by E. R. Brown
I was tired. I turned back toward the lake. At Randle’s house I buzzed at the gate. The moon was bright enough that anyone inside would have recognized my face on the security screens, but either no one was home or they weren’t going to answer at this hour. I headed to the marina, and the skate park, where it was quiet and hidden from the street. I drove in behind the arena and parked, the only vehicle in the lot, and stretched out on the truck seat and tried to sleep.
The bench seat was narrow and hard. In one position, the steering wheel blocked my legs. In another, the gearshift jammed into my kidneys. By the time the cab filled with birdsong, I gave up on sleep.
With the sunrise, minivans had begun rolling past me in a regular procession to the arena. Apparently 5:30 on an August morning was a popular time for hockey practice. Who knew? Beth disapproved of hockey, it promoted aggression and glorified violence.
Watching these kids, I was just as glad I’d missed out on the sport. Car after car disgorged shoulder-padded eight-year-olds, staggering under their equipment bags, and motored off, probably to give Mom or Dad an extra hour of snooze time.
When one of the minivans did a U-turn and cruised past by my truck, I realized what I must look like, a lone male in a beater pickup, watching young boys at the arena. Not a pretty profile. I decided to leave before somebody phoned the cops. My face was greasy and I needed a coffee, a shower, and fresh clothes, but I wasn’t about to head home yet. Beth might have followed through on her threat and stayed there.
Chapter 16
I rolled down Randle’s curved, sloping drive to the security gate and buzzed. The camera lens glinted in the morning light, discreetly hidden in the manicured greenery. Boxwood bushes. I’d learned a few things from Beth, back when she’d worked in the less-profitable side of the gardening business.
The house still looked empty. On a cloudless morning like this, a window should have been open somewhere, letting the sound of Stevie Wonder or Curtis Mayfield carry across the lake. But everything was sealed tight.
I reversed and parked as close to the locked gate as possible. Randle had asked me not to leave the truck in sight of the street, and I figured if I’m going to ask him for something, start by putting him in the right frame of mind.
I got out and stretched, and strolled to where the fence met the water’s edge, found a patch of sun-warmed asphalt and settled down for a wait. The water was alive with little fish, an inch or two long, swarming in mud-brown schools among the pilings of Randle’s dock. I rested my head in my hands and let my eyes lose focus on the rippling, shifting patterns.
The high-pitched downshift of the imitation Porsche woke me, and I stood up a bit too quickly as Randle swooped down the drive and squealed to a surprised halt behind my pickup. I put a shaky hand to the fence. From the passenger seat, Maddie’s expression was quizzical behind oversized sunglasses, her hair windblown from the top-down drive. Randle acknowledged me with a couple of fingers lifted off the steering wheel. An unlit joint hung from his lip as I stepped up and ducked my head in a polite, submissive good-morning.
Behind me the gate swung open with a motorized hum. The Speedster wheeled around my pickup and into the inner driveway. Maddie hand-waved her permission for me to follow.
I approached them slowly, giving them a minute to decide what to do about the rumpled kid who’d obviously slept in his clothes.
“Sorry to surprise you guys. You been for a run?”
“The Sadler trail,” Maddie chirped. “What a morning.” A wave of irritation rippled across Randle’s brow. She’d given out unnecessary information.
“I had some, like, family things last night.”
“Been there.” Randle leaned behind the seat for a water bottle and towel. “Got a foamy in the back of the truck?”
No, but that’s a good idea, I thought.
“I’m here ’cause I didn’t want to park just anywhere,” I said. “I don’t know about you, but I can smell the cargo bed, even when it’s empty, and if some cop stops me for sleeping on the roadside? All he’d have to do is run the plates.”
Randle chewed on the joint and rubbed his nose with the side of his thumb.
“Right on. Isn’t that what I said, Maddie? He’s got more brains than the rest of them put together.” He bumped his car door closed and clapped me on the shoulder. “You look like a man who can use some sustenance.” The crinkles around his eyes were back. “And a cup of coffee.”
