by Boyle, Gerry
“Hey, Brandon,” the small guy said. He smiled like they were old friends.
Brandon nodded.
“You remember me?”
“Sure. Fuller.”
“I’m out now.”
“They let you go or you escape?”
“I just had a couple of days left. That’s why I didn’t go crazy on you at the funeral.”
“Is that right?”
“Yeah. I unload on you, I’m in for another six months.”
“Good thinking,” Brandon said.
“Thanks,” Fuller said. “They teach us that inside. Had a program, it took all one morning: ‘Considering the consequences of your actions.’”
“Well, I guess it worked,” Brandon said.
Brandon put the heavy grinder down on the ground, kicked the air hose away from his feet. The movement caused the other guy to flinch, the hands coming part way out of the pockets. The hands went back in. Brandon crossed his arms on his chest.
“You look familiar,” he said to the big guy.
“He’s a friend of mine.”
“Keeping you company?”
“Something like that,” Fuller said. “We work together sometimes.”
“Oh, yeah? Doing what?”
Fuller shrugged.
“This ’n that.”
“You working now or are you on a break?” Brandon said.
“I’m working,” Fuller said. “He’s on the bench, waiting to see if he’ll be needed.”
“Well, I’ve got to get this bottom painted, so you got something to say, go ahead and say it. Unless you want to help.”
“My ma,” Fuller said. “She—”
“It was an accident. I was just trying to get her to stop choking me.”
“That’s not what she said. She said the plainclothes cop looked right at her, said, ‘How you like this, bitch?’”
Brandon shook his head, smiled. “Never happened.”
“You’re not calling my mother a liar are you?”
An ominous edge to his voice. The big guy watching the two of them like it was a tennis match, his eyes tick-tocking back and forth.
“Not calling her anything. I just know what happened. I just wanted to shake her off me. She was gouging at my face.”
“It’s her face all busted up,” Fuller said.
“So get a lawyer,” Brandon said. “Sue the city.”
“I ain’t got time for that. I figure I’ll just get the money from you.”
“I’m not paying you ten cents.”
“I was thinking more like ten thousand,” Fuller said.
“You can think ten million, if you want. Thinking it isn’t gonna make it come true.”
“College boy, hanging out at the yacht club. You can get the money from mommy and daddy.”
“Ten bucks an hour to scrape and paint. And it’s a boatyard, not a yacht club.”
Fuller smiled. “Don’t know much about boats. When I was growing up, we didn’t have money for fucking toys.”
Brandon didn’t answer. It threw the big guy off his rhythm and he looked from Fuller to Brandon and back to Fuller again.
“Didn’t have a house on the ocean. Didn’t sit out on the porch and sip my little glass of wine and watch the boats go by.”
Brandon stared, now knowing what this was about.
Fuller looked away. “Must be lonely, these old ladies living all by themselves in these big houses. Noises at night. House creaking and animals scuffling around outside the window. Or at least you think they’re animals. Hard to know unless you get up and go out and check.”
“What are you trying to say? ’Cause I’m busy.”
“Just saying it must be hard for old people living alone. My ma, she lives with my sister and her whiney-ass brats. She ain’t ever alone.”
“Is that right?”
“When you’re all by yourself, what are you gonna do? Call the cops, but what if the phones ain’t working? Then what?”
Brandon didn’t answer.
“There’s accidents. Old people is always falling. My grandmother, you met her at the funeral. She fell, busted her hip, took her four hours to crawl from the bathroom to the phone. Two weeks later she dies of friggin’ pneumonia. It’s all interconnected, you know what I’m saying?”
Brandon stared, said nothing.
“Fires. Burglars. Fucking drugs are everywhere now. Junkies look for old people, figure they got a house full of meds. I know this one guy, breaks into this house, cleans out this old bastard’s medicine chest. Ends up selling the shit for like five grand.”
“Jackpot,” the big guy said.
“He speaks,” Brandon said.
