All The Way Back

by David Kearns

  Chapter Twelve

  After a while I followed Eccles down the beach. He had a quarter mile head start on me, and while I walked faster than he did, he still made it to his car and left the parking lot before I exited the beach. The shadow of the bald eagle crossed my path as I walked up the zigzag road to my house. I guess it was feeding time for the eagle, and possibly for Peck, too.

  When I reached my house, Sandy was drinking coffee at the kitchen table and looking at a small laptop computer. She peered at the computer screen through half-moon shaped reading glasses and wore white cotton shorts and a pink blouse that looked like it was made of silk. I walked over to the kitchen table and stood by Sandy’s chair. She was reading a story on her computer about Peck building the casino in Newport.

  “Who’s your friend?” Sandy asked. “I was on the deck a minute ago and saw you following him down the beach. He looks like a cop.”

  “That’s Detective Eccles. He’s investigating what happened to Randall Burton and my parents.”

  “He didn’t put handcuffs on you. That seems like a plus.”

  “He’s got me cold on the Burton thing. He says he’ll leave me alone if I leave Peck alone.”

  “Why?”

  “Because Eccles doesn’t want to prosecute someone who was twelve years old when he defended himself against a professional killer. And he doesn’t want me to go after Peck, because it would create problems if it surfaced later that Eccles knew I’d killed one of Peck’s thugs and he didn’t try to keep me from going after Peck, too.”

  “What a mess,” Sandy said.

  “Indeed.”

  “You don’t seem too worried.”

  “People keep telling me that. It’s making me think I should worry more.”

  “Possibly.”

  “You seem very Zen, Sandy,” I said. “I notice that you’re not taking pills to cope any more.”

  “Those pills were artificial shortcuts that I used to cover the sadness I felt about my career and my self image. I’m trying to find better ways to be at peace with myself.”

  “That sounds like something a person in therapy would say,” I said.

  “Right as rain. Still true though.”

  “So what’s your alternative?”

  “Well, I exercise more, pay attention to my diet, no pills, and don’t drink so much. I also stopped letting people, particularly men, take advantage of me.”

  “It’s hard to imagine any man taking advantage of you,” I said.

  Sandy looked at me over the tops of her reading glasses. “Plenty of people put up a front like they’re strong and independent, but they’re really pushovers,” Sandy said. “And then they hate themselves afterwards.”

  I thought about that for a moment.

  “Seriously,” she said. “I wanted to be liked so much that if you’d made a pass at me before, I wouldn’t have been able to say ‘yes’ fast enough.”

  “I’m kicking myself mentally,” I said.

  “You’d have to try a whole lot harder now,” she said. “I’m much more discriminating than I used to be.”

  “Seems well worth the effort to try.”

  “You bet it is.”

  “Well, whatever you’re doing agrees with you,” I said. “You have an inner glow and seem cool as a cucumber. Maybe you should write a self-help book.”

  “I’ll give that some thought. Now that I’ve got my affirmation out of the way, what are you doing for the rest of the day?”

  “Eric asked me to check on a lady in WITSEC who’s convinced she was being watched. I’ve been following her around and keeping an eye on her house for a while and haven’t seen anything. I was going over to tell her that I think she probably doesn’t have anything to worry about.”

  “Can I come? Since I need to watch your back and all.”

  “Of course.”

  “Are the seats in your convertible big enough for my bustle?”

  “The seats will coddle your bustle like a Fabergé egg,” I said.

  She stood up from the kitchen table and looked at me across the short space that separated us.

  “If I didn’t know better, I’d say that you’re obsessed with my bustle,” she said. I noticed that she’d applied mascara that highlighted the blue of her eyes.

  “I wouldn’t say that it’s an obsession,” I said. “At least, it’s not an obsession that’s crippled me yet.”

  “My bustle is off-limits to you, mister,” she said. “I have standards.”

  “I’ll keep that in mind.”

  She nodded once. “See that you do,” she said.

  She turned and walked through the living room. Then she stood at the doorway to her bedroom and looked back at me as if she were thinking of saying something, maybe something important, but then she didn’t say anything at all. She looked down for a moment before going into the bedroom and quietly closing the door.

