The Man Who Risked His Partner

  She couldn’t react. “Shit!” the man spat He sounded more than a little disappointed. “You’re not Haskell? Fuck it.”

  “If you want,” I told her quietly, “I’ll make him let go.”

  “Please, Mase,” she whimpered. “Please.”

  His eyes narrowed as he raised the rifle and pointed it at my head. He looked like a snake.

  I didn’t make any threatening moves. “That dragon,” I said, nodding toward his left forearm. “Cambodia, right? Special Forces?” My brother used to talk about things like that. “You must’ve earned it the hard way.”

  He was at least as dangerous as a stirred-up rattler, but he wasn’t any smarter than I was. Surprised by my recognition, he loosened his grip on the rifle. “You know about that?”

  “Sure.”

  Still nodding, I kicked the rifle out of his hands. Instinctively he let the woman go. Before he could get his legs under him, I heaved him out of the chair by the front of his shirt, jerked him into the air, and slammed him to the floor with a jolt that rattled his bones.

  Clamping one foot on the back of his neck, I pushed his face against the floorboards. For a second he struggled. Then he stopped. He must’ve felt how easily I could break his neck. He started frothing obscenities, but I put more weight on him until he stopped that, too.

  While I was bending over him, I took a quick glance at the subscription labels on the magazines. They were all addressed to Mase Novick.

  So he was a mercenary. Or had been recently. He didn’t live here because he was poor. Instead, he was professionally paranoid. He felt safer in the barrio, where people like cops, ATF cowboys, and the FBI weren’t likely to come looking for him. And if he happened to shoot one of his neighbors by accident, no one would know the difference.

  He was exactly the kind of man you’d hire to kill someone if you didn’t have el Senor’s resources.

  With Novick pinned to the floor, I got my first good look at Gail Harmon. At the bank, they’d called her Frail Gail, and she looked like that more than ever now. She wore a ragged old flannel shirt with only one button to keep it closed over her breasts, jeans that probably fit her before she lost too much weight, no shoes. If she’d washed her hair anytime in the past month, it didn’t show. Her face was covered with freckles that would’ve looked perky and fresh if she’d been healthy. Behind them, however, her skin was the color of stale dough, and the life in her eyes was being erased by dope, beer, and exhaustion.

  She didn’t seem to be aware that I was hurting her boyfriend. Still on her knees, she gave me a white stare and asked in a voice like a little girl’s, “Do you know Reg? Have you seen him? Does he want me back?”

  She made my insides hurt worse than the M-16. I didn’t need a doctor to tell me that I was out of my depth. I knew it as soon as I got a good look at her eyes and heard her voice. Inside her skull, she was already a wasteland. Before long the rest of her would end up the same way.

  All of a sudden, I wanted Ginny, wanted her so badly that it closed my throat. I couldn’t say anything.

  When I didn’t answer, Gail got to her feet. “You said you wanted to talk about Reg. I heard you.” She was starting to sound wild. “You said his name.”

  Out of my depth, and close to drowning. Her desire to hear me say something about Haskell made her breathe harder and harder. Her eyes didn’t focus anywhere. I thought she might try to hit me. To stop her, I pulled out the .45. Then I took my foot off Novick’s neck.

  Quickly he rolled into fighting position. But I had him covered. Directing him with the barrel of the .45, I moved him to his chair and made him sit down. Then I picked up the M-16, cleared it, and leaned it in the corner. He watched every move, his eyes blank with hate, but he didn’t try to jump me.

  Finally I forced the muscles of my throat to unclamp. “Novick,” I said, and didn’t care how my voice shook, “what the hell’s going on here?”

  He didn’t answer. He didn’t move. He just fixed his hate on me and waited.

  I had trouble swallowing a shout. “Whatever it is, she doesn’t know anything about it. She probably doesn’t know her own name half the time. You’re the one who knows. You may be strung out with drugs and paranoia, but you haven’t lost your mind yet.” For a second I almost lost control. “What the fucking hell is going on?”

  A bit of a smile touched his thin lips. He liked seeing me upset. But he didn’t say anything.

