Corridor Man: Auditor

by Nick James

  He took her by the arm and led her into the barroom headed for the front door. All conversation stopped. A couple of guys snickered.

  “Thanks,” the swirl-haired bartender called.

  “Lots a luck, don’t forget to wear protection,” some guy yelled and everyone laughed.

  Chapter Fifteen

  Once they were outside, Kate took two steps and threw up on the sidewalk. She wiped her mouth with the back of her hand like it was an everyday occurrence, which maybe it was. Bobby directed her into the back seat and rolled down the window in case she got sick again. He walked around to the driver’s side and rolled down the back window just to play it safe. Kate was already stretched out on the back seat with her eyes closed.

  He climbed behind the wheel, and then cautiously backed up to within an inch of the burgundy Escalade parked behind him. Two guys stepped out of Foxies and looked frantically up and down the street. He recognized one as the curly haired guy who almost walked into the ladies room. He waited for a couple of cars to shoot past before he pulled the Geo into traffic.

  They were headed downtown. Bobby was aware his passenger was in no condition to give a deposition. In her current state he’d be lucky if he could get her into the building let alone past polite Marci at the front desk. As if to confirm his thoughts she suddenly bolted upright in the back seat and thrust her head out the window, gasping. She made all the right sounds, but nothing came up. After a long minute and some very surprised glances from other motorists she sat back and wiped her hand across her mouth.

  “Where the hell are we going?” she asked and looked out either side of the Geo in an effort to try and get her bearings.

  “You were scheduled to give a deposition this afternoon at Denton, Allan, Sawyer and Hinz, that’s a law office,” he said, then glanced at her in the rear view mirror. His answer didn’t seem to register with her.

  “Do you remember? They had you scheduled for four this afternoon.” It was almost four-twenty at this point and obviously a stupid question.

  “Whatever.”

  A moment later she thrust her head back out the window and her hair blew across her face. She gathered up a fistful and yanked it behind her head just as she lurched forward, mouth open, eyes bulging. Not what you’d call attractive. Nothing came up. She lurched forward a few more times, then settled back in against the seat and closed her eyes.

  “Can we stop and get something to eat? I’m starving and I need to calm my stomach.”

  “I’m really sorry, Kate. You mind if I call you Kate? We’re going to be close to a half-hour late by the time we get down there. To tell you the truth I don’t think they’re going to allow you to give a deposition today. It’s fairly obvious you’ve been drinking. If you can hang on I’ll stop on the way back and you can get something. That sound okay?”

  As he spoke he glanced in the side mirror, there were three cars passing him. There was a space he could pull into after the third car and hopefully speed up and cut a couple of minutes off their arrival time.

  “Come on, come on, pass damn it,” he said, waiting for the third car, a black Prius. The woman seemed to hold a position just off his rear wheel, like she was keeping pace. He took his foot off the accelerator and waited for her to pass. Once she drifted past him she did the same thing with the car in front of him, keeping pace just off the rear wheel and blocking Bobby.

  He honked a couple of times, then put his blinker on hoping she’d pick up on the fact he wanted to get in her lane. It seemed to make her grip the wheel even tighter and slow down. She remained focused straight ahead not looking left or right.

  “Damn it,” he said, then saw his opportunity completely evaporate as a burgundy Escalade raced up behind the Prius eliminating any chance to change lanes.

  He glanced over at the SUV just as the tinted window was lowered. There was something about it. It probably registered in a nanosecond although it seemed like it took a long time. Everything was suddenly in slow motion. He recognized the young face, the same curly haired guy he’d seen at Foxies. Then he recognized the burgundy Escalade from in front of Foxies. And then there was that large pistol suddenly pointing out the window.

  Chapter Sixteen

  Bobby couldn’t tell if the curly haired guy looked deadly serious or had he just gathered that from the fact a very large pistol was pointed at him. He jumped the curb and slammed on the brakes just as the guy with the gun leaned out the window. The windshield on the Geo’s passenger side suddenly sported two spider web patterns. Bobby swerved around a boulevard tree and onto the sidewalk, taking out a portion of a white picket fence in the process.

