Shattered Shell

by Brendan DuBois

  Kara came in and sat down on my couch, unbuttoning her short leather jacket and taking off a pair of black gloves. She looked good, with only a slight discoloration on her cheek and a puffy lower lip to mark what had happened to her in the outside world.

  I made the usual offers of a befuddled host, and in a few minutes we were sipping tall glasses of orange juice. Kara smiled and looked around. "It's been a while since I've been here. Still such a beautiful place. You know, Diane once told me that if she were single and hetero, she'd be moving in here so quick it would make your head spin."

  "Really?" I said. "Would I be allowed to live here?"

  "Probably, but don't ask me if you'd be her lover or her roommate.”

  We both laughed, and after some forced discussion on the weather and the last big storm we had, she put the glass down on the coffee table and looked up, her face somber. I couldn't begin to imagine how different she was, and how she had changed in these past days. A shattered shell is damn hard to put back together again.

  "I want to start by saying two things, okay?"

  "Go right ahead."

  "The last time we talked was awful. I know you're just trying to help. I was ----"

  I raised a hand. "Kara, please. You don't have to say a thing.”

  A firm nod. "Yes, I do. It wasn't right and I've felt bad were just trying to help us and you didn't deserve to get a flamethrower in the face. So I'm sorry."

  "It's okay."

  She sighed and crossed her arms. "That was the easy part. Here comes topic number two. Please stop."

  No need to ask what she wanted me to stop. "I'm not sure I can do that."

  "Yes, you can," she said. "Just go back to Diane and tell her that you're done, that there's nothing out there, nothing more you can do. Just stop it. Please."

  I looked at her, seeing the tension in her face. "Protecting your brother Doug?"

  She looked away from me. "I can't say anything about that.”

  "Kara," I said, trying to keep my voice even. "What happened that night? Is your brother connected? And your landlord, died couple of days later. What's going on?"

  Her eyes were welling up. "I'm not going to appeal to our friendship. You're more Diane's friend. But please, for God's sake, will you stop asking questions and bothering people? You’re going to get hurt, and if Diane ever... " Her voice trailed off.

  "You're afraid of what Diane might do to your brother, is that it?"

  She rubbed at her chin with a clenched fist. "I can't say anymore, I'm sorry."

  "What's your brother involved with? Why did your landlord get murdered?"

  Kara still looked away. I went on and said, "Yesterday afternoon I saw Doug at the Brick Yard Pub. He didn't seem happy to see me. A couple of hours later, I'm getting shot at in North Tyler. So what's he involved with?"

  She sighed. "Doug was my first friend. We could talk about things and play together, and go hiding when my parents were on the warpath. Doug wasn't too bright, and I helped him with his schoolwork, though I'm not sure how much I accomplished. She smiled faintly and looked back at me. "You've met my parents, right?”

  "We had a brief visit that seemed to last about a year."

  "Good description," she said. "Mother and Father --- I could really never call them Mom and Dad --- felt like they had responsibilities. So they labored to have the required two children, and were quite pleased that they received a male and a female. As we got older, we were just props, props for them to show that they were committed parents. We were also expected to do well in school, be active in the required school events --- sports for Doug and music for me --- and then join the right crowd. Which always turned out to be the children of my parents' friends."

  "Somehow I don't think your parents are too pleased about what happened."

  She was still smiling but in an odd way: I could see a note of anger play across her face. "That's so true. The true-blue son who was supposed to do well and go to Harvard and join the old man's business, well, he turns out to be a college dropout with a taste for potato chips and soap operas. The dutiful daughter who is supposed to marry the up-and-coming lad in Father's business and have two point-nine children, well, she turns out to be a dyke. After all these years, still quite a shock to both of them."

  I leaned forward a bit. "After all these years, are you still protecting Doug? Even if it means something connected to your landlord getting murdered?"

  She looked right at me. "Will you stop what you're doing?"

