by Tim Maleeny
Julio was about to say something, try to shout above the ringing in his ears, when he registered a subtle movement of Zorro’s feet. He was pivoting on his left foot, shifting his weight around to the right. He was bringing the shotgun around in a tight arc, moving the barrel away from the body in the chair toward the only other person in the room.
Julio.
Zorro’s crooked teeth curved into a cruel smile as he prepared to take his last shot. From less than five feet away, the shotgun would punch a hole in Julio the size of a basketball. Game over.
Julio took one giant step across the room and swung his pistol like a club, catching the barrel of the shotgun and knocking it to the left. Zorro held fast to the grip and started another arc toward Julio’s face, but the 50-caliber pistol returned on the backswing and caught Zorro on the temple. He went down like a bag of corn meal.
Julio kicked Zorro savagely in the ribs, then grabbed the shotgun with his left hand and threw it across the room. He paused for an instant and contemplated the pistol in his right hand, then jammed it back under his belt—he wanted both hands free.
This is personal.
Julio’s hand was wide enough to palm a basketball, so grabbing Zorro around the ankles and neck posed no serious challenge. His arms were long enough to hold Zorro at either end like an unwilling barbell, then hoist him over his head in a clean-and-jerk motion worthy of the Olympics. Zorro’s arms were technically free but Julio had cut off his oxygen, so they flailed listlessly around the giant’s head. With one hand squeezing Zorro around the neck and the other holding the legs tight, Julio turned and stepped into the hallway.
The twin urges of vengeance and escape battled for control of his next move.
He turned left and saw the end of the hallway where the wide glass door opened onto the fire escape. The door was reinforced with cross-hatched wires embedded in the glass, but Julio was confident he could kick it open. Besides, the door didn’t seem to have a lock. It was probably against the fire code to lock an exit leading to a fire escape.
That gave Julio one escape route. A little climbing and then home free. The other would be the way they came in, down the hall to the elevators.
Julio turned in that direction and stopped dead in his tracks.
The cop who was supposed to be dead stood in the hallway. He had a thin smile on his face and a gun in his hand.
“Your move.”
Sam shifted his thumb across the back of his pistol.
The ringing in Julio’s ears had subsided enough that he could hear the familiar sound of a hammer being cocked. Having his hands up already was certainly convenient, but it presented another problem altogether.
Zorro was getting really heavy.
Chapter Sixty-nine
Larry spasmed with every blast of the shotgun, almost knocking himself and Jerome off their bar stools.
“Did you hear that?”
Jerome was sweating but managed to raise one eyebrow in what he hoped was a wry expression. If you act cool, you just might be cool.
“Bro, the whole fucking neighborhood heard that.”
It sounded good when he said it, but Jerome didn’t feel cool at all.
***
Jill’s hands shook as she latched the door. Sam had just stepped into the hallway and told her to stay inside no matter what happened. She moved to the kitchen and rummaged through drawers until she found an ice pick. She tested the point and decided it would do the trick. Now she had to figure out where to hide.
***
Shalya and Tamara jumped when they heard the gunshots but stayed on the big bed. They tried to concentrate on painting each other’s nails but took turns nervously glancing toward the cameras in their room. If they were going to be murdered, at least there would be witnesses. Thousands of them, from all over the world.
***
Gail sat on her couch and held Gus’ hands in hers, their knees touching.
“We should call the cops,” said Gus.
Gail shook her head. “How long do you think it would take the police to arrive?”
Gus shrugged. “Five, ten minutes, tops.”
“Too late.”
“Too late?”
Gail nodded. “We’ll all be dead by then.”
Chapter Seventy
“He must be getting heavy,” said Sam. “Even for a big guy like you.”
Julio shrugged to show it was no big deal, but the motion made his shoulders ache. Fucking Zorro needed to lose some weight. Maybe there was saturated fat in sheep eyeballs.
Sam held the gun steady, his expression bland. Julio’s eyes flicked past Sam toward the elevator, but the hallway remained empty. Then his gaze darted toward his belt, where the mammoth 50-caliber handgun had slipped across his belt to rub against his crotch. It was an itch he couldn’t scratch without getting his head blown off.
Zorro grunted and tried to twist free. Julio held him fast but the struggle made Julio sway back and forth as if he were doing the hula in a private luau for Sam.
The cop was right, Julio had to make a move. This was humiliating.
The thought occurred to Julio just as Zorro managed to open his mouth and spit. A thin line of drool escaped the sieve of his ruined teeth, oozing onto Julio’s forehead and into his eyes.
Chingalo! Julio clenched his mouth shut and blinked. He wanted to be able to look the cop in the eyes. He took a deep breath and tightened his grip. Above, he heard Zorro squeak like a dog’s toy.
The cop held Julio’s gaze, the gun steady.
Julio stood motionless for a long moment, then nodded at the cop.
Sam watched as Julio pivoted slowly on one foot, Zorro held high, the big finale of the hula. When Julio’s weight had settled on the other foot his back was turned to Sam. Without looking over his shoulder, Julio took a tentative step toward the fire escape.
