"She looks tasty," Mr. Blue Eyes said somewhere behind her.? His hands returned, roaming her body.? He stood behind her, his erection poking between her thighs, rubbing against the fabric of her bikini bottom.
"Let's spread these legs a little," he said.
She leaned down close to the desk, like someone doing a push-up.? She turned her head to the side, cheek against the hard surface.? From the corner of her eye, she saw Mr. Blue Eyes, his attention consumed by what he was about to do.
"Uh, Lola?" Mr. Shaggy said.? "We're playing both ends against the middle in this game.? I'm gonna need some help up here."
She placed her forehead against the desk.? Her body tightened like a coiled spring.?
"Lola?"
She thrust herself upward, legs planted, body pivoting at the waist.? 90 degrees to a vertical 180 in one second flat.?
The back of her skull smashed into Mr. Blues Eyes's face.
There was pain, but also the pleasure of feeling him cave in like a wet, rotten pumpkin.
He grunted like a pig, and the impact reverberated like high voltage electricity down her neck to the base of her spine, and across her small shoulders.? Her whole body thrummed with the recoil.
For a long instant, the world went black.?
Then white light streaked across her vision and Mr. Shaggy stood across the desk from her, erection in one hand, camera in the other, eyes wide, mouth a great big O of surprise.? She spun, bringing her right elbow up and around with the full force of her momentum.? It connected, but not well, with the side of Mr. Blue Eyes's head.? He held his hands to his face.? Blood flowed between his fingers.
??? She sidestepped away from him.?
??? A moment passed, the three of them standing in a triangle, each person's eyes darting between the other two endpoints.
??? Suddenly Mr. Shaggy whooped and laughed.? "Damn.? You let a little girl bloody you up like that?? Shit.? I've never seen anything like it."
Lola backed away, kicking off the high heels.?
Mr. Blue Eyes stood nude, monster erection at half mast now.? He rubbed blood away from his face.?
"Nose broken?" Mr. Shaggy said.
"I don't know.? I think maybe not.? It sure hurts though."?
Mr. Blue Eyes looked at Lola.? Then he did an odd thing.? He smiled.?
"I knew I shouldn't have let her go."
"Look," Lola said.? "Let's make a deal.? You let me leave, I don't call the cops."
Mr. Shaggy smiled too.? "Oh, that's funny.? You're not going anywhere, Lola.? We tried to do it the nice way.? We like the nice way.? Makes for better content.? But we can do it the hard way, too."
Mr. Blue Eyes grinned broadly, his face a swirled mask of blood.? His teeth were jagged, like a row of shark's teeth.? His eyes showed a simplicity, nearly a brute stupidity.? He was enjoying himself.? He sauntered toward her.
"You know I used to be in the ring when I was a kid," he said.? "Had 15 fights.? Never once did I get knocked out.? Probably not gonna start now."
Mr. Shaggy moved toward her from the left, buttoning his pants.? He was a hairy son of a bitch.? He even had hair on his shoulders.? "You know," he said, "it's gonna be awfully hard to make it in modeling if you won't do nudity."? He was still filming with the hand held.
She backed toward the tripod camera, watching them approach.
"This is the most exciting one yet.? You know, we've had some get away, walk out before we ever got this far, but you're the first one who ever went this far and still showed this kind of spunk.? Mostly, they just go limp."?
"Seem to enjoy themselves, some of them," Mr. Blue Eyes said.
And then Lola realized what was missing.? She wasn't angry.? Up until this moment they had scared her.? Everything had flowed their way, their trap working perfectly.? And she had gotten scared.? But now she saw them clearly for the first time.? They did this over and over, tricking young women who wanted to feel glamorous, wanted to feel good about themselves, wanted to be like the people they saw on TV.? Wasn't that it?? Yes it was, and in a sense she saw herself for the first time, too.
The exploitation, the degradation, the goddamn fucking lie of it all.
Somebody had to make them pay.?
Well, if the past nine years hadn't been for a moment like this, then it had been for no moment at all.? The high white buzz of adrenaline surged through her veins.? Still shaking, still crying.? That was okay.?
A whistling sound seemed to shriek near her ears.?
Mr. Blue Eyes was almost upon her.