  Everything felt heavy about me as I answered her. "I made a promise to Diane, one I take seriously. I can't lie to her. I have to see it through."

  Her voice was clear and to the point. "If you do that, I'll never speak to you again, Lewis, and I can tell you, as much as Diane is fond of you, she loves me more. If I shut you out, she'll follow me. She might not like it, but she'll follow me and you'll never see her again. Are you prepared to do that?"

  "I'm prepared to keep my promise."

  She nodded and said, "Don't get up," but of course I did, walking her to the door, and she trudged up the snow-covered path and my mind was racing, trying out the phrase or combination of phrases I could use to call her back and try to make it right with her, but nothing came to me, nothing at all, as she went over the rise.

  I slammed the door and went back into the living room, and picking up the two juice glasses, I went into the kitchen and in one quick motion threw them down into the sink, the glass shattering so loud it almost hurt my ears.

  Felix called me later that day. "I've finished my snooping. They did well, picking that place. The airfield's been abandoned, but someone keeps plowing it out. The access road is a couple of hundred yards in, and then you come to a grove of trees. Past the trees is the hangar. Nice and remote and wide open. Some old pieces of machinery in the yard, and a couple of outbuildings. You could hide a platoon of assassins in there with no problem. There's another access road, leading out back to the highway."

  "So we get there early, and then what?"

  "Then we wait for them. If it's not a trap --- a slight possibility --- then they're surprised to see us there and we apologize, saying we misread the time or something. If it is a trap --- a much larger possibility --- then we've spoiled their plans. We've confused them, then maybe we get a good look at who's been shooting at you. Or maybe everything works out for the best and we end up with the package. Do you believe that?"

  "I don't know what to believe."

  He laughed. "Who does? I'll be by tomorrow, about nine o'clock. You plan on bringing along some ... urn, supplies?"

  "Wouldn't leave home without being supplied, not these days."

  "Good. I'll see you tomorrow."

  I hung up and went to wash my hands. The house smelled of cooking, gun oil, and a faint scent from Kara's visit. There was also another odor there, of fear and terror and apprehension, and I opened the kitchen window to the January air, hoping it would help.

  At five minutes before five o'clock on the next day, my phone rang. It was Felix. "I'm up in the parking lot. Are you ready?"

  "That I am," I said. "I'll be right up."

  I hung up the phone, and by the front door I gathered up my belongings and looked back. I guess I should have been thinking great thoughts about what lay ahead for us this winter night, or at least I should have had melancholy feelings about leaving my safe house for a possible bloody encounter, but no, I was just ready to get on with it.

  Felix stood at the parking lot's border, hands in pockets, the engine of his car rumbling and gray exhaust clouds eddying around the open trunk. He nodded at me as I placed two long zippered bags inside.

  "What do you have there?" he asked.

  "Twelve-gauge shotgun," I said. "And an eight-millimeter assault rifle."

  He whistled. "Anything else?"

  "Just my Beretta, under my coat."

  "Expecting trouble, I see."

  "No, expecting to be alive when this evening is over," I said. “An
d you?"

  He grinned as he slammed down the trunk. "Let's just say you and I have parity."

  I climbed in and Felix joined me. On the rear seat of the car was a collection of black zippered bags. We got out of the parking lot and I said to Felix, "Do we have time?"

  "Time for what?"

  "A quick favor." And when I asked him, he agreed and we headed north.

  Fifteen minutes later I was standing on cold concrete in a garage in Bretton, hands in pockets, just looking. Before me, on three flat tires, was my Range Rover. The driver's side was stitched with bullet holes and most of the windows had been shattered. Fluid was still dripping from the engine. I wanted to touch the scarred metal, and I forced myself to stand there and look, feeling the memories come back to me, back when I had first moved into Tyler Beach and had bought this four-wheeler. Many good miles had passed with this vehicle, far from its home in England, and now it lay dead and hidden.

  What an ending. I rubbed at my eyes and turned to Felix "Let's get out of here."

