No Easy Way Out

  “How am I supposed to watch your ass if you hide crap like this from me? I could have helped you find food for them. We could have moved them someplace together. It’s this sneaking behind my back crap that pisses me off.”

  “Like Marco?”

  Mike pointed at Ryan’s heart. “Exactly.”

  Ryan told them what he knew about Marco—that he had planned that first party on some level, and that steroid-pumped guys were threatening him. “I have no idea what he’s thinking. The guido guys looked like they wanted to kill him.”

  “I know the feeling,” Drew grumbled.

  “Marco has been a team player,” Mike said, cutting Drew off. “But he’s definitely running some scam on the side and he’d better be able to explain it to my satisfaction.” He stood, cracked his neck, and walked toward the door. “First, we put together another crap dinner.”

  “If I eat another refried bean, I’m going to frickin’ puke.”

  Ryan practically sprinted for the food. He hadn’t eaten all day and that tomato juice had only made him hungrier. He’d eat beans of any kind, maraschino cherries, whatever could be scrounged from the fridge of a bowling alley’s bar.

  • • •

  Marco let himself into the service halls and tracked his way toward the Sam’s Club as soon as he saw decent lines for dinner on the first floor. He knew from his work on construction that all the food in the mall was being consolidated there. He wasn’t sure why—maybe just to keep people from living off Jujubes instead of the freeze-dried camp food. Sam’s was a good place—fairly isolated from the rest of the mall, it had only one main entrance and exit point, which was gated off. But there were four exits into the service hallways, so he used one of those.

  Marco had guessed right that the doors would not be patrolled during dinner—he’d seen guards in the service hallway during the “work day,” but none now blocked his path. He slid his card through the reader and pulled open a door.

  The Sam’s Club was huge, like the HomeMart, only all white. The shelves had been rearranged, and any non-food items cleared and replaced with what could be scrounged from the rest of the mall. Refrigerators and freezers that had been rolled in from somewhere lined one wall. Their thrum filled the cavernous treasure trove.

  Marco wanted to be in and out of there as quickly as possible. Not only because the place was like a tomb, but he still had three kegs to move, and a third party location to find, after which he had to get his butt out of everyone’s way so he didn’t end up serving as party bitch for another consecutive night.

  He ran down the few steps and began scanning the aisles for bags of chips, anything that one might count as bar food. Just as he spotted giant bags of popcorn mere feet away, he heard a voice behind him.

  “We have an intruder,” the voice said.

  And then a lightning bolt struck him. Marco lost control of his muscles and hit the linoleum.

  He regained his senses in a dark stockroom. He could not tell for what store. A lone light shone on him like this was some Nazi interrogation. “Where the hell am I?” he said, his voice sounding scratchy.

  A large man with a gut sat in the chair opposite. “I believe we’ve had the pleasure, Mr. Carvajal. I’m Hank Goldman, head of security, and you’ve been a pain in my ass since day one.”

  Marco vaguely recalled this man from one of his meetings with the senator; however, the guy seemed to have intimate knowledge of Marco.

  He continued, “Rescue of prime targets Richter and Bonner, as well as an assault with fire extinguishers on my guards to rescue the kid on the wire, Murphy. Theft of a police access card key, and suspicion of having assaulted that officer to get it. Numerous absences from your work crew. Detainment every single evening after curfew.”

  The guy looked up from the paper he was reading. “Quite an impressive list.” He shifted on his seat and leaned toward Marco. “What I want to know is why Ross’s little pet criminal is sneaking through the food storage center when I have received no clearance for your being there.”

  Marco could see several shadows outside the aura of blinding light. This was some Gestapo bullcrap. He had freaking rights. “I want to see the senator. I can explain what I was doing.”

  “Then you can explain it to me.” Goldman did not budge.

