Punishment

by Scott J. Holliday

  Jessica released him. She drew back and away to her side of the bed. Barnes let his head fall back into his hands, felt hot tears bubbling at the edges of his eyes.

  “Come here,” she said.

  He turned to her, saw her through blurry vision, naked, up on an elbow and lying on her side, holding the blanket up for him to enter. He crawled into her embrace, placed his head beneath her chin. She threw the blanket over him and pulled him close. He spoke into her chest. “Is there a third-date rule about a grown man crying in bed?”

  “Usually that happens on the fifth date.”

  Barnes pulled back from her chest, looked into her eyes. Though it was dark, he was close enough to make out her nose, her cheeks, the dark triangle of hollow at her neck. He’d never felt so willing to die. “I have to go.”

  Barnes walked out to his car. He hopped in and pulled the gearshift into drive. He was about to lift his foot from the brake when he saw a man walking toward him down the sidewalk through the rain, smoking a cigarette. He flicked the butt into the street. It shot sparks where it bounced.

  It came to Barnes what had been nagging him about his dream. Baseball-bat-waving lawyer Jeffrey Dunham hadn’t expected Calavera. He had expected his client, Damon Beckett. The same Damon Beckett that Barnes had met in the church parking lot the day before.

  “It wasn’t Beckett that hurt me.” Jeffrey Dunham’s voice.

  “Shhh.”

  Barnes picked up his radio and depressed the button, brought the microphone to his mouth. “Dispatch, this is Detective John Barnes, badge 5-2-2-5.”

  “Go ahead, 5225.”

  “Can you run a check on a name? It’s Damon Beckett. I’m guessing B-E-C-K-E-T-T.”

  “One moment.”

  The man passed by Barnes’s car. Barnes watched him in the rearview mirror. The man stopped, cupped his hand to light another smoke, and turned the next corner. The radio crackled when the dispatcher came back. “There are four Damon Becketts in Detroit and the metro area.”

  “Gimme their ages.”

  “Fifty-two, thirteen, twenty-seven, thirty-five.”

  “Bounce the old guy and the kid. Tell me if either of the other two have a sheet.”

  “Thirty-five is clean. Twenty-seven has one count misdemeanor, drunk and disorderly; one count misdemeanor, DWI; one count felony, concealed weapon. Sentenced one year, out in eight months.”

  “That’s my guy. Send me the address.”

  19

  Barnes pulled to the curb in front of 2548 Bertrand. The tiny house was a few blocks north of Saint Thomas of Assisi, one block south of a neighborhood bar called Shootz. The house had two darkened windows bisected by a concrete porch barely big enough for the folded lawn chair set against the aluminum siding. The home’s aging foundation caused it to lean forward like a shamed man’s head. It was what Franklin would call a vampire hut—no one ever home at night, nothing but drugged-out addicts or munkies during the day. Barnes could predict the interior—a heavy glass TV, sweating furniture, seismographic grime on the walls, and a machine in the back bedroom. He picked up the radio again, got a hold of dispatch, and asked, “My guy Beckett, does he have a registered vehicle?”

  “He never renewed after the DWI. Suspended license.”

  “Thanks.”

  Where’s a munky gonna walk?

  “To the bar, dumb-ass.” Chunk Philips.

  Barnes pulled into the Shootz parking lot. Three vehicles were nestled alongside the building—a lawn-service truck, a rusted-out sedan, an early-model Ford Bronco. The bar’s front door had a porthole window in the center; otherwise, the building was windowless and nondescript. There’d be no college girls standing on the tables and swinging their bras over their heads inside Shootz; if these walls could talk, they’d say, Go to hell.

  Barnes stepped inside the bar to find the scents of yeast and dirty deep fryers. Tom Waits was on the jukebox. The man’s voice sounded like demons and angels were playing tug-of-war with his vocal cords. The barroom was mostly filled with flies and sagging lifers. The bartender stood at the far end by the EMPLOYEES ONLY door, her arms folded over a black Pantera tank top, a knee bent with a foot against the wall. She had disinterested eyes and the hair of a drowned poodle. In another life, and with a subtler approach to makeup, she might have been a looker. Still, she had Damon Beckett’s attention. He was sitting at the bar, one elbow propped on the lacquered wood, a full shot glass before him. He had a cool confidence concerning the bartender. Barnes envisioned her sitting on the edge of a yellowed bed, clutching a sheet to her bare chest, random bruises on her arms and thighs, shaking her head and saying, “You’re such an asshole, Damon,” as he headed out the door.

