Kings of Midnight

by Wallace Stroby

  “If you’re going to shoot,” Taliferro said, “then shoot.”

  After a moment, Benny lowered the gun. He righted a chair, sat down, tried to catch his breath.

  Everything was fucked. It was trouble to leave these three alive. They wouldn’t give up now, wouldn’t leave him alone. But he couldn’t kill them, not like this.

  Marta came into the kitchen. “There aren’t enough suitcases. We’ve only got the two.”

  “Pack what we can carry,” he said. “Forget about the rest.” When she turned, he said, “Wait a minute. Find some rope. Clothesline, anything. Check the hall closet.”

  When she went out, Taliferro said, “Where do you think you’re going to run to? You and that little whore?”

  “Shut up.” Benny stood. His right elbow ached where he’d hit Longo. He could hear Marta out there rooting in the closet.

  Taliferro and Dominic were watching him. Longo began to stir. Benny knew he was running out of time.

  “You ever fire that thing before?” Taliferro said. “Doesn’t look like it, the way you’re holding it.”

  “Shut up,” Benny said again, feeling foolish now. Marta came back in with a ball of recycling twine, handed it to him. It would have to do.

  Benny went around the table, kicked the bloody paring knife aside. He gestured at Taliferro with the Colt. “On your stomach.”

  “Screw you.”

  Benny raised the gun, fired into the wall over Taliferro’s head. The gun kicked up like a live thing in his hand, the bullet slapping a hole through the sheetrock. Taliferro flinched, leaned away. Dust drifted down on him.

  Benny lowered the muzzle, pointed it at Taliferro’s face. His arm was still tingling from the recoil. “Don’t make me do it, Danny.”

  Taliferro blinked. “You just made the biggest mistake of your life, you know that?”

  “On your stomach, Danny. Don’t make me shoot.”

  Taliferro looked at Benny, then at Marta standing behind him.

  Slowly, he turned over, lay facedown. “We’ll find you. You think we won’t?”

  Benny put the Colt on the table where he could reach it, got the twine. He knelt on Taliferro’s legs, pulled his hands behind his back, wound the twine six times around his wrists. He got the paring knife, cut the loose line, tied it tight. Taliferro winced.

  “You’re making this worse for both of you,” he said. “If you’re smart, you’ll just walk away now.”

  Benny patted his overcoat pockets. No gun.

  “Shut up,” he said. “Don’t make me change my mind.”

  Benny did his ankles next, then cut a length of twine, moved to Longo. Dominic was watching him, but his eyes were heavy. The pool of blood under his leg was spreading.

  Longo groaned again when Benny rolled him onto his stomach, tied his wrists. Concussion, Benny thought, or worse. Longo kicked out weakly, and Benny pinned his legs, tied his ankles. He went through his pockets, found the Lincoln keys.

  “Finish packing, get the bags,” he said to Marta. “We need to go. Now.” She went out.

  Dominic’s eyes were half-closed now. Passing out from blood loss, Benny thought.

  Benny felt light-headed, had to sit down again, catch his breath. The room seemed to swim around him.

  Taliferro had twisted to face him. Benny tried to steady his breathing, waited until the room slowed. He took off his glasses, straightened the frames as much as he could, put them back on. He looked around the room, and it all settled in on him now, what he had just done. He used a sleeve to wipe sweat from his brow.

  Marta came back with two suitcases, an overnight bag.

  “Got everything you need?” he said.

  “Are we really going?”

  “We have to.” He tossed the keys. She caught them in midair. “Put our stuff in their car. We’ll drive it downtown, get mine. We’re not coming back.”

  When she went out, he stood again, steadier now, breathed deep.

  “Sooner or later, you’ll work your way free,” he said to Taliferro. “First thing you should do is call nine-one-one. Your friend Dominic’s not in such good shape.”

  “Don’t you worry about him.”

  “I’m not. I just don’t want a dead man on my tab, if I can avoid it.”

  “You’ll get yours, too, you Jew bastard. Bet on it.”