  Gail went to him, put her hands on his shoulders. “Mase,” she whispered softly, pleading with him, “he said he wanted to talk to me about Reg. I heard him.” Her fingers stroked the side of his neck, the back of his head. “Make him talk to me about Reg.”

  Because I didn’t have any better ideas, I said the simplest and most direct thing I could think of. “Novick, she needs help. She needs help bad.”

  At that, something I wasn’t expecting came into his face. Something like a snarl of rage—or a twist of grief. “You think I don’t know that, asshole? You think I look at her and don’t know that?”

  “Then do something about it, for God’s sake! Take her back to her parents. Take her to a doctor. Something. She isn’t going to last much longer.”

  “‘Do something.’” He laughed softly, like a splash of acid. “You big fucker. You think you understand. You understand nothing. That Reg bastard fucker kicks her out. I take her in. I take care of her. Whatever I got, we share. What do I get? She lets me do what I want.”

  Abruptly he reached into her shirt, squeezed one of her breasts. Then he knotted his hand in her hair again and pulled her down to her knees beside him. He had a virtuoso range of endearments, but she didn’t react to either of them. She just kept watching me, waiting for me to say what she wanted to hear.

  “But she don’t want me,” Novick rasped. “She wants Reg. She thinks Reg, sleeps Reg, smokes Reg. You think I like that?”

  Without warning, he pushed her away so hard that she sprawled into the magazines and pillows. “‘Do something.’ I’ll fucking do something. She don’t need no parents. And no doctor, either. I’ll give her what she needs. I’ll give her Reg Haskell’s balls on a stick.”

  On some important level, Gail wasn’t aware of what he said, or even of what he did. She climbed out of the pillows and got to her feet, hardly strong enough to keep her balance. Her face was pale and venomous.

  “You said you wanted to talk to me about Reg.” In her frail way, she hated me worse than Mase Novick did. “You lied. You don’t know him at all. If you knew him, you would have told me he wants me back.” Then she turned to Novick. “Make him go away, Mase. I don’t like him.”

  He grinned at me. He didn’t have all his teeth.

  By then a Mongoloid idiot could’ve told you I’d botched the whole thing. I’d come all this way, and all I’d learned was that Gail Harmon didn’t have any of her oars in the water, and Novick liked his work. If I didn’t start doing better soon, I’d have to laugh myself out of Puerta del Sol. So I did something a little crazy. I said, “Gail, someone’s trying to kill Reg. I came here to find out who it is.”

  At least I wasn’t alone. No expression marked her face as she bent down and picked up one of the pillows. She didn’t look at me, didn’t see me. I had no warning when she flung the pillow at my head with all her little strength.

  Faster than I thought she could move, she snatched up a beer can and threw it. Another pillow. A magazine.

  While I was fending that stuff away from my face, Novick came out of his chair at me like the slam of a piston.

  Surprise had rocked me back on my heels. I couldn’t pull all my muscle together. But I managed to get my arm around in time. Swinging hard, I clubbed him across the shoulder, deflected him past me.

  Toward the corner where I’d propped his M-16.

  As he grabbed his rifle, I pivoted after him and raised the .45 so it would be the first thing he saw when he turned.

  And Gail jumped onto my back. Reaching for my head, she clawed her fingern
ails at my eyes.

  For a temporarily sober drunk, my reflexes were still pretty good. Better than good when I didn’t have time to second-guess myself. Just in time, I squeezed my eyes shut.

  Her nails raked my eyebrows and cheeks. Novick brought the rifle into line on my chest and grabbed for the bolt. I opened my eyes again.

  Somehow my right hand still aimed the .45 into Novick’s face. With my left, I caught Gail’s wrist and swung her around me, pitching her against him and the rifle.

  That saved me. Before he could recover, I racked the slide of the .45 and shouted, “Don’t even think it!”

  He froze. Force of habit, probably. Good mercenaries have to know when to take orders. And how to stay alive.

  I felt blood on my face, but I ignored it. “You’re both insane,” I panted, out of breath more from fear than exertion. “You’re too sick to live. You should be put out of your misery.”

  Saying that made me feel better. But it didn’t get me out of there in one piece. They both watched me like cornered rats, waiting for their chance.

