Splintered

by Jamie Schultz

  “Help!” she yelled. “Oh God, please!”

  The man stopped. She pushed herself out onto the sidewalk. It wouldn’t take much acting—she had been hurt; there was blood everywhere. She didn’t think she could overpower him, not in her current state. But that wouldn’t be necessary. Not if he’d just get close enough.

  She started chanting under her breath.

  “Ma’am, what’s wrong? Are you—oh!” Maybe he saw the blood, or just her general state of disarray, but he ran toward her.

  He stopped abruptly two steps away. Yellow streetlight fell across his face, and Sheila saw the shock of recognition there. Panic followed recognition, and he spun again, this time to flee.

  She finished the words and lunged for him.

  The sudden motion was too much, and a wave of dizziness crushed her to the sidewalk. The man was out of reach, fleeing frantically down the sidewalk, jacket flapping as he ran.

  She heard a single word, a familiar word, and the back of the man’s head exploded. A chunk of asphalt the size of her fist fell to the sidewalk, covered in blood and lumpy bits of tissue. The man’s body hit the ground a moment later.

  Rain stood at the corner, her right hand stretched out in front of her. In her left, another piece of ammunition.

  “Come,” she said, not taking her eyes from the corpse. “Eat.”

  Chapter 18

  “You okay?” Anna asked. Three o’clock in the afternoon, Nail’s downtime, and he wasn’t sleeping. Just sitting out in front of Van Horn’s room, staring out the nearest gap in the cinder block wall that passed for a window. Outside there was only broken brick and desiccated grass, dead and bleached nearly white from day after day of pummeling sun.

  He swiveled his head away from the scene outside like it took a massive effort. Anna could imagine the bones in his neck creaking and grinding together.

  “I’m just askin’ because you look like shit,” she said.

  He put his tongue in his cheek and ran it over his bottom teeth, then exhaled heavily. “I’m fuckin’ beat,” he said. “I have just fuckin’ had it.”

  “Pussy.”

  He didn’t laugh, just grunted in a way that barely acknowledged the remark.

  Anna sat on a camp stool across from him and lit a cigarette. “Need a smoke?”

  “Shit no. You know, we get Karyn straightened out, she’s gonna kill you for starting that shit again.”

  “She’s not my mom.”

  “No.”

  She waited for more, but that seemed to be all he had to say on the subject. “I’m so tired all the time, and the buzz is nice.” She drew air in through the cigarette. It tasted like shit, now that she was paying attention to it, but that wasn’t the point. So did coffee. “Anyway, I’ll quit again when this fucking job is over.”

  “Which fucking job is that? The thing with the house? Van Horn? Or getting Karyn straightened out?”

  His tone sounded unusually bitter, taking her by surprise. “You think we got too much going on?”

  “Yeah. Just a bit.” He cracked his knuckles. “Be nice to get a break from Sobell’s shit for a while, know what I’m saying?”

  “Yeah. I do.”

  “What if he goes down?”

  “Not sure I follow you.”

  “There’s a whole lot of five-O up in his shit right now. He goes down, does he take us with him?”

  Anna glanced at the plywood sandwich that served as Van Horn’s prison door. She wasn’t sure how much he could hear from in there, but he had to be looking for any scrap of information or anything else he could use to make himself more valuable to Sobell. She met Nail’s eyes, jerked her head toward the far entrance, and got up.

  Nail followed her halfway to the other end of the building, where she stopped. She looked up at him. He was worried. Really worried. She wasn’t even sure quite how she knew. His face was its usual stoic mask, but there was something—a very faint tightening of his brow, a twitch at the corner of his jaw from clenching and unclenching his teeth, something. Not a state she’d seen him in a lot.

  “It’ll be cool,” she said softly. “When they get the big guy, they don’t ask him to testify against all the little guys. It’s the other way around.”

  “Lotta people gonna get real fucked if they nail him,” Nail insisted.

  “They ain’t gonna nail him. He’s a slippery son of a bitch, and look—they haven’t hauled him in. Haven’t indicted him for anything. Haven’t done anything more than ask a few questions.” She took another draw off the cigarette. “Look, you know how it works. The big money guys never go down.”

