Then he heard movement off to his left, sensed a shadow, and he opened his eyes. Mouse was standing over him, grinning down at him with flashing metal teeth.
“Hey, Mr. Cop Man. I don’t think you’ll be needing this.” His hand darted out and snatched the com unit from Carlucci’s grip. He stepped back, then swung his boot forward and kicked Carlucci hard in the ribs.
Jesus Christ. Carlucci closed his eyes against the pain, against the sight of that nasty little prick standing over him. Binoche was right. He opened his eyes, tried to lurch up and grab for the com unit, but Mouse was too quick and jerked it out of the way.
“This what happens you fuck around with the Mouse. Hah!” Mouse snapped his teeth at him.
Carlucci heard sirens, but there was no way to know if they were for him or not. Even if they were, they sounded too far away, they would never get here in time. And if Mouse walked away right now, even without doing anything else, if he took the com unit…Carlucci didn’t know if anyone would be able to find him. He’d lie in this damn alley and bleed to death. Here in the fucking DMZ, for Christ’s sake.
Suddenly Mouse jerked upright, eyes bulging. He took a single staggering step, then seconds later his face and forehead exploded, blood and flesh and bone splattering everywhere. The neuro-collar went crazy, flashing all kinds of colors as Mouse fell forward and collapsed across Carlucci, the com unit still gripped in his hand. Blood poured from what remained of Mouse’s head, pooling on the ground next to Carlucci and soaking into his pants and shirt.
He tried to roll Mouse off of him, but he didn’t have the strength. He was fading in and out. Mouse’s neuro-collar was dead now, no lights at all. Carlucci tried for the com unit in Mouse’s hand, but he couldn’t reach it. He tried again to move Mouse, but still couldn’t manage it.
His shoulder was going cold, and he could no longer feel anything in his left arm, his left hand. Blood was everywhere, slick and slippery, and the stink of it filled his nostrils, mixing with the stench of the cooking meat.
Sirens were getting louder. Or were they? Suddenly he couldn’t hear them at all, he couldn’t hear anything.
Then the sirens returned, loud and piercing, only to fade away once again.
This fucking place, he did not want to die here. The flames of the barrel fire seemed to grow, leaping upward, then out at him, licking him with their heat.
He tried to turn his head toward the mouth of the alley to see if anyone was coming, but when he did a shower of silver glitter washed over his vision. He let his head fall back, the glitter faded, and the flames returned.
There was a voice from the com unit, but he couldn’t make out the words.
Sirens again. But they were too late, and it was all for nothing.
He closed his eyes and tried to hang on.
18
CAROLINE HAD IMAGINED the meeting would take place in the dead of night, in some dark, hidden subterranean room reached by endless and confusing twists and turns through dimly lit passages and guarded doorways. Instead, they met Rashida at midday, in the open courtyard of a three-story building.
A warm and steady rain had been falling since early morning. Caroline and Cage were led across the courtyard by a short man wearing jeans and sandals and a serape. Rashida, slim and dark with long black hair and dark brown eyes, was sitting at a table protected from the rain by a second-floor balcony. In front of her was a package of cigarettes, a stone lighter, and a beautifully worked turquoise and copper ashtray. She was smoking a cigarette, and nodded in greeting, asked them to sit down, then asked them if they wanted anything to drink.
“I can offer you coffee or tea, or lemonade,” Rashida said. Her voice carried just the trace of an accent that Caroline couldn’t identify, but assumed was Middle Eastern of some sort. “There is no alcohol here, but if you want, I can send Adolfo to buy some beer for you.”
“Lemonade will be fine for me,” Caroline said.
“The same for me,” Cage added.
Rashida nodded at Adolfo. “Bring a pitcher.”
