by Anthony Izzo
She looked back down the tunnel. Hopefully she could talk him out before the cops got here. “Dad, the cops are coming.”
“I need to save this building.”
“You can’t fight it from jail,” Laura said.
“As soon as they pull me out of here, this place will be rubble. I can’t get the city to stay the demolition. And even though that moose standing next to you would probably like to bust my schnoz right about now, I don’t think they’ll tear the building down around me.”
“Don’t be so sure,” Pirrone said.
Laura stood up. “That’s my father you’re talking about.”
“Yeah?”
“You remove one brick while he’s in there and I’ll find the most rabid pit bull of a lawyer I can and sic him on you.”
“That old man is trespassing and you know it.”
“His name is Charles,” Laura said.
“Charles is trespassing, then.”
“Let me talk to him,” she said, and crouched down again. “Dad, you have to come out.”
“You have no idea what’s riding on this, Laura. None.”
“They don’t let you golf from jail, you know.”
Dad made a disgusted noise. “They’re not sending me to jail.”
“That cardigan won’t match with a prison jumpsuit.”
The creases in his forehead unfolded and a smile crossed his face, and then disappeared. He didn’t want to give in, but she had gotten a quick smile. Perhaps she was breaking through.
“Let them move me.”
Laura heard footsteps. She looked around and saw two Buffalo cops, both roughly the size of refrigerators, climbing the steps. The one in the lead was sliding a baton into his belt. The one behind him had a flashlight.
“Glad you guys are here,” Pirrone said.
“Where is he?” The first cop said.
Pirrone pointed to the opening.
“Who are you, ma’am?” The cop said. Laura stood up, looked at his name tag. It read: SLOWINSKI.
“I’m the trespasser’s daughter,” Laura said. “I’m trying to talk him out of there.”
“What’s he doing in there?” Slowinski said.
“He’s trying to save this building from demolition.”
Slowinski raised his eyebrows. “Better ways to do that.”
“The Common Council didn’t listen to him.”
“I’ll give him a chance to come out, but if he doesn’t, and I have to go in after him, he’s getting arrested.”
Her dad wouldn’t last half a day in jail.
Laura started to speak and stopped in midsentence when she saw her father emerge from the tunnel. Cobwebs littered the back of his sweater, and his fine gray hair stood askew.
“You going to leave now?” Slowinski said.
“I can’t fight from jail, can I?”
Can’t fight what, Dad?
“I suppose not,” Slowinski said. “We’re out.”
The two cops felt their way down the stairs. Pirrone muttered something under his breath and motioned for them to follow. At the bottom of the stairs, Laura gave him back the hard hat and he gave her a thumbs-up as a big engine coughed to life.
Laura looked back at the building. Even the rats might stay out of a place that dark and dreary.
She walked toward her car, her dad next to her. She put her arm around him, gave him a squeeze. “You had me worried.”
He gave a quick smile, then turned and looked at the building with a measure of sadness. No, not sadness, it was more like worry. The same look he used to get before she left on a date with a new guy, as if Dad feared she had brought home the Boston Strangler.
“What is it about this place?” she said.
“They don’t know that they’re doing. The only reason I came out was because in jail, I can’t do any more.”
“Do any more of what?” Laura said.
“Getting ready.”
“For?”
“Honey, can you get out of here, pack up, leave?”
The question caught her off guard. She felt as if she’d been rocked back a bit. “There’s this little thing called the hospital, and they like me to show up now and then.”
“Don’t get smart, girl. I’m not kidding. Can you?”
“Why would I leave?”
He placed his hands on her shoulders. “Things are going to get bad, Laura, and it all starts with this building coming down. That’s all I can tell you, but very soon you won’t want to be in the city. Not if I think what’s going to happen does happen.”
Was he drifting into the early stages of dementia or Alzheimer’s? Or maybe the stress of fighting to keep the brewery open had cracked Dad. Either way, the prospect of him slipping into some sort of mental abyss was disturbing.
