Sallow City

by Jim Heskett

  Micah jerked around, looking for the other gunman. He was nowhere to be found. Just an alley between the fence and a row of stores and restaurants.

  Go after the missing assailant, or stay here with this injured one? Micah didn’t know what to do. Didn’t have time to think it through.

  Mustache man looked up at Micah.

  “That’s my gun,” he said through a throaty gurgle. The pool of blood was spreading fast. Mustache man’s skin turned from tan to pale to nearly white. His hands were open, his bloody palms pointing at the sky. The fingers of his left hand flickered, jerking. This guy would be dead in a matter of seconds.

  “Where’s the other one?” Micah said. Mustache man didn’t answer, so Micah lifted his Glock and pointed it at the man’s face.

  The guy laughed. “I’m already dead, you idiot. There’s no point in shooting me.”

  “Why is this happening?” Micah said, his voice approaching a scream. “Why is there a dead man in a morgue that looks exactly like me? Who was he?”

  The dying man squinted up at Micah’s face. “Oh, wow, he does look a little bit like you. Wait… are you Micah Reed? Holy shit, is it really you?”

  Micah snapped his fingers to get the man’s attention. “Who is the dead man? What is his name?”

  Mustache man coughed, then his head slipped to the side. It jerked once, then settled. His eyes were blank and frozen.

  Dead.

  The police sirens came closer. On an impulse, Micah snatched the dead man’s wallet from his back pocket, hid the gun in his waistband, and casually walked away.

  ***

  By the time Micah had returned to the motel office, there were no cops inside because they were now investigating the dead vigilante. They would probably assume the two gunmen had been there to kill him. Like carriage horses with blinders on to block out anything distracting.

  No motel manager, either.

  Micah wanted to dash back upstairs, grab Frank’s gun, but he didn’t want to risk it. Hopefully, he could come back for their things later.

  Frank was still in the chair, hunched over and groaning. But he smiled when Micah walked in. A meager, level smile.

  “What’s the story?” Frank said.

  “No story. We’re alive, not in handcuffs, and we’re leaving before anyone can ask us questions. I’ll explain on the way to the hospital.”

  Micah lifted Frank and aided him out to the parking lot, then helped him ease into the rental car passenger seat. As he’d expected, the cops were outside the dead vigilante’s room, preparing to kick in the door. The motel manager stood behind them, hands clasped to his chest. Some nearby neighbors had poked their heads out of motel rooms, watching with rapt interest.

  Frank reclined his seat and grimaced as his hands massaged his side. The old man didn’t seem healthy at all.

  Micah started up the car and backed out of the lot. Gave one last look at the cops to make sure they hadn’t been seen. The law was too busy kicking the door down and barging into the second story motel room. “Are you sure that’s food poisoning?”

  “Nope. I’m not sure of anything. Don’t know what else it could be, though.”

  “Do you think maybe Olivia and her partner did that to you?”

  “I don’t know why they would. If they wanted to kill me, they could have done it in that motel room. They seemed professional; not like the types to hurt me unless they thought it would gain them something.”

  Sound logic. Micah dug the dead gunman’s wallet out of his pocket. Flipped it open.

  “Paul Browne, with an ‘e’ on the end. Do you know who that is?”

  Frank shook his head. “Doesn’t ring a bell.” But then his mouth dropped open and he sat up a fraction. “Wait. It was a white guy, right?”

  “Yes. There were two of them. One died from a bullet to his leg, and the other got away. Paul’s the dead one. Must have severed a main artery or something when that wifebeater guy shot him.”

  “Light hair?”

  “I think so,” Micah said.

  “I know a guy named Browne with an e who was part of that Crossroads gang, a long time ago. He’d be an old man now, but he had twin boys, I know that much.”

  “That’s a good place to start. You don’t happen to know this address, do you?”

  Frank examined the address on the license. “I do, actually. I can show you exactly how to get there. We take 475 toward Grand Blanc, and it’s near there.”