  Barnes plopped down next to Beckett and smiled. The man reeked of cigarette smoke. He’d probably be sucking a butt now if not for the bar ban. Beckett turned to him, did a quick double take, and then smiled back. “Moon must be full tonight.”

  Barnes nodded. “Brings out the finest people.”

  “That it does, sir,” Beckett said, raising his glass. He downed the whiskey and knocked the glass on the bar top. “What can I do you for?”

  “Remains to be seen,” Barnes said. He signaled to the bartender. She rolled her eyes and popped off the wall, came over reluctantly, toes dragging with each forward step.

  “You a friend of his?”

  “Maybe.”

  “Then maybe you can tell him he’s not getting another drink until he settles his tab.” She crossed her arms and sagged.

  Barnes raised an eyebrow to Beckett.

  Beckett shrugged.

  To the bartender, Barnes said, “What’s he into you for?”

  She kept her eyes on Beckett. “A hell of a lot more than he’s got.”

  “Honey,” Beckett said, smiling supremely, “you have no idea how much I got.” He turned to one of the lifers against the back wall of the bar. “Ain’t that right, Charlie?”

  Charlie, who sat on his wooden chair like it was the Harley-Davidson he could never afford, grunted. His arms, thick right down to the wrists and tattooed to a blurry black and blue, looked like castoffs from a slaughterhouse.

  Barnes set three twenties on the bar top. “Will this cover it?”

  The bartender looked down at the bills. She smirked and said, “With two shots to spare.”

  Barnes said, “Make mine a bourbon.”

  “Two,” Beckett said.

  She left to pour the shots.

  Barnes said, “You threatened Jeffrey Dunham.”

  “Excuse me?”

  “Your lawyer. When he couldn’t get you off your concealed-weapon charge, you vowed to make him pay for his ineptitude.”

  Beckett shifted in his chair, suddenly interested in the labeled bottles against the wall behind the bar. His hands moved for the pack of smokes in his T-shirt pocket but stopped short, fell back to the bar. The shots arrived. The bartender set them down easy before wandering back toward her wall. Beckett watched her go. “How the hell did you know that?”

  “Call it intuition,” Barnes said. He downed his bourbon.

  “Nah,” Beckett said. “No way anyone could have known that. I—oh.” He closed his eyes and nodded. “The machine, right?”

  Barnes offered a wink.

  “Then you know I didn’t kill him.”

  “Not necessarily,” Barnes said, “but let’s not go there yet. For now I’m just wondering how much you know about the man that did.”

  “Pickax guy?”

  “Bingo.” Jeffrey Dunham.

  Beckett shrugged. He drank his shot, clacked the glass down.

  “You see,” Barnes said, “there’s something that’s been nagging at me about the night Dunham died.”

  “I’m sure it ain’t his brand of pajamas.”

  “His security alarm never went off. Someone gave his murderer the code.”

  “They questioned me about all this already,” Beckett said. “Some big black dude.”

  “And I�
��m sure Detective Franklin did a bang-up job,” Barnes said, “but you were one of dozens Dunham defended, and there was no reason to suspect you had anything against him, other than he couldn’t get you off the gun rap. Now I’m digging deeper.”

  A darkness fell over Beckett. “Is that right?”

  Barnes spoke slowly. “That’s right.” He turned on the swiveled stool and opened his body toward Beckett.

  “Excuse me a moment,” Beckett said, tapping the smokes in his chest pocket. “I gotta have a smoke.”

  “Oh, hell no,” Barnes said. He placed a hand on Beckett’s chest. With his other hand he loosed his Glock and placed it hard against Beckett’s ribs, kept it hidden beneath the bar top. In a low voice, he said, “This ain’t some TV cop show full of bumbledores who can’t keep a suspect. Now ease that pistol out of your belt. Put it on the bar.”

