“Good job,” I lie. An older kid watches, inching closer, shaking and twisting like he’s had to pee for three years. He’s wearing Nike athletic pants and a hooded sweatshirt, so of course he thinks he knows more about basketball than my kid. When Zach goes to pick up the next basketball, dropping it, the other kid swoops in, picking it up, bumping Zach out of the way, lining up to shoot.
“Hey, hold it,” I say. “It’s his turn.”
“I’m just showing him how to hold it,” the kid says, and shoots. He misses, the fucker.
Zach stands there lamely, watching, shrinking. “Go ahead, Z. There’s one more ball.”
But the little fucker picks it up. I lean over, take it from him. “I said it’s his turn.”
“He’s just trying to help.” A tall thin dude with those thick black hipster glasses smiles at me. He’s got his hands in his pockets, super suave, like he knows it all and the rest of the world just needs to catch up. Also wearing a Nike sweatshirt. The dad then.
“He needs to wait his turn,” I say.
The dad takes his hands out of his pockets, holds them up like I’ve just whipped out a pistol. “Chill, man. It’s just a game.”
I give him a cool look. My best last week I broke some fucker’s ring finger with a hammer look. I could shove my thumb in his windpipe, knee him in the stomach, break his neck with one quick twist and shove him under the pool table right now and no one except the cockroaches would find him for weeks.
It works. Dude Dad grabs his punk by the shoulder. “Come on, Timmy. Let’s go find another game to play.”
Timmy. I feel a ball in my throat and check the time. One twenty. Shit.
“Zach, bud, I need to—”
But Zach’s already running away, tokens clanging in his cup, into the crowd with a group of kids I assume he knows. I wonder if I should say goodbye, find Georgetta, something, but time’s ticking in my ear like a bomb about to go off.
I turn, bump into someone, and go to say excuse me when I’m drowned out by her splitting, high-pitched voice. “Well, look who crawled out from his rock.”
“Bernadette,” I say, feeling the migraine pound louder. She’s wearing the Mike ’n Mouse get-up, white button-down shirt and red pants and a baseball cap with an obnoxious cartoon mouse shouting into a bullhorn. “I—didn’t know…”
“You didn’t know what, Bluto? My phone number? Forgot to call, is that it?” She smirks, her black curly hair shaking, and I’m reminded of the way it looked sprawled across her pillow in the morning sun. Like dozens of little snakes.
“Look, I’ve got to run.”
“Of course you do,” she says loudly, and I see the other parents around us staring. She lowers her voice, and her face changes. “Not a big deal, Bluto. I’m not upset. Don’t flatter yourself. It didn’t mean anything.”
It didn’t mean anything. The words come back to me in a flash. Olivia, her fiery hair glowing like a halo around her head as we sat in the posh lobby of the Sheraton hotel. She had her legs crossed, a short skirt, and her thighs kept sticking to the leather in the summer Atlanta heat that the over-airconditioned lobby couldn’t keep out. She sat one cushion away from me on the couch, not looking directly at me.
And just like that, without her having to say another word, I knew what it all meant.
It didn’t mean anything. Anything at all.
I take only back roads. One thing I learned the two years I drove a truck was never to rely on GPS or fancy electronic maps. I use my instincts. Would rather be moving than stuck in traffic.
There were many things I loved about that job. One was getting away from everything—which I needed at the time. I’d take supplies from Trenton to Colorado and back again, stops along the way. Something soothing about the dead-of-the-night highway darkness, interrupted only by an occasional crackle of chatter on the CB radio. Lots of time for a man to think, to figure out his next steps. I can’t say it was the happiest I’ve ever been, but it was up there in the rankings.
I hurry, but the creeping clock tells me I’m going to be late. I fucked up. Don’t screw this up, Hank. A test. A simple test, and I’d blown it. The only thing that will save me is if Timmy is also late.
When I get there at ten after two, I park quickly, illegally, but getting towed is the least of my worries. Rush into the alley. It doesn’t have to be orchestrated or beautiful. The job just has to get done. I can feel the sweat trickling down my back. The smell from the dumpster is stronger now, a dark rotting that somehow feels comforting.
