by Tracy Sharp
Then I realized that I’d been staring at him and I could feel my face and neck grow hot. He looked back at me as if he were waiting to hear what I was going to say. I glanced away and scanned the rest of the room. “No offense, but I guess I expected more from a former attorney. You know, bigger. Fancier.”
“None taken. I just don’t see the need for anything more. This place suits me just fine.”
His bed sat on the left side of the room. It was queen-sized and made up with a red, green and white tartan pattern. Very masculine. I wondered how comfortable it was. Feeling him watching me, I pulled my eyes from the bed and turned back to him.
He grinned. “Wanna try it out?”
“Yes, I do. Right now we have bigger fish to fry. There actually is a reason I showed up here other than wanting to jump your bones.”
He sighed. “I thought you’d say that. A guy can hope. You want coffee or a beer or something?” He was fumbling through niceties, clearly not used to having guests. Either that or he just wanted me the hell out of there. This was entirely possible since I’d caused him nothing but trouble since the day he’d met me.
“No, thanks.” I bent and unclipped Buddy’s leash from his collar, signaling to him that he could wander freely if he so chose.
“What are you doing?” The pitch of his voice rose.
“It’s cool. I’m just letting him know that he can relax.”
He watched Buddy take himself on a tour of his one room apartment, sniffing and inspecting various objects.
“He’s not going to pee on anything, is he?”
“I don’t know. I’ve never taken him visiting before. But so far he’s been very well mannered. I guess we’ll just have to wait and see. Hope for the best.”
Callahan failed to see the humor. He reluctantly looked away from Buddy and his gaze landed on me. “So what’s up?”
“I got a call from Woodard. That’s what’s up. He thanked me for sending the cops over to that house, but said that they didn’t find anything. He also threatened my brother.”
He tilted his head back and closed his eyes. “Oh, shit.”
“Yeah, that was my reaction, too. Maybe not so subtle. I went to see an old friend. He thinks Woodard’s bluffing about hurting Jesse. None of Woodard’s minions would be in the same type of prison as Jesse. So I don’t think he can really get to him as long as he’s in there. My friend thinks it’s just a terror tactic.”
“Let’s hope so.”
I let out a long breath. “I never thought I’d say this, but I wish Jesse was in longer. I’m going to have to watch him like a hawk when he’s out.”
Callahan nodded, remaining silent. He looked bothered, clenching and unclenching his jaw as his eyes skittered around the floor.
I continued, “Anyway, the cops didn’t find anything. So they haven’t seen any evidence of the women who were smuggled over.” I took a breath to slow my heart. I was getting really pissed off again. “Cal, you know he’s using those women as prostitutes and for porn.”
He nodded slowly, his face resigned. “I know.”
“I can’t let it go. Can you?”
He was silent for a long moment. In his face I could see some kind of inner battle going on. I was pretty certain his conscience was putting up a hell of a fight.
Finally he spoke, his jaw set. “No.”
“Okay, then.” I reached around and pulled my 9 mm from where it rested between the snug waistband of my jeans and my lower back. I held it up for a moment before putting it back. “Let’s go.”
“No,” Callahan said, crossing the room to his desk to open the top right hand drawer. He reached in and pulled out a leg holster and a shiny .45 caliber automatic which he rested on the desk top. He strapped the holster to his lower leg and tucked the .45 into it as if he’d done this a hundred times. He grinned at me. “Well, don’t look so shocked. I told you that being a defense attorney was dangerous.”
“Apparently.”
He pulled the leg of his jeans over the holster to hide the gun. He straightened up, the grin gone from his face. “Now, let’s go.”
* * *
This time we parked the red Mustang several blocks away and hoofed it to Jarrett Street. We knew he couldn’t have moved the Asian women far, since Woodard was like a spider and didn’t move away from his familiar territory. We crouched on the rooftop of an old abandoned movie theater which sat facing kitty corner to the house the women had been brought to. The rooftop afforded us a clear view of almost the entire street, so we figured it wouldn’t be long before we discovered where the women had been taken.