"Hey, take it easy now," he said.? "Let's stop crying.? Let's cut out all this nonsense and be friends again, okay?"
Her chin quivered.
He opened his strong arms to embrace her.
"Careful," Mr. Shaggy said.
"Oh, I'll be careful.? I'll be gentle.? We're gonna make Lola feel right at home."
Lola planted her feet and rammed her forehead into Mr. Blues Eyes's face.? He was just as dumb as a stump, wasn't he?? She drove it in hard, like she would hammer a nail into a log.? The blow accelerated into the impact.?
His nose felt sharp.? This time she broke it.? She heard a sound like a club pounding on a hollow gourd.?
Mr. Blue Eyes made a choking sound.? Maybe it was a scream.
He fell back.
She lunged forward.? As she did, she delivered a punch to his throat with the edge of her right palm, the blade of it.? The punch was part of the lunge, organic to it, instead of tacked on at the end.? She had practiced just such a move thousands of times until it was seamless and flowed like water.?
Mr. Blue Eyes gagged and sputtered, his hands to his face.? Blood soiled his chin and neck.? His eyes seemed to peer at her from over the top of a bright red wall.? She leapt into the air and delivered a front kick to his naked, helpless groin.? He dropped to his knees, then fell to the carpet like the broken toy of a careless child.
Mr. Shaggy was there, too late for his friend.? He grabbed her from behind.? She tried to use her head on him, but he sidestepped and her skull bounced harmlessly off the meat of his shoulder.? He got both hands, strong hands, in her hair and spun her around.? Roughly, he forced her to her knees before him.
He had put away the camera.???
She stared up at him.? He looked down at her.? Their eyes locked.
She had two free hands, and he had none.? With one hand, she reached up and grasped his testicles through his loose fitting chino workpants.? She got a good grip on him, measured the heft of him.? She held him as she would hold a piece of fruit for inspection.
She smiled.
He shook his head.? "Don't."
She squeezed and gave a savage twist.
He let go of her hair.?
She sprang to her feet, phantom hands still yanking her hair, the pain there still bright.? Shaggy was slightly bent, holding his balls with both hands.?
She took one step and side-kicked him in the face with the ball of her foot.?
He staggered away, lost his footing and fell over.?
She glanced around for something to do next.? The camera on the tripod caught her eye.? She walked over and inspected it.? It was a Canon XL1, a digital.? It was still filming.? She fumbled with the camera for a moment, then ejected the disk, a Mini-DV cassette.? She flipped it onto the desk next to the hand held camera.? She ejected the Mini-DV from that one, too.
Then she picked up the tripod, camera and all.? She held it by the tripod legs like a baseball bat.? It was heavier than it looked.???
"Don't even think about breaking that," Mr. Shaggy said from the floor.
Now she was having fun.
"You know?? I kind of liked you, Shaggy.? I mean, like an hour ago, when I first met you."? She swung hard and smashed the camera against the wall.? A piece of its hard plastic casing flew across the office.? The force of the blow punched a hole in the painted sheet rock of the wall.
"Aw fuck," Mr. Shaggy said.? "Honey, I paid $3,000 for that."
&nb
sp; She swung again, punching another dent.? The LCD screen broke off and hung by a wire.? "I guess you'll need a new one."
He climbed heavily to his feet.? She watched him.
He paused, staring down at Mr. Blue Eyes, who writhed and squirmed on the floor, blood from his nose staining the carpet black.? Mr. Shaggy sighed from deep in his chest.? He released a long exhalation.? "I think my friend is hurt."
"Shaggy?"
He turned to look at her.
"Yeah?"
She swung the tripod and the shattered camera connected with his face.
"So are you."
Alone now, Lola surveyed the wreckage.
She crouched between the two men piled on the floor.? She was naked but for a bright orange bikini.? No matter.? Mr. Blue Eyes had no clothes on at all and Mr. Shaggy's belly hung out there like a giant hairy potato.? She was still breathing hard, her hair was matted to her head and sweat dripped down her face.? No matter.? They were both bleeding like twin volcanoes.??
All those years of practice, Women's Self-Defense, Extreme Self-Defense, Karate, Grappling, several different styles, years of sparring, and she had never really known if any of it would work in real life.?
