by Avery Duff
He reached for her. She slapped his hand away. “No, shit, don’t touch me. Do not. I can’t be around you anymore. I have no idea who you are. Who the fuck are you?”
It wasn’t really a question, so he didn’t answer. She pushed the garage-door opener on her visor. The door started rising ahead. She squealed inside—almost clipped the rising door—and slammed to a stop.
“It’s over, okay? I’m done with it,” he told her.
“You’re so full of shit. I told you, I’m not your dead sister. I’m not your fucking tattooed lady, and I don’t need you to save me. Everything we need, we’ll have it tomorrow. But you think some other lawyer got one up on you, and—”
“It’s done. I’m over it,” he said.
“No, you’re not. You’ll never get over it. You think there’s something wrong? Who cares what’s wrong? Who gives a shit?”
She jumped out, hurried toward the alarm pad. He opened his door, sat in the car.
“I’m over it, seriously. Please, c’mon.”
He watched her start to punch in their alarm code. It wasn’t armed. She turned to him, crying.
“This whole thing, you and me, it was never about us. I knew it last night, but I kept hoping I was wrong. It was always about him. Day one, we were always all about him. I am so outta here.”
She disappeared into the stairwell.
He didn’t move. Way to go, bro, he told himself.
Once he slid out of her car, he heard her banging up the stairs. He walked to the stairwell door. Then he remembered. The alarm. He’d set the alarm before they left.
“Alison!” he shouted. “Alison, stop! Come back!”
No answer.
Upstairs, she rushed down the hall toward the living room. She heard him calling and wasn’t about to stop. Ahead of her: their beatbox and TV were stacked by the slider onto the patio. That stopped her cold at the hall’s kitchen entrance.
“What . . .”
She peered in the kitchen. Drawers had been pulled open, the floor covered with trash-can debris.
“Are you . . . ,” she said.
Then she heard his voice, louder: “Alison, stop, wait!”
She turned around. Looked back the way she came. Robert was halfway down the hall when a man in a ski mask swung out from the utility closet behind him.
“Behind you!” she screamed.
The attacker raised a metal pipe. Robert started to turn around, but he was a split second too late. The attacker let fly with a vicious blow, and even though Robert managed to block part of it with his shoulder, the attacker’s shot caught him, side of the head. The force of it knocked him to the floor, and he lay there, perfectly still.
That left the attacker good to go. He ran down the narrow hall toward Alison. She dashed into the kitchen, grabbed a big knife out of the sink. Too late. He grabbed her hair, twisted it in his fingers, and jerked her body back into his.
“Don’t think so, doll!” he screamed.
Her knife clattered onto the floor. She tried reaching behind her head, to get at him, to gouge his eyes, but the attacker was strong, and his grip gave him more leverage than he needed. Pushing her body over the counter, he grabbed her hair with both hands now.
“Lights out, bitch!” he screamed.
She could barely breathe. Nothing she could do about what was about to happen. He pulled her head up by her hair, ready to bash her face into the granite counter when he caught a flash of motion to his right.
Robert jumped him without a sound.
The attacker’s fingers snagged in her hair. That worked against him now as Robert got an arm around the attacker’s neck from behind, choking him out, hard as he could. The attacker got both hands free of Alison, pulling at Robert’s choking forearm. He was about to lose it when he twisted his body, snaked a hand between his neck and Robert’s arm, and stole a breath of air. Then he grabbed Robert’s forearm with both hands and torqued his body, hard as he could. That powerful motion broke Robert’s grip on his neck and slung him over the counter into the living room.
In the kitchen, Alison was scouring the trash-covered floor for that knife when the attacker booted her in the ribs. She doubled up, and he dropped to the floor, looking for the knife, too.
Moments earlier, Robert crashed onto the living room floor. In a second, he was up. Tearing open Alison’s desk drawer, he grabbed her empty revolver. Hands shaking, he started to fumble a bullet into the chamber.
Before he could load that first one, he heard Alison whispering: “Please . . . don’t . . .”
