OUR SECRET BABY

by Paula Cox

  And I do.

  ***

  Maya gets up from the bed and gets something out of the black bag: a small, white box. She snaps a pill through the plastic sheath and pops it down.

  “Easy peasy,” she smiles. I smile back and pat the sheets, motioning for her to return. Christ—here we are like a married couple in their honeymoon suite. The worst thing is, I’ve got no problem with it. Nothing on my mind whatsoever—not even mobsters with big guns and deadly fucking tempers. Not even the Stitches. Not even myself. Everything’s on Maya.

  She floats back to the bed with that smell like flowers and bubblegum. And now, knowing this second uncaged Maya, I like everything about her.

  She nestles herself in the crook of my arm. Her fingers draw patterns on my arms.

  “You have an incredible body,” she whispers to me. This is how we’ve been communicating for the past few hours, as though anything louder would break something valuable but invisible that only we two knew was there.

  “So do you,” I say. It’s absolutely honest. I find her nipple and begin to stroke it with my thumb. She doesn’t flinch.

  “Have you ever done anything like that before?” I ask.

  “Nipple clamps you mean?”

  “Sure.”

  “Just when I masturbate. Never with someone else.”

  “Why me?”

  “What do you mean, honey cakes?”

  “Kirill’t call me that.” I apply a little bit more pressure on her nipple until I see her wince. She knows I’m expecting it and doesn’t.

  “Then you’ll just stay Quinn. How about that? My Quinn?”

  She buries her head into my neck. I hold her there, running my fingers through the tendrils of her hair.

  “It’s funny, you know.”

  “What’s funny?”

  She unlocks herself from my embrace and looks at me seriously. “That we can do all of that—you can force me to surrender to you and do whatever you want, but I still don’t feel like I know anything about you.”

  I stiffen. “I’m not interesting.”

  “I’d disagree.”

  “Then you’d be wrong.”

  She touches my arm. The simple pressure sends shivers through me. What is this girl doing to me?

  “Quinn,” her voice is soft and tender. “Why is it that I have the feeling you’re trying to keep something from me?”

  “I don’t know. That’s not a fair question to ask.”

  “You haven’t given me any fair answers.” She frowns. And so here we go. We’ve spent all of thirty minutes being nice to each other and now she’s going to go on asking questions and ruin it.

  “You don’t trust me.”

  “It’s not that. It’s definitely not that. I wouldn’t have let you put pinchers on my nipples if I didn’t trust you.”

  “Then what is it?”

  “What I’ve already said. I don’t know anything about you. Only that Daddy hired you over a bunch of other toughs, that you like rough sex, and that you’ve got weird tastes in music, and that’s everything. It’s like for two months all I’ve known about is what I could have learned on your Facebook. You’re still a stranger to me.”

  I realize that this can only go one way. Better to meet the road at half point than make her go the whole way by yourself.

  “Alright.” I shift the blanket off my shoulder and lean over on one elbow, facing her. “Then ask. But we’re going to do this fairly: anything you ask me I can turn around and ask you back. Deal?”

  “Deal.” She hops closer to me, still in her Indian position squat and kisses me on the eye. “What’s your favorite color?”

  “Really?”

  “Answer.”

  I think for a moment. No one’s asked me this since my Kindergarten teacher.

  “Black,” I decide.

  “That’s honestly the best you can do? You’re such a tool.”

  “What’s yours then?” I ignore her witty insult. Pink, I think. Or something springtime, bright, and super-girly, like yellow.

  “Green.” She has to think about it for a second, too. “Because it’s the color of the sky before a big thunderstorm. Okay, favorite TV show?”

  “Kirill’t watch TV.”

  “Movie, then.”

  “Lawrence of Arabia.”

  “Casablanca.” She lifts an eyebrow at me. “That’s not half bad. Favorite song?”

  “Ask me something else.”

  “Favorite musician?”

  “Miles Davis,” I say, remembering Palmert’s “Kind of Blue” album that night at his house. Christ—seems like forever since I’ve seen those guys.

  “I don’t have one. We’ll say in the genre of oldies. Okay.” She snaps her knuckles like it’s time to get down to serious work. “First job?”

  “Repair work on a crew. Woodworking, mostly. You?”

  “Never had a job. Probably never will.”

  “Do you want a job?”

  She goes quiet, thinking. “Ye-es,” she says hesitantly. “I think so. Something in design. Clothing design—I live for Chanel, you know.”

  “I didn’t know. Have you ever been out of the state?”

  “I thought I was asking the questions!”

  “Then ask.”

  “Have you ever been out of the state?”

  “I’ve been everywhere,” I say.

  “So have I.” The next question comes hesitantly. She’s moving over to uneven ground, and she knows it. “Do you like your job?”

