Borrowed Time

by Tracy Clark

  I photographed everything before putting it all back the way I’d found it, except for Symonds’s file. Since there was no death date filled in, it was possible she was still alive, I thought, feeling the urgency bubble up from my gut like a toxic brew. Was she safe now that Darby was dead, or would Spada arrange for someone else to solve the Symonds problem? I couldn’t take the chance. I slid her paperwork into my bag. I’d have to warn her.

  Who was Spada to decide when people died? And for what? Money? I glanced at Spada’s expensive toys, the framed photographs of his perfect family, those documenting his rich-man’s pastimes: boating, golf, fly-fishing. Nick Spada had discovered a way to make dying his business, and I was going to make sure he didn’t get away with it. Unfortunately, the files only proved that the deaths were to Spada’s benefit. They weren’t evidence that either he or Darby had committed murder.

  I pulled the newspaper article on Langham’s death out of my pocket. I unfolded it and laid it flat on the desk. Why had Tim kept it? It didn’t appear to have any connection to Spada. The short article offered nothing new. I’d stared at it a million times, all but memorized it. The photo was just as grainy as before. There were the firemen standing around, the crowd looking on. The crowd. Looking on. Something there. Something I’d missed.

  I got real still, afraid to move or even blink, for fear that what I thought I saw would evaporate like mist. I searched Spada’s desk for a pair of eyeglasses, a magnifying glass, anything to get a closer look, finally finding the latter tucked inside his mahogany in-box. I lasered in on the photo, studied it, every dot, every murky shadow, every face. Not the firemen. Not the house. The tall man standing in the back, partially hidden by the crowd: dark, curly hair, handsome. “Darby,” I muttered, my heart pounding. It was Vincent Darby.

  I rose slowly. That was it. Why Tim kept the clipping. He’d somehow stumbled upon what Spada and Darby were up to. He knew why Langham and the others were dying. When he saw Darby in the picture, had he put two and two together? Had he accused Darby that night on the boat of rigging Langham’s furnace, flooding the old man’s place with carbon monoxide? Was this the big picture Tim Ayers missed? That was it. I was sure of it. I grabbed up the clipping, put the magnifier back where I’d found it.

  Just then, a vacuum cleaner started up down the hall and I nearly lost my lunch. The loud roar of the industrial machine was underscored by the rapid-fire exchange of a foreign language. Polish? Russian? I pedaled over to the door and eased it open a crack, in time to see the night cleaning crew. There were three older women in light blue smocks, grabbing rags and bottles of cleaning solution off a big rolling cart and slipping into one of the front offices. A fourth woman, the one with the vacuum, had headed toward reception, cutting off my exit. I closed the door, pressed my back against it, envisioning the next two to five years inside Logan Correctional. This, the moment you realized the jig is up, was why crime did not pay. This was the point where consequences for bad behavior clocked you on the chin like a big angry fist.

  I stared longingly at the window; I was twenty-five floors up. Not an option. I took a moment to settle myself, then pulled it together and lifted off the door. Another peek confirmed the women were still there, though the hall was temporarily clear. The vacuum still roared up front. I counted to three, swung the door open, and bolted, racing down the hall, my eyes on the office with the women in it. My plan was to streak right past them, one fast blur of humanity they wouldn’t be able to identify. However, halfway there, I saw the vacuum cleaner heading back and I skidded through an open door and hid behind it.

  This office was a lot smaller than Spada’s and hadn’t a single knickknack in it, but it offered the same trap. I could not get past the cleaners. I pressed my head against the door and thought it through, my brain picking away at the problem. I suddenly got an idea.

  I lunged over and flicked on the lights, then ran for the desk, pulling papers out of the in-box, grabbing a pen. When I heard the women approach, I slid into the chair behind the desk, snatched up the receiver and held it to my ear, like I was listening to someone on the other end, remembering almost too late that I still had on the latex gloves. I cradled the receiver between neck and shoulder blade, scrambled out of the gloves and shoved them into my pocket, just as the women appeared in the doorway.