“Dad, maybe you should get checked out. We’ve got a real good psychiatrist at the hospital, Dr. Pham, or maybe start you out with a physical.”
“Always the doctor, aren’t you?” He dropped his hands. Behind them, metal squealed as an excavator rolled to the building. The operator raised the boom and the metal claw bit into the brick and sent up a puff of dust. Again, Dad looked back at the building, his face taking on a pinched look.
“It’s not just for historical value, is it?” Laura asked.
Dad turned and faced her. “I wish I could explain, Laura, but not now. There’s too much to do.”
“You can tell me anything. That’s what you always told me.”
“If you can’t leave town, stay buttoned up in your house for a while. Please?”
“So the building is going to release a dust cloud, set off my allergies?”
Dad frowned. “Just listen to me, Laura.” He looked down at his sweater and brushed off a bit of gray dust.
“I’ll be careful.”
“You’ll need to be more than careful. Walk me to my car?”
He was being cryptic, which didn’t surprise her, but his considering the demolition of an abandoned building to be a threat to her left her unnerved. Not because she thought his warning had any validity, but because the cheese may have slipped off Dad’s cracker.
They passed through a cloud of dust and around them the shouting of men and the whining of metal on metal filled Iroquois Alley. They reached Dad’s car, a white Caddy, and he opened the door.
“I hate shrinks, you know.”
“I’m sorry, but you’ve got me worried.”
Dad leaned over and kissed her on the cheek. “Stay safe, Laura. Hopefully things will be fine and I can keep it in check. And don’t worry about me.”
But I do, she thought. Oh, how I do.
CHAPTER 4
Upon entering the house, the first thing Dave noticed was the lack of noise, specifically the White Stripes or The Ramones pumping through the stereo speakers. The lack of noise left him on edge, and although he knew he hadn’t been followed and the house appeared untouched, he wished for his revolver right now.
“Sara?”
He slipped through the kitchen and the living room and climbed the stairs. He entered her room. The blue comforter was neatly tucked under the pillow, the stereo off, her closet and dresser drawers closed. She wasn’t working at Cook’s Records today, and on days she didn’t work, Sara came home and started on geometry, one of her least favorite subjects. She should’ve been here.
A quick call to Lori Packer, Sara’s best friend, confirmed she wasn’t there. He tried the school and Mrs. Davenport, the school secretary, confirmed that Sara had been by the office before leaving at three p.m.
Where the hell was she?
He checked the rest of the house, calling her name, and when he got no answer, he decided to pack up, lock up, and try Robbie’s house.
He threw together some clothes in a leather satchel, along with the Magnum and a box of shells. From under the mattress, he pulled out eighteen hundred dollars in cash, mostly saved from his drywall and carpentry work. He stuck his hand back underneath the mattress, unable to find what he wanted. The ar
ticles about Laura Pennington were gone, as was the letter.
It didn’t matter now. What mattered was finding Sara.
He took the cash and his bag and went to the kitchen, where he counted off fifteen hundred dollars, the next three months’ rent, and stuffed it in a number ten envelope. Then he called Vera Peterson, his landlady, and left her a message saying he had to leave for a few months and the rent was on the counter. Harris Roofing had laid him off, so there was no need to call in sick to a job.
He got in the pickup truck and threw the satchel on the passenger side floor. The Magnum went in the glove compartment. As he drove over to Robbie’s, his worry about being followed had subsided. The sunshine came in the truck, warm on his face, and it seemed unlikely that an attack would occur on such a day. The breeze had died, and a bleached-out fall day had given way to the golden hues of Indian summer. He felt slightly better.
He pulled into Robbie’s driveway, where he heard the hum of a weed whacker coming from behind the house. He killed the engine and got out and strolled through the side yard, past a row of neatly planted hostas and a blue storage shed.
He rounded the corner and saw Robbie swinging the trimmer like a scythe. Robbie looked up, aware that someone was watching, and he cut the engine, which puttered out.
