The Fever Kill

by Tom Piccirilli

  Morena said, "He's been talking like that for two days. This is what you did to him."

  Crease nodded. He knew what it meant. Tucco was feverish. He'd taken a lot and enjoyed how far out on the rim he was standing, but now he'd been pushed far enough and was about to make his move.

  "You shouldn't have snuffed the old lady," Crease said. "Since when do you care who I ice and who I don't?"

  "Since you did it just to get back at me."

  Tucco grinned, barely showing his teeth, talking out the side of his mouth like he had a large audience. "Now he's sensitive. Now the badge means something to him. Before, he'd cap anybody, clip 'em three, four at a time. How many wild shots do you think went out the window, killed some baby in a crib across the way? Just so you could bust some seventeen-year-old Colombian mule, throw 'em into prison forever?"

  It was happening to Crease too, the feeling of being so far out on the edge there was nothing beneath him anymore.

  Maybe that's why they'd become friends. Because once you found a player as good as you were you really didn't want to beat him, you just wanted the game to go on and on.

  "You can't hurt me," Tucco said. "No matter how many old ladies I waste. You tried to hurt me and you couldn't do it. Nobody wanted to hear. You put a gun in my face and couldn't pull the trigger. How long we been together, huh? Two years?"

  "Little more."

  "All that time you haven't hurt my business, haven't even put away any of my best guys."

  "I know," Crease said softly.

  "The coke keeps flowing, the pills, the H, the ladies do what they do, the johns are happy. The money keeps coming in. Got more girls on the street now than ever. You've cleaned up my messes, taken out my competition. I'm worth twice now what I was two years ago, maybe three times. You've made me what I am."

  "Don't say that."

  "It's true."

  "That doesn't matter."

  Tucco was hitting his stride. "Of course it matters. It's all that matters. You know that."

  The back of Cruez's right hand gleamed with gun oil. Crease knew that he could walk right up to the monster and shoot him in the heart and Tucco would just smile about it, shake his head like it was a good joke. Nobody meant anything to him except maybe Crease, which made it all the worse.

  "Come back with me, man," Tucco said. "I need you. I can't trust anybody else. They all got secrets. But you, you don't have any secrets now. I know you, all of you, inside and out. Loco bastard like you, we work on the same level. We need the same things. That's what I need in my partner. Just come on back."

  "I can't."

  Tucco waited. "Well, why not?"

  "I'm not sure."

  He waited some more. "That's it, that's all you're going to say? You're not sure? That's it?"

  Like it was easy, putting your life into words. Your contradictions, your guilt, your jones. Nobody else could understand what it was like carrying your old man on your back for seven years, loving him and hating him, sending your will into his heart hoping it would stop beating, for his sake. How much you could care about your wife and son and yet despise the position they put you in. To be the middle-class mook, the guy picking out wallpaper, trimming the lawn, reading fairy tales, going over the times tables. Anything that took you off the point of the knife just wasn't ever going to be good enough.

  But so was going back to where he'd been with Tucco. It just wasn't possible. The engine had been screaming for too long. Even if you couldn't take the curve, you had to stomp the pedal and keep your weight on it. You had to.

  "That's it," Crease said.

  ~ * ~

  Tucco was going for the butterfly blade.

  He knew Tucco had already started going for the knife even though he couldn't actually see him moving. Tucco was speeding along in his brain, willing it to happen. Nobody had shifted an inch and already Crease was being outmaneuvered.

  Too slow, he almost let loose with a laugh. His hands started going for the blade but he was too slow, he'd lost a lot of his frosty competence screwing around with Edwards and the Jimmys. Crease had known it was coming and it still didn't matter. Even if you were a step ahead, sometimes that wasn't enough.

  He couldn't help himself. His gaze shifted to Morena. He wanted to look at her, fill himself with a touch of her beauty, a little of his longing. Still trying to decide if they could really love each other. It was another mistake. He realized it at once but her eyes confirmed it. They didn't show any fright or even alarm. He could see the regret there, the dissatisfaction. Even a touch of pity.