He whirled with the empty gun. The attacker—a knife held against her throat—edged from the kitchen into the hallway.
“How ’bout I slit her throat, dude?”
“You touch her, I’ll blow your fucking brains out.”
“Robert . . . ,” she pleaded.
“Gun’s empty! I saw it!” But the attacker wasn’t sure.
“That’s why I loaded it. Let her go, and get the fuck outta here!”
“You didn’t load nothing.” He wasn’t sure about that, either.
“Wanna bet, motherfucker?” Robert cocked the revolver, bluffing. “Let her go, and get out of here. I won’t follow you.”
Off their stalemate, the attacker suddenly tripped Alison and pushed her toward Robert. She fell, tumbling into him, and they went down together. That gave the attacker time to race back down the hall. Taking the stairs three at time, he burst out the door onto Speedway.
Robert knelt, held Alison’s shoulders, looked in her eyes. “You all right?”
“Think so,” she said. “I can’t believe . . .”
He picked up her revolver, went to the desk, and tried to load it. But bullets fell from his shaking hand and bounced around on the carpet.
He gave up loading the gun and took her hand.
“You were right. He wants to kill us.”
“Not gonna happen,” he said. “Call 911.”
“All right, I will. I’m sorry,” she said.
She watched him take off, running down the hall. She lay back down on the floor, trembling. Heard their Speedway door slamming behind him.
“He was right,” she said.
Then she tried to breathe.
Robert hauled ass on foot down Speedway. He had the attacker in sight, seventy-five yards ahead. Looked like the attacker had pulled up that ski mask as he jammed left onto a walk street.
His head pounded from that pipe shot. He ducked left off Speedway, scrambling down a street parallel to the attacker’s. He made it to Pacific where Grand Canal blocked the way.
Looking right, there was the attacker again, who ripped down that mask before Robert got a look at him and reversed course into the street he’d just exited.
Once Robert made the corner of the attacker’s street, the man was halfway down it, topping a chain-link fence and dropping into a home-construction site.
Robert jammed down the street to the eight-foot fence. No visibility inside—a green-mesh fence cover blocked his view. So he grabbed the fence top, pulled himself over, and fell hard on the other side, half expecting the attacker to jump him.
When he didn’t, Robert got to his knees and made out the attacker booking toward the rear fence. Robert ran toward him as the guy slipped through the fence. Latino workmen on the second floor of the house started yelling at Robert. All he could make out was pendejo and kept going.
At the back fence, green-meshed, too, he found a slot between fence sections. Squeezed through it like the attacker did into the rear alley. Right then, a two-by-four came flying at his head. He ducked, turned, and raised his arm, but a four-inch nail sticking out of the end of the board spiked into his deltoid.
He scrambled to his feet.
“Like it?” the attacker screamed through his mask. “Here’s more!”
Swinging the board in tight arcs, he backed Robert up till he was pinned against a workman’s vintage pickup. The attacker raised the board overhead, but Robert rolled a
way—just as the board smashed the windshield, setting off the alarm.
More pendejos rained down from the second story as Robert snapped off the truck’s antenna and lashed the attacker, backing him up. The attacker dropped his board and covered his face, so Robert struck at his arms, whipping them, too, found his face again, slashing at that mask. Getting results, judging by the pained noises the attacker was making, and now it was the attacker backed against that fence.
With nowhere to run, the attacker bounced off the chain link and booted Robert square in the chest, knocking him back. Robert tripped over a pile of scrap lumber and went down. That was the attacker’s chance—he took off down the alley to a sagging wooden fence and pulled himself over all seven feet of it.
Robert followed, sluggish, clambered over the fence, too, but crashed onto a row of garbage cans, spilling onto the ground of a backyard. A paint-peeled beach house ahead, looked like a place that time forgot, and there went the attacker, clearing the side of the ramshackle structure.
Robert staggered to his feet, gassed, when a shotgun blast rocked the yard.
“Stop right there!” a male voice shouted.
