Shit.
All these thoughts had passed through Hal’s mind in the first seconds after spotting them. Then they had come down the block, moving fast, and gone into Lola’s little walk-up building. Here’s where it got squirrelly. The building was old. It fronted the street with a red wooden door, right on the sidewalk. The door was locked – Hal had checked it half an hour ago. The big boy had jimmied the lock on the door and had it open in about ten seconds flat. Of course. These locks were to make the straight world feel safer. They were there to keep honest people on the narrow path. They didn’t mean shit to somebody who knew how to take them down.
But why would two cops break into the building?
Easy answer: they’re not cops.
He glanced over at Darren, who was smoking a joint to calm his nerves. The lumpy skin around Darren’s eyes was slowly turning a sickly yellow. Darren smiled and offered the joint. It was clear from the beatific look on his face that Darren had taken the edge all the way off.
“No thanks. Look, do me a favor, okay? Go up the block and break the right taillight on that Taurus those guys popped out of, will you?”
“Why?”
Hal shrugged. “No reason. Just looks to me like something’s going on, that’s all. Boyfriends, maybe, but I doubt it. Boyfriends usually have a key to the front door. A broken taillight ain’t really any harm if I’m wrong, is it?”
“Suppose not.”
Darren climbed out and moved up the block in the darkness.
Simple Darren. The two guys – bad guys, trouble – go in our building. A building we already cased. There’s three apartments in there. The first floor opens on the street, and we already saw a creaking old man enter there just as the sun went down, straw hair swooped back over his head like a cartoon version of a symphony conductor. Then there’s a second-floor apartment, currently empty. Then there’s a third-floor apartment, belonging to Lola Bell / Pamela Gray, according to the mailbox. Roommates, apparently. These guys break in there, and Darren’s wondering why I might want their taillight broken. So I can tail them, you silly fuck.
He loved Darren like a brother, but this is how Darren got to the trailer park. He didn’t think. He couldn’t think.
Hal heard the sound of a breaking taillight. At least Darren got that part right. Here he came now, floating back up the sidewalk like a ghost.
He slid into the passenger seat. “No problem,” he said. The grin seemed permanently locked onto his face.
Hal glanced at the building again. He imagined reaching up and hitting that carved granite face he had seen go in there a moment ago. Just the thought of it made his arms tired. Another woman, a young white woman, her hair pulled straight back, came along the street and entered with what looked like a bag of groceries. She didn’t even stop and notice the door was already open. She just went right inside.
“Well, it looks like we got ourselves a party now,” Hal said.
The pain was like a rotten tooth lodged in Smoke’s skull.
“Shit,” he said. “Motherfucker.”
He stood at the public phone in the parking lot of the Gas-N-Go. Traffic flowed by, the people oblivious to the life and death struggles going on all around them. Lola’s telephone was a loud, obnoxious and constant busy signal. The girl was in her twenties, supposedly of the new modern generation, and she seemed like the only person left in America who didn’t have call waiting.
He slammed the receiver down.
“Shit!” He walked around in a tight little circle.
Only moments ago, Smoke had awakened and crawled through the hedges next to his home. When he reached the end of the hedge, he had lingered in the alley a moment, staring out at the parked cars. Behind him, huge orange shadows had danced on the sides of houses. Every few seconds, his vision had grown dark at the edges and he thought he would pass out again.
The fire department had already come, hosing down the backyard and the shed, which burned intensely. Crowds of people had gathered. Smoke came out and began walking along the street, eyes downcast, his head spinning, limping along at just under double speed. Bad enough just to walk. But worse if people noticed him and saw how badly he had been beaten the same night that his workshop exploded. Either way, he had no choice – he had to get moving.
Now, he stepped a few yards away from the phone. He could still see the red orange glow on the horizon. Cruz was out there now, rolling around like a loose ball bearing. No telling what he was going to do next. Then Smoke realized why Lola’s phone was busy. Cruz was already there. He had taken the phone off the hook – maybe ripped it out of the wall. Maybe Moss had wrapped the phone cord between his hands and…
Shit, Lola. A searing pain ripped through Smoke. It had nothing to do with the beating he had endured. It was the pain of separation, the impotent fear for her safety. His mind raced. He couldn’t breathe. He drifted back to the phone.
Call the cops. Call the fucking cops. Smoke had never called the cops in his life. Call the cops. Call them NOW.
A woman stood there next to him. She was blonde and slim, that kind of early-forties suburban mom who chauffeurs her children in a late model minivan from school to soccer practice to music lessons.
“Sir, do you need that telephone? My cell phone died.”
She smiled, but the smile died when she saw his bloodied face.
“I’m using it,” he snapped.
“Are you all right? Do you need an ambulance?”
“I’m fine.”
He punched in Lola’s number again. This time it rang. Thank God.
It rang and rang.
Finally, she picked it up. Her voice came, upbeat and musical as ever.
“Hello?”
Cruz and Moss paced through the second floor apartment.
It stood to reason it would have a similar layout to Lola’s place upstairs. Two bedrooms, a narrow bathroom, a living room, and a combined kitchen and dining room by the front door. This apartment was stripped – no furnishings, half-painted – paint cans, ladders and canvas tarps piled in a corner of the living room. It had that stale, musty smell – that stench of paint and sawdust trapped inside for too long. Cruz looked around. All the windows were closed. The smell was giving him a headache.
It was crazy roundabout bullshit to do it this way. If they had the girl Dugan would have to give himself up. Or would he? Some men would ditch, Cruz knew. It all depended on what the old boy felt for this hot little black girl he had seen in the dossier, and that remained to be seen. If she was just a piece of ass to him, he would leave her behind and run.
That simple.
And then Cruz would have blown the job and would have one more person to kill, an innocent. Two innocents, including the second girl. Not to mention Moss. He’d have to kill Moss, too, wouldn’t he? Sure. If he blew this job, there was no going home again. Man, this shit was wearing on him.
“It ain’t lightweight,” Vito had said. “You let us worry about the thinking end of it.”
Well, it wasn’t lightweight so far.
Someone was coming up the stairs. Moss pulled his gun and stepped lightly to the door and watched through the eyehole. Cruz heard the person reach the top of the first flight of stairs. Footsteps moved along the hallway.
“It’s a girl,” Moss whispered. “Going upstairs. Must be the roommate.”
Shit, another one. Another innocent in the way of this bullshit job. Cruz flashed to the cleaning woman weighted down in twenty feet of seawater, being picked clean by the crabs and the elements. When they pulled her out of there, they’d have to check the dental records just to know who she was.
Cruz didn’t want to go up there, not with Moss. Moss could turn this thing into a bloodbath. Unless…