  He was surprised that he felt so cold. Jesus Christ, he was freezing. Where was the heat now that he needed it? His blood wasn't moving.

  Tucco stepped in, his blade still not showing. Crease almost had his out. It was going to be close but not close enough. Crease stabbed forward a fraction of a second before Tucco completed his move. A surge of pride went through him.

  It ended almost instantly. He'd gotten there first but all he'd cut was that fucking llama sweater. He'd missed.

  Tucco's knife slid into Crease's stomach just above his bellybutton. It went in and in and Crease just watched it.

  He didn't hurt yet. He'd already gone into shock. He dropped back and drew himself off the blade and leaned back up against the 'Stang.

  The end of the game. The bop till you drop contest over. Tucco looked extremely sad, like he didn't want to do it but, maybe, this was the kindest thing for them all. He took another step forward, got ready to bring the knife in again.

  Morena was near Crease but not next to him. He wondered what the hell that meant. He saw her glide away, her black hair roiling in the sunlight like liquid, as she spun to him. The shadowed curves of her body revived him for a second. He felt strong and righteous.

  Then her hand was coming up, just a blur.

  She was faster than Crease, faster than Tucco. Her eyes reflected nothing.

  Tucco said, "Goddamn, woman."

  She eased the barrel of Crease's .38 against the back of Tucco's head, pulled the trigger, and blew his brains into the middle of the road.

  ~ * ~

  She said, "You idiots and your knives."

  Crease angled his chin at Cruez, worried about the monolith moving in. "What about him?"

  "What about him? He works for us now." She pocketed his gun. "Did you expect it to be any different?" She held his jacket open and inspected the wound, the blood leaking steadily down his pants. She unwrapped a wool scarf and tied it around his waist, pulled it tight. "Come on, we need to get you to a hospital. It's not that bad. You'll be all right."

  He stared at her and thought, This is my woman. This is the woman for me.

  It was a good thing she didn't lie or he might be worried. She helped him to the Bentley. Cruez got in behind the wheel. He hadn't said a word this whole time and didn't need to. He was doing the only thing he could, being the right hand. Morena opened the back door and Crease looked in but couldn't climb inside.

  He turned back and stared at Tucco's corpse on the ground, wondering where he was supposed to go from here. "Don't," Morena said. "Don't run. Stay with me."

  "I'm not running."

  "You are, you're backing up. You're going to run. Don't go."

  "I'm not," he told her. But he felt himself moving away from her and couldn't seem to stop.

  "You don't really want to die, do you?" she asked. "I don't know," he said.

  "Just come with me. I'll take care of you."

  "You wouldn't know how," he said.

  "Come home. Everything will be okay now."

  He was terrified she might be right. They'd walk away together now and he'd ... what? Go back to being a cop, shine his badge up again, put his father's back on the mantel. Or take over the business, run it the way it should be run. There was a list of about five guys that, if he popped them all, most of the tri-state area would be his. He could do either. Marry Morena. Raise the kid as a punk who would know the street from minute one. O
r maybe a boy in blue, like Stevie was, attending PBA events and waving in the parade. He wondered if he could even quote Miranda anymore. He was torn up the middle.

  "Think about the baby," Morena said. It was the most emotional she could sound, but she didn't sound emotional at all. "Your child."

  He backed up some more and hit the hood of the 'Stang. He turned over and left a thin blood trail across the headlight. He got into the car. He pulled a rag from beneath the seat, carefully drew back the scarf, and jammed the rag into the wound. Tucco's blade had been so sharp that the incision was extremely clean and things still weren't hurting. There was hardly any bleeding now that he'd plugged the hole.

  He turned the car around. Morena's eyes followed him in the rearview.

  He gunned it for the highway and changed his mind, doubled back, wanted to see Hangtree one last time. He tore up Main Street and circled the city. Crease hit the outskirts of town ripping seventy down neighborhood streets. He was spinning his wheels like always.