We sat with binoculars pointed to the street and slowly scanned both sides of the road carefully. It was pretty much status quo for the most part, hookers getting into cars and coming back ten or fifteen minutes later, drug deals going down. I imagined that Woodard owned several of the buildings on this street. In addition to being a drug lord and pimp, he was also the neighborhood slumlord. The abandoned theater rooftop we crouched on was probably one of the few buildings he didn’t own. I shuddered to think what other activities occurred in the other buildings he did own.
There was movement at Woodard’s house. One of his underlings came out and called the pit bull guards away from their stoop on the front stairs. He took them around to the back of the house where he closed them in the backyard behind a metal gate.
He then went back into the house. After a moment, Woodard emerged with another underling in tow and they began their trek along the strip, gathering the day shift’s earnings.
“Well, that’s interesting,” I said. “Looks like Woodard’s afraid of his own dogs.”
“Aaaw, maybe he was bitten by one as a kid,” Cal offered. That could traumatize a person, you know.”
“Apparently so.”
The longer I watched Woodard, the hotter my blood boiled. I got so angry that despite the fading daylight, the colors on the street became so bright I could hardly stand it. My head began to throb. I dug into the fanny pack I’d strapped around my waist and pulled out a tiny bottle of aspirin. I shook two into my hand and tossed them into my mouth, chewing and swallowing them dry.
Callahan pulled his binoculars away from his face and grimaced. “That’s gross, Leah.”
“Yeah? So’s a gaping head wound. Keep watching the street.”
Callahan looked so cute when he was shocked. I guess I’m not the type of woman he’d be interested in. I figured that was a good thing, since we had to work together and mixing business with pleasure rarely worked out for the best. Besides, we couldn’t afford to get distracted.
After about an hour of watching the street below, I’d become increasingly more interested in the old Victorian the women had been brought to. There appeared to be the same amount of traffic coming and going from the place and it wasn’t the typical traffic that a drug house might have. Many of the men were the same men who’d come and gone when we’d sat in the car watching the house.
“Are you thinking what I’m thinking?” I lowered the binoculars and looked at Cal, my pulse speeding up as realization dawned on me.
“Son of a bitch.” Cal kept peering into his binoculars. “He’s moved them right back into that house.”
“Why risk losing business by causing your clients the inconvenience of having to find the other house, when all he had to do was move them back to that one.”
“He’s bold. He’s really bold.” He lowered his binoculars and looked at me with unbelieving eyes.
“Yeah, well sometimes being too bold gets you into trouble.”
“You can say that again.” The voice came from behind us and sounded amused.
We both whirled and stood at the same time, bringing ourselves face to face with three of Woodard’s favorite cronies. There wasn’t much light on that rooftop, except for moonlight and a little thrown from the street lights, but by now we’d have known Woodard’s friends in pitch blackness, by the smell if not anything else. The leader of the pack, short a
nd stocky with a buzz cut, reeked. The man had the worst taste in cologne I’d ever smelled, so strong he must have bathed in the stuff. His two friends stood back aways, obviously just back-up. Buzz-cut was the one to administer punishment, it seemed.
I couldn’t believe it. How the hell did they get up there so fast? How did we not notice? Woodard and friends seemed to know where we were at all times and he could appear and disappear like smoke. It was almost supernatural.
Buzz-cut’s laugh had the gleeful ring of a child’s laughter, high pitched and a little crazy. I had the feeling he was more than a little tweaked. He was completely off his nut.
“You shouldn’t of messed with Mr. Woodard.”
Shouldn’t of messed with him? Jesus. The guy needed grammar lessons. Being a thug was no excuse for slaughtering the English language. I just hate it when people slaughter the English language. Whether you’re a crook or a doctor, we’ve all been taught the basics. It’s weird how even in a bad situation, little things like that can bug you.
