Sleight

by Tom Twitchel

  I had my phone and a flashlight app so I wouldn’t be blind but I was also following him into an area that I was unfamiliar with and all by my lonesome. I reached under my sweatshirt and touched the stunner for a little reassurance and started down, leaving the metal door open above me. The floor was about twenty feet down and looked level. As I began climbing down I worried that it might be a sewer duct and that I’d be shuffling through sludge. The tunnel was square, tall enough that I could stand, and only went in one direction as it dead-ended at the ladder rungs. Shafts of weak light pierced the darkness at regular intervals, spearing down from grates up on the street level. Leaving my phone off and using my camouflage knack I moved in the direction of the piers.

  At about a hundred feet the tunnel sloped down and the dim light from above disappeared. I dropped my camouflage and pulled my phone out, waking up the screen and holding it so that I could see a few feet in front of me. The slope leveled out and the floor surface changed from concrete to metal. Moving slowly so that I didn’t make a lot of noise, I traveled another fifty feet and noticed condensation on the walls. A rotten moldy odor became stronger the further I went.

  The floor surface reverted back to concrete covered in loose grit, and every step I took produced what felt like ridiculously loud crunching under my feet. Feeling very vulnerable and fearing discovery, I was beginning to consider turning around when I came upon two doors. One was covered with high voltage warning signs and the other was labelled plainly ‘stairs’. Turning on the flashlight app I scanned the floor in front of each door and then played the light up to the door handles. The handle to the door that led to the stairs was dirty and covered with an undisturbed layer of dust. The other door handle was relatively shiny and there was a single wet footprint in front of it. Using my knack I opened the door and grabbed the stun gun with my free hand as I stepped over the threshold into a dark hallway. I pulled a coin from my pocket and placed it in the door frame so that the door wouldn’t close completely.

  With my phone in my left hand as my light source I moved forward past banks of gigantic circuit breakers with huge levers as big as my arm all pushed in the ‘off’ position. I swung the phone’s light ahead and let it play over the walls and floor. There was another door at the end of the narrow space. As I approached it I heard muffled voices. When I put my ear to it I could hear the voices more clearly.

  I agonized over whether I should risk opening the door. I didn’t see how I could be satisfied following him all this way just to chicken out at this point. Taking a deep breath I used my knack to open the door as slowly and carefully as possible, while pointing my feet and angling my body to make a hasty retreat if One-Eye was on the other side of the door. I had it opened about two inches when a loud voice boomed out, and I just about wet my pants. It was all I could do to reassert my control over the door before it banged shut, as I realized that the voice hadn’t been in response to my opening it. Letting out shallow ragged breaths I opened the door wide enough to slip through and used another coin to keep it from latching closed.

  The room I entered was dimly lit by a light source coming from around a corner that was fifteen or twenty feet ahead. The yellow light wavered and jumped around, which probably meant that the source was a candle or a gas lantern. Between me and the corner were just blank walls and floor, with nothing to hide behind and nowhere to run except back through the doorway I’d just entered. The voices carried and I could hear what sounded like the legs of chairs scraping the floor.

  “…tell me that then Wendell!” came a familiar sounding baritone.

  “You know I don’t like it when you call me that, Tank. I like plain ol’ Dell,” came the thin raspy voice that I knew belonged to One-Eye. I marveled over the name of Dell’s fellow thug, Tank. My memory of that voice was associated with a huge Neanderthal. It had to be a nickname.

  Brilliant and deeply imaginative.

  “Well, Wendell, I’ll call you shit-for-brains if it suits me. Why are you here? What have you got?” rumbled the deep-voiced Tank.

  “I got plenty. Where is she? She was supposed to be here and why are we meeting down here anyway. We should be meeting her in her fancy-ass waterfront condo instead of this hellhole.”

  Invoking my camouflage I tried to decide where I would be safest if they came around the corner unexpectedly. I decided on a spot on the wall to my right midway between the door and the corner. I figured when they walked around the corner they would probably hug the wall to their right, which would be on my left. By stationing myself along the opposite wall I would reduce the risk of them running into me. I just had to hope my camouflage would hide me effectively.

