He climbed out of the car and moved slowly toward the building, limping, gun palmed in his hand. He could palm the fucking thing, like they used to do to hide their cigarettes from adults when he was nine years old. Despite the chill of autumn in the air, beads of sweat ran down the back of his neck. He had incinerated their friend, so God only knew what they had done to his friends.
Unless, of course, they were still up there, laying in wait for him. He had called the apartment again, and had gotten only a busy signal, but that didn’t mean anything. They could be sitting there in the living room, waiting for him to walk in. Or lurking in the stairwell along the empty second floor.
Well, fuck it. If he was going down, he was going down shooting.
He reached the building. The old man was home downstairs, playing his violin. The haunting beauty of the music seemed to come from a world other than the one Smoke inhabited. Looking around, up and down the street, he entered the building.
Nobody was in the bottom hallway.
The overhead light was on. He reached up and smashed it out with the gun. The small crash of the bulb breaking didn’t disturb the violin in the least. Smoke ventured up the narrow stairs into the gloom of the second floor. He tried not to let the ancient wood creak. It was ridiculous. If they came now, he would be doomed. Then again better they come for him than kill Lola. He stopped trying to hide himself.
He reached the second floor landing, and hobbled along until he reached the bottom of the stairs to the third floor. He peered up. The door was closed. There was no sound up there. He climbed the stairs.
The door was unlocked. He walked in.
Nobody here.
He could feel the apartment’s emptiness. The light in the bathroom was on, throwing shadows through the living room. The coffee table in there had collapsed, as though someone had fallen on top of it. That was the only sign of struggle he could see.
He stood for a moment, holding his breath, looking and listening.
No sound, except from below. Far away, the strains of the violin.
He settled onto one of the dining room chairs. His breath came out in a long, low groan. Okay. He had come this far. Now he would take a moment, gather his emotions, and then search the rest of the apartment. If anyone was here, they were dead.
I’m so sorry, Lola.
The phone was on the floor. He stood, picked up the receiver, and placed it back in the cradle hanging on the kitchen wall.
It started ringing.
Smoke jumped so high he nearly banged his head against the low ceiling.
Two rings. Three rings. He stood and watched it ring. He picked it up just before the answering machine.
“Hello?”
“Dugan?” the voice said. It was Cruz. It had to be.
“Yes.”
“Are you alone?”
“Yes.”
“Good. I was wondering when you were going to finally get there. That was some job you pulled with the kid. It’s not going to make this any easier on anybody.”
Smoke swallowed. “I understand that.”
The voice went on. “Your friend is here with us. Okay? Other than that, we don’t have much to talk about.”
“There’s no reason for her to be involved.”
“Well, sure, I agree with that. But you involved her. Okay?”
“Okay.”
The little man went on. “The other one, too. The roommate.”
“Was she here?”
“Oh, yeah.”
Smoke nearly choked. “Where is she now?”
Cruz said nothing. He didn’t even answer. Smoke had dealt with men like this for most of his life. They were fucking animals. They had no reason to keep Pamela alive. No reason at all.
“Where is she?” Smoke repeated.
“See if you can find her.”
Fuck.
“So it seems like the thing for you to do is to get moving. That place is going to get pretty hot by tomorrow, if not later tonight. I don’t think your friend here wants you to see that kind of heat, you know?”
Smoke knew. Sooner or later, the explosion at his apartment, combined with the death of the kid and Smoke’s disappearance, would lead the cops here to Lola’s place. In fact, sooner or later the cops were going to find out that there was no Smoke Dugan. Probably sooner rather than later. They were going to take some prints in that apartment and find out that Smoke Dugan was actually Walter O’Malley, convicted felon from thirty years ago. Shit. He needed some time before the police came down on him. The last thing he needed was to get picked up by the cops. Getting picked up by the cops was worse than getting picked up by Cruz. They’d kill Lola and then get him in jail.
Cruz went on. “Do me a favor, all right? We need a place to meet, a public type place, a crowded restaurant, say. We’re there, you walk in, sit down at our table, your friend gets up and walks out. And we need to know where you’ll be staying tonight, a place we can reach you. Got any ideas? We’re open to ideas right now. Ways we can make this happen without too much pain.”
“There’s a Best Western in South Portland,” Smoke heard himself say. “It’s a motel right by an exit off the highway. There’s a big restaurant there, Governor’s, a lot of people go there for breakfast.”
“Yeah? How’s the food?”
“You eat eggs? Bacon? It’s a buffet.”
“Okay, that sounds good. Best Western, South Portland. Governor’s Restaurant.” There was a pause as Smoke imagined Cruz writing this down on a napkin or an envelope. “Your friend know how to get there?”
“Sure.”
“Okay, then. Take a room at the Best Western. We’ll contact you there tomorrow, or maybe later tonight. You won’t know. If you’re not there when we call, I guess you know what happens. The deal will be off. The trade won’t happen. Do you know what I mean?”
“I do.” The trade was Smoke for Lola. That’s what they were offering. “Is the trade for both of them?”
“Sure, if you like.”
It didn’t sound right. He didn’t know whether to believe them or not. Lola and Pamela could both be dead already.
“Put her on the phone.”
“Who’s that?”
“You know.”
“Tomorrow.”
Smoke shook his head, as though Cruz could see that. “Not tomorrow, now.”
“Okay, that’s enough chat. Never know who’s listening nowadays. Do me that little favor I mentioned, will you? Wouldn’t want anything to get in the way.”
Smoke was about to say something else.
The line went dead.
He stood there with the phone in his hand for several minutes. Out the back window, and far away, a boat went by on the dark water. He couldn’t see the boat at all. He could tell it was there by the red running light at its stern.
The phone started buzzing violently. “If you’d like to make a call,” a robot woman said. “Please hang up and try again. If you’d like to make a call…”
Smoke hung up.
Shit.
He walked through the rooms absently, checking out the rest of the apartment. Shadows loomed all around him. No one was here. Pamela wasn’t here. Whatever they had done with her, they hadn’t left her behind.
He went into Lola’s room and the life-size poster of the black tennis player startled him. It hung there over the bed, accusing him. You murdered her. You did it. There was nothing he could say in his defense.
He kept an extra cane here at the apartment. He rooted around in the closet and found it at the back, behind a pile of clothes. That, at least was something.
He went back into the dining area and sat down again.
Smoke looked at the cane in his hands. It was knobby wood, more of a walking stick than a cane. Along its shaft was a button, camouflaged to look like a part of the cane itself. You’d have to look closely to even notice it.
Hell, you’d have to know it was there.
He pressed the button and the bottom twelve inches of the cane detached and fell off. A sharp stiletto spike six inches long protruded from the end of the shaft that he held. A solid jab with that would piece anyone’s heart, even big, bad Moss.