by Roger Smith
Barnard walked back to the car and popped the trunk. He took a. 38 revolver from under the spare tire and shoved it into his waistband. He’d taken it off a dead drug dealer and kept it for special occasions. Like this. Then he hauled out a jerrican and walked back to the kid.
Ronnie looked as if he was thinking of making a run for it.
Barnard stopped in front of him and set the jerrican down. Then he took the revolver from his waistband, cocked it, and shot the kid between the eyes. The little bastard hadn’t even seen it coming, just gave him a stupid look and dropped. Barnard shot him once more in the chest, jst to make sure.
Barnard dragged Rikki Fortune’s body until it lay next to his beanpole buddy. Then he grabbed the half-breed kid by a bare ankle and slung him across the two gangsters. He emptied the jerrican onto the bodies, set fire to a scrap of cloth, and tossed it, stepping back. The bodies exploded into flame.
There was no way that Barnard was going to let this crime scene into the system. He knew there was only an outside chance that anybody would give a shit about these useless lives ending, but it was a chance he wasn’t prepared to take.
No, he knew that the answer to his prayers lay in a house up on the mountain. This was a gift from God.
In very fucken weird wrapping paper.
CHAPTER 9
Burn found Susan making up the single bed in the spare room. “This for me?”
She nodded, tucking in a sheet. “I think it’s best.”
He tried to help, taking one side of the sheet. She snapped it out of his hand. “I can do this, Jack.”
“You know that Matt’s slept with me the last couple of nights?”
“Then he can sleep with me.” She shook a pillow into a cover.
“He’s wetting the bed again.”
“I’m not exactly surprised.” She levered herself up to standing. “He needs counseling. I want him to get help, as soon as we’re back in the States.”
He nodded. “Sure.” He turned to leave the room.
“Jack?” Her voice stopped him. She was looking at him, in the direct way she had, as if she could read the fine print on his soul. “Do you believe in retribution?”
“Susan, where’s this going?”
“Do you ever think of that cop? In Milwaukee?”
“Every day.”
“Do you even know his name?” Burn didn’t answer her. Susan pressed on. “Do you know he had a wife? And a son?”
Burn said nothing, letting her get done with this.
She walked past him, that splay-footed balancing act. “Just like you, Jack.”
When the fat boer showed her the picture on his phone, Carmen Fortune felt a sense of disbelief. Could it really be? Could Rikki really be dead? Did this really mean she would never again feel him shove himself inside her or hit her with his fists?
She stared at the image on the phone. “Is it cut? His throat?”
“No, he’s smiling for the camera.” Gatsby grabbed the phone out of her hand and slid it into the pocket of his sweat-stained shirt.
“Who did it?” a ht="0em"›
“Dunno.”
“Where is he? His body?”
“Don’t worry about that.”
Carmen had been out smoking a globe of tik, come back with that crazy rush in her head when she saw the fat boer waiting for her outside her apartment. She had let him in, expecting abuse over the money that Rikki owed him. The cop was bad luck.
But today he had brought her good news. Fuck, it was unbelievable.
The cop was speaking, but she was caught up in the spin cycle in her head. He prodded her with one of his fat fingers, and she nearly fell. “I’m fucken talking to you!”
Carmen had to concentrate hard to keep her head together. “What, man?”
He shook his head at her. “Fucken tik whore.” She opened her mouth to protest, but he lifted a hand to shut her up. “Now listen and listen careful.”
“Okay.”
“People are going to want to know where he is, you get me?”
“Ja.”
“But you not gonna tell them he’s dead.”
“Why not?”
“Because I’m telling you not to, that’s why not!” He was looming over her, his stink like a dead thing in the room.
“But what do I do? If people want to know where he gone?”
“You tell them him and his buddy…”
“Faried.”
“Faried. You tell them you heard them talking about going up the west coast.”
“For what?”
“Who gives a fuck for what? For crayfish or abalone. Or Hottentot whores. Just say they went and you haven’t seen them since. You understand me?”