  Meanwhile, Tank was ripping on Del again. “That’s for her to decide and by now you should know that. You think we would blend in there? No. She’s smart. Unlike you. You should be thanking her for getting you out. What did you find?”

  There was a pause which could have meant anything but based on the conversation it was probably Dell pouting before he continued. What he said next made the hair on my neck stand straight up.

  “He’s back in his apartment, so it should be easier than messing with the shop and the old dude.” Del said, with more than a little pettiness creeping into his voice.

  Tank snorted, “That all you got? Two weeks and that’s it? He’s sleeping in his own bed?”

  “NO! That’s not all I got! And if it’s so easy why ain’t you doing it?” spat Del.

  “You know why you little bitch. What else?” snapped Tank, clearly reaching the end of his obviously short temper.

  “Okay, okay,” whined Del. “We got some kinda competition. There was a big kid that was hanging around. Didn’t look like he was wantin’ to party if ya know what I mean.”

  “I don’t. What was he doing?” growled Tank.

  “Sorta hanging around, like he was trying to ambush the kid. An’ there’s another kid scoping out the place but I didn’t get a good look at ‘im. Small. Sneaky,” Del said.

  That was probably Justine and the other, bigger kid, was almost for sure my new best buddy Trey. My stomach felt queasy as I realized that these creeps had been watching my apartment building and that they had been doing it for Sonja. I’d learned enough and decided that I should start backtracking when Tank spoke again.

  “Kids? That’s not a problem, especially since I wasted the Mexican. That dude was a problem. So, he’s back at home? That it, or is there more?”

  Del cleared his throat, “The dummy’s back too. The kid musta brought him back home. He’s only back maybe a day. Ain’t been out though. Stayin’ holed up in his ground floor apartment.”

  “Now see, that there is important. We both owe that son of a bitch some payback. That’ll move up the time table. As in right away. Like possibly tomorrow. That prick created some serious damage when we tried to grab him. I don’t know about you but I’m tired of parting my hair different because of what he did to my face, although with you maybe it was an improvement.” Del made a rude noise before Tank continued, “She’s not gonna be happy that he’s back in the picture. He burned her bad. It complicates things. Unless...” Tank’s voice trailed off and I panicked thinking that I had overstayed my welcome and that I was about to be discovered. I started edging back to the door.

  Dell’s whiny voice floated after me. “What? Unless what?”

  Low, ugly laughter echoed through the confined space. “Maybe we’ll upgrade this whole project to a twofer!”

  TWELVE: IT’S NOT ALL ABOUT YOU

  Have you ever tried to move quietly and quickly when you’re scared?

  Not easy to do.

  As I retraced my steps every noise I made seemed to be horrendously loud and my speed frustratingly slow. My neck started to hurt from looking over my shoulder every thirty seconds. It wasn’t until I was out of the tunnel and back up at street level that I felt like I could take a deep breath and control my nerves. My legs were heavy. I was spent from all of the physical activity and high emo
tional tension I’d been bathed in since the moment I’d woken up.

  Unwilling to hoof it back up the hills to my neighborhood I angled toward the nearest bus stop. Sun having set, street lights were now shining brightly, giving the whole area a different feel. The relative warmth of the day was replaced by near freezing night air. The earlier pungent smells that had wafted in from the water had been replaced by the aroma of grills heating up for the night, and music drifted in from nearby restaurants. As I swung aboard a bus I scanned the seats before taking one myself. I’d been cornered more than once when I’d been on a bus and it was now a habit to check out the other passengers and to grab a seat as far back as possible. The seat at the rear was open so I slid in against the window. A few people got on after me, the door closed, we pulled away from the curb and I was left with my thoughts.

