Lucky Score

by Deborah Coonts

  “I can talk to them, and it can’t go anywhere.”

  I didn’t think this was the time to enlighten Mr. Nixon as to the limitations of his theory. Since Squash didn’t step in, I assumed he agreed. “So,” I continued, “the clients get the drugs from the dealer and the insurance proceeds?”

  “Sweet deal, huh?”

  More like a felonious deal. “And the dealer has hot goods. What happens then?”

  “Sold on the black market. There’s tons of folks who just want to own a piece of greatness, you know? They don’t care how they come by it.”

  Yeah. And somewhere out there in this world of two-bit hoods and major players all looking to score, my young cousin was looking for a gun.

  I needed to find her before the bad guys got a whiff of her scent.

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  N OBODY HAD heard from Bethany. I’d called everyone I could think of while my not-so-happy little gang waited for Metro to show up.

  Of course, Mona had to have been right—Bethany didn’t have her phone.

  When the cops arrived, I gave my statement, corroborated by all present, and took my leave, but only after threatening Squash with bodily harm if he didn’t deliver Miss P safe and sound and intact when all the excitement was over.

  Out of ideas, I waited until I knew a black-and-white had been scrambled to pick up Stanley and Godwin. With half a mind to stay and watch them sweat, I fought the urge. I couldn’t, not with Bethany unaccounted for and an invitation burning a hole through my imagination. The guest list alone would be worth the price of admission. With his new ankle jewelry, Mr. Ponder wouldn’t be there. And, without supervision, Mrs. Ponder would be fun to watch.

  Despite my anticipation, I had a feeling Teddie and Jordan were going to enjoy it far more than I.

  But I wouldn’t enjoy it at all if I couldn’t get a bead on Bethany. Fairly confident she could handle what came her way—she’d already fielded a lot in her few years—I still worried. Somehow, I felt a responsibility that truly wasn’t mine, once again proving that if there was an emotional minefield, I could not only find it, but charge right in without a dog to sniff the way through.

  Now there was an idea! A dog to ferret out the bombs of life and help you avoid them. But the problems helped you grow. Okay, so a terrible idea—avoiding life was never a good long-term strategy. Sort of like the guy who sold pieces of his life to investors through the Internet. They all got to vote on the life decisions he made. Last I heard, it hadn’t worked all that great, despite his initial euphoria at offloading responsibility for his decisions.

  Life by committee. Just shoot me now.

  Not feeling at all in the party mood, I headed toward the Ferrari. With Squash Trenton in the middle of the melee, I felt pretty confident justice would be served, although perhaps not in the expected way.

  The lawyer piqued my interest. A bit of a conundrum, he kept me off balance. I liked that, and yet I didn’t. A challenge always intrigued me. Part of that was the juvenile in me—just tell me I can’t have it or can’t do it and my resolve hardens and my focus pinpoints. The more adult side of me knew that not every challenge needed to be met and not every interesting man was worth the attention, in fact almost none were. But…

  Didn’t they say keep your friends close and your enemies closer?

  A rationale for questionable behavior—and that would be painting it in the best possible light.

  If I was my own worst enemy, how exactly did the adage play out? Not sure I could keep myself any closer. Of course, I’d twisted the logic into a worthless tautology, leaving only the kernel of truth it grew from.

  Romeo sprang to mind—or really moved to the front as he’d taken up permanent residency in the worry lobe of my tiny brain and its counterpart in my heart.

  My thumb found his speed dial number.

  After the twelfth ring, I hung up. Out of ideas, with no destination, I just stood there on the sidewalk, in a not-so-nice part of downtown, after dark.

  And I gave up.

  I couldn’t do it anymore.

  Years ago, I’d met a criminal defense attorney at the height of his game. Shortly thereafter he dropped off the face of the earth. Several years later he resurfaced as the manager of an Italian joint in one of the ubiquitous, cookie-cutter strip malls dotting suburbia. His words haunted me still.

  You spend too much time with the bad guys and you become one.

