by Boyle, Gerry
Mosquitoes had found him, whining around his head, lighting on his hands. Fuller calmly wiped them off, told himself this was part of the test. He remembered the time when he was stung by a yellowjacket when he was a kid, his father slapping him, telling him to stop blubbering like a little baby. It was the last time Fuller cried. He’d refused to let bugs bother him ever again.
He leaned against the oak, trying to hear past the mosquitoes, the salty mist dripping in the trees. He thought he’d heard another noise in the woods on the other side of the drive, but then there’d been nothing for the last ten minutes. Probably an animal, Fuller thought, and then he heard the door open. Voices.
They came out the door by the garage, first one of the guys from the truck, then the girls, in a long line like school kids going on a field trip, following by the second guy. The first guy unlocked the truck, climbed in, and started it. Turned on the headlights. The girls milled about, looked warily at the truck. The guy got out, went to the back, undid a lock, and rolled up the cargo bay door.
There was something stacked there, almost to the ceiling. Mesh bags of something dark. Fuller was trying to figure it out when the smell drifted his way on a puff of wind. Fish. Freakin’ clams or something. The guy with the goatee climbed up and started unloading them, passing them down to his partner. When he’d passed down twenty bags or so, there was a passage through the wall of shellfish.
The guy in the truck moved in, out of sight. A light went on deep in the back. The guy on the ground said something to the women in another language, and then the hot Russian lady, she repeated it, added some more. Fuller watched as the girls came to the back of the truck. The Russian lady’s boyfriend was there now and he held out his hand to help them up.
They ignored him and climbed in themselves, grabbing a handle and hoisting themselves up. One by one, they passed into the passage between the bags. When they were all inside, the light went out. The bags were passed up and restacked. When they were done, it was again a solid wall of shellfish bound for market.
“Sweet,” Fuller said to himself, watching from the woods, holding the nine millimeter at his side.
Across the driveway, Brandon still crouched. “So that’s it,” he said.
The guy with the goatee pulled the door down and snapped a padlock on the hasp. He went around to the passenger side, climbed up and in. The other guy put the truck in gear, a beeping warning sounding as it backed up. The beeping stopped, the truck turned and started out the drive. Fuller eased behind his tree as it passed. Brandon stayed low as it passed.
Irina and Lucky watched the truck go up the drive, red lights under the dark trees, then turned and went inside. Brandon raised himself up, his legs stiff and cramping. He started for the house, the rifle low against his right leg.
Fuller grinned, knowing this meant the money was here, that Brandon would come for the twenty grand to bail his girlfriend out. And where there was twenty, there had to be more.
“Damn,” he said, as he eased out from behind the tree. “You are good.”
CHAPTER 59
Irina and Lucky were cleaning up, all of the takeout mess going into a black trash bag. Then Irina wiped down the table, the doorknobs, the sides of the chairs, the doorjambs where two of the girls had gone through looking at the house.
Lucky did both bathrooms, first downstairs, spraying all of the surfaces with cleaner, opening the cabinet and wiping down the aspirin bottle inside.
Then he went upstairs to the other bathroom, was there spraying and wiping when Brandon stepped into the dining room, the rifle in the crook of his arm.
Irina was bent over the trash bag, looping a twist tie around the top. She looked up at him, the rifle not in ready position but close.
“Brandon. Are you okay?” she said, leaving the bag and moving toward him.
“No,” he said. “Not really.”
“What’s the matter, dear?” Irina said. “The gun—”
“They have Mia. I need to borrow some money.”
“They? Who?”
“Fuller and Kelvin.”
“Have her?”
“Yeah. Took her. They want twenty thousand.”
“The police?”
“No police, or they leave her where she is, she dies.”
Irina was close. She put a hand on his shoulder.
“Don’t worry. We’ll take care of this. Where I’m from, these things happen all the time. There are ways to deal with these people.”
“I’ll pay you the money back,” Brandon said.