  “I know I will,” Benny said. “Everybody does.”

  * * *

  They left town on Route 70, heading east. Outside Cloverdale, Benny pulled over, tossed the two guns and the Lincoln keys over a fence and into a retention pond. The Colt was in his suitcase.

  He kept an eye on the rearview as he drove. For what, he wasn’t sure. It wouldn’t be the Town Car. Even if they had an extra set of keys, he’d flattened all four tires.

  They drove in silence. After an hour, they began to see signs for Ohio. The Hyundai still had a half tank of gas.

  “Where are we going?” Marta said.

  “New York. Brooklyn, maybe. I’m not sure yet.”

  “New York? Isn’t that where those men are from?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Then why are we going there?”

  “There are people I know there. Down in Jersey, too. They might be able to help us.”

  “When are we coming back?”

  He squeezed her thigh. “We’re not, baby. I’m sorry.”

  “My parents.”

  “When we get settled, you can call them. But not until then. Better they don’t know anything, in case someone comes around to talk to them.”

  “Who?”

  “I don’t know. Police, probably. Maybe someone else.”

  “Are they in danger?”

  “No,” he said. “Of course not. Why would they be?” Wishing it were true.

  He was feeling light-headed again, weightless. “Did you bring my Monopril?”

  “It’s in your bag, I’ll get it. Are you okay? Feeling dizzy?”

  “I’m fine. I just forgot to take it today.” Lying again.

  She leaned over the seat, fumbled with the overnight bag. She came back with the pill bottle, opened it, shook a tablet into her palm.

  “Thanks.” He took it from her and dry-swallowed it, winced at the bitter taste.

  Ahead of them, clouds were thinning, stars showing through.

  It’s all come down to this again, he thought. On the road. On the run. Maybe the way it’ll always be. For the rest of his life, running.

  “My parents warned me,” she said.

  “About what?”

  “You. That you would get in trouble again. That someday you’d go back where you came from, leave me behind.”

  “Did you believe them?”

  “No.”

  “Good. Because wherever I’m going, baby, you’re coming with me. I promise you.”

  She took his hand in both of hers, leaned into his shoulder.

  “Go ahead and sleep,” he said. “We’ve got at least an hour before we have to stop for gas. Are you hungry?”

  “Not yet.”

  “Let me know when you are. I’ll stop.”

  She closed her eyes. Then, barely above a whisper, she said, “I’m scared.”

  “I am, too. But everything’s going to be all right.”

  She squeezed his hand tighter. “I love you.”

  “I love you, too, angel,” he said. “And don’t worry. I’m never gonna let you go.”

  She nestled into him, warm against his shoulder. In minutes, she was asleep.

  He drove on into the night.

  FOUR

  Crissa took an Amtrak train as far as Baltimore, got a cab to a hotel near the Inner Harbor. The bellboy loaded her two suitcases and overnight bag on a luggage cart. She followed him into the elevator, rode up to the fifth floor. The overnight held clothes, a laptop she’d bought in Atlanta, and a .32 Beretta Tomcat. The suitcases were full of money.

  When he was gone, she opened the suitcases on the bed, spent the next half hour counting
and banding bills. She was exhausted, kept losing her place and having to start over again.

  When she was done, the stacks of cash were laid out neatly on the bed. The total came to $340,560. Some of it was left over from the stake she’d had back in December, but most of it came from the six ATMs. Even though the bills weren’t sequenced, she’d have to find a way to launder them, to be safe. Hollis had a man in Savannah ready to handle it for them, but she’d had no contact with him. Only Hollis knew who he was. Now, with Hollis gone, the problem was her own.

  She put the money back in the suitcases. She knew little about Rorey or Hollis, whether they had family, children. They’d only come together to do the work. Even if she were able to find their people, hand over their shares, it would be too much risk. The money was hers now.

  There was an arena across the street, the neon glow from its facade lighting the room. She closed the heavy curtains to shut it out, then pulled off her boots, lay on the bed.