  I had two choices. Drag them out of the house with me, keep them covered while I got to the Olds. Or gamble. Choosing self-respect over caution, I decided to gamble.

  “Well, today you’re lucky.” A drop of blood ran into my left eye, smeared my vision. I blinked it away. “I’m not going to shoot you.” Lowering the .45, I cleared it and put it away. “If you stop and think about it, you don’t have any reason to shoot me, either.”

  Which probably wasn’t true, but I trusted it anyway. I gave Novick one last chance. “Get her some help.” Then I pulled the door open and let myself onto the porch, out of the overcooked heat into the cold.

  The blood felt like sweat on my face. Closing the door behind me, I crossed the splintered porch to the bare dirt of the front yard and strode toward the Olds without looking back. I moved briskly, but I didn’t run.

  Which wasn’t as stupid as it sounds. I’d be able to hear the door if they opened it.

  They didn’t. I reached the Olds, got in. For once, the engine started as soon as I touched the key. I drove a few blocks farther down Bosque before I stopped to see what I could do about the state of my face.

  The rearview mirror didn’t raise my opinion of myself much. Seven or eight bright weals oozing blood started in the middle of my forehead and ran down across my eyes into my cheeks. They were beginning to feel like fire. And they made my face look ghoulish, like some kind of death mask. My eyes stared wildly out at the world through streaks of pain.

  I dabbed up most of the blood with a handkerchief, but I couldn’t wash my wounds without soap and water. And washing them wasn’t going to improve my appearance any.

  Reaction set in. I felt nauseated with disgust. My hands shook, and my clothes smelled like a sweat locker. If there was any way to screw up my encounter with Gail Harmon and Mase Novick worse than I did, I couldn’t think of it.

  On the other hand—looking on the bright side—I wasn’t sleepy anymore.

  Since I didn’t have any better ideas, I decided to risk going back to Ginny’s apartment. If the cops were there, I was shit out of luck. But if they weren’t, I could shower, shave, put on some clean clothes. Pack the suitcase Ginny wanted. Take care of my face. My other priorities could wait that long.

  It was a nice plan, but I was interrupted. Before I put the Olds in gear, I readjusted the rearview mirror—and saw a tan-and-white Puerta del Sol Department of Police unit cruising down Bosque toward me.

  Terrific. Just what I needed. You don’t see cops in the South Valley very often. Keeping my fingers crossed, I sat where I was and waited for the car to troll on past.

  It didn’t. Instead it pulled to a stop in front of me, blocking the Olds. Then another car, a baby blue Dodge with a powerful exhaust and anonymous city plates, came up and parked on my rear.

  Now I wasn’t going anywhere without permission.

  Two street cops emerged from the unit. They had their riot sticks out and ready. They came around to my door and planted themselves there, standing well back so that I couldn’t surprise them. I thought I recognized one of them, but I wasn’t sure. Maybe I knew him back in the days when my brother was a cop. There was something familiar and not very kindly about the way he said, “Get-out of the car, Axbrewder.”

  They’d been looking for me.

  At the moment, I had no idea how they’d found me.

  I wanted to know. But there was something else I wanted to know a hell of a lot more.

  “What’s wrong, officer?” I asked, doing my best to pretend that I wasn’t scratched up like a punk rocker.

  Good as twins, both cops tapped their palms with their sticks. “I said,” the familiar one repeated, “get out of the car.”

  Before I could stop myself, I replied, “As long as we’re here, do you mind if I get out of the car? I don’t mean to scare you. I just want to stretch my legs.”

  They swore at me with varying degrees of subtlety while I opened the door of the Olds.

  Right away, they let me know I wasn’t under arrest. Probably that decision hadn’t been made yet. Instead of reading me my rights, or making me assume the position, or even taking away the .45, one of them jabbed me with his stick before I had both legs under me, hit me hard enough to rock me back against the side of the car. Just making sure he had me under control.

  I gave them a smile that would’ve curdled milk, but they ignored it.

  Once I was safely pinned to the side of the Olds, two more of Puerta del Sol’s finest got out of the Dodge. Plainclothes detectives. One of them was a small individual with the secret harried look of a man whose wife didn’t like his line of work. The other was Captain Philip Cason.