“Oh, don’t worry about that. Money’s not important. What’s important is that we get her home safe. Listen, let me get Lucky. We just got back. Rain and wind, stuck in Kennebunkport Harbor. Miserable. Finally we said uncle. He’s upstairs.”
“You’ve been cleaning,” Brandon said.
“Left the place a bit of a mess, just picking up.”
She went back for the bag, took it through the kitchen to the hall that led to the garage. Lucky had heard the voices, was coming down the back stairs. He was tucking a handgun into the back of his jeans, pulling his shirt down over it.
“It’s Brandon,” Irina said. “Those two idiots have—”
“I heard.”
Softer now.
“He’s wet. He’s been outside watching. He knows. I could see it in his eyes when I said the part about Kennebunk.”
“So now he’s in,” Lucky said. “Leverage.”
“He’s a policeman.”
“In training. Barely.
“I don’t like it.”
“We save his girlfriend, he owes us forever. We need somebody local. We need somebody to crew. His grandmother can keep her house. It’s perfect.”
She looked at him, smiled coldly.
“I know what you like. You like—what is the word?— the ironic. Brandon working for the person who—”
“You think too much,” Lucky said. “Let’s get it done.”
He strode through the kitchen, found Brandon in the dining room, slowed for a split second as he saw the rifle.
“Brandon, buddy,” Lucky said, moving to him, touching Brandon’s right shoulder, away from the rifle barrel. “Jesus, the gun—what happened?”
Brandon repeated what he’d told Irina, said the rifle was just in case he ran into Fuller, Kelvin.
“Can I borrow the money?”
“Sure, man, but the money’s only part of the problem. We gotta get Mia back. We gotta make sure those two morons don’t do something really stupid. And Brandon—”
Lucky paused, stared into Brandon’s eyes.
“—we gotta be honest with each other.”
“Yes,” Brandon said.
“You’re all wet. How long were you out there?”
“Half-hour. A little more.”
“You parked, walked in?”
Irina moved up beside Lucky, something more than sympathy in her expression now.
“So you were there when—”
“When they loaded the women into the truck? Yeah,” Brandon said.
“I wanted to tell you,” Lucky said. “I told Irina I thought you’d understand.”
“Understand what?” Brandon said.
“How we’re selling the American dream, man. How these girls, this is their big chance. They’ve got nothing where they come from. Work some totally shit job, if they’re lucky. Live in some crappy two-room apartment with their parents, their grandparents, screaming nieces and nephews. Watch mom and dad drink themselves to death on cheap vodka, parked in front of the one channel on the twelve-inch television. How hopeless is that?”
“Nothing that’s good in the future,” Irina said. “Just emptiness as far as you can see.”
“So they come here,” Lucky said.
“They pay you for the passage?” Brandon asked.
“Me, some other people.”
“Where do they get the money?”
“Some of them repay part of it with money they make once t
hey get here.”
“Doing what?” Brandon said.
“Au pairs, mostly. Domestics. But they meet people, too. We had a girl just get married to a guy, this commodities trader in Chicago. Big house in Lake Forest. Like she died and went to heaven.”
“So they’re not all dancers,” Brandon said, catching the flicker in Irina’s expression, a ripple across the screen.
“They have different skills,” she said.
Brandon pictured them: all young, attractive, even after the ocean crossing.
“I’m sure,” he said.
“What they don’t have,” Lucky said, “is permission to enter the U.S. I’m being straight with you. It’s illegal, what we’re doing. But I think of it like the Underground Railroad. It’s their passage out of a world of suffering. Ask Irina. She knows.”
“Very, very tough where they come from. Bulgaria, Macedonia, Russia, Albania. No hope.”
“Are they prostitutes?” Brandon said.
“Oh, God no,” Irina said. “They’re waitresses. Secretaries. We had a girl who taught yoga. We had one almost has her degree in finance. They come here with many skills.”
There was a pause. “So the money?” Brandon said.
