Cork shot Daniel a look that said traitor. He took a deep breath. “Would that satisfy you, Jenny?”
“That would satisfy me.”
Cork turned away from her, turned away from them all, and was silent a long time before he finally faced them again. “All right. But you do exactly what I say, understood? If trouble comes and I say run, you get the hell out and you don’t look back. Are we clear?”
“We’re clear.”
“Fine,” he said, though his tone said otherwise. “Let’s go.”
The crib, as Raven had called it, turned out to be in an old brick apartment building not far from downtown, the kind a rat might call cozy. It appeared to be a fourplex, two apartments up and two down. There was a wide porch on the first floor and above it a balcony. An alleyway bordered it on one side. On the other lay a great patch of weeds with one tall sunflower making a proud showing near the center. The neighborhood was a sad collection of residential buildings that had probably once been large family homes but had been carved up into tiny, forgettable units, and everywhere Jenny looked, the face of neglect stared back. The saving grace of the old fourplex was that anyone sitting on the front porch or on the balcony would be able to see the calming blue of Lake Superior far down the hill. Jenny imagined this would be a blessing to a girl constantly under the eye of men like those who called themselves Wolf and Windigo.
They’d taken Daniel’s truck and had parked across the street and a few houses down, where they could check out the place without being seen. The moon was climbing, everything beneath it painted in either silver or shadow. Far down the hill, Jenny could see where the moonlight spilled like mercury across the dark surface of the lake. She could see the tall sunflower and the shadow it cast across the weeds, a sort of black reflection of itself. She could see the glow behind drawn shades in the apartments. What she didn’t see, none of them saw, was any kind of vehicle parked near the building.
“You two stay here,” Cork said. “I’m going to do a little reconnoitering. Daniel, you got a crowbar in that toolbox of yours?”
“Yeah.” Daniel handed him the key.
Cork climbed into the bed of the truck, rummaged around in the big toolbox, came back with a crowbar, and returned the key to Daniel. Without further explanation, he left the truck, slipped across the street, kept to the shadows, and disappeared down the alley around the back of the apartment building.
For a little while, neither Jenny nor Daniel talked. Then Jenny said, “Thanks for backing me up.”
Daniel, whose attention seemed to have been totally on the building across the street, angled his face toward her. He smiled gently in the dark. “I was beginning to think we might be there all night arguing the point. He can be stubborn, can’t he?” He waited a beat and said, “Kind of like you.”
“Both cut from the same cloth,” Jenny said.
“Good cloth,” Daniel replied.
They waited fifteen minutes. Jenny’s father didn’t come back.
“I’m getting a little worried,” Jenny said.
“He’s just doing a thorough lookover is my guess. Never good to walk into a situation you haven’t scoped out well.”
He sounded as if he meant it and wasn’t just trying to reassure. Like her father, he knew this kind of business better than she. So she believed him.
A dark SUV pulled into the alley and parked next to the apartment building. Two figures got out. One was tall and powerful-looking. The other was small, a walking willow branch. Female, Jenny thought. And probably just a kid. The two entered the building through a back entrance. Lights came on in one of the upper units.
“Where is he?” Jenny said after another few minutes had passed. “Shouldn’t he have had a good idea of things by now?”
“Every situation’s different,” Daniel said. “But I think I’ll go see if he needs a hand.” He reached across Jenny, opened the glove box, and took out his sidearm and a pair of handcuffs.
“I’m coming, too,” Jenny said.
“That’s exactly what you promised him you wouldn’t do.”
He was right. She said, “Don’t be long. Call if you need me.” She held up her cell. “You have my number.”
“On speed dial.” He smiled that gentle smile again, then left his truck and crossed the street. Like Cork before him, he stuck to the shadows cast by the moon. Jenny watched him slide around the back of the building, where the big man and willow-stick girl had gone.
