by Alex Moss
The young man who attacked Stelson.
His body is ripped in two ways–he’s lean and muscular, but also damaged–new cuts on his shoulder from his collision with the rocks and a mottled array of deep bruising and abrasions from getting run over, twice. A young man with many lives it would seem.
“You look a little worse for wear,” says the prosecutor.
“The cold water helps me forget the pain.”
“Death does that to you.”
Koit smiles, displaying his gold-filled incisors. He’s face to face with the old man now. “I won’t die out here. This is nothing. Not so long ago I was forced to swim in the Parnu River mouth in the Gulf of Riga, every October morning, just as the water was turning to ice. From one breakwater to the next. It was like swimming through cold shit for a whole nautical mile. The boat crew would poke me with a stick to stop me from blacking out. The rocks were my destination, my savior. That’s why I like swimming close to them. I don’t trust the sea or the elements.”
“So don’t swim in it.”
“I like to be reminded of the island I came from. I might have to go back to it.”
“Maybe sooner than you think.”
“Oh? You have a problem with the way I do things?”
“You screwed up, royally.”
“I know.”
“You know? You forget to inform me that some of them got away. Gone, totally AWOL. Saints go marching into Cedars-Sinai, asking for another employee of mine. To get fixed up. An employee who doesn’t need to know about our relationship. An employee who is smart enough to snoop about and eventually work out what is really going on in this city. And you forget to tell me about this?”
“I’m an entrepreneur now, sir.”
“So what?”
“I don’t have the resources you fine people do. Sometimes things go a little crazy. They had help. Someone saw an opportunity and took it but it’s okay now. They’re off the street for all time.”
“And the items?”
“They are safe.”
“Well, that’s something at least.”
“Anything else, sir?”
“We have another problem which we can turn into an opportunity. There is another one out there. A young fool who visited my employee, Doctor Grant.”
“I know.”
The prosecutor seems surprised.
“I believe I had an encounter with the same boy you are talking about. You can see some of the scars. He has help. Some protection. A crew that he is running with.”
The prosecutor eyes the bruising and scars on Koit’s body. “Seems so. I had him followed by a couple of your strays. As a result, both are dead. The one called Molloy suffered a messy death–at the boy’s hands I assume?”
“You want me to find out more, I can find out more, or I can finish the job.”
“Find out about his crew and why and how he’s involved. It doesn’t smell right to me. They might be looking at something that touches us.”
Koit nods.
The prosecutor turns and walks away from Koit. He’s stony-faced and intent on getting back to his brown sedan parked up street side.
Koit starts a run along the beach, heading for a flock of gulls that are skipping about the shoreline.
TWENTY-ONE
Kenny Hackett is in a phone booth on Highland Avenue making a call. The others watch him from the car across the street. Kenny doesn’t appear to be saying anything to anyone. Anna looks nervous. Kenny hangs up, exits the phone booth, and jogs across the street and gets back in the car.
“Victor’s unavailable.”
“What does that mean?” Anna asks.
“It just means he’s unavailable. We need to sit tight.”
Later, they check into Room 115 at the same motel in East LA. While Kenny fumbles the key in the lock, Anna and Stelson glance furtively down the row of doors toward Room 109. The memories are still fresh in their mind and they don’t look at each other. They all step inside Room 115 and close the door. It’s dark. Tilman flicks the light on.
“What the hell are we doing here?” Anna stares despairingly at the synthetic features of the room and she rips open the drapes to let some bright midday sunlight in. It dazzles her and everyone else. Outside, shuffling silhouettes of other sorry-assed patrons cross the window frame, which unnerves her, so she pulls the drapes together again to leave a long sliver of light and she sits on the bed to let it dissect her torso, absorbing the heat.
“What does unavailable really mean?” she asks anyone who will answer.
Kenny shrugs.
“He’s just left us to rot in this shitty place? If we don’t go through with the deal, it’s just a matter of time before we’re all dead.”
“And whose fault is that, Anna?” Kenny points out.
She glares at him.
Later, Anna lays on her back while the others watch TV. The sun-light dissecting Anna begins to strobe. She sits up and turns toward the window. More shadowy figures seem to cross in front of the room outside, but these ones aren’t shuffling. They’re quick and there is a thud against the door, then silence. Kenny switches the TV off and on the same beat as the click, the door is kicked open by a SWAT team who don’t say a word–it’s all fast movements–no time to react. Just let it happen. Seconds later, all four–Kenny, Tilman, Anna, and Stelson–have their heads buried in the musty worn acrylic carpet, hands being cuffed behind their backs by a team of six guys armed with Glock 17 handguns.
Nobody says a word. They know not to.
Their cuffs are checked and bodies padded down, personal items removed, weapons tossed and bagged as evidence, then pulled onto their feet and hustled out of the room, down the line of motel rooms, down the stairs past the ice machines, and into the back of a black armored van. Doors are slammed and locked and they’re left to gawk at each other and wonder what the hell just happened. None of the SWAT unit jump in the back with them. Doors are shut in the cab up front, partitioned off from the rear by what looks like a thick steel panel. They are completely contained in here and the light is artificially beamed in by a series of thin vertical halogen strips along each siding. There is what looks like an AC unit built into the forward end of the roof.
