Declination

by Gregory Ashe

  “And judging by the plants, somebody drove through here not too long ago.” Shaw touched a broken branch, pressing back leaves to show where a thicker stalk had bent under the weight of a vehicle. “Want to take a look?”

  North laid a finger over his lips, and together they slipped through the line of bushes. After another ten yards, the road cleared again where the shade from the tall trees prevented brush from encroaching. The gravel was easier to see too, a faintly gleaming white trail that led through the weeds. Between the trees ahead, Shaw could see a small yellow house and a dark car.

  When they got closer, Shaw could tell the small house had been abandoned for years. The car, on the other hand, looked old but well maintained. On the back, the familiar Cadillac insignia marked the trunk.

  “Keys?” North said.

  Shaw lay on his back and wriggled under the car. Nothing. A moment later, the car rocked slightly and North called, “Found them. Stashed under the hood.”

  “What now?” Shaw asked as he squirmed out from under the sedan.

  North dangled the keys from one finger as he stared north, in the direction of the winery. “What are the odds that Waggener and Taylor know we’re here?”

  Shaw shrugged. “I don’t think she likes them or trusts them, but if they come down here and press her, I think she’ll tell them. She’s known them longer than she’s known us, and no matter how much she suspects her husband and them of doing something wrong, that relationship might win out.”

  “And she’ll tell them that we went for a walk.”

  Shaw grimaced. “Probably.”

  “Which means we can’t leave the DeVille here.”

  “It would be a risk.”

  “So we take it back to the city and hide it somewhere.” North seemed to consider the logic again, and then he spun the keys and glanced at Shaw. “Thoughts?”

  Shaw just nodded.

  The Caddy started up with a nice rumble, and North steered them back out the way they had come, rolling slowly over the tangle of honeysuckle and then hesitating on the shoulder until he was sure the highway was clear. Then they bumped out onto the road, and North shot them up to the winery, pulling in so that they could pick up the GTO and drive both cars back.

  Everything went wrong at the same time.

  As they rolled into the winery’s parking lot, Shaw spotted the brown Ford sedan that he recognized as Taylor and Waggener’s unmarked police car. The door to the restaurant opened, and Taylor stepped out, his massive shoulders ratcheted almost to his ears as he argued with Waggener. Marjorie was visible behind them, bobbing along in their wake and, to judge by the expression on her face, desperately wanting to hide again in the kitchen. Taylor stopped; he saw Shaw and North at the same moment Shaw saw him.

  “Fuck,” North whispered.

  Taylor pulled his gun faster than Shaw expected, and with the same shocking speed, he reached back and grabbed Marjorie, dragging her out in front of him.

  Chapter 26

  HUMAN SHIELD, Shaw thought as he watched Taylor hold Marjorie against him, the gun pressed to the back of her head. Or hostage. Or both. Taylor pointed the gun at them and shouted something that Shaw couldn’t hear over the distance and the white rush of the air conditioning. Then Taylor pointed the gun at Marjorie.

  “Fuck,” North whispered again. “Get out of the car and come around.”

  Shaw elbowed the door open; as he skirted the hood of the car, North got out of the driver’s seat, the engine still rumbling. They stood together with Marjorie staring back at them, her face as white as her hair. She was shaking, but she held herself straight and tried to throw off Taylor’s grip. Taylor didn’t seem to notice. Red blotched his face, but where the flush didn’t reach, the skin looked like plastic pulled too thin. He jabbed Marjorie with the gun and shouted something unintelligible.

  “I’m going,” Shaw said.

  “What?” North clutched his arm. “Like fuck.”

  “One of us has to talk to him. One of us has to try to get Marjorie.”

  “Fine. I’ll go. You sit your ass here.”

  “No, North. I’m going. Let go of me, please.”

  “Like fuck,” North said, kind of gaspily, like he’d been punched. “Like fuck.”

  Shaw pried off North’s fingers and took his first step. The gravel crunched underfoot. A breeze stirred the thistles at the edge of the lot, bending the heavy purple crowns sideways, and the sharp smell of sap came from the pines along the edge of the highway. Shaw’s hand drifted, but he caught the cardigan’s hem and held on. He had been reaching for the Springfield, and then he remembered that the gun was back at his house.

