The Devil’s Share

by Wallace Stroby

  “Phoenix,” she said. “Downtown.”

  “That’s a hike. Four hundred miles from here at least. You’re talking six, seven hours on the road.”

  “You’ll manage. I’ll pick the spot, tell you where to drop off the car. You driving?”

  “Hell, no. That’s what delegating’s for. Sandy maybe.”

  “I don’t like that idea.”

  “What am I supposed to do, hire some guy off the street to drive a car cross-country with three hundred grand in it? How do you think that’ll work out?”

  She gave that a moment, knew he was right. “Then he leaves the car where I say. Puts the keys somewhere I can find them, takes a walk. Catches a bus back, whatever. But there’s nobody near the car. If there is, I go home, and you still owe me the three hundred.”

  “Pretty confident, aren’t you?”

  “Confidence has nothing to do with it. This is business. How soon can you have it?”

  “I’ll have to see. That’s a lot of cash to get together. It’ll need to be counted and packed. Maybe by this weekend we’ll be able to…”

  “Day after tomorrow,” she said. “He brings the money, waits somewhere in town. I call you, tell you where he needs to go. You call him, he makes the drop-off.”

  “That’s not much time.”

  “Time enough. Have it ready.”

  “I’ll do my best,” he said, and was gone.

  Clouds were pushing in from the east, the temperature dropping. Gulls squawked above her, backpedaling in the wind.

  She called Chance.

  “Payment’s coming,” she said. “Doing the pickup in a couple days. I’ll drop off your share on my way home.”

  “You need me to come with?”

  “No, I already have an escort.” She told him about Keegan and McBride.

  “Careful with those two,” he said. “Not sure if I trust them after all this. You should bring me along.”

  “They want their money. I can’t blame them. You’ve done enough, I’ll handle this. How’s Lynette doing?”

  “Happy to have me back, I guess. Hard to tell sometimes.”

  “More reason not to come.”

  “Call me when it goes down,” he said. “Soon as you can. If you change your mind, shout. I’ll be on the next plane to wherever it is you need me.”

  “Thanks. But it’s under control.”

  “This is no time for pride.”

  “I’ll call,” she said, and hit END. Then she punched in Keegan’s number.

  * * *

  “That the car?” McBride said.

  They were parked on a side street, Crissa at the wheel of the rented Camry, McBride beside her, Keegan in back. A half block up was Second Street and the parking garage she’d chosen. From here they had a clear view of the entrance and exit ramps. A car had just pulled up to the attendant’s booth, driven inside.

  “No,” she said, and lowered the binoculars. The car was a Dodge Stratus. She’d been told to expect a Chevy Impala.

  “Just about time, though, isn’t it?” McBride said.

  She looked at her watch. Five minutes to four. “Almost.” They’d been here more than an hour.

  Keegan lit another cigarette, blew smoke out his half-open window. “Patience.”

  It was a four-level parking garage in downtown Phoenix, surrounded by office buildings, concrete and glass. On one side was a redbrick plaza with planters and park benches. During the week the streets would be crowded, the garage almost full. But this was Saturday and there was little traffic. From what she could tell through the binoculars, the garage was half empty.

  She’d gotten to Phoenix the day before. After checking into a motel near the airport, she’d driven around downtown, looking for someplace public but not too busy, that could be surveilled from a distance. She’d chosen the parking garage, had called Hicks an hour ago to give him the address, then picked up Keegan and McBride from their own motel.

  “I don’t like this,” McBride said. “Being out in the open where any bugger can see us.”

  He wore a dark windbreaker, half zipped, too heavy for the weather. Keegan had on a floral print shirt, tail untucked. She assumed both were armed, had managed to acquire guns once they got out here. She wore a T-shirt and jeans, hadn’t bothered with a weapon. If anything looked wrong, she’d walk.

  On the console, her phone began to buzz. She picked it up.

  “You should be seeing him any second,” Hicks said. “I just talked to him. I’m assuming you’re someplace close by.”

