What I’m trying to say is this. When Lovell asked if I had his missing cocaine, I flashed back hard to another man asking about something that was missing. Torturing me. Suddenly, any semblance of bad-ass I might have cultivated since then went right out the window. People who think they’d be all tough in that kind of situation have never been really hurt.
“Leave her alone,” Cody said, trying to be valiant, struggling against the meathead’s grip. “She didn’t do anything.”
“So you admit it was you?” Lovell asked.
“What was me?” Cody asked, voice cracking. “What the fuck are you talking about?” Then suddenly, realization flooded his features. “Okay, hang on a second. You’re saying something was missing from the shipment?”
“Yes,” Lovell said. “That’s what I’m saying.”
“Why the fuck would I want to steal steroids?” he asked. “You know I can’t use that shit because of the show. It must have been Beto, or someone else from the school.”
“Steroids.” Lovell squinted at Cody. “Right. Who else has the combination for your locker?”
“Well...” Cody paused, brow creased. “Well, nobody except your pick-up guy. How do you know he didn’t take it?”
“Because I know,” Lovell said. “Just like I know it was you who took the missing jar.”
“I didn’t take anything,” Cody said. “You’re crazy.”
Lovell froze, genial smile melting away.
“Okay,” he said. “I’m done with this now.”
He turned away from us and stood there, unmoving, while the biker bound Cody’s hands behind his back with a length of greasy, splintery rope. I’m ashamed to admit the tremendous, knee-melting relief I felt when it became evident that Lovell wasn’t going to torture me. At least not right then and there.
“Mr. Lovell, listen,” Cody said. “This is some kind of terrible misunderstanding, okay? Come on, can’t we just talk about this for a second?”
The biker stuck a knotted rag in Cody’s mouth and tied it behind his head. Apparently not.
“I’m writing this off,” Lovell said to no one in particular as he sat down behind his desk.
“Let’s go, baby,” my pal with the gun said to me, gripping my upper arm and hustling me out of the office. Cody and the biker followed close behind.
Out in the main room with the ring nobody noticed or cared about us as we were marched along behind the last row of seats. They were all too into the fight. When I looked up into the ring, I saw it was Hank up there.
His face was flushed, lips distended and horsey from his mouthguard. One eye was bloody and swollen shut, but he seemed to notice me right at the same moment that I noticed him. His head turned, good eye widening at the sight of the guy with the rifle behind me. Hank’s handsome Mexican opponent took that split-second distraction to deliver a devastating right that sent Hank spinning across the ring in a drunken pirouette. The crowd screamed and jeered and the guy with the rifle steered me away, towards a large metal fire door in the back of the room. I stole one last glance at the ring, and saw Hank face down on the mat with the ref crouching over him waving his arms. I was horribly sure that was going to be the last time I ever saw Hank.
17.
The fire door led to a fenced-in parking lot. A dented blueand-white ’70s-era Suburban was idling just outside the door like it had been waiting for us. Behind the wheel was an older guy with slick white hair and a stoic Indio face. He nodded, then got out, spat on the concrete and headed around to unlock the hatchback.
The biker brought Cody forward, bound his ankles together and tossed him into the back of the Suburban like a trussed buck. The white-haired guy got back behind the wheel and for a second I was sure he was gonna drive off with Cody and that would be that. I even had a half-composed apology to Vic spinning through my mind when my pal with the rifle dragged me over to the passenger side, threw my go-bag in and got in after it, then pulled me up into his lap.
I tried to shut out my fear and anger and how bad I wanted to break the guy’s wandering fingers as they kept on finding their way up under my shirt. I tried to focus and think of nothing but how close that go-bag was, bumping against my foot as the big old SUV tore down winding, unpaved roads to God only knew where. My pal had the long rifle at his side, but there wasn’t enough space for him to actually use it. He and the driver were having some kind of spirited debate in Spanish. There had to be a way to get to the tiny Warthog in the side pocket of my go-bag, but I didn’t want to give even the smallest hint that I was anything other than a terrified little girl until I was sure I could prove it.
