Page 14 of Smoked


  "Do I have any other choice?" Darren said.

  Hal smiled.? "Nope.? It's either this or crawl back to Auburn with your tail between your legs."?

  He waited until the Taurus had turned left at the next corner onto Congress Street.? Up at this end of town, the top of Munjoy Hill, Congress dead-ended into a quiet street of walk-up apartment buildings and storefronts.? Down at the bottom of the hill, it became the main artery for downtown Portland.

  Hal pulled out onto the street and cruised to the corner of Congress.? The car was up ahead, driving down Munjoy Hill into the lights of downtown.

  "We should've used handcuffs the other night," Darren said.? "On Lola, I mean.? Keep her pacified."

  "Maybe we will," Hal said.? "Maybe we'll make handcuffs a regular part of the act."???

  Hal made a left, and he and Darren followed the Taurus downhill.? The naked bulb shone bright white, while the rest of the taillights shone red and yellow.? Darren had done a good job.? Hal was going to be able to read that thing from a hundred yards back.?

  Hal knew how to tail.

  For a long time, Hal had drifted from place to place and job to job.? For a while he worked as a security guard, and that job led to undercover store security, and finally to a gig working with a private detective agency.? He spent five years as a detective, then started his own firm and went belly-up in a matter of months.? But he was good at surveillance, he knew that much.

  In truth, Hal figured that he excelled at almost everything he did.? Amazing really, since he had just about graduated high school, after all.? Now, he had spent more than twenty years finding out how good he could be at things.

  Tailing with one car, though, this was going to be work.?

  "You're letting 'em get too far ahead," Darren said.?

  "I got 'em," Hal said.?

  "Yeah, but?"

  "Brother, you got to keep it shut and let me do this, okay?"? He said it forcefully, in a way that would pre-empt any more conversation.? He needed all the concentration he could muster, and he couldn't afford a smoked up Darren butting in every couple of minutes.? Darren was not the brains of this operation.

  The Taurus was three blocks in front already.? Ahead and far below was the skyline of the city, lit up at night.? Hal let them put on a nice lead, and kept his eye on that broken taillight.? It disappeared for a second behind another car, then came back.? He didn't worry.? It took an instinct, and he had it.? You had to know where that car was going to be.? Here was his guess: they would turn right on Washington Avenue and head for the highway - 295 North - or they would head straight downtown.?

  "No problem, no problem," he said to the Taurus.? "Do what you need to do."

  When Hal did detective work, on important jobs, two tail cars was the minimum.? Three cars were better, if the client would pay for that sort of thing.? The more cars the better.? One car would be on the tail awhile, then drop back and another one would pick it up.? The extra cars would be on the radio, following along on parallel streets.? On the highway, they'd drop waaaaay back, or they'd speed up and get out ahead.? Whatever.? Keep dropping in and out of the tail, give them different looks, that way the target wouldn't catch on.? Leapfrogging, they used to call it.?

  But one car.? That was an art.? You had to play it real cool.? You had to lose touch sometimes.? You couldn't give them any reason to suspect you.? If they did, if they made you, then they'd bolt.? They'd blow red lights.? They'd drive the wrong way on one way streets.? They'd make U-turns at police speed traps on the highway.? They made a move like that, then you were lost.? You blew it.? You couldn't follow.?

  Hal had a hunch here.? It buzzed in his head like electricity.? These guys weren't going to blow any red lights.? They weren't going to try to shake a tail.? There was something happening, and they couldn't risk getting busted by a traffic cop - not with a couple of prisoners in the trunk.

  In the trunk!? He couldn't fucking believe it.? Man, this beat everything.? This was like the movies.? This was better.? This was real.? Totally awesome.? Goddamn!? They had walked right into some kind of full-blown hostage drama.

  Hostages.? Sure.? These bastards had taken the girls hostage.

  In some sense, hadn't he and Darren done the same from time to time??

  ?

  * * *

  ?

  "Make a right," Cruz said.? "Right here, take this right."

  Moss took a long looping right past a fried chicken take out and onto a main drag, Washington Avenue.? It was long, nearly deserted, a big old warehouse or factory passing by on their right.? The highway entrance was at the end of this strip.???