  I got the thirty-eight special out of the nightstand in my bedroom and then waited by the big picture window for Sandy to come back to the kitchen. I looked past the asphalt-tiled rooftops of my downhill neighbors at the dark green ocean and the foamy surf at the base of the bird sanctuary. I saw a pair of elderly tourists get folding beach chairs out of the trunk of a car in the parking lot at the bottom of the hill and then hold hands as they walked down to the beach. I watched people stand patiently in line outside the entrance to Josephine’s restaurant. They were talking and laughing, occasionally waving their hands in an animated way. I felt the jarring mental sensation that comes along with preparing for war within sight of other people who are on vacation. You feel as if you are simultaneously living in two different worlds, and not for the better.

  Sandy came out of her bedroom. She’d put on a pair of tennis shoes whose color matched her shorts, and she was carrying the same lethal-looking weapon she’d had when she was doing her workout in the living room: a Mossberg 500 pump-action shotgun with a pistol grip attachment. She toted the gun as casually as if it were a sack of groceries.

  “You strapped?” she asked me.

  I lifted my tee shirt to show the handle of the gun in my waistband.

  “You gotta be pretty close to hit anything with a barrel that short,” she said.

  “I’m pretty accurate out to fifty feet or so. It just feels right in my hand.”

  She shrugged. “To each his own,” she said.

  My cell phone buzzed. I didn’t recognize the number.

  “Hello.”

  “It’s Anthony Peck. Is this Delorean Harper?”

  “That’s right.”

  “We need to talk,” he said. “I’m sending a car for you. It should be there soon.” I don’t know what I’d been expecting his voice to sound like, but it had an Oklahoma drawl to it. When he said the word ‘talk’ it sounded like ‘tawk.’

  “We’re talking now,” I said. “What do you want?”

  “We need to talk in person,” he said.

  “Really? Why’s that?”

  “Some business is best done face to face.”

  “I have an idea,” I said. “There’s a police station in Tillamook. Meet me in the lobby in an hour. Of course, if you’re too much of a coward to meet me there, I understand.”

  “That’s a pretty salty thing to say,” Peck said.

  “If you don’t like the police station, they have amateur cage fights in Newport on Saturday night. That’s your home turf, right? You want to step into the ring with me, we can talk all you want. Of course, if you’re too much of a coward, I understand.”

  “You keep the attitude up and I’m going to burn you down,” Peck said.

  I heard Sandy say “Is everything okay?”

  “That won’t happen,” I said. “You were with Randall Burton when he killed my parents, right? He was working for you and that was your car in the driveway, wasn’t it?”

  “I’d be very careful about making accusations like that,” he said. “I’ll have you in front of a judge if you say that in publ
ic.”

  “No you won’t,” I replied, “because my claim would become part of the public record, you could be forced to testify, and the state gaming commission would take an interest. That won’t play well with your investors.”

  “Let me make myself clear,” he said. “You make trouble for me about this Burton thing, you’ll wish you were never born.” He said the word ‘born’ like ‘bone.’

  I surprised myself by actually laughing out loud.

  “Are you threatening me, Anthony?” I asked.

  “I repeat, if you make trouble for me I’ll hunt you down and make you pay,” he said. “Believe it.”

 

  “Bring it, then,” I said. I killed the connection.

  I let out a big breath.

  “Was that Peck?” Sandy asked.

  “Yeah.”

  “What did he want?”

  “He wanted a face-to-face meeting and said he’s sending a car to pick me up. I don’t see how I can be around him without it getting physical. I wanted to reach through the phone and tear his throat out.”

  “I heard. I think you should avoid him,” Sandy said. “Eric said that Peck’s a pretty big deal. Could be a career-ender.”

  I laughed. “Career? What career?”

  “I just mean that Peck’s organization is like an octopus, and a lot of it is legitimate. You go after him and the feds won’t look the other way. It would be like taking down a crooked governor. There’d be so much heat that the police would have to do something even if they’re actually glad he’s gone.”

  “Probably true,” I said.

  “I don’t think you’re going to be able to avoid him, though,” she said.

  “Why’s that?”

  “You insulted him, and you challenged him to make good on his threats. He’s not going to take that lying down.”

  “Neither am I, and now he knows that. I wanted him to think twice about bothering me.”

  “The irresistible force and the immovable object,” Sandy said.

  “Are you saying that you think I’m irresistible?” I said. I smiled.

  “If I thought it, I’d never admit it,” Sandy said. “You’re hard enough to live with as it is.”

  We went out to the Mustang. Sandy put her gun on the back seat and covered it with a dark towel. We’d driven about three miles and were in the small beach community of Netarts when a black SUV went by in the opposite direction. Sandy twisted in her seat to watch them as they went by.

  “That car did a U-turn after we went past,” Sandy said. “Looks like Peck kept his word.”

