by Don Bruns
“God, I hope not.” My cell phone went off. “Hello.”
“Skip. You could have called. I’m a little frantic right now.”
I’d like to think it was the shock of the story and the two Cuban guys showing up at the front gate that caused me to forget to call Em, but some of it is that I’m a self-absorbed asshole. I know my faults. Most of them.
“Em, I am sorry. Really. Listen, Angel didn’t kill the Cuban. Big Mouth showed up tonight with his arm in a sling. At least we think it was him.”
“Oh, my God. Are you all right?”
“It’s a long story. It has to do with—” It was going to be a long explanation. Forty some years of Cuban history, a short course in business and being an entrepreneur, a crash course in Caribbean real estate, and a lesson in modern warfare. I didn’t want to do it on the phone. Besides, the minutes cost money. “I’ll give you a full accounting tomorrow. Everything is all right for now.”
“Skip, we’ll talk tomorrow, okay?”
“I’ve got calls in the morning, but how about we meet for lunch?”
She paused.
“Are you okay?”
“I’m not feeling that good right now.”
“Em, what’s wrong?” She was strong, never weak. I don’t know that I’d ever seen her really sick.
“A little sick to my stomach.”
“Are you taking anything?”
“No. Nerves I guess. I’ll be all right. Dutch treat tomorrow?”
“No. Fuentes paid us the rest of the money. Actually $3,000. My treat.”
She smiled over the phone. I could tell. “Don’t forget, partner, a third of that is mine.” She hung up.
“I’m going to turn off up ahead and get some oil,” James said. “That light is flickering. All we need to do is throw a rod.”
“Do you know what that means, throw a rod?”
He looked at me with a sneer. “No.”
He pulled off at a gas station and got out of the cab. Hundreds of black bugs swarmed around the yellow glow from the light fixtures above the gas pumps. Catching a glimpse of a car in my peripheral vision, I spun around. No rear window. It must have pulled in behind us. I thought it was blue and big and the brief look I got made me think it might be the Buick.
James sauntered out of the garishly lighted gas station/carryout with a can of oil in his hand, popped the hood, and proceeded to drain the contents into the engine. I got out and looked behind us. No Buick.
We got back in and James pulled back out onto I-95.
“I think that man has problems we can’t imagine. He doesn’t know where his son is, only that he’s been injured. He can’t be honest with his investors because if he tells them the truth the people behind Café Cubana will send his son home in a body bag.”
I looked out the side mirror and saw lights coming up behind us. Traffic was light, but this guy was hell-bent for leather, pulling alongside of us on the outside line. James glanced over and hit the brakes hard.
My mother harped on wearing a seat belt. Every time I left the house—“Don’t forget to wear your seat belt!” I didn’t pay a lot of attention to my mother. I bounced from the seat and cracked my chin on the dashboard as James skidded to a stop on the berm.
“What the hell was that all about? What?” I rubbed my chin, gingerly feeling what was going to be a nasty bruise. “Damn it, James.”
“Son of a bitch had a gun aimed at my head and I swear he fired it, Skip. It was our big-mouthed buddy in the Buick. That’s about as close to death as I think I’ve come.”
Up ahead, a pair of brake lights came on and the car swerved onto the berm. I sat there rubbing my chin as the car ahead shifted into reverse and hit the gas. The big automobile was barreling backward, the rear end swerving back and forth like a fish’s tail.
“Jesus! He’s going to ram the truck.”
“I think it’s us he wants to ram, James. The truck just happens to be in the way.” I was shouting and not sure why.
James stepped on the gas and we pulled out onto the highway. We passed the blue demon going forty-five miles an hour. The Buick braked again and reversed motion, chasing us at an alarming speed.
“James, we can’t outrun that son of a bitch.”
“I know.”
“Bump him.”
“What?” James shrieked.
Now the Buick was three car lengths back, and with my window down I could hear the roar of its engine.
“Bump him!”
“What about the truck.”
“Fuck the truck. Think about our lives.” Now I knew why I was shouting.
The big blue machine came whining up to the driver’s side and when I leaned forward and looked out James’s window, I could see Big Mouth taunting us with the gun. With his good hand he waived the pistol as they pulled even.
James jerked the steering wheel hard. He grimaced as he gave it a vicious twist to the left and for a moment I thought the truck was going to go over. Then I heard the crunch of metal-on-metal.
The crunch, then the shrill scraping sound and sparks flew from the friction. James hung in there, straightening the wheel then spinning it again, pounding the car next to us, again, and again. Finally he spun it to the right and straightened it out one last time, punching the accelerator and heading down the highway.
“What?” I was still screaming and I couldn’t see a damn thing. My side mirror showed nothing and with no rear window—which was the reason we were in this situation—I had no idea what had happened.
“Don’t talk to me about it, Skip. I don’t even want to discuss it until I see how much damage I just did to the truck.”
We pulled over two exits later and got out in a deserted shopping center parking lot. Surprisingly, the body damage wasn’t terrible. Oh, it was crumpled in spots and the dark blue from the Buick streaked across the white body like war paint, but with my limited knowledge of bodywork, I figured it could be fixed for minimal dollars. I was certain all three of us would have to put money from our profits into the repairs.
