otherwise arouse."

  "That reminds me." Kerrin frowned. "How is Gary planning on explaining his sudden residence in Freedom?"

  Marty's open face immediately shuttered. "Oh, we ‑‑ that is, I'm letting him handle that on his own. The DWP's whole plan, you know. Getting into town and remaining there unobtrusively is part of the job of getting through the DWP's security."

  "Oh yes, of course." But Marty's answer left Kerrin with a decidedly uneasy feeling. She didn't like the idea of the thief being on his own or in control of anything. Not for the first time, she wondered if she were doing the right thing, quietly going along with this ridiculous scheme. Perhaps she ought to be exposing the DWP and their perfidy in bringing a felon into Freedom.

  But then the Department would simply close down and move their facility. Kerrin would have killed the town for sure. At least with Gary Sullivan they stood a chance.

  That chance was waiting for her in the parking lot, pacing along the barred pool fence. The sun had disappeared behind the crags of the Sierra Nevada and a pink and hazy dusk had fallen.

  He halted and looked up as soon as she stepped out of the hotel room. Kerrin felt her heart slam immediately into high gear again, merely from the way his eyes fixed on her. It's been five years, she reminded herself, he'd look at any woman this way.

  He watched closely as she descended the concrete treads of the exterior stair. Behind him in the pool a couple of kids splashed in the heat that still clung to the valley floor.

  Kerrin paused at the bottom of the stairs. She'd come to Bishop for reassurance, but had yet to get any. For that, she'd need to speak to Sullivan, himself. It was her duty, as mayor.

  So, setting her chin at an angle where her trembling would be least visible, Kerrin grasped her purse strap with one clenched fist and started toward his position by the pool fence.

  "That took long enough." Sullivan's eyes searched her face without giving away a thought of his own. "Satisfied?"

  Kerrin lifted her chin a bit more. The raw, rasping quality of his voice sent shivers up her back. "No, I'm not satisfied. I ‑‑ I want to hear it from you."

  His brows contracted swiftly. "Hear what?"

  "That you're going to...behave yourself."

  A faint glimmer of amusement lit behind his eyes. "You mean stay straight?"

  Kerrin waved a hand in the air. "Whatever."

  "You want my word?"

  "That's right."

  He gave her an odd look. "Hasn't anyone told you, lady, that my word isn't worth squat?"

  Kerrin blinked, absolutely dumbstruck by such a statement of brutal self-criticism ‑‑ and from a man she hadn't thought owned any personal integrity. "No, nobody told me that." She cleared the astonishment from her throat. "So if you don't mind, I'd just as soon have your word. I'll decide myself whether or not it has any value."

  She kept her gaze firmly fixed on his face. He stared back, and not with gentle kindness. No, he looked more like he wouldn't mind if she up and melted into the heat-softened asphalt of the parking lot.

  "I don't get it. What do you want me to say?"

  Kerrin was getting a definite impression of evasion here. That evasion let her imagine, for the first time, that Sullivan might not turn out to be as much of a menace as she'd feared. Would a man who meant to create havoc scruple to lie about his plans?

  "I want you to tell me your intentions." Kerrin noted a hint of moisture high up on his forehead. Was her question making him nervous?

  "All right." He heaved a sigh. "I don't intend to rip off anybody in your miserable little town. Now, are you satisfied?"

  His stress of intent rather than result did not escape her notice, but Kerrin nodded. "Yes, I'm satisfied. You see, Mr. Sullivan, your word means a great deal more to me than any fancy deals you've worked out with the prison authorities."

  His expression was bemused. "You," he pronounced, "are one dizzy dame."

  Kerrin lifted a shoulder. It was not the first time she'd been handed the title. "Good day, Mr. Sullivan." Saying which, and with a lofty lift of her chin, Kerrin turned to go.

  "Not so fast, sweetheart."

  Her progress was halted by the strap of her purse, which Gary Sullivan had grasped in one lazy fist. She turned, eyes wide, and alarmed all over again.

  The perspiration was now trickling down his sideburns but he didn't seem to particularly notice as he suddenly grinned at her. Kerrin's breath caught at the excellent physical confidence of the man. He didn't care that he was sweating; as far as Gary Sullivan was concerned, sweat was just another natural, perfectly acceptable part of his whole sensual body.

  Kerrin experienced then an emotion she never dreamed she would with respect to this man: envy.

  "You and me, we've got things to work out." Sullivan's grin faded as he let go of her purse strap.

  "We ‑‑ we do? Such as ‑‑ what?"

  "Such as ‑‑ you're the only person in town's going to know who I really am." Sullivan scowled. "That's a problem."

  "A problem? Marty seemed to think it a necessity."

  "Oh, Marty." Sullivan gave an airy wave. "He has the ridiculous notion you're going to be able to keep an eye on me. As if you'd be able to do anything but gape with those eyes of yours, after the fact. No," Sullivan decided wearily. "You're a problem." Suddenly he brightened. "Say, maybe you should give me your word."

  "My word?"

  "Right. That you aren't going to botch things up for me."

  Kerrin could only admi
t this was fair. She nodded. "Very well. You have my word. I won't interfere ‑‑ in your legitimate work."

  "That means that when I hit town, you don't know me from Adam. Got it?"

  It occurred to Kerrin that Gary was setting up a situation where it would be very difficult for her to keep tabs on him. "I ‑‑ well, I ‑‑ Got it," Kerrin decided, withering under a forceful glare from the man. "Umm. How are you going to explain yourself?"

  "I haven't decided yet." Gary gave the impression that even if he had, she'd be the last to know. "But whatever it is, you're just as much in the dark as everybody else. Right?"

  "Right." What else was she going to say?

  "Now," Gary told her, in much the same severe tone. "The sun is going down and you have a long drive home. Where's your car?"

  "My car?" This sudden change in topic baffled Kerrin. "It's ‑‑ over here." She pointed to the little Toyota as she began moving in that direction.

  Gary followed close behind. "Oh no," he said.

  Kerrin, searching for her car keys in her purse, looked up. "What's the matter?"

  The expression on the thief's face could only be described as outraged. "You're not driving home in that car."

  Considering that Kerrin couldn't locate her car keys, this fact was too possibly true. But Kerrin ignored that detail for the moment. "That's my car. Of course I'm driving home in it."

  His eyes darkened. "It's seventy-five miles to Freedom. Seventy-five very empty miles. And you plan to drive them in this junk heap, alone?"

  "This is not a junk heap." Kerrin gave her car a defensive pat on the hood. "'96 was a very reliable year for Toyotas."

  "Right." Gary closed his eyes. "And I'm a prime candidate for governor." Opening his eyes again, he trained them demandingly on her face. "And what do you do if this wonderfully reliable car plays out of character and breaks down? You couldn't possibly get cell reception out there."

  "My car isn't going to break down ‑‑ " Kerrin halted, remembering Ollie's warning she ought to have her hoses replaced. She'd put it off until the fall semester started with her regular salary. "I mean, it got me here, didn't it?" she claimed. Meanwhile she made one more ‑‑ she hoped unobtrusive ‑‑ search of her purse with a blind hand. Where were those keys? "And besides, even if it did break down I could do like everybody else and walk to one of those call phones. The Auto Club is pretty fast about picking you up. Damn!"