by Tod Goldberg
“Mom,” I said, as calmly as possible, “wake Nate up and tell him to secure the house. He’ll know what to do.”
I didn’t actually know if this was true, but it would take me ten minutes to get home and with what we already had in place surrounding the house, all Nate really needed to do was turn off HGTV, close the shutters and make sure he had plenty of bullets nearby.
“What about me?” she asked.
“Grab your shotgun and stay low,” I said.
There was a pause. This was not a time for pauses.
“Where’s your shotgun, Ma?”
“In the car with Bruce.”
No.
No.
No.
This was not happening.
We were already out of the loft, running down the stairs. The bikes were there, as was the Charger. I wasn’t looking especially biker-ish in my worker uniform anymore, so I didn’t bother with the artifice. At some point, disguises and poses and your ability to sidle up to someone become irrelevant.
In those cases, a bad man with a bad woman, armed to the teeth with automatic weapons and driving a 1974 Charger usually suffices.
“Where is Bruce?”
“Don’t use that patronizing tone, Michael. He’s an adult.”
“Ma,” I said, “those two men out in front of the house are there to kill Bruce. They are also there to probably kill me. The odds are fair that if they see you first, they’ll kill you, too, so pretty please, with sugar plum fairies, tell me where Bruce went.”
“He ran out to get us all some dinner. He said he had steaks in his freezer at home.”
I pressed down on the gas and the Charger lunged forward. “I will be there in seven minutes,” I said. “If those two men get any closer to the house, shoot them.” I hung up and called Sam. “Change to the itinerary,” I told him. “The Ghouls are staking out my mother’s house.”
“That’s not good, Mikey.”
“Understatement,” I said. We came to a stoplight and, after safely checking both directions of oncoming traffic, and properly flashing my lights and honking the horn… I blew through it going about ninety-five. Beside me, Fiona was loading guns and strapping knives to herself, which, while hot, would not be a great experience if we happened to get sideswiped.
Or pulled over by a cop.
Like the one I didn’t see hiding behind a parked RV until I was already fifty yards beyond him and screaming toward my mother’s house.
His lights immediately went on, as did the blaring siren.
“Do I hear a siren?” Sam said.
“No,” I said.
“That’s good,” Sam said. “Because for a minute I thought maybe highway patrol was chasing you.”
“It’s actually a siren and a horn you hear,” I said. I looked in the rearview mirror. “And he looks like a regular traffic cop.”
“That’s a relief,” Sam said. “You have some direction for me, Mikey?”
“One moment please,” I said. We were approaching a school zone and even though it was early evening, police tend to hang out near school zones to pick up speeders. And drug dealers. And gangbangers. And if they got lucky today, they’d get a former bank robber for the IRA who now sold guns to Cuban revolutionaries and a burned spy, both of whom had enough artillery on them to take down Guam in a bloody coup.
The motorcycle cop was still behind me and by that point was probably actively working the radio. If it was a slow crime day, they’d probably scramble a helicopter, which would then get the news helicopters in the air, which would then get all of this on the news.
This could work to my advantage, so I gunned the Charger through the school zone, my own horn honking, my own lights blinking, trying to get as much attention as possible.
“Bruce is either dead or hiding somewhere near my mother’s, so I need you to drag the Banshees there.”
“I’m not sure if the rental van can outrun a bunch of hogs,” Sam said.
In my rearview mirror, I could see the motorcycle cop gaining on me. He wasn’t close enough to see my plate and we hadn’t traveled far enough for this to be considered a high-speed chase, because a reasonable lawyer could conjecture that while the cop was on my tail, I was driving so recklessly as to not notice. Plus, I was driving fairly conservatively, if incredibly fast. Safety first and all that.
“You have to try,” I said. “How close are you to the weed house?”
“I can be there in five minutes,” he said.
“When you get there,” I said, “shoot it up. Maybe take out the SUV, make a big bang, big enough that they’ll follow you quick.”