James kept pacing, looking at the side and saying, “Damn. Damn. Damn. Damn.”
“We’ll get it fixed. You saved our lives, man.”
“You were right, Skip. Angel should have blown Big Mouth’s punk ass away. These guys are bad news.”
“Where are they?”
“The last time I hit them, their car rolled. Last thing I saw, it was upside down. It will take a tow truck to get them out of the median.”
“Well, we’re still in one piece.”
“Skip, what the hell do they want with us? Do we know something? Do they think we still have the mail. Shit, they know we were visiting Fuentes. They must assume we gave him the mail.”
“But we didn’t give him all of the mail, did we?”
He gave me a funny look. “How the hell would they know that?”
I walked back, surveying the truck all the way to the rear. “Hey, pal. Check this out.”
He walked back and ran his finger over the hole. “Son of a bitch. They did shoot at us. What the hell do we do now? What do we do now?”
CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR
WE PULLED INTO GAS AND GROCERY, closed at this late hour. A musty pine scent hung in the air.
“Just because we see him here during the day doesn’t mean he—” Angel just kind of appeared, out of the dark, walking up to the truck and resting his elbows on the driver’s door with its open window.
“My friends.”
“Angel, I’ve got some good news.” James smiled.
“The man wasn’t killed.”
“How did you know that?”
“Because I shot him in the shoulder. I was fairly certain his friend would take care of him. I may have done some serious damage, but I never believed he was dead.”
James sputtered for a few seconds. “Well, then why did you let us believe that he was—”
“People will believe what they want to believe. I have strong feelings for people w
ith belief. But the final proof is in the beholding.”
I leaned over. “Who’s quote is that?”
“Mine.”
“They tried to kill James and me tonight on the highway.”
He surveyed the truck in the dim light. “They don’t appear to have been successful.”
James stared mournfully at the truck. “We just wanted you to know.”
Angel nodded. “Leave the truck with me.”
“With you?” James stepped back.
“With me. If they come to your apartment and the truck is there, they know you’re home. They may try to finish the job. If it’s not there, they assume you’re somewhere else.”
I looked at James and he shrugged his shoulders. “Do you think they’ll come after us tonight?”
“I’d like to think they’re somewhere licking their wounds,” James said.
“But they may be looking for us.”
“True. What the hell.”
It made sense. At twelve thirty in the morning, it made sense. Angel drove us back to the apartment, past the rows of faded concrete block houses and sparse brown, postage stamp-sized lawns, and we tumbled into bed. I slept a dreamless sleep, but woke with a sense of dread.
CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE
I SHOOK HIM HARD. Sometimes James could sleep the sleep of the dead and there were times that no alarm could raise his sorry ass.
“Yeah. I’m sick today, boss.” He rolled over and pulled his pillow over his head.
“Get up, James. It’s safer at work than it is here.”
“I don’t have to be at work for another”—he glanced at his alarm clock—“hour. For Christ’s sake I’ve got an hour.”
“Do you want to walk to work?”
“Walk?”
“Three miles?”
“I’ll take the, oh shit, we don’t have the truck, do we?”
“Nope.”
“I’ll walk. Now get the hell out of my room.”
I showered, shaved, and put on the cleanest dirty shirt I could find. The tie that had the fewest wrinkles was blue, and it only had the fewest wrinkles because I wore it less than the other three. I didn’t like it, but except for the lunch with Em, I didn’t care what I looked like. I was lucky to be functioning at all.
Sammy sat behind his computer, probably checking out a new porn site. He looked up and frowned when I walked in.
“Skipper. I got a call yesterday from an appointment you were supposed to call on.”
“Yeah, I missed one late yesterday.”
“You never called the lady, Skip.” That condescending tone of voice.
“I’ll get her today, Sammy.” What kind of a name was Sammy? What the hell, what kind of a name was Skip?
“Don’t bother. Marie called on her, and it looks like the lady is ready to buy. Call if you can’t make the appointment, Skip. If you want to keep this job, call your clients.” He dismissed me with a jerk of his head. The jerk focused attention back to the computer.
I called Em, just to make sure lunch was still on. “I’ll pick you up?”
“Call me closer to the time, Skip. Right now, I’m sicker than a dog.” She hung up and I closed the phone. I still harbor this fear that germs can float through phone lines. It’s stupid, I know, but sick people bother me.
I stopped by two appointments, and only one was home. The first call was on a newlywed couple who had lied about owning their home. They rented the little shack, and I couldn’t sell them a security system if they’d wanted it. They didn’t. They wanted the cheap hot tub.
The second home had a note taped to the door. We are no longer interested in whatever it was that you are selling. Please don’t call again.
No matter what the placement office at my alma matter had said, a business degree from Sam and Dave will not necessarily open doors for you.
