“It’s Dan,” he said. “Germany?”
“Oh yeah…,” I said. “I forgot.”
“Where did you find drugs?” he asked. “There aren’t any in this place and believe me, I would know.”
“Didn’t shoot up,” I said and pointed weakly to the hole in the window.
It took him a moment to put two and two together. “I guess it’s not safe here either,” he said and helped me from the tub.
Blood oozed from my thigh and he quickly slapped a hand to the wound where I drew the sample. “We need to get that patched up,” he said.
“While you’re down there,” I said with a slurred smile.
“I’m not gay,” he said.
“Me neither,” I said. “I’m just a sweet young woman in an old man’s body. Or am I a young man in a woman’s body in an old man’s body? Or an old woman in a young man’s body in a woman’s body in an old man’s body? It’s so hard to keep track these days.”
“You’re a strange… person,” he said as he taped gauze against my thigh.
“I’m just saying, technically it’s your penis, so it’s not weird at all. Technically.”
He brushed me off and dropped me on the couch where I was more than happy to collapse and do nothing at all. I counted my fingers while he paced about, talking wildly about things I was not at all following, only grabbing a few words at a time.
“…make the announcement…”
“…find a car to…”
“…sober up and…”
“…incorporate some fire and…”
By the time I came to my senses, he’d gotten some clothes on me and propped me up against a wall with no view of the window. A bowl of soup sat in front of me, but it had grown cold. Dan pulled a tattered chair up across the coffee table from me.
“We need to talk,” he said.
“About what?”
“A lot of things,” he said. “For starters, your heroin problem.”
“You mean your heroin problem,” I said.
“No, I mean yours,” he said and his features tightened. “I can keep you away from the stuff. I’m not worried about you scoring any more under my watch. You don’t have any money, and you wouldn’t know where to look. But this whole dying and coming back high thing? We can’t have that.”
“What do you propose?”
“We can’t train you,” he said. “The work’s too dangerous. It’d be cool if you could pull off all the crazy stuff we have planned, and in a perfect world, I’d train you up to it. I know we figured you would probably die, but I think with the amount of time we lose to sobering you up, we can’t risk you dying trying to learn what you’re doing. That means no training and no exposing you to whoever they’re sending your way. If there’s any trace of heroin in your system when you make that jump, we’re humped. No insurance payout.”
I nodded. It made sense. It was terrible, but it made sense. “So instead of saying I’ll probably die, just go ahead and make it part of the plan?”
“Shouldn’t be too hard,” he said.
“Harder than you think,” I said. “I heal pretty quickly once I’m dead. We need something that mangles me so bad they don’t even consider an autopsy because, brother, we might not have time for one. This stunt needs to get a lot more dangerous.”
“That brings me to my next point,” he said. “You were babbling in the tub.”
“Sorry about that,” I said.
“No need to apologize.” He smiled and patted my knee. “It gave me some pretty wild ideas.”
He spent the next several minutes laying out the new stunt. It was a hideous Frankenstein’s monster of a plan cobbled together from every mad idea to pass through one man’s head. The list of ways it could go wrong and get me killed was so long, I was worried I might be killed by the wrong thing and be alive again by the time rescue crews reached me. Jumps, explosions, cliffs, fire, handcuffs. It was so convoluted I couldn’t even remember it all. It was perhaps the dumbest thing I had ever heard. “Did a five-year-old come up with that plan?”
“The kids will love it,” he said gleefully.
“Sure, if they survive the trauma of watching me die in a thousand awful ways.”
“Trust me,” he said. “I do this for a living. It’ll be legendary.”
“Your legacy?” I asked.
“It’s what it’s all about,” he replied, nodding. “Live or die, everyone will be talking about it for decades.”
He was not wrong about that. If we could pull it off, or at least have me survive long enough for it to be impressive and not just sad, it would be a Jeopardy question for sure. A stunt this intricate would make him the laughing stock of the stunt world for a century if I died before it even started, though. It would be like if the whole world gathered to watch Apollo 11 and the rockets failed to ignite. “Let’s hope we don’t embarrass ourselves.”