  “Shit,” Kate screamed as she slammed into the back of the front seat, then dropped to the floor when he hit the brakes. He heard her gasp and maybe vomit down there in the back seat, but he had more pressing issues to deal with at the moment.

  The Escalade fish-tailed back and forth, then hit the brakes and was immediately slammed in the rear by a white delivery van that pushed it into the oncoming traffic lane. There was another screech, then a loud bang and the Escalade spun around facing the opposite direction just two lanes over. The hood was buckled and steam rose from the engine. Tires screeched in all directions. Bobby continued down the sidewalk took a sharp right into an alley and floored it.

  He heard Kate coughing down on the floor.

  “Jesus Christ. You all right?” he asked, picking up speed as he rocketed down the narrow alley slamming into two ill-placed plastic trash bins along the way.

  She coughed a couple of times before she screamed, “What the hell is wrong with you? Are you crazy? Let me get my ass out of here, you’re nuts.”

  “Just stay back there, damn it and shut up,” he screamed back.

  “Oh, Jesus, look at this I’m a mess. I’ve got puke all over me. You dumb shit. Just let me out, please.” She placed her hands on the back of his seat and pulled herself up. He looked at her in the rear view mirror and realized she was right, she was a mess.

  “I don’t know who those guys were. They were at Foxies, did you know them?”

  “What guys?”

  “The ones shooting at us.”

  “Huh.”

  “The guys in the Escalade, they were shooting at us. Didn’t you see?”

  “What the hell are you talking about? God, I could sure use a drink.”

  “Look at my damn windshield. They tried to kill me.”

  “What the hell are you talking about?”

  “Just,” he let the rest of it go. “Do you have a phone, a cell?” he asked.

  “Why?”

  “I was thinking of calling the police. You know since there was a maniac on the road shooting at people. I thought it might be…do you have a cell?”

  “Quit yelling, for Christ sake. Oh, God, look at this, you made me puke all over my cigarettes,” she said, then held up the dripping package of cigarettes to prove her point.

  He felt his stomach begin to lurch, but swallowed it back down. He wasn’t going downtown and as he thought about it, maybe a little more than a week out of the halfway house wasn’t the best time to call the police about a shooting. He sure as hell wasn’t going back anywhere near Foxies.

  “I’ll take you to my place. You can get cleaned up there.”

  Chapter Seventeen

  “Hey, you got a towel?” Kate called through the bathroom door.

  Bobby had been dividing his time between standing guard at the bathroom door and running to the window to see if there was a burgundy Escalade parked out by the dumpster.

  “I just moved in and they’re all still packed away. Hang on, just a minute,” he said, then ran and grabbed two t-shirts from one of his paper bags. He knocked on the bathroom door, then pushed it partially open and stuck his hand in with the t-shirts. “Here, I’m afraid you’ll have to use these. You can dry off with one and slip the other on until your clothes come out of the laundry downstairs.”

  He caught her reflection in the bathro
om mirror as she took the t-shirts from his hand. She was shaking her head like she couldn’t believe what he’d just told her. Her hair was wet and hung down over her shoulders. A series of black and blue bruises ran up and down her side, more from falls than any beating he guessed.

  Even just out of the shower and still looking like a mess there was a sense that she might have been attractive at one time in the distant past, but it would have been a very long time ago. He guessed she was somewhere in her fifties. Her figure had fallen prey to the lifestyle. It had been over four years since he had seen a woman naked, let alone been this close to one. It would be a while longer before he touched one and it certainly wasn’t going to be this woman. He pulled the door closed until it wedged against the door frame and wouldn’t close any further.

  “I’ll go check on your clothes,” he said.

  He had the dryer cranked on high and he put another buck-and-a-half worth of quarters in the slot, he pushed the coins in and hoped the dryer wouldn’t stop. He wanted her dressed as soon as possible.