“A shower’s not a bad idea either.” Maddie said, amused. “You know the time, Randle.”
“We’re all right. But you’ll be eating alone,” he said to me as he checked his Rolex. “Visitors.”
He reached down between the seats and thumbed a remote, and one of the garage doors rumbled up. He tossed a ring of keys my way.
“Leave the gate open, so they can come in and park. Put the car and truck in the garage and lock it tight.”
“If you have people coming, I can take off, no sweat. Beans is open by now. I don’t want to be in the way.”
“No, we’re cool —” he seemed distracted by his thoughts, then snapped back, “Grab a bite, make me a macchiato. I’ve got a machine up there that cost me a fortune and I can’t make it do shit. See what magic you can make with it. But by nine make yourself scarce. Stay upstairs, close the door.” His smile cracked wide. “So glad you’re here, man. We have business.”
I made them coffees — be nice to your host before you ask a favour, like whether you can crash for a while — then took a short shower. Randle’s only breakfast option was granola, of course, which I ate in the familiar top-floor bedroom. I’d just finished when I heard the rumble of a serious bike coming down the drive. Thinking of the ones that had blasted past me in the night, I took a careful peek out my window. An older guy in cowboy boots and jeans sitting low astride a chopper, with long forks and lots of chrome. I couldn’t see the plates. He didn’t wear a club vest, but he didn’t need one. He was senior management in the organization. Wide-jawed with short, thick white hair like a pelt that ran down into sideburns and a goatee, he swung off the bike with a rolling, big-bellied stride — from two floors above I could see the confidence, even arrogance in his posture — and waited for Ivan’s big black pickup to park.
Ivan was joined on the drive by his passenger Keech. Keech wasn’t small, but Ivan towered over him. They waited at a deferential distance until Bullard arrived a couple minutes later. Bullard and the old guy had a few words — Bullard apologized for making him wait, which was further proof to me that the old guy was higher up in the organization — and they headed to the front door.
Ivan and Keech took up watchful positions in the drive. I was two floors up, inside a window and shaded from view, but if I didn’t know better I’d swear that Ivan tried to catch my eye, giving an ever-so-disgusted shake of the head to let me know that I had no business being there, that I was a kid, a civilian, and out of my depth. I ducked back and clicked the blinds shut.
The meeting went on for less than an hour. The rumble of voices cut through with Bullard’s high-pitched tones, and Randle’s animated enthusiasm trying to sway them like a pitchman on the shopping channel. Maybe twenty minutes in, his tone changed to one of disagreement, punctuated by horseshit and are you blind? and I ventured cautiously from the bedroom onto the carpeted hallway. Bullard made a suggestion and was shut up by the older guy. Maddie’s voice floated above the male thrum, answering some pointed financial questions, but I could only pick out a few words. An iPhone marimba ring interrupted the conversation more than once, and I thought, if they can I can, and slipped the battery back in my phone, setting it to vibrate. It instantly hummed — missed calls, from home or Beth’s cell, and missed texts from Rachel. Her shift had been changed, could I still pick her up tonight. Yes.
Downstairs, the disagreement tapered to a stalemate, and I became worried that I might be heard. Just as I crept back into my room, the bikers got up and left, as suddenly as if it had been prearranged. There w
ere no goodbyes, just a click of the door. Motors blasted to life and roared up the drive and away. Down in the kitchen, Maddie and Randle made low, unhappy sounds.
I left them to their discussions — I didn’t want to know about Randle’s dealings with the Devils, whether it was Bullard’s franchise or the international operation — until eventually I had to leave. There were things I needed to get ready for tonight with Rachel, and my truck was in the garage, which meant I had to walk through the kitchen and past Randle and Maddie.
I clunked the bedroom door shut, and heavy-footed my way down the stairs, to be sure they’d hear me coming and change any sensitive subject. Poking my head into the kitchen, I said, “Hey, guys, thanks for letting me use the shower. I’m heading out now.”
