The Water Knife

  A top piece of the dam collapsed. A cement mixer went with it, bobbing and piling down into the tight canyon confines. A toy tossed by the waters, floating and swirling in the increasing torrent.

  Someone keyed the sound for the monitors. A breathless announcer’s voice filled the atrium, running down long lists of towns that were vulnerable to the surge of water:

  “We just don’t know how far it will go! The Bureau of Reclamation expects that the Morrow Point and Crystal Reservoirs will also fail. The Army Corps of Engineers is recommending evacuation alerts for the cities of Hotchkiss, Delta, Grand Junction, Moab…this could go all the way down to Glen Canyon.”

  The announcer rattled off more town names as the cameras panned from the collapsing dam down into the tight confines of the canyon, a raging muddy froth. Boulders as big as houses bobbed in the tumult. The announcers were calling it an act of terrorism, then correcting themselves and saying that it could have been a failure in construction. The dam had stood for almost a hundred years, and now it was dying. More and more muddy water gushed through.

  A part of the canyon wall collapsed, undermined by the blasting water, an entire stack of cracked granite peeling off, spinning, taking a handful of observers with it. Ant people scrambled away from the rim. The announcer was shouting, “There were people there!” as if it hadn’t been obvious, but he kept saying it, breathless and terrorized. “There were people there!”

  “We’re getting word from the Bureau of Reclamation that the dam was recently evaluated and considered stable. The construction and geological location were ideal. No dam on record has collapsed spontaneously, after existing in a stable condition for so long—”

  “So it’s terrorists, then,” someone else said.

  But still the announcer was backing away from the word.

  Lucy wondered if the announcer had a connection to California. If he’d been pressured to go easy on the state the way that Lucy had been pressured. If he’d had his own plata o plomo moment.

  The dam collapsed into a torrent of raging water.

  It would rush down through canyons, cross state lines, inundate towns, sweep away all traces of human activity along its margins, and still the announcer struggled to avoid saying what everyone knew must be true: California had gotten tired of negotiating for its share of the river and had done something about it. It wanted its water, and it wanted it now.

  Everyone stood in the open atrium of the arcology, staring up at the news, and suddenly Lucy realized that her opportunity had arrived.

  All she had to do was move, while everyone else was paralyzed.

  She eased away from her security guard. She slipped through the gathering, easy and relaxed, walking while everyone else stood and stared, mesmerized.

  It was almost as if she didn’t exist. She was a ghost.

  She hopped the turnstiles and made it to the elevators. She tailgated a shell-shocked-looking man into the elevator and let him sweep his key. She pushed her own button.

  As the doors closed, she caught a last glimpse of all the wealthy fivers, the privileged of Taiyang, all of them watching the news, all of them made small in the face of California’s power.

  CHAPTER 20

  Please leave please leave please leave.

  But the men stayed, muttering and joking. Rifling through drawers, rattling dishware. Maria lay pinned beneath the bed, fighting not to make a sound.

  She had to pee. The more she tried to tell herself she didn’t need to, the more the pressure built. All the water she’d greedily consumed was coming back to betray her. She kept praying the men would leave.

  Instead, they were arguing.

  “I can’t open it, asshole. That’s what I’m saying.”

  “It’s a fingerprint reader. Use his damn finger.” And then some thumping and dragging that Maria guessed was Mike’s body, being used.

  “It’s still encrypted,” one of them said. “You want to take it with us? Work on the password?”

  “Try his birthday.”

  “Already did. Birthday. Mother’s name. Did all that easy stuff. It’ll take a while to crack. If we get lucky, we can throw a couple dictionaries at it, but it’s still going to take time.”

  “We don’t have time.”

  “You mean you don’t have time.”

  The apartment phone rang. “You want me to answer that?”

  “No, I don’t want you to answer it, pendejo. I want the code for this fucking computer.”

  The phone stopped ringing, muted by one of the killers, Maria assumed.

  “Time’s running out.”

  “So see if he wrote down passcodes somewhere.”

  Footsteps came back toward the bedroom. Maria held her breath. They were hunting now. They’d look under the bed as they sought whatever it was they wanted. She knew it. She could see the man’s boots and then him reaching down, his hands, inches from her face. She fought the urge to move, to scrabble away.

  The hands picked up Mike’s pants, rifling through the pockets.

  Please God don’t let them get me. Santa Muerte. Mother Mary, please please please please. She felt her lips moving in prayer, but she couldn’t stop her bladder from releasing even as the hands rustled through the pants and came up with a wallet.

  “See if there’s anything in this.”

  Hot urine began pooling in her crotch. The sound of it soaking the carpet was like a shout to her ears. Gushing. She tried to stop and couldn’t. The pain in her bladder was like a knife. She tried to piss quietly, hating it, wishing it was over, and still her body defied her, and there was more, all the water she’d greedily consumed, and still the men kept talking, back and forth, casual.

  She heard the refrigerator open.

  “You want some orange juice?”

  They were never going to leave, she realized. They were devils, happy to live among their dead.

  Something cold and wet touched her bare back. A drop of water. Another.

  What is—?

  Another drip.

  Dios mío.