  “Let Marjorie go,” Shaw said. “And we can talk—”

  Before Shaw could finish, Taylor’s gun swung out. Shaw threw himself to the ground. He heard the shot like a high whine. Shaw had the vague idea that he was supposed to stop, drop, and roll, but he was also fairly sure that only applied to fires. North shouted something, and as Shaw hit the gravel on his belly, he looked up in time to see Waggener bring her gun up and shoot Taylor in the back of the head.

  Skin and bone and brain geysered out of the front of Taylor’s skull. The man staggered. He fell slowly, his hand still clutching Marjorie’s sweater. It was like some horrible gag bit, Taylor falling, his death grip locked onto Marjorie and pulling the tiny woman after him. Like something you’d see on I Love Lucy, with Lucy going down first and taking Ethel with her. Only with brains. A lot more brains.

  Somehow Marjorie squirmed free, and Taylor hit the gravel and rocked onto his back. Waggener was already turning, the gun dipping down and coming around with her.

  “Marjorie, run!” Shaw scrambled up. He heard North echoing him. “Run, Marjorie, run!”

  She took a few stumbling steps; judging by her face, Shaw guessed she was in shock and moving on autopilot. Each movement was stiff and unnatural. On the third step, she almost fell, and then Shaw sprinted forward and took her arm, half-guiding her and half-carrying her back toward the Caddy.

  Waggener watched them. Mousy blond hair had fallen in front of her eyes. The gun in her hand was pointed at the ground, and she took a step forward.

  “Stay the fuck back,” North was screaming. “Stay right where you fucking are, just stay right fucking there!”

  With a shake of her head, Waggener took another step.

  “This is a mess,” she shouted. “We need to talk about this.”

  “Stay the fuck there, hands where I can fucking see them,” North was screaming.

  Shaw kept moving, Marjorie’s weight draped across him now, the toes of her scuffed brown flats barely skimming the gravel.

  Then he reached North, and North picked up Marjorie without missing a beat: “Right fucking there, Waggener, stay right fucking there!”—and slid her into the back of the Caddy.

  Shaw rested against the driver’s door, his breath stitching painfully in his side. He’d probably crossed a total of twenty yards, and Marjorie looked like she weighed ninety pounds, but all of it together, with adrenaline burning through him, had left Shaw exhausted and shaking.

  “Fuck, fuck, fuck,” North kept saying, grabbing at Shaw, as though trying to inspect him for injuries without taking his eyes off Waggener.

  Shaw wrapped a hand around North’s shaking fingers. “I’m ok.”

  “We need to talk,” Waggener said. “I’ll drop my gun. I’ll kick it over to you. You can pat me down. But we’ve got to talk right now.”

  All the color had bled from North’s face; his eyes were like gray chips of styrofoam in an ashfall. His hands were still shaking.

  “I’m ok,” Shaw said again.

  North gave a savage jerk of his head and seemed to pull himself together. Pressing on Shaw’s shoulder, he forced him into the driver’s seat. “The truck stop,” he said.

  “North.”

  “Get there as fast as you fucking can, and don’t get out of the Caddy unti
l you see me. If anybody else approaches you, drive like you fucking know what you’re doing and get the hell out of there.”

  “North!”

  North slammed the door shut and ran for the GTO.

  Waggener was shouting at them still, but she kept her hands in the air, the pistol still hanging from one finger by its trigger guard. Shaw waited until North had dived into the GTO and the brake lights flared; then he shifted the Caddy into reverse and punched the gas. They shot back toward the state highway, cleared the gravel drive, and then launched forward, north, toward St. Louis.

  The GTO slid out behind them a moment later, but it didn’t catch up. In fact, as Shaw scanned the rearview mirror, he saw the GTO lose ground. He knew what North was doing; North was playing defense, trying to make sure that Waggener didn’t follow. It was a risk. A stupid risk. And then the GTO dropped out of sight, and Shaw felt a huge hand crumple his chest, crushing his ribs and lungs and heart, and he had to struggle to keep his foot on the gas.

