Flesh Eaters - 03

by Joe McKinney

  But the table was still tipping, and Jim’s balance was gone. His feet slid out from under him and he went down, landing on his ass just a few inches from the edge of the tabletop. He was lucky he hadn’t landed squarely on it, for the table was heavy wood and slate and solid enough it might have broken his back had he hit a few inches farther to his right. As it was the force of his weight coming down on the table slammed it back down flat on the ground and Jim bounced, unhurt, into the water.

  Bobby lunged for him again, screaming something that Jim couldn’t exactly understand, though the murderous intent behind the sound was plain enough.

  In that instant, a plan popped into his mind fully formed. Rather than try to get to his feet and run away, Jim went under the water, under the table, and kept on swimming back in the direction of the living room. The water was black. He didn’t dare open his eyes, not with all the garbage and chemicals floating around in it. He just kicked wildly, his hands groping blindly at the emptiness around him, hoping he was going in the right direction.

  When his hands hit the recliner he knew he was in the right spot. He felt for the little side table Ms. Hester had always kept there. Where are you? Come on, he thought. It’s here somewhere. And then his right hand closed around a small ceramic figure. Jim shot to the surface, drew a deep breath, and spun around. Bobby Hester was still in the kitchen, but was already charging toward him, the knife still in his hand.

  Jim had just a moment to examine the figure, an angelic child dressed in a graduation cap and gown and holding a small tightly rolled diploma, bought in honor of Madison’s promotion from elementary school to middle school, before Bobby Hester shrieked at him.

  “I’m gonna fucking kill you!”

  But now, with the cold reassurance of some distance between them and still riding the excited high of his narrow escape over at the kitchen table, Jim Norton saw that he could do this. He tossed the figurine an inch or two in the air, giving it a quarter turn, wrapped his index and middle finger over the base like a pitcher about to throw his best heat, and let it fly at Bobby Hester’s head.

  Bobby flinched away from the hurtling figurine. He threw up one arm to block his face, but it was too little too late. The figurine struck his forearm with the solid-sounding clink of porcelain on bone and was immediately followed by a howl of rage and pain from Bobby.

  Jim reached under the water and came up with another figurine. There was a whole army of the things down there, and he was on fire. He threw the next figurine and caught Bobby in the chin.

  Bobby staggered back, stumbling over something in the water. When he looked back up at Jim, there was an expression of utter surprise on his face.

  Jim laughed at him. He reached into the water for another weapon, but when he came up, he found that Bobby was no longer looking at him. And the expression of surprise on his face was gone, replaced by a sour sneer of contempt.

  Jim looked over his left shoulder, and saw Eleanor standing there, her pistol in her hand.

  “That’s far enough, Bobby. Put the knife down and leave.”

  “Fuck you, bitch. This is my hou—”

  The word broke off mid-syllable, for at that moment Eleanor fired a single shot, the bullet smacking into the wall less than a foot from Bobby’s ear.

  “It’s up to you,” she said. “We can stay here and discuss it if you want to, or you can crawl your miserable hide right out that hole in the wall behind you. But just remember this: If you want to stay, I’ve got orders to shoot looters on sight, if necessary.”

  Jim shifted his gaze back to Bobby Hester. Bobby was a wasted life, his mind charred to cinders by all the meth he’d smoked, but nonetheless, Jim could see the logic working itself out in Bobby’s mind. There was a look of savage contempt on his face, but he also seemed to know that Eleanor wouldn’t miss on her next shot.

  And that’s a safe bet, you sorry sack of shit, Jim thought. At this distance, she can shoot your remaining teeth out one by one.

  “You’re gonna fucking pay for this,” he said, pointing the knife at Eleanor. “I guarantee you, bitch. You’re gonna fucking pay.”

  “Do whatever you’re man enough to do, Bobby.”

  But he had already turned and slithered out the hole in the kitchen wall. Jim watched him go, caught somewhere between disbelief at the adventure he’d just had and the dawning realization that the only reason he’d survived it was because his wife had pulled his stones out of the fire.

