Choked Up

by Janey Mack

  “Gee, how can I resist?” Filing. Almost as exciting as a glass of club soda.

  My fearless supervisor led me down the hall into a dank, musty room. She flipped the light switch. Droning fluorescents cast a dismal glow over dusty paperwork and hills of collapsing cardboard boxes.

  More like caustic soda. “Ugh,” I said, walking into the room. “Turn them off.”

  “Pew-ee.” Leticia fanned the air in front of her face. “Smells worse than a cat box in here.”

  “They can’t be serious.” I lifted a few papers. Gritty and slightly moist at the same time. Ergh. Where’s the hazard pay for working at Mold Central?

  “It gets worse.” She left the doorway and returned with an industrial paper shredder.

  “Safer to incinerate the stuff.”

  “You’re gonna shred all the shit in the boxes. Then, you file all the loose papers into the same empty boxes.”

  “But they’re wet.”

  “You don’t get it, do you?”

  “Huh?”

  “The mayor has you riding a two-wheeled trike on a treadmill.”

  A tiny groan escaped me. Talbott Cottle Coles sure knows how to hurt a girl.

  “Well, let’s not hang around gettin’ all morose an’ shit. It’s lunchtime, and Monday is pizza day.”

  “Wouldn’t miss it.”

  Leticia clattered away on her stilettos, while I took a final look at my new and dismal future. I shut off the lights, closed the door, and hit the break room.

  There was a reason why I never, ever came back to the office during the day. The employee lunchroom was as friendly and accepting of multicultural diversity as your average prison yard.

  Sanchez and her mini La Raza crew held the tables at the vending machines while the Betty Bruisers—a squad of fifty-something hefty white women who weighed more than a Mack Truck—staked out the fridge and microwave. The Bella Donnas, hair-hopping Mafia wannabes, drifted between the break room and the locker room, the fruity, floral stink of cheap body spray delineating their territory. Leticia, generally found sitting with the ’Hood Sistas, was the only one able to cross gang lines with no fear of retribution.

  That left me, a couple of Asians, some random no-loads, and a chubby white guy with a mullet hovering at the edges of the pizza party, waiting to snatch a couple of greasy slices without drawing attention.

  “Aww, jeez. They always order Marie’s,” Mullet whined and thumped his heart with his fist. “Are they trying to gimme a grabber?”

  “One of the Bettys’ll spot you some nitro.” I reached around him and shifted a slab of Marie’s Special—sausage, green peppers, onions, and mushrooms—onto a flimsy paper plate. I backed away to the neutral corner—the one farthest from the time clock—and dug in.

  “Yo! Not so fast, culo.”

  I looked up to see hotheaded Sanchez step in front of a huge Eastern European in a suit and tie. I recognized the dark hair, the broad, rounded shoulders and the scarred, lumpy Neanderthal forehead.

  Stannis’s head gorilla.

  He was there for me, I knew, but the chance of seeing Sanchez get knocked down a peg or two had me superglued to my seat.

  The break room went dead quiet, everyone crossing their fingers for bloodshed.

  “Where you think you going? This a private building and you ain’t got no clearance.” Sanchez rolled her shoulders. La Raza got to their feet behind her.

  “I look for girl,” he said.

  “Ain’t no girls here, Holmes. Fuck off.”

  The gorilla didn’t like that. “I help you understand, Frijolero.”

  The tips of Sanchez’s ears went brick red.

  He scratched his chin, his Spanish stilted and slow, “Te voy a meter una leche. Yes?”

  Sanchez rocked back and forth on her heels, furious with an edge of fear.

  Leticia stood up, hiked down her skimpy optic yellow print skirt, and jumped in. “Simmer down,” she said to Sanchez and La Raza. “The man obviously don’t speak no Spanish.”

  Yeah, instead of “I’ll beat the fuck out of you” maybe he meant shit.

  Sanchez weighed her chances, spat on the floor, and went back to the vending machines.

  Another charming display of PEA manners.

  Leticia sauntered up to the gorilla, hips undulating like a cobra on LSD. “I’m Traffic Enforcement Supervisor Leticia Jackson.” She thrust out her chest. “How can I help you?”