“You sure Fiona got all the C-4?” Sam asked. “I’d rather not add a meteor crater to the list of Miami’s attractions.”
I turned to Fiona-she was quietly sharpening a knife against a mortarboard, as calm and detached as if she were doing her nails (while driving ninety-five miles per hour with the cops on her tail). “All of the C-4 is out of the SUV, right?”
Fiona lifted one shoulder.
“Yes or no, Fi, because Sam is going to blow it up in about three minutes.”
“I guess he’ll know when he blows it up,” she said. “I’d advise him to stand at least one foot from any open flame.”
“Sam,” I said, “do the drive-by like the kids do these days. No stopping to admire. But hang back enough for the Banshees to see you. We need to draw them out right now and get them heading toward my mother’s.”
“On it,” he said and hung up.
As soon as the phone was off, it rang.
Nate.
I handed the phone to Fiona. “Would you mind taking a message?” I said. “I need to not accidentally kill anyone.”
“You really need to get a Bluetooth,” Fiona said. “It’s very dangerous to talk on the phone while driving.”
We flew through an intersection just as another motorcycle cop came peeling into view.
We were now being chased.
This would take some explaining, but that was fine. I’d be happy to explain that I was coming to help my mother, who apparently was being held hostage by a brimming motorcycle gang turf war.
Provided I could get to the house before shots started getting fired.
Fiona answered the phone, said a few words, and then dropped it in my lap. “It’s your brother,” she said.
Sometimes Fiona is difficult just to be difficult. It suits her, but it’s not always an enjoyable aspect of her personality.
“Nate,” I said, just as we passed a Starbucks that used to be a coin-op laundry Nate and I used to steal quarters from (a knife, a paper clip and a can of WD- 40 were all you needed to pry open the coin depository on the old washers). “I can’t really talk. I’m being chased by the police.”
“Yeah,” he said, “I hear a bunch of sirens. That you?”
“I’m about half a mile away,” I said, “coming from the east. That where the sound is coming from?”
“Actually, it’s coming from all over. In stereo, pretty much.”
“Good,” I said.
“Yeah,” he said.
“Is there something you wanted to talk about, Nate, or can this wait until after I’m done evading capture?”
“I just wanted to apologize,” he said. “I think these guys found the house because of me.”
“Why is that, Nate?”
I turned left, which was technically away from the house, but I wanted to get a sense of how many police were potentially following me. I knew of two at least, but hadn’t seen any air support.
I used my blinker.
My seat belt was on, and apart from the cache of guns in the car, I was really only guilty of speeding at this point.
And failure to yield.
And some red light problems.
But I was thinking of killing my brother.
“I dropped Zadie off and ran a couple of errands. When I got back she said she had a really nice conversation with a young lady in leather pants about me. Zad
ie points her out in the parking lot, so I go over and drop a little game on her.”
“Drop a little game on her?”
“I talked her up, told her I was staying out at Mom’s, and, you know, to call me there. Maybe we’d get together and watch religious television together and hand-knit bedspreads. Couple hours later, I realized, you know, maybe that she was a plant.”
“Maybe.”
“And, well, now there’s about fifteen bikers circling the house. I’m really sorry, Michael.”
“How about instead of apologizing, maybe load a couple of guns?”
“Mom is on that,” Nate said. “And Maria is pretty handy around a nine. Zadie’s boiling water in case they break the perimeter. She said that’s how we won World War One.”
I looked into the rearview mirror and saw… nothing. I looked to my right: nothing. I looked to my left: nothing. I looked at Fiona. She’d put away all of her weapons and was now texting with someone.
And I didn’t hear any sirens.
“Nate,” I said, “I’ll be there in two minutes. Don’t let anyone into the house. And if the cops come, stay indoors.”
I pulled over at an intersection only a few blocks from my mother’s.
“What are we doing?” Fi asked.
