“She’ll be back.”
“Yeah. I suppose you’re right. Nolan.”
“What?”
“Can I lay down on the bed?”
“There’s only one bed.”
“Does that mean yes?”
“It’s a double bed, isn’t it?”
“That means yes.” She lay down.
A few minutes went by.
“You’re not asleep yet, are you?” she asked him.
“Apparently not.”
“Am I bothering you?”
“No.” His eyes were closed.
“You’re tense.”
“I’m fine.” He rolled over on his stomach.
He felt her hands on his shoulders, on the muscles between his neck and shoulders. She began rubbing. “You are too tense,” she said. It felt good.
“Well, maybe I am,” he said.
“Does that feel good?”
“Keep doing it,” he said.
She rubbed. Then she untucked his shirt and reached her hands up under it and scratched.
“How’s that feel?”
“Good.”
“Just good?”
“Very good.”
“I thought you were human.”
“Why, is that news?”
“I just never knew a man who didn’t like his back scratched.”
She stopped and he turned over and leaned against his elbow and smiled at her. She was a cute kid; nice tits with the nipples poking at the Nodes T-shirt.
“Turn over,” he said.
She grinned and got on her stomach. He rubbed her back a while; then he reached his hand under the T-shirt and scratched her back. She made contented sounds, like a purring kitten.
He slapped her butt and she yelped.
“Looks like you’re human, too,” he said.
She turned over and smiled up at him; took his hands and put them up under her shirt, in front this time.
“Hey,” he said.
“What?” she said.
He didn’t pull his hands away; he liked them where they were.
“You’re Jon’s girlfriend,” he said.
“I’m not his girlfriend. I’m his friend.”
“Just a fellow band member, huh?”
“That’s right.”
She kissed him. Slow, sweet kiss.
He looked at her, pushed her away from him, hands still under her shirt; she had a scared look.
“I need to be close to somebody right now,” she said. “And I don’t think it would hurt you, either.”
She pulled her T-shirt off; her breasts looked just as nice as they felt.
He turned off the light. He took off his clothes, and she took hers off, too. They got under the covers and made love; it was slow and rather sweet. Like the kiss. She was right: it was exactly what he needed right now.
Afterwards, he sat up in bed and said, “Are you sure you’re not Jon’s girlfriend?”
“I care about him a great deal.”
“You’ve never slept with him?”
“I didn’t say that.”
He shook his head, smiled disgustedly. “I been had.”
“Me too,” she said. “Listen, I’m thirsty.”
“There’s a pop machine a few doors down.”
“I’d rather have Cutty Sark.”
“I bet you would. Will you settle for a Coke?”
“Sure,” she said. “You don’t really mean you’re going to go get it for me?”
He shrugged. “You scratch my back . . .”
He put his clothes on. As an afterthought, he stuck the silenced 9 mm in his waistband.
“Do you need that?” she asked, wide-eyed.
“No,” Nolan said, meaning it. “I’m just being paranoid.”
The night air—actually early morning air—was still cold, and he still liked the feel of it, the alertness it gave him. He hadn’t managed to get any sleep yet, after all. But the girl had done him good. She had released some of his tension, though he found himself feeling guilty, as if he’d somehow betrayed Sherry. Which was crazy. He wasn’t married. But he didn’t suppose this Toni could understand how he felt, not with the strange sense of morality she and that generation of hers seemed to have.
As he was nearing the Coke machine, he noticed a car parked in the stall in front of one of the other rooms: a shiny black Mazda. Sporty little car, but it wasn’t the car that caught his eye—it was the license plate. Even though this was Illinois, most of the plates on the cars in the motel stalls were Iowa ones; this one was Illinois, specifically Rock Island County.
Infante.
Nolan had left his LTD home, with its Rock Island plates, for just this reason; he’d suffered the discomfort of Sherry’s little Datsun because its Ohio plates wouldn’t lead anybody to him.
But Infante was dumb. Which became even more obvious when Nolan found the car unlocked. He checked the registration; the car belonged to Carl R. Hines, Infante’s boss.
Nolan took the 9 mm out of his waistband.
He went to the door of the room the Mazda was parked in front of. He knocked.
Infante answered the door wearing a towel, which he held around him with one hand; in the other was the twin to Nolan’s 9 mm, but he was too startled and slow for it to do him any good.
Before Infante knew what was happening, Nolan slapped him across the face with the automatic, knocking him back into the room, the 9 mm’s twin tumbling out of Infante’s hands, leaving him sitting on the floor with the towel a puddle across his lap, rubbing his face and saying, “Shit! Shit!”
Nolan shut the door.
Infante said, “You fucker!”
“Shut up.”
Infante started to get up.
Nolan pointed the 9 mm at Infante’s head. “Keep your seat,” he said.
Infante’s eyes darted around, looking for his 9 mm.
“It’s under the bed,” Nolan said. “I don’t think you can get to it in time.”
“I’m going to kill you, you fucker.”
“I don’t think so.”
“How did you get here so fast?”
“Weren’t you expecting me?”