Randle gave me a lidded nod and turned to the garage. Maddie leaned against the stove and put out an arm to block me from following.
“No problem, darling,” she said. “He needs a time-out right now. Are you feeling better?” Her smile seemed forced.
“Slept in the truck last night.”
“Problems with Mom and Dad? They don’t like what you’re doing?”
I shrugged. She thought I had a mom and dad. Good. She was nice, but I wanted to keep my details private. “They think I work at the coffee shop.” I shrugged, “Which I do, but that’s all they know. No, it’s other stuff. Personal stuff.”
“There’s a girl?” She raised a curious eyebrow.
I shrugged again and a dimple appeared in one of her cheeks, like she thought the idea was amusing but wasn’t going to laugh at me to my face. Or maybe she was reconsidering me.
Before she could reply, Randle returned from the garage, giving me a flat-palmed clap on the shoulder. “What’s your opinion?” Weed smoke clung to him.
“About?”
“Our security,” he said, a bit too loudly. “Does it have holes?” He waggled a dramatic finger in my face.
What was the right answer? Did he want reassurance, or should I say what I thought? I could pat him on the back for his secret codes, the hoods he made his budders wear, his conspiratorial cells of anonymity. Or I could point out the weak link: the high-profile boss who was an unremitting stoner.
“Seems pretty tight,” I ventured. “You’ve got rules, your people are trained, you keep things pretty close to your chest.”
“Exactly, exactly.” Randle nodded almost manically, walking in a circle.
“Each of us knows our primary contacts only,” I said. “One task and nothing else. That’s cautious, smart. Minimizes the risk.”
“That’s what I told Sammy Jay. ” His lip curled. “He was lecturing me about how I run my business. He’s not dumping on Bullard, whose grows are so dirty and mouldy, you can smell them blocks away. We run de-ozonators to mask the smell. And security — Bullard’s idea is to pay off the cops, and threaten to break your legs if you squeal. That’s not security, that’s intimidation. That’s what you do after there’s been a leak. Security is how you prevent the leak in the first place.”
“That’s not the issue,” Maddie said to me. “Security’s just an excuse. It’s control he wants.”
Randle sank into a bar stool, then jumped up again. “Sammy Jay from California. Talks like an MBA — streamline the workflow, create synergies through complementary operations.”
“It’s the House they’re after,” Maddie stated flatly. “And there’s nothing you can do about it.”
“They want to buy you out?” I felt stupid sitting there. They were talking to each other, not to me.
Randle paced. “They don’t get it. Weed is weed to them — but we’re a boutique operation, for Christ’s sake. We can sell our product for triple the price they get.”
“Ten times.” Maddie muttered.
“Can’t they do the math? Gram for gram, the cut that we give them for our product is more than they make total for theirs.”
“You’re too big, too successful. Too independent.” She said, “Bullard’s got to know you’ve got businesses on the side. I wonder if that’s what he told Sammy Jay.”
“They can’t prove it.”
“They’re not lawyers, Randle. They don’t have to prove anything.”
His voice was bitter. “They want me to be a cog in an agribusiness. Grow the weed and deliver it. No specialty breeding, no small batches. No processing.”
And no need for a driver, I thought. “You need them for protection.”
“I do.” He didn’t sound certain.
“In the city there were grows everywhere. Hydroponic supply stores all over, but I never saw any bikers. How do they do it?”
“There are street gangs, but we don’t want to be part of that.” Maddie said. “Every week somebody gets shot.”
“They’re affiliated,” Randle said. “Nobody’s independent.” He pulled a phone from his pocket and headed for the garage. “Not for long, anyway. Nearly twenty years I’ve been paying them half my gross. This is the thanks I get.”
Maddie and I looked at each other for an awkward moment, and she stood up. “From those people, a buyout is remarkably civilized.” She left for the living room. I heard clinking glass as she began picking up after the guests.
