The inside, it wasn’t pitch-black.
A rod of light dropped from the roof of the container unit. Had Contrell installed a light for her journey?
The slender man blinked but could make out nothing in the darkness beyond. It looked like a spotlight on a stage. The aesthetics rather suited him.
“Don’t be shy, my love,” he said. “Step forward.”
A rustling issued from the shadows, a form emerging.
She was bigger than he would have thought. Broad-shouldered.
She was also a he.
And the “he” was holding what appeared to be a nine-millimeter submachine gun of German design.
The slender man felt his throat clutch when he realized that the light on the ceiling wasn’t a spotlight at all. It was the golden light of the moon, shining through a hole that had been cut in the top of Container 78653-B812.
In the gleam of the muzzle flare, he saw the actual Ms. Siegler crouched in the back corner of the container behind the man, hair matted down across her eyes.
Beside him Donnell danced a little jig, the rounds jerking his limbs this way and that.
There came a moment of silence, a curl of cordite rising from the muzzle, during which the slender man grappled with the fact that the carefully curated mood was in fact shattered.
He tried to say something, but the sound he forced through his dry throat was an inhuman croak. He’d never known that terror could feel like this, a physical sensation running through every vein, inhabiting every cell, threatening to explode from the core of you straight through your skin.
The silence stretched out longer yet as the barrel drifted casually to face him, the bore waxing into a full moon to match the one above.
And then he sensed his body flying back against the side of the Town Car, the safety glass of the windows cascading around him, and he tried to make out the face of the man behind the weapon that was tearing him to shreds.
The face was nothing but a silhouette, as black as the darkness that surged up and claimed him.
65
Fragile Little Bond
The cab swept into the porte cochere, delivering Evan to Castle Heights. He spilled out of the car, raw from pain and two days of grueling travel, his bedraggled appearance undercutting the grand entrance. When he reached for the heavy glass door to the lobby, a dagger of pain shot across his ribs. He lowered his arm and staggered a half step to the side, nearly colliding with Ida Rosenbaum of 6G.
The wizened woman, crusted with makeup and built like a fire hydrant, glowered up at him. “Careless, aren’t you?”
“Sorry, ma’am. I’m just…”
“You’re just what?”
He tried to let his right arm hang normally. “Just a little jet-lagged.”
“Jet-lagged? Had a rough business trip, did you?”
He ducked his head to hide the band of skin on his neck that still bore scabs from the shock collar. “You could say that.”
“My Herb, may he rest in peace, worked his fingers to the bone and never complained a day in his life. We knew what hardship was, our generation.”
“Yes, ma’am.”
“We weren’t kvetchers.”
“No, ma’am.”
She clutched her purse to her jacket, a shade of red not found in nature. He realized she was waiting for him to open the lobby door for her. To avoid doing a close-quarters pirouette, he had to reach for the handle with his right hand.
He braced himself, opened the door through the fireworks exploding inside his shoulder, and smiled with gritted teeth. With a waft of rose water, she passed beneath his arm. And with great relief, he released the door and stepped into the cool air of the lobby.
“Evan Smoak!”
As he pivoted at the sound of the raspy voice, Peter collided into him with a hug. Wincing, Evan patted his back.
The boy wore true-blue jeans with a toy gun and holster on one hip and a lasso on the other. A shoved-back cowboy hat completed the John Wayne vibe.
“You like my Halloween costume?”
Evan gave a nod, shuffle-stepping for the elevator. He needed to get upstairs and peel off the dressings before he bled through. “Can’t beat the classics.”
When he looked up, Mia stood right there, holding an empty pillowcase. “Hi, Evan.”
“No costume for you?”
“This is my costume.” She flared her arms theatrically. “It’s called ‘Single Mom Without the Time-Management Skills to Comb Her Hair.’”
He caught himself noticing the birthmark kissing her temple, the way her curly chestnut hair fell across her shoulders, and reined in his focus.
Elevator. Upstairs. Now.
“Haven’t seen you in a while,” Mia said. “What mysterious things have you been up to?”
“Too mysterious to recount,” Evan said.
She took him in more closely, her forehead twisting with concern.
Peter tugged at Mia’s sleeve. “Can he come over for dinner tonight instead of Ted?”
Ted?
“Can he? Mom — can he?”
Mia colored. “No, honey.” Then, to Evan, “He’s a … friend.”
Evan gave another nod, took another step toward the safety of the elevator doors.
“Then can he go trick-or-treating with us?”
“Peter, I’m sure Mr. Smoak has better—”
“I’m gonna shoot horse thieves and bad guys. You should totally come.”
The toy gun was out of the holster, and Evan was staring at it, a hard edge of discomfort rising inside him, something he was unaccustomed to feeling in the floral-scented lobby of Castle Heights. “I can’t—”
“What did you dress up as when you were a kid?”
“I didn’t … I didn’t really celebrate Halloween.”
“Why not?”
Evan was eight hours from his last dose of Advil, the pain starting to cramp his peripheral vision. “Don’t aim that gun at me.”
His voice startled all three of them.
Peter lowered the toy gun. “You don’t have to be mean.”
“I wasn’t being mean.”
“Yes,” Peter said. “You were.”
Mia slung an arm over Peter’s shoulder. “C’mon, sweetheart. Let’s get you some candy.”
They withdrew. Evan stood a moment before turning to the elevators.
By the time he got upstairs, the headache had crept down into his neck, meeting the fiery nerve lines shooting up from his shoulder. He went straight to the kitchen, tugged open the freezer drawer of his Sub-Zero, and assessed his options. A single bottle of Stolichnaya Elit remained. Triple-distilled, the vodka was purified through a freeze-filtration process that dropped its temperature to zero degrees to eliminate the impurities. He wasn’t sure his arm could inflict the abuse he generally put a martini shaker through, so he poured two fingers over ice, palmed a trio of Advil, and took a sip.
As crisp as it was clear. It struck him that his vodka indulgence was something like a purification ceremony. After all the blood and filth he’d waded through, he didn’t drink to numb his senses. He drank to try to cleanse himself from the inside out.
He pressed the frozen bottle to his shoulder. It stung. He let it.
Leaning on the poured concrete of the center island, he glanced across at his vertical garden, the wall textured with herbs and plants. The mint was taking over, as it did. This wall, the sole splash of green amid the metals and grays, was his one stab at living with life. The attempt struck him as poignant and pathetic at the same time.
I wanted you to get out. I wanted you to have a chance.
At what?
At a life! That isn’t this.
He pushed away Jack’s voice, exhaled through clenched teeth.