David approached him and Robbie took a step back. He was a good kid, and an honest one, but he had one failing: Sara. If Sara had suggested they construct a life-size replica of the Eiffel Tower out of Popsicle sticks and Krazy Glue, Robbie would have cheerfully agreed to it. David had no doubt he knew where she had gone.
“Hi, Mr. Dresser.”
“I’ll be brief. Where is she?”
“Not at home?”
“Do you think I’d be asking if she was home?”
Robbie ran a thumb along the weed whacker’s trigger guard, looked at the grass. “You going to hit me or something?”
Dave stifled a snicker. “That depends. You didn’t do anything that would make her suddenly vomit in the mornings or gain inordinate amounts of weight, did you?”
Robbie looked up at him. “Hell, no. Sara wouldn’t even let me—”
“That’s enough info right there. Now where is she? It’s important.”
“I took her to the bus station.”
“For a tour?”
“She got on a bus.”
“Where to?”
“Buffalo, New York.”
“Why?”
“She found some pictures of her real mom.”
The pictures hadn’t been with his stash of money, had they? He’d been in such a hurry he hadn’t noticed them missing. “When did she leave?”
“About an hour and a half ago.”
David scowled. “Whose idea was it?”
“Uh ... Mine?”
“You sure about that?”
“Hers.”
He felt a sick little cramp in his belly, and things around him seemed to spin and lose focus. She was heading right into the thick of things.
David thanked Robbie and ran for the truck.
Reverend Frank opened the door of the Trailblazer, threw in his bag, and sank into the passenger seat. He shut the door, taking in the artificial strawberry smell from the air freshener that dangled from the rearview mirror.
He checked his watch. He had enough time to make a phone call to Charles in Buffalo. He leaned to one side and dug his cell phone out of his pocket, flipped it open, and dialed Charles’s phone number. Charles picked up on the third ring.
“Charles Pennington.”
“Charles, Frank Heatly.”
“Thank goodness.”
“You sound out of breath,” Frank said.
“I just got home. Bad news.”
Why had he thought it would be anything different? “Shoot.”
“They’ve torn down the brewery. I tried to stop it, but they called the cops and Laura showed up and I’d be no good to us in jail.”
That was bad news. The worst. “You fought a good fight, Charles. Did you see the news about Little and his family?”
“Brutal. And it was Them, no question.”
Frank looked out the windshield and saw no one. He didn’t need Sandra poking around asking questions. “David and I are on our way there. I’m going to call Chen in Routersville and see what the situation is there.”
Routersville was one of the last strongholds, and if things were going to get bad in Buffalo, they would need the Guardians in Routersville to help. Chen was always up for a fight. She would be rallying the troops by the time he and David arrived.
“Do you think it can still contain him?”
Charles coughed. “With the building down, I don’t know. And I’m not sure about the strength of the Stone. And the Dark Ones are probably on the move already.”
“So this is it,” Frank said.
“I’m afraid so.”
Frank wished him well and hung up. He took his bag and got out of the truck. He looked at the Adirondack chair out on the deck of the parsonage and lamented that he might not be back (despite what he had told Sandra). Spending a lazy Saturday afternoon with a book and a glass of loganberry might be a thing of the past. All of this might be gone, the church, the town, all of it. All of America and maybe the rest of the world, too, if that brewery didn’t hold its prisoner.
He wished for David to get here. Ordinarily, he despised a long car ride, but he never felt more anxious to get on the road than now. He checked his watch and waited for the ride that would eventually lead him to the Enemy.
Milo Gruder worked the excavator’s foot pedals and joysticks and swung the arm around and over the red dump truck. He’d missed the excitement at the brewery, having spent half the day on another job, where he sheared apart abandoned oil tanks. Apparently some nut had crawled inside and the cops were called. Figures he would miss it.