“You’re not wrong, buddy,” he said. “You are not at all wrong.”
“So, you said you had a lot to talk about,” I said. “That’s only two things.”
“Next, we need a car. Can’t get out of dodge and drive cars off ramps without a car.”
“Good point. Convertible?”
“You wish,” he said.
“But Route 66 in a convertible!” I said. “That’s the dream of the 50s!”
“We don’t have money for two cars,” said the former stuntman. “Needs to be a regular car with a trunk. No hatchbacks or convertibles. Can’t make things easy on you.”
“Gotta keep that stunt gonzo,” I said with a sigh. “Stupid legacy.”
“That stupid legacy is about to put a lot of dinero in your pocket, friend,” he said.
“So what? Grab the first car we can find? How do we pay for it? We can steal one, but that’ll put the cops on our tail, and that will make pulling off this stunt a whole lot more difficult. Plus, it’ll do who knows what to the insurance payout.”
“That’s the last thing we need to talk about.”
“Money? Setting up your beneficiary?”
“Ambrose says he’s already taking care of the beneficiary, but we have to cover the front end. It’s time we make the announcement.”
“Now?”
“Yes now,” he said. “Ambrose agrees. With the car accident, it makes perfect to announce one last big death defying stunt now.”
“Really?” I said, skeptical as a conspiracy theorist when his hot water cuts out. “You don’t think ‘go to a hospital’ might be the next logical step after an accident like that?”
“Think about it,” he said. “It’s a terrible accident you walked away from. When’s the last time Dan ‘Danger Man’ Germany stared death in the face and laughed?”
“Every time you shoot up at this age. It’s a wonder you made it this far.”
“The public doesn’t know about that. Anyway, Dan Germany survives a car crash. The public, suddenly remembering I exist, wants to know where I’ve been, what I’ve been doing. I say I don’t have long, crash made me realize what was important, frailty of man, blah blah blah. I want to face death one last time before I go. Let him know I’m not afraid of him. If he wants me, he’ll have to catch me sleeping because he’ll never catch me awake. That sort of thing. The sales for the GPS coordinates go out, the money comes in. We take the money, turn around and buy a car. And ramps. And explosives. And everything else.”
“It makes sense. It’s not what I would do in that situation, but then I’m not you.”
He gave me a wry grin.
“Well, I am, but I’m not. You know what I mean. The important thing is, I think you’re right.”
“More words I haven’t heard in a long time. Thanks again.”
“Don’t mention it.”
“Well then,” I said. “Let’s write up a press release.”
Chapter 14
OLIVIA
SOMEONE MUST SAVE YOU FROM YOU
Some people won’t let you save them no matter how hard you try. I
shake my head in stunned disbelief and try to wrap my head around what I’m seeing. Just to make sure I’m not imagining things, I watch the YouTube video again.
Dan “Danger Man” Germany sits on the couch in his tiny efficiency apartment. I recognize it from earlier today. Seeing him up close, he looks old, tired. Someone, probably Blondie, holds the camera, but it’s not very steady. The camera shakes with emotion and I can hear an occasional sniffle. Dan Germany must mean a lot to him, whoever he is.
“As the news has already reported, I was in an accident earlier today, an accident for which I am more than lucky to have survived. My apologies to the paramedics and investigators who no doubt saw the blood and assumed the worst. After countless transfusions from stunts gone awry, I’m afraid I’ve gotten into the strange habit of travelling with a couple pints of my own blood just in case. That can make quite an unsettling mess, and again I’m sorry.”