  The gorilla gave her an appreciative eye. “I seek Maisie McGrane.”

  “And what would a fine man like yourself want with her?”

  I raised my hand in a halfhearted wave. The gorilla saw me, pressed the headset at his ear, and said something into his wrist.

  One of the Betty Bruisers whispered loudly, “Forget it, Leticia. You’re too fat for him.” Which was along the lines of a blimp telling a hot air balloon they were overinflated.

  Leticia smoothed a hand down the side of her body. “This ain’t fat. This is sexy overflow.”

  A second suited Serbian entered the break room, carrying a colossal cut-crystal vase of pink roses.

  Yikes.

  The gorilla led him through the ocean of my slack-jawed hill-people coworkers and gestured to my table. The man set the flowers down.

  The gorilla said in a low voice, “Stannislav Renko sends his regards.” He gave me a short nod and the two men left.

  “Who you fucking now, puta?” Sanchez sneered from across the room.

  The mini La Razas started heckling rapid-fire. Thankfully, I couldn’t understand the bulk of what they said.

  They had Leticia chuckling, though, as she came over to inspect the bounty. She reached out and squeezed a rose where the petals met the stem. “Firm. Some damn fine flowers,” she mumured absently. “You oughtta toss in a couple o’ aspirin in the vase, keep ’em fresh.”

  “Yeah. Thanks.”

  She eyed me, brow puckered in consternation. “What is this, McGrane?”

  Six dozen, from the looks of it.

  “A marriage proposal?” She elbowed me in the ribs. “Or a ‘please, baby, take my sorry ass back’?”

  “I have no idea.”

  I officed the day in the break room in front of the ocean of pink flowers. Amidst the occasional hissing slur, I filled out the paperwork for my new position, made a list of the hazmat gear I needed from Home Depot, and chewed over Stannis’s intentions.

  Are the flowers a thank-you, or God forbid, an overture to a date?

  I’d never cheat on Hank. Not for the Bureau of Organized Crime’s Special Unit. Not ever. But even in an alternate universe where Hank didn’t exist, I don’t think I could get past what I walked in on at the strip club.

  I blew out a breath, ruffling some rose petals.

  Danny and Walt will have to be told about my office demotion. And the strip club. And Mayor Coles. And T.G.I. Friday’s. And the flowers.

  When exactly had my proactive-initiative-taking turned into job-jeopardizing-insanity?

  Dammit.

  I pushed away from the table and left the break room to rummage in my locker. Beneath my gym bag, poly-blend uniforms, and a stash of PowerBars, lay half a package of personally engraved Connor stationery from Barney’s. Because when your mother is July Pruitt of the Georgia Pruitts, a handwritten thank-you card for any gift received will be thoughtfully penned on personal stationery and sent the following day or the earth will come to a screeching halt upon its axis, condemning all enlightened society to utter darkness.

  It took four drafts to get the right tone.

  Dear Stannis,

  I am overwhelmed by your generosity. You are a kind and thoughtful friend.

  Maisie

  I sealed the letter and put it in the front pouch of my rucksack. I had no address for Stannislav Renko. Not yet.

  Ragnar was waiting in the truck. He drove me home in a cocoon of country music and confusion. I didn’t need to be clairvoyant to know something was about to happen with Stannis. And, just li
ke Mant’s note, I couldn’t say a damn thing about it.

  Hank protected me from his gray world. Locked it away in a box of silence so I never had to lie to my family. Or even myself. I just had to leave the box alone.

  No sweat. Being with Hank was more important than any secret.

  He’d marveled once at the blind faith I had in him. “I could never be okay with not knowing,” he said, voice so gravelly I could feel it in my chest.

  I looked down at my hands in my lap. My arms felt like they weighed a thousand pounds. Almost as heavy as my conscience.

  I didn’t have the guts to tell Hank I was a cop. Because . . . well, I had more reasons than I could count, and “coward” pretty much topped the list.

  Ragnar pulled into the driveway. Hank was leaning against the garage door, arms folded, superhero mouth in a laconic grin.

  Time to find out if I have the chops to keep my own box of silence.