  Beckett sighed and did as he was told. When his pistol tapped down on the wood, the bartender’s eyes widened. Her body went rigid.

  Barnes picked up Beckett’s pistol and tucked it into his waist. “Now let’s go talk. Somewhere quiet.”

  The two men stood. Beckett started toward the exit, but Barnes shook his head and rerouted him toward the back of the bar.

  “Hey, man,” Beckett said, smirking, “if you’re thinking in terms of bathroom stalls, I don’t swing that way. Nothin’ against your kind, though.”

  “Shut up,” Barnes said. He prodded Beckett toward the jukebox, stood him before it, gun in the munky’s back. “Open it.”

  “What, the jukebox?”

  “Don’t mess with me, Damon.”

  Beckett sighed. He called over his shoulder, “Darlin’, you want to help me out here?”

  The bartender scowled. She lifted the hinged counter that kept her behind the bar top. She made her way over, pulling out a set of keys. She arrived at the jukebox, placed her foot beneath it, and kicked out a wheel lock. She slid the music machine over, exposing a half-size door behind. She showed Barnes dead eyes.

  “Open it,” he said.

  She inserted her key, turned the lock, pushed the short door open. Barnes forced Beckett to stoop, shoved him into the room. He gestured for the bartender to enter as well. She went in. Barnes followed.

  The hidden room was just like the one at Ziti’s, only the walls were decorated with beer posters and neon signs. There were two machines along the side wall, two beds. Barnes gripped Beckett’s elbow and guided him toward the beds. “Have a seat.”

  “Chill out, buddy,” Beckett said.

  Buddy?

  The word triggered memories like rolling napalm. Barnes reeled back as the room spun around him. He blinked and shook his head, banged the butt of his palm against his temple. When the motion stopped, he saw Calavera standing in the corner—white mask, body clad in black, pickax in hand.

  “Freeze,” Barnes said. He stepped toward the killer, gun up. He reached back for his handcuffs.

  The sound of a ratcheting shotgun stopped Barnes’s movement. Time seemed to slow. Calavera evaporated from the scene. The room returned to reality. Barnes turned to find the bartender had picked up a hacked-off Remington 870 Express. She stood there with it aimed at his chest, a Schlitz sign over her shoulder.

  She said, “Damon, run.”

  Time sped up. Barnes turned to find Beckett had already slipped through the short doorway and was pulling the jukebox over to block the door. Barnes ducked through and shouldered the music machine. It spun away. He fell. He stood. Saw the bar door closing. He charged into the parking lot, saw Beckett turn into the alley beside the bar. He ran to the alley. Beckett was scaling the fence. Barnes brought up his Glock.

  Too late. Beckett went over, rattling the diamond-patterned metal. Barnes scampered to a nearby dumpster, leaped up, trampled the plastic top, hopped the fence. He landed, rolled over his head back onto his feet. Now down another alley. A light attached to the side of the building, moths and mosquitoes. At the alley mouth Barnes looked left, right, saw a shadow pass beneath a street lamp.

  He chased it.

  The sound of breaking glass. A wooden crack. A scream. The lights inside a house flicked on. Barnes ran to the house, up the porch, through the kicked-open front door. His feet crunched shattered glass on the carpet. A woman in the kitchen, dressed in a rainbow muumuu, pointing toward the open back door. The scent of a grilled cheese sandwich on the stove top as he moved through.

  The rattling sound of another fence being scaled.

  Barnes bolted across the yard, hopped the fence.

  Another backyard. Beckett’s shadow scampered across the driveway along the house’s side. Barnes chased it. He looked left, right, left. There, Beckett passing between two cars on a nearby driveway. Barnes dashed, his knees barking, his lungs tightening. The sound of cracking wood. He came to the side of the house, a two-story brick. The gate to the backyard was kicked in, the yard enclosed by a six-foot privacy fence. No way Beckett had scaled that yet.

  Barnes slowed to a stop. He scanned the yard, breathing hard. An aluminum toolshed, a blue kiddie pool with fish silhouettes on the outside, a small apple tree in the back right corner.

  “Don’t make this difficult, Damon.”

  “He said he’d kill me,” Beckett said. The voice seemed to come from straight ahead. The kiddie pool? Lying behind it?