  He heard her rummaging in the kitchen area when he stepped back into the apartment. She was standing on her tip-toes peering into the small cabinet above the stove. The rest of the cabinet doors were half open. The t-shirt had risen over her rear and exposed a new set of black-and-blue bruises. Red blotches appeared on the back of her thighs.

  “This place is empty and you don’t have shit to drink around here. I really need a drink.”

  “My name’s Bobby. I guess we weren’t exactly introduced.”

  She ignored the hand he extended and bent down in a very unladylike pose to look under the kitchen sink. “Where the hell do you keep it? I told you, I need a goddamn drink.”

  “Hey look, Kate, like I said I just moved in. Everything is still packed away, in the delivery van. I don’t have any alcohol here.”

  She looked up at him from the empty cabinet. “Any blow? Crank? Come on, you gotta have something?”

  “No, nothing, honest.”

  She stood up and faced him. The t-shirt barely reached her hip bones leaving her exposed. She either didn’t notice or didn’t care. “I really need a drink, Mr. Bobby. I’ll make it worth your while, let you do anything you want. Anything. I just need a little drink is all.”

  “I don’t have anything to drink here, Kate.”

  “Well then go fucking get something,” she shrieked. “Jesus Christ. You’re making it sound like it’s such a big deal. Just go get me something. Now, damn it.”

  “We just had some asshole shooting at us, Kate. I don’t know why, I think it might have something to do with you. But I honestly don’t know. I’ve been out of town for more than four years so I’m pretty sure it’s not me. Maybe now just isn’t the best time to go traipsing over to some liquor store.”

  “Well he missed, didn’t he? So we should be celebrating. Now either go get me something to drink or get me my clothes so I can get the hell out of here.”

  “Let’s just calm…”

  “I want my clothes,” she yelled. Then she suddenly began to shake and slowly slid down on the floor, sobbing. “Please, just get me a drink and I’ll do anything you want, anything. Please, please.”

  If this wasn’t her rock bottom she had to be within sight of it. There was a liquor store about four blocks away. If he left now he could be there and back in twenty minutes.

  “If I go get you something, a bottle, you’ll be here when I get back?”

  She smeared the tears to either side of her blotchy face, sniffled and looked up at him. “I promise. I will, I’ll be here for you, really.”

  “Okay, I’m going to walk. It’ll take me about twenty minutes. You’ll stay here, promise?”

  She nodded from the floor, then leaned over and hugged his leg. “Thank you. I promise I’ll be here, just hurry.”

  As he passed the dumpster in the parking lot he glanced up at his window. He could see her standing there watching him through the grimy glass. She gave him a half-hearted wave or was she just egging him on to move faster?

  Chapter Eighteen

  The two guys ahead of him at the liquor store were buying wine. The first guy dropped fifty-six bucks on two bottles of Chateauneuf du Pape. The second guy bought a bottle of Pinot Noir for nineteen bucks. Bobby had a plastic fifth of Cosmonaut Vodka that went for eight dollars and change.

  The kid behind the register looked at him for a moment but didn’t say anything.

  “I know, it’s a joke,” Bobby said by way of explanation and handed him a ten.

  The kid smiled and nodded like it suddenly all made sense.

  “Have a nice night,” Bobby said, then picked up his paper bag and hurried out the door.

  He spotted her a half block away. Oblivious to the fact his t-shirt wasn’t covering her as she stood in the window with her arms folded across her chest. Waiting. He looked up at the window once he’d passed the dumpster, ready to give her a friendly wave, but she was gone.

  She met him in the stairwell on the second floor.

  “Come on, Kate, you’re not even dressed.”

  She grabbed the bag out of his hand, then marched back up the stairs. She dropped the paper bag near the top of the stairs and screwed the bottle cap off in the hall. Just before the door she tilted her head back and put the bottle to her lips.

