by K. W. Jeter
“It’s better to forget . . . that’s what I told Michael . . . just forget about people. That’s what you should’ve done, Kim. Just forget . . . and then go away and don’t cause any trouble . . .”
“You’re right,” I said. “That’s what I should’ve done.”
He didn’t see it – but I did. From the corner of my eye. At the base of the smoke-filled corridor, a bloodied hand was reaching across the carpet. Reaching for the rifle McIntyre had kicked aside.
“Then why didn’t you!” McIntyre’s voice trembled with anger. “I told you –”
His words broke off. I could feel him shifting away from my back, looking toward what I had just spotted.
I turned my head as well. And saw Cole there. Crawling forward with one hand digging into the carpet, the other holding the assault rifle.
He really looked like hell now. His face was blackened with smoke, smeared wet with the blood trickling from his brow. His gaze narrowed as he looked up at McIntyre –
Who screamed in fear and rage, the gun lifting in his hand as he fired off a shot.
It wouldn’t have mattered if he had fired off a hundred.
The bullet caught Cole in his shoulder, as he rolled onto his side, while he raised the assault rifle in the crook of his other arm. His face contorted with pain, but he still managed to squeeze the trigger. The quick burst struck McIntyre, dropping him in front of me.
He was still alive. I could see the labored rise of his chest and the red bubbles at the corner of his mouth.
I stepped over and took the rifle out of Cole’s grasp. Head nodding forward, he let go of it without a struggle, fingers trailing across the stock.
McIntyre looked up at me as I set the barrel of the rifle against his forehead.
“Take your shot . . .”
I heard the voice coming from behind me. Cole’s voice.
Turning my head, I looked back at him. He’d dragged himself into a sitting position, his back against the corridor wall. He was dying.
“Come on, Kim . . . it’s what you wanted . . .”
The smoke had cleared a little. I could look farther back and see the other bodies scattered about. Everything it’d taken to get to this point. Then I looked back down into McIntyre’s agonized gaze.
“He’s right there in front of you . . . gotta see him . . .”
Cole’s voice becomes low and soothing. My hands steadied as my gaze locked on the target.
“Right there in front of you . . .” The voice started to fade. “Looking back at you . . . and he’s smiling.”
I closed my eyes for a moment. And could see it.
“Just the way he was . . . last time you ever saw him . . .” A whisper. “Said that you were shit . . . you were nothing . . . throwing you away like a sack of trash . . .”
I opened my eyes.
“What . . .” Silent now. Except inside me. “Are you going to do . . . about it?”
I knew what I was going to do.
“Mr. McIntyre?”
Eyes wide, he looked up at me.
“You know that job you offered me?”
McIntyre didn’t say anything.
“I decided not to take it.”
I squeezed the trigger. McIntyre’s head slammed against the floor. I lowered the assault rifle, then turned and walked over to Cole.
“I did it.”
Cole’s eyes opened partway, looking up at me.
“Big deal,” he said. “Anybody . . . could’ve made that shot.”
His eyes closed and his head nodded forward.
I stood gazing down at him. What was left. Until I saw something from the corner of my eye –
A small red light glowed through the drifting smoke. Somebody stepped toward me. It was Ibanez. The red light was on the video camera set on her shoulder, focused on the scene before her. The red light went off and she lowered the camera.
“You’re right,” said Ibanez. “That’s a good story.”
She opened up the video camera, took out the tape cartridge, then tossed it to me. I caught it awkwardly with my free hand.
“Keep it.”
* * *
When we reached the bottom of the stairwell and stepped into the parking garage, Ibanez handed the video camera to me.
“Believe me,” she said. “It’ll come in handy.”
I was puzzled at first, then realized what she meant. “Thanks.”
The whole building was cordoned off, with police teams swarming all around and traffic diverted for blocks around. Beyond the street barriers were the broadcast vans from the other news stations.
“Hey!” A cop spotted us as we emerged into the service lane at the side of the building. “What are you doing?”
I still had the video camera poised on my shoulder. The TV station logo on Ibanez’s jacket was proof enough that she was a media type. The cop came over and grabbed us, shoving both Ibanez and me to the other side of the nearest barrier. Where the other cameramen and reporters were covering the action.
The cop angrily jabbed a finger at us. “Now stay out of the way, or I’ll bust your ass!” He turned away and went back to his duties.
Ibanez glanced over her shoulder, watching me as I carefully looked around. I stepped back into the middle of the cameramen and reporters, then to the rear of the pack. None of them could see me now. I set the video camera on the pavement, then turned and walked away.
TWENTY-ONE
I had to walk all the way back to the warehouse. To collect my motorcycle. And take care of some other unfinished business.
There was no way I could get back into the parking garage and drive out in the TV van, the one Cole and I had arrived at the building in. Even if I had wanted to. Better to just leave it there and get as far away from the scene as possible. And probably not a good idea to climb aboard a bus, to get out to the wharves – I didn’t want to be close enough to anybody that they might be able to catch the scent of gunfire and smoke and explosives from me. So hoofing it was the only option.