  Having just heard two people planning on kidnapping or killing me I felt queasy and frankly, a little scared. But, I’d knocked out both of them once already, and I’d been in pretty bad shape when I’d done it. In the current situation I had one very big advantage: I knew they were coming and they didn’t know that I knew. First thing to do would be to bring Kenwoode into the loop. Number two would be to move Breno and myself into Mr. Goodturn’s apartment.

  Early December weather buffeted the bus as it chugged up the hills back to my neighborhood. On top of the immediate issue of safety and getting to a secure location, I had Justine to worry about, not to mention Mr. Goodturn’s improvement and what that might mean. And just in case I was bored, I had the plan for removing Baffle from my high school population to think about. I’d have to deal with all that business while looking over my shoulder when I went back to school, but I was close to finishing something that might solve that problem for me.

  Justine would have to go through some issues when she officially showed up too. It would be interesting to see how her mother would react to her reappearance, because she had never let go of the fact that Justine had been with me when she was taken. It hadn’t mattered to her that the police had found me and Breno unconscious in the warehouse next to my apartment building. She’d continually spun conspiracy theories that the media was willing to print, with disclaimers of course. My name had figured prominently in almost all of them.

  The bus’s brakes squealed as we pulled up to my stop. Cold wind rushed into the bus as the doors slid open. Standing up, I waited for other passengers to get off, and scanned the street for anyone that looked suspicious.

  “You getting off?” the driver asked, eyeballing me in his mirror. I nodded and got off.

  It was a short walk to my building, but I was on high alert, whipping my head around constantly. Anyone watching me would have had no trouble figuring out that I was worried about being followed. I got to my building without anyone trying to jump me.

  Knacking myself in I let the door close behind me and

  walked up to Breno’s door and knocked.

  Nothing. I waited a moment and knocked again. More nothing. Starting to worry I put my face up to his door and sniffed deeply. No smoke odor, but still no answer. Fearing the worst I knacked the lock and let myself in. The place looked okay, not as tidy as I’d left it after my quick cleaning, but not trashed or smelling weird. I stepped in and closed the door behind me.

  “Breno?” I called.

  No answer.

  “Breno!” I called loudly. A muffled sound came from his bedroom.

  Moving cautiously I pulled my stun gun from my shoulder holster and inched toward his bedroom.

  “Breno, are you okay?” Creeping slowly I got close to the open door to his bedroom.

  His voice trembling, came to me in a weak whisper, “I’m hurting Benny. I hurt.”

  Holding my stunner and pointing in front of me I swung around the door frame of his bedroom. I quickly dropped my arm and re-holstered it. Breno was sitting on his rumpled bed, head bowed and his shoulders shaking as sobs wracked him. His hands were lying in his lap, cradled there like broken china, and covered with the same pair of yellow rubber gloves he’d been wearing the last time I’d seen him. My scalp tingled with apprehension as I entered the room.

  “Breno,” I said. “What’s going on? Where are you hurt?”

  Raising his head he looked at me from red-rimmed hollow eyes. His face was tear-stained. “I feel bad Benny. Mr. Goodturn is going to be mad and I cleaned the floor real good. But it’s not shiny enough. Not shiny. He’s sick because I made a accident isn’t he?” He looked down at his hands again.

  Sitting down next to him I placed a hand on his shoulder. “Breno, Mr. Goodturn being...sick has nothing to do with you.”

  Shaking his head, he drew his hands closer to his stomach. “I feel real bad Benny. I’m scared.” He snuffled.

  Speaking softly and slowly I said, “Breno, he’s getting better and the only person who should be feeling bad about him being sick is me. But he’s better and pretty soon he’ll be fine. Okay?”

  Breno’s head swung in my direction and the pain in his eyes and thoughts was so strong that it shook me. He gave me the slightest nod of his head and squeezed his eyes shut, as if to flush away the pain he was feeling.

  “When can I see him Benny? I think he needs the monkeys.”

  The skin on my arms raised in gooseflesh at the mention of the creepy three monkey clock. “Real soon.” I hoped that it was the truth. “What’s up with the monkeys Breno?” My palms felt sweaty when I asked, afraid of what secret might spill out next.