  “She . . . she shot him,” Marjorie whispered from the back seat.

  “Marjorie, are you ok?”

  “She shot him.”

  “Did they hurt you? Before we got there, did they do anything to you?”

  “Oh my God. She shot Philip.” A hysterical noise, somewhere between a sob and a laugh, ricocheted through the Caddy. “She shot Philip right in the head.”

  “Marjorie, you’ve got to take some deep breaths. Just put your head down and take some deep breaths.”

  “Oh my God,” Marjorie moaned. “Oh my God.”

  Shaw shot a glance over his shoulder. Blood stippled the side of her face, peppering her white bob. Her eyes were glassy and distant, and she was moaning those same words to herself over and over again. Then she started to cry, dropping her head between her knees to sob, her tiny frame rocking in time with the sounds.

  Turning his attention back to the road, Shaw checked the speedometer and eased back on the gas. The last thing he needed was to get pulled over. He settled into a decent speed, five miles over the limit, even though his blood still pounded and he wanted to drop his foot like a brick. After fifteen miles, the worst of the adrenaline had spiked, and exhaustion swept over Shaw.

  The truck stop was a few miles south of the I-55 and I-270 interchange. Shaw had never been there before, but they had joked about it. Back in college, back when being young and gay and beautiful had been thrilling and funny all at the same time for Shaw and his group of friends, the truck stop had been a joke. Benny wouldn’t blow you? I bet you could find somebody at the truck stop. Sigma Sigma formal? When are you going to the truck stop to get your date? And always this truck stop, this particular truck stop, which Rufus had insisted was a landmark of subterranean gay culture, a historic cruising spot from a time before gay men had moved openly in the world. And when Rufus had finished explaining all this, they’d asked him which stall in the men’s room had his phone number.

  Now none of it seemed funny. Shaw couldn’t even remember why they’d laughed so hard; he just felt like his mouth was dry, his eyes dry, his brain dry and slick with exhaustion, a feeling that he associated with rubbing pencil shavings between his fingers. As he coasted into the truck stop, guiding the Caddy around to the back and parking at the end of a row of dumpsters, black spots fizzed at the edges of his vision. Shaw dropped his seat back. He took deep breaths, trying to measure them against Marjorie’s sobbing. Through the windshield, he looked up at the truck stop’s loading dock, where a stack of empty Dairy Pure milk crates was balanced on the edge of the cement. He didn’t close his eyes; he still remembered North warning him to drive if anyone else approached the Caddy. But he could rest, a little.

  Marjorie was still crying.

  The black specks at the edge of Shaw’s vision retreated. He eased himself onto his side, reached between the seats, and found Marjorie’s hand. They sat like that for a while, Shaw holding her hand between his own, letting his fingers trace designs on her palm, on the inside of her wrist, until her sobbing slowed, and then the crying slowed, and then she breathed out once and raised her head and wiped her eyes.

  “I’m sorry,” she said.

  Shaw just shook his head.

  “You . . . are you ok?”

  “I’m fine.”

  “Your friend?”

  “He’ll be here.”

  “Are you sure you’re ok? You—you don’t look good.”

  Shaw smiled. “Your cardigan got pretty torn up on the gravel.”

  At that, Marjorie laughed, and then she cried a little more and shook herself and seemed to come back, when the tears ended, more like herself.

  “Can you reach the glove compartment? I think I have some wipes, or maybe some tissues.”

  Shaw found the wipes and passed them back. Marjorie opened the packet and began cleaning the side of her face. A rap at the window made Shaw jump. Wiggling around, he managed to face the door; North stared at him through the glass.

  An hour of driving hadn’t done anything to improve North’s coloring; his face had the same ashen color, his eyes washed out to nothing. He met Shaw’s gaze for a moment, his face still dead, and then he rolled a finger.

  Groaning again, Shaw pulled the latch.