Long walk – it took me over an hour from the downtown financial district. But out on the street wasn’t a lot quieter than where I’d just been. I figured that back there, the police were already in the building’s lobby and carefully working their way up to the top floor where all the action had been going on. They weren’t in any danger – not now – but they were definitely going to find some grisly evidence. They could have it, as far as I was concerned.
When I got to the warehouse, I didn’t just pull on my helmet, fire up the Ninja, and speed away. I went on inside.
The place seemed really quiet now. Nothing going on, and its animating spirit departed. I could see Cole everywhere I looked, or at least the traces of him – the empty cigarette packs and ammo cartons scattered around the blood-soaked mattress, the bullet holes pocked into the wall, that sort of thing. Everywhere he had ever gone, he had probably left stuff like that behind.
I knew there would be the other stuff I needed. He had a pair of portable electrical generators among his various pieces of equipment. In one of the back areas of the warehouse, there were a couple of cans of gasoline for the generators. I unscrewed the lids on both of them, picked them up and walked backward through the warehouse, pouring out their contents.
The gasoline fumes stung my eyes as I tossed the empty cans aside. I found one of Cole’s lighters near the mattress. At the door of the warehouse, I flicked the lighter on and tossed it into the center of the wet floor.
It only took a few minutes for the warehouse to be engulfed in flames. I got on the motorcycle and started it up. I figured it wouldn’t be a good idea to be anywhere near the place when the fire reached whatever ammo and other lethal bits and pieces might have still been tucked into the warehouse’s corners.
As I rode away, the flames and black smoke mounting into the sky behind me, I knew that burning the warehouse to the ground didn’t get me entirely off the hook. The police had all that fancy high-tech forensics stuff, l
ike you see on the TV shows, where they can pull your fingerprints and DNA and every other thing about you just from finding a broken-off fingernail or a strand of hair in the rubble. I supposed I would just have to deal with that when it happened – if it happened. After all, how likely was it that they would connect me with what had happened over at McIntyre’s offices? Before the TV reporter and I had booted out of there, I had wiped off the assault rifle I’d used, then the door-jammer device out in the stairwell. If there were any other fingerprints around, so what? I’d worked at the place for over a year.
A little while later, I was sitting at the table in our apartment, with my brother Donnie pulled up next to me in his wheelchair.
He’d heard my slow, dragging steps coming from downstairs. He’d known it was me. There had been plenty of times before, when I’d come home so late from my job – that other job, the one I’d had a long time ago – and he’d pull the front door open as soon as I reached our floor, so I didn’t have to fumble for my keys.
There’d be time later, I figured. To tell him everything that’d gone on. Not like he didn’t know there’d been something going on. By the time I’d gotten home, he’d had the news on the TV. It was a big local story, with the police starting to search the building floor by floor. The building, Donnie knew, where I used to have my job. A long time ago.
“You okay?” He laid his hand on top of mine. Leaned forward to peer into my face.
“Yeah.” I nodded. “Job’s done.”
Then I laid my head down on the table and burst into tears. With deep, racking sobs, my face buried in my arms as Donnie stroked my hair.
“It’s okay, Kimmie –”
“No, it’s not. It’s not.” I raised my head and wiped my nose with my jacket sleeve. “I don’t even like guns. And now I’ve got one with me all the time. And I’m doing stuff with it that I never thought I’d have to do.” I shook my head. “I don’t even know how I got here. It’s not like it’s someplace I ever wanted to be.”
Donnie sat back and gravely regarded me. “Kimmie –”
I finished rubbing my red, wet face. “What, honey?”
“When you came to get me . . . I was really glad you did. I knew if I just waited long enough, you’d be there.”
I didn’t even know which time he was talking about. Whether it was that stupid amusement park, or when we’d gotten split up when we were kids. But somewhere that little girl was still trudging head-down through that snowstorm. She always would be.
“And you know what?” Donnie spoke softly. “If I’d had to come get you . . . I would’ve.”
I looked back at him for a long time, then nodded. “I know,” I said. “I know.”
We were both quiet for a while. The TV was turned down low, the voices from it just a murmur.
“What happens now?”
That, I didn’t know. Maybe at any moment there’d be police bursting in through the door and dragging me off. Or maybe I’d gotten away with it.
I didn’t even care. I felt really tired. But . . . happy. Oddly that way. Considering everything that’d happened. I must’ve gotten it out of my system.
“I don’t know.” I smiled at my little brother. “I just don’t know.”
“That’s okay, Kimmie.” He leaned over the side of the wheelchair and wrapped his arms around my shoulders. “It doesn’t matter.”
I closed my eyes and let him rock me back and forth. He was probably right.
It didn’t.
A special message from Kim Oh –
Hope you enjoyed the book! I’m trying to get to the point where I’m making a living at writing them, so I’ll be able to cut back on the killing people thing and just do that as a hobby.
If you did enjoy it, you’d be doing me a real favor by writing a quick review on Amazon.com. Thanks!
My next thriller, Kim Oh 3: Real Dangerous People, is available now – or turn the page for a special sneak preview!
If you’ve missed any, you can get all my thrillers right here!
