by Eric Beetner
Dale put a shoulder against the chest and pushed. The front legs caught on a rug. He turned and waved Lauren over and together the two of them shoved the chest into the room enough for them to enter. Once the stairwell door was closed, Dale exhaled.
“Who the hell are you?”
The voice startled Dale, even though it was old and frail sounding. He turned to see a woman in her sixties, small with dark olive skin like Tat’s, and brown kinky hair. He didn’t need to check with Lauren. He knew they’d found Tat’s mother. He also remained still because of the black eye of the gun barrel staring at him from her hand.
She sat on a small settee, her body sunken into it as if she were a throw pillow. The gun was steady in her hand but looked too big for her. She’d have been better off with a Derringer like the kind women used to stash in their garters, but instead she held a massive revolver and waited for an answer to her question.
Dale kept calm and completely still. “We’re just passing through, ma’am. Sorry for the intrusion.”
“You don’t work for Tautolu. I know all the boys in his employ. So I ask you again—” she drew back the hammer on her gun, “ —who the hell are you?”
Lauren tried on a sweet smile. “You know me. The reporter? The one your son is…” She searched for the right word to describe her kidnapping and imprisonment but came up blank.
“Y’all look like intruders to me.”
“No, ma’am.” Dale hated the thought of making it through the gauntlet of paid thugs only to be taken out by a decrepit old lady. He saw a cane on the cushion beside her, a trio of pill bottles on the side table. “We’re keeping an eye on things. Like I said, just passing through.” He turned to Lauren. “Shall we?”
Dale took a few steps. The gun erupted in her hand and punched a sizable hole in the wall, almost dead center in a wallpaper rose.
“I didn’t say you could move.”
Dale saw the gun shaking now, the recoil a jolt to her frail arms and the weight of the pistol too much to hold aloft for so long. “We’re not here to hurt you.” Dale wondered if it came to it, would he be able to?
“I think maybe I oughta call someone.” She fumbled for a cell phone out of her pocket. It was too much for her to hold both the phone and the gun at the same time and she did a half-assed job of both. Dale stepped over the divide between them and wrapped his hand around her gun. With a quick twist it jumped from her hand. He thought for a second about flipping the butt around and giving her a crack across the cheek in exchange for her warning shot across his bow, but he remembered the shepherd in the hallway and decided to give her at least as much respect as a dog.
“You sonofabitch.” She reached for her cane.
Dale turned to Lauren. “You wanna help me out here?”
“Help you beat up an old lady?”
Dale turned back to the couch in time to see the grip of the cane slide free from the staff and a glinting knife escape its hiding place. He leaned back as she bent forward at the waist and slashed at his face. The knife was a good six inches long and her wide, arcing slice caught the tip of his ear. Dale yelped.
Lauren sprang into action. She dodged around the coffee table, clipping a silver dish of hard caramel candies as she went. She reached the old woman and put both hands around the wrist holding the knife. Immediately she felt as if she was applying too much pressure. The bones under thin skin felt like they were bending under her grip. The woman cried out, then dropped the knife where it stuck in a couch cushion.
Dale slapped a hand over his ear. “Jesus Christ, what next?”
Tat’s mom sat up straight. “Don’t you blaspheme in here.”
Lauren wrestled lightly with her. She easily held the upper hand, but the woman kept fighting.
Dale looked at the blood on his hand, then put it back to keep up pressure. He scanned the room for a mirror to assess the damage. He saw a phone on a desk along the far wall.
“I’m going to try to call Dahlia again.” He pointed from Lauren to the old lady. “You watch her.”
“Watch her do what?”
“I don’t know. Make sure she doesn’t have a hand grenade stuffed up her skirt.”
Dale crossed the room and lifted the phone, accidentally putting it to his cut ear. He winced in pain and switched sides, a smear of blood on the receiver already. He dialed and waited.
Tat’s mom stopped struggling. Lauren let her wrists go. “You’ll be good?”
She nodded.
“Okay. We’re not out to hurt anyone.”