  “We’ll see him,” she said.

  “The money’s in a duffel in the wheel well. The car’s clean, plates and registration are good. All the docs are in the glove box. Drive it anywhere you want. You get pulled over with it, you’ll be fine. If they ask to search, that’s another thing.”

  “I’ll handle it,” she said.

  McBride was watching her. Keegan flicked his cigarette butt into the street.

  Here was the Chevy now, an older model, dark blue, with California plates. Sandoval at the wheel, wearing sunglasses.

  “That’s the bastard,” Keegan said.

  Sandoval stopped at the light just before the garage ramp, his blinker on. She raised the binoculars one-handed. There was no one else in the car.

  “He’s here,” she said into the phone. When the light changed, Sandoval pulled the Impala onto the entrance ramp, got a ticket from the machine outside the attendant’s booth. The gate rose, and he drove into the shadows.

  “Go check it out,” Hicks said. “Call me when you’re satisfied. Then we say good-bye.” He hung up.

  Five minutes later, Sandoval came out the street door, looked around, went to the crosswalk where two others were waiting for the light to change. Then he crossed, headed up Second Street, away from where they were parked, walking casually, no hurry.

  “We should grab him,” McBride said. “See what he has to say.”

  She shook her head, watched him walk a half block to the taxi stand. He spoke to the driver of a yellow cab, then got in the back. She watched as they drove away.

  McBride started to open his door. “Wait,” she said.

  “For what?” McBride said.

  She tracked the binoculars across the front of the garage, the plaza, the buildings on both sides. No signs of anyone else watching.

  Keegan leaned forward, put a hand on McBride’s shoulder, said, “She’s right. We wait, keep an eye out, see if there’s anyone else around. There’s no rush now, right?”

  She lowered the binoculars. If it looked safe, they’d divide the money right in the garage. Keegan and McBride would load their share in the empty duffel McBride had folded beneath his jacket. She’d take the bag Hicks had left, transfer the money to another suitcase back at the motel. Then she’d drive to Tucson, turn in her car, and get a long-distance rental for the ride home. She’d stop in Kansas City to give Sladden his cut, then on to Ohio and Chance.

  Ten minutes later, no one had come in or out of the garage. She raised the binoculars again, trained them on the glass booth. The attendant was reading a newspaper.

  “Enough,” McBride said.

  “This time he’s right,” Keegan said. “Enough.”

  “Maybe we should just take the car with us,” McBride said. “Do the split somewhere else.”

  “I don’t know anything about that car,” she said. “Where it’s been, whether the plates are good or not. I’m not taking any chances. We get the money, divide it, and we’re gone.”

  “Agreed,” Keegan said. She looked at him in the rearview. If they braced her inside, tried to take all the money themselves, there was nothing she could do about it. But it was too public a spot to risk gunfire, and the garage would have cameras. And they would know that if they took the money—her share and Chance’s, too—and left her alive, she or Chance would hunt them down eventually. The risk outweighed the reward. It would be safer, smarter, for them to take what they were owed, leave it at that. />
  “Let’s go,” she said, and got out of the car. She put on her sunglasses, shoved her phone into her pocket, and started for the crosswalk, not waiting for them. Heard car doors open and shut behind her.

  The pedestrian light was green, so she crossed the street to the stairwell door. The attendant was still buried in his paper. He didn’t look over when she went through the door and up the concrete stairs.

  Third floor. Her footsteps echoed in the stairwell. Below, she heard the street door open again.

  She pushed open the third-floor door. Maybe fifteen cars on this level. The Chevy was parked halfway down on the left, nose to the interior wall, empty spaces on both sides. It was dim and cool up here, the concrete spotted with pigeon droppings. No one else around.

  Beside the door was a reinforced glass case with a fire hose. Above that, a security camera mounted near the ceiling. She brushed her hand along the top of the case, felt the keys there in the dust, picked them up. She started for the car, not looking up at the camera as she passed. The stairwell door opened behind her.

