“I wouldn’t do that.”
“What I mean is, you have become the daughter she never had.”
SKITTLES’ BARKING CALLS Jessica from the uneaten tuna sandwiches that she’s mummified in plastic wrap and put in the can outside the kitchen door. She’s trying to keep the uneaten food from stinking up the trash after she’s gone. Now, coming around from the side of the house, she sees Skittles doing a frantic back-and-forth behind the front yard’s chain-link fence.
They have come already. But they have not yet noticed Jessica, behind the overgrown bridal broom at the corner of the house. Men like these, however, are persistent types. Ignoring them, Jessica knows, will not make them disappear for more than an hour or two.
“Skittles!” she calls, though she doesn’t really want the dog to stop her guard dog act.
The men’s heads shift. The four lenses of their sunglasses reflect Jessica in quadruplicate as she approaches. The men’s expressions do not change. They appear neither happy nor angry, neither relieved nor annoyed to see Jessica. They fix on her as if she is merely an expected object that has come into their line of sight.
“Miss Aldridge,” the shorter of the men says. He is not asking if she is Miss Aldridge but stating that she is. Still, the man seems not to be an arrogantly confident type. Jessica can see that he only wishes to believe that this person standing before him is Jessica Aldridge, the same Jessica Aldridge that she was a year ago—before she trekked into the desert, recuperated in a VA hospital, and then vanished. Jessica, playing Jessie, crosses her arms to show her tattoos. The photos this man must have of her are no doubt from when she wore an Air Force uniform, displayed no ink and weighed thirty pounds more. “You are Jessica Aldridge? Formerly Technical Sergeant Aldridge of the United States Air Force?” the man asks.
“And you are?” Jessica asks. She is holding Skittles by the collar to keep the dog between herself and the fence, whose perimeter the men have not yet violated. The other man, the taller of the two, has bent his legs slightly as if he is preparing to vault into the yard.
Skittles begins to growl quietly. Quickly, its vibration intensifies into that ominous type of growl that announces the devolution of a domesticated creature into a beast.
The shorter man’s face breaks into a grin as false as the sentiment it tries to express, which is that all is well between Jessica and him. “Federal Bureau of Investigation, miss.” The man opens his wallet and tries to show her a badge. But Jessica doesn’t shift her eyes from her reflection in his sunglasses. And then the man takes the lenses off. His eyes are brown and, even asquint, surprisingly warm—dangerously warm enough to make Jessica want to trust him. “I’m Agent Daugherty and this is Agent Pyle,” the man says. From the corner of her eye Jessica sees the taller man touch a hand to his hip just inside his coat.
At the gesture Skittles bursts out barking and Jessica tugs hard at the dog’s collar until Skittles’ paws are clawing the air. She lets Skittles pull and froth until the verbal man signals his partner to back off. Then Jessica makes an offer. “I can get a message to Jessica,” she says.
Daugherty’s eyes flicker. “That would be helpful. And you are?”
“A friend,” Jessica says. “A close one.”
Daugherty nods. “Then you wouldn’t mind chaining up your dog and inviting us in for a friendly talk. Miss, excuse me, I didn’t get your name.”
“I said I could take your message to Jessica.”
Daugherty is not flustered. He points his soft chin at the house. “Is Miss Aldridge inside?” When Jessica doesn’t answer he takes out a business card that he pinches into a fence link. The card, with its insignias, resembles a small stiff flag. “Tell Miss Aldridge that her old friends in the Air Force are worried about her. Tell her there are people at the VA waiting to help. Tell her that it would be best for everyone if she came in on her own for an evaluation. All she needs to do is to check in and get checked out. Simple.” Daugherty’s smile is that of a used-car salesman.
TONIGHT JESSICA DRAWS the curtains early and, fully dressed, settles atop the couch—this after packing a backpack and dragging Skittles’ pallet beside her. Skittles’ regular sleeping spot is beneath Newt’s dining room chair and so this night is proving restive for both of them. Every few minutes Jessica checks the flickering numerals of a clock to see if morning’s come yet.