  “Of course.”

  “That’s not what I mean. Your other job. Whatever you did before you were with me.”

  I tense up, sensing danger. Maya doesn’t know much about the Stitches. Doubt she even knows I’m a part of them.

  “I like it well enough,” I say, careful.

  “What do you do?”

  There’s the problem question. But what can I do now? If I avoid it, Maya will think the worst. But why avoid it? What have I done that she hasn’t seen before?

  I take a deep breath. “I hurt people.”

  Her eyes go a little wider but most of her remains steady. “Who?”

  “Bad people. People who deserve it.”

  She nods. Her hand finds mine, and we lace fingers. The next question is hardly more than a whisper.

  “Have you killed anyone?”

  “Yes.”

  Her fingers tighten. “More than one person?”

  “Yes.”

  “Who was the first?”

  I recognize how fast her heart is beating now. The same speed when I was on top of her. Making her mine. The speed it was going when she realized we were tied together, becoming one person. I grip her hand harder, reminding her that no matter what else might happen, I won’t let her go.

  “My father.”

  Chapter 15

  We return to our old hotel room the next morning. Maya drops her brown wig onto the bed and announces she’s going to take a shower. I know there’s an invitation in there too, and grin.

  “We’ll see.”

  “Once the tough guy, always the tough guy.” She leans in and kisses my chin. I drink in her smell of hotel soap, which smells so much better on her for some reason. “Mmm, stubble.” She kisses me again on the cheek, then on the corner of my lips. “My rock. My moss-prickly rock.”

  “I’ll shave once you’re out.”

  “No—keep it. I like it. And the mustache.”

  She wraps her arms around the back of my neck and lassos me into her kiss. I know she wants me to turn her around and put her up against the wall. I’ve already got my hand sliding up, cupping her butt underneath her skirt and rubbing her skin in that hard, pinching way she likes when I hear the buzz of my phone.

  “Leave it,” she says.

  “What if it’s your father?”

  “All the more reason to leave it.”

  “Can’t,” I break off although it almost kills me. “I’ve got a job to do.”

  “You’ve got
a job you’re ignoring. And a hundred to one odds your cell phone can’t beat you off like I can.”

  “Take your shower.” I kiss her on the nose. “I’ll be in soon as I’m finished.”

  She frowns but she knows that’s the best she’s going to get for now and leaves without arguing. I’m glad. Maya strikes me as the kind of girl who spits fire when she gets angry. After seeing how violent her fun, playful side can be, I’ve got absolutely no desire to see how violent her vicious side is.

  I answer the phone a second before it goes to voicemail. “Quinn here.”

  “I know Quinn’s here. Why the hell would I have called this number if I didn’t want to talk to my bro?”

  “Palmer?” I settle into the bed. “Good to hear from you.”

  “Likewise. It’s only taken twenty goddam missed calls. You’d better thank whatever lucky stars you’ve got I’m a patient guy.”

  “I told you I’ve got a gig.”

  I hear the spurt of hot water, and Maya’s voice through the door humming “Moon River.”

  “You may have your gig, big man, but your boys have got a problem.”

  “A serious problem?’

  “You think I’d have called you twenty fucking times if the problem wasn’t serious?”

  “It was at least that many times when you stalled your Camaro.”

  “That was serious. I was two hours late picking up my baby sister from ballet. Those other kids were flat out cruel to her man.”

  I lie down on the sectional with my phone still in hand and take the Item from the back of my jeans and set it next to me.

  “You serious about this being serious?” I ask. “Like—emergency situation stuff?”

  “Wouldn’t phrase it that way.” Palmer pauses to click on his lighter. That’s the second time I’ve heard the noise this phone call. From the sounds of things he’s chain-smoking for all his lungs are worth, which tells me he’s nervous.

  “But follow what I’m about to tell you, right? We’ve got this fan: big industrial fucker you use for like rock concerts and stuff, you with me? And right next to this fan, picture a mountain—a motherfucking mountain of dinosaur shit. And that mountain is set out on a little platform, and that platform leads right into that industrial-size fan. You got me?”

  “Palmer.” I take my legs off the sectional. “What’s happened?”

  Maya’s moved on from “Moon River” to “I Feel Pretty.” My heart’s starting to sink from everything Palmer’s saying. And not just what he’s saying, but all the stuff he’s leaving out. “Is it the Eastern Europeans?”

  “Eastern Europeans. Russians. Motherfucking Kazakhstani. It’s big guys with guns, Quinn. You remember I told you about Miles and the boys trying to settle their tab, yeah?”

  “They got into a fight in Easttown. You told me a few weeks ago.”