  Cruz found himself sulking as they drove along.? It hadn't gone as he intended.? Nothing on this whole trip had gone as he intended.? That fucking taillight.? He didn't like that at all.? Trouble was, he wasn't sure that it hadn't been broken in the first place.? Fingers would know, but Fingers was dead.

  Why would Fingers steal a car with a broken taillight?

  He wouldn't, that's why.

  "Now!? Make this left!"

  Moss veered in front of an oncoming car and made the left.? They cruised down a steep hill, a side street with run down houses climbing the hill.? At the bottom, there were low-slung garden apartment style housing projects.? From an unlit basketball court, dark black faces peered at them as they passed.?

  "I'm telling you, son.? I've been in this game a little while now.? There ain't nobody back there.? It was a kid that broke the taillight."

  "Why ours?"

  "Why the fuck not?? You paranoid, Cruz?? That the problem?"?

  Cruz didn't like it.? The variables were piling up.? Two girls in a trunk.? A broken taillight.? It was supposed to be a quick snatch, and then a return drive to New York.? Goodbye, Smoke Dugan O'Malley, you worry about your problems, I'll worry about mine.? Instead, two people were already dead, and this Lola girl would have to go when all was said and done.? She would have to go just as surely as the skinny girl, her roommate, would have to go.

  And all the while, Cruz thinking about getting out.? Face it.? He was no good for this business anymore.

  Moss cruised the side streets, moving slow, making random rights and lefts, stopping at all stop signs.? They passed a parked police car.? The cop was inside, writing something in his book.? He didn't look up.?

  "We done out here?? You mind if I get back and get on the highway now?? That's all we need, a porky little pig try to pull us over for a broken light," Moss said.

  "That'd be one dead pig," Cruz said absently.? He meant it.? No matter what trouble he himself was having, he knew Moss would drop a cop without giving it much thought.?

  He checked in back of them one last time.? No one back there.? Just dead, deserted streets.

  "Yeah, go for it," he said.? "Make a left here."

  Moss made a left and climbed back up toward Washington Avenue.??

  "I think you're losing your focus, son.? We got the girl, like we said we were gonna do.? Okay.? The man'll either give it up or he won't.? If he don't, then we got problems.? But in the meantime, we got this extra girl back there.? And that's a problem right now.? She's baggage back there.? I can't have that and neither can you.? It's bad for business."

  "I see what you mean," Cruz said.? To Moss, his decision to spare the roommate must have looked like weakness.? To Moss, this entire job must have looked like weakness.???

  "I hope you do," Moss said.

  They were back on Washington Avenue, right near the chicken takeout again.? A group of dark-skinned men sat out on plastic lawn chairs in front of another eatery, this one with no sign on it at all.? The whole long strip of the avenue was darkened and nearly deserted.? As they headed down the street, a few people loitered here and there in the gloom, standing around in ones and twos.

  "Let me see your phone," Cruz said.?

  "Son, you need to stop giving orders.? Your big shot orders got my little buddy killed earlier today."

  Cruz and Moss crossed eye
s like swords.? Now was not the time for the show down with Moss.? Or was it?? Cruz pictured whipping out his gun and blowing Moss away right here in the car.? It was one measure of how far he had fallen that Moss would say these things to him.? The deeper measure, however, was that Moss was still alive.? He couldn't fight the man - Moss was too big, too strong.? In the old days, Cruz would have just killed him instead.

  "Lend me your cell phone, will you?" he said.? "I want to call Dugan so that we can save this job before it goes all the way down the shithole."

  "That's better," Moss said.? "I thought you didn't use cell phones."

  "In an emergency, I'll make an exception."

  Moss handed him the phone, a small black number with a lot of meaningless features.? Cruz scrutinized it for what he needed, the green SEND button for one.? He fished in his pocket for the girl's home number, straight from the dossier.

  "What's the story with this phone?" he said.? He hated cell phones.? He didn't even like to look at them.? Cops could snatch these conversations right out of the air.? Cops could trace back these phone calls.? Somebody dies, and then what?? The cops check the phone records, right?? And here's this cell phone number.? Hell, maybe it's right there on the caller ID.? Shit, he hated these things.? Lazy people used cell phones.?