  Which told me right away what I wanted to know. The story I had planned—the one Haskell suggested—wasn’t going to wash.

  I didn’t have to connect the dots. Cason was investigating the death of Roscoe Chavez. He had an interest in Pablo’s disappearance. So why would he care who blew up a car I rented? Only one reason. The cops on the scene must’ve tracked down Haskell’s cab. And the driver must’ve told them what Haskell and I talked about. When el Senor’s name came up, those cops just naturally passed the investigation over to Cason.

  None of which explained why I wasn’t being arrested. But it was a start. At least I had that much to go on when I began lying.

  As he sauntered toward me, Cason grinned like the blade of a can opener. He was a fleshy man who didn’t mind carrying a little fat because he already knew his own strength. He had hands like shovels, burying hands, and eyes the color of blindness. A dapper hat perched on the back of his head, and his suit and coat looked so expensive you couldn’t wrinkle them with a steamroller.

  Like the street cops, he kept a safe distance. Still grinning, he scanned my damaged face. Then he said, “Well, well.” His voice had a hoarse rasp that came from too much interrogation. “Fistoulari do that to you? She must be one hot fuck.”

  To restrain myself, I folded my arms over my chest. “Captain Cason,” I replied conversationally. “Charming as ever, I see. If you weren’t carrying a badge, I’d take your face off.”

  He must’ve wanted something from me. Instead of coming down hard, he concentrated on his homicidal smile.

  “I’m curious,” he remarked. “What brings you way down here? You were always a bum, but this is low even for you.”

  Not to be outdone, I countered, “I’m curious, too. How did you find me ‘way down here’? I thought this part of the city scared you cops.” If I was lucky, the cold made me look like I was hugging myself to keep warm.

  He didn’t like my attitude. His grin faded. To compensate, he made his voice tougher. “You figure it out, smart-ass.”

  “All right.” Under the circumstances, an educated guess wasn’t hard. “An unmarked car watched the entrance to Cactus Blossom from Foothill. When I drove out, I was followed. Nothing obvious. All you wanted was my general direction. You told yo
ur people to report where I was headed and then leave me alone.” Even in my condition, I would’ve noticed a close tail. “You didn’t care where I went. You just wanted to be able to close in when you were ready.

  “What I don’t know is why you’re wasting all this time and manpower on a two-bit case like me.”

  The look of blindness in his eyes made Cason hard to read. But the way he dismissed my explanation was downright reassuring.

  “One thing at a time,” he growled. “You haven’t told me what you’re doing here.”

  On that basis, I was reasonably sure that he hadn’t already staked out Gail Harmon and Mase Novick. Novick was the sort of man who’d notice being staked out—even if he wasn’t. Cason wasn’t that far ahead of me.

  I was tempted to retort, You figure it out. But that might make him too mad to let me go. Instead I tried to see how many lies he would swallow.

  Trying to look embarrassed, I mumbled, “Ginny and I haven’t been getting along. I came to see a former girlfriend.” I made a brusque gesture toward my face. “She wasn’t amused.”

  One of the street cops gave a short laugh like a pistol shot. Cason’s partner studied the scuffed tops of his shoes. But I didn’t care what they thought. I waited for Cason’s reaction.

  The idea that I came to the South Valley looking for love restored his smile. “You always did like Mex chippies,” he rasped happily.

  He was such a nice man. Nevertheless, I knotted the muscles of my arms and didn’t take him up on it. “Cason,” I said, “I don’t have a coat, and I’m freezing.” Injured-pride Axbrewder. “How much longer do you want me to stand here?”

  He raised one fist, glanced with approval at the scars on his knuckles. “Long enough to tell me why you’ve been on the run ever since that Buick you rented blew up in the Jousters parking lot.”

  If I’d stopped to think, I wouldn’t have known what to say. Did he want me to admit knowing too much about things that were none of my business? Or was he just shooting blind? But I was already in a counterpunching mood, so I kept going.

  “What do you care? Did some hot-wired stoolie tell you I’ve got something to do with Roscoe Chavez, or are you just getting paranoid in your old age?”