by R. J. Jagger
They burned down to his fingertips then he tossed them out the window.
“Maybe,” he said.
“There ain’t no maybes about it,” Alabama said. “Stay away from that woman before you end up dead.” A beat then, “You said I was sexy.”
He smiled.
“You were.”
She came close.
“Does that mean you’re ready to prove it?”
“Maybe later,” he said. “Right now I have to run.”
He grabbed his hat, dipped it over his left eye and headed for the door.
“Where you going?”
He almost answered.
He almost said he was chasing after London to be sure Bluetone or one of his cronies wasn’t sneaking up behind her.
“I’ll be back,” he said.
Then he was gone.
Down on the street, he heard Alabama shouting something from the window. He stopped, looked up and focused.
“I said, she’s trouble. Stay away from her.”
Wilde shifted his feet.
Then he said, “I can’t.”
89
Day Three
July 23, 1952
Wednesday Afternoon
Waverly’s note was simple. “Your life is in danger. Meet me at the Flamingo Bar on Larimer Street at 10:00 p.m. tonight and I’ll explain. Do not tell Tom Bristol where you are going and be sure he doesn’t follow you. This is not a joke.” She folded the note, put it in the envelope, licked the glue and sealed it shut. Then she handed it to the Brown Palace receptionist—the cigar-smoking peach—together with a dollar bill.
“What I need you to do is slip this to the woman staying with Tom Bristol in room 414,” she said. “Don’t let Bristol see you. Tell the woman to read it in private, away from Bristol. Is that something you can do?”
He took the dollar and stuffed it in his pants pocket.
“Done,” he said.
Waverly kissed his cheek.
“Thanks.”
“It’s the least I can do, and that’s what I always do.”
Waverly smiled and left.
Now what?
From a phone booth down near Colfax she called Emmanuelle LeFavre’s hotel again only to find that the woman still wasn’t in.
Damn it.
She headed to her fleabag room, changed into her grungy clothes, laid the dress neatly on the bed and took the bus to her apartment, getting off a block after the fact and circling back on foot.
From across the street, everything looked normal.
No Tom Bristol’s or trolls were loitering around.
She wasn’t going to stay there, not tonight at any rate, but it wouldn’t hurt to check things out, just to be sure everything was all right. She trotted across the street, shot into the building and bounded up the stairway two steps at a time.
Her door was locked as it should be.
She opened it.
The place was trashed.
Someone had broken in and messed it up.
She pulled the door closed, relocked it and headed down the stairs with a thundering heart.
Halfway down she heard steps coming up.
They were heavy.
They were moving fast.
Turn around.
Turn around.
Turn around.
That’s what she told herself.
Turn around.
Do it.
Do it now.
Do it now, this second.
Her body didn’t respond though.
It didn’t turn around.
Instead it did the worst thing it could do.
It betrayed her.
It froze.
90
Day Three
July 23, 1952
Wednesday Morning
“We’re almost there,” River said. Fifty yards later he added in a calm voice, “Okay, this is it. Pull over here.” As expected, Spencer turned his eyes to the shoulder. At that moment River twisted his body violently and kicked at the side of the man’s head with every ounce of strength he had. The man was fast and ducked at the last second but not before River connected.
The car jerked to the right and shot off the road.
The terrain shook the car so crazily that River couldn’t get a second kick.
Then something bad happened.
The car slammed to a stop and Spencer stormed out.
He was stunned but wasn’t hurt.
He wasn’t even bleeding.
He jerked the back door open and shoved the gun into River’s face.
His face contorted.
No words came out of his mouth.
He was heaving.
He was deciding.
River recoiled against the door. He didn’t want to get shot in the face. He’d rather it be to his chest or somewhere else, anywhere but the face.
Seconds passed.
Spencer said nothing.
His finger twitched on the trigger.
Then he spoke.
“I ought to take you to hell right here and now.”
River said nothing.
He didn’t want to push the man over the edge.
“That was a stupid move,” Spencer said. “What did you think? That some puny little kick was going to take me out?”
River looked into the man’s eyes squarely for the first time. They were filled with rage but not as deeply insane as before.
“Get out!”
River complied.
“Kneel down.”
River didn’t hesitate.
Spencer pushed the barrel into the back of the River’s head and cocked the trigger.
“I’m going to ask you a question and you better have the right answer. Where is Alexa Blank?”
“In the field, that way.”
“Bullshit. There’s nothing there.”
“There’s an old abandoned junkyard with farm machinery and trucks,” River said. “She’s chained in there.”
Silence.
“How far?”
“A mile.”
Spencer grabbed River’s hair and yanked him to his feet. “Start walking. If she’s not there, we’re going to start by shooting your kneecaps. Then I’m going to have a little fun with my knife. Now get your ass moving.”
River looked around.
There wasn’t a car in sight, not in either direction.