  The women jumped and gasped when they saw me, surprised, it appeared, to find they were not alone. I hoped none of them recognized Spada’s staff by sight. If they did, I was busted. I calmly held up one finger to signal that I’d only be a minute. My eyes landed on a framed photo on the desk of a white family: husband, wife, and two towheaded toddlers. I flipped the photo facedown. There was no way I could pass any of them off as relatives.

  “Fine,” I said to the imaginary person on the other end of the line. “I’ll send you the contract tomorrow by FedEx. It’s nice doing business with you, Andrew.” I put the receiver down, stood, straightened my clothes, then heaved out a sigh. “Whew. Long day, huh, ladies? I didn’t realize it was so late. Time flies.”

  “Late,” the taller of the three women said, her gray eyes narrowed suspiciously. “No one here works so late.” Her accent was thick and definitely Slavic, definitely Polish, not Russian. “That’s why we clean first here.” She held up a list attached to a clipboard. “See? First.”

  “Then I’ll get out of your way,” I said.

  Her eyes stayed narrowed. “The door was locked. Yes?” “Yes, it was locked. I locked it.”

  “You have key?”

  I reached into my pocket and pulled out the keys to my apartment, flashed them. “Right here. You didn’t expect me to work in here, a woman alone, with the door wide open, did you? That’s not safe. I could get assaulted, mugged, God forbid, murdered. But if you’re still concerned about it, I’ll just call Mr. Spada and he can explain to you why I had to work late when I told him almost a month ago that I had theater tickets for tonight.” I shrugged dejectedly. “Good money down the drain.”

  I moved for the phone, hoping I wasn’t going to have to make another fake call.

  “Everything good,” she said, the others concurring with smiles and nods. “We come back.”

  I smiled, slipped politely past them. “No need. I’m finished. Good night, ladies.” I turned back, remembering the phone and my prints on it. “Oh, I forgot. There’s a cold going around the office. Would you ladies mind wiping the desk and phone down really well for me? I’d hate for anyone to get sick.”

  They nodded, smiled, then went to work. I stood for a moment and watched as one of the ladies began wiping down the desk with disinfectant, running the rag across the blotter, picking up the receiver, wiping it clean. Not foolproof, but good enough. I’d be long gone by the time they got around to the family photo.

  Moving quickly, I headed for the door, hoping it was now unlocked, holding my breath until the very moment I pushed through the glass and stepped out into the hall. I rode down to the lobby like a woman who’d just narrowly missed getting creamed by a garbage truck. I felt a little rattled, yet euphoric, as though I’d teetered on the edge of a cliff and lived to tell about it. It was then that I glanced up and saw the security camera staring back at me. Neither of us blinked. I assumed it was operational and not there simply for show, which meant I was being recorded. Funny, I hadn’t bothered to look for it on my way up.

  Building security would have the date and time of my arrival and departure duly time-stamped. Resigned, I offered the camera a weak smile. The kind a naughty four-year-old might give her mother after tracking mud all over the living room carpet. What else could I do? Spada would know he’d had an after-hours visitor. He’d call building security, they’d pull the tape, and there I’d be. When the elevator hit the lobby, I strolled through it and out into the night. I’d just have to wait to see which one of us made it to prison first.

  Chapter 36

  “It’s him,” I said, sliding the clipping across my desk to Ben.

  He eyed
it and frowned. “Maybe, but we’ll get back to that. What did you just tell me?”

  I’d just relayed the evening’s events: Spada’s Glock, the files, the Polish women, and, of course, the security camera. It might have been that final detail that made him blanch. I swiveled my chair around to my computer and began transferring the photos I’d taken at Spada’s so I could print them out. “I’ll admit, it wasn’t an ideal situation, but I left the place exactly as I found it . . . more or less.”

  His brows raised. “‘More or less’?”

  “Maybe a few picklock scratches . . . and the file, but before you start carping about it, Stella Symonds is a potential murder victim. Now that Darby’s gone, Spada could very well hire somebody else to take her out. And ID’ing Darby at Langham’s place lays that so-called accident right at Spada’s feet.” I smiled. “I’ve closed the loop.”

  He looked as though someone had Tased him, his eyes glassy, blank, with a faraway look in them. “That’s unlawful entry and destruction of private property.”