I slide quietly up to the window. Peer in. See the store owner standing there, measuring someone. The customer’s got his arms straight out, standing on a carpeted pedestal. My heart beats faster—I’ve got him! Good ole Timmy. You get fitted for that suit. You take your sweet time.
But then the guy turns, and I see his profile. Older man with a beard and a nose curved in like a pair of pliers. He says something to the store owner and chuckles, and his belly bobs up and down like a dryer on high speed.
And the fancy green suit that was hanging near the desk is gone.
You’ve got a short window. So don’t blow it. I can feel Olivia’s disappointment like she already knows.
And maybe she does already know. Doesn’t Olivia always know everything—almost like she can predict the future, plan for events before they even happen? Didn’t she know that I’d fall in love with her, before I even knew it myself? Already planning to distance herself that morning in the hotel, already gone before I even knew what had happened.
It didn’t mean anything, Hank. Nothing at all. Just a mistake in judgment. Too much chianti, she laughed, tossing that fiery mane back, only one self-conscious flick of the eye to let me know that she was playing a role. Don’t worry about it. It won’t affect anything with your job with us.
But it had affected everything. That was something Olivia hadn’t been able to predict. Or me either.
I steady myself, pick up a rock, and open the door to the shop. The owner looks up at me, his face drops almost into a frown. I’m not his usual clientele. The man he’s fitting lowers his arms, says ouch, and rubs his fat arm where a pin has pricked him. They both stare at me like cows caught in a pasture.
“Excuse me,” I say, desperate now, not caring about covering my tracks or conducting a clean job. “I’m looking for a man. He was supposed to have a two o’clock appointment?”
“Sir?” the owner says, and I’m not sure if he’s stalling or just confused.
“I was supposed to meet him here? Have I missed him?”
But I don’t need the store owner to tell me. I see his eyes shift toward the register. Toward that empty hanging rack where the green suit had been.
“Which way did he go?” I ask, this time low. No nonsense. The owner’s face goes white, like a vigorous shake of Zach’s Etch-a-Sketch. I hold up the rock. It’s hefty. I like its weight.
“I don’t want any trouble—”
“Which way? Which fucking way?” It all presses on me now, the maddening noises from the birthday arcade, my son’s clumsy athletic skills, my failed career and life. Disappointing Olivia once again.
I throw the rock. They both duck, hands flailing over their heads, but I’m not aiming at them. The rock sails between them, smashes the tie clip display behind the owner’s head with a glorious explosion. A perfect three-pointer. Wouldn’t Zach be proud of his daddy now?
“He left. Fifteen minutes ago,” the owner wails, cowering, cradling his pin cushion on his knees. He points a shaking finger. Out to the street? Out to the ocean? Toward Bermuda? It’s useless, but I turn, leave. Slam the door behind me. Jog up the alley.
Before I can get to the end, two suits flip around either side of the alley like swinging doors. Both with their hands shoved in their pockets, like anyone would be fooled that they were just out on an afternoon stroll.
“Boys,” I say, out of breath, holding up my hands. “He’s gone.”
I recognize one of them now, a squirrely bastard who used to run supplies up to the prisons. A fucking delivery boy. Olivia’s picking them young these days.
“You boys better move on. I need to call this in to Olivia. Tell her Timmy must’ve come early. Maybe he knew his cards were up.”
“It’s not only his cards who are up, Bluto,” Squirrely says, sniffing nervously. He takes another step toward me.
“She’s not going to be happy if she finds out you delayed my call in to her,” I say.
“She didn’t send us here for Timmy,” he says, leaning forward like he’s about to bow. “She sent us here for you.”
I couldn’t pretend it didn’t mean anything. I couldn’t get the feel of her skin under mine out of my skull. I couldn’t stop replaying those urgent kisses, almost violent, almost magic, slamming her against the hotel door, then inside, carrying her like a little kid, throwing her down, my gun on the nightstand, her shoes kicked to the floor, everything so fast fast fast, like we were both worried if it slowed down we’d have time to realize what was happening and stop. One of those furious moments you only see in the movies, all passion and brutality, that raw sort of love.