Worked?? It had damn well rocked.
"Are we done here?" she said.
Neither of the men said a word.
"I guess that means yes."
She climbed out of her crouch and glanced around the office.? Nothing much to see.
"Listen, I want to thank you guys.? That was the best time I've had in years."
Later, fully dressed and back out on the street, she walked several blocks before she started laughing.? She came to a corner and threw the two Mini-DV cassettes in the gutter.? She stepped on each of them, grinding them with her heel, then kicked them into the sewer.? All the while, she giggled like a lunatic.???
Two couples out for Friday night drinks passed her, glanced her way and kept going.?
A moment later the tears began to flow and she could not stop weeping.
?
* * *
?
Smoke Dugan lay awake in absolute darkness, thinking about death.
Across the room, he heard the furtive rustlings as two of his cats wrestled.? A glass of port wine from Portugal sat forgotten on the table at his elbow.? She hadn't called yet and that was not like her.? Somewhere in his mind, he knew this, but the problem was he knew other things as well.? He lay in his basement apartment, watching the visions imprinted on his brain.
The visions were memories.
For more than a year, he had been free of the things.? Then last week, something had happened that brought them all rushing back.? He had been walking in the Old Port, enjoying the bright fall day.? In fact, just moments earlier he had been out on the Maine State Pier watching four harbor seals frolic in the bay.? He had read his morning paper out there on a bench, watching also as the Peaks Island Ferry came in and out.? Now he was walking back through the sparse crowds.? He was thinking he wanted to have a bite to eat, and he was deciding about the many restaurants available to him along the waterfront.
A man was following him.?
Damned if it wasn't so.? Smoke had first noticed him on the pier.? He was a 40-something tourist in a gray fleece jacket, jeans and LL Bean boots.? He wore a Brooklyn Dodgers replica baseball cap and dark sunglasses.? Sure, Smoke had seen him there, registered him with his binoculars and his camera and his leather over-the-shoulder tourist duffel.? He had registered him like he registered the Hispanic fishermen in their sleeveless t-shirts with their plastic bait-buckets, the floppy-haired teenagers with their skateboards, and the crusty old salts sitting on the benches, commenting and frowning about the state of the world.? Smoke registered everything, scanned everything, and as long as everything stayed where it belonged and acted properly, everything was just fine.
But on the crowded sidewalk of Commercial Street, he felt rather than saw the tourist there behind him.? That's when the antennae began to twitch.? Was he really there?? What was he doing??
Smoke bumped into a young woman passing with her girlfriend.?
"Oh my," he said, turning to her.? "Oh young lady, I am so sorry.? Are you all right?"
He touched her shoulders and glanced to his left.
The man was there, following along, 20 feet back.? He tinkered with something on his camera.? Had he taken another photo just a few seconds ago?? Smoke's grip tightened on his cane.?
The young woman smiled.? She was a pretty girl, blonde.? Her friend had a ring through her nose like a bull in a field.? "I'm fine, really.? It's my fault.? I should have been paying attention."
"No, I insist.? It was definitely my fault."
"Well, no harm done."? Both ladies laughed.??
The man found something fascinating in a storefront window.
The young lovelies moved on.? So did Smoke.? He walked along, heavy midday traffic flowing to his right.? Abruptly, he turned and stepped into the flow.? A car screeched to a halt.? The driver leaned on the horn as Smoke waved his cane.? He hurried across the street, glancing behind him at the driver who still hurled epithets.? The tourist watched him go.
Now, Smoke peered into the dark.? He reached and took a sip of his wine.
It didn't prove anything.
Half the street had watched him.? After all, he had made a suicidal plunge into heavy traffic.? People must have thought he was a senile old man.??
Maybe the man really was a tourist.? Maybe he wasn't.? But Smoke couldn't stay here - couldn't stay anywhere - forever.? That's what he realized now.? He had always known it, but this past year had been so good that he allowed himself to forget.? The day would come when the man behind him wasn't a tourist.?
Perhaps the time had come to explain himself to Lola.? Tell her the whole story.? Ask her to run away with him.? There was nothing keeping either of them here.
Would she come?? Would she even believe him?
