by Eric Beetner
My eyes stung. I swallowed hard. “Did you find them?”
“Actually . . . they found me.”
“What?”
He told me about the drop in the morning. Virginia Beach. “So I’ll be there,” he said.
“Me, too.”
I pocketed my phone and slapped some water on my face. Back in the waiting room, I took a seat and watched, getting the lay of the land, checking exits and entrances, trying to memorize faces and figure out who was cop and who was FBI. My head pounded.
“Mr. McDowd?”
I shifted in the orange vinyl chair. The waiting room smelled of rubber soled shoes and old coffee. “Yeah?” I tried to look up at him, but the florescent lights shone right in my eyes, so I rested my elbows on my knees and stared at the floor, waiting for the next round of questions. His shoes were cleaner than mine, polished to shiny black mirrors.
“I need to ask you a few questions.”
“Sure.” I wanted to tell him to fuck off, but under the circumstances . . .
I wanted to slip out, track down the Tahoe, track down the necktie twins and make them dead. Then the goddamn fucking FBI could ask me all the fucking goddamn questions they wanted.
“Follow me, please.” His shiny shoes turned the opposite direction, so I reluctantly pushed myself up and followed. He was shorter than me, but not by much. The suit he wore was expensive, but all wrinkled up in the back, like he’d been wearing it for a few days. I followed him through the maternity ward and out the secure double door with the security pad that was supposed to keep babies from being abducted.
He led me into an empty room. Once inside, he turned to face me. The room had been set up as some sort of makeshift office for him. He tossed his jacket on a small loveseat, his name tag face up. His name was Special Agent Stu Trumble. His briefcase lay wide open on one of the reclining wing chairs. Papers spilled out. “Is all that to find my kid?” I asked.
He shook his head. “Nah. Just PDFs of similar cases. I hate reading on computer screens so I asked my assistant to print them out.” He looked around and shuffled his feet a little bit. “So anyway, you can sleep in here. I know you must be tired. We’ll keep looking for your kid. I’ve found a lot of kids, you know. Been doing this a long time.”
I asked him if he had kids of his own because I felt like it was something I should ask, something that would make me seem like I was just a dad looking for his daughter and not a cut-rate mule who made the mistake of trusting his assistant to do something right.
“I have four kids. Three boys and a little girl.” He was younger than me by at least five years. His face was pink where he had shaved it earlier in the day and now, at eight p.m. was just starting to show a hint of five-o’clock shadow.
“Four kids,” I said.
He smiled and patted me on the shoulder. “Get some rest. We’ll come and get you if anything changes.”
“Actually,” I said, my mind waking up and starting to work again finally. “I’d like to take a shower, too, if that would be okay. Do you think they would let me borrow some scrubs or something?”
He jerked a thumb behind him, pointing to a tall armoire. “Delivery room, remember? All the scrubs for the dads are in there. Soap and shampoo in the bathroom.” He smiled again and held up his fingers. “Four kids.” Then he was gone and for the first time in a few hours, I was completely alone.
I hurriedly changed into scrubs, grabbed the I.D. tag from his jacket and opened the door. The nurses’ station was to my left and was busy with cops, nursing staff, ringing phones. To my right was a stairwell. I took a deep breath and slipped out, hoping I was doing the right thing.
36
SKEETER
I can’t believe I waited until I pulled over for my second bump. The first snort I’d done as soon as I handed over the money for the two bags of crystal. Couldn’t wait no longer to charge the ol’ batteries.
Out on an unlit two-lane the first bump started wearing off already. Fuckin’ crap meth cut to shit with baby powder and corn starch. I laid out a line running up the length of my index finger and held it to my nose. I skronked it up with a mighty snot-clearing honk. Tiny sparkles hit the back of my eyelids and the gentle drip started down the back of my throat.
Now I could be up all night and figure this shit out. Whoo! No rest for the wicked. I drummed a Slayer riff on the steering wheel and tried to think of my next move. The Griffins were AWOL, the cops on the scent and the car rental dudes had about as much info on Griffin as I did right then.