  “I don’t think so, Frank. I can find this place with my phone, so you don’t need to tag along. I think the smart thing to do is get you to the hospital.”

  “That can wait, kid. You have to trust me on this. Let me guide you there, because I have a feeling you’re going to need me. If we’re walking into an ambush, two sets of eyes are better than one.”

  Micah patted the steering wheel and gritted his teeth. Frank was in bad shape, and Micah didn’t want to delay admitting him to the hospital, but the old man seemed insistent on accompanying him. Micah wished he had Boba Fett here with him, but Boba was back in the motel room. Hopefully, he’d be able to return there and collect their things soon enough.

  Obviously, they would need a new motel room.

  Micah changed lanes and headed for the highway. His thoughts drifted to the pretty girl in the casino, the one with the big blue eyes and bigger boobs and the tray full of drinks. Wondered if she knew what she’d been getting into when she applied for a job at a casino run by skinheads. Micah had to remind himself that rescuing her wasn’t his responsibility. Maybe she even liked working for those messed-up people.

  He joined Interstate 475 and drove south until Frank advised him to exit on Hill Road. Pretty town, not anything like the industrial concrete and brick of Flint. This was sparse suburbia. Neighborhoods and strip malls in between vast fields of green.

  “There’s some Michigan lore I haven’t been able to figure out,” Micah said.

  “Go ahead.”

  “People that live in the Upper Peninsula are Yoopers, right? I heard that on a TV show.”

  Frank nodded.

  “So do you call people that live in the lower peninsula Lopers?”

  Frank shook his head. “Trolls. Because they live under the bridge that connects upper and lower. Under it, as far as the map goes.”

  Micah got it, like a light switching on. “Ahh, that makes sense.”

  He navigated directly to the address on the license, except it wasn’t a house, it was a liquor store at the edge of a neighborhood.

  “I don’t understand,” Frank said.

  “Old license. Or maybe it was a fake.”

  “We can fix this. I think I know where the dad used to live. If we find that, maybe we can go from there.”

  Micah didn’t like the way Frank was grimacing with each labored word, but he decided to humor the old man a bit longer.

  They drove around for another half hour, Frank thinking that this next street was the one, then coming up empty, then trying another street, and that one not being it either.

  After a dozen of these, Micah said, “I don’t know if this is going to work, Frank.”

  “No, is has to. It’s just hard to get my bearings. So much has changed.”

  Micah let this go on for another fifteen minutes because Frank was so determined to figure out the location of this house, and Micah didn’t have the heart to shut him down. Micah took another left into a new neighborhood.

  Frank sat up, grunting in pain. “Wait. I know that church.”

  He pointed at a tall white building with a cross jutting from the top. “This is it. Down this street. Browne lives—or lived—on this block, and he was building a brick house with blue siding and a detached garage for his twins to live in. I remember now.”

  Micah marveled at Frank’s recall. “How do you know all this?”

  “Paul Browne’s dad got into a fist fight with the inspector over the distance of the garage to the curb. Put the poor guy in the hospital. I was t
he arresting officer, first of a few times I came out to this part of town. It’s coming back. Let’s keep going, it has to be here nearby.”

  Micah turned past the church and crept along at a slow pace through the neighborhood. Big green yards, barking dogs, a mix of old and new houses. None of the houses had fences around the yards, which seemed to be standard in Colorado. Also, few of the neighborhood streets had sidewalks.

  “There,” Frank said. He was pointing at a brick house with a detached garage, but the siding wasn’t what Frank had described. More of a pale green.

  “That’s not blue siding.”

  “No, but that could be newly replaced. He did build the house twenty-five years ago, you know.”

  As Micah got a little closer, he noticed something strange. The front door was wide open. He parked two houses down. Pulled the dead gunman’s Glock from his waistband and let its scant weight settle in his hand.

  He knew Frank wanted to go in with him, but he couldn’t allow it. “Okay, you’re staying here.”

  “Believe me, I’d go if I thought I could. Just be careful, kid.”