“Not for a couple days. I figured first you’d go to Chicago and check on why we tried to hit you.”
“That’s pretty smart—for you, Infante. But, no, I already know who sent you: a bitch named Julie, with a heart as big as all indoors.”
“She’ll kill you if I don’t, Nolan. She’s smart. Too smart for you.”
“We’ll see. Where’s Jon?”
Infante grinned. “Your lover boy?”
“My what?”
“Julie told me about you two. I’m gonna kill him, too. I’m gonna feed him your dead dick, first. He’ll like that.”
Nolan laughed. “Julie is smart. She’s been pushing the right buttons where you’re concerned, obviously.”
“What do you mean?”
“Never mind. What was the plan, Infante? Was she going to wait for me to show up, then try to trade Jon to me, in return for leaving her the hell alone?”
Infante looked disappointed. “Maybe,” he said.
“And then she was going to have you hit us both.”
Infante grinned again. “Maybe.”
“Where’s Jon?”
“Fuck you, fucker.”
“Don’t tell me. I don’t want you to tell me. I’d rather tie you in a chair and burn the bottoms of your feet till you tell me.”
That made Infante nervous. “I tell you, I don’t know where he is. Somebody, some friend of hers, is keeping him. All I know is it’s not far from here.”
“Is that the truth? Believe me, I’d get a kick out of burning your fucking feet.”
“It’s the truth! I don’t know where the fuck he is.”
Nolan nodded; he believed Infante. Goddammit.
And Infante whipped the towel off his lap and at Nolan’s face, and it stung, stunning him, and the naked Infante was on him, and Nolan went over
backwards.
Then Nolan was on his back, and Infante’s hands were on Nolan’s throat squeezing, and the world was turning red.
“You shouldn’t have killed Sally, you fucker! You shouldn’t have killed Sally!”
Nolan fired the 9 mm, and Infante took it in the gut; his hands loosened around Nolan’s neck, and Nolan pushed him off. Infante lay on the floor like a fetus, clutching his stomach, looking up at Nolan, dying.
“You shouldn’t have killed Sally,” Infante whimpered.
“You shouldn’t have killed my dog,” Nolan said.
15
BY midafternoon, Jon wasn’t afraid of her anymore.
She was really just this poor, sad person, Ron was, somebody who got stuck with the responsibility of her family in such a way that it, well, made a man out of her. She wasn’t stupid, though smart wasn’t the word for her, either. Just this poor, uneducated, pathetic case, who he’d feel very sorry for if she didn’t have him handcuffed to a bed in what was apparently an old house out in the country somewhere.
He guessed he’d been raped. It was a new experience for him, maybe even a learning experience: he understood better what women had been going through all these years. Still, he had a hunch he could put up with being raped better than most women would, as long as it wasn’t a man doing it.
If he’d been pressed about it he’d have to admit that he’d found some enjoyment in it This strange, hungry, mannish woman sitting on him, grinding, coming like crazy, which was the good part: that made her beholden to him, in a way. Afterwards, still on top of him, she’d smiled and stroked his cheek and then suddenly her face had fallen and she seemed embarrassed or something, and got off him and ran out of the room, scooping up her clothes as she went.
She came back in T-shirt and jeans, with breakfast.
“It’s afternoon,” she said, shrugging, “but I figured maybe you oughta have something to eat, and . . . I don’t know . . . this seemed right.”
She’d made him sourdough pancakes and link sausages and American fries. On a nice plate, with a big glass of orange juice. It looked great. She had it on a tray, which she handed him.
“How about undoing this?” he said, nodding toward his cuffed hand.
She shook her head no. “Can’t do that.” She seemed embarrassed about that, too.
She went over and let up the shade, and sun came in.
He ate the breakfast.
“This is terrific,” he said.
She sat on the edge of the bed, watching him, smiling just barely; saying nothing.
When he was done, she took the tray away and was gone for over an hour. At one point he heard water running. Was she taking a bath? Then he heard a hair dryer.
When she returned, she was wearing a white peasant blouse, lacy in front with long sleeves; and jeans. She had a little makeup on: pale lipstick; blush on her cheeks. Her head was a mess of curls: ducktail no more; she had hot-curled her hair, evidently, after washing it. The perfume she had on was a little strong, an evergreen fragrance, like a room deodorizer, and it hit him as soon as she stepped in the room. But it wasn’t an unpleasant smell, and he found it kind of touching.
She came over and sat on the edge of the bed.
“Who are you, anyway?” she asked.
“My name’s Jon. I play rock ’n’ roll. You know that.”
“No,” she said, not looking at him, still embarrassed, “tell me about you. I want to know about you.”
He told her about himself. About living with various relatives while his mother, the “chanteuse,” worked the Holiday Inn circuit or whatever; about his aspirations to be a cartoonist, which really seemed to interest her.
“My brother used to read Spider-Man,” she said, grinning. “I still got some of the books.”
“No kidding?”
She got up and went over to the dresser. She opened a drawer and took out a three-inch stack of comics, then came back and sat on the edge of the bed and put them in Jon’s lap.