  I frowned. “You’re still on that? Haven’t you heard a word I just said? Technically, maybe, but I don’t think Spada’s going to push back on it, do you? He’s got bigger worries than that. I’m thinking about the greater good here, and I’m going to see Marta right now to discuss the whole thing.”

  I loaded up the copies, stuffed them into my bag. I glanced at Ben, who just sat there in a stupor. “Why’d you stop by, anyway?”

  He shook his head, dazed. “I honestly cannot remember.”

  “Okay, then get out.” I held up my bag. “I’ve got work to do.”

  Ben stood, headed for the door. “Don’t worry. I’m leaving before you make me lose my job.”

  “I’ll call you later,” I said.

  He waved me off. “If it’s from jail, don’t.”

  I heard Ben trot down the stairs as I finished packing up. I made extra copies of Symonds’s file; I put one in my bag to show Marta, one in the safe under my desk, and a third I tucked into a stamped envelope addressed to a PO box I used for situations like this. I tossed the envelope into my out-box, like ordinary mail, then flicked the lights off, locked up, and raced down the stairs. I had car keys in my hand, my bag slung over my shoulder, eyes and ears on alert, scanning the street. Now that I knew for sure Spada was not above ending a life, I didn’t want mine to be the next one he took.

  I heard a CTA bus in need of a brake job pick up steam two blocks over as I headed to the car. I kept my pace steady and took a deep breath, smelling rain, grease from Deek’s griddle . . . and cigarette smoke. I tensed, got a weird feeling, and eased my hand down into my bag for my gun, but that’s as far as I got.

  Two men in dark colors shot out of nowhere. One man—wide, tall, built like a Mack truck—seized me by the front of my denim jacket, twisting me almost off my feet. He wore driving gloves. Leather. His hands looked as wide as catcher’s mitts. My bag tumbled off my shoulder, taking my gun with it. The force of the grab strangled the expletive in my throat. His accomplice angled himself somewhere behind me. I couldn’t see him.

  I braced, fists raised, forearms out. I tried to break the viselike hold with short chops to the man’s forearms, but it was like chipping away at tempered steel. I tried to twist around to see the man behind me, but couldn’t. Cold sweat trickled down my back. This wasn’t good, not good at all.

  Man Number 2 stepped around front. I craned to get a look at him. My feet barely touched the ground. He was at least six three, two hundred pounds. No gloves. He was black. He wore a gold signet ring on the right hand. I couldn’t make out the letter. He disappeared behind me again.

  Dammit.

  I stomped down on my attacker’s instep; he yowled and grabbed me tighter. Then I got snatched from behind. One large hand tugged at the back of my jacket. A blanket of dread spread over me. I was a PI sandwich.

  There was a lot of heavy breathing, mine and theirs, and the sound of three pairs of frenzied feet scuffling across uneven asphalt. If there was anything else taking place on the street, I did not notice it. Nothing but hands, bulk, and menace made it through the surreal bubble of assault in progress. My fight for position and escape ended in a sudden explosion of pain as I kneed Mr. Gloves in the kneecap and was conked from behind by something incompatible with the fragility of human bone and flesh.

  Starbursts exploded behind my eyes and for a couple seconds they were all I could see. I slumped like a rag doll as strange hands grabbed me up, keeping me upright, twisting me around. Through the haze of near unconsciousness, I knew I was being moved, shoved. Backward or forward I couldn’t tell, until I slammed hard against brick and got my bearings. I was pinned against the building. A throbbing white heat radiated from the back of my head and down the length of my spine.

  “You’ve been sticking your nose where it don’t belong,” the man who hit me whispered into my left ear, his rancid breath warm on my neck. Despite his closeness, his voice sounded as if it were coming from Cleveland. I had to strain to hear it.

  “Yeah, and we don’t like it,” Mr. Gloves added, his voice even farther away. Pittsburgh? Rochester?

  Everything started to go dark. Who turned the lights out? I couldn’t feel my arms or legs. My head felt like Dumbo was sitting on it.

  “Hey, hold her up. She’s passing out,” one of the voices said. “Hurry up. Make it quick.”

  “Where is it?” Gloves hissed. “Yo, check the bag.”