  As he was about to pass the Groell place he plunged down on the brake. The 'Stang skidded and sluiced to the side, the smoke billowing from the squealing tires. Old lady Virginny must be dead, the window that he'd come to think of as hers was empty.

  But in the other one, the one that was Ellie's, he saw movement behind the shade. It was the same as when he'd left last time.

  Maybe he was already dead and damned to repeat these same ludicrous motions forever. Her silhouette seemed to wag its wrist at him, waving goodbye. The house might be empty, shared by ghosts. He had always been one with the shadows. He had to be crazy.

  He slapped it back into gear and headed for New York. Home.

  Chapter Seventeen

  Teddy taunted him. Crease didn't mind much. The voice kept him awake.

  So he was nuts. There was no other way to explain why he didn't rush to a hospital instead of driving to New York. You had to live with some truths and die with others. The entire ride he considered his options, if he should happen to make it. He could tell the whole story to his superiors and get reassigned to some other dealer or runner. Spend another couple of years on the rim, climbing up the chain and getting in tight with somebody just like Tucco, eventually have another showdown. He could do that.

  Teddy was telling him to just give in and go with the cash flow. Morena would help him make it work. They could just take over the business, improve holdings. Tucco had been lazy, hadn't expanded when he should have, allowed too many people to skim. It wouldn't be like that anymore.

  When they sent in another narc, Crease should be able to sniff the guy out easily. And even if he couldn't, they wouldn't care about taking him down so long as he gave a few others up along the way.

  He took I-91 south through Massachusetts and crossed over into Connecticut. Pockets of intense rain swept across the road like it was clearing half the world away. He wanted to go with it. The sun broke through. I-95 was loaded with family trailers and SUVs and elderly couples out for a New England Drive.

  The dead were packed into the 'Stang with him. They whispered loudly and he tried his best to listen, to their advice or confessions, but their chatter drowned each other out. Mary was telling Teddy to shut up. There still wasn't any pain. The wound had stopped bleeding and Morena's scarf made a decent bandage.

  Morena had his gun and he'd left his own butterfly blade stuck in Tucco's sweater, but he still had the Bowie, in case he needed it. He didn't know why it comforted him. The dead razzed him about it. Teddy said he was sexually hung up. Mary Burke tried to strangle the bear but she didn't have any luck. Teddy kept on talking.

  Crease hit New York and swung it out across the Throgs Neck onto Long Island just as the sun began to set.

  He couldn't remember the last time he'd been to his own house. He didn't fully understand why he was back now. Maybe to fix the screen door. Maybe to ask forgiveness from Stevie.

  It was possible. He thought of lying side by side with Joan in their bed and a part of him wanted to let loose with a groan of relief and another part knew it could never work. Her bringing him breakfast in bed. Her calling out to him in the bathroom saying he needed to remember to floss. Her asking all the time, What are you thinking?

  The tires squealed as he took the exit too fast, muscling through traffic on the service road until he finally turned into the neighborhood. He let the 'Stang prowl, low-slung and growling as it paced up and down the blocks. Teddy told him to get ready for a surprise.

  There was a Taurus just pulling away from the curb in front of the house. Crease caught a flash of a mustached face and shiny moussed hair before the guy slid past and was gone around the corner.

  Crease pulled into the driveway and got out. His legs were shaky and a wave of nausea rolled over him, but it was over in a moment. He buttoned his jacket. He got to the door and wasn't sure what to do. He should probably knock, but this was his house. The house of the cop he was, that he used to be. His father told him to walk in. Crease walked in.

  Joan was in the living room, bent over the coffee table clearing away an empty bottle of beer, a half-finished screwdriver, and a bowl of chips and salsa. He checked his watch. Seven o'clock. An after work drink with the guy.

  Well, he thought. Well.

  He smelled fresh-baked pie. From a back room—Stevie's room—came the throb of music. He started down the hall and stopped. He still didn't know what the hell he might say to his son.