The big guy scowled, like he was unsure whether he was being made fun of. Brandon bent and picked up the grinder, the air hose hissing.
“Same thing goes for these people who live on boats,” Fuller said. “Creep me out, stuck down in there.”
“You don’t have to worry about that, do you,” Brandon said.
“Well, maybe if you don’t worry about yourself, you should worry about that girl you’re with, little thing out here all alone. You gotta look out for—”
Brandon moved a step closer, grinder in front of him.
“You go near her, I’ll kill you. You go near my grandmother, I’ll kill you.” He glanced at the big guy. “I’ll kill you, too.”
“Whoa,” Fuller said, holding up his hands. “We’re just chatting and you’re getting all wound up. We came here to talk about compensation for injuries?”
“You talked, now go.”
“But to sum up,” Fuller said, borrowing another one from his lawyer. “We got an offer on the table.”
“No deal,” Brandon said.
“Well, you think about it. You think about everything I said. You ain’t got the cash on hand, you might consider a personal loan. That guy with the sweet Rusky babe, maybe. He’s fucking loaded. Ten grand to him is nothing.”
“Get the hell out of here.”
“Dude, you got a bad attitude. Easy on the caffeine, dude.”
Kelvin laughed. Fuller looked at him, grinned. “Try to have a conversation, the guy flips out.”
Kelvin shook his head.
“Stay away from everybody I know,” Brandon said.
Fuller took two steps back, said, “You can have this place. I wouldn’t want to live here. I mean, sleeping on a boat? Know what I’d always be worrying about? If it sinks and you’re asleep. And what if there’s a fire? Tanks fulla gas and shit, all these fumes. Thing would go up—” He held up his right hand and snapped his fingers. “—like that.”
CHAPTER 23
The notebook was spilled onto the deck at Mia’s feet. Her head was back, her mouth was open, her delicate throat bared to the sun and the cool harbor breeze. A lock of hair had spilled over her forehead.
Brandon bent to wake her, let his hand hover over her shoulder. He paused, looked at her, then turned and looked back toward the shoreline. Where were they watching from? Would they know every time he left her alone? Would they wait until no one was aboard, sneak on with a gas can and—
“What?” Mia said, jerking awake. Fright in her eyes, then a groggy smile as she relaxed, pulled herself up.“You scared me, baby,” she said. “I know it’s silly but I was having this dream. I was—”
“It’s not silly,” Brandon said. “I don’t think you should stay here.”
Her smile fell away.
“What?”
“I had visitors,” Brandon said, and he lowered himself and squatted next to her chair. He told her who had come and what they had said.
“So now that they know where I live,” he said.
“Where are you going?” Mia said.
“I think I’m going to Nessa’s.”
“Oh.”
“You’d be better off at your apartment.”
“I’d worry. How ’bout you come stay with me.”
“That doesn’t solve anything. They’d just f
ollow us there.”
“I can stay with Nessa, then. That way you don’t have to just sit there and wait. We’ll take turns.”
Brandon considered that. Looked out on a tug moving upriver under the bridge, its wake rising behind it like a serpent. All of it, the normal things, seemed slightly unreal now. Reality was Fuller, his cold grin, the eyes that never smiled.
“They won’t try anything, not yet,” Brandon said. “They hurt somebody, they’ve played their hand. If it doesn’t work, they’ve got nothing left to use for leverage. Their strength now is the threat card, the bluff that they’ll play it.”
“Right. So we don’t cave,” Mia said. “And we don’t run.”
Brandon looked at her, the sun giving her skin a pearl-like iridescence like she was glowing from deep within. Where did this beautiful woman get this toughness? “Why are you talking about ‘we’? It’s not your fight.”
Mia reached out and took his hand. “Sure it is. It became my fight the first time you kissed me.”
“If I’d known that, I wouldn’t have,” Brandon said.