“What’d he do to you?”
“Dale? Nothing.”
“No. My boy.” She looked at Lauren with watery eyes, red veins permanently etched into the whites. Lauren saw the look as someone who expected the worst possible news.
Lauren tried to look as nonthreatening as possible. “What’s your name?”
“Esmerelda.”
“Well, Esmerelda, he didn’t do anything. He was actually quite nice and accommodating.”
“You don’t have to lie to me, girl. I know my boy. I know who he is.”
“I’m serious. He kept me here, but he didn’t…take advantage or anything. The food’s been great. It’s…yeah. It’s fine.” Lauren had a thought. “For my article, I’ve been looking for some records of the business here. Do you have any of that stuff around here?” Worth the risk, she decided. Maybe Esmerelda was sitting on something she didn’t know the value of.
The old lady seemed to sink deeper into the couch. “What are you writing about in your newspaper there?”
“My dad, mostly. The new antidrug law. How it affects your son.”
“And how’s that?”
“To put him out of business is the idea.”
Dale joined them again, his hand still to his ear. “Still no answer. I’m worried.”
Lauren knew she could offer little reassurance. “We’ll be out of here soon.”
Esmerelda looked up at Dale, seemed impressed at her handiwork with the knife. “Did you kill him?”
Dale looked to Lauren, then back to the old woman. “No. We didn’t.”
She nodded. Turned her eyes away. “Someone will. Someday.”
Dale let that hang in the room for a while. He looked at Lauren. “Back to the other stairwell?”
“Let’s take the elevator.”
“Great idea. I can’t get out of here fast enough.”
“What about her?”
Dale looked to the tiny woman practically a part of the couch. “I don’t know.”
“Just take me to my room. I won’t be any bother.”
Dale exchanged a look with Lauren; they silently agreed it would be okay. Lauren put a hand under her arm and Dale stepped closer to do the same from the other side. They got her to her feet and started to lead her away like an invalid.
They got a few feet away from the couch and Esmerelda spun and brought her heel down on top of Dale’s foot with a crunch. He yelped again and, while distracted, she brought a flat hand up and boxed his bad ear. This time Dale yowled and let go of the old woman, hopping away on one foot to nurse his wounds and yell some more.
Esmerelda swung an elbow into Lauren’s gut. Lauren doubled over from the unexpected blow and Esmerelda took off at as close to a run as she could manage. Lauren saw her going and sucked in a deep breath before following. It only took a few steps to catch up and Lauren tackled the old woman from behind and brought them both to the floor.
Dale saw all this from ten feet away and couldn’t believe it. Keeping pressure on his bleeding ear again, he crossed over to where the two ladies grappled on the floor.
“Careful with her.”
Lauren rolled off and stood up. She looked down and evaluated her victim thinking maybe she had cracked a few ribs or even a hip. But the feisty old broad started sitting up on her own. Lauren, guilt ridden, bent down to pick her up again. As soon as her face got near, the old woman grabbed a fistfu
l of hair and pulled.
Hearing Lauren cry out, Dale had enough. He tried not to think about it, crossing the distance between them quickly. He balled up a fist and punched Esmerelda across the jaw as hard as he could. She went out like a past-their-prime prizefighter. A tight fist of guilt squeezed Dale’s stomach.
The woman went limp in Lauren’s arms and the grip on her hair went slack. Lauren eased her down to the floor, then stood up straight. “Thanks.”
“I did not want to do that.”
“I know. It’s okay.”
“Can we get the hell out of here? This is getting ridiculous.”
Dale pressed the button on the elevator and watched the old woman’s chest rise and fall as she slept off the punch, flat on her back. He rolled his eyes, “Okay, shit. Let’s get her someplace more comfortable.”
Lauren gave him a crooked look, but she went along with him.