Sam kept the gun raised, waiting.
Two steps, three. Julio reached the glass door set high on the wall, then quickly released Zorro’s legs, which dangled and bounced in mid-air like the limbs of a marionette. Julio pulled the door open and caught Zorro’s legs before he could find the strength to start kicking.
Julio spared a glance over his shoulder and saw that Sam hadn’t moved. Their eyes met and this time Sam nodded, slowly.
Julio turned and stepped onto the fire escape. He lowered Zorro until he was at shoulder level, then Julio took a second step to the railing and thrust his arms up and away from his body in one fluid motion, launching Zorro into space.
Zorro plummeted a hundred feet before he made any noise. Then his scream tore through the building like an altar boy’s parents in search of a lawyer.
Chapter Seventy-one
The scream bounced off the walls, rattled the windows, and woke up everyone in the neighborhood. For Sam and his neighbors, it was a sound that was all too familiar.
Julio leaned over the railing of the fire escape. The courtyard was illuminated by streetlights, and he could just make out the scene two hundred feet below. He grunted in satisfaction, then turned to face Sam.
“I hit the penguins,” Julio said with obvious pride.
Sam kept his gun raised. “Congratulations.”
“You’re welcome.”
“I think you did us both a favor.”
Julio shrugged. He was careful to keep his hands away from his belt.
Sam asked, “You want to come inside?”
Julio studied Sam for a moment, then shook his head. “I’m not going back to jail.”
“Not my problem.”
Julio nodded, then took a tentative step off the uppermost landing of the fire escape, lowering his weight onto the first rung of the ladder. It creaked in protest but held. Sam remained in the hallway but tracked Julio as he took another step down. Both of the giant’s hands were on the railing now, his gun out of reach, but Sam stayed where he was. When Julio’s head was the only thing visible through the window, he paused. The two men looked at each other, frozen
in time. Sam spoke first.
“Adios,” he said. “And, well, gracias.”
“De nada.”
Sam lowered his gun when the top of Julio’s head slipped out of sight. He counted to ten, then pulled a cell phone out of his pocket and pressed the call button.
It took Julio only three minutes to follow the zig-zag of the fire escape down to the ladder that lowered automatically when it took his weight. The ladder was positioned to blend with a sign that featured the name of the apartment complex, the vertical lines of the ladder forming the letter “L” in Golden Towers. Below the sign, an open archway on the ground floor led to the main entrance.
A jolting ride on the ladder, a short drop and Julio was standing in the courtyard looking up. He had kept his eyes on the top floor, just in case the cop changed his mind about following. But Julio didn’t think he would.
The dead cop who wasn’t dead. The cop who wasn’t a cop anymore. Julio didn’t know what to call him, so he decided to think of him as the smart guy who outfoxed Zorro and could have shot me but didn’t. It had a nice ring to it.
Julio lowered his gaze and turned, facing the courtyard. The main entrance to the building was behind him. The night air was cool but clear, the light at street level more than sufficient to reveal his surroundings.
Unlike the dead landlord, Zorro did not explode on impact. Somehow his sinews, bones, and muscle held his torso together despite the crushing impact of the fall. Maybe there was high fiber in eyeballs. Or calcium.
Zorro was looking up at the stars, arms outstretched in supplication, head thrown back in rapture. Through his chest the beak of the mother penguin protruded majestically, reaching upwards to heaven in thanks for this unexpected bounty. Zorro was the catch of the day.
Julio took a deep breath and turned away. It was time to get the hell out of there.
That’s when he realized he hadn’t heard any sirens. After deafening gunfire and a scream that could wake the dead, no one had called 911? Alarms went off somewhere inside his head, and instinctively Julio reached for the gun in his belt, but he froze before his hand made it halfway to his waist.
A large-caliber handgun was pressing against his temple directly behind his right eye socket. Julio could feel the blade of the forward sight digging into his flesh.
Danny Rodriguez slowly withdrew the gun as he stepped from the shadows of the archway into the courtyard. He wore his badge on the outside of his jacket, its metal surface glinting in the diffuse light from the streetlamps. From a distance of four feet, he kept the forty-five pointed at Julio’s broad face. Just out of reach but too close to miss.
Julio shook his head, disgusted. He tried to think of something to say—something smart or tough—but the only thing that came to mind was the mantra that had been running through his head all week.
“I hate this fucking job.”
“Don’t worry, ese.” Danny used his free hand to gesture toward the penguins. “I think you just resigned.”
Chapter Seventy-two
“Maybe I should resign.”
Sam looked at his ex-partner and shook his head. “C’mon, Danny.”
“You did.”
“I didn’t resign,” said Sam. “I retired. There’s a difference.”
“This is a mess.”
“I said it would be.”
“Easy for you to say—you’re not the one who has to do all the paperwork.”
Sam drank some tequila but didn’t respond. The Globe restaurant stayed open until two A.M., which made it unique in a neighborhood where most kitchens closed by ten. At this hour there was always room at the bar, and tonight Sam and Danny had it all to themselves.
Julio had been taken into custody. His desire to stay out of prison was trumped by his more fervent desire to avoid getting shot in the face.
