Knuckledragger

by Rusty Barnes

  “Rosie,” I said, “we’re not going home quite yet.”

  “What’s wrong?” she said.

  “It’s probably nothing, but I see this Escalade that’s behind us and has been since the DD.” She twisted her neck and looked between the bucket seats.

  “Lots of Escalades on the Cape,” she said. “Not lots but, you know.”

  “Where do you want to go?” I said. “Somewhere we can spend a couple days low profile.”

  “Why don’t we try the lakes or somewhere up in Maine?” She pulled out her phone and began searching Google. “How much cash we have left?”

  “About eighteen hundred, so we can stay someplace nice. Don’t worry about it. I’ll put it on a card if it comes to that.” I shifted the car into the turn lane. Traffic had slowed to a crawl. The Escalade had stopped even making pretenses. It simply followed me into the lane. I’d had enough. I punched the buttons on my phone and brought up Otis’s phone. Someone different answered every time, and true to form, I didn’t recognize the voice.

  “Who dis?” the gravelly voice said.

  “Candy. Give the fucking phone to Otis,” I said. Rosie’s eyes widened and she shook her head. Back-channel noise came through the phone speaker. I held it away from my ear until I heard a voice come on.

  “This is Otis. Make it quick.”

  “You got someone following me?” I said. “I think I know what’s up. You don’t have to have me followed.”

  “Nobody’s following you, son. X and Bluto are here and Tito don’t do that kind of stuff. I kinda resent you calling me on it.”

  “Nobody else has beaten the piss outa me lately.” I said. “Am I coming back to work, or I am going to wind up dead somewhere?”

  “Work, man. We got lots of it. If somebody’s following you, it ain’t me. Your chickie know anything about it?” I hadn’t thought of that. I maybe got on the horn too quickly.

  “All right,” I said. “Just making sure. I’ll be back soon.”

  “Adios, motherfucker,” Otis said. Then the line went dead. I blew out my breath, and as luck would have it, the Escalade had drifted more than a few cars behind.

  “You OK, sweetie? Rosie said, putting her hand on my thigh. I was sweating to the vinyl seats.

  “Fine,” I said. “You find anything good?”

  “How about Gunstock NH, up in the White Mountains?”

  “What’s the appeal?” I said.

  “Private lake with only five houses on it. We can get a small cabin for four hundred a night, and they have canoes!” Rosie said. “We just have to truck in some groceries for snacks and whatever. They supply meals”

  “I could stand some private time,” I said. “Reserve it if you can.” We were almost up to the 93 interchange. I was looking forward to hitting route 3. The mountains would be almost cool.

  “Once we hit Lake Winnipesaukee it’s only about ten minutes.”

  “That lake is bogus,” I said. “People all over it. No privacy at all. My ma used to drag me up there with her boyfriends. They all wanted to teach me to fish, and all I wanted to do was lift and play football.”

  “I got something you can lift,” Rosie said coyly, putting her hands under her breasts.

  “I’m not sure,” I said. “My ribs won’t take it.” I cracked a smile for the first time on the trip, and the smile felt even better when I glanced back at the road and couldn’t see an Escalade within a half-mile. Then I looked back, and Rosie took off her shirt and bra. Her breasts were really just something. Like a museum piece.

  “Comfortable?” I said, laughing.

  “You bet, Irish,” she said. If I could just forget about Otis, and Nina, I’d be a lot better off. In the back of my mind, though, I was fretting.

  CHAPTER 9

  RUNNING UP THE ROADS toward New Hampshire, the number of dark Escalades multiplied by a factor and a half, so I couldn’t tell one from another. I assumed whoever it was still followed us. I started to relax a little when more green and brown showed up by the wayside instead of the concrete of Boston and Cambridge and the suburbs. Rosie had given me a show all the way up Route 3, stripping down to nothing and back up to full dress. I appreciated it, although I couldn’t tell her it was because seeing her obvious enjoyment did me more good than the actual exposure. I couldn’t get my mind off the Escalade, and failing that, my ribs.