“Move I said.”
River complied.
Within three minutes they were out of sight of the road.
The sun was an oven.
Sweat dripped down River’s forehead into his eyes.
Twenty minutes into it the junkyard appeared up ahead.
“I’ll be damned,” Spencer said. “Maybe you weren’t lying after all.”
They kept walking.
The shapes became more and more distinct.
“Which one is she in?”
“That old rusty truck trailer over there.”
“Don’t say a word, you hear me? Don’t call out.”
“Fine.”
“If you do I’ll pay a visit to your little friend January and cut her eyes out. Do you understand?”
“Yes.”
“You better.”
River had left a gun with Alexa Blank. What he needed to do now was let her see he was handcuffed and wasn’t in control of the situation. He needed to make an expression or gesture that told her Spencer was trouble. With any luck, she’d get the gun in hand and point it at Spencer before he knew what was happening. With more luck, Spencer’s rage would come to the surface and scare the woman so badly that she’d shoot. It was a long-shot but it was the only shot River could think of.
When they got thirty steps from the truck, Spencer pushed the barrel of the weapon into River’s forehead and said in a low voice, “Lay down on the ground right here on your stomach. Don’t move a muscle and don’t say a word.”
River looked around for rattlesnakes, then swallowed and complied.
H
e lifted his face up and watched Spencer as the man took one careful, silent step at a time towards the rusty hulk.
With a cat-quick move, he bounded through the rear door and swung the barrel into the enclosure.
“Don’t move!” he said.
“Who are you?”
“I’m here to help. Where’s the key to the handcuffs?”
She pointed.
“Over there in the corner.”
“I’m with the police.”
“You don’t look—”
“I’m undercover. You’re okay now. Don’t worry about anything. You’re safe.”
91
Day Three
July 23, 1952
Wednesday Morning
London had a five-minute head start, not to mention that Wilde had no idea where she was going. His plan was nothing more than hoping to spot her randomly in the distance. The plan didn’t work—she was nowhere, she was gone. She could have turned up a street, hopped on a bus or stopped for coffee.
Wilde didn’t know.
He lit a cigarette and walked up 16th Street.
Maybe he should go to her house. If she wasn’t there he could wait for her and at least be sure it was secure when she showed up.
The Daniels & Fisher Tower loomed up ahead.
As Wilde came to it, he did something he didn’t expect.
He pushed through the heavy revolving door and took the elevator up to Crockett Bluetone’s firm. According to the receptionist, a redhead sitting at a desk cluttered with a Royal typewriter and piles of papers, the lawyer was in a meeting.
“For how long?”
“It could be two minutes or two hours. No one ever tells me anything.”
Wilde weighed the words and said, “I’ll wait.”
“There’s coffee over there,” she said. “Help yourself.”
He headed over.
This was okay.
If Bluetone was here, he wasn’t out somewhere killing London.
The carpet was green and thick. Mahogany molding gave the room a heavy feeling, too heavy for Wilde’s taste, in fact so heavy that it seemed to suck the oxygen out of the air. The chairs were leather and oversized. The walls were filled with oil paintings, mostly western landscapes. One in particular caught Wilde’s eye and made him walk over. It was a sliver of flat desert floor at twilight dominated by a massive orange thunderhead that consumed the upper three-fourths of the painting. On closer inspection there was a Navajo woman and flock of sheep out there in the wild. Seeing them suddenly made the sky seem a hundred times bigger.
“That’s called Evening Thunderstorm,” the redhead said. “It’s by Gerard Delano.”
“Never heard of him,” Wilde said. “It’s good though.”
She smiled.
“That’s cute.”
“What’s cute?”
“Saying he’s good.” A beat then, “I’ve seen you around. You play the drums sometimes down at the Bokaray.”
He nodded.
“Only as a fill-in if someone’s sick or something.”
“You should do it full time.”
Wilde considered it.
“There isn’t much money in it.”
“You can say that about almost anything.”
He shrugged.
“Next time you see me there, flag me down and I’ll buy you a drink.”
She uncrossed her legs and re-crossed them the other direction.
“Okay.”
Five minutes later Wilde found himself in Bluetone’s office with the door closed. He tossed the map on the lawyer’s desk.
“What London gave you before was a fake,” he said. “She didn’t know if she could trust you. That’s the real one. She doesn’t want it anymore. It’s all yours. All she wants is to be left alone.”
Bluetone unfolded the paper and studied it.
“How do I know this isn’t another fake?”
“You don’t,” Wilde said. “Here’s the deal. London won’t be back to the law firm again ever. She’s staying in Denver though. You’re going to leave her alone. You’re both going your separate ways.”
The lawyer shrugged.
“Sure.”
Wilde hardened his face.
“Let me be as clear as I can on this,” he said. “Don’t hire anyone to hurt her. Don’t tell them to make it look like an accident. Don’t even look at her if you pass her on the street.”