Minutes passed. A lot of minutes. In the dead silence, Jenny tried to keep judicious counsel with herself. There was good reason both Daniel and her father had disappeared. Good reason she hadn’t heard anything. Good reason to keep her promise to her father.
This was the part of the hunt that Henry Meloux had said was the most important. The patience. But Jenny knew she was no hunter.
“Screw it,” she finally said aloud and got out of the truck.
She stepped into the street just as a car rounded the corner behind her and caught her full in the glare of its headlights. The blast of a horn came loud and long, and Jenny jumped back.
“Watch where you’re going, crazy bitch,” the driver hollered and drove on.
Jenny stood on the curb, catching her breath, settling herself. She studied the apartment building to see if any shades had been raised at the sound of the horn. As near as she could tell, no one gave a damn. That kind of neighborhood.
She crossed the street and entered the alley and came to the SUV parked there. Minnesota plates, she saw. Tinted windows that, in the dark, were like ink bottles. As she stood in the shadow of the building, amid the foul garbage smell that poured off a big trash bin in the alley, trying to decide what her next move was, the back door opened, and Jenny froze.
The man who stood in the drizzle of light from the overhead bulb was big, well built. He made Jenny think of the WWE wrestlers she sometimes caught a glimpse of when she surfed the television channels looking for something interesting to watch. His face, or what showed of it in the dull light, didn’t look Indian, but Jenny knew that meant nothing.
“Okay, Ember boy, do your stuff.”
Jenny now saw that the man had a dog with him, an Irish setter. The dog looked old, and when it descended the back steps it moved gingerly. It wandered into the weed patch next to the building, sniffed around the single sunflower stalk, and lifted its hind leg. The guy watched from the porch, and Jenny took the opportunity to ease herself behind the cover of the SUV.
The man reached into his shirt pocket and brought out a joint. He dug into the pocket of his khakis, pulled out a lighter, and lit the joint. He drew smoke deep into his lungs, held it, then exhaled. He repeated the process, and it wasn’t long before the scent of burning weed drifted down to where Jenny hid.
“Come back here, you worthless old hound.” The words themselves were not gentle, but the man spoke them as if they were. The dog laboriously climbed the steps, and the two of them sat side by side, the man running his hand lovingly down the length of the animal’s body, the dog’s tail sweeping contentedly across the porch floorboards.
A girl stepped through the door behind them and came out onto the wooden landing. She was young, probably early teens, blond, willowy. Maybe the girl Jenny had seen earlier, but she couldn’t be sure. She wore a white tank top, clearly no bra beneath, and tight jeans. She stood beside the man, who paid her no mind.
“Sharesies?” she said.
Without replying, he held up what was left of the joint. She accepted it, took a couple of tokes, handed it back.
“Thanks, Manny,” she said. “I needed that.” Then she said, “I’m hungry, Manny.”
“Food in the refrigerator,” he said.
“It’s all crap.”
“Guess you’ll have to eat crap, then.”
“There’s a twenty-four-hour McDonald’s on London Road.”
“Sparkle—” she began.
He turned on her. “You say that bitch’s name again, I’ll break your face.”
“I was just going to say that she used to go get food for us there at night sometimes. Maybe she’s there now. I mean, if you really want to find her.”
“I find her, I kill her,” Manny said.
“You already came pretty close.”
“McDonald’s,” Manny said, as if thinking. He shook his head and said, “She’ll come back. You bitches always come back.”
“If she’s there, you could bring her back. That would be good, wouldn’t it?”
“I told you, Cherry, I’m not taking you nowhere. Get back inside.”
Cherry didn’t move. Manny stood, lifted his arm as if to slap her face, and the girl said, “I’m going, Manny. I’m going.”
The man was left alone with his dog. He eyed the last little bit of the joint he held, tossed it in his mouth, chewed a couple of times, swallowed.
“Come on, Ember boy,” he said, standing up. “Let’s call it a night.”