Caroline looked around the courtyard. Across the way, sheltered from the rain by a large palm, a man squatted in front of a small brazier, cooking something on a grill suspended above the coals; from the smells that wafted across the courtyard, she guessed it was fish. Occasionally someone would come into the courtyard from one of several alcoves in the building, hurry through the rain, then enter one of the other alcoves. Two old women sat out on a third-floor balcony down in the far corner, a tarp stretched over them from the roof to keep the rain off. The two women were drinking something from a dark brown bottle, small glasses in front of each of them. Every so often one of them cackled. Except for the steady clatter of the rain, the courtyard was fairly quiet, much quieter than the streets outside. Caroline was surprised that it could be so quiet anywhere inside the Tenderloin.
Beside her, Cage seemed antsy, constantly shifting positions in his chair, gaze darting in all directions. She wanted to put a hand on his shoulder or thigh, silently tell him to relax, but she thought that might embarrass him.
Adolfo reappeared, now wearing a wide-brimmed straw hat and carrying a tray with a large glass pitcher of lemonade and three ice-filled glasses. He set the tray on the table, filled all three glasses, then left.
Rashida put out her cigarette, and glanced back and forth between them. “I don’t like this,” she said. She sipped at her lemonade, then fixed her gaze on Caroline. “Cage tells me you want to meet with me. So tell me what you want.”
“I need to get in touch with Cancer Cell,” Caroline said. “Cage says you’re involved with them. That you are a part of them, a member, whatever.”
“Is that what Cage says?” Rashida shook her head. “I have nothing to do with Cancer Cell. I don’t know anything about them, and I don’t plan to learn anything about them. If that’s why we’re here, then this is all a waste of everyone’s time.” She sipped at her lemonade again, still shaking her head.
Caroline didn’t say anything. She didn’t know how to respond. She had nothing but Cage’s word about Rashida, nothing to back herself up with, and she felt as if she’d been hung out to dry on this.
But Cage wasn’t going to leave her there. He leaned forward, staring hard at Rashida. “Don’t give me that crap,” he said. “I know you’re Cancer Cell.”
Rashida smiled. “And how do you know that?”
“Tiger.”
“Tiger?” Now she laughed, shaking her head. “I doubt Tiger even knows what Cancer Cell is.”
“I doubt it, too.” Cage agreed. “He doesn’t know who he works for. But he works for you and Stinger, and I know Stinger, and Stinger’s Cancer Cell, too. Or he was until he died.”
Rashida continued to smile, but Caroline could see her struggling with it, and her eyes had gone hard.
“Yeah, I know he died, and I know you watched him die,” Cage said.
No one said anything for a long time. Caroline was afraid Cage was going to push it, push at the way Stinger died, raise the question of what had killed him, and she realized she was holding her breath, trying to will Cage to let it go. She felt almost certain that if he pursued Stinger’s death, it would be the end of this meeting, the end of their only chance.
But Cage didn’t say any more about it. He slowly leaned back in his chair and drank from his own glass, then looked away, his attention shifting to the man who was cooking the fish.
Rashida had stopped smiling, and she turned to Caroline. “Why do you want to get in touch with Cancer Cell?”
“I have Gould’s Syndrome.”
Rashida nodded once, hesitated a moment, then said, “Okay. I’ll ask it again. Why do you want to get in touch with Cancer Cell?”
Caroline took a deep breath, then answered. “There’s no cure for what I’ve got. No treatment except for some symptom relief, nothing that really changes anything. And it’s terminal. I’ll probably be dead by the time I’m thirty, and no one can do anything about it.” She shrug
ged. “But maybe Cancer Cell can. I have heard that they are out on the cutting edge of medicine, flying with experimental treatments, drug therapies. I am willing to offer up myself as an experimental subject in return for whatever Gould’s Syndrome treatments Cancer Cell wants to try.”
Rashida didn’t reply at first, looking back and forth between them. She shook her head a couple of times, almost but not quite smiling, then she looked away. No one quite seemed to know what to say.
The rain had grown heavier and clattered loudly on metal canopies, plastic, the palm fronds, and the walkways. There was a cracking roll of thunder, and a few moments later the rain became a deluge, dumping out of the sky. But that lasted only a minute or so, and then it let up until it was little more than a drizzle.
“Cage.”