At midnight she gives in to her insomnia. Peering from a curtain, she sees nothing outside but the night’s usual shadows. Yet she doesn’t believe the agents have given up. They might be staked out up the street. She goes to the front door, then jerks her fingers back from the knob. Maybe her watchers are even nearer, right outside, just behind the flowering bridal broom.
“Let’s get some rest,” Jessica’s voice tells her fuzzy thoughts.
But for the next hours, her eyes do not stay closed. She watches the slow red counting of the clock face. At zero four hundred, she pulls herself to attention.
“Skittles,” she whispers and hears the jingle of the dog’s collar, feels the bristle of fur under her reaching hand. With the other she takes the backpack and then they are moving through the dark back porch to its door. Skittles gambols into the yard, stops, looks back. As there’s nothing out there that’s made her bark, Jessica slips out into the starlight. “Come on, girl,” she whispers, and when Skittles comes she takes the dog’s collar and they skulk past Newt’s grow shack. Then Jessica is struggling to lift the shepherd’s sixty pounds over the rear fence. The dog tumbles over upside down but intelligently gives no yelp. With a heave Jessica joins her and they stalk low through the weeds.
It is a hike to the warehouse, down in Redlands, out of which Kane runs his mechanic’s shop. Dawn is stretching their shadows before they arrive and Jessica finds a spigot to water Skittles. Then she bathes her face and neck and sips water from her cupped palm. Sitting on the tarmac with her back against Kane’s garage door, she suddenly cannot keep her eyelids apart. Sleep, or something close, brings her visions of being able to throw herself high in the air, though with ever diminishing leaps that finally leave her earthbound. Her dreaming shifts to a dream that she knows is a dream—she is on the road with Newt, her ears filled with the familiar tick of his truck’s valve train. Where Newt is taking her she does not care. She is just simply glad to see him alive again, even in a dream that she knows is a dream.
Then the dream crumbles. Groggy in the afterglow of Newt’s memory, Jessica squints at a fan blade spinning through a truck grill. It’s Newt’s pickup. And through its windshield Kane stares down at her.
“Morning, Kane,” Jessica says cheerily. Brushing the dust off her backside, she goes around to the driver’s door and opens it. Inside, Kane is collecting items from the passenger’s seat.
“Just picked up your carb kit, Jess,” he says. “Gonna take an hour or so to install. Wanda told me you’re leaving.” Arms loaded, Kane eases out of the vehicle.
Jessica snaps her fingers at Skittles and like a sterling recruit the dog squirts past Kane and leaps into the cab. Her blue eyes gaze at Jessica with anticipation.
“Sorry. Gotta hit the road,” she tells Kane casually. The less he knows the better. Jessica reaches for the coffee container he’s holding. “Smells good,” she says. “Fresh?”
Kane releases the cup and steps sideways so Jessica can slide into the truck. “Where you headed?”
“It’s a distance,” she says. “Call you when I get there.”
Kane shuts her door. “Drive easy,” he says.
As she engages reverse, the popping engine warns her as well. But she has to go. Already the men in black, Daugherty and Pyle, are knocking at Newt and Shelly’s front door. Of course Jessica is only imagining this—seeing the men in her mind’s eye as if she is aiming a drone camera at them. Yet she knows they will be here soon, for this is how they will operate, not like kidnappers under the cover of night but as bureaucrats in the full light of day. They will gather her up for a psych, which she is predoomed to
fail. Then, officially, her government will own her again, own her because she is the ex-airman who knows too much—knows about the flaws in their drones’ ballistic sighting that can cause collateral damage, knows about the cover-ups of mistakenly targeted schoolyards and hospitals and wedding parties, knows about CIA-directed assassinations in neutral countries, knows all the details of the al-Yarisi miss. She just knows too many damn things. She’s a risk to the security of the security state, to the state of things as they are, to the status quo of war.
And so her country will take care of her as efficiently as it did the catatonic, nickel-slot-playing airman at Pancho’s. But as Jessica is a civilian now, she cannot simply be deported to some remote Kyrgyzstan airbase. Rather, she will be deposited “for her own safety” in some quiet, walled place for rest and medication. She will be allowed to play checkers with the other inmates until she is as dazed and defeated as any lost soul. All this will happen as surely as the next sunset—unless she goes and goes and keeps going.
