Never Saw It Coming: (An eSpecial from New American Library)

by Linwood Barclay

  “Justin, go away.”

  “You look really stressed out, Keisha. Everything okay?” There was nothing in his expression that suggested empathy. He looked—was this possible?—mischievous.

  “I haven’t had a very good day,” she said.

  “I’ll just bet you haven’t.”

  She was starting to close the door on him when he said that, and she stopped. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

  “I’m just saying, I bet you’ve had a pretty stressful day.”

  She tried to read him, figure out what his game was. “You got something you want to say?”

  “It’s kind of cold out here,” he said, on the verge of shivering. Reluctantly, she opened the door and allowed him in. He took his hands out of his pockets and rubbed them together. “I shoulda worn something warmer. But I really hate big coats and boots and all that. Makes you feel like you’re smothering.”

  “Why are you here?” Keisha said, closing the door.

  “Like I said, I got this idea to make more money.” He offered an apologetic smile. “Actually, it’s an idea for me to make more money. But even so, I think you’re going to want to hear it.”

  She waited.

  “So, you gonna invite me into the living room or anything?”

  “No.”

  He looked hurt, then made a quick recovery. “Okay, so, this morning, when I dropped by, as I was leaving, you were watching the news about the guy whose wife went missing on Thursday. There was that press conference, with his daughter, getting all weepy and stuff? You remember?”

  She hesitated. “Yes.”

  That grin. “I knew you would. And I was thinking, that’s your thing. Like with the Archers. I could tell your interest was, what’s the word, piqued. And you know, so was mine. I thought it would be cool to see how you work your magic.”

  No.

  “Remember I said we should work together? How I would like to job-shadow you, like we used to do in high school? And you basically said to piss off?” He shook his head. “That never really works with me. I’m not real good at following instructions. It’s what all my teachers said, even Mr. Archer.”

  “What did you do, Justin?”

  “Okay, so, Dwayne—still a big fan of yours, by the way, for finding me, and even my mom can’t get her head around how you did it—drove me over here this morning, right, and on the way back home I said, hey Dwayne, my man, would it be okay if I borrowed the car for a while? Just to drive around and clear my head? Because for the last week, he and my mom have been all over me, thinking I’m gonna run away again or try to kill myself, right?” He leaned his head toward hers, like there were others in the room and he wanted to tell her a secret. “Between you and me, I really do wonder whether our scheme was such a good idea. I mean, yeah, I got the money we split and they’re all worried sick about me and all, but Christ almighty, they’re watching me like a hawk, you know? I look in the fridge and sigh because we’re out of ice cream and they think I’m going to slit my wrists.” He laughed.

  “Anyway, so I say to Dwayne, I’m feeling really good and would you trust me to borrow the Rover for a spin or something. Said it would lift my spirits, help me clear my head. And he tosses me the keys. So then I look up this Garfield guy’s address and plug it into the ol’ GPS, and by the time I drive by, your car’s already out front. Like, perfect timing.”

  Keisha felt as though she needed to sit down, but kept standing.

  “So I parked down a side street and hoofed it back and I was actually thinking maybe I’d knock on the door and introduce myself as your assistant, you know? But I thought first I should see how it was going, and I got this great spot in the garden, by the living room on the side of the house, where the blinds hadn’t been closed, where I could see you do your thing. I couldn’t hear much, but I was able to get the gist of it, watching you make your pitch, then Garfield looking all, like, you gotta be kiddin’ me. So I’m watching for a while, and pretty soon Garfield brings down a bathrobe or whatever it was and you start running your fingers all over it.”

  He shook his head in wonderment. “I gotta ask, what the hell made him snap?”

  Keisha, speechless, didn’t know which fact left her more stunned. That Justin had seen the whole thing, or that he’d chosen to do nothing when he saw it.

  “I mean, I was totally blown away. Even if he thought you were there to scam him, why would he try to kill you, right? Why not just kick you out on your ass, like the Archers did, or call the cops?” He nodded his head encouragingly, trying to provoke a response. “What was going on?”

  Keisha, her voice no more than a whisper, said, “I got … lucky. My vision was too close to the truth. His daughter killed Mrs. Garfield and he helped her cover it up.”

  Justin’s mouth opened. The shock was genuine. “No shit? Whoa, that’s crazy. That must have blown your fucking mind.”

  Quietly. “Yeah.”

  “So he’s strangling you, and you grab the—what was it, one of those needles for stitching things?”

  “Yes.”

  “And you get him right in the eye. Backhand! That was awesome! Watching him stagger around with that thing coming out of his head, that was fucking unreal. I thought you had the upper hand, but then, when he still went after you, I thought, Jesus, even with a stick in his brain the bastard just won’t stop. Like in a movie, you know? I didn’t think you were going to make it, but I was pullin’ for ya, I really was.”

  “He nearly killed me,” Keisha said, touching her hand to her neck. “And you watched.”