He looked at Rashida and said, “Yeah.”
“You will leave now.”
“What are you talking about?”
“Just what I said. This is as far as you go. You have nothing to do with this anymore. I’ll talk to Caroline alone.”
“And then what?”
She shook her head. “Good-bye, Cage.”
“No, I’m not leaving now, I’m not leaving her alone here with you. I’m not leaving without knowing what’s going to happen to her.”
Caroline reached out for his arm, squeezed it. “Just go, Cage.” She held his gaze, and nodded once. “Go on. You got me here. That’s enough.”
“It’s not enough,” he said, shaking his head.
“It has to be, Cage. It’s my life, my disease. My risk. And I’ll be fine.”
He looked like he wanted to protest further, to argue some more with both of them, but he just shook his head again. He stood up from the chair, gripped Caroline’s shoulder. “You take care of yourself.”
“I will.”
“And you…” he said, turning to Rashida. But he didn’t say any more, just sighed, turned away, and hurried across the courtyard the way they had entered.
When he was out of sight, Caroline turned back to Rashida. “All right,” she said. “It’s just the two of us.”
“I should have sent you away, too,” Rashida said.
“Why didn’t you?”
Rashida shook her head. She looked across the courtyard at the man who was cooking his fish over the coals, waited until the man glanced toward her, then signaled to him, holding up two fingers. The man nodded, did some things with plates and bottles, took some fish off the grill, and put more on. Then he stood up and hurried through the rain with two plates in his hand, crouching over to shield them. He set one plate in front of Caroline, the other in front of Rashida, then added napkins and forks.
“Thanks, Hernando.”
Hernando nodded, then hurried back to his fire.
“Please,” Rashida said. “Dig in. Hernando makes a great grilled fish. It’s the sauce he brushes on.” She began eating.
With her fork, Caroline cut a piece of the fish, watched the steam rising from it, and blew on it before putting it in her mouth. It was whitefish of some kind, very flaky and tender, and coated with a dark, sweet sticky sauce. Rashida was right, it was delicious.
They ate without talking, Rashida refilling both of their glasses. The rain continued to fall, but the air grew even warmer. At first, Caroline tried to figure out what was going on, what Rashida was trying to accomplish by sending Cage away, and then having the fish brought over. But she decided it didn’t really matter. It was actually quite pleasant sitting here in the damp heat, listening to the rain fall all around them. She relaxed and let herself enjoy it.
When they had finished eating, Rashida signaled to Hernando again, who came and took away the plates. She lit a fresh cigarette, took a couple of deep drags on it, then looked at Caroline.
“You don’t look like you have Gould’s,” she said. “How can I know for certain that you do?”
“The same way it was diagnosed in the first place. I’ll be glad to give you a blood sample.”
“You’ll do more than that. You’ll submit to a complete physical and we’ll do the blood work and tox screens and whatever other testing we think is necessary.”
“So you are with Cancer Cell,” Caroline said.
“Better you just don’t mention that name again,” Rashida replied, and looked away. That was probably as close to an answer as Caroline would ever get.
Rashida finally turned back to her. “Has the Gould’s even gone active yet? You look like you’re doing fine.”
“Yes, the Gould’s has gone active. Just recently. Only one minor attack so far, but it was definite.”
“But you might have years ahead of you of relatively good health. And you have no idea what’s in store for you here, if we go ahead. I have no idea.”
Caroline smiled. “You’re making all the same arguments Cage made. He tried to talk me out of it, too.” She paused. “I’m not sure I can explain it very well. But I know what the progression of this is like, and I don’t look forward to it. Maybe if Can…if your people have something experimental they want to try, maybe the chances of it working will be better if I’m in the earlier stages. I’m just trying to give myself the best chance I can.”
Rashida took a deep drag on her cigarette, then put it out even though it was only half gone. “I have to be honest with you. I’ve never dealt with anyone with Gould’s Syndrome before. I don’t know if anyone has been doing any research on it, or has any treatment ideas. It’s possible no one has anything, and that we can’t do anything for you.”