As we drove, I pictured Cody in the back, bound and bouncing painfully around. What could be going through his mind? Was he really as clueless as he seemed? He seemed to really believe this was all about steroids. Or at least that’s what he wanted me to think. He had evidently inherited his father’s taste for narcotics. No reason he couldn’t also have inherited Vic’s ability to lie to my face with earnest, heartfelt conviction.
I wanted to believe Cody. I needed to believe him if I was going to keep on sticking my neck out to save his ass, but if I was honest with myself, I had to admit that I wasn’t entirely convinced he was on the level.
Before I could come up with some way to get my hand on the Warthog, we abruptly arrived at wherever we were going. The driver slowed, pulled the Suburban over. The debate raged on as they both got out and dragged me out with them. We were nowhere, a particular kind of barren, empty desert nowhere that I was unfortunately quite familiar with. The kind of nowhere where you brought people who wouldn’t be coming back.
My pal with the rifle was getting increasingly handsy, tugging at my breasts and gripping my ass. It was becoming obvious that the debate was about whether or not fucking me first would be a good idea. Not that I had any desire to fuck that guy, but I was still less than thrilled when he apparently lost the argument. It just meant they were going to get on with the killing that much quicker, giving me even less time to figure a way out of this.
The white-haired guy muscled Cody out of the back of the Suburban and untied his ankles so he could walk, marching him away from the car at the end of a small revolver while the other guy grabbed a shovel and handed it to me.
“Dig,” he said, pointing with his rifle to a sandy patch of dirt about fifty feet from the front bumper of the car.
I looked over at Cody. He was pale and sweating, eyes huge and chin slick with drool from the gag. He was shaking his head from side to side and making lots of emphatic mmmmphs through the cloth. There was no way I was gonna let it end like this. I gripped the shovel hard and thought about using it for something other than digging. I knew I would only get one chance.
I started digging to buy myself some time. The guy with the rifle was to my left and slightly closer than Cody and the driver to my right. I figured I had at least an hour, probably more since I was going at it alone. That kind of monotonous hard labor leaves the brain wide open for figuring and I could feel something like a plan beginning to form.
I could see that my pal with the rifle was getting bored. He was trying to stay threatening, but I kept on catching him staring off into the night sky or kicking at pebbles like an impatient child. At that point I was standing nearly waist deep in the growing hole and I decided it was time.
I started slowing down, breathing heavily and acting like the shovel was too heavy to lift. Like the work had worn me out and I was nearing exhaustion. My pal was barely paying attention. My muscles felt shaky, stomach sick with adrenaline as I sucked in a deep, dusty breath and then collapsed in what I hoped was a cute, girly faint.
I heard my pal swear softly and then the crunch of his footsteps towards the edge of the hole. I lay flat on my back at the bottom with the shovel clutched to my chest. I could feel a startled insect crawling across my neck but I didn’t move to swat at it. I waited.
He knelt down to haul me up, and when the oval of his head appeared over the edge of the
hole I let him have it with the shovel.
I was up on my feet in a heartbeat, following through with a second and third crack with the blade of the shovel, laying the bastard out on the sand.
I was expecting the driver to start shooting at any moment and was ready to dive back in the hole, but when I turned to him, I saw him lying curled up on the ground with Cody kicking the shit out of him. Clearly Cody didn’t need his hands. All he had needed was a split-second distraction to kick the revolver over to where it now lay, beside a smooth flat rock about ten feet away. In that moment I was ready to forgive Cody for any and everything he might have done to get us into this situation in the first place.
I let my pal have one more from the shovel, grabbed the fallen rifle and then ran to where Cody stood over the driver. The older man was out cold, drooling blood into the sand. Meanwhile my pal was trying to get up on his knees, one hand pressed to his bleeding nose. I wanted to untie Cody and pull out his gag, but my hands were full with the rifle and the shovel and there just wasn’t time.
“Let’s get the hell out of here before they get up,” I said.