  Justin shrugged. “Couldn’t very well go busting in and have people think I was some sort of peeping Tom pervert. Anyway, you handled yourself just fine. After you took off, so did I.” He rubbed his hands together again. “So, you want to hear my idea?”

  “I’m betting I can guess.”

  “I want your half.”

  “What?”

  “The money Dwayne gave you for finding me. I know we agreed to split it, but now I want it all. And …” He rubbed his chin. “Another two grand on top of that ought to do it. Let’s call it forty-five hundred. You give me that, and I don’t tell the cops what I saw.”

  “If you tell the cops what you saw, then you’re saying you were there.”

  Justin waved his index finger at her. “Good point. But there’s nothing to say I can’t make an anonymous call, is there? Maybe confirm a few things for the cops. Get them looking in the right direction.”

  “You’d do that,” Keisha said.

  Justin laughed. “Hey, I’m doing you a favor here. You don’t see me going to the cops first. I’ve come here with an opportunity for you. And you know what else I was thinking? I was thinking, you and me, we should work together in the future. We make a good team.”

  “I don’t know that I can get you that kind of money,” Keisha said. There was the five grand from Gail Beaudry, but right now it was in Kirk’s back pocket. How likely was he to surrender it? Hesitantly, she said, “I don’t know if Kirk will give it to me.”

  “Kirk? That’s your boyfriend?”

  She hesitated again. “Yes.”

  “You saying he won’t give it to you? To keep you from getting arrested?”

  “He’ll take some convincing.”

  Justin asked, “Does he know what went down today?” Keisha nodded. “Then you need to talk to him. Convince him.”

  “Maybe you should ask him yourself. I’m expecting him back in a little while.”

  Justin nodded confidently. “Okay, good, I’ll talk to him. I can wait. I’m guessing he’s not gonna want his sweetie to get into any trouble.”

  “Yeah,” Keisha said flatly. “He’s always thinking of me first.”

  Thirty-two

  Justin was getting antsy standing by the front door, so he went uninvited into the living room and plopped down onto the couch. He cast his eye over the half-full beer bottle and the Twinkie remnants. “You got anything to drink?”

  �
��No,” Keisha said.

  “Some host,” he muttered under his breath. “So tell me, what’d you do after you left Garfield’s house? You must have been a mess. You go through a car wash with all the windows open?”

  She didn’t answer him. She was at the window, watching for Kirk.

  “Fine, ignore me,” Justin said. “So this boyfriend of yours, what’s he do? Does he predict the future, or track down aliens, or some other shit like that?”

  “He works construction,” Keisha said. “But not for a while. He hurt his foot. But he’s walking okay now.”

  “That’s nice,” Justin said. “I look forward to doing business with him.”

  Keisha heard a familiar rumbling, then saw Kirk’s truck turn into the driveway. The truck bed, as far as she could see, really was empty. Kirk got out and came strutting up the walk like a man who was not only proud of himself, but expecting to get laid.

  He came into the house and said, “Hey, babe!”

  “In here,” Keisha said.

  He took a couple of steps into the house and scanned his eyes across the living room. Justin stood and extended a hand.

  “Hey, how ya doin’,” he said. Kirk shook his hand, his face a puzzle. “Don’t think we’ve ever actually been introduced. I’m Justin. Last time I was here, you were still snoozing.” He grinned. “Had to keep my voice down. Keisha here didn’t want to disturb the beast.”

  Kirk didn’t know what was going on. He’d never met Justin, although Keisha had told him about the scam she’d run with him. Only thing was, she’d told him her share was a thousand, not twenty-five hundred.

  “Justin and I did that job together,” Keisha reminded him. “His parents hired me to find him? We set it up ahead?”

  “Oh yeah, right,” Kirk said. “Nice.”

  “Yeah,” Justin said, smiling. “My idea, totally. I was just telling Keisha here, we should do some more work together.”

  Kirk shrugged, like maybe that was a good idea. “That why you’re here now? You cooking up something?”

  “No, this is about something else,” Keisha said.

  “Keisha tells me you’re all up to speed on what happened today,” Justin said.

  Kirk eyed him warily. Even he wasn’t dumb enough to admit to anything until he knew what it was Justin knew.

  “Possibly,” he said slowly.

  Justin understood his caution. “The Garfield house. I know all about it.”

  Kirk glared at Keisha. “What the hell were you thinking?”

  “I didn’t tell him,” Keisha said. “He was there. Looking through the window. Spying.”

  “Well,” Justin said, “I think spying is a tad judgmental. Especially considering you went there to rip him off. And really, it wasn’t spying. I was just hoping to broaden my horizons, see how Keisha did her thing. Who knew she’d moved from bullshit predictions to eye surgery?”

  “How would he even know to be there?” Kirk asked.

  Keisha quickly explained that Justin had been by the house in the morning, suspected she might go see Wendell Garfield, and found her at the man’s house.

  “Yeah,” Justin said proudly. “And my mom says I lack initiative.”