That was something that hadn’t occurred to Caroline. But there was no point worrying about that now. “I understand,” she said.
“Fine then,” Rashida said. “We’ve got an exam room set up in the building here. We’ll take care of that today. And we’ll want you to stay here until the test results are in and I’ve had a chance to talk to people. Then we’ll go from there.”
“Okay. Let’s go do it.”
Rashida shook her head. “Not quite yet, if you don’t mind. There’s no hurry.” She smiled. “I don’t get out much. I’d like to just sit here a while, drink lemonade, smoke cigarettes, watch the rain, maybe have some more of Hernando’s fish. Join me?”
“Sure,” Caroline said, smiling back. “I’ll skip the cigarettes.” She leaned back in her chair, holding the glass of lemonade. She thought she should be apprehensive, maybe even frightened about what was to come. But she wasn’t. She was very comfortable with Rashida, and she was, for the moment, quite content.
19
THE FIRST TIME Carlucci fully came to, it was night. He was on his back, surrounded by darkness except for a rectangle of light off to his left. He had the vague recollection of coming around maybe two or three other times, but he’d never been fully conscious, never completely realized what he realized right now: He was alive.
He felt almost giddy, despite the growing awareness of pain in his left shoulder and arm. Alive. He was alive, and Mouse was dead.
Where was he?
The room was dark, but his eyes were slowly adjusting to the darkness, and objects were becoming visible. He turned his head to the left, toward the rectangle of light—a doorway. He saw white walls, linoleum floors; then, at the far edge of his vision, hanging above him and to the right of the bed—he turned his head back to bring it into focus—reflecting the light from the hall, was a clear fluid bag hanging from a metal hook, with clear tubing running down and looping into his right arm.
Of course. He was in the hospital. Where else would he have been? He’d been almost afraid to find out.
He closed his eyes for a minute, tired from just that tiny exertion of looking back and forth and trying to decide where he was. Sounds filtered into the room now, sounds he hadn’t noticed before—quiet, indistinct conversation; a squeaking wheel; a regular tapping sound, from outside the room but nearby; a gentle hum.
He opened his eyes again, and turning back to the right once more he could see the broken amber rays from a stre
et light slashing in through the window blinds. Then there was a rustling sound, also from the right. He raised his head, fighting the vertigo, and looked over the side of the bed.
Andrea was asleep on a futon beside him, wrapped in a light blanket, her face on the pillow illuminated by bands of amber light. Her mouth, as usual, was partially open, and her hair was slicked to her cheek.
She was beautiful.
Seeing her brought a strange pressure to his heart and the beginnings of tears to his eyes. He lay back, gazing up at the blank, dark ceiling, and blinked back the tears.
He was alive.
He woke again later that same night. Nothing had changed. The hospital remained relatively quiet, though he heard someone pacing up and down the hall. Andrea was still asleep. A persistent, dull ache throbbed in his shoulder, but somehow he didn’t mind it that much; the pain helped keep his head clear, and right now, in this dark peace and quiet, he wanted to think.
He wanted to think about who had shot him. Not Mouse. At first, right after he’d been shot, as he was crawling across the ground, scraping and cutting himself on the gravel and broken glass, he had thought Mouse was responsible. But Mouse had been in front of him, and he was pretty sure he’d been shot from behind. That was something he’d have to ask the doctor about. And then, of course, Mouse had been shot himself—he’d had his whole head blown off.
Carlucci thought about that some more, replaying what he could remember of that whole grisly scene. Two shots to Mouse, he thought. The first one that seemed to catch Mouse by surprise, then a few seconds later, with Mouse still standing, teetering above him, the one to his head.
Something blocked the light coming in through the doorway. Without turning his head, keeping his eyes half closed, he shifted his gaze to the left. Mostly what he could see was silhouette, but he recognized the uniform. Someone had stationed a cop outside his door. Carlucci didn’t move, and a few moments later the cop backed out and moved out of sight. Carlucci could hear the creaking of a chair.
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