  “Fight?” Palmer laughs. “That was playground Cops and Robbers compared to this new shit, man. That was nothing. They’ve just put a goddamn target on our boy’s back, Quinn. Miles is in the hospital—I’ll tell you the whole thing later. But it’s the stuff in addition to that: I’m talking shots in the street and grenades cars. Give these guys a couple weeks man, and they’re gonna be making hits. Who the fuck makes hits in our city aside from the mob and us, huh?”

  His end of the phone goes quiet. I don’t say anything. I just let Palmer’s last sentence fill the room, mixing with the sound of Maya’s shower and the air conditioner and the faraway hum of cars on the freeway.

  “You mean war?” I finally say. I can’t see anything obviously, but I know from experience with the guy Palmer’s nodding.

  “War’s a good enough word for it.”

  “Jesus Christ. How the hell did you let this happen? Easttown’s supposed to be neutral. That’s the whole goddam reason we set up shop there in the first place.”

  “Stitches haven’t done a damn thing, Quinn. You know that. Hell, we’re pacifists compared to some of these meaner guys. Even during the territory wars we never took what didn’t belong to us. Now these big cats come in from downtown or wherever the hell they’re from and beat up a couple of our guys and expect us to turn tail. No way we’re gonna do that. Laws of physics, man. We’re reacting.”

  The shower goes off. I’ve got to wrap this up soon—there’s no way I want Maya listening in on this.

  “Palmer, I gotta get out of here soon. I’ve still got a job to do. But give me a few hours, and I’ll make it out to the docks.”

  “Quinn,” Palmer’s voice goes so neutral so fast it’s eerie. “You know what all this means, don’t you? I don’t need to make any of this clearer than I already do.”

  “We’re gonna be at war soon. You’re summoning your generals. What could be clearer?’

  “Good man. Stitches are looking forward to seeing you.”

  I drop the call just as Maya’s coming out of the bathroom. She trails steam like a Greek goddess. The gold of her hair and the darkness of her skin, which I can see plenty of because the only thing she’s got on is one of those super-short hotel bath towels—all of that along with the water from the shower makes her look like she’s shining.

  My heart sinks another floor. If all that Palmer said was true and not just drama; if the Stitches really are going to be at war soon, then I can probably count on my fingers the days I have left watching Maya Butler.

  “That was lonely,” she says, scrubbing a second towel through her hair to dry it out.

  “I’m sorry. I had to take it.”

  “Well, as long as you’re sorry. Or even if you’re not—that way there’s punishment.”

  She tosses her hair out a little more and turns my way and smiles, sticking out her top teeth and dragging them back from her bottom lip. Yesterday—hell—ten minutes ago, that would have been enough to make me lose my head. Just like she’s been wanting me to do this whole time. Now, I look down at the floor and don’t say anything.

  “What is it?” She sits down next to me on the sectional. “That wasn’t Daddy, was it?’

  “No. It was a friend of mine.”

  “Oh. What did he want?”

  “To come help him keep the bad guys away.”

  Her body goes a little rigid. “What bad guys?”

  “I don’t know yet. Guys who have already hurt some of our own. Guys that need taking down, so they don’t go making a mess out of everything. Dangerous guys.”

  “And you’re going to go.” It’s not a question. Maya knows just by looking at me that things have already been decided.

  “I have to,” I say. “They need me.”

  “But you’re part of a club, aren’t you? There are other guys who can do what you do. You don’t have to go at all.”

  I breathe out. It’s forced, heavy, and angry. I put an arm around Maya’s shoulders, and she doesn’t move it away, which is a good sign. She’s angry with me, but she’s still letting me in.

  “I don’t have to go. I want to go. These guys are my brothers. We’ve been everywhere together, raised each other. We’ve lost families together. When everything else goes bad, we’re always there. And I’m not going to let these guys face it on their own.”

  “So you’re just going to leave me here?” Her brown eyes go sharp as flint. “Soon as something more exciting comes along you’re just going to up and abandon me?”

  “I’m not abandoning you.”

  “How is this not abandoning me? How is it not abandoning me when you just trade me off for your other friends?”

  “Because I’m bringing you with me.”

  Chapter 16

  Kingston Pier. Easttown. About ten miles following the canal. Go straight out east another fifty miles or so and you’ll hit Bar Harbor, just south of Bangor. Then Nova Scotia, and finally Greenland. Those are your bearings.

  There’s a general rule of thumb for hitmen, mob men, and anyone who’s organized in highly illegal crime, that if you’re going to do anything you do it at the Pier. The thing hasn’t bee
n used in thirty years, maybe even longer. Used to be the main docking grounds all the skippers used for their boats. The only problem was that the original architects of the place didn’t take into account the rising tides and water levels or any of the stuff you see over at the Docks on a Saturday morning.