Cody nodded and we ran together to the Suburban. I dropped the shovel but not the rifle and then dove into the driver’s seat, hand reaching for the ignition.
No keys.
“Shit,” I said, climbing back out of the Suburban. “The driver must have the keys.”
Cody, still bound and gagged, mmphed loudly, eyes wide and frantically gesturing with his chin towards the downed men.
“What?” I asked, raising one hand to remove the gag.
He kicked me hard in the back of my knees, causing them to buckle. I fell awkwardly backward onto the rough sand, a curse half formed in my mouth. But just before I hit, the crack of a small-caliber shot echoed through the jagged rocks and arroyos.
I rolled under the Suburban, clutching the rifle to my chest. I couldn’t see where Cody had gone, but I didn’t see him dead on the ground either, so I figured he must still be on his feet somewhere behind the Suburban.
Another pop and I raised myself up on my elbows, set the rifle on semi and aimed in the direction of the noise, sending out a silent thank you to Duncan’s ghost for everything he’d taught me about the venerable old Kalashnikov.
From what I’d seen, the driver was down for the count, but the guy I’d hit with the shovel seemed to be more resilient. It had to be him shooting at us. I scanned the darkness, spotted a low, creeping shape crowned with bloody white hair. The driver was moving, trying to crawl away. I still didn’t think he was up for a gunfight. I pointed the rifle towards the last place I’d seen the bigger guy and pulled the trigger, hoping to make him give himself away. It worked. The revolver replied with another shot that hit the dirt beside the large front tire a few feet to my left and the muzzle flash caught my eye. The bastard was down in the hole I’d dug.
“Cody!” I called. “If you can hear me, make a run for the keys. I’ll cover you.”
I fired again in the direction of the hole. I had the clear advantage with the rifle, but the big guy would only need one lucky shot to take Cody out. I was tempted to flip to full auto and make with the lead firehose. That would definitely keep the guy down for a few scary seconds, probably make him piss his pants too, but I didn’t want to blow my whole wad all at once. Cody would need more time. My hands were sweaty, shaking.
I saw a flash of Cody making the run for the driver and I covered him with a dozen quick but controlled shots. I wasn’t watching Cody. I was staring at the hole, trying to will my night vision to sharpen. I hoped the pause would tempt the big guy to peek up.
I let my gaze flick to Cody and saw him crouched backward beside the driver, feeling blindly inside the guy’s jacket, head tipped up to the starry sky.
A swift blur of movement drew my eye back to the hole and I pulled the trigger. I’m hardly a crack shot, so I didn’t think I got a good hit, but I must have at least grazed him, because he yelped and swore like he’d been stung by a bee.
When I looked at Cody he was running towards the Suburban. I couldn’t tell if he had the keys or not. I crawled out from under the car and fired off another dozen to cover Cody’s retreat, but the big guy was too smart to pop up again.
Cody loudly jingled the keys he held behind his back and then ducked into the car. I followed, sliding into the driver’s seat and tossing the rifle into the rear. Cody leaned forward, twisting his hands towards me. I took the keys, slid them into the ignition and cranked it.
As I hit the gas and pulled away in a spray of gravel, Cody’s window shattered and my heart nearly stopped. I was expecting to turn and see him shot in the face, bleeding and dying, but he was fine. Gagged and terrified but fine, unharmed. There was a large, fist-sized rock on the seat beside him. We both looked down at the rock, and then up at each other.
Another loud clunk from the rear and I looked in the mirror to see the big guy running after the Suburban, winging rocks like a major league pitcher. Man, was he pissed. I sped up and out of range and his angry face faded into the darkness.
18.
I kept the pedal to the metal for another five or ten minutes. When I came to a crossroads, I pulled the car over, figuring I ought to stop driving in a random, headlong panic and figure out where we should be going. See if there was a map in the glove box. My heart was still pounding, hands shaking so badly I thought I might rip the wheel right off the steering column. There was a small wooden cross stuck in the dirt about ten feet ahead, wreathed with dusty plastic flowers. It was the only visible human structure. No houses or buildings for miles. Nobody in sight.