  Sarah’s blood, draining through the mattress. Dripping cold on her back. She fought the urge to scramble out from under the bed, to escape Sarah’s dying blood as footsteps returned to the bedroom.

  The closet rattled open. From where Maria lay, she couldn’t see their feet, but she could hear them moving through the space, searching. They were in the room, circling. They were going to find her. It was only a matter of time before they looked under the bed.

  “Motherfucker had himself a party, didn’t he?”

  “Bad luck for the bitch.”

  “Pretty, though.”

  “What, you want to take a run at that?”

  “I don’t need to whack a girl just to get in her pants. That’s you, you psycho fuck.”

  The other guy laughed. “Don’t knock it till you try it. Dead girls don’t whine about how you don’t call ’em after.”

  Just go, just go, just go, Maria prayed.

  “You know, this would be a hell of a lot easier if you hadn’t whacked him.”

  “What can I say? Motherfucker had spirit. Don’t get that many people just go after my gun like that.”

  They were both rifling through the closet now.

  “I still wanted to ask him questions,” the first one complained.

  “You got his computer and his tablet and his phone. I bet you’ll be fine.”

  “If I can crack it.”

  There was a knock at the door.

  The two men fell instantly silent.

  Maria held her breath with them.

  Another knock.

  The men ghosted out of the bedroom, their footsteps suddenly stealthy.

  The cops, Maria thought, relieved. They’d heard something.

  She was going to be saved. She was going to escape. She’d run to Toomie. She’d disappear. She’d had too much pride to rely on him before, but now she knew she’d do anything to hide under that man’s wing. Toomie was the decent
sort. She’d melt into the city’s dark zone. Nothing would bring Sarah back, but she could still find safety. She’d seduce Toomie. Give him whatever he wanted. She’d make him take her. Make him want her. Make him be happy with her. It didn’t matter if she didn’t want him. She’d make him want her.

  Anything. I’ll do anything. Please, God. Help me. Santa Muerte. Help me. I’ll do rosaries. I’ll do anything.

  The knock came again.

  “Well, I’ll be damned.” One of them laughed.

  Maria heard the door opening.

  A woman started to say, “Michael—” but her voice broke with a hard thump and a sharp cry of pain.

  The door slammed shut. Grunts and muffled thuds followed, dull and distant and full of horror.

  The woman screamed for help, but Maria knew it wouldn’t do her any good. Glass shattered—maybe the coffee table. One of the men shouted in pain and started yelling, too.

  “Get her! GET HER!”

  More thuds.

  The woman stopped screaming.

  For a long time, no other sounds came from the living room.

  At last one of the men said, “Fucking hell. We need to get out of here.” His voice was ragged and exhausted.

  “What are we going to do about her?”

  “You mean after the goddamn racket you made?”

  “It’s hard to make someone go down quiet. You want me to finish her? Dump her in with the bangbang?”

  “Fuck no! I want to know what she knows. I already got one corpse that can’t tell me anything useful. Grab her. I’ll get the computer.”

  There was a grunt and another thud.

  “Watch her head!”

  “Sure.” A laugh. “Whatever. Dead girls are heavy.”

  “She better not be dead, pendejo.”

  The door opened and closed. The apartment fell silent.

  Maria lay still, unable to believe that they were truly gone. Minutes ticked by. Finally she crawled stiffly from beneath the bed. Her back burned. She’d scraped herself bloody forcing herself to fit. She tried to stand. Her skin itched with the irritation of urine.

  Sarah lay in the bed, her blood soaking the sheets. Maria stared at her stilled body. She should have been dead, too. As dead as Sarah. Dizziness overwhelmed her. She sat down on the floor, fighting off the blackness that swamped her vision, trying to breathe, trying to fight past panic. She’d held it together all through the crisis, but now she found she couldn’t even stand. She put her head between her knees. Forced herself to breathe slowly. The blackness receded.

  Out in the living room, the gorgeous view was still there. The water glasses that she and Mike had been drinking from were still on the counter. The bowl he’d used to beat eggs was shattered across the kitchen floor, diamond glints in sunlight, punctuating blood on the tile.

  When she got closer, she saw that Mike had a bullet in his face. His nose and eye were missing, and a huge hole yawned at the back of his head. Shards of hair and skull and brain had sprayed across the white carpet, potterylike. A wide streak of blood was smeared across tile and carpet where they’d dragged him.

  He was missing a finger.

  That did it.

  Maria bolted for the bathroom, holding back vomit.

  That hand had touched her. A dead man’s hand, mangled now, had touched her skin.

  She threw up. Water and bile and terror poured out of her. She vomited, shaking and crying, her stomach convulsing, her guts twisting until there was nothing left, and all her grief and fear were ripped from her. Purged and gone.

  All scraped out, she thought dully.

  She rested her forehead against the cool porcelain of the toilet.

  Run. Get out. Get to Toomie.

  No. Be smart.

  Maria made herself climb into the shower. She bathed deliberately, scrubbing away blood and piss and sweat and terror, forcing herself not to think about the bodies just outside the bathroom door.