Shit. Not a whole lot to go on. This was the kind of time when I wished I knew someone on the police force. I could call in the favor and have him look up license plates or credit cards or some shit. Maybe I needed to go visit that little Indian fuck again, get him to tappity-tap-tap on his computer and come up with another link to Griffin.
But, man, it would be so much easier to just call up a cop and find out what they know from the hotel and where they think the Tahoe went.
As if my prayers had been heard by Jesus H. his own self, a pair of headlights and two berries—one cherry and one blue—lit up my rear-view. Dammit.
I pushed down my packet of crystal into my shirt pocket and wiped my nose with my hand, checking my eyes in the mirror. Bloodshot, but averagely so. I prepped for Johnny Law to come around to the car, but this good ol’ boy was taking his sweet mother-humping time. By the time he got to knockin’ on my window I bet he’d gotten a year closer to retirement.
I powered down the window and he looked past me to the passenger seat with its broken glass and gaping hole where the passenger window was before I busted it out.
“Help you, Officer?”
“Why you stopped out here, boy?”
Oh, shit. We had ourselves a cracker. A real southern po-lice man. Woulda fit right in on screen in Smokey and the Bandit.
“Jus’ makin’ a phone call, sir. You know it’s not safe to talk and drive.” I smiled at him but his mirrored shades gave me zilch in return.
He leaned back and eye fucked the backseat, looked around at the trees on the side of the lane. We were alone. No accomplices. “Son, I had a report of this very car here being stolen this afternoon. You know anything about that?”
The crystal buzzed my brain and the seconds ticked by in double time until I answered him.
“No, sir. Could be my grandma didn’t know I took the car today. She’s gettin’ a might forgetful what with the Alzheimer’s and all that shit, y’know?”
He nodded slow. “Grandma, huh?”
“Yessir. I live with her so I can be there to take of her needs. She can still cook so it ain’t all bad.” I smiled and got nothing but my own gap-toothed reflection in his sunglasses.
“Son, step out of the car. And bring your license and registration with you.”
“Well, like I say, the car’s registered to my grandma you see—”
“Still want you to step out of the vehicle.”
“Oh, sure, sure.”
Dumb move, pig. That good ol’ boy just signed his death certificate. I kinda wanted to ask him to see his license and ask to check his time of death.
He stepped back from my door and gave a look back to his patrol car. I looked too but I knew I wouldn’t see another cop waiting in the car. If there were two of them, they woulda flanked me. The dumb ass was alone.
I shut the door behind me and shot my hand forward and had it on the butt of his gun before he turned his head back from his own car. He put a meaty paw over top of my hand, but I had momentum on my side. I yanked his revolver free and only had to move it six inches to the left and I was pointing it at his belly.
Kevlar vests hadn’t reached the sticks yet. He wasn’t no city cop used to being shot at. Besides, most of these Bible thumping NRA types thought bullet proof vests were for pussies. I put three shots in his stomach and while he was digesting those I lifted the gun and put one in his forehead. He went down and his shades never came off his face.
&nbs
p; I went over to the cop car to stock up on whatever he was selling. There was a clipboard of bullshit paperwork, an extra set of cuffs, a cold half cup of coffee. I zeroed in on the shotgun clipped to a rack between the seats. I tugged on it, felt it move a tiny bit in the rack. I thought if I could just get it rattling around in there I could snap it out and have some serious firepower. I yanked and pulled and jerked and tugged, but that thing was more stubborn than a whore telling you to put on a rubber.
I tried like hell to get a better grip on the damn thing and wouldn’t you know it, I shot a hole in the damn roof. My finger slid onto the trigger and blammo! The lights fizzled off on the blue side and the shot was louder than hell inside the car. I almost fell backward as I backed out to get away from the loud-as-fuck of it all. That was, like, Motorhead loud.
I decided to fuck it and leave the shotgun there. I did take the cop’s badge and his radio. You never know when that shit could come in handy.
