Detonation Boulevard

by Craig Schaefer

  “So riddle me this,” Jessie said. “He’s safe, he’s off the feds’ radar, off our radar, and he’s got his own little kingdom out in the desert. So why come back with a bang, pulling that massacre out in Texas? He left his magic playing cards buried in the bodies; might as well have spray-painted his name on the wall. Was it a message to the Network? Some kind of declaration of war?”

  Harmony was inside herself.

  Part of her stayed outside, the part that drove with mechanical precision, flicking the turn signal and aiming for the hotels along the boardwalk. Just enough consciousness to function. The rest of her, the iceberg below the water, slid along the strings of her mental corkboard.

  The imaginary index cards sprouted, blooming in fractal snowflakes. Combinations, possibilities, if-then-else statements. She sorted them, filed them, arranged them like poker hands and threw away every losing combination until she found the clues that fit.

  Jessie was talking. Harmony heard her from a distance, muffled, like she was on the other side of a thin wall. “—connection to Reinhart and Roth, anyway? We know Vanessa’s husband was hooked in with the Network, pushing ink in New York City. Somebody massacred him and his buddies up at that abandoned zoo, but the scene didn’t have any of Faust’s usual signatures. As far as we can tell, it looks like Vanessa Roth did most of the killing. If they’re working together, why did he suddenly shy up after leaving us a trail of clues out in Dallas?”

  “They’re not,” Harmony said. She blinked, back outside of herself.

  “Help me out? Because last I checked, you were convinced finding these two would help us catch Faust in the process.”

  Harmony spoke slowly, pondering her own words like she was explaining something to herself. Internalizing the lesson.

  “When you have eliminated the impossible, whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth.”

  “Is that from ‘The Purloined Letter’?”

  “Sherlock Holmes,” April said over the speaker. “The Sign of Four.”

  Jessie pushed her dark glasses back up over her eyes. “Have either of you ever tried not being nerds?”

  “The clues don’t fit,” Harmony said, “because the clues are lying. Jessie, if you wanted to dangle some bait absolutely guaranteed to grab my attention, what would you use?”

  “Easy. Your white whale.”

  “Fact: the Vegas mob and the Network are in conflict. Fact: Faust and his organization would benefit from attacking Network operations. To that extent, the massacre in Dallas made sense.”

  “With you so far,” Jessie said.

  “But of all the places to hit, why a stash house halfway across the country? And why would Daniel Faust, who has every reason to keep his survival a secret, break cover and leave a crime scene tailor-made to grab my attention?”

  “I have a feeling you’re about to tell me.”

  “A crime scene,” Harmony added, “where we found a perfect lead, letting us follow the ink pipeline to New York. Which, in turn, pointed us toward Marie Reinhart and Vanessa Roth.”

  “We’re being played,” Jessie said.

  “And so is he. He didn’t do it. I doubt he ever set foot in Dallas. Somebody, another player, blew his cover on purpose. They want us chasing Reinhart and Roth and used him to lure us in. To lure me in. It’s a sacrifice play.”

  “Huh. Somebody who likes Faust even less than you do. You should start a club. So what’s our next move, partner?”

  “The person pulling the strings thinks we’ve been fooled. Let’s stay fooled a little longer. I want to see where this rabbit hole goes, and I think—”

  Metal crunched and the car jolted, slamming Harmony against the strap of her seatbelt.

  Eight

  Tony stared out the window of the rented SUV. They were parked at the side of the road, not far from the boardwalk, with a storm brewing over the water. Hotels jutted up at the ocean’s edge like rotten teeth. The government sedan was pulled over, too, about ten feet in front of them. The back bumper looked like a wad of chewed-up bubble gum.

  “Janine,” Tony said, not looking at her. “What the fuck. Just…what the fuck.”

  “Keep ’em busy,” she told him.