A smile slowly worked its way onto Bluetone’s face.
“I feel sorry for you,” he said. “It’s no fun to be in a woman’s spell.”
Wilde got up and headed for the door, turning long enough to say, “This is your only warning. Be smart and take it.”
Then he was out, walking quickly down the hallway that suddenly seemed too dark and narrow. As he rounded the corner into the reception area, the redhead looked up from a magazine, startled that someone was there.
Wilde looked down at what she was reading.
What he saw he couldn’t believe.
The woman flicked it shut and shoved it in a drawer. “Our secret, okay?”
“Can I see that for a second?”
Yes.
He could.
It was a fashion magazine, one of those expensive ones with glossy paper that showed styles from New York and Paris and London. Wilde flipped through until he found the page that had been open before. On that page was Secret St. Rain, dressed to the nines with a devious smile as she sprayed perfume on her neck from an ice-blue bottle.
It was her.
There was no question about it.
Not even a little one.
His heart raced.
“Can I take this page?”
Sure.
No problem.
He ripped it out and shoved it in his pocket.
“Thanks.”
Then he was gone.
92
Day Three
July 23, 1952
Wednesday Afternoon
The heavy pounding of feet continued up the stairwell towards Waverly’s frozen body. Two seconds later the 29-year-old lanky frame of Miles Rocket bounded around the landing and almost knocked her down. A cigarette fell from his lips. He picked it up and replaced it.
“You’re not dead,” he said.
“Why would I be?”
He shook his head.
“Damn, I thought for sure—, I mean, first you drop off the face of the earth, then that guy shows up and trashes your apartment.”
Waverly narrowed her eyes.
“What guy? Did you see him?”
“Yeah, I saw him.”
“Tell me.”
The man retreated in thought.
“I heard all this noise,” he said. “At first I thought you were back and were having a fight with someone or something like that, but then I didn’t hear any arguing so I figured you were alone. The longer it went on, the more I got to thinking that it wasn’t you. When it stopped, I looked out the peephole of my door to see if someone walked by. Someone did, a man.”
“What’d he look like?”
“Scary, that’s the best way to describe him. Damn scary.”
“Give me specifics,” Waverly said. “Tall, short, fat, skinny, what?”
“Well, he was wearing a black T-shirt, although I don’t suppose that helps very much,” he said. “He had a scar that ran down his forehead towards his eye and then down his cheek. He was tall—over six feet—and strong too, not in a thick Gorilla kind of way but more in a taut way. Oh, he had a tattoo, too. It was on his forearm. I didn’t get a real good look at it on account of how fast he was moving, but it could have been a red rose or something like that.”
“Did you ever seen him before?”
“No that was it, just that one time. That was enough. There was something about the guy’s eyes.”
“What do you mean?”
“I don’t know,” he said. “They were just, I don’t know—wrong, if that makes any sense.”
Waverly
nodded.
“Yeah, it makes sense. When did this happen?”
“Last night, about ten. No, wait, not last night, Monday night. Right, Monday night, about ten.” A beat then, “What was he doing there?”
“Good question.”
“You don’t know him?”
“No.”
“He was probably just a robber then,” Rocket said. “You’d think he’d be a little more quiet though. Was anything taken?”
“I don’t know.”
As much as Waverly didn’t want to be around, she wanted even less to be ignorant as to what actually happened, so she went back to her apartment, stepped inside and closed the door.
The sight wasn’t as dramatic as before.
A lamp that could have easily been smashed was still in place, likewise for a picture frame, a radio too for that matter. Destruction wasn’t the motive. On the other hand, every drawer in the place had been pulled out and dumped. If something had been taken, it wasn’t obvious. A few things that should have been taken weren’t—her jewelry box for one, not that any of it was worth anything, but a thief wouldn’t know that at a rough glance, he’d be more prone to just take it and figure it out later. The more she looked around, the more she came to the conclusion that the man had been looking for something.
She picked a butcher knife off the floor and set it on the counter.
Then she got a pot of coffee going.
She drank a cup on the couch with the knife at her side.
Sunshine streamed through the windows.
Suddenly the phone rang.
It was Su-Moon, checking in to report she’d arrived safe and sound in Cleveland.
Waverly brought her up to speed on the break-in to her apartment as well as the note she was trying to get delivered to Bristol’s little spankee.
“With any luck she’ll show tonight.”
Su-Moon wasn’t impressed.
“You’re playing a dangerous game.”
“I’m going to scare her over to our side.”
“I doubt it.”
Waverly shrugged.
Time would tell.
“I won’t be coming back to my apartment so you won’t be able to get a hold of me here after this. Give me the number where you’re staying. I’ll have to contact you.”
Su-Moon read the numbers off and Waverly jotted them down and stuck the paper in her pocket.