Dead Mann Running (9781101596494)

by Petrucha, Stefan

  The kid was too close to the fire, so I slowed down enough to say, “Get the hell out of here.”

  What was left of her nose turned up in the air, but she didn’t move.

  I didn’t have time to explain the nuances. “Out! I said out!”

  She hissed like a cat and made for an alley.

  Did Chester know what she was? Would he have swerved if he did?

  I pushed into dry heat and the smell of gas. Grabbing the center of the chassis where the metal was still cool, I scrambled to the upturned passenger door. Balancing as best I could, I yanked it open. Smoke poured out. I heard Misty coughing, saw her arms flail in the haze.

  She was alive.

  Chester, not so much.

  Car bottoms have no airbags. The impact had crunched his side of the roof, forcing his head into a position only dead things can manage.

  I tried to keep Misty from seeing him, but she was struggling too hard for me to do a very good job. No sooner did I have her out, than she tried to climb back in.

  “Chester! We have to get Chester!”

  “He’s gone,” I told her.

  “No, he’s not! He’s right there! His head’s hurt!”

  She pulled at me so hard, the tail of my jacket flew out and nearly caught on fire.

  I pulled back, harder. “No, Misty. He’s dead.”

  It was as if my saying it was more real than seeing it. She stopped struggling, went limp, and shrieked his name. She screamed it over and over as I dragged her back from the flames, blood from her wound seeping onto the gray skin of my right hand. And all the while, all I could think was that I wished I’d never opened my damn office door.

  6

  Light and heat and plenty to go around. The light was from the recently arrived squad cars blocking the street, the heat from the burning wreck, flames covering half its underbelly. The jaws of life nowhere in sight, four men in blue risked their lives pulling Chester’s mangled body up across the passenger seat and out. I recognized them, worked with them. Now I wished I could remember their names. One was Darnell, I think.

  The body was laid on the street, the young, handsome face covered with someone’s jacket. They didn’t bother trying to put out the blaze with the rinky-dink extinguishers kept in the cars. That would have to wait for the fire trucks.

  I took Misty to the side, as if that would help. Already exhausted, her screaming had slowed to a chugging sob. My more immediate concern was the wound. Hoping I looked apologetic, I tore the shoulder of her first new blouse in ages for a better look. The bullet hadn’t penetrated, just left a long, angled gash. She might need a stitch or two to prevent unsightly scarring, but she’d live.

  The cops had nothing against Misty, so I was about to call one over when another car arrived. It seemed bigger and louder than the others, but that could’ve been my mind playing tricks. Out stepped Chief Detective Tom Booth, square jaw clenched so hard it looked like he wanted to crack his teeth. He was my old boss, the man who slept with my wife, Lenore, and was still convinced I’d killed her. Lately, he’d left me to rot in the Bones, but our relationship was complicated.

  Despite the carnage between us, his eyes found me. His looked like he was about to form some words, my name, an order to arrest me, or maybe a colorful invective. But one second there he was, the next, a blob appeared in the corner of my eyes and my whole field of vision went paper white. The color faded briefly into a sort of periwinkle, then settled in on yellow and red. The gas tank, cracked and weeping, had, at that moment, decided to blow.

  Debris flew around us. More smoke would follow, so I pulled at Misty.

  She resisted. “Just leave me,” she said.

  There wasn’t any energy in her voice. Her arm felt cold, even to me. If she’d been a chak, I’d worry about her going feral. That’s when it happens, when you give up. As it was, I think she was going into shock.

  Booth, in some ways a decent man, would’ve called her an ambulance, but with everyone dealing with the blast, I couldn’t bring myself to trust him. I dragged Misty out of sight, into an alley between a deli and a pharmacy.

  We’d crashed on the other side of the park, liveblood territory, nowhere near as bad as the Bones, but the economy had taken its toll. The buildings were smart and stylish, but looked as if whoever had built them were long gone and their descendants had no idea how to maintain them. Still, there was a clinic about a block away. With any luck, they kept their needles and thread sterile.