  Micah patted Frank on the shoulder and stepped out of the car. He held the gun low but remained ready to wrap his finger around the trigger at any second. He didn’t like carrying guns around anymore, but he had to admit it felt a little familiar in his hand. Like the comfort of meeting up with an old girlfriend. His memories of life in the cartel were often like old lovers, ones who were kind and sweet at first but cruel and domineering later.

  Micah climbed onto the front porch and tuned his ear at the open door. Couldn’t hear any sounds coming from inside.

  He marched carefully, gun out in front. Reminded himself to raise it to eye-level if he was going to shoot. Resist the temptation to pull the trigger too quickly. He didn’t know this gun, didn’t know how much it would kick and throw off his aim. Probably not much, since it was so compact, but you don’t ever know a gun’s personality until you’ve fired it at least once.

  After crossing the threshold and stepping inside, he immediately knew why it was quiet. There was a man duct taped to a coffee table, blood leaking from a half a dozen stab wounds in his chest. No one else in the house.

  Blond hair, just like the dead gunman back at the motel. Maybe he could have been that man’s twin brother, but it was impossible to tell because someone had plucked this poor bastard’s eyeballs out of his head.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

  Micah drove Frank back up to a hospital in Flint so they could keep close to the casino. All of this chaos had some connection to those Crossroads people. That part, though, he hadn’t figured out.

  A body in the morgue that looked like Micah. The plastic surgeon who’d altered him, murdered by employees of the casino. Olivia kidnapping Frank. Questioning him about Micah’s past. People showing up to Micah and Frank’s motel room to kill them. How did all the pieces fit?

  “Someone really cut out Browne’s eyeballs?” Frank said.

  Micah had been trying not to think about it. “Uh-huh.”

  “Probably wasn’t Crossroads who did that. Not their style.”

  “Unless,” Micah said, “he was on the outs with the gang. They send him to kill us, then they plan to kill him after. But I don’t get why they tortured him.”

  Frank slipped a handkerchief from his back pocket and coughed into it. “None of this crap makes sense.”

  The giant beige and glass building of the McLaren hospital come into view. Micah had to slam on his brakes when some woman cut him off turning out of a gas station, then the offender offered a shrug when she met Micah’s eye. People in Michigan drove like they were always trying to kill you. Didn’t do much to settle Micah’s nerves.

  “Did I ever tell you about Red Sweater Barry?” Frank said.

  “I don’t think so.”

  “I met him in Denver, but he was from Michigan. Heard him speak at an AA meeting, and we bonded over memories of Detroit’s heyday. You know, back when that town was worth a crap.” Frank grinned, lost in a memory. “He used to say that the difference between an alcoholic and a normal person is that a normie doesn’t throw the cap in the trash after opening a fresh bottle of whiskey.”

  Micah emitted a little chuckle. “That’s funny.”

  “Anyway, Barry grew up in Alpena.” Frank held up a hand with his fingers together and pointed halfway up his index finger. “On the mitten, it’s here. Thunder Bay. So one night, Barry’s drunk as a skunk and he drives his car off the pier. Even though the water’s shallow, he’s still in deep enough to sink, so the water’s rushing in, he’s freaking out, the whole nine yards. Barely made it out alive.”

  Frank paused to groan and squeeze his side.

  Micah pulled into the McLaren parking lot. “Hang on, Frank, we’re almost there.”

  “I’ll get to the point,” he said, his teeth clenched. “Sometimes, you think you know where you’re going and have every intention of getting there under your own power, but you still end up at the bottom of the lake.”

  Micah chewed on this story as he helped Frank out of the car and into the emergency room entrance of the hospital. The doors swooshed open in front of them.

  After Frank had checked in, Micah helped him to a chair in the waiting room. They sat opposite each other, Frank appearing tired and haggard, and Micah feeling the way Frank looked. None of this had gone the way he’d planned. He had no useful information. Maybe trying to uncover the identity of this lookalike had been a colossal waste of time. Dead end after dead end, finding only more questions anytime he looked for answers.