Even though Buzz-cut and his minions were mostly just silhouettes, I could see the shape of something long and cylindrical in Buzz-cut’s hand. A crowbar. I was sure the two other men were holding guns in their hands. I guessed Buzz-cut wanted to have a little fun before they shot us dead. He was the kind of guy who liked his murder to include a lot of pain. He brought the crowbar down lightly on his hand several times, and the tap tap tap tap sound was having the desired effect on me. I was nervous. The weight of my 9 mm against my lower back kept me from getting really scared. Only problem was, Buzz-cut’s buddies already had their guns drawn.
“You know, you’re one tenacious chick. First you take Woodard’s car, and then he hadda threaten you. Then you send the cops after us, and he threatened you again, with your brother’s health, no less. And here you are, still dicking with us.” He shook his head. “So tell me the truth. You can’t be surprised to see us.”
“No,” I replied. “But I am surprised that you know what tenacious means.”
Out of the corner of my eye, I could see Callahan shaking his head slowly.
“Oh, I’m going to enjoy this. A lot,” Buzz-cut said, advancing toward us.
“Time to play,” I said to Callahan. He got my drift and I felt his arm brush against me as he reached down toward his leg holster.
The ever-gathering dark was a friend to us, giving me cover as I reached behind myself and grasped my gun, feeling the heat of the metal against my skin. Cal and I cocked our guns almost simultaneously and pointed them toward Buzz-cut. He stopped walking, crowbar suspended just above his palm.
“I wouldn’t try it if I were you.” Cal’s voice was low. I’d never heard him sound so deadly calm and serious.
“What, we going to have us a regular Wild West shoot-out here?” Buzz-cut sounded amused.
“Well, chum, we might, but you won’t be around to see it,” I said.
“Oh? And why’s that?”
“Because we’re going to shoot your ass off first, then we’ll go after the two other stooges.”
I could see the two other stooges shifting from leg to leg. They hadn’t expected us to have guns.
“Screw you. You’re not going to shoot me.”
I took a step toward him, then another, until I was a foot away from him and could smell stale booze and cigarettes, even urine. “You so sure?”
“Yeah, bitch. I’m sure.”
“You’re right. I’m not going to shoot you. Not right now, anyway.”
He laughed too loudly, tossing a look back at his buddies. He looked back at me, his eyes shining in the light of a neon sign below. “I know you’re not, cuz you’re just a useless whore. Just like all women are. Hey, Mr. Woodard could give you a job.” He looked me up and down. “You’d bring in a pretty penny.” He brought his crowbar up between my legs and moved it back and forth.
“I said I wasn’t going to shoot you.” I brought my knee smashing up between his legs. “But I am going to mess you up.”
His eyes widened and his mouth opened and closed several times, but no sound came out. He bent over, retching and gagging. I moved to stand beside him, watching him and enjoying the show. I looked over at his friends who stood staring in disbelief. Their guns were held much lower than they’d been before. “Just like a bully. All talk. Your buddies aren’t helping you. Have you noticed?”
“Shoot them.” His voice was a croak.
They both raised their guns … hesitantly.
“You really don’t want to start something with me.” Callahan’s voice was calm and steady. “You’ll leave this rooftop in body bags. Trust me.”
“You filthy bitch,” Buzz-cut said through gritted teeth.
He swung his arm and the crowbar glinted under the moonlight. I hadn’t seen him switch the crowbar to his other hand, and although I side-stepped quickly, I wasn’t quite fast enough. The crowbar got me under the jaw at the last second and my mouth snapped shut so hard I felt my teeth rattle. I stumbled back a few steps, feeling my jaw where he’d hit me. The jaw wasn’t broken but I was going to have one hell of a nasty bruise. And I could feel a sharp edge where one a tooth had chipped. This pissed me off because I had no dental insurance.
I saw Callahan raise his .45 but I held up my hand, backing him off. I heard him curse. He didn’t shoot but he kept Buzz-cut in his sights.
Buzz-cut grunted and straightened up, getting his second wind.