  “I found the alcohol, just like she wanted. But the guy who’s holding it said I couldn’t have it unless I brought him food, so I was getting him some chips. I was trying to fix this whole party situation and the alcohol problem in one shot.” It was almost the truth. It was close enough to save his ass.

  “Party situation,” Goldman said snidely. “I told the woman this was a mistake. You put criminals in jails, you don’t throw them friggin’ parties.”

  “Look, I can explain everything to the senator.”

  “I don’t want you to explain diddly crap to that woman.” Goldman stood and flipped off the light. “I’m glad we found you, Carvajal. You are going to be a useful member of our team. See, we needed someone to act as the fall guy to steal us some decent food. Now that the woman has secret cameras hidden everywhere in the service halls, we can’t remove merchandise without alerting her to our operations. But you,” he said, grabbing Marco’s arm. “You can do all that for us.”

  Gooseflesh prickled from where Goldman held his arm and spread over Marco’s entire body. What the hell was going on in this mall? The head of security was running some scam behind the senator’s back? This was too much.

  “So here’s the plan,” Goldman continued. “You finish your little shopping trip, roll your pallet of grub back to the Pancake Palace, and then be a good boy and wait for us to pick you up again and bring you to the senator.”

  “No,” Marco whispered. “I won’t do it. Screw this, I’m out. Let the assholes find their own liquor.”

  Goldman twisted Marco’s skin. “Buddy, you’re so far in, they’d need a friggin’ scalpel to get you out.”

  “Screw you.”

  Goldman let go. “Kinsey, I think our friend needs some more convincing.”

  A woman stepped from the shadows, pressed a stun baton to Marco’s arm, and Marco lost some time to pain. When he came to, they were all still standing there, like they had watched. Had he peed his pants? His face felt numb, his lower lip, heavy. His thigh would not stop twitching.

  For the first time in a very long time, Marco was petrified. There was no fighting these people, no running away. He was trapped in a mall with a head of security who endorsed torture for something so lame as stealing popcorn. What would he do for higher stakes? Now that he had Marco on his radar, what was the limit of his madness?

  “F-fine,” Marco stammered. “Okay.”

  Goldman slapped Marco’s shoulder. “Now, was that so hard?”

  They shoved Marco’s head into a sack, half dragged him down the halls, and left him around the corner from where he’d started, in the service hall outside the Sam’s Club. When they were gone, Marco made a run for it. He was not falling victim to this crap scheme. He would come up with a plan—once he figured out what in the hell was going on in this fraked-up place.

  Run, though, was an overstatement. His legs weren’t functioning at top capacity. His face throbbed and his lip felt like the blubbery appendage of a dying cetacean. He needed to regain control of his muscles, use of his face. He thought of the one place on earth he might feel safe and headed there.

  L

  I

  G

  H

  T

  S

  OUT

  Lexi, Maddie, and Ginger lay awake and watched the lights blink off throughout the mall. Lexi liked having one friend on either side of her, like buoys she could reach out and touch. “Are you going out tonight?” she asked, afraid of the answer. Their alcove now only contained the three of them, the other cots disappearing over the days
.

  “Go where?” Maddie answered. “Word is there’s no party tonight.”

  “I don’t think I could party tonight,” Ginger said. “It would be like dancing on a grave.”

  “Any dancing in here is dancing on a grave,” Maddie said.

  Lexi did not want to go to her office. What if Marco never showed? What if she had to spend the night alone?

  Maddie rolled, rustling her sheet. “Don’t you have a date?”

  Lexi took a deep breath. “I guess.”

  “If you don’t go, I’m taking your place.” She rolled back. “This is the longest dry spell I’ve had since the family vacation to Grandma’s in the Adirondacks.”

  Lexi waited another minute before rising and slinking along the wall to the stockroom door. As she turned the handle on the door to her office, Marco’s voice called out, “Leave the lights off.”

  He came.

  “You become a vampire since lunch?” Lexi tiptoed into the space, trying to remember its layout so she didn’t face-plant.