  Maybe he never should have let anyone in this town see his face. But they had seen his face, whether or not they knew exactly who he was.

  “Do you think—” Frank said, but Micah sat bolt upright, cutting him off.

  “Holy shit,” Micah said.

  “What? You got something?”

  “Seen my face. Those kids at the casino. Not kids, I mean, but younger guys who were hanging out outside the mall. Rourke and the other two.”

  “Hanging out?”

  “I think they’re casing the mall to try to rob the casino. Anyway, one of them asked me if he knew me. He recognized me. Not me, but the lookalike.”

  Frank nodded. “It makes sense. Someone around town would have had to know him.”

  “I’ve got to get my ass back to the mall and find those guys.”

  “I’ll call you from my room after I’m admitted,” Frank said. “Whatever you do, Micah, please think it through before you do something you’ll regret.”

  Micah stood and rested a hand on Frank’s shoulder. “Don’t worry about me, boss. You focus on getting better and let me take care of this.”

  ***

  Rourke and his two friends Ethan and Carter sat quietly, watching the back door of the Dort Mall. No one had come out of that exit in an hour. In the stillness, Rourke thought he could almost hear the sounds of the casino. But he had to be imagining that noise, because it was underground and hundreds of feet in front of him. Had to be his brain playing tricks on him.

  They were hidden behind a dumpster at the edge of the parking lot where it met a line of enormous trees. Crouched on plastic buckets. Rourke held an iPad in his hands, tapping out notes about what they had seen over the last few hours.

  12:30 pm- Man in blue suit takes out trash. Does not look around.

  2:15 pm- Man in blue suit steps outside to smoke a joint. Outside for less than ten minutes, does not leave the door area.

  3:10 pm- Man in black suit pushes someone through the door, punches him, and then closes the door. The pushed man stumbles to the front lot.

  3:55 pm- Man in blue suit takes out trash, spends a couple minutes walking the nearby area. His route doesn’t take him out of eyesight of the door.

  There was no pattern. No consistency.

  Rourke studied the map of the interior that Carter had drawn for him, based on an undercover mission inside the casino earlier that week. Carte
r had drawn a large rectangle with most of the gaming tables and slots in rows at the center of it. Cashier in a cage-like room in one corner, and several other offices lining the outside area of the larger room. Seemed the same as Rourke remembered it as a kid.

  Entering through this back door was going to be their best bet since the front would require passing multiple sets of guards and gatekeepers. If they could just get in that door. It seemed a nearly impossible task. But, then it would only be a straight shot down into the casino, and then a quick jog back to the cashier. Then stick a gun in his or her face, fill up the duffel bag, then skedaddle out the back door.

  But they couldn’t get in that door when it was locked.

  Ethan kicked a stray soda can against the dumpster. “I am bored as shit. Let’s go pound some beers. It’s still happy hour at Pachyderm for another forty-five minutes.”

  “Keep it down,” Carter said. “We don’t know if they have surveillance out here.”

  “We’re not doing anything worth spying on,” Ethan said.

  Rourke held up a hand. “Guys, knock it off. I don’t know how much longer we need to stay out here. Something worthwhile might happen. Or, if you two want to go on, I’ll hang out and hook up with you at the pub later.”

  “Why stay?” Ethan said. “What’s the point?”

  “There’s got to be some kind of pattern.”

  “We’ve been at this for days,” Carter said. “If there was a distinguishable pattern, we would have found it by now.”

  “Let’s just bust in the front. Guns blazing,” Ethan said. “Take them all out quickly, then we have the place to ourselves.”

  “A full-on assault would be suicide,” Rourke said.

  Ethan grunted. “Not the way I’d do it. They would never see me coming.”

  “And give people in the mall a chance to look at our faces so they can identify us to the cops?” Rourke said. “Or are you going to kill them too?”

  Carter laughed. “People in that ghost town mall? That’s funny. Either way, Rourke, we’re running out of time to figure out a way into the back door.”