  We drove past several lakes as we got farther north, almost all of them built up into small resorts with Wi-Fi and laundry service and other bullshit. Since Rosie had done all the arranging, I wasn’t sure of anything except the name of the place, Cocoa Lake, named for the way the water looked. It hadn’t sounded like much of a recommendation, but for the fact that the owner had said it was a great lake for outdoorsy people. I didn’t know if I qualified on that count, but I was dead certain Rosie didn’t. I’d have to hope for a seat on the side of the lake, hopefully in the long grass, and a chance to drown a worm.

  Rosie turned the GPS toward her. “Almost there,” she said, squirreling her hair into a ponytail and putting on my Sox cap. “I hope you brought some sunblock. Your white ass is gonna fry in this heat.”

  “I’ll manage,” I said. I couldn’t see anything on my side of the road but tall trees; the GPS said the left turn was in five hundred feet. Sure enough, by the time the English woman’s tuneless accent cued me to the turn, I’d already made it. Maple and birch trees lined the sides of the road, if you could call it a road. It was a wide path filled with wood chips instead of gravel or dirt. Either way the road still popped like corn under the wheels.

  I drove out into a small clearing which apparently served as a parking lot. Across the lot I could see the lake, as brown as its name suggested. The owners lived in a huge Victorian situated about a hundred yards from their frontage and a nice dock with bass boats moored on either side and a set of three Grumman canoes resting on a utility pole rack next to the water. The lake was larger than I expected from the description, and I could make out all the rentals on either side of the lake. I could feel my breath start to come a little easier.

  “This is great,” I said to Rosie. “Nice job.” I patted her on the ass as she walked into the space marked OFFICE. After I’d unloaded our couple suitcases she came out with keys for the rental and another agreement renting one of the canoes.

  “The owner’s real nice,” Rosie said. “Our cabin is the one straight across the way. She said the easiest method of getting there is canoeing, so I went ahead and took one.”

  “Slick,” I said. “This’ll be boss. Nobody around at all.”

  “Meals are strictly at eight, one and six. Vegan options possible.”

  “Since when are you vegan?” I said.

  “I just wanted to know if they offered it. It’s a sign of a classy place.”

  “I thought you could tell that from the price,” I said as we walked toward the dock.

  “By the way,” Rosie said. “If we want to, they threw in Saturday night for free. For some reason they’re not booked up on weekends.”

  I liked our situation. No way could the guys in the Escalade make their way in here without showing they didn’t belong. It would be a great place to sort out what went on in my head. I picked up a canoe and slid it into the water.

  “Best get in,” I said. “You’re in the front.” I slid the two suitcases and duffel bag into the middle of the canoe, trying to weight it toward the front, since I was so much bigger than Rosie. “You ever been in a canoe before?” I said.

  “Fuck off,” Rosie said. “Probably more than you have.” I pushed us off and jumped in. We disturbed a water snake who skimmed his way back to the shore as quick as he could. Rosie took to the paddle like she’d been doing it her whole life.

  “I didn’t know you could swim, let alone paddle a canoe,” I said. She snorted and sent a paddle-full of water splashing back at me. The ride across the lake was a smooth half-mile. It didn’t look as if any of the cabins were occupied but ours. We pulled into a gravel be
ach with two deck chairs. I heaved the suitcases out onto the gravel and secured the boat so it wouldn’t drift away or fill with rain.

  “Look, it’s so cute inside,” Rosie said.

  “Is the bed big enough?” I said. “I don’t like my ankles hanging off.” Once I saw the inside I had no worries. Full kitchen, smallish bath, a nice leather sofa and a flatscreen TV bolted into the wall. Out the back door sat a charcoal grill and a picnic table. From the looks of it, there was a regular parade of animals around the back too. Fifty feet from the cabin, almost in the trees, was a hummingbird nest.

  “This is so nice,” Rosie said. “We should probably go get some snacks.”