  That wouldn’t be hard. The two agents were getting out—Harmony straightening her tie, Jessie rolling her head and rubbing the back of her neck—and both of them had their eyes locked on Tony. He clambered out of the passenger seat and strolled up to meet them halfway, holding up his good hand in what he hoped was a friendly gesture. At least friendly enough to not get him shot.

  “Detective Fisher,” Harmony said. “Funny meeting you here.”

  “Agent Black. I had some downtime, seeing as I’m on admin leave for the time being.”

  “So you came to New Jersey.”

  “I love it here,” Tony said. “Everybody loves New Jersey.”

  “And the fact that your former partner grew up in foster care less than a quarter mile from this very spot…that’s a total coincidence.”

  “Did she?” Tony’s eyebrows lifted. “I had no idea.”

  * * *

  The echoing crack of the fender bender drew Nessa and Marie to the hotel-room window. They saw the two women get out first. Then came Tony and Janine.

  “Is your roommate a bad driver?” Nessa asked.

  “She’s an excellent driver.”

  They watched Tony grab the agents’ attention, turning their backs toward the road, while Janine eased her way closer to the rear tires of their car. Marie zipped up the suitcase. She’d seen everything she needed to.

  Ten minutes later she and Nessa were hustling along the boardwalk, skirting the edge of the hotel parking lot. They kept their heads low, moving between parked cars for cover, on their way to the Eldorado.

  * * *

  Just up the road, a motorcycle—a Suzuki Boulevard built for muscle and speed, with jet-black paint and fat chrome pipes—idled with its kickstand down. Its rider sat high in the saddle, helmet resting on her lap, her eyes shrouded behind vintage Wayfarers. Her lips were a frosted-pink line as she raised a phone to her ear.

  “This one,” Nyx said, “is not pleased.”

  A man’s voice breezed over the line, a light chuckle on his lips.

  “Nixy, baby, long as I’ve known you, you ain’t never been happy once. This is not front-page news.”

  He went by the name Webster Scratch these days. Nyx knew him as Calypso. That and a dozen other names he’d worn and shed over the centuries, molting them like a serpent’s skin.

  “This one was contracted for a vengeance hit,” she said. “The women who murdered Senator Roth’s son. One cop, one fledgling witch. Simple, you said. Easy, you said.”

  “You and your entire organization. You do have competition out there, sweetheart.”

  The case of her phone creaked, plastic threatening to buckle under the curl of her fingers.

  “Other hunters, this one does not mind. Competition makes one strong and weeds out the weak. But you offered no warning about the other pursuers. Why are Vigilant Lock agents also on the hunt?”

  She took some satisfaction in the metallic squeal on the other end of the line, like Calypso had just slammed his chair bolt upright.

  “Say again?”

  “Harmony Black and Jessie Temple are in Asbury Park, pursuing this one’s quarry. They are known to you, yes?”

  Calypso didn’t answer right away. She could hear him weighing his words. They came out tinged with a rare and angry edge.

  “That’s one way to put it.”

  “Not the first time they have interfered with your ambitions for Senator Roth, no? What is their interest? Why do they want these women?”

  Another long pause.

  “Let me get back to you on that. I need to make a few calls.”

  “And the targets?”

  “Are still the targets,” he replied.

  “This one has no objection to killing Temple and Black as well. Would welcome it with
great pleasure, in fact…but not for free. Quadruple the bounty.”

  He laughed, but there wasn’t any humor behind it.

  “In other words, ‘fuck you, pay me,’ that about right?”

  Now it was Nyx’s turn to be silent. She didn’t see a need to speak when he already understood.

  “Get hip to this,” Calypso said, “the targets are still the targets, and they are the only targets. Wait until they’re out from under Temple and Black’s thumb before you take them. I don’t want you getting into a fight with those ladies if we can avoid it, too dangerous.”

  “Your concern for this one’s well-being is touching.”

  “Nothing to do with you, baby girl. I’ve got a lot of plates spinning at the moment, and getting into a shooting war with some rogue government agency is not on my to-do list, you feel me? I’ve toed way too close to that line more than once already.”