Danger Man takes a moment to clear his throat for dramatic emphasis. “The reason I’m making this video today is to make an announcement. I know I haven’t been in the limelight much lately. Those of you who remember me probably assumed I retired or died years ago. The truth is, I didn’t retire and to quote Mark Twain, ‘rumors of my death have been greatly exaggerated.’ You know the rumors I mean. Jumping a motorcycle over an active volcano? Ridiculous. But as I got older, I stopped laughing in the face of death, and just chuckled, then maybe sniggered under my breath. Saying snide things to death when he turned his back. The truth is, I got scared. I’m old. I think it’s time to retire. Almost.
“I’ve been talking with a few close friends for years about doing one last big stunt, not for the fame or the fans but for myself. Something to prove to myself I’m not afraid anymore. It was a pipe dream, and we all knew it. That is, until today. I could have died today. I didn’t, but I could have. I spent years avoiding doing the thing that I love because I didn’t want to die, but the thing is, death doesn’t respect your limits. Death doesn’t care if you are playing it safe, eating healthy, doing the right thing. One day it will come for you. One day it will come for me. When he shows up, I want him to know I wasn’t afraid. I want to know myself that I wasn’t afraid. When he comes knockin’ again, I want him to have to speak up so I can hear him over the sound of my engine running.
“One last stunt. No tickets. No camera crews. No audience. Just me and my doubts, and only one of us will make it out alive. Thank you for your love and support over the years. Thank you for your thoughts and prayers today. Thank you for your hopes as I move into this last phase of my life. Thank you. Good night.”
The video ends and brings up a slew of suggested viewing that I couldn’t care less about. I let it sink in.
How do you protect someone from external threats when he seems so hell-bent to kill himself anyway? I don’t buy the car accident story. Paint chips suggest another car ran him off the road. Could be an unintentional hit and run, but given the hide and seek boards, I highly doubt it. Dan has to know someone is coming for him. The car accident. The bullet hole in his window. So why make the announcement now? Is he hoping maybe they’ll leave him alone of it looks like he might die anyway? That doesn’t seem likely. Typically, when someone puts a hit out on a guy, he doesn’t want the target to take control of the situation. If you’re the mob, what kind of message does it send to those who might take advantage of you if the guy you put a hit on lives long enough to organize a death-defying stunt and die on his own terms? No, likely what will happen is they’ll up the ante and come at him twice as hard. Now it won’t be just business anymore. It will be personal.
I redouble my efforts to find out who might be coming at Danger Man. The person who tried to run him down is probably DeathProof, presuming he took his username from that Kurt Russell movie where he kills people with his car. I’ve identified Bigbadaboom84. The sniper was probably eagleeye6969 or VasilysHeir, presuming he wasn’t one of the users who didn’t hint at a favored weapon with their screen name, people like WhozUrDaddy and SoccerMomByDay.
I forge an invite to the Fist’s hide and seek boards, create an account under the misleading Motherof3 handle and pepper the profile with details that will send people looking in all the wrong places. Then I convince the database that, yes, in fact, I have paid my dues and am cleared to pursue this target. “No 1 takes my kill. Just ask boom. My babies R going 2 college N that ain’t cheap,” I post, and hope that’s enough of a goose chase to keep the feds off my tail when I turn the website in, while still preserving my professional integrity as a taker of lives if word gets out I interfered. I can always say I wasn’t saving a life. I was hogging the ball. It’s not a perfect plan, but after that monumental sloppiness of allowing not one, but two of these guys to see my face, I have to do something.
As I’m logging off, I spot a couple new posts that catch my attention.
The first is a reply to my post. VasilysHeir tells everyone to be on the lookout for Motherof3 for playing dirty, and he gives a vague sort of physical description of me, coupled with some very unkind suggestions regarding my sex life for a person my age to have three kids already.
The second post is on the main page for Danger Man’s game.
In light of recent announcements, the winner for this game gets an extra five thousand dollars, but to claim your bonus prize, you must submit proof of success before the hider pulls off his little stunt. No easy task given certain members’ careless work. No doubt, our hider knows we are coming for him and has gone into hiding.