Then Lucky said, “How ’bout we don’t loan it to you. We pay it to you. You’ve been really helpful, getting the boat and all. I could really use somebody like you. Last trip got a little hairy, trying to keep her running with the wind, just the storm jib up. Blowing hard and gusty, big seas. Irina, she’s below dealing with the girls, making sure they’re okay. I could have really used somebody on deck who knew what they were doing.”
“The whole twenty?” Brandon said.
“Let’s call it ten in advance for the next trip, ten as a signing bonus,” Lucky said.
“You have the cash here?”
Suddenly they were all aware of the rifle in Brandon’s arms. “Sure,” Lucky said. “This is a cash sort of business, as you may have noticed. Money’s not a problem.”
“Good thing,” Fuller said, stepping from the hallway with the Ruger leveled. “’Cause the price, it just went up.”
CHAPTER 60
Lucky had his hands up. Irina was to his left and she took a half-step back, ready to go for the gun in Lucky’s jeans.
“All your hands showing,” Fuller said, moving in and to the right, Brandon watching the open end of the nine-millimeter, dark as a cave. “Blake, hold that popgun by the barrel, put it on the floor.”
Brandon did, easing the rifle down.
“Hey, man, take it easy,” Lucky said. “We can cut a real nice deal.”
“Lotta money in sex slaves?” Fuller said, still moving slowly, a sliding sidestep. “I saw a show on it in jail. Weren’t Russkies, though. Freakin’ Mexicans. Little girls. There’s some sick people out there, dude.”
“You got that right,” Lucky said, trying to get Fuller talking, get him to ease up, just for a split second. “What they choose to do once they get here, that’s their thing. Irina and me, we’re in the transport business.”
He and Irina were turning with Fuller, their hands still up, keeping him in front.
“We could use somebody like you on the ground,” Lucky said. “Brandon here, he’s in. You let the girl come home, no hard feelings, we get down to business. This could make all of us very rich, very quick.”
“That right?” Fuller said.
“Oh, yeah,” Lucky said. “Twenty thousand? That’s nothing. You could make ten times that in six months, we work at it. Brandon gets the boats, sails with me. You do logistics on the ground. You’re a smart guy.”
They continued to turn, but Brandon was slower, could see Irina inching closer to Lucky, saw the bulge at Lucky’s waist.
“Could be quite a team,” Lucky said. “None of this nickel and dime stuff, man. Big time.”
Brandon saw the plan, Irina diving to the right behind Lucky, a roll, Irina getting the shots off.
“Where is she?” he said. “If you touch her—”
“Chill, dude,” Fuller said. “She’s fine. I left, she was playing Texas Hold ’Em, watching the tube. I get my money. Make a phone call, she’s free and clear. After we get a head start of course.”
Lucky bent forward, hiked up the back of his shirt so the gun came out. Irina eased a foot closer to him. They were getting ready. They’ll kill him, Brandon thought. And Mia—
“He’s got a gun behind him. In his pants,” Brandon said.
They all froze, the Ruger swinging to point at Lucky’s head.
“Well, I can see somebody’s thinking here. Blake, you know they don’t give a shit about your girl there. Gonna take me out, if they can, let her fucking rot. Dying of thirst, dude. Sucks. Your tongue swells up and turns all black. Not fun.”
He motioned with the Ruger to Irina and Lucky.
“On the floor, hands stretched out toward me.”
They eased down, kneeling first, then falling forward. The pistol butt was black at Lucky’s waist. Fuller eased around, put his gun on Lucky’s neck as he bent and yanked the pistol out of Lucky’s waistband.
“A Sig, man. Nice little going-away present.”
He slipped it into his jeans in front, moved around the front of them, prostrate like pilgrims. Motioned to Brandon.
“Search her.”
Brandon dropped his hands, moved to stand over Irina.
“She’s the one I don’t trust,” Fuller said. “Not one fucking bit.”