She wouldn't.? It was that simple.? Lola grew up in bad circumstances, but she was a good girl.? She wasn't tough.? She wasn't cut out for the life Smoke had led.? Few people were.? Lola was comfortable with the idea that he was a kindly older man who had made a lot of money building toys for retarded children.
Even that.? He laughed at the word.? "Retarded."? She hated it when he used it.?
"Why can't you say special?" she said.? "Or even developmentally disabled?"
?He didn't know why.? He just couldn't.? He loved the children, God knew, but he hated the way people danced around what things were, describing them with words that didn't explain anything.? Hearing impaired for deaf.? Vision impaired for blind.
Fuck it.?
Since the tourist, Smoke had started setting the traps again.? And the traps had brought the dead children back to him.? He saw the dark ocean water with flames riding on the surface, the bodies floating like dolls, the sharks gathering in the deep.? The adults, okay that was bad.? But the children?? He saw their big vacant eyes most of all, the life gone from them.
"Shit," he said and rolled over.?
He was fully awake now, itching to call her.? Every minute she didn't call was another minute they had gotten her.? He would call her, but that didn't conform to the rules.? The rules were she was a big girl, she had grown up in the Chicago housing projects long before she met him, and she could take care of herself.? She would call when she got in.
"Some tough girl," he said.? "Can't even say the word retarded."
The phone rang, too loud in the close darkness.
"Hello?"
"Smoke?"? It was her.?
He smiled.? He put the sound of sleep in his voice.
"Yeah, babe.? Thought you forgot."
"Did I wake you?" she said.
"Not really.? How'd the audition go?"
"It didn't? it didn't go well.? I don't think I'm going to get the job.? I don't think they liked me very much."
"Well, that's okay.? You'll get 'em next time."
"
Sure."
"We having dinner tomorrow night?" he said.? "You, me and Pamela?"
"We sure are."
He thought he heard her voice shake just a little bit.?
"Hey," he said.? "Is everything all right?"
"I'm just tired.? It's been a long day.? I'm on my way to bed."
"Well, I love you," he said.?
There was a pause.? Sometimes he feared he said it too much, put too much pressure on her.? Damn.? She was half his age.?
"You don't have to say it," he said.
"I love you too, silly."
When they hung up, Smoke picked up his wine glass.? Somewhere in the room, the cats still played.?
Smoke saw the flames again.? He saw the dead eyes of the children.
He pictured two massive hands, grasping in the dark.? They were groping for him, trying to find him.? Hands that would seize him and crush him.??
Searching, searching.
?
CHAPTER TWO
Denny Cruz had murderer's eyes.
That's why the waiter never looked at him.? It wasn't the four-inch scar that came down the side of his face like a jagged stretch of highway - the scar that he left there against all the best advice of well-meaning people.
"Hey Cruz, you got the money, why don't you get rid of that scar?" someone would say to him.
"Because I want to remember," he would answer in a voice that rose just barely above a whisper.? In Cruz's experience, you didn't need to talk loud to get people's attention.
"Yeah, but one day a witness is gonna see that thing and you're gonna go down."
"I don't leave witnesses."?
It wasn't the scar.? And it wasn't his slim, razor sharp body.? No.? It was the eyes.? Even now, after all these years, some mornings Cruz was startled to see those eyes looking back at him in the mirror.? He had seen the same eyes in newspaper pictures from Rwanda.? Men who had hacked thousands of innocent women and children apart with machetes, men who lived 40-deep in small, unlit cells, waiting to go on trial for genocide.
Killers.?
In newspaper photographs, these men had the eyes.
Cruz sat in the open-air restaurant just off the lush courtyard and in-ground pool of the elegant Hotel St. Therese in New Orleans.? He had just finished his breakfast, and his appetite had been good.? He had polished off a plate of Eggs Bayou Lafourche, two golden beignets piled with snowy sugar, a glass of juice, and two cups of real New Orleans French Roast with chicory.? It would be nice to light up a cigarette right about now.? Of course, it was verboten to smoke indoors.? Smokers like himself had been hounded and persecuted by the good clean pink-lunged people of the world for going on ten years.? Soon, the smokers would probably be packed off to camps in the countryside.? For their own good, you see.???