  “You’re supposed to be keeping watch,” North said, dropping into a squat so they were face to face. He wrapped his hands around his knees. “You were supposed to be making sure nobody snuck up on you.” He rocked forward onto the balls of his feet; his fingers curled and uncurled. “How are you going to do any of that when you’re—”

  He cut off when Shaw’s hand found his cheek. North trembled; his eyes filled, and he shook once like he was trying to shake off Shaw’s touch. Then he turned, pressing hard into Shaw’s hand as the tears finally overflowed and spilled down his cheeks. “Fuck, baby. Fuck, I thought—”

  And then he lunged, taking Shaw’s head in his hands, holding him, studying him, and then leaning forward to kiss him. The first kiss was tender. The second was hungry, ferocious. The third—

  Shaw moaned, but he pressed a hand to North’s chest.

  “Sorry,” North muttered, wiping his face as he pulled back. Some of the color had come back, and he looked steadier. But he cupped Shaw’s cheek. “Not sorry.”

  “I’m ok.”

  “This time.” He shook his head. “But that’s later. Now, we’ve got to get her someplace safe.”

  “The Borealis office?”

  North shook his head. “We don’t know who else might be looking for her, but Waggener will definitely check the office.”

  “She’ll check your place too.”

  North nodded. “We need someplace safe. Someone we can trust.”

  “Teddi?”

  For a moment, North considered this. Then he shook his head. “We don’t know what Waggener’s playing at. She just shot her partner in the back of the head right in front of us. For all we know, she’s already called in the shooting and pinned it on us. That’s too much of a risk for Teddi. We need someone who’s willing to back us against something this serious.”

  “Dzeko.”

  North rubbed his chin.

  “Think about it,” Shaw said. “She’s got a lot on the line. Personally, she’s being framed for Jadon’s shooting. Professionally, she’s built her career on taking down dirty cops. If we can get Marjorie to her, and if Dzeko can get her deposed, get everything Marjorie told us on record, and we have the Caddy and we have the footage, we can at least start to put something serious together.”

  “She’s out on bail,” North said. “She’s not going to want to get involved. She’s got to cover her own ass right now.”

  Shaking his head, Shaw said, “No, she needs this. We’re giving her a way out—hell, we’re basically handing over the next election.”

  “What about Barr?”

  “We can’t trust any of the cops,” Shaw said. “Even if Barr isn’t dirty, even if he really is just trying
to help Jadon and keep his partner alive, the whole force is a snake pit right now. We don’t know who to trust.”

  “Barr wants to help. He dragged us into this mess at the hospital.”

  “Not until Marjorie’s safe,” Shaw said. “Not until we can arrange a meeting on our terms.”

  North blew out a breath. “Dzeko.”

  “Dzeko.”

  “Do we call her?”

  “Not a chance,” Shaw said. “We toss our phones, right now, in case they’re tracking us. Then we show up and we knock on her door. I don’t want her to have even five seconds to think twice about this.”

  North nodded. “Let’s get her to Dzeko.”

  Chapter 27

  DZEKO ANSWERED the apartment door on the second knock. She wore WashU sweats, her feet bare, and her hair hung loose around her shoulders instead of the severe bun she normally wore. North smiled; he twitched a finger at Shaw, who waited at the end of the corridor with Marjorie, signaling them to stay put.

  “What are you doing here?”

  “I’m selling Girl Scout cookies.”

  Dzeko’s eyes narrowed; she shifted her weight, and her sweatpants rode up to expose a glimpse of the ankle monitor. “North, what the fuck is this?”

  “Cable guy. I was supposed to be here sometime between noon and midnight.”

  “I forgot what a fucking asshole you are when you’re trying to be funny. Where’s Shaw?” She tried to poke her head out into the hallway, but North stepped into her space, penning her inside the apartment.

  “What the fuck is this?”

  “Special delivery,” North said, his smile souring. “About the most special delivery you’re ever going to get. How interested are you in getting your name clear and bagging a whole lot of dirty cops in the bargain?”

  “If this is a joke,” Dzeko said, “I’m going to cut off your balls and find a way to make you and Truck share a cell for the next twenty years.”