  But I’d spent my life training to be who I’d become—I wasn’t competent to be anyone or anything else. Me, the great hedger of bets, and I hadn’t left myself an escape route out of the life I’d let pick me.

  All I’d wanted to do was save everybody.

  And it dawned on me that some folks didn’t want saving. Others didn’t deserve it.

  Something whizzed by my head. Lost as I was, it didn’t register at first.

  A voice out of the darkness shouted, “Get down!”

  Paralyzed, I didn’t move.

  A body hit me from behind. The air went out of me as I face-planted on the cement. My nose took the brunt of it. Whoever hit me landed on top, then held me there with his weight.

  “Silencer,” the body said in a muttered curse.

  Another shot ricocheted off the storefront. Then another shattered glass.

  “Yep, silenced,” I reiterated because that’s the one thought I could muster. “Get off.” I tried to rise against the man’s weight, gaining little ground.

  Maneuvering under him, I worked my hands under my shoulder. Gathering strength and some air, I took several deep breaths and only succeeded in making myself madder.

  “I said, get off!” With my palms under my shoulders, I levered myself with all the force I could muster.

  The body on top of me rolled to the left. He placed a hand on my shoulder. I couldn’t make out his face with the light behind him. “Stay here, okay? Get behind something solid.”

  Jeremy! The accent finally registered on my diminished consciousness.

  “Just this once, don’t do anything stupid.” He pushed off and disappeared into the darkness before I could tell him stupid was all I had left.

  I half crab-walked and half crawled to the car, then, with my back against solid metal, took a moment to gather myself. I tasted the metallic tang of blood. With two fingers I pinched down the bridge of my nose, working gingerly toward the tip. Halfway down, it wiggled where it shouldn’t. I bit down on a gasp of pain. My hand came away wet—blood. So this is what a broken nose feels like. Cosmic payback?

  Nothing I could do about that…except deliver some payback of my own.

  The shooter was mine.

  Like I said, stupid was all I had left.

  Reaching up, I popped the door then risked brief illumination by the interior light as I rooted for the Glock I’d started keeping under the driver’s seat. Thankfully, the Italians weren’t big on bright lights inside fast cars. The gun was where I’d left it, and it felt good in my hand. I didn’t have to check the chamber. What’s the point of having one if the thing wasn’t loaded?

  I cocked an ear to the wind, listening. No shots. No shouts.

  Jeremy had run south. The pawnshop was north. Using a dark spot between the weak glow of the streetlamps, I crossed the street.

  North was my bet.

  Frenchie said he was supposed to hand off the goods to a cop.

  A cop could connect the dots.

  A cop would know where to look.

  My give up gone, I fought the urge to hurry. Miss P was back there. Marion and Squash, too.

  Frenchie could handle just about anything…unless the shooter intended to shoot him, which didn’t raise my blood pressure overmuch. Eventually, we all got what we deserved—or what we couldn’t out-run.

  Keeping to the shadows, I broke into a lumbering trot as I limped to protect my injured calf. The warm trickle of blood oozed down to my upper lip, then sideways to the corner of my mouth, then down my chin. Nothing I could do about it, so I igno
red it.

  Up ahead, somebody else had the same idea to use the shadows as cover. I slowed as I watched, keeping pace but not closing, not yet. Hard to tell in the darkness, but I’d say male, not large enough to be Jeremy. And he held one arm down at his side as if he had a gun. He ducked behind a car across from the pawnshop, giving me the opening I needed.

  Crouching, I moved between the cars parked along the curb and into the street. Hugging the cars, I kept them between the figure in the shadows and me. Seven cars separated us, and I counted them as I moved as quickly as I could.

  From his vantage point, the guy had a clear view through the front glass windows into the shop. Given a modicum of skill, he could pick off anyone he wanted.

  That thought alone made me want to kill him.

  At the sixth car, my breath coming in short gasps, my legs screaming to straighten, my back joining the chorus, and my calf on fire, I moved back between the cars toward the curb. Afraid to make a noise, I moved slowly, methodically, an inch at a time, fighting myself. What if he shot through the window? What if he shot Miss P? My heart hammered. I held my breath. Seconds turned into eternity.