  Bobby picked up the paper bag and screw cap, squeezed past her, then took hold of her arm and guided her in so he could close his apartment door. He heard her gulp and swallow as he watched the bubbles rising in the upturned bottle.

  “Ahhh-hhhh,” she finally gasped, coming up for air. She’d knocked close to a good two inches off the contents.

  “You want a glass?”

  “Forget it I already checked, you ain’t got any,” she said, then took another long swig. Her faced seemed to grow a little crimson and she belched. She held the bottle tightly, leaned against the wall, then slid down to the worn carpet.

  He folded the paper bag and placed it in the trash under the sink.

  “Soon as it gets dark I’ll take you back home. I just don’t want to risk those guys seeing me, seeing us. You got any idea what that was about?”

  She shrugged, took another sip, seemed to relax a little more and ignored his question altogether. “I ain’t got no reason to go home. Drop my ass at Moonies.”

  “I can do that. Let me ask you again. Do you have any idea what that was about this afternoon? Those guys shooting at us.”

  She shook her head and took another healthy sip, then closed her eyes. “Maybe you just pissed them off, you got that way about you, acting high and mighty like.”

  “No, they came into that bar, Foxies. They were looking for you. One of them tried to go into the ladies room while you were in there. They left the same time we did, they just didn’t see us until we pulled away. I didn’t put it together until I was walking back here. It all seems to fit. I just don’t get why they were willing to do me in, just to get to you.”

  She kept her eyes closed, took another very healthy swig and half snorted. “Me? Shit no one wants anything to do with me.”

  He couldn’t argue that point. “Why were they going to depose you this afternoon?”

  “Do what?” She opened her eyes and attempted to focus on him. Her glassy stare had begun to return.

  “Why were they going to take your deposition, talk to you? They were going to pay you for your time. The lawyers. Downtown.”

  “Bankers and lawyers, bankers and lawyers. They’re just out to screw all of us one way or the other. Just grab your ankles Mr. Bobby, you’ll get yours soon enough,” she said, then took a couple more gulps and smiled.

  “But what were they going to ask you about?”

  “Well, I guess I don’t really know since you never got my ass down there. I ‘spose now I ain’t gonna get paid.”

  “I’ll call them in the morning, get them to reschedule you.”

  She snorted. “Shit. Don’t waste your time, I’ll probably be go
ne by then.” She laughed, put the bottle to her lips and started swallowing. When she put the bottle back down it was almost half empty.

  “Maybe you should back off on some of that, Kate. Give it a rest for a few minutes.”

  “Maybe you should just shut the hell up,” she said and raised the bottle to her lips again to emphasize her point.

  “I’ll go see if your clothes are dry.”

  Chapter Nineteen

  Mercifully her clothes were dry and he tossed them on the carpet next to where she was sitting. Even though they were just out of the dryer they still looked dirty. Jeans, socks and a t-shirt. No underwear.

  She’d already made it past the halfway point in the plastic bottle. As she looked up at him with glassy eyes she bounced her head off the wall with a thump, then put a half-hearted grin on her face.

  “Hey, I got it, you want to do me?”

  “What?”

  She spread her legs apart on the carpet. “Come on, I’ll give ya a deal, just a couple of bucks.”

  “No thanks.”

  “Suit yourself, high and mighty. Probably couldn’t get it up anyway. Besides, I can get better than you anytime I want. You hear? Any damn time I want,” she said, then took another gulp.

  “Come on, why don’t you get dressed and I’ll drive you over to Moonies.”

  “Good idea,” she said, then sat there with a half smile on her face.

  He pulled her jeans on her legs, then helped her to stand up. She leaned against the wall and giggled, never letting go of the vodka bottle. She seemed oblivious to his t-shirt so he just left it on her and pulled hers over on top. She slipped into one of her shoes unaided but couldn’t get the other one on so he helped her. He tied both of her shoes as she leaned against the wall, then walked her down to the car holding her arm and poured her into the back seat.

  She curled up with the vodka bottle, closed her eyes and smiled.