I blocked out the pain as Jack had taught me. Everything became hyper-focused, my senses razor sharp. I whirled around and landed a kick to his side. There was a sharp cracking sound. He shrieked high up in his throat but didn’t go down. I hadn’t expected him to. He was bent over a little, consumed by the pain of his newly cracked rib. I stepped back, brought my leg up full force and booted him in the gut. He went down on both knees and threw up on the ground in front of him.
I shook my head. “Now see? This is what happens when bullies don’t learn to fight and have other people doing their dirty work for them. The only time you beat people up is when your friends here hold them in place with a gun, isn’t that right? Just the same as with your boss. Tell him if he wants me, he’s going to have to come and get me himself and not be such a pussy.”
“You’d better kill me now, because you’re going to wish you had.”
I considered his words and I knew they were true. Still, I couldn’t kill him. And I couldn’t kill Woodard. It hadn’t gotten that bad yet. It was bad for the druggies and prostitutes who worked for him on the streets. It was bad for the Asian women who’d come here on a promise of a better life and who were now working as hookers and low budget porn stars for whatever scraps of food Woodard tossed at them. It had gotten that bad for them. It hadn’t gotten bad enough for me to have the courage to put out his lights permanently.
The first chance Woodard got, he’d come after me for real. I didn’t have it in me to kill him. Not yet.
I hoped to have the courage do it when I had to.
Chapter Sixteen
We left them on the roof like that. Buzz-cut doubled over, snarling threats through clenched teeth. His two cronies hovered over him like a couple of nursemaids, clearly afraid of the shit-kicking they’d be subjected to once Buzz-cut was able to get off that roof and make a phone call to Woodard who would oblige in dishing out their punishment.
“Dump trucks,” I said, under my breath.
“What? Where?”
“No, it’s a substitute for ‘dumb . . . ‘F’ words.”
“Ah. Okay.”
We didn’t say much else on the way back to my place. I tried to keep the needle below sixty on the surface roads, but it was hard. The adrenalin was still pumping through me, making me want to push the gas pedal to the floor and just fly through the night.
“Slow down,” Cal said. “You’re going to get a ticket or kill somebody.”
“I should’ve killed somebody. He’s going to come back at us or someone we love.”
From the
corner of my eye I could see his face turn to me. “What, so you want to be a murderer now?”
“No. If I wanted to be a murderer, that asshole would be dead. I’m well aware that there will be repercussions for the ass-whopping I gave him.”
He grew quiet and I could almost hear his thoughts. He was wondering how he’d ended up in this mess. Probably regretting the day he’d repo’d my Jeep. Wishing he’d never laid eyes on me. I couldn’t blame him. I’d turned his life upside down and put him, myself, and my brother in jeopardy. Somebody had to help those women.
“We still have that bike at the depot?”
“Yeah.” Then he shook his head. “No.”
“Come on. Who’s going to care? I need to go for a ride, Cal. I’ve got to get some of this tension out.”
He sighed. “I guess it wouldn’t hurt. Please. I’m begging you. Don’t crash it.”
“Cal. Have a little faith in me, would you? Have I ever steered you wrong?” I flashed him a grin.
He chuckled in spite of himself. “My life sure hasn’t been boring since you came around. I’ll give you that.”
“That’s worth a ride on the bike, isn’t it?”
“Yeah,” he said. “Why not?”
“That’s the spirit.”
* * *
We dropped the car off at the repo depot and exchanged it for the sleek bike Jack had made for the dorky loser who didn’t deserve it. It might be petty, but it bothers me when beautiful machines such as that bike and the gorgeous Rubicon Jeep Wrangler fall into the hands of spoiled brats who would never appreciate them.
Oh yeah, I’m bitter.
I needed to drive and Cal sensed this, so there was no argument from him when I donned a helmet and climbed onto the front part of the seat.
“I’m surprised you wear a helmet. You seem like such a daredevil,” Cal said, placing the other helmet over his head.
“I may be crazy, but I’m not stupid. Ever see a head that’s been smashed all over the road?