Carmen nodded. “Ja. Okay, man.”
Gatsby grabbed her by the arm. She could feel her tit lying against his hand. He pulled the hand away. “I hear you saying anything else, and I come and cut your fucken throat. You got me?”
She nodded, stepping away from his stench. He looked around the room. “Where’s the old alkie?”
“Gone to buy a wine. Don’t worry, he won’t say nothing.”
“And the kid?”
“Social Services took him.”
“What, they say you unfit?” She shrugged. “So, no husband. No kid. You can sell your ass again.” There was a phlegmy sound from deep in Gatsby’s lungs, like a chest wound sucking. He was laughing.
“Fuck you!” Carmen couldn’t stop herself.
He moved fast for a huge man, and his fist flew at her. He pulled the punch at the last second, and she felt his clammy knuckles brush the skin of her cheek. They stood like that, eyes locked until he lowered his fist.
“Next time, I’ll put you in hospital.”
Then he turned and lumbered out, leaving the door open. Carmen shut it.
She sat down on the stained sofa. Rikki was dead. She still couldn’t believe it. She had dreaded telling him they had lost Sheldon’s grant. Rikki would have blamed her, and, unlike the fat boer, he wouldn’t have pulled his punches. Fuck, knowing Rikki, he would have put the boot in.
She felt relief and even some odd sensation that wasn’t familiar to her. It was happiness, she finally realized. She was happy. For the first time since she was seven years old, when her father had started visiting her with his whispered, sweaty demands, she belonged to no man.
Burn stood in the kitchen looking through at Susan and Matt on the sofa in front of the TV. Susan held her son’s hand. Two days ago this would have made Burn happy. He would have taken this as a sign that Susan was growing close to Matt again, that she was moving out of the closed circle of her and her baby.
But he knew now that Susan was getting ready to turn herself in. She was afraid she’d be separated from her son and was taking what time she could to be with him. Burn couldn’t stand watching them any longer, in the knowledge that in a couple of days they would be out of his life.
Probably forever.
He found himself on the deck in the dark, staring out over the lights of the city below. He felt a moment of vertigo as if everything was sliding away from him. He sat down on a wooden chair and deliberately slowed his breathing. Forced himself to calm down. Forced himself to remember who he was.
He had always been a fighter. As a kid, he’d protected his older brother from bullies. He’d worn the bruises and the broken teeth, but he’d never backed down. Ever. There were still men in his hometown who would prop up the bar and talk about the night he won them the high school state championship with his arm broken. His throwing arm. He’d landed his passes on a dime and scored the winning touchdown.
In the marines, no matter what brand of shit hit the fan, he had found a quiet place, some stillness within, that allowed him the time to act.
The night the men had come in off the deck, he had known he was going to take them down. It wasn’t a thought; it was a reflex. He was a fighter.
Now he was losing his family, and he wasn’t doing a fucking thing. He
was letting Susan slip farther and farther away.
He stood and paced the deck, asking himself the tough questions: Did he want her to go? Did he want to be alone, with nothing to lose? Did he want to get rid of everything that made him vulnerable, go deep into a cold place within himself and live out the rest of his days a refugee from both the law and any of the emotions that made him human?
No. He did not.
Burn went inside. Matt was still hypnotized by the TV. Susan was in the kitchen, chopping vegetables.
Burn leaned on the counter and watched her chop. She had beautiful hands, long delicate fingers. She’d been a sculptor when he had first met her. She’d lost interest in sculpting in the last few years, her passion to be an artist diluted by the duties of a wife and mother. It was a pity. She was talented.
Susan ignored him. She scraped the vegetables into a wok and walked it across to the stove.
Burn didn’t take his eyes off her. “Ernie Simpkins.”
She looked up at him, brushing hair from her face. “What?”
“The dead cop’s name was Ernie Simpkins.” She shrugged, stirred the wok with a wooden spoon. “I wish to hell I could change what happened, Susan, but I can’t. I don’t want to lose you. Or Matt. Or the baby.”