“Waiting,” I said.
“Is that the best idea?”
“Do you see any police?”
Fiona did the same compass pass I’d just performed. “Where are they?” she asked.
“Listen,” I said.
In the distance I could make out the faint sound of about a hundred sirens humming alongside the growling of motorcycles. There was a good chance the cop following me was called off pursuit for a larger, more dangerous issue-namely, a horde of thugs speeding through residential Miami.
I called Sam.
“ETA?” I said.
“I’ll be there in about five minutes,” he said. “I’ve got a posse on my back that you wouldn’t believe.”
“Any shots fired?”
“Not yet,” Sam said.
“If you pass an open field, bury a bullet.”
“I like that idea,” Sam said.
“Tell me what street you’re on,” I said. He did and then I hung up with him and called 911.
“Yes, thank you, I’d like to report a very serious situation. There are approximately two hundred men on motorcycles chasing a man in a white van down Reston Avenue. One of the motorcycle people just fired a gun. Yes. Very frightening. My name?” I paused for one moment and thought it through. “Clifford Gluck,” I said and then hung up.
“This is exactly how you planned it, right?” Fiona said.
“This is all contingency training, Fi,” I said. “Textbook stuff.”
“Funny,” she said. “Oh, yes, the old pit-two-enemies-together-to-k ill-each-other-off-so-a-third-party-can-prosper textbook. I heard about it on Twitter. The kids love it. Always such a winning plan.”
“Vietnam?” I said.
“Yes, that ended up particularly well.”
“Iraq?”
“Another solid victory for the good guys,” she said.
I kept thinking and watching the intersection, waiting for the inevitable flurry of action. Two or three minutes later, it flashed by: a hunk of white followed by what looked liked a swarm of giant flies. The police were not yet on the scene, but I could already feel the ionic change in the air-a helicopter was nearby, but it was also the release of anxiety and breath and sweat by the people on the street.
When people talk about sensing fear, this is what they mean. When you’re scared, your sweat emits a different smell, a genetic marker that one can pick up on and exploit. The breeze rolls by and things smell and feel different and you start to feel anxious and aware, it’s usually because you’re perceiving someone else’s fear.
“We need to ditch some guns,” I said. If I was going to show up at my mother’s at the same time cops were, it would be wise not to have an arsenal of illegal guns on my person, nor would it be great if Fiona came sliding out of the Charger strapped like Bigfoot was coming after her stamp collection. A pretty face and a cute walk go a long way, but a pretty face and a cute walk and several guns in front of twitchy-fingered beat cops could mean a bullet.
And I really didn’t want Fiona shooting anyone.
“Do you propose I walk into the Chick- fil-A and just hand them what I have?”
She had a point.
I looked around the area. There was indeed a Chickfil-A, but there was also a library, a gas station and three houses. In front of one of the houses was a gutter.
“We’ll dump them in the gutter,” I said.
“I have to tell you that I find this offensive on every level,” she said, but then she gathered up what we had, leaving us each with one gun, and threw the rest into the drain system. She got back into the car silently.
A girl separated from her guns is never a time for joy.
I started the car back up and drove at a natural rate of speed toward my mother’s, though with the windows down so I could hear the sirens and any shots.
The sirens were easy enough to hear-they came in crashing waves.
And then came the gunfire-a wail of shots echoed into the air as I pulled onto the street adjacent to my mother’s. It was mostly small-arms fire from what I could hear, which made sense. The gangs weren’t known to be stocked with a lot of rifles and submachine guns. What was clear, however, was that there was a volley going on-an all-out assault vs. an all-out assault. You could hear the call and response of battle.
This would be good for home values in the neighborhood.
If everything was working as planned-or, at least, as recently devised-the Ghouls and the Banshees were now doing a bit of mutual assured destruction. The police would be arriving soon enough, but one thing police are keen to do is let bad guys kill bad guys. It’s a lot less paperwork in the short and long term. If we got lucky, the Ghouls would be so busy with the Banshees, they’d be forced to forget about Bruce for at least a few minutes, and that meant they’d forget about my mother’s house and all of the people inside.