  A pair of hands let me loose, and my knees buckled. A hand slapped my right cheek twice, rousing me enough to get a second wind. Unfortunately, I acquired no common sense with the wind. I began to fight back.

  “Get off me, you pieces of shit!” I shrieked. I punched and kicked, aiming for noses, eye sockets, Adam’s apples, sternums, kidneys, kneecaps, but it was like boxing a granite wall. I got nothing for my effort but a head shove to the bricks. I groaned and squeezed my eyes shut to steady the dancing lights. Another goose egg on top of the one already forming. Wunnerful.

  “You got to give it to her,” one of the men said. “She’s got guts, but that’s just what the man don’t want. I found it. Let’s go.”

  More furious than prudent, I rammed the heel of my right hand into the nose nearest to me and shoved up. I heard a growl. It was mine. Mr. Gloves screamed and clutched his nose, which started to bleed through the nose holes in his mask. His gloves were getting messy. “Aaaah, godammid. I dink she broke by dose. Fuck it all doo hell.” He lunged for me, grabbing me by the neck with bloodied fingers, rearing back to smack me with the other hand. His partner stopped him midswing.

  “Back off. We got it. Let’s go.” He then grabbed the bottom of my face in his monster grip, a thumb to one cheek, index finger to the other. “You’re done with this, if you know what’s good.”

  Gloves cradled his nose, glaring at me through the holes in his messy mask. “Dext dime.”

  “Hey, what’s going on down there? Hey!”

  Another man’s voice had been added to the mix, and he sounded pissed off. All hands flew off me. The human cluster I’d been in the middle of melted away and I could feel night air on my face. My shirt and jacket front were bloody and bunched up around my chin. I felt along my chest, taking inventory. I’d lost only a couple buttons, thankfully. Buttons I could replace. Teeth? Now, that was a whole other story.

  “Oh, good Lord!” a woman screamed from a distance. Or at least I thought it was from a distance.

  It was Muna. Muna?

  I teetered against the side of the building alone, fresh air flooding over me like a wave of good fortune and newfound redemption. Angry voices being raised in defense, and then the sound of running feet, gave way to the start of a car engine and the squealing of angry tires.

  “You all right?” Muna asked.

  I gave focusing a try. Two Deeks. Two Munas. Both staring at me. The apartment building across the street undulated lazily like the psychedelic ooze inside a lava lamp.

  “Far-out,” I heard m
yself say.

  And then the lights went out . . . and stayed out.

  When I came to, I was lying on my back on something cushy. And I was moving. Streetlights in a box flickered past. Out of the corner of my eye, a felt-covered puppy dog nodded lazily at me. Everything smelled of fake pine. Streetlights in a box? Not a box. A window. Streetlights whizzing past a window. Of a car. I was in the backseat of a speeding car. I slowly opened my eyes wider, focused. The something cushy was Muna. My throbbing head was in her lap.

  I bolted up, or tried to, but the force of the action sent my brain swishing around in my skull. I eased back down, gritting my teeth. “Owww.” Cass Raines, mistress of the understatement.

  “Don’t you worry,” Muna said. “We’re two blocks from the emergency room. Step on it, Deek.” Stunned, I looked a question. “Yep, Deek’s driving. We didn’t want to wait for the ambulance, us being so close like we were. You lay back now. Don’t worry about a thing.”

  “My bag.”

  “I got that right here.”

  I struggled up, my head throbbing. “Let me see.”

  Muna handed it to me, and I searched it feverishly. My gun was still there, though it hadn’t done me a bit of good. The copies I’d made from Spada’s files were gone. The thugs had taken them. “My phone?”

  “I have that, too. It must have fallen out. I found it by the curb.”

  I eased back down, smiling. Then I began to laugh. The thugs would go back to Spada, their job accomplished, but I still had a duplicate set of the copies.

  “She’s laughing,” Muna said. “Why are you laughing? Step on it, Deek. She’s delirious. Good thing I called your emergency numbers.”

  I stopped laughing. “Whoa, whoa. What?”

  “I found them in your phone. I called the numbers with stars next to them, Detective Mickerson, Mrs. Vincent. I figured they were your go-to people. They’re meeting us at the hospital, so just relax till we get there. Good old Muna Steele’s got everything all worked out.”