  Struggling with her weight, I propped Misty against a brick wall.

  “Can you walk?”

  “I don’t want to.”

  “Not what I asked.”

  I put my right arm under her good shoulder, hefted, and moved through the alley. We came out on Damon Street. The clinic was across the way.

  As soon as we hobbled through the doors, a curly-haired male nurse rushed up, all googly-eyed. “My God!” he said. “Were you in that accident?”

  Before I could stop him, he put his palm to my face. Realizing his mistake, he snatched it away. Must’ve been his first night.

  “Too late for me,” I told him. “Not her, though.”

  A taller, more tired but less frazzled woman, the doctor, I figured, came over, and helped us get Misty into a chair. I knelt beside her.

  “Looks like you’re in good hands for the next ten minutes or so. I’ve got to get the case and hand it over to the police.”

  A spark of energy took her. She grabbed my sleeve. “Hess, what if it’s meant for you?”

  Was she delirious? Gently as I could, I took her hand from my sleeve and laid it on her lap.

  “Remember what I said about that bullet with your name on it? The sooner I’m not the only one who knows where it is, the better I’ll feel about both of us. I’ll be right back.”

  She said something else I didn’t make out. The bleary-eyed doctor started asking her questions, so I moved away and kept going.

  I’d gotten here all right, but the first half block back was tough. My limp was more pronounced, the movement of my hips jagged. I’d done some damage when I rolled out of the car. Supporting Misty’s weight had made it worse. After another half block, it felt like a branch snapped inside me. A bone shifted back into place and I was once again what passed for normal in my world.

  The case was where I left it, on the hood of a parked car. I picked it up and headed toward all the bright shiny lights at the accident scene, which now included a fire truck.

  Sticking to the cool dark near the buildings, I moved up along the side of the accident, wondering what to say to Booth and how to say it. I decided to leave out the part about the arm. Hallucinations were a sign of mental problems, mental problems were a sign I might be going feral. With a cop down, he might listen to me, but that didn’t mean he wouldn’t try to find an excuse to have me shipped off to a camp.

  At least I thought he’d hear me out.

  As I neared, thanks to a chak’s propensity for blending into the gray, he couldn’t see me, but I could see him. He was surrounded by six or seven officers, all eager to do what they could to find the cop killer. The wind slapped the fabric of his coat against his torso like a plastic bag against a statue. He usually looked angry, but tonight a downright loathing lurked in his eyes. He looked like he’d been forced to swallow something big and shitty, and was struggling mightily to keep it down.

  “Forget the sedan and the limo,” he said. “Find the girl and the chak. I want them in custody within an hour.”

  In unison, the men’s jaws dropped. Chester O’Donnell, one of their own, was dead. Everyone knew he was seeing Misty, that she was my assistant. Several had seen the sedan speed off. The orders didn’t make sense. They stood there for so long, stunned, he had to say it again. “Find Mann and the girl. Arrest them on suspicion of murder. Go! Tonight!”

  What the fuck? Booth wouldn’t go after the wrong perps with a cop down, no matter how much he hated me. There’s a myth, Greek, I think, where a poor basta
rd steps on an invisible temple and winds up turned into a bush or a plant as punishment. An invisible temple. I was beginning to understand how he felt. The gods must be sadists.

  I pulled back, faded the rest of the way into the dark, then ran. I had to get Misty, figure out our next move, but being wanted by the police was too much for my body to process. Then my ankle acted up, clicking with every step, like it was about to crack.

  I crashed through the clinic door. An old woman in midcough screamed. A puffy intern’s eyes shot up from his e-reader. Figuring I was feral, he came for me, wobbling on elephantine legs. Thankfully, he was slow enough for me to maneuver around.

  “Misty?” I yelled.

  I rushed past admitting into a wide space with curtained beds. Pulling back the first curtain, I saw a pug-nosed kid laid out. He was maybe sixteen, had a bullet or knife wound in the leg. He was blue, unconscious.

  A caffeinated doctor leapt between us, waving his clipboard in the air like I was a dog he could scare off. “Get out of here!”