  Ragnar honked his horn twice and drove away.

  “Hi,” I said to Hank.

  “Hi, yourself.” He held out his fists. “Choose.”

  I tapped his right hand. He opened it. Car keys.

  He took the garage door opener from his pants pocket. “Number two.”

  I pressed the middle button. The door opened on a pitch-black Dodge Challenger SRT Hellcat. “Whoa. Did a little shopping today, I see.”

  “Like it?”

  “What’s not to love?” The V-8 alone was a big F.U. to the carbon footprint wussies who wouldn’t recognize exhilaration if it put them in a headlock and ground its knuckles into their skulls. “Where’s the Super Bee?”

  “In storage. Try number one.”

  An obsidian Ford Mustang Shelby GT500. Another modern-day muscle car. I gave a low whistle. “Are you planning a race?”

  “If you’d rather drive the Shelby—”

  “What?”

  Hank squinted at me. “What what?”

  I held up the keys. “You’re letting me choose your new car?”

  “No. Yours.” He slung his arm over my shoulders.

  “Hank—”

  He gave me a playful swat. “Let’s tear it up.” He trotted to the passenger side of the Hellcat and reached for the door.

  My vision blurred. I hate myself. “Hank, it’s one thing to let me drive your cars, but this is something else entirely.”

  “No,” he said. “But I realize you think it is. Get in.”

  I did, feeling like a heel. I put my hands on the wheel, breathing in the new car smell. “An automatic?” I said, unable to disguise the happy in my voice.

  “Tested faster than manual.”

  “How’d you know I’d pick that hand?”

  “I didn’t. Top of the bluffs?”

  I smiled and started the car. And it was glorious. I touched the gas and it leapt into life as though it had been stung. Flying around the hairpin curves, the steering was, as my brothers would say, talkative. The Hellcat was a heavy, road-gripping beast.

  There was no way I would accept a $68K muscle car. As much as I coveted it. But that was a talk for another day.

  “We’ll hit the track,” Hank promised as I came to a stop. “Soon.”

  I parked and we got out of the car. Hank leaned his forearms on the roof and stared across at me, his face strangely vulnerable, the hard lines of his jaw blurred by his thick scruff. “I need to be in Central America for the next five days.”

  Oookay. “I’ll miss you.”

  “I need you to take the week off. Stay protected.”

  I tapped the hood of the car. “This a carrot?”

  “No. You can’t drive it until I come home.”

  I sighed. “Hank . . .”

  “Mant’s a threat. You will be safe.”

  Wow. That was pretty final. “You let me go to work with Ragnar—”

  “Because Mant would come for me first. And I won’t be here.”

  I walked around to his side of the car. “I need to go to work. I’ll lose my mind if I don’t.”

  His jaw tightened.

  I put my hand on his arm. “Besides, I promised my mom I’d go home the next time you went out of town.”

  “No.”

  A breathy laugh slipped from my mouth. “I’ll be in a house with four cops. And you can surround me with Ragnar and Chris—heck, hire a small army for all I care.”

  He stared at me until I couldn’t bear it a second longer.

  “Okay, okay,” I said. “I’ll stay the week at your place. Let Ragnar drive me to work every day. Spend Friday and Saturday at my house. Everyone’s home on the weekend. You can pick me up on the way home from the airport.”

  “I don’t like this,” he said. But he lumped it. And left that night.

  Tuesday, at the office, same time, same way, the gorilla oversaw delivery of a massive tower of fruit and nuts. Wednesday, bricks of Belgian chocolate. Stannis’s gifts were giving my social status a leg up. I now had a temporary seat at the Bettys’ table, and a creeping sense of dread of what today would bring.

  The gifts were equally disconcerting and disturbing. So much so, I was almost looking forward to my debrief with Danny Kaplan after work.

  The break room was filled to capacity. At 12:40, the gorilla sat down across from me. He glared at the Bettys, who after twenty long seconds got the hint, gathered their lunches, and lumbered off to gather at the microwave.

  “Mr. Renko would like to see you.”

  “When?”

  “Friday night. Dinner. Nine. He will send car. Address?”

  “Uh, I’m not sure I can make it.”