Their upper bodies sway as the van pulls out of the motel parking lot. Stelson is about to say something but Kenny shakes his head and glares at him. Stelson looks at Anna who is just staring at one of the neon strips, hoping for the moment to be over.
After an hour of driving, the van parks and the doors in the driver’s cab slam shut as the SWAT unit exit the vehicle and simply walk away. That’s what it sounds like anyway–their voices fading in the distance. Now that the van’s engine has been switched off, the air conditioning unit is no longer pumping out cold air and the temperature rises fast. They’re starting to sweat, a slick sheen of moisture rising from the pores on their calmly confused faces.
About four hours later, delirium sets in.
Anna and Stelson are laying on their sides on the floor where it’s coolest. Kenny and Tilman are just rocking back and forth, sucking the sweat from their lips with heavy eyes that are starting to roll back in their sockets. Then someone gets in the front cab and starts the engine and the air-con unit with it, but the wilting occupants don’t seem to register any of this. Their minds have probably brushed this off as some tantalizing trick of the mind. The van moves off with the sound of the reversing vehicle warning signal beeping away like an early morning wake up call. Moments later, the van brakes abruptly, engine switched off and driver exits.
The doors at the rear are flung open and Victor is standing alone, admiring the sorry state of things.
First, he drags Anna out of the back of the van. She’s coming around, her delirium subsiding, conscious now that Victor is holding on to her. He has a key in his other hand and removes the cuffs from
behind her back so that she can push herself up and step away from the vehicle with an ounce of civility.
The SWAT van is parked in a small industrial warehouse that’s been lined with plastic sheeting from wall to floor. Some of the space has been partitioned off with the sheeting into separate rooms. It’s like being in a serial killers abattoir before the blood-letting.
Victor guides Anna into one of these rooms where there is a small bunk. She perches on the end and composes herself, her long dark hair matted and glued to the side of her face and neck. Victor brushes it away and hands her a plastic cup of water. She guzzles it and then crushes the cup.
Victor returns to free the others. Stelson, Kenny, and Tilman regain their focus on events and then crawl out of the box and into another slightly bigger one. They take in the space in the same way they did when entering Anna’s mansion in Hancock Park. It’s just another bubble to them.
Victor watches to gauge their reactions, and then Kenny looks at him. “Expecting me to be pissed with you?”
Victor shrugs.
“Someone else does angry better than us.” Kenny nods to the left of Victor.
Anna charges from her bunk, fists first, landing a one-two punch to Victor’s ribs and stomach. He takes it well then shoves her backwards so she falls on her ass. Stelson glares at Victor and clenches his fists.
“Don’t even think about it,” Victor warns Stelson. “This was just a reminder to show you who is pulling the strings here. Anna is just a kid that’s started a dangerous game and we’re all players now. We need to get serious. We have less than four days to prepare. This place is just a start but it’s our new home.”
“So where is home?” asks Tilman.
“Burbank.” Victor steps over to a table where there is a large map of LA and environs. “C’mon, gather round.”
They all obey and step gingerly toward the table.
“We’re here, just off North Brighton Street and San Fernando Boulevard. Exit routes to I-5 and minutes away from Bob Hope.”
“The airport?”
“There will be a jet waiting.”
Anna raises her eyebrows. “Well, maybe I wanna stay right here and you can fly off into the sunset with these two goons instead of me.”
Stelson looks hopeful, but Anna doesn’t shoot him the needy glance he was expecting.
Victor ignores her protest and moves on. “As you can see, I-5 is reasonably well connected to Downtown via the 110 and the exchange point at Olympic and Bixel.”
“There’s one little teensy weensy hitch, Victor,” says Kenny. “Those SWAT team pansies padded us down, took our badges, and probably ID’d us. They’ll have us down as dirty cops, right? I mean, you musta had us fingered as perps in order to set up the strike, correct? Tongues will be a-waggin’ and we’ll be expected to show up and answer for our sins. We are marked.”
Victor seems disappointed that Kenny has expressed some doubt in his abilities. “Take a look at the monitors over there. Help yourself to the food and refreshments too.” He points to another partitioned area. They all drift over to it, Stelson brushing aside the plastic sheet to reveal a booth with a table, chair, and three monitors, cans of Red Bull, bottled water, and take-out pizza boxes.
They all grab their fill.
“The first screen is a view of the side street outside this warehouse and flips between the north-west entry point at North Brighton Street and the eastern entry point at Victory Place and the on-off ramps to Interstate 5.”
Stelson is just looking at the second and third screens.
They show two views of Bobby Floyd’s brightly, spot-lit industrial unit near Sherman Way and Van Nuys.
“And these?” Stelson asks, knowing full well that he’s looking at his brother’s operation from the well-concealed cameras across the street–but he controls the sickly feeling in his stomach–the jarring revelation that his world has become more closely intertwined with Bobby’s.