Plus, I’m hard at work on the next Kim Oh thriller and hope to have it to you soon. If you’d like to receive an announcement when it’s ready, sign up for my newsletter.
Or if you’d just like to chat, feel free to email me!
You can also follow me on Twitter. I’m also on Facebook – so really, you have no excuse for not finding out when the next book’s ready.
And don’t worry – I’m not that dangerous.
Best,
Kim
KIM OH 3:
REAL DANGEROUS PEOPLE
Sneak Preview
PART ONE
Trust everybody. To do exactly whatever it is that would screw you up the most.
– Cole’s Book of Wisdom
ONE
“You’re going out?”
“Yep –” I went on loading up my backpack. “Got things to do.”
My younger brother Donnie seemed a little dubious about the prospect. “But the race starts in half an hour.” He pointed over to our beat-up little TV, in the corner of our equally unglamorous apartment. “You’ll miss it.”
“Come on.” I opened up a box of ammo on the kitchenette table and began sliding the bullets into the .357. “It’s just the truck series.” For the most part, when I’m at home I like to keep the gun safely unloaded. “Not like it’s even Nationwide.”
For the last couple of weeks, Donnie and I had been spending some quality time together. The start of the NASCAR season was always a big deal for him. And of course, it’s not just the races. It’s the pre-race coverage, then the post-race analysis, plus all the other NASCAR shows leading up to the weekend. Which I was fine watching with him, even though I was just barely up to speed on telling one driver apart from another. The technical stuff – all that bump-drafting and track bar adjustments and restrictor plates, et cetera – all that was way beyond me, no matter how many times Donnie patiently explained it.
It didn’t bother me. After all, I was way better at killing people than he’d ever be. Just goes to show that everybody has their own area of expertise.
“It’s still racing,” Donnie pointed out. “And I’ve got bets down on it.”
“For real money?” I flipped the gun closed and looked over at him. “I’ve told you –”
“No – just bragging rights.”
I was okay with that. He’d done pretty well with the Fantasy League stuff last season, to the point that some NASCAR fan blog had interviewed him for handicapping tips – they’d probably figured they were talking to some deep redneck gearhead type, instead of a twelve-year-old Korean-American kid. But anything to do with money, I’d put a serious kibosh on. With what I was doing for a living these days, I didn’t exactly need some federal Internet police squad raiding us for illegal online gambling.
Correction, actually – what I was hoping to be doing for a living. Just like everything in this crummy economy. You can be really good at something – and I was at least okay at the killing thing – and you still got the problem of getting a paying gig. Let alone benefits. On second thought, maybe I should’ve let my brother put down some actual money bets. Our household account was getting a little on the thin side.
Everybody’s was, I supposed. Something that’d popped into my head, last time I’d gone shopping –
Groceries are the new cocaine.
Seriously. You go to the corner, next thing you know all your money’s gone, and you’re holding a little bag with nothing in it. From an accountant’s viewpoint – and I used to be one – how is that not like doing drugs? I mean, at the celebrity level. Not that I had any actual first-hand knowledge about the subject, except what I read in the gossip magazines while standing in the checkout line, the few times I went to a real store.
“Okay –” Down to business. I tucked the .357 into my backpack. I’m always careful with that gun – partly for sentimental reasons. Somebody important in my life gave it to me. “I don’t know how late I’ll be. So when th
e race is over, fix yourself some real dinner. Don’t just finish off the Doritos and the rest of the junk.”
“Sure.” Sitting in his wheelchair in front of the TV, he gave me an absent nod. “No problem.”
Probably hadn’t heard a word I’d said. The screen was already full of mutant pickup trucks with sponsor endorsements all over them, zipping around an oval track. Obviously way more important than whatever I was up to.
As I headed down the apartment building hallway to the stairs, it struck me that maybe Donnie had gotten just a little too used to the notion of his sister going out and killing people.
TWO
While I’d been getting ready, there were other people who already were.
Matter of fact, they pretty much always were ready. For all sorts of unpleasant things. Just the nature of the business they were in.
In my mind’s eye, I could just see one of them trudging down the street, over in one of the city’s other genuinely crappy neighborhoods. This time of year, there was still dirty snow piled up in the gutters, with an equally gray and dismal sky overhead. It’d be the end of March before the wind stopped cutting through your clothes like razor blades that’d been stored in a deep freezer. That’d be why Foley had his hands dug deep into his overcoat pockets as he made his way toward the neon palm tree glistening on the damp sidewalk.
Well, partly glistening. Every time I saw the place, it was just a couple of the fronds that lit up on the overhead sign, plus one side of the curved trunk. The rest, including most of the letters that spelled out Mae’s Diamondhead Lounge, had burnt out a long time ago.
Somebody comes in off the street, in weather like this, there’s always a little ritual soon as you get inside the door. You have to unbutton your coat and grab its thick woolen lapels, then flap them back and forth to shake off any snow that might’ve drifted onto your shoulders. Plus stamp your feet on the worn tire-tread mat, to get the icy slush off your shoes. Small place like this, if you’re a regular, you try not to track a lot of thawing mud across the floor.