“We don’t have any choice, Brandon,” Mia said, like she was privy to some dark secret. “You don’t. I don’t. You know why, don’t you?”
Brandon thought he knew the answer, took a moment to let the unfamiliar words form. They were frightening, even shocking words, words he’d avoided for most of his life, until Mia came along. And uttering them would change everything. The stakes would be exponentially higher. Now he could hear them, in his voice. I love you.
Those words stuck in his throat. “I think I do,” he said.
There was a long pause and then the wake from the tug reached the outermost float, rocked it gently, like a child being pushed on a swing. A gull swooped low over the boat, banked, and circled back, double-checking that there wasn’t something edible to be had. It swooped low a second time, then shot off again, Brandon thinking that it looked like it was carrying an urgent message.
“So what did you say to them?” Mia said.
“I told them if they came near you I’d kill them,” Brandon said. “I said if they went near Nessa I’d kill them.”
“With the rifle in the cabinet?”
“Yes.”
“What is it?”
“It’s just a twenty-two. An old lever-action Marlin Model 39. It was my grandfather’s.”
“Show me how to shoot it,” Mia said.
CHAPTER 24
“So it was all implied,” Griffin said, “except for the part about the ten thousand.”
“Right,” Brandon said.
“No witnesses.”
“Except for his big buddy. You’re sure it’s this Kelvin guy?”
“Ninety-nine percent. Unless Joel has made a new friend of that description since he got out.”
“They seemed like they’d known each other a long time,” Brandon said. “A lot of unspoken stuff going on.”
They were in the cruiser, an hour into the day shift, slowing for each house on Blackstrap Road in West Falmouth, just north of Portland, Griffin calling Falmouth P.D., saying he was looking for a witness in an assault investigation, the voice on the radio saying, “Ten-four.” Griffin had written the description of the place—blue and white mobile home, wishing-well out front, a white van shoved into the brush to the right of the driveway—on a piece of paper. Brandon was holding it, watching as each house came into view.
And then the trailer, set back under a canopy of pines.
The white van.
Griffin pulled in, drove the cruiser as close to the front door as he could.
They got out and walked to the door. A big dog barked inside as Griffin knocked. The barking turned into a frantic snarling and a baby started crying. A woman’s voice said, “Shut the hell up.”
Neither of them did, but the barking grew muffled, like the dog had been shut in another room. The door opened.
It was a big busty woman, barrel shaped, with blonde hair and bangs with a band of dark roots. There was a wide-eyed baby in her arms, both baby and mom staring at the cop with suspicion.
“Morning, ma’am,” Griffin said. “Officer Griffin. This is my colleague from the Portland Police Department, Brandon Blake. We’re looking for Kelvin. You Crystal?”
“Yeah, and he ain’t here.”
“But Kelvin does live here?”
“I kicked his ass out.”
“When?”
“Three days ago. Ain’t heard a word since.”
A pause, Griffin’s way of letting her know he thought she was lying.
“You know where Kelvin might be staying?”
“No idea and I don’t care.”
“Has Joel Fuller been here?”
Crystal gave a short I-told-you-so sigh, tried to catch, it but couldn’t.
“So you know Joel,” Griffin said.
“I thought he was in jail,” Crystal said. The baby, a little girl, looked at her, reached out and grabbed her face. She pushed its hand away.
“He’s been out three days,” Griffin said. “Kelvin’s been seen with him.”
“Ain’t been here, if he has. I won’t let Joel Fuller in my house.”
“Why’s that?”
The baby on her hip, she reached into the back pocket of her jeans and fished out a pack of cigarettes. True Menthol. She shook one loose, fished it out with her mouth, tossed the pack into the room behind her. Dug a lighter from a front pocket and lighted the cigarette. Took a long drag and blew the smoke out, away from the baby.
Griffin and Brandon waited, Brandon thinking Crystal had mastered the art of the dramatic pause.
“Why? ’Cause he’s a piece of shit, that’s why.”