  I snatched the clipboard, turned it around and handed it back to him.

  “In a minute, pal.”

  Misty was behind the curtain of the second bed, alone. There was a little more color in her face. The stitching on her arm looked finished, but the loose ends dangled, waiting to be cut.

  “We’ve got to go,” I said. “The cops are after us.”

  She didn’t even ask why. “I don’t want to. Let them take me.”

  “Misty, no. There’s a lot going on here and I don’t know what it is. You wouldn’t leave me. I’m not leaving you.”

  A lab coat hung on the wall. I grabbed it, wrapped it around her and pulled her to standing. Out front there was some kind of hubbub going on. Either the intern and the doctors were arguing about how to deal with me, or the police had arrived. With Misty wounded, the clinic would be the first place to check.

  I steered her toward the rear of the building, scaring more patients in the process. Pushing open an emergency exit, I set off a lame whine of an alarm, but we were out. Despite the cold, Misty wouldn’t hold the lab coat on. I kept having to stop and wrap it around her again. Other than getting us someplace safe, I didn’t want to think about her emotional state, but I couldn’t help it. She looked broken, helpless. Electric syrup pumped through my veins, tearing them open as it went, making me shiver.

  Once they realized we’d left the clinic, the cops would probably focus on the park and the Bones, knowing it’d be stupid for me to try to hide in an LB neighborhood, so that’s where I stayed. I needed a direction, though, an idea, and Misty wasn’t in the mood to offer suggestions.

  After maneuvering some alleys that were cleaner than my office, I spotted an ancient Chevy Nova all by its lonesome, begging to be stolen. I don’t usually steal cars, or anything else for that matter, but whistling for a cab in the middle of the street here wasn’t going to work. Most won’t pick up a chak anywhere.

  A fallen brick took care of the driver-side window. I put Misty in the passenger seat, the briefcase in the trunk, and climbed behind the wheel. Next, I pulled off the plastic column covering the ignition. It wasn’t until I was staring at the three pairs of wires that I realized I’d forgotten how to hotwire a car.

  I grabbed a few, to yank them free, but picked the wrong ones. Nasty sparks rolled into my fingers, making my arm vibrate until I let go. The car filled with a gross smell, like a bad hamburger cooking on a grill. There were black scorch marks on my fingertips, but I didn’t feel much of anything that resembled pain.

  “Red pair’s usually the battery, brown’s the starter,” Misty mumbled.

  I eyed her. “Now you tell me. What do I do with them?”

  She sounded like she didn’t care. Part of her must’ve or she wouldn’t have kept talking. “Twist the red together, then touch the brown ones for a second. Careful you don’t…”

  Another set of sparks, more burning. That time, I felt it.

  “Ow. Careful I don’t touch the brown ones, right?”

  She gave off a weak laugh. That was something, anyway. Almost worth the burn.

  The engine roared to life.

  7

  I doubted there was enough gas to reach any of the major shantytowns where most chakz lived. Besides, between the weekly LB raids involving machetes and rice grinders, and the guard passing through to hunt for chakz who hadn’t shown for their tests, they had enough troubles of their own.

  The closer option was a darling of a cheap motel on the southern outskirts of town called the Deluxe Econo-Sleep, false advertising on all three counts. If a liveblood with a penchant for chakking-up preferred his necrophilia in a bed instead of an alley, it was the place to go. On the plus side, the police treated it like it was in another dimension. We might even get a nice view of the desert out the back, if the windows weren’t painted over.

  It was past midnight when I pulled onto the buckling asphalt of the parking lot. Out front, a blue oval hung from a tilted steel post. The neon that used to spell the name was long gone, angry rust stains dripping down the center. I was expecting it to be quiet, but there were barely any spaces left. Love, or something more contagious, was in the air.

  Misty wasn’t perky, but she was on her feet, walking with me to the office at the end of the L-shaped building. Inside, there was a short line and a familiar face, or I should say half face. The raggedy was here, the girl Chester swerved to miss, arm in arm with a paunchy, slimy-skinned pederast.