He froze—his attacker was long gone. A crazed elderly man in a bathrobe leveled a shotgun at him from the back porch. “On the ground now, or I take both of ’em off at the knee!”
Robert went belly-down fast. Guy took his time walking over, got the gun barrel right down in his face.
“You kids getting drunk up in the bars, coming down here at 2:00 a.m., throwing shit in my yard, pissing on my fence.”
Robert didn’t risk telling him it was noon, or worse, that he was a lawyer. “I had a break-in. I’m your neighbor. Five blocks up the beach.”
“You’re what?”
He said it all again, gave his address. The man finally pointed his shotgun skyward.
“Neighbor?” he asked. “Then you get what I’m saying.”
CHAPTER 40
Stanley thought his face looked badass in his Celica’s mirror, all those lashes lawyer man dealt him with that antenna. With a fresh carton of Larks on the seat, he had just now driven over to Mailbox United and parked in its rear lot. It was on Lincoln. He wanted to, he could grab a hand job next door for forty-five bucks, plus a tip if he ever planned on coming back.
This mailbox outfit had what Jack demanded: no cameras inside or out and sparse foot traffic. Two days ago, Stanley stepped to the counter, gave them two sets of fake IDs, and filled out forms for a three-month bit, the minimum. They handed back one key to his box.
As he tried to Purell more construction-site paint off his hands, Jack backed in beside him. Now they faced each other. Stanley handed him the key through his window, and Jack went inside, holding a package. That left Stanley with his thoughts about what had happened with the lunatic lawyer.
At least he had the right alarm code. That was about the only thing that went according to plan. After meter parking at the jetty cut, he’d headed up Speedway with his day pack. Just a guy going to the beach, wandering around till he saw the pair drive to the courthouse in her car.
Good to go, he thought, but when he reached their Speedway alarm pad, the Navigator pulled up, parked on the corner. Navigator got out of it, and Stanley started moving again. Two minutes later, the Navigator’s work crew pulled up in a truck, and they all piled into Unit 3. Maybe to fix up after him, maybe for rain damage last night, it didn’t matter. For the time being, he was screwed trying to breach Unit 1 undetected.
No point trying to reach Jack about this hiccup. Each of them had a burner with no texting capacity. Besides, now was the time. It needed to go down now.
“Today, no matter what,” Jack had told him.
So he hit the beach, stayed in character, kicking it with his backpack. From there, he could see the Navigator jefe and his crew on the roof, Navigator making notes, pointing out this and that to his crew.
Watching them, his stomach churned, his nerves monkeyed, and his greatest prison fear surged up out of the dark. Fear of being cornered. Better part of an hour he watched, Navigator taking his sweet time, till they all split. That put him outside Unit 1, fronting the alarm pad, one hour and change after the lawyer split.
In a huge rush, panic building. Not the excitement he’d feel on a hot prowl. That was almost sexual. The pressure he fought now was This-is-gonna-end-bad pressure, that trapped-inside feeling he felt every single hour of every day he was doing time.
And there it was, the next wrong thing: the front slider swollen shut from that storm, blocking his out via the beach. Even with the slider stuck, he stacked a few of their things in front of it. Made it clear to anyone with a brain: this was nothing but a low-level burglary. Obviously, this crime could be—had to be—related to that squatter in Unit 3, and that would be a dead end for everybody. Ha!
Then the situation inside the condo compressed more. His thinking: Forget grabbing your cameras. First things first. Do what you’re here to do.
After that decision, time melted. Seemed like seconds later, he heard the garage door open downstairs. The car driving in. Voices in the garage, the lovebirds fighting, and he spotted that utility closet down the hall, and he ran into it, hiding in total darkness and losing his shit—
“Looks right to me, Stanley. Now you. I’ll wait here.”
It was Jack, coming from the mailbox outfit, handing over the one and only key. Stanley put on his painter’s cap and went inside. Keyed open the box and saw what Jack had left him: a square object wrapped in slick, white fish-wrapping paper. Then he tooled over to the counter with it and with his papers filled out in advance, he canceled his box, forfeited his deposit. They didn’t want his key—they’d need to make a new one—so he headed back out to his car.