After the man and dog had gone back inside, Jenny waited a full minute before she dared to move. Slowly, she rose from the crouched position she’d held, despite her aching knees.
The hand on her shoulder made her jump. She spun, fists raised, ready to defend herself. Daniel held a finger to his lips, begging silence.
“You,” she whispered in relief. “Dad?”
Daniel said nothing but crooked his finger in a sign for her to follow. He made his way around to the other side of the building, where a short flight of steps led down to a basement doorway. The door was open a crack. Jenny saw splintered wood along the doorframe, and the hasp and padlock hung there, useless. She followed Daniel into the utter black inside. She felt his hand on her arm and let him guide her blindly for a dozen steps, then another door opened, this one onto light and a stairway that headed up. Daniel led the way, and again she followed. They came into a long hallway suffused faintly with the odor of mildew and fried onions. The floor was bare, the old boards worn to gray. The hallway ran straight to the front of the building, where doors on either side opened onto the two lower units and another stairway led up. Daniel went ahead and began to climb. Jenny started up after him, but when she put her weight on the first stair, an old board let out a screech. She held still. They both held still. Nothing else happened. They moved on, but after that, Jenny followed exactly in Daniel’s footsteps.
On the second floor there were two doors, just as there’d been on the lower level. From behind one came the sound of a television turned too loud. Jenny had yet to see her father. She looked to Daniel for explanation, but he only pointed, his finger indicating a set of hallway windows that overlooked the long balcony in front. The panes were up to let in the night air. Jenny saw that one of the window screens had been cut, a long slash down the center. Daniel slipped through the cut screen and signaled Jenny to follow. Outside, Jenny found that each of the upper units had a door that opened onto the balcony. Her father was standing at one of the doors. He put two fingers to his eyes, then indicated a window beside the door. Daniel eased himself to the window frame and took a look. He drew back so that Jenny might look, too. The window was curtained, but the curtain wasn’t completely closed. Jenny could see an old green couch, and on it was seated the girl who’d earlier been on the back porch with the man she’d called Manny. She wore only the white tank top and shiny, lime-green bikini underwear. She was idly turning the pages of a magazine. Manny was nowhere to be seen.
Jenny’s father motioned Daniel to him but raised his hand like a traffic cop, warning Jenny to stay where she was. Daniel slid his Glock from where he’d nested it in the waist of his jeans. He worked the slide and nodded to Cork. In one hand, Jenny’s father held the crowbar. With the other, he gripped the doorknob and turned it gently. The old piece of hardware gave a rusty little cry, and Cork shoved the door open fully and rushed inside.
She was supposed to stay back, but Jenny could no more do that than she could stop her heart from beating. She bolted to the doorway.
Inside, the girl had jumped from the couch. She stood staring at Cork and Daniel, her eyes big as apricots, her mouth opened, as if for a scream that hadn’t yet come. From a doorway behind her, where Jenny could see a refrigerator and half a stove, the big man, who’d also been on the back landing, appeared, wiping his hands with a dish towel.
“Police. Hold it right there,” Daniel shouted and leveled the Glock.
The big man looked at Cork. He looked at Daniel and the sidearm Daniel held. Jenny had a sense that he might be calculating the distance between himself and the intruders and the intruders’ gun. But he did as Daniel had ordered. Until the girl finally let out her scream and charged.
She came at Daniel and threw her whole self onto him, wrapping as much of her thin body as she could around his gun arm. As soon as she’d made her move, the guy in the kitchen doorway charged Jenny’s father. He knocked the crowbar from Cork’s hand, and the two of them tumbled in a sprawl of limbs. The man made wild beast sounds and went at her father like rage sheathed in flesh, as if murder pumped through his veins instead of blood. Daniel was doing his best to shake off the girl, but she was like glue and was trying to sink her teeth into his arm.