  “I don’t know. He drowned the city in bugs so he could have one conversation. That don’t look like something you do if you got no worries.”

  “Three conversations,” Anna said.

  “Whatever. Just—if the shit hits, we oughta be thinking about how we’re gonna stay clear of it.”

  She thought about Guy and her upcoming meeting. If this Mona person really had the goods, Anna would fuck Sobell over without hesitating. That would certainly split the sheets with him, though she didn’t know if it would get them clear of any legal fallout. There’d be plenty of other kinds of heat to worry about besides.

  “Hey, I need to tell you something,” she said.

  “Uh-oh.”

  “Yeah, well. Could be I’m about to get us in a whole lot of trouble with Sobell. You wanna know about it, or you wanna stay clear?”

  A sketch of a grin appeared on Nail’s face. “I notice you aren’t asking me whether or not you should do it, just whether I want to know about it.”

  “That’s right.”

  “I don’t suppose he’s the kind of guy who’s gonna say, ‘Oh well, you didn’t know. That’s all right, then.’”

  “No. Probably not.”

  He looked out the entrance at the pavement, then crossed his arms and leaned back against a support column. “Lay it on me. We’re all in this together.”

  Anna winced. “Yeah, about that . . . Maybe you shouldn’t say anything to Gen.”

  “You asking me not to?”

  “It’s just—look, I trust her. Pretty much. Just not when it comes to Sobell.” The words sounded uglier out loud. She wished there were some way around it, but that was the flat truth. “She’s still convinced everything can work out for everyone. Me, not so much.”

  “All right. It’s your call.”

  “Here’s the deal: I think this Mona person can help Karyn.” Nail’s expression turned to one of surprise, and Anna talked faster. “I got hooked up with some guy who knows her—I mean, I didn’t know it at the time—and he gave me a . . . a thing, and I gave it to Karyn, and it helped. It really did. I guess this Mona person is the source. She’s got more.”

  Nail stood, contemplating the news or mentally condemning her, she couldn’t tell.

  “Anyway, it might all work—maybe I can get hooked up with her and steal that fucking tooth thing for Sobell, and nobody will be the wiser. But you know. If I have to choose one or the other . . .”

  “You choose Karyn. I get it.” He scratched his jaw. “Could make shit a lot harder for the rest of us, but I get it. I’d do the same thing.” He stopped, frozen with a breath still locked in his chest. “Yeah,” he said after a moment.

  “What?” Anna said.

  “Nothing. It’s cool. Do what you gotta do.”

  “Thanks.”

  * * *

  Nail checked the clock on the dash. Quarter after seven, the sun now well above the horizon. He’d be a little early, but Gen probably wouldn’t mind. She’d probably appreciate the break, and hell, he wasn’t getting much rest anyway. Somebody ought to get a break from this shit.

  His phone rang. He checked the screen, swore under his breath, and flipped the phone open.

  “What have you gotten into, DeWayne? Just what the fuck have you done?”

  “Hey, relax. Just chill out.”

  “I’ll chill out when you tell me what’s
goin’ on.”

  “Nothing’s going on. But, uh, you think you could maybe put me up for a bit?” When Nail said nothing, DeWayne kept talking “You know me. Can’t quite keep my head above water long enough to get more than a breath or two, right?”

  Eighty-five thousand dol—one. Two . . .

  “Am I right?”

  ...Three. Four. Five.

  “Can’t you hit up Lisa or something?”

  “Yeah, she’s not really talking to me this month. Or last month, either. Been quite a few months, now that I’m thinking on it.” He paused, swallowed, and then forced another laugh. This time it was so strained it came out like the word “Ha” repeated a few times. “And, uh, I don’t think that’d really be all that good for her right about now.”

  “No? Why’s that?”

  “I’m, like, kinda out on bail right now.”

  So. That much was true. “So?”

  “So, maybe I got some shit going on right now, you know? And maybe somebody said something to somebody, and I think Clarence got the wrong idea about some things. Like he thinks maybe I’ve been talking to some cops.”

  “Have you?”

  Another phony laugh, this one the worst of the lot. “Shit no.”

  Oh, fuck.