  We headed south, to Newburyport and its neighbor Plum Island, a barrier island off the East Coast. It's a community made of loners, fishermen, malcontents, and other people who believe the mainland doesn't understand them, and they're probably right. It's connected to the coast by a drawbridge, and the north end is a cozy community of winterized cottages and shops, and the entire south is a national wildlife preserve.

  As Felix drove I looked around at his car. It was a rented black Toyota Camry. The fact that we were driving a rented car was another sign of what we were getting into.

  I looked out at the lights and said, "Where do you get your vehicles?"

  "Trade secret," Felix said. "And a pretty expensive one. The deal I have, I'm all set, no matter what dents, dings, or odd bullet hole might be in it when I bring it back. The only real no-no is blood. I can't bring back a car with bloody seats or trunk."

  "How do you get around that?"

  "Plastic sheets."

  "I'd like to have you connect me with that someone," I said, "I need a vehicle, and I'd like to have it by tomorrow."

  "Deal."

  After another hundred yards or so, Felix pulled over to the side, letting the engine run, switching on an overhead light. He pulled a folded sheet of paper from the glove compartment and unfolded it. It was a hand-drawn --- and quite nicely done --- map of the airport and the surrounding buildings.

  "Pre-job briefing," he said. "We drive in there, nice and slow, like we're lost or something. We'll both have windows down and weapons in our laps. We're about two hours early, so either we're going to catch them by surprise or it'll be empty. Then we'll sit, engine running, keeping an eye on things."

  ''They don't show up at eight, then what?"

  "We give them a few more minutes and then we scram. We'll be waiting and getting nervous and wondering what's going wrong. To hell with that. I don't care what your caller said, we're running this show."

  I looked down at the piece of paper, with the straight lines marking the buildings, and the two wavy lines outlining the access roads. "What should we be looking for?"

  "They drive down and we all start acting like gentlemen, then it's fine. They should have our rapist friend secured somehow. I'll handle the exchange, and it should go real quick. Anything longer than a minute or two, we're gone. This isn't a debating society. The deal is straightforward: We get the bad guy and you stop bothering them."

  "All right," I said. "We run into talkative folks and then we’ll leave. What else?"

  "You see a bunch of guys with weapons coming at us with no talking or talking it real rough, then it's going to the shits real quick and we're outta there. In fact, you get a bad feeling about anything, Lewis, we're driving out and we try something different."

  "I'm getting a bad feeling right about now."

  He grinned. "That's normal. Nothing to worry about. Come on, let's get dressed."

  From the rear seat he pulled forward a larger bag, which he unzipped and from which he emptied two Kevlar bulletproof vests. We helped each other on and instantly the inside of the car started getting fifteen degrees warmer. Felix switched off the overhead light and I noticed that I was wiping my hands a lot on my pants leg.

  "Okay, let's get to it," he said, and we pulled out into the road.

  About a mile toward Plum Island Felix started whistling a quiet tune that I couldn't place, and he pressed a switch that lowered both windows. He kicked the heater up a notch and then I joined him in pulling out our pistols, resting them in our laps. Even with the heavy vest and the heater running at full tilt, I was shivering even harder as we went down the access road, which was bumpy and roughly plowed.

  Felix clicked on the headlight's high beams. There were snow-covered fields stretching away to either side of us, glowing stark white. Bare trees spotted the landscape, their gnarled branches looking sharp and awful. Off in the distance to the right were some lights and low buildings, and Felix saw that I was looking that way.

  "New airport, started last year. Place we're going to is just down the road."

  We passed through a gentle corner and there were two small buildings and a large hangar. The doors were open and snow had drifted inside. Snow-covered hunks of rusted machinery were outside. Felix drove up and the headlights lit up the interior. Toward the rear were workbenches and the bare carcass of a Piper Cub and some doors. No one was in the building. Felix backed up the Camry until we were facing the access road. Off to my side the road curved, and I pointed that out and Felix said, "She curves around and reconnects to the main road. It's more rough than what we came in on."