She grinds the gearshift into first and offers Kane an apologetic glance. He raises his hand in farewell, and then his Jessie is gone.
CHAPTER 32
New York City
To: [email protected]
From: [email protected]
Subject: An invitation
Hey, Zoe,
I promised myself that if you didn’t answer my last email I would respect your silence. And for four days I have. Tonight there’s a send-off dinner for Alex at Red Cat, 8 p.m., so I’m trying you again.
Where is Alex going all of a sudden? The Black Sea. To paint a mural. It’s for Sergei, the guy who wants to hire me. Alex, being anti-self-celebrity, says he’s happy to skip town while his show is up at Medusa. The trip, like my job offer, is Juliette’s doing. With Alex away she can be sure he won’t sabotage his new reputation, which is all you need to know about Juliette. Well, you saw her at the opening—fawning over a Hollywood actor while ignoring us two, the nobodies. Or maybe I’m just jealous. Ethaniago, that’s me.
But Juliette is good at what she does, which is to make opportunities. So about my trip to Sagaponack. It’s a nice village. I could live there. The base of operations is a short walk to the beach. In theory the job looks great. But I don’t know.
See you tonight at Red Cat. I hope.
E
To: [email protected]
From: [email protected]
Subject: Red Cat update
The dinner has been pushed back to 8:30. See you there. No problem though if you can’t make it.
To: [email protected]
From: [email protected]
Subject: We’re here
In case you’re out there looking for us, we’re dining in the private room. Just tell the hostess you’re with the Giroux party. And don’t worry about arriving late—the festivities should be going on here for quite a while. I’d be texting you this if your old number worked. See you soon.
To: [email protected]
From: [email protected]
Subject: Fuckin RSVP please
Zo,
So where you? farewell party over. Everybod gone but me. Wish you’d been here. Had a merry time after splling a Campari down Juliette’s blouse. Told Alex to fuckoff after three scotches at the bar. I’m up to numero six and bartender says go home. Fine. Need a clear head tmorrow to drive Alex to JFK. Juliette, strangle her, booked him on a Aeroflot to Kiev. Since dying always a good career move for n artist and with Aeroflots crashing one a week laetly, I raised a toast to Julie’s manager skills. That’s when I got bar exiled. No wait. It was after I called Sergei an oilagarch. Thought that was good since he’s a petrochemical squillionaire. Hung around here hoping you would show eventulaly so I could test it on you. Least you coulda told me yu wern’t come. What? NYU sundenly cut off your studnet email? Or u fall out a widow or somethig?
Love,
Enth
your X
remember me??
To: [email protected]
From: [email protected]
Subject: Last night’s email
Zoe,
I apologize for being a jerk. Obviously I need a Breathalyzer app that stops me from drunkmailing. Not that I get wasted often. If it’s any consolation my head feels the size of a pumpkin. What’s funnier though is that after I emailed you Sergei joined me at the bar to tell me I was all right. My new job is on.
Anyway, right now I’m pulled over on a JFK access road. I just dropped off Alex and am watching his plane take off. I don’t know why I’m doing this. What is this fear? Have I gone delusional? Tell me. Tell me anything because I’m worried as much about you as I am about Alex.
Zoe, if we ever meant anything to each other stop torturing me with your silence. I know you have your own problems and don’t need mine on top. But you know how I fixate on things. So just let me know you’re okay. With Alex gone, I’ve got nothing else to do but go over and over the reasons for your silence. If only I could shove my obsessions in a sack and drown them and be out of my misery. But I can’t. Damn it, Zoe, help me out a little here. Answer me.
E
To: [email protected]
From: [email protected]
Subject: Tonight
8 p.m. 169 E. Broadway.
To: [email protected]
From: [email protected]
Subject: RE: Tonight
I’ll be there.
PART FOUR
PURSUIT
September 2013
CHAPTER 33
New York City
After rereading Flytiger’s emails, Sarah Chen puts away the victim’s cell phone so she doesn’t twist an ankle clomping along East Broadway on her three-inch pumps. And there’s Eddie now, outside the 169 Bar where she’d set up the meet. Ridiculously, Banco opens the door for her.