  “Goddammit, DeWayne. Just go to fuckin’ jail. You fucked up, do your time. Keep your goddamn mouth shut. Clarence will ventilate you, you got that?”

  “Hey, I don’t know what you’re talking about. My lawyer says we can beat this thing, that’s all. I didn’t know what was in the package—I was just taking a thing from point A to point B and making a few bucks on it.”

  The hell of it was, he might even have been telling the truth. It wouldn’t have surprised Nail one bit if he’d just taken a package and pocketed a few dollars. It didn’t matter. It would be good enough to convict, or at least to convince DeWayne it was good enough to convict, which meant Elliot had him by the short hairs. “One night. You can stay at my place one night. Then you gotta find somethin’ else.” Nail shook his head, half ashamed of himself. King of the enablers, that’s me. “Might be a little while before I can get you a key.”

  “That’s cool.”

  “You fuck anybody on my bed, I’ma kill you, you got that?”

  “Wait, where you gonna be?”

  “Not at home. Got shit goin’ on.”

  There was a long pause, of a sort Nail had learned to recognize. Here came the rest of the hair on the deal. With DeWayne, it was never just one thing. Usually, it was money, but not just money. It was money and a ride. Money and a favor.

  “There might be more than Clarence looking for me. He was just, you know. Point A. I don’t think Point B is any too happy, either.”

  “Look, just crash at my place. I’ll send somebody to meet you with a key. Lock the door and don’t let nobody in, okay? I’ll be there tonight. We’ll figure shit out after that.”

  “Yeah. Cool. Later, bro.”

  “Later.”

  Nail pulled the car over. “Fuck!” he said, and he slammed his hands on the steering wheel. Elliot straight up had him by the balls. And if Clarence really thought DeWayne was talking to the cops, he’d be dead by morning. No doubt about it.

  He had to get DeWayne’s deal killed.

  He reached for his phone. This would bring heat. But what was it Anna had said? If saving Karyn meant the crew took a little more heat, so be it. She’d understand.

  “Fuck!”

  He dialed Elliot.

  “This is Special Agent Elliot. What can I do for you?”

  “DeShawn Owens. I don’t know how much I can help, but I’ll do your fuckin’ C.I. thing.”

  “I’m glad to hear it. When can you come in to talk?”

  “How’s tomorrow?”

  “Fine . . .” She dragged the word out in a way Nail didn’t like at all. He thought there might be a “ . . . but” waiting at the end of it.

  He jumped into the pause. “One thing, though. I need you to arrest my brother, like right goddamn now. Get him in custody.”

  “I’m sorry, Mr. Owens, but we’ll need to meet before I can take any action on your brother’s situation.”

  “You need to get him in fucking jail. I’m serious.” He was squeezing the phone so hard he thought it might crack.

  “I can’t do that.”

  “Dammit, can you cut me some slack on this?”

  “No.” She sounded cheerful, goddammit. Cheerful.

  He thought furiously. DeWayne was too chickenshit to do time—he’d cut a deal, no matter what Nail told him, relying on his ability to fast-talk his way out of trouble. That was hopeless. Clarence already suspected something was up, or DeWayne wouldn’t need to hide, and if he made the deal, no amount of bullshit would keep him from getting cut into tiny pieces. The only way out of this was to get the deal killed, make sure no information ever flowed from DeWayne to the cops, make goddamn one hundred percent sure he never testified, and then go see Clarence and try to get it sorted out. That looked just about impossible, but it was all he had.

  The first step was to kill the deal, and that much, at least, he could control. He prayed it wasn’t too little, too late.

  “I can meet you at nine o’clock,” he said. As soon as Genevieve was good and gone. It would mean abandoning his post for an hour or so, but fuck-all ever happened there anyway.

  “I’ll see you then.”

  Chapter 19

  Anna stopped at the back door to the surveillance house, her hand resting on the knob. Every damn thing these days seemed to take a deep breath and more energy than she had, so, once again, she took a deep breath and forced herself to keep going. This will get better when we get Karyn back. God, she hoped that was true.

  She let herself in and went up the stairs. Nail was sitting a few feet back from the window on a chair he’d brought up from the dining room, elbows on his knees.

  “Anything?” Anna asked.