  She’d make some phone calls from here. Then head north, try to reconnect with Rathka, the lawyer in New York. She thought of Wayne in prison in Texas, his parole hearing coming up in just a few weeks. With Rathka’s help, she’d already funneled more than a quarter million in cash to a lawyer in Austin, who had an inside man at the statehouse with influence on the parole board. But it wasn’t a sure thing. Nothing was.

  The identity she’d left behind in New York was the one she’d used to get on the approved visitors roll at the prison in Kenedy. The name was on file there, along with her photo. She couldn’t go back. Wayne was pushing fifty-one, with seven years left on an armed-robbery bid. Being inside was killing him. If he didn’t get out soon, she knew, she might never see him again.

  She closed her eyes, the fatigue on her. She felt suddenly alone, adrift. Less than twenty-four hours since she’d left Rorey and Hollis, dead on a cold concrete floor. A stupid waste of life. There’d been too much blood lately, too many bodies.

  She’d killed a man in December, a man who’d taken out two of her partners, nearly crippled a third. That one man had undone everything she’d built. She’d shot him to death outside a burning house in Connecticut, left him there in the snow. It was the first life she’d ever taken. The killing had drawn police from two states, and brought an end to the life she knew.

  Now it was time to build again. Everything she owned in the world was in that hotel room. There was nothing else. She would use the money to carve out another life, find a place to call home. A new start with Wayne, far away from steel doors and razor wire. A beginning.

  She was too tired to shower or undress. That could wait. For now, everything could wait. She closed her eyes, and let sleep drag her down.

  * * *

  The next morning was gray, cold March rain slanting down from a leaden sky. She bought a prepaid cell phone at a corner market, took it back to the room. Standing at the window, curtains open, she called Rathka’s number. Cars splashed by in the street below, people hurrying along the sidewalk.

  She waited while Monique, his secretary, put her through.

  “Ms. Hendryx, good to hear from you,” Rathka said. “I was hoping you’d call.”

  “First chance I’ve gotten. Work’s been busy.”

  “It’s been a long time. I was worried.”

  The Roberta Summersfield name had led police to Rathka’s office. He’d been questioned, but it had gone no further. Still, she knew he’d be reluctant to meet again, pick up where they’d left off.

  “Things are fine,” she said. “I was down south for a while, but the weather turned suddenly. Thought it was a good idea to leave.”

  “I’m sorry to hear that. I hope there were no lingering effects.”

  “None I’m aware of yet.”

  “That’s good. However, I’m not sure this is the best time for further investments, the way the market is and all. Still a certain amount of turbulence.”

  “I understand. I wouldn’t put you in that position. But I wanted an update on that other matter.”

  “Of course. I’ve been staying on top of that, even in your absence.”

  “And?”

  “Nothing very new. Board meets on the twenty-eighth.”

  “Everything in place down there?”

  “I wouldn’t say ‘in place,’ but we certainly came through on our share of the deal.”

  “Are they asking for more?” she said.

  “Not yet. I don’t expect them to, either. But there’s always a certain amount of risk involved, as you know. We won’t know anything for sure until that day.”

  “I haven’t been able to get down there.”

  “For obvious reasons.”

  “I can’t contact him at all, not the way I used to. I don’t think it’s safe.”

  “It’s not,” he said. “I’d recommend you continue to act under that assumption.”

  “But I need to get a message to him. To let him know I’m okay. That we’re working on it.”

  “I understand.” She could hear him tap a pencil on his desktop. She was used to the pauses, the tapping. It meant he was thinking.

  “Here’s an idea,” he said after a moment. “As one of his attorneys of record, I could arrange a phone call. It would have to be done from here, of course.”

  “Is that safe?”

  “Safe enough, I’d think. After their initial visit here, our friends seem to have lost interest. I’ve had no contact with them since. So, if you’re asking about the integrity of the line, I think we’re fine on that.”

  “Good.”