Once he was behind the wheel, Jack said, “Toss me your key.” Stanley handed it over. “Why’s there paint on your hands?”
“Did some work around my house last night,” Stanley said. “Calms the nerves.”
“What the hell happened to your face?”
“Little dustup with your lawyer.”
“Dustup? Did he see your face? Yes or no, talk to me.”
“Nope, had it covered. Don’t worry, you’re good.”
Jack eyed him from his car. “Oh, I always worry, but I worry especially hard when I give a junkie a chance to change his life.”
What Jack said was true. Stanley didn’t like hearing any of it, but the white package on his seat took some of the sting from Jack’s words. Listening and nodding, he cracked open the Larks carton, opened a fresh pack, and fired up a smoke. That helped some. Not much.
“How’s it possible?” Jack asked. “They were gone, what? A good hour and a half?”
“We used decent phones. I coulda texted you, vice versa.”
“Texting’s never an option, Stanley. I held up my end, same as always, same as when we were kids, but you?”
There it was. Jack never letting anything go. Stanley wanted to tell his friend about the Navigator showing up, how careful he’d been waiting on the beach, how he wound up fighting the lawyer, kicking his ass, but he knew Jack didn’t want to hear that. No matter what he said, Jack would accuse him of making excuses, and sure enough, here came the twenty motherfucking questions:
“Did you cancel the box?”
“Yes.”
“Do I need to double-check, make sure you did it right?”
“No. I did it right.”
“You sure this was the only key?” Jack asked, holding it up for him to look at.
“Yes. The only one.”
“I’m not gonna find out there’s another key. A key tying us together, am I?”
“No. You’re not.”
“Even though you’re a convicted felon, I don’t mind being tied to you. We went to high school together. I was once your attorney of record. What I don’t want is being tied to you this week. Especially today.”
“Got it,” Stanley said.
“Suspicion, I can handle,
” Jack told him, not letting up. “But proof? That’s another matter entirely, isn’t it?”
Stanley stared down at his white package while Jack reamed him, humiliated him. Package or no package, he decided, he didn’t need this shit from anybody.
“Why don’t you cool it, Jack? You said he was some farm-boy lawyer outta the Bay Area. John Deere tried to take me out today, okay? All the way out. Lucky for you, I can take care of business.”
“Take care of . . . twenty grand for a few days’ work and you’re complaining? Twenty K’s what I used to make every other day, week in, week out.”
Stanley watched Jack smiling like he did sometimes. He’d seen that smile over the years, always meaning it for someone else. But this time, Jack was giving him that smile.
Now Jack was starting up that cheese-eating rental he was still driving. Jack’s parting words to him: “What I know about hard-core junkies like you. No matter what you do for them, no matter how hard you try helping them, it never fails. They always find a way to let you down.”
Once Jack took off, Stanley sat there another half hour, trying to process his anger and shame. What should he do? Call his sponsor? Go to a meeting? Hoist free weights? Take a run?
Go home, he decided. Take a run, hoist some iron, make a protein shake, take my vitamins, go to a meeting. No, make the shake first. And have a good, sober life.
Digging deep after what just happened, he made himself say: “Jack Pierce. You are my friend. And I mean it. Jack Pierce, I want you to have a good life, too.”
CHAPTER 41
Robert couldn’t believe it, winding up at Brotman a second time. This go-round, he was checked into the ER, too, a couple of Vicodin already under his belt. His nurse had given him a tetanus shot and was dressing the nail puncture in his shoulder. He poked his own ribs. They hurt, bruised from crash-landing on those garbage cans. Not as bad as Alison, though. Once again, she’d been admitted for overnight observation.
Now he looked back on what had happened, once his gun-toting neighbor let him go. Headed up Speedway, he spotted an ambulance in front of his building. Two paramedics loaded Alison inside, an oxygen mask over her face. The garage door was open, her car halfway into Speedway.