“Nice shoes. Louboutins?” he says and grins like they’re on a date.
“Zappos,” Chen answers.
Tall and slim, Eddie Banco is a handsome young guy pretending to be a metrosexual. But he’s gay and fooling no one at work. As Sarah passes through the door she gives him a soft punch and the side of her fist bounces off Eddie’s lean trampoline gut.
“The thanks I get,” he says, falling back on his habit of talking rougher than he looks. They both overcompensate.
At a two-top near the bar Chen orders a cranberry seltzer. Banco asks the waitress for a pickle martini, which is advertised colorfully on a chalkboard. After she leaves he says to Chen’s stare, “What? I’m off-duty doing you a favor here.”
“We’re early, Banco. Just don’t get wrecked on me.”
“Chen the Merciless,” he says—her office nickname. Despite its racism it’s somewhat empowering so she leverages it.
“Detective Chen to you,” Chen replies, instantly regretting pulling rank on Eddie. “Or just Chen. Or just Merciless. Or how about Sarah. Take your pick.”
At the precinct house Sarah and Eddie—because they don’t fit the stocky, balding mold of detective and plainclothes officer—have to grin through every challenge to stay in the club. The jokes, the sexism, the nonironic racism. But complain once, Sarah knows, and you’ll never have backup when you need it.
After their drinks arrive, Eddie raises a toast, “To expense reports.”
With the departmental budget cuts—which have thinned their ranks so that Sarah can’t even keep a regular partner—she wasn’t supposed to take the Leston investigation this far. “Wrap it up,” the captain had said. But after the computer forensics lab cracked the victim’s cell password—and this took days—some loose ends turned up.
The bar hasn’t drawn a crowd yet—just a seeding of hipsters and grad students ignoring a few Wall Street types who are trolling for coeds.
“You think this guy’ll show?” Eddie asks. “I wouldn’t pick him from a lineup of anyone here.”
“He’s coming because he’s desperate.”
“So, if he�
��s desperate, he’s guilty then?”
“Maybe. I’ll get it out of him.”
“Is that why the clothes?”
Instead of her usual oxford walkers and pantsuit, Sarah is wearing those painful pumps, a skirt and eye makeup. It’s almost like the days when she baited the johns exiting the Cross-Bronx Expressway in their minivans. But Eddie’s looking at her funny. “Do I still read as a cop or something?” Sarah asks.
Eddie leans toward her and straightens her collar, rests his fingertips on her shoulder. “You look fine,” he says.
A man enters through the street door. Sarah checks her watch. It’s seven forty.
Eddie’s eyes follow Sarah’s. “Is that him?” he asks.
The man is lanky and would stand six-two or more if he didn’t stoop. His clothes are a mismatch of cheap and threadbare expensive—there’s the designer cardigan shiny at the elbows, the five-hundred-dollar shoes that need resoling. In contrast, the baggy jeans are bargain bin—the man’s ass sits in them as flat as the bottom of an iron. The pale back of his shaved neck betrays a twenty-dollar haircut. The man must be thirty to thirty-five, Sarah decides—though his eyes are those of a lost eight-year-old searching for his mom in a department store. He’s not her killer. He’s a sheep.
IT’S EIGHT THIRTY and Sarah has just abandoned her fourth former suspect at the bar—a man wearing a herringbone fedora and a shadow beard who as she walked away recommended she “chill.”
“It’s fine,” Sarah tells Eddie, fanning her diminishing hopes. “The captain will let me trace Flytiger’s email address now that I have evidence of guilt.”
“Just because he didn’t show tonight doesn’t mean he’s guilty.”
“Wrong.” This is not a subject on which she’s going to agree to let Eddie disagree. “I’ve got Flytiger on the run now. He played the email alibi card in a panic. I called his bluff and he folded. I’ve got him now, or soon will.”
Eddie shakes his head. He’s starting his third pickle martini. “Truth or dare me,” he says.
“Truth,” Sarah says.
And West Is West Page 17