  “Who said he’d kill you?”

  “I did.” Antonio Reyes.

  “Shhh.”

  “The guy,” Beckett said. “The pickax guy.”

  Barnes stepped tentatively toward the kiddie pool. “We’ll take you into custody. We’ll protect you.”

  “I’m not going back to jail. All I did was give him the code.”

  “Shoot him.” Jeffrey Dunham.

  “That’s good, Damon,” Barnes said, still stepping toward the pool. The water inside looked dark, putrid. “It’s not that big a deal. You were threatened, coerced. We can work with that.”

  “Screw that,” Beckett said. “A four-time offender? Snowball’s chance.”

  The voice seemed to change location. Behind the shed now? “Just come on out,” Barnes said. “Running won’t help.”

  No reply.

  Barnes stepped around the kiddie pool, Glock aimed at the darkness behind it. Nothing. A quick glance behind the apple tree. Nothing. He moved toward the shed, gun at shoulder height. He stepped into the black space between the shed and the fence. A mass of shadow near the ground.

  “Just stay put, Damon.”

  With his gun still trained on the shadow, Barnes pulled out his flashlight and shined it into the darkness.

  A pile of tires.

  He stepped around the tires to find a gap in the boards of the privacy fence, just wide enough for a skinny bastard like Beckett to slip through.

  20

  The bartender, Jackie Helms, had been stupid enough to still be at the bar when the police arrived. She had been walked out and tucked into the back of a cruiser, her hands cuffed behind her back. A uniformed officer was about to close the door.

  “Let me talk to her for a sec,” Barnes said.

  The uniform shrugged and walked off, leaving the door open. Barnes leaned into the opening, one arm resting on the door frame, the other on the car’s roof. He could see now that behind her layers of makeup she was young. Eighteen, maybe less. “What was all that about?”

  No response.

  “You love him?” Barnes said.

  The girl hung her head.

  “Look at me.”

  She looked up. Tears welled in her eyes. Her chin began to quiver.

  “Jesus,” Barnes said.

  “He’ll kill him.”

  “Who?”

  “The axman or whatever.”

  “He told you that?”

  She nodded. Tears rappelled down her face on streaks of mascara.

  “What else?”

  She turned away.

  “I’m trying to protect him,” Barnes said.

  “Yeah, right.”
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  “So what, Daddy didn’t hug you so you shack up with a guy like Beckett? Wind up pulling a shotgun on the cops? Fuck the world and all that?”

  “You got me all figured out.”

  “Look at me.”

  She didn’t.

  He snapped his fingers.

  She looked at him.

  “You’re willing to go to jail for Damon Beckett? Cut the shit. Tell me what I need to know.”

  “He said unless Damon gave him the lawyer’s alarm code, he’d kill him. That’s all I know.”

  “How would Beckett have the code?”

  She tilted her head to wipe her cheeks on her bare shoulders, left black streaks on them. “Isn’t this the part where I should ask for a lawyer?”

  “Probably,” Barnes said, “but you’re increasing the chances that Damon meets his old friend first.”

  “Damon can protect himself.”

  Barnes pulled back his jacket, showed her Beckett’s gun in his belt. “Sure about that?”

  She glanced at the gun and then stared at the hard black plastic of the cop-car passenger seat before her.

  “He’ll be dead before your lawyer shows,” Barnes said.

  “Damon was going to stick it to that lawyer.”

  “How?”

  “Break into his house, steal from him.”

  “How’d he get the code?” Jeffrey Dunham.

  “Shhh.”

  “How’d he get the code?” Barnes said.

  “He knows a guy at DAT Security. Some computer kid. He gives Damon house codes, Damon steals a few things, fences them, and they split the profits.”

  “This DAT guy, you know his name?”

  “No.”

  “Know what he looks like?”

  “Never met him.”

  “Did Damon ever mention the Pickax Man by name?”

  “Just said he was a Mexican guy.”

  “Anything else?”

  She shrugged.

  “Think.”

  She sat still for a moment, her eyes moving back and forth. “After Damon gave him the code, the axman told him to go visit his mother. Damon was weirded out by it.”

  “His mother still alive?”

  “She’s been dead a few years, or so he says.”