  “Just a sec,” I said. I walked the perimeter of the hedgerow, checked out the woods a little. A hiking trail terminated a few feet behind our cabin. If I’d been in better shape physically I’d have suggested we take it, but this time would be spent inside or relaxing on that little gravel beach. Maybe we could even swim. I came back in and told Rosie what I’d found, but the rumble in my stomach convinced me she was right, so we locked up our little cabin and paddled back across the lake to the car.

  We asked directions and found a little mom and pop grocery in between Gunstock and one of those other little towns you only find in New England. Rosie picked up some pastry you could heat up in the oven, and I grabbed a big bag of jerky and some cheese popcorn, plus some diet tonic. They sold firewood, too, and I picked up three plastic-wrapped packages plus some matches. Then Rosie picked up marshmallows.

  “I’m not eating those things,” I said.

  “More for me,” she said. We got in the car and drove back to Cocoa Lake. A couple more cars had shown up, a late model Lexus and a 4Runner. And in the owner’s spot, a black Escalade. That made me worry a little, but what possible odds could there be that the owners were with Otis?

  “You notice that Escalade?” I asked.

  “It can’t be the same one,” she said. “The odds are just way out there.”

  “What did the owners look like?” I said.

  “Just a hip, sort of fit couple,” Rosie said. “The guy looks like one of those guys who plays tennis and all the time, and the woman has a booth tan. They seem just like ordinary rich people.”

  “This place must pay out quite a bit,” I said. “With the prices they’re charging, anyway.”

  “Fuck them anyway. Let’s go build a fire.” Rosie slid her arm along mine. “C’mon Irish, lighten up and relax a little.”

  “I would if my ribs didn’t hurt like a motherfucker,” I said.

  “I’m going to make you forget you have ribs tonight,” Rosie said.

  “I can always hope,’ I said as I let the paddle drag in the water. Gnats swarmed around me even as we were moving along to the other side of the lake. I saw something jump in the water, and heard the low murmur of conversation the way you can across a small body of water. We didn’t say much else, and by the time the canoe scraped bottom early evening had set in.

  I made two trips bringing everything in while Rosie made a fire in the pit out back. While she fought with some sticks and paper I lit a few citronella candles that had been provided by the resort. I wished we had a bug zapper. Eventually she got a fire going, and the bugs stayed out of range except for one huge tricolored moth in brown black and white. I’d never seen one like that. We sat in the back enjoying the fire and eating jerky. Rosie kept pushing closer and closer to me.

  “I don’t know if I’m up for you tonight,” I said. “You know, the ribs really hurt.”

  “It’s OK one way or the other,” she said, tucking her head into my shoulder a little. “I have an idea anyway.” We talked about all kinds of things, her job, what little I could tell her about my job, our childhoods. It felt like what it was, a long heart-to-heart conversation of the kind you get into when you pair up later in life. You have to tell your story to each other. The problem I had was that I dug having Rosie around, I enjoyed her company, but all I could see in my mind’s eye was Nina. I felt bad having this conversation here with Rosie when I really wanted someone else. It made me feel shitty. When the talking lulled a little and the fire died down to orange and gray coals, Rosie blew out the candles and drew me inside the cabin.

  “I brought some other bandages and stuff,” she said. “Some of the ones Dottie put on need to be changed. You want?” I said sure, and she sat me down on the leather sofa and rustled in among the suitcases, coming up with a fistful of gauze and medical tape. “It’s mostly the cuts on the sides of your face,” she said. “I can do those, but I don’t know what to do with your ear.”

  “I don’t think I know anything more to do with them. I mean, I guess you could lance it or something, but I don’t know how much blood that would be.” I lay back on the arm of the couch and gave myself over to her ministrations. I winced once when she caught the edge of the cut across my nose, but otherwise there was very little pain. She made me so relaxed I might have even fallen asleep.