  Two Chevy keys on a ring, an electronic fob. She pushed the button, heard the doors unlock. Her phone vibrated. She pulled it from her pocket.

  “Well?” Hicks said.

  “I’m at the car.”

  “Everything go like you wanted?”

  “So far.” Keegan and McBride had come up behind her.

  “Then call me when you’re clear,” Hicks said. “Let me know you’re happy.”

  “Right.” She ended the call. Beside her, Keegan said, “Keys.”

  “I’ve got them,” she said, and McBride moved up on her left. She felt the pressure in the small of her back, the gun he held. The way they stood, it would be hidden from the camera.

  “Keys,” Keegan said again. She held them out, and he took them.

  “Is it worth it?” she said. She still had the phone in her hand.

  “Way we look at it,” Keegan said. “All the trouble you put us through, to and fro, here and there, all that risk, another twenty isn’t quite enough, is it?”

  McBride cocked the gun, the hammer snicking into place. He ground the barrel into her spine, payback for Charlestown. At this range, with the muzzle flat against her, the shot wouldn’t be loud. When she went down they could catch her between them, muscle her into the car. To the camera, it would look as if she’d fallen, and they were helping her.

  “I should shoot you where you stand,” McBride said into her ear. “Just for being a right bitch.” He twisted the gun harder, sent a flash of pain up her back.

  Keegan walked around the car, looking through the windows.

  “Trunk,” she said. “Wheel well.” There was nothing else to do now, except let them take the money, then try to find a way to get it back.

  Keegan pressed the fob button that opened the trunk. The latch clicked, and the lid rose two inches. McBride took the folded duffel from inside his jacket, tossed it onto the Impala’s roof, then caught her belt and pulled her away from the car, not trusting her.

  Keegan crouched, looked through the gap in the trunk, then straightened. “Let’s see what we’ve got here,” he said, and raised the lid the rest of the way.

  The trunk was empty. No spare tire, no duffel bag. When the lid reached the top of its arc, she saw for the first time the thin wire there, and she knew.

  She threw an elbow into McBride’s face, twisted away from him, running. He fired at her, the bullet passing over her head, chipping concrete from the wall.

  She looked back, saw Keegan turning away fast from the trunk, McBride looking at him, confused, and then it was too late. She saw the flash, dove for the ground, and it wasn’t there, and then she was falling, falling, falling.

  * * *

  Hicks tried her number again. It didn’t ring this time, went directly to an automated message that said the subscriber was no longer on the network.

  The phone clicked, another call coming through. Sandoval.

  “Where are you?” Hicks said.

  “About a block away. I took a cab, then doubled back to watch, just in case. You’re right, they couldn’t wait.”

  “They?”

  “The two micks were with her. The three of them went in, nobody came out.”

  “You sure of that?”

  “I’m standing right here.”

  “How’s it look?”

  “Like someone called in an airstrike. Whole floor’s burning like a motherfucker. Nobody walked away from that one.”

  “Stick around, call me back,” Hicks said. “Let me know what you see.”

  “Right.”

  Hicks came in from the balcony. Cota rose from his seat by the cold, dead fireplace, leaning on his cane with both hands.

  Hicks tossed the phone onto the chair he’d been sitting in a few minutes earlier, looked at Cota, and said, “It’s done.”

  TWENTY

  Water running over her, warm, constant, hissing from above. The crackling of flames somewhere behind her. The air full of smoke.

  She tried to roll onto her side, but there was weight across her back. She pushed it away. McBride.

  She was at the base of a concrete wall. Twenty feet away, the Impala was burning. All the glass blown out, the trunk lid gone. Thick black smoke billowed up, flattened against the ceiling. The sprinkler system was spraying water, the concrete floor wet with it, but it was having no effect on the flames. There was no sign of Keegan.

  She tried to stand, put a hand on the wall to steady herself. Coughing made her ribs hurt. On the other side of the Impala, three spaces away, another car was on fire.