  “I saw.”

  “What’s the plan?” she asked.

  “I don’t want them to follow us to Emily’s house. I’m going to a bar.”

  “Seriously?”

  “There are a few bars in Tillamook. Let’s pick one, go inside, and see if they follow us in. It’s a public place, so there’s a better chance that they’ll keep it civil.”

  “You sure about this?”

  “I’m sure. I don’t want these people to know where Emily French’s house is, and I don’t want a confrontation with no witnesses, either.”

  We headed for the Ocean’s End bar on Third Street.

  As we approached the parking lot for the bar, Sandy turned in her seat to look out the back window. “They’re still back there,” she said.

  “Like we thought they’d be.”

  “Aren’t you worried about civilian casualties?” she asked. “This could get ugly.”

  “We’re leaving the guns in the car,” I said.

  “What if they don’t?”

  “You may have to unleash the bustle.”

  “I thought you said that you weren’t obsessed with my bustle.”

  “I’m trying my best to stay strong,” I said.

  We parked the Mustang by backing into a parking place so the nose of the car was pointing out. Sandy had a black satin handbag in the back seat and reached for it after she got out. I tucked the thirty-eight special under the floor mat before I left the car.

  Sandy slid her arm through mine as we walked towards the bar. When her purse bumped against my hip I felt something hard.

  “What have you got in your purse?” I asked.

  “Play your cards right and you might find out,” she said.

  “Something to look forward to.”

  Sandy took a quick look over her shoulder as I opened the door to the bar. She said “The Suburban that’s been following us just pulled into the parking lot.”

  It was a warm, sunny day, but it was cool and dimly lit in the bar. The place smelled faintly of cigarettes, beer, and cedar. The room was rectangle-shaped, with an oak bar running the length of one long wall. There was heavy wool carpeting on the floor, faded grey wood paneling, and circular padded booths against the walls. Between the bar and the booths there were a half dozen oak tables, each with four chairs. None of the tables had anyone sitting at them. There was an unused pool table against the far wall with a light hanging over the table that advertised Rainier beer in stained glass lettering. At the end of the bar near the pool table, two large men dressed in construction worker’s clothing and baseball caps watched football on a flat screen mounted high on the wall. Joe Namath and the New York Jets were playing the Baltimore Colts in Super Bowl Three. The video had the kind of grainy quality and washed-out color you’d expect from forty years in the past.

  The two construction workers glanced at Sandy and then looked at each other as if they’d just seen a movie star. Sandy and I took seats on round, rotating barstools just a few steps from the door. She had her purse on her lap and was turned to the right so she could see who followed us in. I was facing left, so I had a view of Sandy and the two construction workers.

  The bartender was a tall, heavyset man with thinning grey hair and a full beard. He wore a white, long sleeved shirt with black pants and had red suspenders stretched tight across the substantial girth of his stomach. He came over and placed cardboard drink coasters on the oak bar top in front of us. I watched the two men who’d followed us inside take a table about a dozen feet from where we sat.

  “What can I get for you and your lady friend?” the bartender asked. His name tag said “Jerry.”

  Stout beer was on tap and I ordered one. Sandy said “Jerry, I am overheated. I need the coldest, driest martini you can make.” Then she gave him a big smile. She didn’t smile often, but when she did it was dazzling.

  The bartender’s eyes swelled as if someone had hooked a bicycle pump to them. Then he smiled back at Sandy before turning away to get her drink started.

  “Are you trying to give the bartender a heart attack?” I asked. “I saw the smile you gave him.”

  “Not yet,” she said. Then she reached up with her thumb and index finger and popped the top button on her blouse. Several inches of cleavage appeared.

  “Abracadabra,” I said.

  “Hocus Pocus,” she replied. “The tool bags who followed us in here look like they probably carry most of their brains in their pants. I thought I’d see if I could control their tiny minds with my anatomy.”

  I couldn’t help but laugh.

  Sandy shifted her position on her barstool so that her knees pressed against both sides of one of my legs. Then she rested one hand on my thigh as she reached into her purse.

  “The drinks are on me,” she said, and she slapped a money clip down on the bar. She raised her voice and said “Jerry, I’d like to buy a round for the gents at the end of the bar, too.”

  The two workmen raised their glasses off the bar in a salute of appreciation. The one sitting closer to us had a week’s growth of reddish beard. He looked our way, nodded his head, and then smiled. I nodded back, and he turned his attention back to the football game.