“It’s too late, Jack. You already have.”
“I screwed up, big time. I admit that.”
She looked up from the wok. “No, Jack, forgetting an anniversary is screwing up. Murdering a cop is in an altogether different category. And let’s not even talk about what you did the other night.”
Burn watched her as she cooked, determined not to let her anger scare him and drive him into silence. “Baby, do you really want to split up our family? If you do that, you know that we’ll never be able to see each other again. The kids will grow up not knowing who their father is.”
“You say that like it’s a bad thing.”
“That isn’t you talking, Susan.”
“It is, Jack. Get used to it. I’m not your cute little trophy wife anymore.”
“You were never that.” He came up behind her, tried to hold her, but she spun away from him and crossed to the fridge for soy sauce.
He pressed on. “Let’s go to New Zealand.”
She laughed in disbelief. “New Zealand?”
He nodded. He had to sell this. He had one chance. “I made a mistake bringing us here. This place is like, hell, I dunno, a candy castle built on a septic tank. New Zealand is beautiful, wild, just about zero crime.”
“Now there’s an irony. You looking for a place that’s crime free.” She added soy to the vegetables, stirring rapidly.
“Susan, look at me.” Reluctantly, she looked up. “I want another chance. Jesus, I deserve a chance to make things right. For all of us. Stop shutting me out. Because I made some bad choices doesn’t mean you have to.”
She was looking at him, at least. Holding his gaze. “So, you’re saying we go to New Zealand? With me like this?” She pointed at her belly.
“After you have the baby, yes. I’ll get us an apartment here until then. In a security block. Tomorrow. We’ll pack up and get the hell out of this house. And we’ll leave as soon as it’s safe for you to fly.” He saw that he was reaching her, sensed an opening in her armor. “Susan, I love you. And Matt. I want a chance to make it right.”
She shook her head, turned away from him, fighting tears.
He walked over to her and wrapped his arms around her from behind. She tried to free herself, but he held her tight and at last he felt her begin to relax and give in.
Susan almost surrendered, almost let his words convince her. Then she saw him with the knife, crouched over the skinny man, and she broke his hold on her and stepped away from him.
She saw his face, the desperation in his eyes. “Leave me alone, Jack.”
“Susan…” He was reaching for her again.
“Just leave me the fuck alone!” She shouted before she could stop herself. Burn nodded and walked back out onto the deck. She held on to the kitchen counter, battling to calm herself.
She looked up to see Matt staring at her from the sofa. He was crying.
She composed herself and went across to him, sat down beside him, and put her arm around his shoulders. “It’s okay, Matty.”
She knew she’d pushed her son away, and she’d been trying, since she got back from the clinic, to reconnect with him. To love him again. But every time she looked at him she saw his father.
The child sobbed as she held him and stroked his hair and whispered reassuring words. She felt his pain and confusion. And she felt her own guilt. God, how could she have done that? To her baby boy?
Matt was calming down; the sobs were not as desperate. Susan blew his nose on a tissue. She pointed to something on the screen, the antics of a cartoon character, and Matt smiled. Then he laughed. Susan sat next to him, held him, until she saw that he was caught up in the swirl of color on the screen. Then she went out on the deck, where her husband stood with his back to her, staring out at the night.
He didn’t see her, and she watched him for a few moments. He had always been her rock, the one thing in her life she could trust completely. Not anymore.
“Jack.” He turned to her, his face catching the light from the house. The beaten look on his face aged him.
“Okay,” she said.
“Okay what?”
“Let’s do it. Let’s go to New Zealand. Or wherever.”
He was staring at her. “You’re serious?”
“Yes. But I’m doing it for Matt and for her.” She put a hand to her belly.
He came toward Susan and took her in his arms, her belly pressing up against him. She stared over his shoulder, out at the swollen yellow moon hanging like a bruised fruit over the ocean.