Four minutes later, Esmerelda was in her own bed, a posh four-poster with gold and deep crimson bedding. She was also tied up, one hand to each of the posts above her head. Her legs were free. No sense torturing the old lady. Dale had even kept her hands a little loose. He didn’t want to cut off circulation or accidentally snap one of her brittle bones. He worried for a moment about leaving her too much room to escape, but then he looked down at the passed-out sexagenarian and felt silly. Last thing he wanted on his conscience in his new attempt at a life of good was an old lady any worse off than she already was after he punched her in the face.
Even thinking it brought a shiver. Punched a grandmother in the face. Good Lord. Every bit of graft he’d taken over the years was a pinched gumball compared to that.
Dale turned his back on Esmerelda and walked out. Out of sight, out of mind.
In the dark confines of the closet, Tat grew tired of waiting. The initial shock of his wounds, large and small, had worn off partly due to the quiet comfort of the closet.
None of his men had been by to let him out. Points off for them. But then again, he didn’t know how many those two psychos had killed.
Tat turned his shoulder to the door. His arms hung limp at his sides, the dislocated sockets unable to create any movement. He sprang himself the half body length across the closet and hit the door. Pain rocketed down his arm from his shoulder to the hole in his hand. He bit his lip to hold in a scream. Bad idea. The worst. It took a good minute in frozen silence before he was sure he wasn’t going to pass out.
Tat leaned back against the coats and pressed into the back wall of the closet. He lifted a foot and tried kicking at the door, but there was barely enough room to get his leg half straightened. The lock held tight.
This was not good. Suckered by a fucking cop. A cop on his payroll, even. And that reporter. If this ever got out…
Tat needed one of his men to come get him. This was his house, his castle. He’d built it to avoid shit like this. Impenetrable. Now he had two parasites inside. Bugs that needed to be squashed.
CHAPTER 12
The officer waved his arm out straight, turning his palm up like a maître d’ ushering Dahlia to her table. “Ma’am. After you.”
Dahlia took the chance to look at his watch. There were no clocks in the interrogation room she’d been sitting in, and though she’d only been there a minute or two, she hadn’t checked the time since she ran out of her own house. Less than an hour had passed. There was still time to make her appointment if she got out of the station house soon.
It was a cruel reminder, but she smiled at the fact that she could let herself think about things other than her own survival now that the ordeal was over. Now if she could only talk to her husband. The threat of death made her want to see him, maybe even forgive him and work things out. Maybe.
“Did they have any luck tracking down Detective Burnett? Dale Burnett?”
“I’m not sure, ma’am. This way.” He guided her away from the main lobby, which was fine by Dahlia. The fewer criminals she rubbed shoulders with the rest of the day, the better. She’d had enough to last her a year.
“Did the boys get to see a doctor? Is someone on the way?”
“I’m not sure, ma’am. Right through here.”
This guy didn’t know much. He looked young. Probably second or third year. Maybe just moved over from the night shift. He aimed her toward a door leading out the back of the station. Dahlia went where he pointed.
She pushed through the door and found herself facing the alley in back of the station. She stopped and turned. The friendly officer’s body filled the doorway blocking her reentry into the police station. He smiled. Reilly, his name tag said.
“Am I being released?”
“Please step out, Mrs. Burnett.”
“Who’s going to take my statement? Do I get to sit with a sketch artist? Where’s my husband?”
“Please, ma’am.”
The uneasy feeling from her own front door crept over her. She didn’t like being told what she was going to do and where she was going to go. What was with the men today bossing her around and telling her how it was going to be?
Car tires crunched on debris in the alley. Dahlia turned around and saw the familiar car of her attacker easing down the alley between a brick wall and a dumpster.
She spun her head back around to Officer Reilly. He stared at her with a hard look, his body unmoving from his roadblock position. She only had one way to go and it was toward the man trying to kidnap her. Kidnap or kill. At this point, she’d lost track.
“What’s going on?”
Reilly stayed silent. He crossed his hands in front of him down around his waist. He looked to her like a soldier at ease.
Dahlia swung her head from Reilly to the car and back again. She added up the situation in her head. She’d been sold out. No way she’d make her appointment now.