  Joan stepped over and said, "You don't look well. Your face, you've been fighting. Are you all right?"

  "Yeah."

  "Do you need something?"

  "I don't know."

  "Why are you here?"

  He never expected her to ask why. All this time, he'd figured she'd just take him back, feed him meals, swab his wounds, talk his ear off until he hated her. She said, "Crease? Talk to me. What's happened? What's wrong?" She noticed the pants, where his blood had darkened them. "What's all over you?"

  He stared into her eyes and he didn't hate her at all. It was a revelation of sorts.

  "Who was that?" he asked.

  "A friend."

  "A friend," he repeated. "Your friend?"

  "His name is Ken. He's very nice. He's a guidance counselor at Stevie's school."

  So that's where she'd been until midnight after the parent-teacher meeting. And Crease had been telling Reb he was certain that Joan didn't have another man. Out of everything, why had he been so confident about that?

  "Crease, why are you walking like that? Are you drunk? Are you sick? Did you throw up on yourself? Tell me what you want me to do."

  "Nothing," he said.

  "Then why are you here?"

  "I want to see Stevie."

  Her face hardened. She checked down the hall to see if their son's door was still closed. "I don't think that would be such a good idea."

  Crease couldn't believe what he'd heard. "What?"

  "Ken says that Stevie has a great deal of repressed rage towards you."

  "It's not so repressed."

  "All the more reason why, if you're serious about dealing with some issues, we should be in counseling."

  He almost agreed. "Joan, I just want to see him for a minute, all right? Then I'll go."

  "What do you want to say to him?"

  "I won't know until I say it."

  The roar of an engine broke the night, swarming the house until the windows rattled. The mad screech of tires tore up the street. Crease parted the blinds. Jesus Christ, it was the Bentley. Sure, if the tech kids could find him in Hangtree, they could find him here.

  He had choices to make, and the sense that time was running out filled him with a flood of anxiety. Odd, when you thought about it, since Tucco was now dead. One war was over. Maybe it had been the easiest one to fight. This other one with himself just kept on going and going and would never come to an end.

  "Who are those people outside?" Joan asked.

  Crease turned and went for Stevie's room, but the door
was open. His beautiful boy was standing there staring at him, saying nothing.

  He walked to his son. Stevie was afraid and backed up, step by step until he was almost in the kitchen, scowling with his face turning red.

  "Stevie?" Crease said. "I just want to talk to you for a minute, okay?"

  The boy shook his head, not in response to his father's plea but as if he was trying to deaden noises in his skull. Crease had done it to the kid, passed over his problems. As far as he'd tried to keep away from him, he'd always been close enough to do the wrong thing. The expression on his face was something Crease couldn't put a name to. He knew of no word to cover it. He'd never seen it before, not on anyone. His heart beat savagely in his chest at the thought of what the boy must be going through. He took a step forward and the kid retreated. He took another step and Stevie continued to back away.

  "When you were born," he said, "I thought I'd made good in the world. I'm sorry. I expected you to save me somehow. It was wrong of me to put that burden on you."

  "Crease!" Joan called. "There are people running up the walk. Who are they? What trouble did you bring to my house?"

  The question was, what trouble could he take away? He kept approaching his son and Stevie backed up into the kitchen.

  The pie had needed to cool before Joan sliced it, but she must've thought of cutting up a piece for her new boyfriend. Crease could see the guy saying, No no, don't go to any trouble, as she scurried around the kitchen doing what she loved to do best. Treating other people kindly. Being a mother.

  The knife was there on the counter and as Crease walked in Stevie went for it.

  Knives, always with the knives.

  Most people think of an eight-year-old as a baby. Little. Weak. But Stevie had some weight and real muscle to him already, and he was full of intent. He had a lot of rage built up inside him all right, his own fever burning. The kid was sweating. Crease tried to find something to say but everything that ran through his head sounded even more foolish than all the things he'd already said to his son.