Alone in the kitchen, I had a bad few moments, thinking of myself and how ripped-up my life was all of a sudden. There was no going back to Beth, and I was basically fired from the café. Now I was losing Randle’s money too, when I was so close to getting out of Wallace. I just wanted something to hold on to. I wanted Rachel.
I waited until I heard feet on the garage steps and Randle clicking his phone shut, and I opened the garage door.
“I’ve got to go,” I said.
“Not yet.” A wisp of smoke trailed from his nose. To Maddie, he said loudly. “He’s not taking it well.”
“Who?” She said, carrying an armful of dirty glasses.
“Skip. Gutless wonder. I’m not sorry to lose him.”
“What’s with Skip?” I asked.
“He’s gone, finished, past tense.” His red-eyed stare roamed from me to Maddie. “Sold to the highest bidder. The only bidder. And he’s only the first of them, I’ve got to tell them all —” His eyes flicked to me. He still didn’t want to reveal any more names. “Maddie, I love you but it’s time for you to fuck off.”
She put her hands on her hips, then bobbed her head quickly, like a bird. “You know where to find me.” She pushed past me, leaving the dishwasher open, and let the door slam behind her.
I made to follow her, but Randle grabbed my arm and waited until her car started up and the garage door hummed open.
His eyes narrowed. “Are you in?”
This was when I should have said no, but instead I waited to hear what he had to say. I acted like I was confused, but I knew exactly what he was talking about.
“Wheels within wheels,” he said with a grim chuckle. He patted his pocket for a joint, found it empty, and frowned. “Faced with a non-negotiable proposition, I gave the big boy what he asked for. He’s getting value for his money, but he’s not getting what he wants. What they want, Bullard and him, is for me to be out of business. Instead I’m selling them a few parts of the business. The ones they know about.” He poked me in the chest with an index finger. “Ivan may be their eyes and ears, but there’s a lot that Ivan hasn’t seen or heard.”
“I’m not fired.” I wanted clarity on that point at least. His off-kilter grin said no, I wasn’t fired. “And you’re not telling Maddie. But she lives here.”
He laughed and poked me again. “No she doesn’t. She’s my accountant, for Christ’s sake.”
He sat me down and rambled about the “other” businesses, which were no surprise: his online seed sales, his private clients — there were more than just Rory Doyle — and how he wanted to bring House of Dreams to the cannabis cafés in the city.
He always said my face was easy to read, and my doubts must have shown. I couldn’t see how he thought he could continue to run grows and proces
sing operations and hash factories and whatever else he had, right within Bullard’s territory.
“Tate, I can handle those guys. This is just a blip. Head office in California has their eyes on Bullard for some reason. Maybe they’re making him clean up his act. More likely they’ve figured out that legalization’s coming to Canada, and that he’s totally clueless — but whatever, I don’t care. They’ll be gone as quickly as they arrived. A business like theirs? Ultimately, they’re not interested in me. They ship container loads, they’ve got a pipeline from here through Mexico all the way to Colombia. A niche product like mine is a waste of their time.”
Time to change the subject. “I have to go, but first I have a favour to ask.” The favour was why I was letting him rattle on. I needed somewhere to crash, I said, just for a few days. He still had a few grows, was there one with a spare room? I didn’t need much space.
“No need.” He said, as he pulled a lavender sticky-note pad from a drawer. “When we’re getting this started, I want you here.” He wrote a number on the pad. “That’s the guest code for the keypad at my gate. Same code for the door lock. Remember it, and lose the piece of paper.”
“Okay, thanks.” I’d have preferred a bit of distance from him.
“It’s you and me now, no Skip, no Ivan, none of those guys. As far as they know, you’re fired.”
I told him I’d be out for the evening, maybe all night. I planned to talk things over with Rachel and see what she thought about hauling weed through Devils territory without their knowledge, whether it sounded sane to her.