  Jim looked down and realized he was still holding the figurine, this one a little girl on a stone reading the Bible. He dropped it into the water. Outside the house, Bobby Hester was climbing into his boat. His movements looked hesitant, though, and Jim could see that he was holding his injured left arm where the first figurine had hit him.

  “Are you okay?” Eleanor asked him.

  Jim kept his gaze on Bobby. The motor fired up, and a moment later Bobby was speeding off between the houses, curving around a toolshed, and then slipping away out of sight.

  “Jim?”

  He turned around.

  “Yeah,” he said. “I’m good. Let’s go home.”

  CHAPTER 6

  “Okay, this is good,” Anthony said. “Stop here.”

  Brent Shaw eased up on the throttle, but he wasn’t fast enough. He could feel the boat gliding forward, past the mark he’d been shooting for, and it still wasn’t stopping.

  “Come on, come on,” Brent pleaded with the boat. “Whoa-o-o!”

  There was a downed tree just ahead of them, and he watched helplessly as the bow slid into the branches with a sickening crunch, burying itself deep in the foliage.

  “Shit,” he muttered.

  He looked over his shoulder. Anthony and Jesse Numeroff were in the back of the boat, holding on to the railing, glaring at him.

  “Sorry about that,” Brent said.

  He reversed the engine and the boat eased back, tree limbs snapping as they released their hold on the bow.

  Out of the corner of his eye he could see Anthony and Jesse exchanging worried looks. Jesse said something under his breath to Anthony and nodded toward Brent. This wasn’t good, and Brent knew it. The Wonder Twins had been riding his ass since they set out, and it was starting to really piss him off.

  Anthony whispered something else to Jesse, then started walking forward.

  “Shit,” Brent muttered again.

  Anthony put a hand on the windscreen above the steering wheel, the other on the seat back behind Brent’s head. He was smaller than Brent, but that had never made any difference. Anthony was the one blessed with the looks and the speed and the self-confidence that opened every door. Brent got none of that. And when his younger brother loomed over him, as he was doing now, Brent, though physically huge compared to Anthony, felt small.

  “What the fuck are you doing, Brent? We’re trying to load dynamite back there, for Christ’s sake.”

  “I’m sorry,” Brent said without looking at him.

  “You’re sorry?” There was a pause, and when Anthony spoke again his voice was a savage whisper. “Holy shit. You’ve been drinking. You motherfucker, you’ve been drinking, haven’t you?”

  Anthony glanced back at Jesse in the rear of the boat, then turned back to Brent.

  “What the fuck’s wrong with you? You know how important this is.”

  “I’m sorry,” Brent muttered.

  “Don’t tell me you’re fucking sorry,” Anthony said. “I don’t give a rat’s ass about sorry. I need you sharp. I need to know I can count on you.”

  Brent said nothing.

  “Did you bring a bottle?” Anthony asked. A pause. “Answer me. Did you bring a bottle with you on this boat?”

  “No,” Brent said. It wasn’t as much a lie as an equivocation. He had poured most of a pint of vodka into a thermos of grape juice that he’d been slowly nursing since before they’d left the EOC. The thermos was tucked out of sight, down by his feet, hidden by a life preserver.

  “You b
etter not have,” Anthony said. “This is too important for you to fuck it all up.”

  “I’m not gonna fuck it up,” Brent said.

  Jesse looked up at them, frowning.

  “Keep your voice down,” Anthony said. His voice was an angry whisper.

  “I’m not gonna fuck this up,” Brent said, also whispering.

  Though Anthony had always been the gifted one, the cool one, the one their dad thought of as a chip off the old block, it nonetheless rankled Brent to be accused of fucking up. He was doing his part, wasn’t he? Maybe he wasn’t going down into the vault with them. Maybe they wouldn’t trust him to be within arm’s length of the dynamite they carried. But damn it, he was doing his part. Sure, he’d had a couple pulls off the thermos, but he wasn’t drunk. He had got them here, and he would get them back out again.

  “I’m gonna do my part,” he said.