Not good at all. I had hoped to buy some time, save a life. It seems all I’ve done is kick a hornet’s nest. I need to get a GPS tracker on Danger Man somehow and I need to do it fast. Wherever he’s doing his secret stunt, I can’t trust that if I can’t find him, they can’t either. I try his apartment phone, but he’s not answering. Figures. He’s probably not even home anymore. I really don’t want to try to sneak in again, especially since the police and the media will no doubt descend upon the place in short order if they haven’t already. I don’t want to, but what choice do I have? If he’s been planning this thing for a while, if there’s any indication of where he’s heading next, it will be there.
I park my car two blocks away and get ready to climb. I don’t dare use the front door. It’s too likely I’ll be recognized, plus anyone on the boards worth their salt will be watching, and thanks to my run-in with VasilysHeir and my ill-advised interrogation of Bigbadaboom84, they know what I look like. I’ll have to slip in through a window, which thankfully Bigbadaboom had the courtesy to pre-break for me.
I watch carefully down the street as I approach the building. Still no cruisers. No flashing lights means they probably don’t know about the sniper. One less thing to worry about. Just to be safe, though, I slip on a bulky hoodie and a blonde wig, followed by a ski mask of my own. If things go wrong, maybe I can at least confuse them about who they’re looking for. I slip a camera into my pocket just in case. He may not be in, but that doesn’t mean he won’t come back. Climbing the fire escape is no trouble and the broken window gives me even less difficulty. The place is empty. It would have been nice to find Danger Man at home, but I’ll settle for no surprise killers. If only all break-ins could be this easy.
I set to work nosing about the apartment as quickly as I can, but it’s nowhere near as easy finding information as I had hoped it would be. Dan Germany is by no stretch of the imagination a neat freak. He has papers scattered everywhere. On coffee tables and counters, piled on top of dressers and underneath chairs, and sticking awkwardly out of drawers.
“How do you find anything?” I ask no one in particular as I prod my way through a stack of old bills marked Past Due. Each half-written thought on the back of an envelope gives me a glimmer of hope, only to be dashed to the floor when it turns out to be nothing more than a grocery list or phone number for someone he probably owed money to.
I’m about to give up when I find a list of dangerous items scrawled on a grocery receipt crumbled in
the garbage near the kitchen.
Big jump
Helicopter
Escape? Explosions?
Flames
Grand Canyon
I frantically flip the receipt over and scan the list of items until I find the timestamp. My heart races. It’s the first solid lead I’ve had since I started this nonsense of saving lives instead of taking them. This list was written today.
I shove the slip of paper into my pocket and dig a little deeper into the trash, hoping to find something more substantial. That’s when I hear the click of the doorknob. I look for someplace to hide and am forced to settle for the tiny island in the kitchen. I won’t go unnoticed for anything beyond the most cursory of glances, but the couch is too far away and a bad hiding place is better than none at all.
The door creaks open and I recognize the old familiar voice of the land lady. “The other officer was here earlier,” she says. “Did he not find what he was looking for?”
“No, ma’am,” says another voice. “This is a follow up on a separate matter.”
“Oh,” she says. “Well, it doesn’t seem he’s here.”
“Well, I’ll be just a moment, ma’am. I need to take a look around for a minute.”
I furrow an eyebrow. That can’t be legal, can it? Doesn’t he-
“Don’t you need a warrant for that?” the old woman asks, finishing my thought for me.
“No, ma’am,” he says. “I’m not collecting evidence. Just trying to find out where we can find him. I have a few questions I need to ask him.”
I’m pretty sure that’s not how it works.
“That’s not how they do it on Law & Order,” she says.
What is with this lady reading my thoughts? I wish I could have her around every time I’m hiding out trying to overhear information.
“Well, ma’am, that is a TV show. They make up a lot of stuff for dramatic effect.”
His voice trails off toward the end, and I hear his footsteps draw close. I freeze. Has he seen me? I hear a click behind me.
The Daredevil Corpse (The Departed Book 2) Page 7