I drove into a mall parking lot, with its pitted, potholed blacktop and dollar stores and a place called Cheap and Sweet. They aren’t stores you usually find in a mainstream mall. I roamed through one of the discount outlets just to kill some time and ended up buying a brown tie that looked better than the blue one. At eleven thirty I called Em and we decided to meet at Esther’s. Her dad’s construction offices were only a couple of miles away, so it worked for both of us.
I had baked meatloaf and mashed potatoes and Em ordered a cup of soup and salad. The lady in the booth behind us talked loudly with her friend, never slowing down for a minute.
“Oh, my first ex hit me. He did, girl. Mental, verbal, and then physical abuse, and when he grabbed my arm and almost twisted it out of its socket, I knew it was time to leave.”
Her friend mumbled some condolences but was drowned out.
“My second ex—you remember Richard? Well, that was even worse. I had to have dental work from that relationship and now he has the kids. They gave him custody. Can you believe what I’ve been through? The father of my children.”
We got up and moved farther to the back of the restaurant.
“So tell me what happened.”
When I finished telling her, she smiled. “You think this is funny?”
“My God, Skip. We’d better laugh, because if we start crying we may never stop. You have to admit, this is almost comical. We’re just young—almost kids. I mean, we’re not involved in any of this. We just happened to be in the wrong place at the wrong time.”
“You never read the Hardy Boys when you were a kid?”
She shook her head no.
“Well, if James could have backed up a truck with side mirrors—”
“Told you.” She smiled.
“We never would have had the accident, we never would have found the finger, and—”
She folded her hands and was quiet.
“What?”
“Vic. I just keep thinking about this poor guy, kidnapped, his finger being cut off, and his father not having any idea where he is.”
“That’s the last part of the story, Em. His father warned us to back off. After he begged us to keep looking. He says that if we stay involved, they may kill Vic.”
“And there’s a good chance Vic is already dead.” She buried her head in her hands.
“Yeah. However, I think we should keep looking.”
“What?” She pulled her head out of the palms of her hands and gave me a big-eyed stare. “You think what?”
I couldn’t tell her. It was just not the right time. I believed there was never going to be the right time. “I just feel I need to do this.”
“Give me a break. You guys almost got killed last night. You can’t keep getting in deeper.”
“Listen, these guys have got it in their heads that we know something. We can’t convince them we don’t. For some reason they either want to scare us or kill us and we can’t just sit around and wait for it to happen. If we can find Vic Maitlin, then Rick Fuentes has his kid back, and he can go to the cops and tell them everything.”
She had tears in the corners of her eyes. Once again with the tears.
“It’s going to be all right. Really.”
She reached across the table and put her hand on mine. “I’m pregnant.”
I forgot to breathe. For what seemed like an eternity she looked at me, waiting for my reaction.
Once again she said, “I’m pregnant.”
Finally I managed to stammer out a response. “Who’s the father?”
She slowly stood up and headed toward the door.
“Em, wait.”
She kept walking.
I caught up with her and put my hand on her shoulder. “I’m sorry. Or maybe I’m not. Do you want—” I didn’t know what I was saying.
She spun around and gave me a fiery look that even her tears couldn’t put out. “You’re the father, you ass. Don’t you get it? You. Who else did you think it might be?” She turned and walked out the door and I just stood there. I watched her drive away, and I couldn’t take one more step to stop her.
CHAPTER THIRTY-SI
X
I DID THE MATH YEARS AGO and figured out that my mother was pregnant for three months before she married my father. Maybe that was in his mind when he left home. Maybe he’d been pressured into marriage because of me and never got over that.
I could marry Em. I could do a lot worse, but I still feel that I’ve got a lot of growing up to do.
I couldn’t get a grip on this father thing, and I certainly wasn’t going to be able to just accept it in the first minute I found out. I called her cell, but she didn’t answer. An hour later I called her at work, but she wasn’t in. I called her home, but the machine picked up. I drove to Biscayne Bay, but she wasn’t there.
I drove aimlessly, passing the entrance to the causeway where a black guy sat up on a mound of earth, watching the cars go by, his laundry hung out to dry over a guardrail. I ended up a couple of blocks farther at Bayside, a sprawling, colorful outdoor shopping and restaurant community on the bay, with a Hard Rock Café, Hooters, and all the other chain attractions you’d expect. It was almost like a carnival. I had a seven-dollar beer at an outdoor bar and watched a lady with a parrot on her shoulder hustle a mother and her little girl for a ten-dollar picture with the blue and red bird on the girl’s shoulder.
I’d blown off two afternoon appointments and figured I may have to find another job. Construction was probably out of the picture. Right now, Em’s father might not be in the best frame of mind to hire an unskilled carpenter.
When I pulled into the apartment, the truck was sitting in the lot. Buick-blue streaks and raw-rubbed metal graced the driver’s side of our moneymaker. It might take just about all the money we’d made to fix it. Right next to it was a rusted-out Ranchero, one of those old Fords with the front of a car and the back of a pick up. I’d seen it parked there before. It’s a junk heap that barely runs and the magnetic sign on the side says Refinance—let us make your dreams a reality. As if.
The TV was blaring and James was sprawled on the couch, drinking one of my beers, a box of Cheese Nips sitting on the floor.