  Anthony eyed him coolly.

  “Yeah,” he said. “You do that. Come on back here with me. And don’t you dare stumble. Don’t you dare slur your words. You keep your shit together until we’re all done, got it?”

  Brent wanted to raise his chin and look his younger brother in the eye, but he couldn’t.

  “I got it,” he muttered.

  “All right. Let’s go.”

  They walked back to where Jesse was packing the last of their gear. Jesse looked up at the two brothers and said, “Problems?”

  “No problems,” Anthony said, a little too harshly.

  Jesse’s doubtful gaze lingered on Brent for just a moment; then he handed one of the bags to Anthony. “That’s the last of it.”

  Brent watched the two men readying their gear. They worked together seamlessly. Always had. Back in high school, while Brent was silently waiting out his senior year in a desperate attempt not to get noticed, Anthony and Jesse were building reputations as the best shortstop-and-second-baseman combination in Texas high school baseball. They were only sophomores at the time, but they were already local celebrities. One of the nightly news sportscasters had even called them the Wonder Twins.

  At the time, Brent had been perfectly willing to step back and let his younger brother grab the limelight. At least no one was bothering him while they were worshipping his little brother. He had to swallow some pride, sure, but he knew his own limitations. He knew he wasn’t in their league. He drank too much, for one thing. Even back in high school, he drank too much. And with the drinking came melancholic fits of depression and self-abuse, which made him a chore to be around. Underneath it all was an unpleasantness, a surliness that came from the realization that he was tolerated merely because of his proximity to Anthony and Jesse, the Wonder Twins. But only tolerated. Never welcomed. He knew that about himself, even then. Brent had hid the resentment back then, and he hid it now. He had grown used to it. He was good at it.

  Jesse was explaining their schedule, but Brent found it hard to stay focused. He let his attention wander across his surroundings, across the murky water that covered the streets, the cars, nearly everything. They had stopped at the corner of Canal and Stiles, just north of Eastwood Park. It was past dusk, and their surroundings were lost in deepening shadows. As he watched, the night, like the floodwaters, seemed to rise all around him, filling the areas below trees and in the alleys between buildings first before spreading into the street and off to the horizon.

  Looking down Canal Street toward Lockwood, Brent could just see a long line of brick buildings, all of them with the windows busted out. Here and there the cabs of a few of the larger trucks were still visible. Black wooden telephone poles jutted out of the water at odd angles like the skeletal ruins of old docks. Everywhere he looked the city was still, the air charged with that restless electric murmur that proceeds a storm.

  And somewhere out there, someone was moaning.

  Brent frowned.

  He looked back at Anthony and Brent. The Wonder Twins had their heads bent over a laminated map spread out on the white top of a red Igloo cooler. Apparently, neither of them had heard the sound.

  He turned back to the flooded ruins and listened.

  Nothing.

  He strained his senses against the gathering darkness, trying to pick up the sound again.

  And there it was. Yes, it was someone moaning. There for a moment he hadn’t been sure—thought for a dreadful second that maybe he really had had too much to drink—but he was sure of what he’d heard now. The sound was coming from one of the buildings up on the left side of Canal Street. Past the Church’s Chicken? He couldn’t tell. Maybe the parking garage? Or that old white house over there? The noise was distant, muffled, but it was definitely there. Someone was moaning for help.

  “Brent?” Jesse said. “Hey, Brent, you with us?”

  “Huh?”

  “Oh Jesus,” Jesse said. He slapped the map and looked at Anthony. “Seriously? You said he was sober.”

  “He is,” Anthony said. “Aren’t you, Brent?”

  Brent looked at them, his thumb hooked back over his shoulder in the direction of the noise. “You guys didn’t hear that?”

  “Hear what?” Jesse snapped. He listened. The night was pulsing with the drone of mosquitoes and frogs. Jesse shrugged. “What, Brent? I don’t hear shit.”

  “I thought I heard somebody moaning.”

  Anthony snapped his fingers at Brent’s face.