Dahlia broke into a sprint. She ran straight for the car. T had opened the door but hadn’t yet stepped out. He watched the wall of the alley closely to be sure his door didn’t hit the brick and mar his paint job.
There was barely enough room for her to make it between the car and the building wall on one side and the dumpster on the other. But Dahlia didn’t plan on either route. She ran for the hood of the car. T froze, not sure if he should get all the way out, or duck inside and be ready to give chase.
While he dithered indecisively, Dahlia vaulted herself onto the hood, left two small divots as she ran across it and then set one foot on the windshield, one foot on the roof, then was down onto the trunk and took a leap off the back and landed two-footed on the alley floor. She ran expecting a bullet in her back.
The car engine growled to life. The high whine of reverse gear being pushed to its limit filled the alley. T drove as fast as he reasonably could while maintaining a straight line and not crashing into the narrow walls of the alleyway. It wasn’t as fast as Dahlia could run.
It was the only gym workout she enjoyed. Running on a treadmill gave her time to listen to podcasts, audiobooks, play music. All those classes—zumba, spinning, pilates—they all had an overly perky instructor chanting or barking instructions and Hallmark-level encouragement at you. Dahlia wanted to be in her own world when she worked out.
She reached the end of the alley and turned left. T would reach the street soon, then he’d gain his advantage. She decided alleys were the way to go. Half way up the block, she ducked into a new alley across the street as T backed out of the alley behind her.
She dropped to a more sustainable running pace. Her breath was already coming heavy and fast. She’d started in a sprint and had to get the balance back or she’d be out of steam in another half block. Dahlia pumped her arms and took long strides. She’d made it halfway down the block by the time T’s car turned into the alley behind her.
This was an unfamiliar part of town. The type of area she’d never go to. Four- and five-story apartment buildings, nice in their day but rundown now. Fire escapes rusted on building sides. Graffiti marred
the walls. The windows on street level all hid behind bars.
Only two blocks from the police station and she felt like she was in an unsafe neighborhood, and it had nothing to do with the car bearing down on her or the man behind the wheel who had already announced his plans to abduct her and whom she’d seen murder her elderly neighbor and slash a kid’s arm.
Dahlia reached the alley’s end and dodged a fast right. T blasted out onto the street a few seconds behind her. His car squealed tires as he turned to pursue her. She ran for another alley, her only hope of outrunning a car.
She darted in between two buildings, her lungs burning with the effort and the tangy odor of piss and old food rotting in the garbage cans behind businesses backing the alley.
T tried to take the corner too fast. He skidded and ran his rear panel into the corner of a building at the mouth of the alley. Dahlia turned at the sound of the impact and saw him slapping the steering wheel and mouthing“Fuck, fuck, fuck.” Ahead, Dahlia knew her time was short. She slowed her pace and reached for the nearest door. Locked. She scurried up to the next, an overflowing trash can to the left of the door told her it was a Chinese restaurant. Also locked.
T’s engine sprang to life again. He started motoring down the alley, more reckless this time. The car was already damaged and now he drove pissed off. Dahlia was nowhere in sight ahead of him. The narrow passageway was clogged with garbage cans and the walls of the buildings were pockmarked with alcoves hiding doorways and awnings meant to keep rain out of back doors.
Dahlia tried a third door and found it locked as well. On her fourth try, the door sprang open and she ducked inside.
CHAPTER 14
The intercom buzzed. “Your wife, sir.”
Mayor O’Brien looked up to see the door to his office swing open before his secretary’s sentence was even done crackling over the speaker.
“Lori, what a surprise.”
Mrs. O’Brien moved quickly across the room. Her face was pinched with concern, undoing thousands of dollars of cosmetic surgery meant to erase lines like the ones she was forcing onto her face. Still beautiful—statuesque was a word used often in the press—Lori O’Brien was a consummate first lady of the city. She maintained a busy schedule of civic center openings, symphony fundraisers, art museum receptions, and charity luncheons. She knew nothing of her husband’s dirty dealings, and he wanted to keep it that way.