  In the bedroom, she avoided looking at Sarah as she found her dress and pulled it on, hating now how it felt against her skin, hating how defenseless the clinging fabric made her feel. She found her shoes, the silly little high-heeled things that Sarah had said Mike would want her in.

  Be smart.

  Maria went through Sarah’s clutch. Inside, she found a couple Plan Bs, another shot of bubble, and a couple stickypatches of something that she didn’t think they’d tried. Also, twenty dollars and a five-yuan coin.

  Maria remembered Sarah pulling her close as they kissed.

  He’ll pay, he’ll pay…

  Money.

  Maria went into the living room and rifled Mike’s discarded wallet. No cash—just cards. But then, he might not have had it at the club. Or maybe his killers had taken it. Sarah claimed she always got paid up front. But Mike was a regular. Maybe Sarah had trusted him to pay after.

  Maria looked around the living room, trying to imagine where a rich Cali might stow cash for a girl. She steeled herself and went back into the bedroom, avoiding looking at Sarah. Rifled through Mike’s drawers, socks and underwear, pants, shirts with a thin graceful bird logo and the words Ibis Exploratory…No cash. She went through the closet, searching the pockets of Mike’s suits, getting down on her knees and going through all his shoes—

  She heard a jiggling scratching noise from the living room. She froze, listening. Nothing. She eased out into the living room. Stealthy, trying to figure out what she’d heard. It was probably nothing. But still, she’d stayed too long already in the apartment. She had the creepy feeling of time running out. It had to have been her imagination. It was time to go. On her way out the door she spied the book lying on the counter. Cadillac Desert. Mike had said she could sell it. People liked old books. She couldn’t find money, but at least—

  The scratching came again.

  It was the front door, she realized. Someone was on the other side, messing with the lock. Someone quiet. Careful. Maria swallowed. She wanted to run, but she was frozen, staring at the door as the scratching continued.

  They’re back, she thought. They’re coming back. They—

  The latch handle turned. Maria bolted for the kitchen.

  “Hey!” one of the men shouted.

  Maria grabbed a kitchen knife, but the killers were fast. One of them slammed up behind her, grabbed her hand, and hammered it against the countertop. Once. Twice. The knife skittered away. Someone was screaming. Maria realized the shrieking was coming from her own mouth. She lunged for another knife, but the man lifted her bodily off the ground, leaving her legs kicking air.

  Maria brought up her legs and threw herself forward, overbalancing them both, sending them toppling.

  Tiles rushed up.

  Maria barely felt the pain as her head hit.

  CHAPTER 21

  Lucy awoke with a sack over her head and someone running his hands over her body. “Got her phone,” he said.

  “Pull the battery,” someone else said.

  “You want me to toss it?”

  “No. I still want to go through her contacts. But not until we’re somewhere shielded. Last thing we need is a tracker on us.”

  She was in a vehicle, and it was moving. She could feel the vibrations. Her hands were zip-cuffed behind her back. She was jammed into a cramped space, on an unforgiving bench.

  A truck? The back of an extended cab, she guessed, jammed in with some guy who smelled like weed overdrive cartridges and sweat. He finished running his hands over her body, pinched her breast hard, and laughed when she flinched.

  “She’s clean,” he said.

  Lucy tried to sit up, but he shoved her back down. “Oh, no you don’t. Tinted windows only go so far, girl.”

  “Like anyone gives a shit,” the other one—the driver, from the sound of it—said. “They’ll just think we’re bagging a Texan.”

  “You never know. Texans are getting uppity these days. Fuckers all banding together and shit. Makes ’em think they got some güevos.” He tapped Lucy o
n the side of the head. Sharp raps with his knuckles. “Fuckers. Don’t. Know. Their. Place.”

  “I’m not a Texan,” Lucy said.

  That got her another rap to the head. “Like I give a shit.”

  The heat and stifling air of the sack made Lucy feel as if she were suffocating. It made her want to hyperventilate and panic.

  Slow down. Breathe. You’re not suffocating.

  “So you and old Ratan had a thing, huh?”

  That was the driver, Lucy thought. His voice sounded farther away than the other one. Directed away from her. She tried to remember the men’s faces as they’d opened the door and gone after her. Something about one of them had been familiar. Was it because they’d been stalking her? Following her? They’d felt so familiar. The shock of knowing them. She remembered the red truck, driving past her house. Was this them?

  The guy who was sitting beside her pinched her again. “The man asked you a question.”

  “I don’t know Ratan,” Lucy said.

  “Why were you visiting, then? Not like Taiyang lets strangers just come walking in.”

  “I could ask you the same question.”

  Hands went around her throat, tightening the sacking over her head. She struggled to breathe.

  “This goes better if we do the asking and you do the answering.”

  I’m not going to survive, she realized. I saw their faces.

  She remembered the apartment, Ratan, lying on the floor, his blood soaking into the geometrics of his Navajo carpet. She was going to end up just like him.

  As quickly as the man grabbed her, he let her go. This is what I get for not listening to Anna, Lucy thought as she coughed and sucked air into her lungs.

  The truck came around a curve and began accelerating. They were getting onto a freeway, she thought.

  “What do you want?” she asked when she could breathe again. “Just tell me what you want, and I’ll help you if I can.”