  “Hey,” he said. “There’s nobody out there. Pay attention to this right here.” He tapped the map. “We don’t have much time, and I need to make sure you know this. We won’t get a second chance.”

  Brent hesitated a moment, his attention lingering on the ruins.

  “Yeah,” he said at last. He blinked at the map, trying to focus. “Yeah, I’m looking.”

  Brent watched the Wonder Twins slip into the water and go gliding over the sidewalk along Canal Street, dark shapes in the dark water. From the map and what little of the briefing he’d been able to follow, Brent knew they were going to swim up to the next intersection, where Canal met Lockwood, and enter the Texas Chemical Bank from the far side of the building, just around the corner, so that should someone official come along and question what Brent was doing there in the boat he would have some measure of plausible deniability. He didn’t understand the rest of their plan and, truth be told, hadn’t tried to. It seemed to involve an awful lot of math for just blowing something up.

  And besides, from here on out, there were only two parts of the operation that mattered for him. The first was that he had about forty-five minutes to wait while the Wonder Twins blew the vault and surfaced with the cash. The second was to keep a weather eye on his surroundings. If he saw anybody that might give them trouble, he was to hit a button on a small black box Jesse had given him. The button would trigger a signal on a device Jesse wore around his wrist, warning them it wasn’t safe topside.

  That much he could do, and so Brent sat down behind the wheel and waited, listening to the wind in the trees and the gentle lapping of the water against the boat’s hull.

  The thermos with the grape juice and vodka was still down at his feet, and he took it out. He had about half the mixture in there, and that was just about right. He envisioned himself tilting it back, feeling the alcohol burn in his nostrils right before it hit his tongue and sizzled down his throat. There wasn’t enough in there to get him wasted. He couldn’t afford that. But it would tide him over until this “operation,” as the Wonder Twins called it, was done and he could go somewhere quiet and start drinking seriously. And then he would drink and drink until everything went—

  An unexpected sob in his throat made him pause. He put the thermos down and, for a moment, thought he might start crying. Sniffling, he rubbed at his eyes with the back of his hand. Fucking pathetic, he thought. Weak and pathetic. Here he was, a grown man, about to break down like a scolded child. He sat there for a long time, waiting on the tears, just on the verge of losing control, but to his surprise, they didn’t come.

  Brent was mad at himse
lf for the weakness, but wasn’t surprised by it. Like several other heavy drinkers he knew, Brent had spent a lot of time studying his addiction. Over the last few years, his life had taken up a sort of orbit around drinking. He couldn’t deny that. He thought about it all the time. So yes, liquor was an addiction, an addiction that owned him, no matter how much he would have liked to believe otherwise. He knew this about himself. No sense in lying about it. Call a spade a spade, after all, as Daddy always said.

  He went through periods where he needed liquor, where he hated it, where he couldn’t remember what he’d done while drinking it. Other times, he’d stormed through his apartment pouring out every single bottle he’d hidden around the place. But love it, need it, or hate it, he always came back to it. Liquor had its own gravitational hold on him. Or, if he was in one of his more self-destructive moods, it was the hole at the bottom of the commode and he was the turd circling it. But regardless of his moods, regardless of the metaphor he used to describe his circumstances, its hold on him was real, and it was relentless.

  He scooped up the thermos and took a long drink. It was warm and syrupy, harsh as homemade moonshine, and God did it ever feel good.

  He’d been drunk pretty much continuously since Gabriella, and all the days and all the things he’d done since then seemed a blur. But not all his memories were gone. The really shameful ones . . . those he remembered with perfect clarity. Memories like being in Police Headquarters, appearing before the chief’s Vehicle Accident Advisory Board. God, what a disaster that had been.

  He set the thermos down on his knee and let the memory play out in his mind. He was powerless to stop it anyway. The board was a panel of seven officers, all of them clean-cut and serious, sober-looking, charged with hearing the facts of his latest crash and then making a decision on his punishment that they would then forward to the chief of police. The board’s commander was Captain Ricky Macklin, one of his dad’s partners from back in their days in Homicide.