The coroner’s wagon had left an hour ago, along with the uniformed cops and the lone crime scene technician. A meager crew by CSI standards, but this wasn’t television. Danny and Sam had moved to the restaurant down the street so they could talk in private.
“They came early,” Danny said. “Good thing you were ready.”
“Yeah.” Sam blew out his cheeks. “I knew it wouldn’t be last night, but tonight—I thought they’d come later.”
“Like one A.M.”
“Exactly. In the middle of the night for sure, not at ten. Almost caught me with my pants down.”
“I don’t think patience is—was—one of Zorro’s talents.”
“Neither was flying,” said Sam.
Both men took a sip of their tequila and stared at nothing for a minute, anticipating the conversation that neither one wanted to have but knew they couldn’t avoid. The bartender had told them it was sipping tequila. The price of each shot convinced both men that sipping was probably a good idea.
“I’m going to start with the painfully obvious,” said Danny. “Then you fill in the blanks.”
“If I can.”
Danny gave him a look. “Use your imagination—you’re good at that.”
Sam kept his mouth shut.
“Zorro is dead. Killed by Julio, who should have considered trying out for the Olympic shotput team.”
“Or horseshoes.”
“That’s not an Olympic sport.”
“It should be.” Sam took a drink.
“And then we have Walter, who was—”
Sam cut in. “—shot by Zorro.”
The two friends sat there, shoulder to shoulder, contemplating the importance of semantics when writing police reports.
“There’s a difference between shot and killed,” mused Danny.
“There is a difference, but does it make a difference?” Sam turned on his bar stool to face his old partner.
Danny met his gaze. “Should it make a difference?”
Sam shook his head. “Not in this case.”
“You saying Zorro killed Walter?”
“I’m saying you stopped the bad guys,” said Sam. “At the end of the day, isn’t that the job?”
Danny studied his glass of tequila as if it were a crystal ball. Not finding any answers from looking at it, he tried drinking it in one gulp. Six dollars down the hatch. He hissed as the liquid burned his throat, then set the glass back on the bar.
“These days I’m not sure what the job is.”
Sam threw his own drink back, then gestured for two more. “You stopped the bad guys.” He felt pedantic for saying it again but needed to convince himself. “They’re all dead or in jail.”
“Walter was into something,” said Danny, but it sounded half-hearted.
“And he’s dead.”
“Zorro must have had some connection to that apartment building—inside that building.”
“You working Narcotics now, Danny?”
“Fuck you.”
Sam laughed. “Fair enough. But if you were Zorro’s connection and if—if—you were still alive, what would you do, now that Zorro’s dead?”
“Find another line of work and keep my head down.”
“Exactly.”
“What about Ed?” asked Danny. “Your lovable landlord?”
“He’s dead.”
“You saying he got sideways with Zorro, too?”
“Julio’s got quite an arm,” said Sam.
“You saying Julio threw him off the building?”
“You could ask him.”
“Throwing Zorro off the roof might get him a plea bargain,” said Danny. “Or a fucking medal from the Mayor. But throwing a civilian off the roof, well…the judge might frown upon such behavior.”
“You’re saying he’ll deny it.”
“Wouldn’t you?”
Sam took a deep breath, then exhaled loudly. “Know what I think?”
Danny said nothing.
“I think Ed was a bad guy.” Sam tried to keep the edge from his voice. “You talk to anyone who lives on that floor, and they’ll tell you the same thing.”
“Guess you got
to know your neighbors.”
Sam nodded.
“Do you trust them?” asked Danny.
Sam seemed to consider the question before saying, “About as much as I trust myself.”
Danny studied his friend and former partner for a long time. Finally, he said, “That’s good enough for me.”
Neither spoke for a minute. Sam finished his drink and turned toward Danny.
“When I was on the job,” he said, “I used to say that I worked for the dead.”
“I remember.”
“I had it all wrong,” said Sam. “I think we’re supposed to work for the living.”
“Is that what you’re doing?”
“Yeah,” said Sam. “That’s my new job.”
Chapter Seventy-three
When Sam got home, Jill was already there, standing in front of the mantle. She adjusted a picture frame on the far right, then took a step back.
“What do you think?”
Sam looked around the room. Blood stained the hardwood floor around the ruined chair. Gore splattered the curtains. The nearest sliding glass door was shattered. But the pictures were back on the mantle in precisely the same arrangement as before. It felt like home.
Sam sighed. “I think you’re amazing.”
Jill smiled, but her eyes darted left toward the kitchen.
“Anything else?”
Sam gestured toward the broken window. “I was going to ask if I could sleep at your place tonight.” Then he studied her expression and added, “But you seem to have something on your mind.”
Jill glanced to her left. “I read your letter.”
“I figured you would.”
Jill took a tentative step forward. “What are you going to do?”
“Let me ask you a question.”
“OK.”
“You think all our neighbors are still awake?”
Jill nodded. “Gail invited everyone over, after we’d all stuck our heads out. After the shooting was over.
“Imagine that.” Sam held out his hand. “Come with me.”