  One more car to go. He was at the other end, between this car and the next, eyeing the pawnshop. The light through the window dimmed the shadows. I felt exposed. Sweat slicked my palm. I adjusted my grip on the gun.

  A car rounded the corner up ahead, then gunned in our direction. My heart skipped a beat. I held my breath. I tensed. The car accelerated past.

  I eased my breath out in a silent sigh.

  The man was close. A matter of feet.

  So close I could hear him breathing, smell his sweat.

  I could shoot him. But if I missed, the pawnshop was behind him.

  I set the Glock on the ground, then I coiled myself and counted to three.

  On three, I launched myself around the car and tackled the man still taking cover there. Taken by surprise, he had no time to turn or even raise a hand or gun in defense.

  I rode him to ground. He landed with a meaty thud and a groan.

  His gun—I’d been right about the gun—skittered under the car.

  “Shit.” A ragged gasp for air. “Lucky?”

  “Romeo?” Now I knew why he hadn’t answered his phone—he’d been skulking around in the dark…with a gun. I held him down as relief and homicide coursed through my veins.

  “How’d you know it was me?”

  “Your perfume. Could you get off me? I can’t breathe.” He expelled his last bit of breath with the last word.

  “I don’t wear perfume.” Sympathy eluded me. I didn’t give voice to any of my worst fears. I let him up but stayed behind the cover of the car after retrieving my gun. I wasn’t willing to even admit the possibility that Romeo could’ve been shooting at me, so there had to be another shooter out there. Another shooter with a silencer.

  “Female. Large. Pissed. And with a limp. You sorta stand out.”

  “Don’t hold any punches, okay?” A bum calf, a broken nose, and now a bruised ego. “You knew I was back there?”

  “You got skills, but skulking isn’t one of them.”

  I could live with that. “What the fuck are you doing out here?”

  Romeo joined me crouched behind the car. He kept an eye on the pawnshop. Inside the shop, Marion sat on a Honda 250, dwarfing it. The detective who had grilled me now had Frenchie in the bright light. Frenchie hadn’t moved—he remained rooted to the same spot behind the counter. Uniforms swarmed the place.

  I couldn’t see Miss P.

  “Who’s the cop?”

  “Somebody new, on loan from Reno.”

  On loan. That meant something internal was going down at Metro.

  “Friend or foe?”

  Romeo took a moment as if weighing dice before throwing them down the table. “Depends on how smart he is.”

  Didn’t everything? Nothing like having your life in somebody else’s hands and hoping to hell the guy was smart enough to figure the score. Not as unusual as it should be.

  While we watched, I felt under the car for Romeo’s gun. My hand touched metal. “Since when do you use a silencer?” I retrieved it and handed it to him.

  He stuffed it in his coat pocket. “Since I started trying to beat them at their own game.”

  I shook my head. A dangerous game. “You don’t need me to tell you how stupid an idea that is.”

  “I think you just did.”

  “No, that was my pitch to join the team, your team.”

  “Well, I appreciate the noble gesture and all, but I haven’t a clue what game we’re playing.” His sigh held a hint of desperation and a resignation that wouldn’t be helpful and could prove deadly.

  “Buck up, Grasshopper. We’ll figure this out. We always do.” I hazarded another glance over the hood of the car. Still no Miss P anywhere in the shop, at least, not that I could see through the front window. “Were you shooting at me?”

  “Of course. Anybody else would’ve hit you standing there like the wide side of a barn.”

  “I think I’m insulted.”

  “I wasn’t the only one out here with a gun. I wanted to make sure you hit the concrete. Lots of people would love to take a crack at you.”

  “Now I feel honored.”

  “You are the weirdest person I know.”

  “Flattery, so beneath you. If you have a plan, now would be a good time to tell me. I have a party to go to.” I glanced at my phone. Plenty of time—if I didn’t dawdle too much. Just in case we got hung up, I took a moment to text Teddie.

  You got us all costumes?

  I held my breath for the answer.