  Moss shrugged.? "It's clean."

  "How clean?"

  "It's PCS.? Completely digital.? Encryption codes make it almost impossible to intercept the call."

  To Cruz, it sounded like so much mumbo-jumbo.? "What about trace-backs?"?

  "The phone belongs to a gentleman from Fresno, California.? He paid the whole contract, a whole year, up front.? He likes to travel a lot, this gentleman.? He's got coverage everywhere in the great forty-eight.? Anybody traces back a call, they'll find out this gentleman made that call."

  "Who is he?"

  Moss smiled, showing the gap in his front teeth.? "Someone who don't exist anymore."

  ?

  * * *

  ?

  Hal leaned up against a telephone pole in the dim light along Washington Avenue.

  Thirty yards away, the Cadillac was parked in the lot of the old bread factory.? Now it was an office building, a low-rent warren filled with the offices of low-budget social service organizations.? Hal glanced at the Caddy.? Darren was hunched down low, probably wondering what the hell he was doing out here.

  "Come on," Hal said under his breath.? "You know you want me."

  All the same, he was starting to worry.? He had seen them make that sudden turn down the side street.? But he knew those streets.? He knew there was nothing down there for them.? He knew it.? There was nothing down there but machine shops, auto shops, and housing projects filled with refugees from African wars.? Imagine, the wretched of the earth, refugees from Somalia and the Sudan, the desert, the baking heat, the sand storms, being relocated to Maine.? It was like a cruel joke.? Don't like all the warfare, you desert nomads?? Here, try snow and ice six months out of the year.?

  A car was coming along the avenue.

  Hal looked at his shoes.?

  It passed, and he looked up.? A green Ford Taurus.? The broken taillight shone bright and white as it receded in the distance.? They were heading for the highway.

  "Ha!? I knew you couldn't leave me!"

  He stepped into the shadows and ran for the Caddy.

  ?

  * * *

  ?

  It was cramped and dark in the trunk.

  At times, little beams of light stabbed in through some crack above their heads.? It was hard to breathe.? They were on their sides, hands cuffed in front of them, facing each other.? For a while, Pamela had hyperventilated.? Now, as Lola watched her, Pamela simply lay there, eyes wide like saucers, tears streaming down her face, her lower lip quivering.

  "Listen!" Lola hissed.? "Pamela!? Listen to me."? Pamela was beyond listening.

  The car hit some kind of dip in the road.? They went down and then up.? It was like riding a roller coaster.? Lola nearly fell over on her face.? The car accelerated, and she guessed they were on the highway now.?

  "It's going to be okay," she said, not sure if she was saying it to Pamela or to herself.

  She thought of the moment the two men burst into the apartment.? Smoke was on the phone, shouting something into her ear.? Then that massive man with the stringy hair was there.? He seemed to fill the entire room.? And she had fought him.? Kicked him.? Punched him.? Knocked the gun out of his hand.? Knocked him down.?

  When he had slapped her, it was like a car crash, the force of it.? He was that strong.? She had been stunned.? No one had ever hit her that hard before.? And she knew he hadn't hit her nearly as hard as he could.???

  But he wasn't unbeatable.? None of them were.? They could be beaten, and she could do it.? Maybe if Pamela? no, Pamela was a goner.? Well, you could hardly blame her.? Two strange men storm the apartment, handcuff them, and whisk them off.?

  To where?

  Where are we going?? Who are these men?? The questions piled up.? She had never seen either of them before in her life.? She pieced it together.? They were the ones who had attacked Smoke.? Did they know Mr. Shaggy and Mr. Blue Eyes?? Maybe not.? Smoke had said it had something to do with him - they wanted money from him.? Why did they want money from Smoke??

  She sighed heavily.?

  All these men.?

  She had defined her life in relation to them.? If she could, she thought she would thank those boys that raped her now, if she ever saw them again.? Unfortunately that in itself would be hard to do.? But she would if she could because the boys had awakened her.? They had created the Lola that existed now.?

  At first, she had crumpled up and died inside.