  The bartender put our drinks on the coasters, sat a polished stainless bowl of party mix on the countertop in front of Sandy and me, and then he went over to get refills for the two workmen.

  At
that point, the two who’d followed us inside got up from their table. They could have been coming over to talk to the bartender, but I didn’t think so. They were tall, lean, and solidly built mid-thirties dudes with straight postures. They had short haircuts, black shoes with rubber soles under their jeans, and pressed white dress shirts worn untucked. One looked Eastern European, with black hair trimmed to a short ducktail in back and formed to a point over his forehead like the prow of a boat. He had eyebrows that nearly met in the middle over his nose and had a tattoo on the outside of his right forearm that looked like a skull head attached to a dagger. The other guy had pockmarked facial skin, blond hair shaved completely off the sides of his head with half an inch left on top, and a thin-lipped mouth that made him look a bit frog-like. Both men seemed relaxed, and had their hands hanging loose at their sides as they strolled over. Sandy picked up her drink with one hand and slid her free hand inside her purse again.

  The two of them stood close to Sandy and me, as if they didn’t want our conversation to be overheard, or maybe they just wanted to pin us against the bar so we couldn’t run away. They were definitely invading our space. I could have reached out and touched the one with the big eyebrows.

  The one with frog lips talked first. “Mr. Peck wants to talk to you,” he said. He jutted his chin towards me. His voice was high-pitched and seemed out of place in someone his size. The one with the big eyebrows changed his stance slightly so that he could watch the door and the workmen at the other end of the bar at the same time.

  I shrugged and took another sip of my beer. It tasted of caramel, cocoa, coffee, and brown sugar. Just right for a summer afternoon.

  “Mr. Peck already talked to me,” I said. “Just a few minutes ago. Didn’t he tell you?”

  Frog Lips and Eyebrows looked at each other briefly. Frog Lips said “I’ll go check that.”

  “See that you do, Kermit,” I said.

  Frog Lips gave me a hard look, and then the two of them went back over to their table. I saw the one with the big eyebrows get out his cellphone.

  Sandy said “You know they’re going to be back in a couple minutes.”

  “I know,” I said. “I wanted time to finish my beer before we rumble.”

  Sandy said. “This isn’t West Side Story, Del.”

  “Wasn’t it the Jets and the Sharks in West Side Story?” I said. “By coincidence, the Jets are on the flat screen over the bar. Maybe that means we’re the Sharks.”

  “God, you’re strange,” Sandy said. She shook her head, smiled a little, and drank some of her martini.

  “Strange but likable,” I said. “How’s the mind control experiment on the two tool bags going?” I asked. “They seem to be staying on task so far.”

  “It’s only a matter of time,” Sandy said. “I may have to unleash the bustle.”

  “No man can withstand the power of the bustle,” I said. “Have mercy.”

  “I’ll hold off on the bustle for now,” Sandy said. “If you insist.” Then she popped the next button on her blouse. Unrestrained by the silk blouse, her chest swelled visibly to devastating effect. Another couple inches of cleavage materialized above the shiny white fabric on her push-up brassiere.

  I thumped myself in the chest and coughed as if I’d inhaled smoke.

  “I thought you were immune to my charms,” she said.

  “Like a rock,” I replied.

  “Oh?” she said, cocking one eyebrow. “I may have to unleash the bustle after all, then. That brass pole at the end of the bar looks inviting. I can see if Jerry would mind some gymnastics.”

  I looked into her blue eyes and saw ribald humor, intelligence, and fearlessness all mixed together.

  “You’re one of a kind,” I said. “I mean that.”

  “It’s about time you noticed,” she said. “Shame that I practically had to strip to get your attention.”

  “I’m suffering here, too,” I deadpanned. “Against the onslaught of your ripe and overwhelming beauty.”

  “Ripe and overwhelming? Are you saying I’m fat?”

  I shook my head. “You’re a tidal wave of feminine charm.”

  I took several long pulls on my beer and then put the empty glass down on the countertop. I waved over the bartender, who’d been watching the football game at the far end of the counter.

  The bartender was one of those men who looked fat at first glance but was probably strong as an ox. His arms looked suitable for moving pianos around. I held up my beer glass and said “Could I get another of these, please?”

  “Absolutely,” he said. “Anything else for the lady?”

  “Would her ladyship like another martini?” I asked.

  Sandy batted her eyelashes at Jerry. “Jerry,” she said. “Your martinis are so good that I’m still savoring this one. Maybe another couple minutes.” Then she gave him a wink. Jerry took a furtive look at Sandy’s décolletage before smiling the big smile and going over to the pump to refill my beer.