  “I had my face rearranged by a stun gun,” he said, sounding wasted. “I’d hate for you to remember me like this.”

  “Who hit you with a stun gun?”

  She heard Marco shift; he was on the desk. “Your friendly chief of security.”

  Lexi was only mildly surprised. “Why did he hit you with a stun gun?”

  “Because he’s insane. I think he stole the alcohol, or is at least helping the guy who did.”

  The edge of the desk chair nudged Lexi’s leg and she sat in it. She needed to sit. “You have to tell my mom. You can’t let this guy push you around.”

  Marco remained silent. Finally, he spoke. “Which are better, the Burton Batman movies from the nineties, or the new Nolan ones? Let’s not even consider the Schumacher catastrophes.”

  Lexi was confused as to how this was relevant. “Depends on what you’re looking for.”

  “Just pick one, whatever criteria you want.”

  She sensed that more rode on this question than an assessment of her tastes, so she took a second to consider. Lexi and Darren had watched all the Batman movies, one after the other, from Burton’s 1989 Batman through to The Dark Knight, before heading to the midnight showing of The Dark Knight Rises. The Burton films were funny, kind of silly, more comic book than thriller. They featured things like Danny DeVito as a fat, horny penguin running for mayor. She recalled Darren’s remark after switching off The Dark Knight: “The world sucks.”

  “Burton,” she answered. “I like Michelle Pfeiffer’s Catwoman. And the Nolan films are so dark.”

  “I thought you would,” Marco said. “I wish I could pick Burton.”

  Lexi rolled the chair toward his voice and hit his knee. “Sorry,” she said.

  “Don’t be,” he said. His hand touched her face, fingers running from her brow down her nose to her lips.

  Shivers ran over her skin. She crawled onto the desk beside him. “I like the Nolan films,” she whispered.

  His breath tickled her ear. “I’ve never kissed anyone before.”

  “Me neither.”

  His lips hit her cheek. She angled her face to meet them, merely brushing lips at first, but then, somehow, they both knew what to do, hers to press harder against his, and his to hers. Their mouths opened like clockwork and Lexi finally understood why Maddie and Ginger were so starved for this sustenance.

  • • •

  Lexi’s kiss brought life back into Marco’s body. Muscles stopped twitching, his head cleared, everything became focused on the heat burning from her lips down through him. He wasn’t sure what to do with his hands, so he gripped the desk, afraid to touch her and freak her out. He didn’t want anything to interrupt this kissing.

  She pulled away first.

  “Sorry,” he said. He must have screwed something up.

  “No, I’m sorry,” she said. “My arm hurt.”

  “Did I do something?”

  “No, no.” She moved and they bumped heads.

  “We’re screwing this up,” he said, rubbing his skull.

  “How could we not?” She was farther away. “Total amateurs.”

  He wondered how he could get her to start kissing again. Was there something you were supposed to say? What would Ryan do? He hated himself for even thinking that.

  The room was beginning to feel wrong. He slid off the desk and flipped on the light. They both winced in the glare. That had been a mistake. The light ruined whatever shreds of mood had remained between them. He quickly flipped it off.

  “I guess I should go,” he said, not wanting to at all.

  “Oh, okay,” Lexi said.

  “So, yeah,” he said. “I’ll see you tomorrow?”

  “Sure, yeah.”

  Not sure what else to do, he slunk out the door. He was no Casanova, but that was it: his first kiss. He’d been kissed. It was the only bright point in the day.

  The service hallways echoed with shouts and screams. It was like that first night all over again. He’d failed to deliver on the parties and the freaks were running wild. He had to find cover. And he knew now exactly where he needed to go.