37
CLYDE
I made my way down the stairs and into the parking lot. Realistically it would have been better if I had a different car, but I didn’t want to add that to the list of felonies I was committing. Besides, good ol’ Special Agent Stu Trumble had told me to get some sleep, so he wouldn’t be bothering me for several hours, unless something happened with Madeline. And she was a tough bird. Mostly I just had to worry about her popping her stitches when she kicked my ass. A couple of nurses heading in from a cigarette break nodded at me. I guess I looked pretty official in the scrubs. I nodded back and kept moving.
When I got into the car I dialed Corgan’s number and waited for him to pick up.
“Clyde, my boy, good to hear from you.”
“Don’t hurt my daughter,” I said, hating how desperate I sounded. “Jesus Christ, just don’t hurt her.”
“Calm down, Clyde,” he said, chuckling like we were talking about a golf game or some run of the mill shit like that. “No one is going to hurt anyone. You’ve confessed your sin. All will be forgiven once you make it right.”
“It was just a big misunderstanding, Mr. Corgan,” I said.
“I know, son. I know.”
“The car. My wife. She was in labor. The car wasn’t in the usual place . . . my assistant . . .”
“Shhh. Shhh. Shhh. Now this isn’t going to get us anywhere. What’s done is done. Let’s work together to make this right.”
His calmness was terrifying. Sweat was soaking through the armpits of my scrubs. “The people with the Tahoe have contacted us.”
“Well, that’s good news,” he said, sounding almost paternal. Hey, Dad, I just got an A in Geometry. “I knew you could do it if you just had the proper motivation.”
I rested my head on the steering wheel, fighting tears. Please don’t hurt my baby. “Yessir.”
“Now tell me what they said.”
“They know about what’s in the ceiling.”
“Ah. I see.”
“They are meeting me tomorrow in Virginia Beach. I’ll get the car back then.”
“And the rest of my property, I assume.”
“Yessir. Of course.”
He sighed. “I’d like to believe you’d do it for the sake of our history together, Clyde. But I feel like perhaps you need to keep that feeling of motivation at peak level.”
My heart pounded. “Sir?”
“Your daughter wants to talk to you.”
“Oh God. No. Please, don’t!”
I heard the sound of a tiny baby, breathing through the phone, making tiny grunting noises. She whimpered first, and then began to wail and cry. I climbed out of the car and paced, the phone clutched in my hand. I’m sure I looked like a crazy person, but it was night and there was no one around. I wanted it to stop. I wanted the noise to stop. I didn’t dare hang up. I needed to tough it out with my baby. I needed to fix this for her.
“My goodness she can yell. Reminds me of my granddaughter.” The crying stopped, faded, like someone was carrying her away.
“Don’t hurt her,” I said, my voice thick with tears.
“I trust you are motivated now.”
“Yes. I’m motivated.” I imagined myself shooting the fat fuck in the face.
“I know it is distressing to hear a baby cry,” he said. “But in your case, I would recommend you be relieved when you hear her cry. You should worry when you no longer hear that noise.”
“I’ll get the stuff tomorrow.” My jaw ached from clenching my teeth so tightly.
“I think I’ll send one of my own men just to make sure things go as they should.”
As far as I could tell, he already had three men on the job, Skeeter, the usual driver, and Purple and Blue Tie. There was nothing else I could say about that, so I said the only thing I could think of. “Please don’t hurt my little girl.”
“See you soon, Clyde.” The phone beeped in my ear as he hung up.
38
SKEETER
All I have to say about that don’t drive and talk on a cell phone crap? Fuck you, this is America.
So I answered the call when I saw it was Corgan. He told me about the meet scheduled for the morning. A pretty little package dropped right in my lap.
“So, what, you want me to get the dope and come on back? Or you want me to make them realize what a mistake they all made?”
I think Corgan sighed at me. “You’ll be outnumbered.”
“So?” I said. “I’ll put them down first thing. No talking, no arguing, just bam, bam, bam. They all go down for what they tried to pull.”