  The gorilla stared at me, unblinking. “Address?”

  Oookay. I scrambled around for a napkin and pen, scribbled my parents’ address, and handed it to him. He removed a small red leather box from his suit coat pocket and placed it on the table. It was decorated with an unmistakable pattern in gold leaf.

  Cartier.

  He pushed it in front of me with two thick fingers.

  I flipped the lid.

  Diamond earrings. Not little ones, either. Danglers, exquisite and delicate. Each a strand of five alternating pear and round-cut diamonds suspended in white gold.

  Cripes.

  I tried to clear my throat, but I couldn’t get any air to or from my lungs.

  The gorilla leaned forward and slapped me on the back. I started coughing.

  “Dress pretty,” he said. “Mr. Renko likes pretty things.”

  Chapter 17

  I rode up the fourth elevator at Silverthorn Estates Assisted Living for my debrief with the insect-waisted, wasp-vicious Danny Kaplan, careful to push both the fourth and fifth buttons at the same time. Two tiny lights went on in the upper right-hand corner. The Kimber Solo and Swiss Army knife in my backpack had been detected.

  I swiped my way into Special Unit and ran into Officer/Nurse Anita Erickson. “Heads up, Rook. Kaplan’s spitting nails. A word to the wise, get in and get out as fast as you can.”

  Terrific. “Anything in particular?”

  She grimaced. “We seem to have misplaced a field agent.”

  Is that a euphemism for clipped or was the agent actually missing?

  I knocked and entered Ms. Kaplan’s office. There were no chairs in front of her shiny red desk today. Instead they were tucked in tight to the conference table. She didn’t look up from her laptop.

  No Walt. No chairs. I get it. Grunts stand.

  She was wearing a navy suit coat over a white shirt with cuffs so sharp I checked her wrists to see if they were bleeding.

  I stood at full attention in front of her desk, concentrating on keeping my breathing even. There’d be no riding the next-level-bullshit train of prerehearsed excuses. Not today.

  Four minutes later, Ms. Kaplan closed the laptop with a snap. “Ahh, Miss McGrane.” She rolled back her chair ever so slightly and snarled, “Seán Ó Rudaí. What the hell were you thinking?”

  Whoa. My eyes popped. Don’t hold back.

  “You j
oined the Special Unit of the Bureau of Organized Crime, not a secret spy club with a password and a magic decoder ring. Everything within Special Unit is classified on a need-to-know basis. Young Mr. Ó Rudaí far exceeded your clearance level on Operation Steal-Tow.”

  Initiative taken not appreciated. Check.

  “Your existence in the BOC is contingent upon my assessment, your grandstanding for Walt Sawyer notwithstanding. Do I make myself clear?”

  “Yes, ma’am.” I winced inwardly. She’s gonna love what’s coming.

  “Your report?”

  I handed her the binder containing my summary, spreadsheet, GPS marked and labeled map, along with individual sets of photos taken by the Parking Enforcement Agents that week. “I’ve been transferred,” I blurted my shame. “Desk duty.”

  “Brilliant.” Her smile could have cut glass. “How could you possibly have let this happen?”

  “Well . . . uh . . .”

  A funny thing happened on the way to the strip club . . .

  She tossed the report onto a corner of the desk and folded her thin arms across her chest. “You’re still able to collect data from the other meter maids, correct?”

  I nodded.

  “Continue on, then.” She opened the laptop and began typing rapid-fire. “That’ll be all.”

  Hardly.

  I sucked up my guts and said calmly, “No, ma’am, I’m afraid it won’t. Friday night, I helped Stannislav Renko elude a VICE bust at a strip club. I’ve received a gift from him every day this week, culminating in these.” I opened the Cartier box and set it on her desk.

  I had her attention now. Or at least the earrings did.

  “Go on,” she said.

  “He wants to see me tomorrow night at nine o’clock.”

  “Pull up a chair.”

  I brought back a chair, sat down, and explained what happened Friday night.

  “So Stannislav Renko wants a girlfriend.” She sounded amused.

  “Not exactly. When I went in to warn him, I found the mayor of Chicago performing . . . er . . . fellatio on him.”