Miss Sink managed to insert her MasterCard into the machine, and typed in her PIN and answered all questions. She could smell Divinity's cloying perfume and feel her evil spirit as ten twenty-dollar bills were ejected from the machine.
'That's a lot of bus money,' Divinity said to her sarcastically.
'Please leave me alone,' Miss Sink said in a shaky voice.
'Don't you tell me what to do, old bitch,' Divinity said in a tone mean enough to break the skin.
'Come on,' the young man said to Miss Sink. 'I'll walk you to "your car, ma'am.'
'Oh thank you.' Miss Sink almost grabbed his hand. 'Oh you're so nice. I can't thank you enough.'
Miss Sink caught a glimpse of Divinity tearing off a strip of duct tape and slapping it over the money machine's camera.
'We should call the police!' Miss Sink whispered to her escort as he opened the driver's door for her.
She didn't understand why he went around and opened the passenger's door, too.
'I want to ride with you maybe half a block just to make sure you're okay,' he explained as Divinity hung around the money machine, waiting to cause trouble for the next poor person who showed up, Miss Sink assumed.
She turned around to check on Loraine. Thank goodness she was sleeping. Miss Sink started the engine and locked the doors.
'I don't like the looks of that girl,' the young man said. 'Sometimes people like that work in pairs, like snakes. I'm worried there might be someone else around. You know, there's just something about all this that doesn't feel right. And I guess you've heard about these ATM robberies.'
'Oh, yes!' Miss Sink exclaimed. 'Thank God you came along when you did! You must be my guardian angel. I don't believe I know your name.'
'People call me Smoke.'
'Well, I hope you don't. Once upon a time I did. Can't tell you how hard it was to quit.'
'That's not why they call me that.'
Miss Sink backed up as the camera's blind eye observed nothing.
'They call me Smoke because I used to burn up things when I was a kid,' he said between clenched teeth as he snatched a gun out of the back of his pants and rammed it hard into her ribs.
'Oh dear God!' Miss Sink exclaimed. 'Oh no!'
'Keep driving,' Smoke snapped. 'That way. Around the back of Kmart.'
'Oh please, for God's sake,' Miss Sink begged. 'There's a child in the car. Just take what you want and leave us be.'
'Shut up, bitch!' he said.
Smoke watched Divinity drive the Escort from behind the bank, where it had been hidden. She inserted herself into the solid line of traffic creeping toward downtown, early morning light winking off windshields. He smelled shit and pee and at first thought it was the kid in the back seat.
'Fuck,' he said when he realized his victim had lost control of her bowels and bladder. 'I wish you hadn't done that.'
'I'm sorry. Please don't…'
'Shut the fuck up, bitch. You're going to drive real normal and you try anything I'm gonna blow your sweet little baby's brains all over the back of the car while you watch.'
'Take anything,' she cried. 'Just don't hurt her. Anything you want. Oh please! Anything…!'
'Shut up!' Smoke hissed.
Miss Sink was crying so hard her teeth were chattering. They drove behind Kmart and parked where asphalt gave way to acres of woods. Smoke grabbed her wallet out of her purse. He took the ten crisp twenties she had gotten from the money stop.
He robbed her of an additional two dollars and sixty-two cents, and quarters and tokens for tolls. Her watch and necklace weren't worth the trouble, and pawn shops were risky. She stunk so bad he was about to gag, and the fucking kid was waking up and beginning to cry.
'Loraine, it's all right, sweetie. Please be quiet, honey. My name's Miss Sink and this is my grandniece, Loraine,' Miss Sink prattled on. 'You don't want to hurt us. For God's sake, you must have a mother, a grandmother 'SHUT UP! QUIT NAGGING ME, YOU UGLY OLD BITCH!'
Smoke turned the radio up loud. The kid began to howl.
'SHUT THE FUCK UP!' Smoke yelled at the baby.
'Oh God in heaven! Please don't hurt us! Dear God! Think about what you're doing! You look like a smart young man. You don't want trouble like this!'
'I hate ugly old women like you. So you better shut the fuck up and consider yourself lucky I don't do other things to you. But you stink too bad,' he said in a low, cold voice. 'So now you're gonna bend over. So you don't see me when I get out. Okay?'
'Okay,' Miss Sink whimpered.
She pressed her face against the steering wheel. She squeezed her eyes shut and tightly covered them with her hands. She didn't move. She barely breathed. Annie Lennox was stepping on broken glass on the radio as Smoke dug through the glove box and the kid screamed. Smoke emptied the purse on the floor mat and helped himself to a pack of spearmint Freedent gum, fingernail clippers and a prescription bottle of Atavan.
'Thanks, Miss Sink,' he said. 'Grow up to be a good girl, Loraine. Y'all don't forget me, promise?' He laughed.
He popped a stick of Freedent into his mouth and scanned the area. No one was around.
'You know what I look like, bitch?' he said. 'I mean, you gonna recognize me on the street?'
'No. No. I didn't see you! Please,' Miss Sink begged.
'What 'bout that ugly little motherfucker of yours in her little seat back there. She know what I look like?' 'No! She's just a baby! You don't want to hurt us!' Miss Sink was shaking as if she was having a seizure. 'Let me think about this. What's a guy to do?' Smoke smacked his gum. He pulled back the slide of his Glock and it snapped forward with a loud clack. He felt the power. Smoke was high and hard with it as he pumped three Winchester hollowpoints into the back of Miss Sink's head.
Chapter Twenty-Six
Brazil stood with his hands in his pockets, impatiently staring out at sloped, loamy land sutured by railroad tracks and tangled with brambles and trees. Steam billowed from the Fort James Paper Company, and the river was soft music played with fingers of wind and bright notes of sun.
The portable radio on Brazil's belt was a staccato of dispatchers and cops cutting in and out in spurts and codes. Nothing was going on. A handicap van was abandoned on a roadside, traffic was tied up because a light wouldn't flash, a driver had been stopped at a Kmart.
Unit numbers and military time peppered the air, but Passman and Rhoad were strangely silent. Passman dispatched no calls. Rhoad answered no one. Brazil was furious. He was certain the cops were messing with him.
'Eleven,' Brazil tried again.
'Go ahead, 11,' answered a communications officer whose name Brazil did not know.
'Radio, I'm still at the cemetery,' Brazil said, trying to keep the anger out of his voice. 'Need someone to 10-25 me right away.'
'That's Hollywood.'
'Ten-4.'
'Any unit in the area of Hollywood Cemetery, need someone to 10-25 unit 11 there.'
'Unit 199-'
'Go ahead, 199.'
'Just two blocks away, I'll swing by the cemetery, 10-25 11.'
Ten-5, 199, 0812 hours.'
Brazil turned away from the river as he heard a rustle. He caught a flash of red on the other side of the cemetery fence where Spring and South Cherry streets intersected. The chain link was dense with ivy. Through it Brazil could just make out the back of the large metal sign advertising Victory Rug Cleaning, an arrow pointing to the business a block away. He turned off his radio and didn't move.
The fence began to shake as someone gripped the edge of the sign and hoisted himself up. Brazil was hidden by the thick shadows of holly trees as he watched Weed reach for a tree branch and pull himself up with ease, swing over the fence and drop branch by branch to the ground. Brazil took cover behind a monument.