“I’m sorry, baby,” he said. “I’m going to make it right. I promise.”
More than anything, she wanted to believe him.
CHAPTER 10
Why hadn’t he smacked the brown bitch in her filthy mouth?
As Rudi Barnard left the Flats behind, drove the Toyota across the railway bridge to Goodwood, he puzzled over that half-breed slut, Carmen, and why he hadn’t he hit her. Normally he didn’t think twice about something like that. Disrespect or cross him, and you paid the price. He was confused by this aberration in his behavior.
Did he really want to fuck her? No, he decided. It wasn’t that. He realized, relieved, that she was someone who would be of use to him sometime. And his intuition was that she had been beaten senseless so often by so many men that it meant nothing to her. In fact, he reckoned he would have more power over her if he didn’t hit her.
Barnard smiled to himself in appreciation of his psychological insights. He knew women. Hell, he’d been married to one once, hadn’t he?
Fucken bitch.
On impulse Barnard stopped in at a cop bar on Voortrekker Road, a few blocks from his dingy apartment. The Station Bar had opened back in the days when men were left alone to do their drinking, women banished to the cocktail bar where a real man wouldn’t set foot.
Although by law no woman could now be prevented from entering the Station Bar, few did. The bar was ugly, it stank, and it was filled with crude and violent men. It took a certain kind of woman to be drawn to this sort of company, and most of them were out on the street plying their trade.
Barnard grabbed a stool. The barman, a bald and wrinkled man with skin the color of nicotine, shoved a bottle of pine nut Double O across to him. Barnard grunted his thanks and took a gulp.
He didn’t come to the Station for alcohol or company. He was a teetotaler and a loner. Rather he came here to plug into the cop network; when mouths were loosened by booze, he often gleaned information that was to his advantage.
He needed a few questions answered. The grapevine had been whispering to him, telling him stuff that woke him from his sleep, his hemorrhoids aching and the itch between his thighs burning like crazy.
He watched a skinn
y guy with a potbelly and styled hair, dressed fifteen years too young, in conversation with a half-breed down at the other end of the bar. The half-breed nodded, laughed at something, chugged back his beer, and left.
Barnard took his Double O and levered his fat onto the stool beside the snappy dresser. “Lotter.”
Lotter looked at him with disinterest. “Barnard.”
Waving at the barman who slumped like a dirty rag across the counter, Barnard pointed at Lotter’s empty glass. “Give him a drink.”
“Whatever you want from me, the answer is no,” Lotter said.
“Who says I want something?” Barnard leaned in close and tried a smile.
Captain Danny Lotter wasn’t a squeamish man; in fact he had been known to eat hot dogs during postmortems, but the full blast of Barnard’s halitosis forced him back on his stool. He quickly fired up a Camel, not offering one to Barnard.
Lotter’s brandcoke arrived, and Barnard lifted his Double O in a toast. “Good luck.”
Lotter grunted, but he didn’t turn the drink down.
“Lotter, I’ve been hearing some funny things.”
“Get your ears tested.”
Barnard had to restrain himself from grabbing the skinny cunt by his blow-dried hair and pulping his face on the bar. He wheezed, taking it calm. “Things about some task force, anticorruption what-what being set up.”
Lotter looked at Barnard. “Ja, so?”
“So, I know you’re screwing that girlie in the superintendent’s office.”
“Marie?”
“Ja. The ugly one?”
“She’s not ugly, exactly…”
“Lotter, just because you fucking her doesn’t mean she’s not a dog.” Barnard laughed one of his sucking laughs.
Lotter drained his glass and set it on the counter. He stood. “Thanks for the drink.”
Barnard put a heavy paw on Lotter’s shoulder, easing him back onto his stool. “I’m trying to be nice here. Let’s keep it that way.”
Lotter looked for a moment like he was going to resist; then he realized it would be foolish and he nodded. “Okay, but take your hands off my jacket. It’s just been dry-cleaned.”