  He shook his head. After a pause, he cleared his throat. “Gen said she saw somebody looking out the attic window, though. Said she thought it was a woman, though she couldn’t be sure.”

  “Yeah. I heard.” That had been just about all Genevieve said to her. A few curt words, and she’d seemed eager to get the hell away from Anna as soon as possible. She’d slept, or pretended to, until Anna “woke” her when she was ready to leave. It wasn’t normal, and all afternoon Anna had sat with sour dread churning her belly. What did Genevieve know? “Hey, you didn’t say anything to her, did you? About . . . you know.”

  “Huh? Oh. No.” Nail got to his feet. Anna heard something in his hip pop. “You good?” he asked.

  “Guess so. Beer in the fridge?”

  “Yeah. Right. Water, though, and about a hundred cans of that Red Bull shit Genevieve likes.” He made a puking noise. “Diet fucking Red Bull. Sign of the end times, you ask me.”

  Anna shrugged. “It was a handful of bennies in the old days.”

  “I ain’t sure this is better.” He yawned. “I’m out. Call me if the place blows up or anything.”

  “Roger that.”

  He lumbered stiffly out of the room and down the stairs. He must really be beat, Anna thought. She couldn’t remember seeing him quite so worn down.

  She settled in to wait.

  The sun went down, though Anna could have sworn the street got dark first, as if its natural state was darkness, and it was eager to shed its daytime camouflage. Bullshit, she knew, but regardless it was the most singularly dreadful sunset she’d ever witnessed. Light and color fled the street, a draining tide leaving pools of black shadow behind, even while the sky was still a darkening purple. Things moved in those pools, things with glimmering eyes and shifting, furtive bodies. Rats, for starters, but she also saw something that might have been a ragged, patch-furred feral cat, and it seemed there were other things only glimpsed at the edges of her vision.

  You’re just freakin’, that’s all.

  Maybe. She was certainly freakin
’, though whether she was just freakin’ . . . Not here. Not on this street. This place was fucked. It would be a relief when Guy got here and they could get on with it. Be a further relief when they could wash their hands of the whole mess.

  She checked her phone. Ten to nine. Guy was supposed to arrive at ten. It was gonna be a long hour.

  The sun was gone. Not a single light was on in any window or on any porch across the way. If Anna got close to the window and looked down the street, she could see one porch light five or six houses down, and then a single streetlight another few houses past that, but when she sat back, they were gone. The half dozen houses she could see from her chair were dark. It seemed unnatural. The word itself made her grin—these were houses, for God’s sake, on a paved street in twenty-first-century America; what could be less natural?—but the concept behind it wiped the grin away. People didn’t live like this. Somebody left a night-light on for their kids. At nine, people should still be up and around. Television sets should be flickering in windows. Hell, some people would normally be eating dinner this late, or, in this neighborhood, walking their dogs now that the sun wasn’t hanging overhead, waiting to cook them. Instead, it was as if one of those bombs had gone off here, the kind that was supposed to kill everyone and leave their stuff. Or maybe some kind of chemical or disease had been released. It was easy to believe everyone was dead or had left, but she didn’t think that was the case. People still lived here, or at least they had last time she had a day shift.

  She sat and watched. Nobody stepped out for a cigarette on the front stoop. No cars rolled through the neighborhood. Nothing happened. Instead of relaxing her, lulling her to sleep, it just made her more tense. This was the calm before the storm, a held breath before a huge, maybe final leap.

  At nine thirty, she stopped putting her phone back in her pocket after checking the time and just kept it on her lap. At quarter till, she realized she’d been staring at the tiny LCD screen, willing the time to tick past, and she put the phone back in her pocket.

  A big bird—a huge bird, like a big vulture or something, its ugly hairless head exposed and gruesome in the moonlight—settled on the grass of the Gorow place. It was a testament to how messed up Anna’s head was, how twisted up her reality had gotten, that she thought, seriously, that maybe it was Guy. Like he’d changed shape somehow. You never knew, right? But it didn’t stretch, growing into the shape of a man, and it didn’t disappear. It pulled a glistening gobbet of something gross out of a shadow, choked it down in a series of convulsing swallows, did an ungainly, shuffling little run, and took off again.