“Come on in, girls,” Kendra said. “You’ll see — it’s not that bad. Really.”
When the trio got to the fourth floor — up a freight-style elevator, Max walking her Ninja along — Max and Original Cindy discovered that Kendra was right. Like the building itself, the apartment was unfinished, a study in taped drywall and plastic-tarp room dividers; but the place had running water, two bedrooms, and some decent secondhand furniture. They all crashed in the tiny living room area, Kendra in a chair covered with a blue sheet, and the other two on a swayback couch covered with a paisley sheet.
“Kendra, you right,” Original Cindy said, leaning back, getting comfy. “Kickin’ crib.”
“And nobody bothers you in here?” Max asked.
Kendra made a small face. “Well... there’s Eastep.”
“What’s an Eastep?” Max asked.
“He’s a cop. Who collects from all us squatters.”
“He’s crooked?”
Kendra smiled a little. “I said he was a cop.”
“They all bent in Seattle, honey,” Original Cindy said to Max; then to Kendra, she asked, “What’s the goin’ rate?”
“Too much,” Kendra said, and proved it by telling them.
“Ouch,” Max said, but asked, “Are there any empty apartments left in this building?”
With a shake of her blond mane, Kendra said, “None fit for humans. Hot and cold running rats... holes in the walls, missing ceilings... no water, no electricity... you name it, they’ve got the problems. All the habitable apartments have been taken.”
“Great,” Max muttered. She turned to Original Cindy. “Any ideas?”
“Original Cindy’s got a friend she could stay with for a while.” She shrugged regretfully. “But girlfriend’s only got room for one more... We got to think of somethin’ else, Boo.”
“No you don’t,” Kendra said. “You two have to live together?”
The two women looked at each other.
“Not really,” they said in unison.
“You aren’t a couple?”
“We friends,” Original Cindy said.
“Just friends,” Max said, overlapping Cindy’s answer.
“Fine,” Kendra said. “Max, if Original Cindy’s got a place to crash, why don’t you move in here? I could seriously use some help payin’ Eastep’s rent... and it’d be nice to have somebody to talk to. But I just don’t have enough room for all three of us.”
“Sounds prime,” Original Cindy said. “My friend’s place ain’t that far from here; she was sort of expectin’ me, anyway. We can still hang, Boo. No big dealio.”
Max looked back and forth from Original Cindy to Kendra. Finally, she said, “Cool — let’s do it.”
“Next thing,” Original Cindy said, “we got to find a way to get some cash.”
Screwing up her face, Max said, “You mean like a job?”
“What else you gonna do, Boo... steal for a livin’?”
Max said nothing.
Kendra perked up, getting an idea. “We should go talk to Theo!”
The two women turned to her.
“Theo?” Max asked.
“Yeah, he lives next door with his wife, Jacinda, and their kid, cute kid, Omar. Place Theo works is always looking for help.”
Max and Original Cindy exchanged glances — that was a rarity in this economy.
Original Cindy said, “Well, let’s not keep the man waitin’... Original Cindy needs some money, honey, to allow her to live in the high style she’s become accustomed to... Luxuries, like eatin’ and breathin’ an’ shit.”
Kendra led the way and they knocked on the door to the adjacent apartment. A tiny, knee-high face peeked out, his eyes big and brown, his skin a dark bronze.
“Omar, is your daddy home?”
The adorable face nodded.
“Can we come in?”
Omar looked over his shoulder and a female voice said, “That you, Kendra?”
“Yeah, Jacinda — I’ve got a couple of friends with me. They’re cool.”
“Well, come on in, then.”
Stepping back, Omar, who couldn’t have been more than five, opened the door for the three women.
Max took in the apartment, which looked a lot like Kendra’s. A thin black woman in a brown T-shirt and tan slacks stood in front of the couch, an Asian man — shorter than his wife, his hair black, his eyes sparkling, his smile wide — standing next to her.
“Jacinda, Theo,” Kendra said, “this is Cindy and Max.”
“Original Cindy,” the woman corrected.
“Original Cindy. They both need jobs and I thought maybe Theo could hook them up.”
The smile never faded as he waved for the women to sit down on the couch. Jacinda moved to a chair with Omar climbing into her lap, Theo standing next to them, a hand on his wife’s shoulder.
“There’s been a ton of turnover lately,” he said. “It’s a hard job... very physical, and you go into dangerous parts of the city, sometimes. Lots of times.”
Original Cindy asked, “What kinda job we talkin’ about, Theo? Repairing power lines? Filling in potholes?”
The smiling Asian asked, “Either of you young women ever been a bike messenger?”
They looked at each other and shook their heads.
Theo asked, “You got bikes?”
Max half grinned. “I do — Ninja, two-fifty.”
Theo’s smile actually grew wider. “Bicycles. Either of you have a bicycle?”
“No,” Original Cindy said.
“But we will by tomorrow morning,” Max said.
Original Cindy looked at her disbelievingly, but Theo took it in stride, his smile unfailing.
“Excellent,” he said. “You can go in with me. The place is called Jam Pony Xpress. Normal, the fella that runs it, he’s a bit uptight... but he’s not evil. Pay’s lousy, hours are worse; but the other riders are a nice, easygoing group.”
“Original Cindy’s up for givin’ it a shot, least till somethin’ better comes along.”
“What is it exactly we’d be doing?” Max asked the Asian.
Original Cindy answered for him. “We ride around on bikes delivering packages to different places, what else?”
“I don’t know anything about the city,” Max said.
“You will, Boo, you will. Original Cindy’ll show you the way. Middle next week, you be tellin’ taxi drivers how to get around this town and shit.”
Theo said, “Bike messengers cover the whole city. Very interesting... they see everything and everyone in Seattle.”
That made Max smile.
“What you thinkin’, Boo?” Original Cindy asked.
“I’m thinking we were lucky to meet Kendra,” Max said, “and luckier to meet Theo.”
But she was thinking: Bike messenger. Ride all around town... an invisible person, wheeling here, there, everywhere... That could work.
That could work...
Chapter Six
Money talks
Housed in a run-down warehouse, a world of dented lockers and rough wood beams and ancient brick and obscene graffiti, Jam Pony Xpress turned out to be just the sort of madhouse where Max could blend in and lie low, while she looked for her sibling.
Having had the whole trip up the coast to replay that grainy video in the theater of her mind, Max was now a gnat’s eyelash away from convincing herself that the “young rebel” she’d seen kicking cop ass on that news show was indeed her brother Seth.
The X5 didn’t know how long it would take to find him, but this innocuous cover was looking like it could work for the long hauclass="underline" no one, not even Moody or Fresca or any of the Chinese Clan, had any idea she’d booked for Seattle. Dodging Manticore all these years had given her very few peaceful nights of sleep; but somehow here — in Original Cindy’s Emerald City — Max felt safer, more underground even than in LA, where she’d drawn attention to herself and her singular abilities by her cat-burglar activities.