  His time in the dark that afternoon had yielded some glimmer of understanding of the craphole he was stuck in. Goldman was clearly in with the guy in the Pancake Palace; Marco had no idea if they had started on the same side, or whether Goldman saw him stealing booze and decided to assist in his operations, but it was clear that they were working together now. The senator, therefore, was a total dupe. Her whole hippy-dippy, we’re-all-going-to-get-through-this-together government was a corrupt joke. How he’d ever gotten sucked into believing otherwise was a critical failure of judgment—the world sucked; how had he forgotten that?

  So Marco had to find his own protection. Luckily, he had his own ready-made team of thugs and he was betting that Mike Richter was even more of a psychopath than Goldman. Mike was a career sicko; this Goldman, he was new to the work.

  Marco took the shortest route to the bowling alley. The douches were not out in the open, but rather huddled in the back of the pinsetters’ catwalk. Ryan, the closest, stood and stared him down.

  “Where have you been?” Ryan appeared to have wormed his way back into the fold after his days of wandering.

  “I’ve been unearthing a craphole of epic proportions.” Marco laid out for them everything that had been going on: his deal with the senator—though he gave it the spin that he’d been playing her the whole time—the bodies on the ice-skating rink, the attacks by the other gangs, the discovery of the guy in the Pancake Palace.

  “Wait.” Mike stood. “What did he look like exactly?”

  “Silver-gray hair, kind of leathery, brownish skin. The guy looked like he had money outside the mall, something about his condescending, I-rule-the-world smug bastard face.”

  “Reynolds?” Drew asked, looking up at Mike.

  “I will frickin’ kill him.” Mike gripped the handrail like he was gripping a throat.

  “Whoever he is, he’s working with security. The chief, this huge guy Goldman, took liberties with a stun gun to convince me to help them steal food.”

  “Really?” Mike said, as if gaining a new appreciation for Marco.

  “And so, in conclusion, I propose we take these assholes down.” Marco leaned against the handrail and prayed his pitch had worked.

  • • •

  It took Ryan a minute to catch up with the conversation. Marco had essentially ripped the world of the mall apart—it had seemed so safe, so perfect. Kids went to school, there were showers. The head of security was stun-gunning a kid to force him to steal supplies? There were more than a thousand bodies on the ice-skating rink? The number sounded unreal, like a million dollars or fifty years old.

  He was the
first to speak. “How has no one noticed a thousand people just disappearing?”

  Marco shrugged. “People see what they want to see. And it’s a big mall.”

  Mike hoisted himself between the handrails and swung to sit on one, raised up as if on a throne. “My point exactly, Taco. This is a big mall, and what you’ve said convinces me that my original idea was the best one going. We hide and let this whole crapstorm play itself out.”

  “I am not going into that basement again.” Drew folded his arms across his chest as if this alone settled the point.

  “Screw the basement.” Mike pointed to Marco. “You need to find us a place that is isolated and has few exits for easy defensibility. And it needs to be big enough to store supplies in—we’re going to wait out this thing in the comfort of our own bunker.”

  “Got just the place,” Marco said. “The IMAX theater is soundproof, isolated, and has only two exits—one in the front, and one out into a fire stairwell.”

  “Go, Taco Supreme!” Drew barked, punctuating his approval with a round of applause.

  Ryan thought of Ruthie and Jack, of Shay. How could he leave them in the mall if the place was really the mess Marco said it was? “Shouldn’t we tell someone?” he said. “I mean, we can’t just leave everyone in the mall to die.”

  “They’ve left us to die,” Marco said. “The senator was willing to write off anyone who went to these parties.”

  “But what about Shay?” Ryan thought at least she would mean something to Marco.

  “What about her?” he said, voice flat like he couldn’t give a crap.

  Ryan wondered why he was surprised at this change in Marco. “If we’re holing up, she’s coming with us. And Ruthie and Jack.”

  Mike landed on the catwalk, rattling the thing like a gong. “We can discuss recruits after we secure our supplies. Marco, you head to the IMAX and clear out any squatters. Drew, you go with him. Shrimp, you’re with me.”

  Ryan did not like where this was going. “With you where?”