  “I think your mind control experiment is working,” I said. “Jerry is smitten.”

  Sandy took another taste of her martini. She held one pinkie away from the stem of her glass as if she were at a tea party for royalty.

  “I’d rather be looked over than overlooked,” she said.

  “Mae West said that, right?”

  “Very good.”

  “How’s your drink?” I asked.

  “It’s actually excellent,” she said.

  The two men got up from their table and came back over, resuming the positions they’d had before.

  “You got to come with us,” the one with the frog lips said. I ignored him.

  The bartender came back with my beer.

  “Are these two bothering you?” the bartender said.

  I looked at Frog Lips. “Are you bothering me?” I said. “Yeah. You are. Everything about you offends me.”

  At that point, the one with the big eyebrows turned to look at me. Then Sandy took in a big breath and held it, straining both the brassiere and the fabric on her shirt to the breaking point.

  I heard the one with the eyebrows say “God,” under his breath. It sounded like he said “Gott.”

  “This is no joke. You have to come with us,” Frog Lips said.

  “Are you deaf, Kermit?” I asked. “Do I need to use sign language to communicate with you? Beat it.”

  “Mister Anthony Peck wants to have a conversation with you,” Frog Lips said. “It’s going to happen.”

  “Could be,” I said. “But not today, and not because you’re giving orders. Go back to your boss and tell him that I said his best option is to back off. Yours, too, for that matter.”

  The bartender had a deep voice. He pointed at the two men and said “You two either order something to drink and sit down, or both of you get the hell out. Stop bothering the other customers. You hear me?”

  Frog Lips gave the bartender a hard look and then met my stare head-on. He laughed mirthlessly. “Don’t threaten me, and don’t threaten Mister Peck, either.” At that point the one with the eyebrows shifted his feet to face Sandy and me directly, like he wanted to be able to throw a punch without turning his body first.

  “Did your mother wean you off breastfeeding too early?” Sandy said loudly enough to be heard throughout the bar. “Is that why you won’t stop staring at my boobs?”

  “I thought it was advertising,” the one with the eyebrows said. “You’re a working girl, right?”

  The bartender turned around and bent over as if he was reaching for something under the cash register. I clenched the rim of the metal party mix bowl in my fist.

  Sandy screamed “Get your hands off me!” and threw her martini in the face of Frog Lips. Out of the corner of my eye I saw the two workmen come off of their stools.

  Eyebrows’ hand moved for something behind his back. I pivoted on the stool and swung the metal bowl at the side of his head as hard as I could. Party mix flew, and the bowl made a loud, hollow, gonging
sound when I made contact. I felt the impact all the way up my arm and into my neck. Eyebrows staggered back, dropped a folding knife, and put his hands to his face like he was trying to keep the contents of his head from exploding.

  I saw Sandy’s hand come out of her purse, and she popped Frog Lips squarely in the crotch. He grunted and bent at the waist as Sandy came off her barstool, brass knuckles shining on her right hand.

  The two workmen plowed through the oak tables and chairs that blocked their path to Sandy, sending furniture flying out of the way as they came to join the fray.

  I jumped off my barstool, too, took a quick step, and stomp-kicked Eyebrows in the sternum, putting the force of all my momentum into the heel of my right foot. He slammed into the cedar-paneled wall behind him and stayed there as if he’d been nailed to the wood.

  Sandy stepped forward as she threw her second punch and hit Frog Lips in the mouth. The two workmen arrived as Frog Lips staggered back, slamming him to the ground like linemen taking down a quarterback. Then the workmen started raining blows on him.

  The bartender slapped a baseball bat onto the countertop. The bat made a sound like a gunshot when it struck the oak bar top.

  We all froze. Then the bartender lifted the bat off the countertop and pointed it at the two workmen.

  “Y’all stop,” he said. “These two probably needed a beating, but you’ve already given ‘em that, and you ain’t killin’ ‘em in my bar. Everyone who can walk, get out now. I’ll call an ambulance for the rest.”

  The workmen pushed off against Frog Lips’ flattened form and got to their feet. Sandy buttoned her shirt, pulled a stack of twenties from the money clip, and left the bills on the bar top.

  “See you around, Jerry,” she said.

  “I hope so, Ma’am,” he said.

  “See you boys,” she said. The workmen, chests still heaving from the effort of beating the hell out of Frog Lips, just nodded.