  I’d say it was funny how the law worked for chakz, but I’ve yet to laugh. If she died six years ago aged twelve, technically she was eighteen, the age of consent. That’s how the courts saw it anyway, mostly thanks to perverts like billionaire Colby Green, current owner of Nell Parker.

  Misty grabbed my arm to keep me in place, but it took all I had to keep my mouth shut. Of course she didn’t recognize the kid, she was just a blur in the windshield at best. Probably better that way. At least this explained why a raggedy was in that part of town. She’d been meeting her john.

  But here we both were, and I like coincidences about as much as I like child molesters. I wasn’t about to let either go. Hearing the room number the clerk gave them, I reached for my digital recorder to get it down, but my pockets, like Mother Hubbard’s cupboard, were bare. I’d left it in the office. Whispering the number to myself over and over, I let Misty fill in the motel form.

  At least we didn’t raise any eyebrows. Between her clothes, and my good looks, this was the only place in the world we’d pass for a couple. The only problem was that they rented by the hour. I knew she had Chester’s credit card, but didn’t want to mention it because one, it would remind her about Chester, and, two, it could be used to track us.

  We still had some money from the last case, and between us, enough cash for three hours. When I forked over my share, the bespectacled night manager, who looked like a watermelon with suspenders, a greasy head and gray stubble, gave us an impressed whistle.

  “Last guy I had to argue with to pay the full hour. Only wanted fifteen minutes,” he croaked. “Bless your endurance, both of you. Making a video or using some kind of pills?”

  I grabbed the pen from Misty and scribbled the raggedy’s room number on my hand. “Neither.”

  He smiled, showing shreds of some kind of food between his teeth. “No offense. Just asking. I could use some pills myself.”

  “I’ll let you know if I find any.”

  Our room was on the second floor. A thick odor of bleach swept out as soon as I opened the door. The sheets were clean, though sterilized would be a better word and they weren’t Egyptian cotton. The cloth was so thin, the deep depressions and wildly shaped stains on the mattress made it look like a relief map of a mountain range.

  “At least it’s germ-free.”

  Misty, moving faster than she had since the ambush, headed for the window and tried to open it. “The only way this place would be germ-free is if you burned it.”

  I smiled. Not t
hat it was funny, but she seemed a little less shell-shocked. I pulled the cushions off the couch, laid them on the bed and motioned for her to lie down.

  “I doubt anyone uses the couch.”

  She sat on the edge of the bed. “I don’t know if it’s worth it anymore, Hess.”

  “What? You don’t like the room?”

  “No, I mean, anything.”

  I parked myself beside her. “You just got hit in the head with a baseball bat. Not a good time for making plans.”

  “Y’know how you get, staying in your office day after day, doing nothing, like you’re ready to just say fuck it all and give up completely, go feral?” she said. Her eyes bored into me. “And don’t bother telling me that’s not how it is.”

  “All right.”

  “Well, except for the feral part, I finally think I know how you feel.”

  I wasn’t sure that was true, but I wasn’t about to argue the point.

  “Okay, yeah, I’ve been on the darker side lately. Used to be I held on to the crazy idea I might find Lenore’s killer, but that’s done with, other than proving it to Booth and the police, and frankly, I don’t care about that. But, I haven’t gone feral, have I? I figure a lot of the reason is you, the promise we made. We take care of each other, right? Keep each other from falling in the toilet?”

  “Hess, it’s just…never mind.”

  I hesitated, wanted to pet the hair on her head, but didn’t. “Baseball bat, remember? It’s going to hurt a long time, but until it slows down, no decisions, no big investments. Lie down, pretend you’re somewhere else, someplace you can rest.”

  Soon as I stopped talking, thumps from the wall behind the bed filled the room, shaking a torn picture of a crying clown. I wouldn’t call them rhythmic.

  “Well, try to rest,” I said. “You heard the man. The racket won’t last longer than fifteen minutes.”

  I stood up.

  “Where the fuck are you going now?”