I couldn’t make it go away. Even when it destroyed my marriage. Even when it ruined my ability to make good judgments. Even when she…
You need to stop this, Hank. Now. Or I will kill you.
I thought the long-haul trucking job would clear my head of her. And it did, maybe, for a time. But when I got back, everything had changed. And the scab that had formed kept flecking away, bit by bit. I had no purpose, no love, no job. I kept taking riskier and riskier chances, dangerous hit jobs, high-stakes poker games. Once, and once only, I burned down an old factory so the owner could get insurance money. Collapsing outside, watching the flames lick that building to the ground, the heat scorching my face, I realized I didn’t care if I got caught. Didn’t care if I died.
Maybe I was headed this way all along. Like a barren, winding dark highway stretch, lit only by two headlights cutting through the fog. Only now could I see my final destination.
Squirrely pulls out a gun, and he’s more confident with it than I would’ve thought.
“Oh come on,” I say, though I can feel my insides melting, a hot fire settling in—so this is how it feels on the other side. “Call Olivia. We can sort this out.” And then I add, pathetically, “Today’s my kid’s birthday.”
“We’ll make sure he’s provided for,” Squirrely says. “And we’ll make sure we finish the job you couldn’t.”
“It’s open season now,” the other says. “On everything.”
As he pulls the trigger, as I fall, as I close my eyes, I turn. I’m driving again, on the long highway, miles and miles of road ahead of me. And beside me, Olivia’s there, her hair streaming out of the open window. She’s laughing, trying to paint her toenails and swiping at me each time I hit a pothole in the road. It’s a lovely feeling, with the hot sun blazing down, turning my whole body into a soothing, white-hot fire.
We’re finally going somewhere. It doesn’t matter where.
Back to TOC
Mother Knows Best
Rebecca Drake
Olivia was fit to be tied. That’s how the housekeeper, Jolene, put it when she called her boyfriend to tell him the boss lady’s daughter had run off with some jackass. It wasn’t the way Olivia would have described it, but of course she was a Yankee. No matter that she’d lived in Atlanta for over twenty years—she would never be considered a true Southerner.
The whining outside the bedroom door had provided the first clue that Melody was gone. Was it a circular saw? An insect? Olivia’s sleep-muddled brain hadn’t cared enough to process it. Burrowing deeper under the eiderdown, she’d adjusted her satin night mask to shield her eyes from the faint strips of light creeping past the edges of the drapes and tried to ignore the noise. She’d always been a night owl, but it was only since Mason’s death that Olivia had been able to embrace her own inclinations, staying up until one or two in the morning and sleeping in until she felt like rising. One of the best things about being the boss.
The whining increased until her pillow couldn’t block it, and then came a sound that was unmistakably a bark. Peaches? That woke Olivia. What was the dog doing outside her door instead of her daughter’s?
The tiny terrier sat next to a pile of fresh poop. “Bad dog!” Olivia scolded, but Peaches’ big brown eyes just stared up at her like a woebegone toddler. There was no point in trying to teach her anything. Damn beast was half blind, deaf, and increasingly incontinent. Of course she had to pick the carpet to defecate on; God forbid she trot the few extra feet to tile. “Melody? Come clean up after your dog!”
There was no reply—that was the second clue. The third came from Melody’s perfectly made bed.
The hot-pink bedspread on the queen-sized white canopy was smooth, the pillows expertly fluffed. There was no way Jolene had gotten to it this early. Melody was supposed to make her own bed, but she never did.
Olivia hustled down the wide front staircase, tightening the sash on her silk robe. The house was ridiculously large, but it certainly made a statement. Mason had built his beloved McMansion years ago on borrowed money—he’d always been more about flash than substance. Olivia would have sold it after his death except the neighborhood was one of the better ones in greater Atlanta, and if she’d learned one valuable thing from her late husband, it was that the appearance of something was often as important as the thing itself.