  After she was raped, she had dropped out of school, she had quit dancing lessons, she didn't go anywhere.? She didn't see her friends anymore.? She stopped taking an interest in anything.? She stayed in her room and watched soap operas on television most of the day.? She didn't even read.

  One day when she woke up, there was a thin, paperback book on the table next to her bed.? Her grandmother had gone out to run her errands, but that book was there.? It was called Sandinista Woman.? It had a photo of a woman on the cover, a Hispanic woman in a green camouflage military outfit.?

  Lola didn't pick it up at first.? First she watched TV.? But later in the day she grew bored with the television, and she picked up the book.? It was the story of exactly that, a woman who had fought with the Sandinista revolution in Nicaragua.? The woman had been captured by the fascist forces of the Nicaraguan government, and raped by dozens of soldiers.? It was a source of terrible shame for the woman, until she met other women who were fighters for the cause.? They came to realize there was nothing to be ashamed of in their suffering, that indeed it was a badge of honor.? Gradually, all of the women came to realize this, as did the men who fought alongside them.

  Lola read the book in two days, stopping only to eat and use the bathroom.?

  Still, she didn't buy it right away.

  The next day, a flyer slid through the crack under her bedroom door.? It showed an Asian man flying through the air, kicking and shattering a brick that must have been suspended ten feet from the ground.

  DEFEND YOURSELF! The flyer read.? Learn devastating self-defense techniques from a master.? At the bottom of the flyer it said Special Women Only Classes Available.? Below that, her grandmother had scrawled in pencil.

  Interested?

  So she joined.? What else was she going to do?? She couldn't stay in that room forever.? At first it seemed like a joke.? The basic techniques she was learning, she didn't think they'd work on anybody.? But times passed, and months later she wasn't so sure.?

  She started to come alive again.

  And as part of being alive, she began to think of revenge. ?They had stolen her old life from her, but now she had this new life.? She was increasing in confidence, and with that newfound confidence came a new question.? Could she get back at them someh
ow??

  If so, how??

  She began to keep alert for news of them. ?Five boys, one older than her by a year, a couple her age, one a year younger and one a year younger than that.? Kendrick.? Tyrone.? Abel.? Michael.? Ishmael.

  A whole year went by and she was still musing on this subject.? She had changed - she was astounded by the things her body was capable of.? It still didn't mean she could take her revenge with that body, though.

  Michael died in a drive-by shooting.? A week later, Tyrone and Abel were arrested for the crime.? A year after that, Ishmael was shot in the groin and then in the back by an unknown assailant or assailants.? He lived, but he was paralyzed from the waist down.? The rumor went that not only was he impotent, but that his member was actually obliterated.? That left only Kendrick alive and on the streets.? And he had disappeared.?

  Five years ago, it came to pass on a chilly evening in March that she climbed off the bus three blocks from her apartment and her dying grandmother, and began to walk home.? It had been raining all day, and had just stopped recently.? The ground was wet, the air was wet, and she could see her breath as she moved along.? Just in front of her, a big man shuffled along in a long and ratty trench coat.? From behind him, all she could see was the slope of his back, the shake, rattle and roll of his legs, and the fluffy crown of unkempt nappy hair piled on top.? She moved along behind him, walking slow, watching the tall man weave.

  The back was familiar, but she almost couldn't believe it was him.

  On this strip, nobody was around.? Two young crack dealers lolled on a bench to their right.? One said something to the other and they both laughed.? Tall and skinny, they looked to be about twelve years old.? They both wore big bubble TROOP jackets, their legs sticking out the bottom like pipe cleaners.? They looked like some new kind of dinner bird, fattening up for Christmas.

  Lola watched the big man approach them.? He said something, but they shook their heads.? "Ken, you used up all your credit already.? Go on back to Gary, you want credit."

  The big man shuffled on.

  The kid called him Ken.? Her heart did a lazy barrel roll.? It had been years since she had seen him.

  She let him get another ten yards past the prepubescent dealers.? Then she moved in.? "Kendrick?"? At first her voice came out as a croak and the man heard nothing.? He just shambled along, bopping to some music only he could hear.?

 
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