Both of the men Jenny cared about could use a hand. She chose Daniel. She caught the girl around the throat in the crook of her arm and squeezed to cut off air. It was a move that her father had shown her once, but that she’d forgotten until this moment. The girl let go of her hold on Daniel to claw at Jenny’s arm. Daniel used his sudden freedom to club the back of Manny’s head a good one with his sidearm. The wild man pitched forward and rolled to the floor.
The girl in the crook of Jenny’s arm had begun to ease up in her struggle.
Jenny said, “If I let you go, will you behave yourself?”
The girl nodded rapidly.
“Sure?”
“Uh-huh,” the girl managed to grunt.
Jenny released her. The girl stumbled away and stood feeling her throat as if to be certain it was all still there.
From somewhere in the back of the apartment came a barking, but the dog didn’t appear.
The girl lunged for the door to the hallway. Daniel cut her off.
“We’re not here to hurt you,” he said. “We came for that one.” He nodded toward the man who called himself Wolf and who lay groaning on the floor. “Who else is here?”
“Nobody,” she said. “Just him and me right now.”
Jenny’s father rose slowly from the floor. He gave his head an experimental turn to the right, to the left. He looked down at the man lying prone at his feet, then at Daniel. He said, “Thanks.”
“What’s your name?” Daniel said to the girl.
She glared at him and didn’t answer.
“Cherry,” Jenny said, then added more softly, “But that’s not your real name, is it?”
“Fuck you,” the girl said.
“You know someone named Sparkle?” Daniel asked.
Her mouth was silent, but her eyes said everything. Fuck you.
“She’s okay,” Daniel told her. “Sparkle’s safe.”
The girl’s face changed. She’d been like a cornered animal, angry, maybe afraid she’d end up like Wolf, or worse. But now she seemed surprised. Amazed even.
“Okay?” she said.
“Yes. Safe. We can make you safe, too, if you let us.”
It was clear she didn’t believe him. She stared down at Wolf and shook her head. “There’s no safe now.”
“We’re after the one who calls himself Windigo,” Cork said. “We’ll get him, you can be sure of that. And you’ll be safe then, I promise.”
“Windigo? I don’t think so.”
“Can you
tell us where he is?”
She shook her head again, harder this time.
“You can’t or you won’t?”
“I don’t know who you are,” she said, “but I know him and I know what he’ll do if he finds out I said anything. I mean anything.”
“Just tell us this: Do you know where he is?”
“I don’t,” she said. “I swear to God I don’t.”
“Does he?” Cork gave a nod toward Wolf, who was just now beginning to rouse himself.
She didn’t answer, and that in itself was an answer.
The dog somewhere in a back room had stopped its barking. Daniel pulled his handcuffs from where he’d hung them on his belt. Wolf tried to push himself up from the floor, but Daniel kicked his hands out from under him, and the big man went down again. Daniel knelt with his knee in Wolf’s back, grabbed an arm, cuffed the wrist, then cuffed the other. He rolled Wolf over, so that the man looked toward the ceiling. Wolf blinked a few times, and his eyes began to focus.
Cork leaned over him. “Where’s your brother?”
Wolf took a moment to reply. When he did, it was cold and quiet. “I’ll kill you. And then my brother’ll kill you.”
“Where’s your brother?” Cork asked again.
Wolf glared up at him. “We’ll both kill you,” he said. His dark eyes traveled across Daniel and Jenny. “And then we’ll kill you and you.” He looked at the girl who’d done nothing but try to help him. “And what the hell. We’ll kill you while we’re at it.”
Cork spoke to the girl. “Do you have any duct tape?”
“In a kitchen drawer.”
“Jenny?” he said.
She went to the kitchen. The barking began again, from behind a door next to the refrigerator. She ignored the sound, found the duct tape, and brought it back. Her father took a strip from the silver roll and pressed it over the mouth of the man called Wolf.
“Let’s get him out of here,” he said.
“What about me?” the girl said.
“Do you want to stay here?” Cork asked.
She considered that possibility and gave a faint shake of her head.
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