  In the night, Rosario slept up against me like a child would, one arm thrown over my chest. I heard noises all through the night, thumps and bumps that all sounded like people out to get us. Once I heard a crash outside the door so loud I had to get up to check it out. I opened up the back door just in time to see a raccoon scrambling away from the charcoal grill it had just knocked over. I walked out in my bare feet and set it upright again. I could feel moisture like a second skin. Maybe it meant rain here, maybe it meant rain somewhere else in the mountains with the lightning shows so common up here. Maybe it meant nothing at all.

  CHAPTER 10

  ROSIE WOKE ME UP around seven. I washed my face as best I could around the stitches and the bandages and dressed myself in shorts and a t-shirt. Rosie looked great in a denim skirt and a black wifebeater. We paddled across the lake quickly, as a morning chill had come in with fog so heavy we couldn’t see the owner’s house or the office. When Rosie pulled the canoe up onto the gravel, I saw the reason why my stomach had been upset since the middle of the night. A black Escalade sat parked three cars away from my Hyundai.

  “See that?” I said, pointing at the huge vehicle. “That’s no fucking coincidence.”

  “But Otis said—”

  “Nothing I can trust.” I finished her sentence. “Let’s go in to breakfast and see what’s up.”

  Rosie took my hand as we went up the stairs to the front deck where they served breakfast. It didn’t feel like a restaurant, more like family dining. Soon the owner’s wife Linda came out and brought us fresh-squeezed OJ and steel-cut oatmeal if we wanted it, then took our order. I got a cheddar bacon omelet and Rosie got fresh fruit and another order of the oatmeal. The only other couple in there were somewhat older, maybe in their fifties, the woman with that well-tanned skin that means tennis or golf in the mornings four times a week. I relaxed a little and dug into the omelet.

  “Everything’s fine, right Irish?” Rosie said, sprinkling brown sugar onto her oatmeal.

  “Yep,” I said. “Just fine.” She didn’t need me to tell her the older couple hadn’t come in an Escalade. Those motherfuckers were not accounted for yet, and that fact made me very nervous. I couldn’t figure out what the end strategy was for Otis. He could have killed me if that’s what he wanted, but unless he had something on Rosario (she didn’t know anyone I worked with or for) there was just nothing.

  “Look,” Rosie said. A new couple was negotiating the somewhat steep steps up to the dining area, a dark-skinned brother and his white wife.

  “Escalade,” I mouthed at Rosie.

  “You’re such a racist,” Rosie said.

  “Probably, but you wanna bet on it?” I said.

  “Shh,” she said. She pointed her spoon at me. “You are a bad man.”

  “Not me,” I said. “Let’s go. We have relaxing to do.” I slipped a sharp fruit knife into my pocket. I had the brass knucks back at the cabin in my bag, so short of coming in with a gun, I was prepared as I could be with one eye and a couple broke
n ribs. Even just getting up from the chair made my ribs twinge.

  The 9 a.m. sun sat high in the sky, and temperatures reflected it already. It must have been eighty-five degrees already. As we paddled, I wished the lake hadn’t been so dark and filled with silt. It felt like a swimming day, but I didn’t want to chance anything getting into the many open wounds I had. I’d have to be satisfied with showers.

  “Who the hell is that?” Rosie said as we got closer to our own little gravel beach. Two men sat in the chairs on our beach. I back-paddled, trying to get some distance between us, but one man got up and went into thigh-high water to retrieve the canoe with one huge hand. Rosie swung at him, and he took the flat of the paddle on his head as if it was nothing, then dragged us forcibly onto the gravel.

  “What’s the deal?” I said. The big one just scowled and tossed the canoe aside like a toy.

  “I’m Benjamin,” the other man said, rising from the chair. “This is Manuel,” he indicated with his thumb.

  “What the fuck?” Rosie said.

  “It’s OK,” I said, even though it wasn’t. “I know these guys.” And I did, by reputation. They worked for Diovisalvo at the liquor store in East Boston, the guy I’d taken twelve-G from day before yesterday.

  “So you understand we’re just here to deliver a message, Candy,” Benjamin said. Manuel cracked his knuckles and leered at Rosario. I had a little message in mind too.