Victor pauses a moment. He studies the mild look of embarrassment on Stelson’s face, then at Anna who clearly senses something’s off here. She frowns at Stelson. He scratches his ear and bites his lip, nervous.
Victor half-smiles then nods at Stelson.
“What was that?” Anna asks.
“What was what?” Victor responds.
“That nod?”
“I was just checking your friend here was feeling okay.”
“Bullshit.”
Victor turns his back on her and studies the monitors. “This is where it gets a little complicated,” Victor continues. “The SWAT team are non-legit. They work for the contact we are looking at now. Both him and his team take down scores. Been in the game for some time now.”
Kenny and Tilman seem relieved.
“They’re slick,” Tilman says.
“So why’s the contact not been locked up in a state prison?” Stelson asks. “You got his whole operation here.”
“It’s never that simple.”
“So what’s this about, Victor,” Anna asks. “Shall we get to the point?”
“The point of all this was the mess you created. You did a fifty-five million dollar deal with a client who has a high enough profile for our intel to know whether that kind of cash is being moved about in preparation for a transaction. There is nothing on the vine to speak of.”
“Maybe the intel is wrong?” Anna asks.
Victor bows his head. He’s clearly wound up like a spool of fishing wire. “On what planet is maybe good enough for anyone here? Experience dictates that the intel should be the prime source from which to make a decision when prudence is required and that’s exactly what we need to be, because we are talking the difference between fifty-five million dollars and zero; between dead or alive. There is strong potential that the client is going to screw us over, and that usually means they are prepared to drop us. The motive is there. We didn’t complete on the last deal. The quantity was smaller but that’s not the point. These assholes lost face and we all know how important that it is to these sons of bitches. So don’t tell me to grow up, Anna. You need to grow up and there is a strong chance that ain’t ever going to happen if they have anything to do with it.” Victor storms out of the booth.
Anna remains calm with an icy glaze that hides her emotions.
The others all sit in silence and wait for Victor to calm down. “Is anyone going to say anything?” Stelson asks. Kenny and Tilman shrug. “What’s to say?” Kenny asks. “We’re up to our necks in shit and we’re about to have our heads cut off. It’s a horrible predicament.”
“I don’t think you’re giving Anna any credit here.”
Anna looks at Stelson.
“For what?” Kenny asks.
“Anyone asked how she set this up? Can’t have been easy.”
Kenny and Tilman look at each other.
“Anna, why don’t you tell us?” Stelson asks.
Anna says nothing for a moment. She’s just staring straight ahead at the monitors–focused on the amber glow of the street lamps on North Brighton Street.
Stelson starts fiddling with the lining on his jacket and pulls out a cheap old Casio digital watch that had been tucked inside for safe-keeping. He holds it up and presents it as though it were some rare and precious gemstone. “Anna, you said something to me once which didn’t make a lotta sense at the time. ‘These moments. We make them happen and we don’t expect them, ever’.” Anna can see the watch without looking at it. “Anna wanted me to find this watch. Sounds messed up, I know, but she wanted my help when no one else could.”
Victor drifts back over to listen. He’s intrigued.
“She knew what these people were capable of, what to expect. She knew that they were going to burn down the little house that she and Victor lived in, yet she still came back to it when it was burnin’. She came back for a reason that wasn’
t some sentimental bullshit. Anna’s stronger than that. Victor, am I right?”
“She is so strong. There is no doubt about that.” Victor looks at Anna. There is more to his comment than he’s saying–something that goes way back, perhaps when Anna was a child.
Stelson pauses and flicks his gaze between Anna and Victor. “You came back to set up the deal, Anna?”
Anna opens her mouth a fraction and thinks about what she is going to say before she says it. She’s guarding something. The shield is still up.
She starts talking.
“The place on Lexington Avenue was always meant to be an escape from the ghosts of the house on South Muirfield–the family heirloom that I never wanted.”
She pauses.
They all wait for her to continue. She takes a sip of water, licks the moisture from her lips, and swallows.
“The Deep,” she says.
She looks at Stelson, losing herself in his intense, pale green eyes…
TWENTY-TWO
Anna stops running outside the family mansion. She knows this house and so she invades it. Her graceful figure pads over the lush grass toward the swimming pool. The pool bottom, tiled in over-sized mosaic pieces and at one end of the pool it says The Shallows, and at the other, The Deep.
The rebooted memory of The Deep has taken hold of Anna’s consciousness.
The figure of a small boy standing nearby that moves closer to the edge of the pool and stares at Anna–the face–the most striking feature–clown-like but distorted. Anna’s chest heaves in spasm. She’s having some kind of attack, where she loses the ability to breathe freely and she eventually collapses with exhaustion and losing consciousness.
A dark cloud moves over the house and garden. Anna shivers, her eyes flicker open as her subconscious senses a presence and rolls over to face the pool and resting on the bottom is the body of a middle-aged woman. Fully clothed, face down, and motionless. Anna looks at the body, vacantly, retrospective, and mutters the words:
“Mother. Are you okay?”
But then she reconsiders what she has just said. She is unsure about her sincerity; after all, the tone of her voice was flat, void of all emotion.