  Up ahead, the agents were focused on the man with his arm in a sling. Nyx recognized him from the intelligence briefing. She recognized the driver, too, puttering around the back of the agents’ car. Two more hunters, then. A wounded cop and a librarian, out looking for their wayward friend.

  Those two, she would kill for free. Charging money for swatting flies was beneath her dignity.

  “This one will be very displeased,” she said, “if you are withholding information.”

  “As much as I relish being the man with the plan, I must confess this is an unexpected and unwelcome wrinkle. Only reason I called out the big guns in the first place is because Alton’s all mopey over his dead kid and I need the man to get back to work. Still…”

  He trailed off, slipping into his thoughts.

  “Still?” Nyx asked.

  “I met her once. Vanessa Roth. I was more focused on her no-good excuse for a husband at the time, but she…she made an impression. Still not sure exactly what I saw, deep in those baby blues. But I saw something.”

  “Rich girl,” Nyx sniffed. “Soft, pampered human with a scrap of magic she can barely control. She will be an easy kill.”

  “You best be looking with all your eyes, sweetheart. And you’d best be sure before you make your move. No room for mistakes.”

  She hung up on him. She kept her eyes focused on the agents. She kept her hate focused on them, too, like a lance of boiling lava. She’d encountered Temple and Black twice before, hunting different prey. They’d done far worse than hurt her: they’d embarrassed her. The only thing better than tearing them both to pieces would be getting paid to do it. And if Calypso took the blame for any fallout, well, that was hardly her problem.

  The client’s wishes always come first, she thought. Except when they don’t.

  The heel of her boot thumped against the motorcycle’s kickstand.

  No room for mistakes.

  * * *

  “If I was in your shoes,” Harmony said to Tony, “if it was my partner in a bind, I’d probably do the same thing.”

  “So you understand why I’m not leaving.”

  He stood his ground, his good arm crossed over his sling.

  “I do. And what you need to understand is that you and your friend here aren’t equipped for this job. You’re in over your heads.”

  “Hard for me to believe that when you won’t level with me,” he said.

  “For your own safety. Go home, Detective. I can’t legally compel you to turn around, but I can call up some local cops, have them run you both in, and let you cool your heels in a holding cell for a day or two. You’re a nice guy and I don’t want to do that, so don’t make me. Go home.”

  She knew, even as she got back in the car, that he wouldn’t. She caught the look in his eyes as he stood in her side mirror. Cold steel, harder than before. The other one, Marie’s roommate, looked even more determined than he did. Harmony waited, watching them get back in the SUV, rumbling away from the curb and up the road ahead.

  “They’re gonna get themselves hurt,” Jessie said.

  “Maybe not. Marie Reinhart isn’t a threat, not to them anyway. Trust me, fugitive or not, they only took her badge: she’s still a cop where it counts, on the inside. Her first instinct, in any situation, is going to be keeping civilians out of harm’s way.”

  “And Vanessa? You saw the aftermath at the Vandemere Zoo. She tore through that place like a Cuisinart. What happens if they find ’em first, try to break up her little Bonnie-and-Clyde deal with Marie, and she gets really pissed off?”

  Harmony turned the key in the ignition. The sedan’s engine woke with a low growl.

  “So we do our jobs and make sure that doesn’t happen. Somebody went to a lot of trouble to lure us out here. I want to know why.”

  She stepped on the gas—and squeezed the steering wheel as it jolted in her hand, the sedan thumping on its rear axle. The back right tire let out a strained squeal as the rim slapped pavement.

  Harmony put the car back in park.

  “The roommate,” Harmony said.

  “Yep,” Jessie replied.

  “When we were talking to Tony.”

  “Yep.”

  “She put a hole in our tire.”

  Jessie slid lower in her seat and wriggled her shoulders, getting comfortable.

  “Yep.”

  “I’m calling HQ.” Harmony plucked her phone from the center console. “I’ll have them send up reinforcements. And a new tire.”