Olivia headed into the kitchen, hoping to see Melody sitting at the massive island, elbows propped on the Carrara marble, locked in headphones and gaze glued to phone or tablet. Except only the housekeeper was there, standing at the six-burner Viking range scrambling eggs. If it weren’t for Jolene, that stove would be gathering dust. Olivia had never mastered the art of cooking anything more than the books.
“Where’s Melody?” she asked without preamble and without stopping, moving through the room as Jolene startled, whipping around, her spatula flinging raw egg across the Italian tile floor.
“Ain’t she in bed?” the housekeeper called after her boss. Olivia hadn’t bothered answering her, just moved rapidly through the rest of the house, but it had been no use. Melody was nowhere to be found.
It was darkly amusing that Olivia actually wondered if her daughter had headed to school early. That hope lasted all of a hot minute. Melody was many things, but she wasn’t a scholar.
Olivia always excused that. After all, she hadn’t been much of a student herself and clearly that hadn’t held her back. But Melody had opportunities that had never been available to Olivia. She went to a wonderful private school, had everything, including the dog, that she’d ever wanted, and she was going to get to go to university. She could afford to attend the best of them; Olivia had enough money to pay any exorbitant fee. Melody was supposed to be working on college applications, but her mother found her daughter’s laptop sitting open on the family room couch where she’d left it yesterday.
Melody’s backpack was still in the front hall where she always tossed it and the jacket she’d had on yesterday was still in the coat closet. But then Olivia noticed that her favorite jacket, the pink leather one that her daughter coveted, was missing. Something crunched under Olivia’s slipper and she lifted her foot to find a crushed Clark Bar wrapper sticking to her sole. That was when Olivia realized that Melody was well and truly gone.
How could someone with a name so sweet grow up so sour?
“Jolene!” Olivia’s holler brought the housekeeper scuttling into the hallway, as she slipped a mobile phone back into her apron pocket. “Did you see Melody leave this morning?”
“No, I thought she was still asleep.”
“Well, she isn’t—wasn’t. Did you let anyone else in the house?”
Jolene shook her head, wide-eyed. A huge cubic zirconia solitaire in her right ear c
aught the light from the chandelier in the hall, momentarily blinding her boss. Jolene had five piercings in her right ear, but only three in her left. The asymmetry bothered Olivia more than the piercings themselves, which was good since Jolene also had them in her eyebrow, nose, and tongue. They’d be more distracting if it wasn’t for the all the tattoos. Her housekeeper was a sixty-six-year-old biker chick who rode a noisy Harley to work. She’d borrowed money years earlier from one of Olivia’s “loan officers” and started cleaning as a way to pay it off when her bets hadn’t hit at the track. Jolene had been working for her ever since.
“Well someone was here,” Olivia said, waving the candy wrapper at her. “Two guesses who Melody’s run off with.”
“No way!” Jolene raised work-hardened hands to her gray pixie cut. “That little fucker!”
There was only one person Olivia knew who ate Clark Bars, touting their greatness along with everything about his native city of Pittsburgh. He’d been working for her for just over a year, a Steelers-memorabilia-wearing Goodfellas wannabe, a Midwest goomba dumb enough to think that hooking up with Melody would help him climb in the family business. It wouldn’t.
Timmy Milici was a dead man.
Olivia stalked off to her office to phone Sheldon. It wasn’t that she didn’t trust Jolene, it was that she didn’t trust what the feds could get Jolene to say if they ever managed to put together a case against Olivia. Oh, she knew the government was watching her, and the house, and everyone and everything to do with the family business. It wasn’t a secret; everybody in the neighborhood knew. Olivia preferred to pretend that the agents were paparazzi, and she channeled Jackie O, gliding past their not-so-secret cameras with her head held high as if they were beneath her notice. Occasionally she channeled Queen Elizabeth, too, giving them a regal back-handed wave. What she never did was underestimate them.
The Swamp Killers Page 2