  Got them. It’s going to take a while to talk you into yours, so leave me a window, okay?

  He wouldn’t…oh, but he would. Even though unsure of my transgression, I knew, somehow he’d make me pay.

  “You’re going to the party?” Romeo sounded like he didn’t believe me, but he knew better. “What, and miss all this?”

  “The guest list will be most interesting. You said so yourself.”

  “Need a date?”

  “A cop would dampen the frivolity.”

  He let out a long sigh. Even though I couldn’t see him very well, hidden as we were in the shadows, I knew he was shaking his head, his face scrunched into his best disgruntled look. “Why I wanted to be a cop.” Romeo sighed into the night—a sigh full of subtext. I didn’t even know that was possible. “I should be you.”

  “Me? Well, that would come with all sorts of complications.”

  “I’m adaptable.”

  “Funny, I never pegged you as a switch-hitter.”

  “What?” The kid wasn’t following. Of course, he was concerned about life, and, apparently sex, or making a joke about it, was foremost in my pea brain.

  So helpful. I’d left him somewhere near his own goal line. “Never mind.” I leaned my head back to rest against the metal.

  “Is that blood all over you?” Romeo switched from banter to concern.

  “When you started shooting at me, Jeremy tackled me. My nose took the brunt of it.”

  “Jeremy’s gonna have hell to pay.” Romeo sounded like he wanted a ticket to the face-off.

  “Can’t blame a dog for being a dog. He was just doing what any guy on testosterone overload would do.”

  Romeo angled a better look at me in the light.

  “What?”

  “Just making sure you’re really you. You don’t sound like you.”

  “A loaded statement full of wiggle room. So, what are you doing here?”

  “I could ask you the same question,” he deflected, buying time.

  “I was following some stolen goods and Bethany, on a suicide mission looking for a gun. She ran away from Mona who is not pleased.”

  “Bethany. That kid has a strong streak of you in her.”

  “That’s what worries me.”

  “Nothing to worry about—she’s smart enough not to cross the lines you leap over. I
saw her get in a cab about fifteen minutes ago.”

  I thought I’d faint as relief opened a flood of blood from my brain. “Where’d you see her?”

  “Being escorted out of one of the pawnshops a couple of blocks over. She’d given the guy one hell of a time.”

  “Any idea where she was headed?”

  “I heard her tell the driver to take her to the Babylon.”

  By my calculations, fifteen minutes should be enough to get her home. If the driver knew the back roads, she should be in the bosom of her family once again. As if on cue, my phone vibrated—I’d turned it to silent. Mona. Since I knew the news and didn’t have time for the drama, I declined the call.

  “Is there anything more irritating than a teenager who thinks she knows everything and wants to rub everyone’s nose in it?” Romeo sounded like he’d had experience.

  “Oh, a few things.” Young, wet-behind-the-ears detectives going all Lone Ranger and playing a dangerous game ranked a bit higher than stupid teenagers, but with no upside, I didn’t push it. “Did you see if Bethany had a rifle?”

  “She’s seventeen!”

  “And this is Utopia where we all live on love and happiness and play by the rules.” Frankly, that sounded like Hell—I’d have no purpose, no reason to get out of bed in the morning. “Some things are not self-evident, Romeo. By definition, law-abiding citizens do not break the law. That leaves the rest of us, Bethany included, who will bend all the rules to see the good guys win. So, I showed you mine, now your turn.”

  “No gun.”

  “What brought you out to this fine neighborhood after dark? Are you looking for the rifle as well?”

  “No.” Romeo sounded like he wished it all was that simple. “I was following Reynolds.”

  “Did Jeremy come with you?” Romeo popped the magazine from the handle of his pistol, then added enough rounds to bring it up to maximum.

  “No.” With everyone doubting Romeo, I didn’t tell him I had Jeremy following Reynolds. Instantly, I felt horror at my waffling on Romeo’s virtue. But I didn’t tell him. “You said you shot at me. Did Reynolds also take aim my direction?”

  “Yep. Stupid fuck. He should know that does nothing more than piss you off.”