“Let me guess, that would raise your fee?”
I didn’t like his tone, but he had called me out. I saw another way, though. “Not necessarily. If I do this job for you, maybe you think about moving me up a bit in the organization. I think I’ve proven myself over the years and now that I’m about to wrap up this cluster fuck—”
“But you didn’t find them. Clyde did. He called me, not you.”
“Well, sure. But I got right up their ass. Spooked them out of the bushes and now I’ll go finish it. I think it shows I’m ready for the next step.”
“We’ll see.”
Then the bastard hung up on me. It was an opening, at least. Not much of one, but I figured he wasn’t in the mood to deal until this was all wrapped up, which would be the next morning.
I banged another bump of crystal up my nose and drove off to find a place to sleep. Damn, I sure ain’t a morning person.
39
SEAN
Ernie and Betty were ambling around in the kitchen. I didn’t hear the kids, which wasn’t surprising. They were likely asleep. Linda and I had slept in a guest room off the family room in the back of the house. It had a tiny double bed that we crushed ourselves into and had the smell of old people . . . dust and mildew and just . . . oldness. I sat on the edge of the bed and listened to Linda breathe. I smiled a little, thinking of last night. Forty years old and still able to give my wife the high hard one.
I carried my clothes into the bathroom, showered, and got dressed. I had two days’ worth of beard growing in and I’d be lying if I said I didn’t look damn good. Linda had packed my suitcase for me, so I was stuck with putting on a pair of Bermuda shorts with palm trees and tiny martini glasses splattered all over them and a World’s Best Dad T-shirt. I brushed my teeth and then I ripped the sleeves off the T-shirt.
Betty grunted as I poured myself a cup of coffee. “New shirt, Sean?”
I gave her a tight smile. “I’m on vacation.”
Ernie had his face buried behind the newspaper. Every few seconds his hand snuck out from behind its folds and grabbed his mug of coffee. I didn’t even bother to sit down. I stood at the sink and powered down the coffee. I’d get a Danish or something on the road. “I’ve got something to do this morning,” I announced. “I’ll be back later.”
Betty sniffed like I’d farted after a plate of nachos and looked out the window above the sink. I headed for the door and remembered I’d left the
keys in the bedroom. Shit and fuck. The last thing I needed was Linda tagging along. Bad enough that she was, well, a bitch. But on the serious side, what if something happened to me? What if I got shot or got in a wreck? Chad and Becky would need someone.
My flip flops slapped against the bottoms of my feet as I tried to tiptoe through the family room to the guest room. I kicked them off. I picked up my jeans from the night before and fished around in the pocket. I grabbed them and turned to leave the room.
“Don’t even think about it, Sean.” Linda glared at me from the bed. Maybe it was more of a scowl. There was none of the “morning after” glow on her. She just looked bitchy.
“Don’t even think about what?”
“Leaving without me.”
“I want you to stay here. In case something happens to me.”
She laughed a little bit as she tossed the blankets aside and stood. “Bullshit. I’m not staying here. Nothing’s going to happen to you except that maybe you’ll leave us all and go on your merry way.”
She was working to get her boobs stuffed into her bra, taking her frustration out on them.
“I’m not going to leave you, Linda. I would never leave you and the kids.”
She snorted. Seemed like there was a whole lot of that sound going on this morning. “Right. Whatever.” She worked her feet into a pair of sandals and pointed to the bedroom door. “Let’s go.”
I couldn’t help but notice she didn’t brush her teeth.
40
BRENT
With the heater on the windshield fogged up in the morning chill. I tried to find the right balance. Heater on, window cracked. Defogger on, temperature up to eighty. It kept me occupied, at least. Gave me something to do. My fingers bounced from the heat controls to the radio in a futile search for something not coated in sugar and sung by a teenage girl.
I went on a mini rant in my head about the sorry state of music today. I watched the parking lot, the walking path along the beach side. Nobody. A few minutes earlier a guy had jogged past, but I knew damn well that fat bastard Griffin wouldn’t be jogging.