He released the load from the machine’s grapple bucket, and it thudded into the dump with a clang, giving up a cloud of brown dust. The machine’s controls were like arms and legs, second nature to him. He was the best guy Eastern Wrecking had, an ace with a bucket or a shear, and he knew it. He didn’t mind the heat in the summer, the cold in the winter, the dust, the mud, any of it. The only complaint he had was the stabbing pain that radiated down his right leg. Sciatica, the doctor had told him, an inevitable condition arising from spending fifty hours a week seated in the same position. But the pay was good, and in another two years he planned on retiring to a place in Boca Raton.
He finished loading the truck, the last one to go out. He shut down the machine and stepped down from the cab. The air was crisp and had taken on a dry, dusty smell. Nearby, half of the old brewery lay in a heap of bricks and twisted metal, and the dilapidated houses beyond the building were now visible.
Milo took off his hard hat and wiped his brow with the back of his hand. A chill washed over him. It had been warm in the cab of the machine, but damned if it wasn’t getting downright nippy.
He gathered up his lunch box from the cab of the machine, as well as his quilted flannel jacket. He put the jacket on, remembering it as a present from Vera. She had bought it for him two Christmases ago, five months before the aneurysm dropped her to the kitchen floor and he had found her slack jawed and drooling. She had died during emergency brain surgery. He would keep the coat until it was rags. It had a rip in the sleeve and a tattered hole in the front pocket, but it had come from her and he was loath to throw it out. She would have sewn it and patched it if she were here. God, he missed her.
He started past the loading door, then the pile of rubble. The sky had started to go dark purple, and he hurried a bit to his truck. The East Side didn’t have a good reputation. Just last week two rival drug gangs had a shoot-out on Swan Street, just a few blocks in the other direction. Milo had enough holes in his head already without needing an artificial one.
As he neared the truck, he heard the clink of brick on brick and he turned to look at the pile. A small cloud of dust had risen,
as if the pile had stirred. It may have been a rat, although before they could start demolition, an exterminator had been brought in and poison bait set out. The city insisted on it before they issued a permit.
The pile shifted again and a few bricks tumbled from the top of a four-foot pile. That’s one big rat, Milo thought.
“Anybody there?” He realized how feeble his voice sounded, but he couldn’t deny his racing heartbeat and the stab of fear that went through him.
He popped open the door of his truck and slid inside. After starting it up, he backed out and pulled down the alley. As he drove farther from the wreckage, he felt a little silly jumping at what amounted to nothing more than a rat in a pile of bricks.
He reached Broadway and signaled left. The cell phone clipped to his belt rang. He unclipped it, opened the phone and said, “Yeah?”
“Milo. Drenker here. You still on the site?”
Great, a call from the boss when all he wanted was to get home.
“Just pulling out,” Milo said.
“Do me a favor. Bill Holly called me up. He left a chop saw sitting by the big loading door. If it isn’t already gone, grab it, will you? It won’t be there in the morning if we don’t.”
He wanted to think of an excuse, but couldn’t come up with one. Don’t really want to drive back there, do you? Damn Holly for leaving a seven-hundred-dollar saw on the site. At least maybe Drenker chewed his ass for forgetting the tool.
“All right.”
“You’re solid, Milo.”
He didn’t feel particularly solid as he hung up the phone. Milo swung the truck around, kicking up a dust cloud. The suspension bounced and the joints whined as he steered the truck back down the rutted alley.
He stopped the truck within twenty feet of the brick pile. Leaving the headlights on and the engine running, he climbed out. Wish I had a flashlight, he thought.
He stood at the side of the truck for a moment, listening, and when he heard no more scraping noises, he started forward. Near the roll-up door, Drenker had said. Just grab it, throw it in the pickup bed, and scoot. That’s all.
Approaching the loading door, Milo squinted. There it was, one of the new Bosch saws Eastern had bought for this project. Man, Bill Holly was going to get it for leaving the saw on-site. He gripped the saw by the handle and hoisted it. So far, so good.