  On her feet now. She took a step, kicked something, looked down to see a bare and blackened arm, severed at the shoulder, wondered whose it was.

  A muffled alarm was sounding somewhere, and she realized then she couldn’t hear out of her left ear. Just an echoing silence there, pressure.

  Dizzy, she leaned back against the wall, moved along it, trying to get away from the flames. There was an explosion behind her, the other car’s gas tank going up. A wave of heat blew over her.

  Ahead of her, through the smoke, was the stairwell door. She held her breath, lurched toward it, hit the panic bar. The door flew open, and momentum carried her through. She fell hard onto the concrete landing, the door slamming shut behind her.

  She coughed, sucked in cool air. In her nostrils was the scent of scorched hair, cooked meat. She could hear sirens somewhere far off, wondered how long she’d been unconscious.

  Get up, she thought. Move. Walk.

  She gripped the metal railing, pulled herself to her feet, used it for support as she went down the stairs. There was pain in her left leg. It wanted to fold under her. The right side of her head was numb, and when she touched her hair there, her fingers came away with blood.

  She limped down the stairs, holding on to the railing with her left hand. Shouting outside and below, more sirens. On the second-floor landing, she pulled open the fire door, went in. She didn’t want to go all the way down, run into cops or firefighters coming up the stairs.

  Heading toward the exit ramp, she stopped to lean against cars when she had to. At the bottom of the ramp, she stood behind a pillar, tried to catch her breath. The attendant’s booth was empty, and Second Street was full of people, all of them looking up at the flames.

  She scanned faces, looking for Sandoval, wondering if he’d come back to watch, or finish the job. A fire truck, lights flashing, came around the corner and pulled to the curb, men spilling out of it. Firefighters began moving people off the sidewalk, toward the opposite side of the street.

  She went down the exit ramp then, out into the street and into the clot of people. A man said something to her she didn’t hear. She pushed past him.

  When she reached the other sidewalk, she looked back. Smoke poured from the third floor of the garage, flames licking up the outside wall to the roof, the concrete already black from the fire. A flare inside, the whump of another explosio
n, and the smoke thickened.

  A woman next to her was pointing at the sky. Crissa looked up, saw something in the air, caught in the thermal updraft from the flames. It drifted lazily down, its edges glowing red, and the crowd parted for it. It landed, faintly smoking, on the sidewalk. A charred piece of cloth about a foot square. A floral print. Keegan’s shirt.

  She turned and went through the crowd, no one paying attention to her, everyone watching the fire. When she reached the car, she felt a wave of dizziness. She put a hand on the hood to keep from falling, bent and vomited into the gutter.

  “You all right?”

  She looked up, and there was a uniformed cop standing there. She nodded, leaned back against the fender.

  “You don’t look it,” he said. “EMTs will be here in a minute. You need to go with them.”

  “Right,” she said, and looked past him to where his cruiser was parked halfway on the sidewalk, rollers flashing. “I will.”

  More sirens, another fire truck. The watchers had been pushed back farther. The cop turned from her, spoke into the body mike on his shoulder. The first truck had a hose going, was pouring water into the third-floor opening. Dark smoke roiled up into the blue sky.

  She’d lost the phone, but she still had her keys. She unlocked the car, slipped behind the wheel, had a coughing fit that left her dizzy again.

  An ambulance came up fast behind her, siren and lights going. It turned the corner, pulled up at an angle to the fire truck. The cop trotted toward it.

  She gripped the wheel until her hands stopped shaking. Her head was throbbing, pain replacing numbness. There was a rhythmic pounding in her left ear, in time with her pulse.

  She turned the rearview toward herself. Dried blood on her face. Her hair was singed on the left side, and there was a lump on her right scalp that triggered a surge of pain when she touched it. But no fresh blood. She had turned to her right just as the Impala went up. McBride had been in front of her, had taken the brunt of the peripheral blast, but she must have been thrown back, hit her head against the wall, blacked out. Concussion maybe. Or worse, a fractured skull.