  “It’s his heart. He needs it,” Breno whispered, rocking slowly.

  His heart. His favorite memento from the ‘olden’ days. Me and my suspicious mind. Breno thought Mr. G needed his teddy bear.

  My heart twisted. I’d been sweating over all the garbage in front of me. Breno’s heartbreak made me realize something I should have been paying more attention to him. And others as well.

  It wasn’t all about me. The things that were happening affected all of us.

  THIRTEEN: A CRACK IN THE ARMOR

  AN HOUR LATER I was up in Mr. Goodturn’s suite in a spare bedroom watching Breno snoring loudly. Kenwoode had given him a mild sedative to help calm him down. He looked down at him, frowning with his arms crossed over his chest. His jacket and vest had been put aside while he had helped me get him into bed. His crisp white shirt sleeves had been rolled up to the elbow, revealing thickly muscled arms that surprised me.

  Breno’s face was relaxed and peaceful. It was the most normal I’d seen him since I’d found him at the pier. Rather than putting on his vest and jacket, Kenwoode picked them up and folded them over his arm. While he’d been tending to Breno I’d filled him in on One-Eye and his buddy Tank.

  Turning to me, he said, “I think having the two of you stay here is best based on what you’ve told me, but I don’t think Mr. Giacomo’s agitation will be allayed by seeing Harald in his current condition. Best to wait until the appropriate time.”

  I nodded, but I was already thinking about something else.

  “Mr. Kenwoode, what do you do?” I asked.

  Arching an eyebrow he said, “Pardon?”

  “What do you do. You know, work.” I said.

  “I’m retired.”

  Stifling a groan I pushed for more. “Yeah, but retired from what? What did you do before?”

  He patted at the sleeves of his coat, smoothing them out. “I was an independent contractor. I provided a number of services that others found useful.”

  Not willing to accept that vague answer I asked, “Like what?”

  Looking up from his jacket, he stopped fussing with it and stared at me with icy blue eyes. My ability to sense what went on inside people had never given me any insight into what he was feeling. It was as though he could clamp down on any stray thoughts or emotions.

  “Why do you ask Benjamin?”

  This kind of redirect was his patented response to a question.

  I shrugged. “I’m curious. You’re super smart, and the way you...handl
e people is like you’re used to giving directions, and having them followed. You just handled Breno like you were familiar with dealing with people under stress. You’re friends with Mr. Goodturn, but I really don’t know much about you. Were you in the military?”

  The ghost of a smile played on his lips. Shocking, because I’d never seen anything remotely like a smile on his face. He turned and motioned for me to follow him into the hall. When we were outside the room he closed the door behind us. We began walking down the hall toward the library and he cleared his throat.

  “I am not enamored of the armed forces. I would like to allay any concerns you might have about me but the fact is that my background is not something I discuss much. What I will tell you is that Harald and I met on the East Coast. He was running a business that was perceived as interfering with one of my clients and when I began my research to determine how to best prevent said interference I began to notice anomalies in his past. I was intrigued.”

  Rather than interrupt and run the risk of turning off his willingness to talk I just nodded in response.

  “My client’s resources were significant, and Harald, on the surface, did not appear to be much of a threat. But as I dug deeper I was surprised by his confusing personal history and frankly astonished at how vast his resources were. It was only after months of careful investigation and a slowly developing respect for each other that Harald and I became more than business competitors. Although to be precise he was not truly competing with me, just my client.”

  I couldn’t help myself, “What was his business? What was the business your client had that he was so concerned about Mr. Goodturn?”

  I had trouble imagining a pawnshop owner getting into a turf war with another purveyor of discarded items. We walked into the library and sat down in a couple of chairs set in a corner near the windows. The comfortably familiar smell of old books made me relax. Diffused light from the street glowed at the bottom edge of the windows. Mr. Kenwoode carefully laid his jacket and vest over the arm of the chair and looked at me.