Brandon bent and lifted Irina’s shirt at the back of her waist, then the Lycra top she wore under it. He patted her down.
“Nothing.”
“The front,” Fuller said. “Ice pick in there somewhere. Roll over, Natasha.”
She did, her black eyes shining with hatred. Brandon hesitated, then ran his hands along her abdomen. Felt nothing. Did the same with her legs, ankles to crotch.
“Check the bra,” Fuller said.
Brandon did, patting through the shirt. Started with the left breast, felt something hard, long.
“Here,” he said.
“Take it out, slow. No stupid moves, Natasha baby,” Fuller said, “You don’t want your boyfriend’s brains all over the nice clean floor.”
Irina looked at Fuller and said, “You’re dead, how do you say it here? Trailer trash?”
Fuller went pale.
“Bitch,” he said.
She lifted her shirt, slipped her fingers in. Came out with a four-inch pick with a two-inch wooden handle, pencil thin.
“Nice little shiv,” Fuller said. “You’ve done time, huh? Toss it.”
She did and the pick hit the wall under the cabinets, bounced and rolled.
“Okay, now we tell my buddy Blake where the money bag is.”
They looked at him with mouths clamped shut.
“Okay,” Fuller said. “You want to play games, try this one.”
He took three steps to Lucky, put the gun on his forehead. “What should we count to? Maybe a small number ’cause I sucked at math. Let’s say eight. I’ll start. One, two, three—”
“It’s got to be right here somewhere,” Brandon said. “They didn’t have time to hide it. The women were all here.”
“Four, five—” Fuller said.
“No. Don’t do that,” Brandon said. “I don’t know where it is. You kill ’em, we can’t find it, we’re done. And they can’t report it, if you take the money. You kill ’em, you got a big mess. More cops. You got their friends up the line wondering where they are. Give me one minute.”
Brandon lunged to the cupboards, started flinging the doors open. He opened the refrigerator, the stove. He yanked a closet door open, pulled jackets from hangers. Pushed through the French doors, heard Fuller say, “Hey,” but started yanking drawers. Moved to a desk with a wooden front, yanked it open.
And there it was. A black L.L. Bean backpack.
He unzipped it. Saw the wrapped bills. And sticking out from under the backpack, the barrel of another handgun.
Brandon picked up the gun. It was a small revolver. On the left of the butt near the trigger was a safety, no markings. He looked at it, guessed that Irina and Lucky would leave it off. He shoved the gun in the back of his jeans, grabbed the backpack by the top handle.
“Seven,” Fuller said.
At the door, Brandon pulled his shirt over the gun butt.
The bag in front of him, Brandon stepped through the doors into the kitchen.
“Got it,” he said.
“Eight,” Fuller said. “Too late.”
Brandon saw the half-smile on his face, the decision already made, money or no money.
“Don’t,” Brandon shouted. “It’s all here.” He tossed the backpack at Fuller, pulled the gun out, and fired, all one fluid motion. The shot came just after the thud, the sound of all that money hitting the floor.
CHAPTER 61
The blood had run all over the white tiles, pooling in the grout between them, turning it dark brown.
Fuller was seated, his back against the cupboard in front of the sink. His face was gray like beach sand, and he stared at the blood-soaked towel wrapped around his right thigh. Lucky was wrapping the towel in packing tape. The bleeding seemed to have slowed. Irina watched, crouched on the floor.
Brandon stood against the wall, the little handgun ready, the rifle on the granite countertop beside him, the ice pick, his rifle, the Ruger, Irina’s gun, too.
“So you tell me where she is. I bring you into town, pick her up. You and Kelvin get the money. We all go our separate ways.”
“Go to hell. I get the money first. Then we let her go.”
“Worth dying for?” Brandon said. “I could just leave you with these guys.”
“You won’t do that,” Fuller said. “Remember how I said the tongue swells, it turns black and cracks. Lips, too.” He grimaced. “But with a gag in, she’d probably suffocate at some point.”