“Oh, yeah?” Brandon said. “What’s he done to you?”
Crystal looked at him, wondered what a colleague was. No uniform, too young to have made detective. Or maybe they’d started using these young guys undercover. This one was kinda cute. She stood up straighter to accentuate her chest. The baby reached out and grabbed her right breast.
“I got nothing to say about Joel Fuller except he’s nothing but trouble. Kelvin wants to go down the toilet with that piece of crap, go right ahead. But they both better stay outta my life.”
She took another drag on the cigarette, forgot to turn her head, and blew smoke around the baby. It grimaced.
“Well, ma’am, if you do see Kelvin,” Griffin said, “tell him I’m looking for him. Here’s my card.”
He handed it to her. She glanced at the card, shoved it in the front pocket of her jeans. Jiggled the baby up and down like she was full of something that had to be shaken.
“Give him this message, too,” Griffin said. “Tell him I want to talk to him before he makes a serious mistake.”
“Ain’t seen him. Ain’t planning on it,” Crystal said. “You think I want my daughter growing up having cops knocking on the door asking about her daddy? Screw that.”
Another cloud of smoke. The baby screeched. Crystal flicked the cigarette out onto the packed ground in front of the door.
“Word to the wise, Crystal,” Griffin said. “These guys are hiding here and we bust them, that could be endangering the welfare of a child. You want Child Protective knocking this door down? I’m telling you right now, that’s what’ll happen, we find you’ve been lying for these guys.”
Crystal scowled, slammed the door. The dog barked. Brandon and Griffin walked back to the cruiser, climbed in, and sat staring at the trailer for a minute.
“That got her attention,” Griffin said.
“Would that happen?” Brandon said.
“No,” Griffin said. “But it plants the seed. She can choose him or she can choose the baby. At least that’s what she’ll think.”
“So now we wait for the phone to ring?”
“Let her stew,” Griffin said. “I give her a day.”
Baby still on her hip, Crystal waited in the living room, back from the window. She watched as the two cops talked, finally backe
d the cruiser out, and drove off in the direction of Portland. She went to the phone, dialed.
“Hey,” she said. “I need you to watch Destinee for a little while. Now. But drive by once, check and see if there’s a cop car down the road.”
She hung up, went to the bedroom, and put the baby down on the bed. Destinee rolled over and scooted for the edge. Crystal grabbed her and held on, leaned down to put on Nikes. The baby squirmed as Crystal got the shoes on, picked Destinee up and went back to the window and smoked and waited.
Finally an old blue pickup pulled in and her mother, a stout gray-haired woman, got out, marched to the door, walked in without knocking.
“How’s my pumpkin?” she said, taking the baby from Crystal’s arms.
“Anybody out there?” Crystal said.
“Not that I could see,” her mother said. “What, you got the police watching the house? What’s Kelvin into now?”
“I don’t know and I don’t care,” Crystal said. “Give me twenty minutes,” and she walked through the kitchen, out the back door of the trailer, and into the woods.
CHAPTER 25
The path was overgrown, ruts from a four-wheeler, a ruff of asters and bur-dock grown up in the center. Crystal walked quickly, arms swinging, chest thrust out like a shield. She kept to one side of the path until that side turned to mud, and then she hopped over to the other side and kept going.
She slapped a blackfly, brushed choke cherry aside. Chipping sparrows flushed ahead of her, just tweetie birds to her, something Kelvin used to shoot with his shotgun when he was into the coffee brandy. She thought of the time he got completely hammered at their first family cookout here, went and got the shotgun, and lined up pots of her mother’s flowers on the back lawn, blew them to smithereens.
When she asked him why he did such a crazy thing, he said, “Because nobody wanted me to.”
Should have known then the whole thing was doomed. Better late than never, though. And she was damned if she was going to let Kelvin get busted for some stupid shit, not if he expected to use her money for some goddamn loser lawyer, hold his hand when he was found guilty.