  He put the car into park and switched off the headlights, leaving on the parking lights. The engine still rumbled softly and the heater was on. Felix reached behind the seat and pulled a dark duffel bag toward him, which he unzipped.

  "Little toy for the both of us, give us a little advantage," hr said, taking out two hard plastic cases from inside the bag. The cases opened with a sharp pop! and he took out what looked like a pair of bulky binoculars, which I recognized instantly.

  "Night-vision scopes," I said. "Very nice."

  I could sense his smile rather than see it. "I suppose you might have had experience with these. Do you need a lesson, or do you plan to give me a lesson?"

  I hefted the bulky instrument in my hand, found the power switch, and turned it on. "Oh, you might want to give me a few pointers. One does tend to get rusty."

  "So they say."

  Ten minutes later I had the night-vision scope up to my eyes, It worked by gathering all the available light --- starlight, moonlight, whatever --- and concentrating it to make the night visible. Everything was in a ghostly green glow, and I brought the scope up to my eyes every few minutes for a quick scan. Though I was with Felix and we were well-armed, I still had disquieting thoughts of men in white snowsuits, creeping across the fields, reaching into the open car windows and slitting our throats.

  Felix coughed and said, "Pretty strange night for you, isn't it.”

  "The same could be said for you."

  "True, my friend, but there's a big difference. This is a part I of my life, a part of who I am. I expect this kind of work. Hell, sometimes I even look forward to it. But not you. You're a quiet bookish type who used to do something spooky for the Pentagon, and I'll be damned if I can quite figure out why you now do this. It doesn't figure. This is my turf, not yours. What happened to you out there with the feds, that makes you do this?"

  I wasn't in a mood to talk. "Classified. Sorry."

  "I'm not looking for the details," he said, his voice quiet but insistent. "I'm just curious why you feel compelled to do this."

  I remembered the frantic call from Diane, and the shaking and teary face of Kara in the hospital examining room, and the flames that flickered up the Crescent House, and I said, "What makes you think I have a choice?"

  Felix stayed quiet for a while, and I did, too, bringing up the scope every few minutes, looking to t
he access road in front of us, and the side road off to my right. The snowfields looked ghastly in the pale, fake light. By concentrating I could make out the sounds of traffic heading toward Plum Island. I put the glasses down and Felix’s voice startled me, though it was quite low and even.

  "Car coming down the access road."

  I turned and saw the approaching headlights. Forgetting my old DoD training, I brought the scope up and was instantly blinded, the circuitry not being able to handle the sudden rush of light from the oncoming car. I brought the scope down and blinked hard a few times. There was a creaking noise as Felix shifted in his seat.

  "Only one," he said, "That's good. And right on time."

  He started to say something else, but I wasn't paying attention. I could now make out the sound of the approaching car, but there was something else. Metal creaking. Just the car settling in the cold, or Felix moving around? I picked up the night scope and looked out to the other access road. Empty. I scanned the fields. Nothing.

  Metal. Creaking again.

  I turned full in the seat and looked behind me, through the rear windshield. The quality was blurry, since my hands were shaking and I was looking through dirty glass, but it was clear enough to see, clear enough so I grabbed on to Felix's shoulder, hoping I could speak up soon enough, very soon, as the two men with shotguns worked their way through the abandoned airport hangar just a few score feet away, moving quick and sure, the shotguns now rising up to their shoulders.

  "Felix!" I yelled. "Bad guys behind us! It looks like --"

  I didn't have a chance to finish, as Felix shifted the Camry from park and slammed down on the accelerator, the tail end fishtailing as he spun around and headed out the other access road. I fell back against the seat and dropped the night scope, and I felt a hot flush of fear, wondering if I was overreacting.

  I was still thinking that when there was an earsplitting boom! and the rear window was shot in.

  Chapter Twenty-Four