Still, I had to be there to be sure.
I started to get out of the car, but Fiona stopped me. “You can’t be seen there,” she said. “You walk into the middle of that gunfight and you’ll either be killed or arrested. And if you’re arrested, you have no idea if you’ll ever see freedom again.”
She was right, but I couldn’t stand by, either.
If you’re a good spy, you don’t need to be the instigator of violence to be effective. Sometimes it’s enough just to be the guy who makes everyone else feel safer.
“I’ll be fine,” I said. “Take the car back to the loft. I’ll call you when it’s over.” I leaned over and kissed her once on the cheek before jumping out of the car. I hurdled the Evanses’ side fence, took the Strongs’ back gate in a nice swing move, scaled the Williamses’ block wall, shimmied under the Mecklenburgs’ bougainvillea bush (which was just a sprig when I was a kid) and then wormed my way into my own backyard.
The sound of gunfire was intense, but the sound of approaching sirens was pervasive. I looked up and saw not one but three helicopters hovering.
The news has always loved to televise bad people doing bad things to one another, especially when they do so in unusual places, like, say, neighborhoods filled with blue light specialers.
My main goal now, however, was to navigate the labyrinth of razor wire I’d prepared in the yard, as I’d become accustomed to having two Achilles tendons and had every intention of growing old with both. I put my head down and watched every step, remembering the pattern of the wire, the circle pattern meant to ensnare even the most limber advancing army, which in this case would be me. All I knew was that I had to get into the house and make sure all was okay.
“Don’t take another step or I’ll blast you.”
I looked up to find Zadie clutching a shotgun. She didn’t have her glasses on, so I was like
ly just a blur moving through the yard. She was looking to her right. I was standing about twenty feet to her left.
“Zadie,” I said, “it’s Michael. Don’t shoot.” I took a step forward and she fired a single shot that conveniently found its way into the dirt about five feet behind me and to the left.
“Are you dead?” she asked.
“No, Zadie, I’m still standing right here.”
“You didn’t run off?”
“No, Zadie, I didn’t. Now put that gun down before you hurt someone.”
“You say you’re Michael?”
“That’s what I say, yes,” I said.
“How do I know it’s you?” she said.
“You could go inside and get my mother,” I said. “Just don’t tell her you shot at me. My mother reacts very poorly to people who try to shoot her son.”
I could almost see the gears working in Zadie’s head. Eventually she lowered the gun. It must have made sense to her, so I kept walking until I was directly in front of her and then gently removed the shotgun from her hands.
“Let me take that,” I said.
“In my day I was a pretty good shot,” she said.
“I’m sure you were,” I said.
The gunfire on the street had come to a stop and now I heard the barking of police officers, shouting, screaming, moaning, and the approaching sound of more than one ambulance. I didn’t know where Sam was, or his condition, only that he’d brought a war zone to bear on my mother’s street and the likely result was that the bad guys were now about to be the incarcerated guys. My first concern, however, was the collateral damage.
I looked Zadie over. She was unwounded. She didn’t even seem all that nervous. “Are you okay?” I said.
“This isn’t the first time I’ve heard people fighting,” she said.
“That was a bit more than a fight,” I said.
“I ever tell you about my husband robbing buses?”
“Yes,” I said.
“So maybe sometimes he wasn’t alone.”
You learn a lot about someone if you know how to get the right stories out of them.
I put my arm through Zadie’s and guided her inside the house, where we found Nate crouched behind a sofa, my mother and Maria beside him. Maria’s dog stood panting over them. There was no blood and it didn’t look like any bullets had come sailing through the windows. I peered out the window and saw a dozen police cruisers, SWAT members, three ambulances and a lot of people on the ground.