I turned to look at Cody. His face was flushed, eyes wide. He just sat there for a moment, still and silent, then started laughing behind his gag. I shook my head and leaned over to untie his hands.
When they were free, he pulled off the gag, smacked his palms against the dashboard and whooped like a rabid sports fan. He tore the passenger door open and tumbled out, laughing and howling at the moon with his arms spread wide.
I left the Suburban running and managed to open my own door, got my shaky legs under me and stepped out onto the rocky shoulder. I felt like a newborn giraffe. Cody’s laughter was contagious.
“Jesus,” he said with another wild laugh. “Did you see that guy’s face? Fuck, I can’t believe we’re alive.”
“Believe it,” I said, laughing too.
He grabbed my wrists and whirled me around.
“You were awesome,” he said, stopping and holding both my hands. “Seriously. Do you do this kind of thing a lot?”
“No,” I said. “I try to avoid this kind of thing.”
He looked down at me, his eyes in shadow, nothing visible but the bright pinpoints of reflected headlights. Then he slipped an arm around my waist and pulled me into another one of his intense, full-body hugs. This time, he wouldn’t let me go and suddenly everything was different.
I could feel that big Pagliuca dick waking up under his track pants, sliding against my hip. He was breathing too fast, hands sweaty against the small of my back.
The next thing I knew, we were making out.
After a few endless, drowning minutes, I pulled away, trying to catch my breath and keep my wits about me.
“Okay,” I said. “Okay, hang on a second.”
I reached back into the car to grab the last rubber from a pocket in my go-bag.
“Here,” I said, tossing him the little plastic packet.
“Sure, yeah,” he said, tearing it open with his teeth while I got my shorts and panties off over my shoes.
I watched him struggle heroically to get the condom on for nearly a minute before it finally tore and snapped into two pieces, leaving behind a comically tight ring of rubber about halfway down. I should have just put it on with my mouth.
“Shit,” he swore, ripping off the torn remnant and throwing it into the dust. “Sorry. Have you got another one?”
I shook my head.
“Fuck,” he said.<
br />
He just stood there for a moment, head down and unsure but still hard. I’m not proud of what I did next.
“Fuck it,” I said.
Now you got to understand, I haven’t had unprotected sex since before Cody was born. It was all kinds of wrong, but goddamn it was good. The kid was ravenous, on fire, and he popped like the fourth of July after less than a minute inside me, but he kept on going without missing a beat. Another classic Thick Vic move. In his prime, Vic had been famous for delivering two or three high volume pop shots in one scene without breaking his stride. Even though he lacked Vic’s experience and finesse, Cody was clearly his father’s son.
I wasn’t all that worried about getting knocked up, since I’d had several nasty bouts of Pelvic Inflammatory Disease in my reckless youth and had been told by my gyno that I’d probably never be able to have kids. Besides, at this rate if I lived long enough to need to worry about pregnancy or STDs, I’d consider myself lucky. For the next twenty minutes, I didn’t think about anything other than how good it felt to be alive.
Then, suddenly, I found myself thinking about Hank and the way his body had pressed up against mine as he twisted me around on the mat. About how bad I wanted to take control of that powerful, dangerous body and push it to its limits. Drive it like a racecar. I was right on the edge and thinking about Hank put me over, hard.
After that, I found myself thinking about Vic again, about him asking me to take care of Cody. About him dying. I started to feel weird about fucking his kid. About the fact that Cody was young enough to be my son. At that point, I just wanted to put an end to it, so I flipped the switch in my head to pro mode. I pulled away and bent down to finish him off with my mouth.
“Fuck!” Cody said when I was done, the curse drawn out long and incredulous. “That was amazing.”
I chuckled under my breath. At least he didn’t say awesome.
He made a grab for me like he meant to pull me in for another make-out session, but I dodged out of range and started hunting around for my panties. I found them crumpled and filthy by the Suburban’s front tire so I tossed them aside and put my shorts on without them.
Hard Case Crime: Choke Hold Page 10