  “I have someone come in and sweep once a month, too, as you know. And as far as the phone call, even if there was an issue, it wouldn’t do them any good. Attorney-client privilege.”

  “Then let’s do it.”

  “Can you get up here? How far away are you?”

  “About four hours,” she said. “I can rent a car, be there tomorrow. I have something for you as well. For investment purposes.”

  “That might be an issue right now. But we’ll talk about it when I see you, examine our options. This number good for a while?”

  “Yes. It’s new.”

  “The call may take a couple days to set up. They don’t move very fast down there. Let me work on it, and I’ll get back to you as soon as I can.”

  “I’ll wait to hear from you.” She ended the call.

  She’d planned to stay in Baltimore a few days, try to decompress from the last week. She knew no one in the city, had anonymity here. But now she was restless. She considered driving up to Atlantic City, hitting the casinos, trying to launder some of the money through chips. She could play blackjack or roulette long enough to make it look good before she cashed out. But it would take a while, and she was an indifferent gambler. It held no appeal for her.

  There was a local phone book in the desk drawer. She got the number of a car rental agency, made the call. It would feel better to be on the move. There were plans to be made, to try to get her life back to where it had been. It would take time. And there was never enough of that.

  * * *

  She left Baltimore in a Ford Fusion that afternoon, headed up I-95. She stopped in Wilmington, Delaware, and used her ID to rent safe deposit boxes at two different downtown banks. She’d bought a shoulder bag, used it to carry banded cash into the banks. In each box, she left $20,000.

  She did the same at three banks in Philadelphia, then crossed the bridge into Jersey, hit two banks in Camden, two more in Trenton. It was dark by the time she got on the New Jersey Turnpike, headed north, wipers on against the drizzling rain. She had $160,000 left.

  It felt good to be on the road again, moving forward, seeding cash along the way. The first steps of a new life. The rest of the money she would try to launder, keep fluid. The money in the safe boxes was for emergencies.

  She tuned in a classical station. “Venus” from Holst’s The Planets came through the speakers. It was one of the first classical CDs she’d ever bought, knew almost
every note of it by heart. When she’d left New York, she’d had to leave all her music behind as well, except for what was on her laptop. Once she got settled, she’d buy more. Maybe a book, too, one of those classical guides for beginners. She could recognize favorite pieces, but beyond that she was lost.

  She turned up the volume. Music filled the car, calmed her.

  The rain was coming down harder now, slashing through her headlight beams, the wipers clicking rhythmically. Her hips ached, another souvenir from Connecticut, when she been clipped by a car driven by the man she’d killed. But despite the weather, despite her fatigue, somehow it all felt right. The night, the road, the music. It felt like going home.

  FIVE

  When they reached the corner of Fifth Avenue and Fifty-fourth Street, Crissa told the cabdriver to pull over. They were five blocks short of the address she’d given him. He steered into the loading zone in front of the building, horns sounding behind him. She looked up at Rathka’s office window, twelve stories above, and wondered if anyone beside Rathka was waiting there for her.

  “Miss, I can’t stay here,” the driver said.

  She paid him, got out. Wind was whistling down Fifth, light rain in the air. The weight of the shoulder bag pulled at her. Inside was $150,000 in cash. She’d left the other $10,000 in the trunk of the Fusion, in a parking garage downtown.

  Her first time back in the city in more than three months. Rathka had given her the all-clear over the phone, but there was still the chance of a setup. Enough pressure would turn him. He had a wife, children, grandchildren, a flourishing practice. Too much to lose.

  Nothing for it, though. She was here now, had nowhere else to go. She had to trust him.

  When the elevator doors opened on the twelfth floor, Monique was waiting for her. She escorted her through an outer office, two of the chairs there occupied. Crissa scanned faces as she went past. A heavy black woman and a hard-looking man in his fifties, with long gray hair and a tattoo on the back of his neck. Neither of them looked much like law.

  Monique led her down a hallway and into a conference room with a big oak table, law books lining the walls. Watery gray light came through the window blinds. There was a multiline phone in the center of the table.