  Nine

  Nessa navigated. Marie drove. They headed west. From Interstate 195 to 276, they crossed the border into Pennsylvania and put long, rolling miles behind them in a race against the sunset. They still had an hour of light left—the sun fading fast beyond a veil of smoky clouds—when Marie took an off-ramp just outside Claysville.

  “Needle’s almost on empty,” she said.

  Under better circumstances, she would have enjoyed this. The open road, clean springtime air, the sugar maples in bloom. It was a recipe for romance. All the same, she couldn’t feel anything but the target pinned to her back. She checked every driver they passed, hunting for the signs of an unmarked police car, and watched her speed with the fervor of a zealot. Not too fast, not too slow, blending with the traffic and keeping one eye on the rearview.

  A Shell station squatted right off the highway. Marie started to pull in—then kept going. Two sheriff’s cruisers were fueling up, their owners having an amiable chat out front.

  “Someplace a little more remote,” Nessa suggested.

  Five minutes later, at the end of a winding strip of road under a maple-leaf canopy, they found another gas station. This one was empty, old, passed over by time and the turnpike. Marie pulled the Eldorado up alongside the dusty and dirty-white pumps.

  “I need to freshen up,” Nessa said. “Get you anything from inside?”

  “Caffeine. Lots of caffeine. I’m not picky about the format.”

  “Done and done.”

  The gas lid popped with a squeak. Marie got out and fumbled with the cap, the warped plastic fighting her as she wrenched it open, and watched Nessa disappear into the gas station.

  * * *

  The man behind the service counter was bald, wide-lipped, with an unhealthy glow to his wrinkled skin. He looked like a forty-something newborn, ruddy pink and squeezed into denim overalls that fit him like a sausage casing. He looked Nessa up and down as a bell chimed over the station door, with most of his attention focused on her chest.

  Well, Nessa thought, if the police swing by, he won’t be describing my face with any accuracy. Small favors, I suppose.

  “Forty dollars on pump one,” she said and laid a couple of twenties on the counter. “Do you have a washroom I could use?”

  “Help yourself,” he told her, gesturing toward a drink cooler. The door was on the other side. It opened onto a small washroom with a single stall and a urinal alongside it, the porcelain yellowed and chipped. The sink sported crusted stains that dared her to question their origins, and the only wastebasket was stuffed to overflowing with crumpled paper
towels.

  “Lovely,” she said. She tore off strips of toilet paper and layered the seat, making a protective cushion over the black plastic—and then a second layer before she sat down, just to be safe.

  While she sat, she tallied a list of people who needed to die.

  The architect of their curse, of course, topped the list. Countless lifetimes, countless deaths and rebirths, all that suffering…and for what? She couldn’t imagine anything that she or Marie could have done to deserve that kind of retribution. She wanted answers almost as much as she wanted revenge. Almost.

  Alton Roth was next on the hit list. She had ample reasons to want him in the grave—the senator’s naked corruption, his arrogance and greed, whatever failures of parenting had turned his son into a monster—but in the end, only one mattered. Marie had been indicted for Richard’s murder because of him. Marie was a fugitive because of him. She’d lost the badge she loved, her home, everything in her life, because of him.

  He. Hurt. Marie. And in Nessa’s world, that was the one unpardonable and capital crime. Alton Roth had invited her most savage displeasure. He’d reap the consequences. Every last bloody drop.

  The thought made her smile. Her reverie carried her far enough that the glimmer of movement, a tiny blur in the far corner of her right eye, almost went unnoticed.

  There was a crack in the yellowed tiles. Just a penny-sized opening, high up in the wall, barely wide enough for light to seep through from the stockroom on the other side. She realized, as she froze like a deer in a hunter’s sights, that what she’d seen was the light cutting off. A man was standing on the other side of the wall. Watching her, staring at her while she sat on the toilet with her skirt around her knees, his face pressed to the crack.

  She held her breath. His breathing was heavy enough for both of them, while he enjoyed the show.