Or in my case…It’s almost immediate. I’m already there, in my mind, a thousand times every day. When I open my eyes in the morning, cold sunlight in my cabin window, I’m thinking about her doing the same in her own bed. Somehow I can feel that she is awake at the same moment I am. I can hear the shower as she steps into it. I know how long it takes her to be ready to face the day. Her hair dried, a few brush strokes across her cheeks. That’s all she needs. How much she hates to waste time.
I know when she’s driving her Jeep. The music she is listening to. The sounds of a city all around her. It’s a miracle that I know this, moment to moment. A miracle both wonderful and terrible at the same time. After so many years, to feel this way.
I don’t know how long it can last. Even now, I can feel it start to fade sometimes. A faraway station on the radio, lost in the air. In the mornings especially, when she goes to the operations room instead of to the precinct. Her whole routine different now. I have to ask her about it after the fact to fill in the blanks. That she has to take more time in the morning to put herself together. That she’s already wearing her undercover clothes when she drives into the city. That she’s still meeting with the task force before she heads out to the coffee shop.
It’s become a regular thing now. Seeing Rhapsody there, spending a few minutes at one of the tables. It’s hard for me to imagine how that would feel, to be on stage every day. To be somebody completely different from yourself. I don’t know how long it will take for Natalie to win Rhapsody’s trust, assuming she ever does. How long it will take, with just a few words every morning, to steer things around to a certain type of merchandise that might find its way from the States to Toronto for the right price.
Five hundred miles away from me, it’s all coming together, day by day. Natalie is inching her way closer to the man they call Antoine Laraque.
It took about five seconds for the men to remember where they’d seen Vinnie before. That was just enough time for Jackie to grab his bat from under the bar, and for me to slide out from between Cap and his pal Brucie. Now it was two against three plus a baseball bat, on our home field.
Cap played it cool. He took another long pull off his beer, like he had never had any other intentions. Vinnie kept standing in the doorway, looking like something out of an old western. Brucie just looked at Jackie and his bat, like the sight was vaguely amusing.
“I get the impression,” Cap said finally, “that we’re not welcome here anymore.”
“Leave this bar,” Jackie said. “Leave it now.”
“How much for the beers?”
“Just. Leave.”
Cap put the bottle down. He gave his friend a little tilt of his head and then aimed for the door. When he got to Vinnie, he looked him up and down for a moment. “We have to stop meeting like this,” Cap said.
Vinnie didn’t say anything. He stepped aside slowly and let them pass. They opened the door and left the place. Through the window I could see them getting into one of those big Cadillac Escalades. It was black with silver trim.
“What did they want?” Vinnie said.
“They wanted to buy me a drink,” I said. “So Jackie gave them some of my beer.”
“How the hell was I supposed to know better?” Jackie said, putting the bat away. “You could have said something.”
“Is that all they wanted?” Vinnie said. “It looked like they were getting ready to tear this place apart.”
“After they expressed their gratitude, they sort of moved on to another topic. Apparently, there was some kind of floating box in the boat last night. They seemed to think I might know something about it.”
“Did you?”
“I honestly never saw it.”
“A floating box. What the hell could have been in there?”
“They said it was just their wallets and cash.”
“Who gets in a boat, takes out their wallet, and puts it in a box?”
“Yeah, it sounded a little fishy to me, too.”
Vinnie thought about it for a while. “I’m gonna head out,” he said. “We can get back to work tomorrow, eh?”
“What are you going to do?”
“I just want to check on something.”
“On what? Vinnie, for God’s sake, you’re not gonna do something stupid, are you?”
“No, I just want to go see somebody, make sure she’s all right. A woman who was working at the casino last night.”
“You want me to come with you?”
“No, she might not talk to me if you’re there.”
“Vinnie, you’re not going after them now, are you? Am I gonna have to bail you out of jail again?”
“One time, Alex. One time in my whole life. You make it sound like I get put in jail every week.”
“I’m just saying. If you’re gonna go do something stupid, let me know first. So we can do it together.”
“Okay, I promise. I’ll see you later.”
And then he was gone, too. I finished my beer and watched Jackie trying to calm himself down.
“I would have hit the big guy,” he said. “I swear to God. If he had laid a hand on you, I would have broken that bat right over his head.”
“Nothing like a wood bat,” I said. “Don’t you hate the sound those aluminum bats make?”
“What?”
“When you hit him, it would have been ‘clang!’ I hate that sound.”
“You’re worse than Vinnie.”
“No, I think it’s a tie.” I got up, went back to the chair by the fire, and grabbed my coat.
“Where are you going?”
“Same deal,” I said. “I’ve gotta go check on somebody, too.”
I thought about what the man had said as I drove. He needs to understand, Brucie. The man needs some enlightenment. Unless it was the most useless bluff in the history of bluffing, this man named Cap knew something important. Maybe he was important himself. Although, hell, I didn’t even know his last name. I had no idea who the hell this man was.
The rain started. I took Lakeshore Drive, my favorite lonely road in the world, but today the view was nothing but a study in gray. Water. Sky. The whole mood of the day.
I took the road all the way down to Brimley. I could have stopped at the reservation, tried to find Vinnie, but I let him be. Instead I went to Tyler’s house. I parked in front, happy not to see the black Escalade there. Although from what they had said, it sounded like they had already paid a visit here. I knocked on the front door.
A woman answered. She was about five foot nothing, and she looked like she came from the same hippie culture as Tyler. She had a wonderful smile, though. The kind of smile that makes you feel welcome. On a day like this, it was exactly what I needed.
“Is Tyler here?” I said.
“He’s in the studio. Come on around.”
She opened the door farther, and together we walked around the house to the back, where the big garage was. “How do you like this weather?”
“I think we should all get our money back.”
“It’ll warm up soon. It always does.”
“I hope you’re right,” I said. I was thinking maybe I should hang around this woman for the rest of the day. Maybe some of her optimism would rub off.
Tyler was in the studio, earphones on his head and a cigarette in his mouth. In the daylight I could see out the big picture window. There in the cold water were the two rows of dark wooden pilings leading out toward the point. I couldn’t see the boat, at least not in the water. But there was something on the shore, covered by a large blue tarpaulin.
“Alex!” he said when he saw me. He took the earphones off. “Did those jackasses pay you a visit, too?”
“I’m afraid so. It sounds like they were here earlier.”
“I’m sorry about that, man. I would have called you if I had your number. I don’t think I ever got your last name.”
“It’s McKnight.”
“This is Liz,” he said. “The old lady.”
“The next time he calls me ‘the old lady’,” she said as she shook my hand, “I’m going to throw him in the lake.”