They were early issues of Spider-Man, The Fantastic Four, The Avengers, well read but not in bad shape; not the very first issues, but within the first twenty of each. Toward the bottom of the pile he found Amazing Fantasy 15, which had the first Spider-Man story.
“Do you know what this is worth?” Jon said, holding it up for her to see the cover, which showed Spider-Man dragging a bad guy to justice in the sky.
“I’d never sell it.”
“It’s probably worth five or six hundred bucks.”
She shrugged. “It was my brother’s. I wouldn’t sell it.”
“Well, if you ever need a few bucks, these books are worth something. Particularly the Amazing Fantasy.”
“You can have it if you want”
“I can have it?”
“Sure. My brother would want you to.”
“Ron. I might not be alive tomorrow.”
“Don’t be stupid.”
“Let me go, Ron. You can’t keep me here like this.”
She frowned. “I don’t want to talk about it.”
He let it pass. For the moment.
“Listen,” she said. “Before, when we . . . you know.”
“Yeah?”
“It wasn’t so bad, was it?”
He smiled. “It wasn’t so bad.”
“You mean, you . . . liked it?”
“I liked it.”
“You’re not just saying that?”
“No.”
“You’re not just trying to get on the good side of me?”
“No.”
“Are you sure?”
“Yes.”
She sat there and thought about that.
Then she undid his pants again.
She stayed beside him in bed a while, curled up next to him in peasant blouse and panties, till it got dark. This time of year it got dark early, so it was probably only about five or five-thirty. He hadn’t been here a full day yet, and to his knowledge, Julie hadn’t been in contact with his keeper yet, either. As Ron lay sleeping beside him (or pretending to be asleep, he didn’t know), he considered again the possibility of overpowering her. He could slip an arm around her neck, but unless he was prepared to kill her, that wouldn’t do him any good. Not unless the key to the handcuffs was in the pocket of those jeans of hers, tossed over on the dresser. And there was no guarantee he could drag himself, by somehow dragging the bed with him, over there to find out. And the way she was softening to him, maybe keeping up the good behavior was the best way to go. But just how long he could—well, keep it up—he didn’t know.
Pretty soon she rose and stretched and smiled at him, without embarrassment now, and went and put her jeans on, moving with a lack of shame and a confidence that seemed more like the old Ron, but not at all masculine.
At the doorway she stopped and turned and said, “I’m not much at cooking, except breakfast and sandwiches and that. I usually eat my meals in the kitchen at the Paddlewheel. It goes with the job. But I can stick a TV dinner in the microwave for you.”
Somehow it seemed incongruous to him that she would have a microwave.
“That’s fine,” he said. “Anything.”
She was on her way out when he called to her. “Ron?”
“What?”
“I want you to let me go.”
She sighed.
“Things are going to get rougher than you know,” he said. “I wasn’t lying about the bank robbery. I wasn’t lying about Julie trying to kill me that time. And I wasn’t lying about my partner, either.”
“He’s a real bad-ass, this partner of yours?” There was no sarcasm at all in Ron’s voice.
“That’s one of the best descriptions of him I ever heard,” Jon said.
She stood poised in the doorway like something in an arty photo. Then she said, “I’ll think about it,” and was gone.
He grinned at the door, which Ron had halfheartedly pulled shut. Only partially shut: he could hear her footsteps on the stairs very clearly.
A few minutes later, there was a banging sound downstairs: somebody at the front door. Pounding the hell out of it.
He heard the door being opened.
Ron’s voice said, “What is it?”
“Things are falling apart, Ron. I need you. I need your help.”
A woman’s voice.
Jesus fuck. No.
Julie.
“Come in, come in,” Ron said. “Is it raining out?”
The door shut.
“Drizzling,” Julie said. “Cold. Icy. Maybe snow, I don’t know. Listen, that kid.”
“What about him?”
“I’m going to have to go away for a while.”
“Yeah?”
“But I’ll be back. I’ll be back for you, Ron.”
“You will?”
“I’m dumping that asshole Harold, and we’re going to be together, you and I. But first I have to go away for a while.”
“I don’t understand. . . .”
“I’ll have five thousand dollars in cash for you, in just a few minutes. I’m going to the club to get it, before I leave.”
“Five thousand dollars? . . . For me? Why?”
“It’s time.”
“Time?”
“You said you could make that kid disappear for me, any time I wanted. Well, it’s time. And I want it.”
“What?”
“You to kill him, what do you think?”
“Kill him? I don’t know . . . I don’t mind sitting on him for you, but . . .”
“Ron! What’s the matter with you? You said last night you’d as soon cut his throat as look at him! Since when did you care whether some goddamn man lived or died?”
There was silence.
“I want more,” Ron said.
“What?”
“I want more than five thousand. I want ten.”
“Well, Ron . . . we’ll be together . . .”
“Maybe we’ll be together and maybe we won’t. I want ten.”
“Okay. You got it.”
“You go get the money. It’ll be done when you get back.”
“No. You do it now, Ron. I want it done now.”
He could hear the shrug in Ron’s voice. “All right.”
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