  But even with all this explanation, Kirk was still confused. “So what are you doing here, if you’re not planning something new?”

  “He’s here to blackmail me,” Keisha said.

  “What?”

  “He wants money to keep quiet about what he’s seen.”

  Kirk, reflexively, reached around and touched the bulge under the back of his winter coat.

  “How much?” he asked.

  “Forty-five hundred,” Justin offered cheerily. “That’s Keisha’s share out of the scam we pulled on my parents, plus another two grand.”

  Keisha thought, Nuts. She could see Kirk doing the math in his head. He looked like a caveman trying to figure out how to take pictures with a smartphone. He said to her, “You told me you only got a thousand out of that job.”

  Keisha shrugged. “You got me.”

  Kirk would deal with her later. To Justin, he said, “So you’re asking for nearly five grand or you tell the cops Keisha killed Garfield.”

  “Good,” Justin said, like Kirk was five. “You deserve a sticker.”

  Kirk said, “And you figure we’re just going to give it to you.”

  “Don’t you think it would be kind of dumb not to? I make an anonymous call to the cops and they’ll be over here. And if you’ve been helping her cover up what she did, that makes you an accomplice, so it’s as much in your interest to keep this all under wraps as it is hers.” He waited for some kind of response. “Hello?”

  “Yeah, yeah, I’m hearing you,” Kirk said, stepping further into the living room, crowding Justin and forcing him to take a couple of steps back. “Well, you’re kind of in luck, as it turns out, because I’ve got the money on me.”

  Not exactly what Keisha was expecting. She looked at him, dumbfounded.

  “No shit?” Justin said, like a junkie seconds away from a fix. “You’re kidding, right? No one carries that kind of money on them. I’d have given you a couple of days to get it together.”

  “No, no, I got it,” Kirk said, and reached behind him for the wad of cash Gail had given Keisha.

  “Fuck me,” Justin said, not believing it as Kirk fanned out the bills in his two hands.

  “I’m gonna keep five hundred back, because there’s five grand here,” Kirk said.

  “Shit, you rob a bank or something?” The kid couldn’t take his eyes off the money.

  Kirk took the five hundred and shoved it into the front pocket of his jeans. He extended the rest of the money to Justin, and just as the young man was about to take it, Kirk let the money fall to the floor. It fluttered like giant confetti.

  “Oh shit, sorry, thought you had it there,” Kirk said.

  “Hey, no problem,” Justin said, and dropped to his knees to collect the scattered bills.

  Kirk brought up his knee and caught Justin on the nose.

  “Fuck!” he screamed, stumbling back, throwing both hands over his face, blood trickling out between his fingers. “What the hell?”

  He turned his face away defensively and flailed blindly at Kirk with his bloodied hands like a bullied schoolboy. Kirk deflected Justin’s feeble blow with one sweep of his arm, then glanced down at the bloodstains that flecked his shirt. “Shit,” he said, and slammed Justin into the wall to the right of the shelves displaying his new wheels.

  “You think you can come in here and pull this kind of shit?” Kirk said. “You think I’m just gonna hand you that money?”

  “Don’t hurt me!” Justin screamed. “I think you broke my nose! Jesus!”

  “I’m gonna break every bone in your body if you think you’re going to leave here with one fucking cent.”

  “I’ll tell!” he shouted. “The cops’ll be all over her!”

  Kirk closed the distance between them and put his hands around the young man’s neck, just the way he’d done with Keisha earlier in the day.

  Justin coughed. “Can’t …”

  It was Justin’s turn to use his knee. He brought it up fast and hard, catching Kirk in the testicles.

  “Shit!”

  Kirk let go of Justin’s neck and closed in on himself, hands over his crotch, the pain radiating through him. He stepped back and to the left.

  Justin reached out with his right hand, slipped it between the wall and the shelf, and, putting everything he had into it, pushed forward. The shelf was not secured to the wall, and with two wheels on the top, two in the center, and none on the bottom, it was unsteady to begin with.

  It teetered, in slow motion at first, then with a gathering momentum.

  The two wheels on top pitched off first. One caught Kirk on the shoulder, knocking him to the floor. A fraction of a second later, the other wheel landed on his upper body and flipped over once, covering his face, the edge of the rim pressing against his neck.

>   As the unit continued its plunge, the two wheels on the middle shelf fell off. One landed on Kirk’s knee, while the other hit the carpet.

  “Yeah!” Justin said. “Take that, asshole!”

  He spun around, giddy, grinned at Keisha, just in time to see the beer bottle coming at his head.

  As soon as she hit him, she dropped the bottle. She felt the pain of the impact—the bottle hit him solidly on the forehead—shoot right up her arm. The bottle didn’t break, not even when it hit the floor, but it did the trick. Justin staggered backwards and collapsed, hitting the wall next to where the shelf had been and sliding on his back to the floor.

  Keisha stood there, her labored breathing the only sound in the room.

  She surveyed the wreckage. The overturned shelf, the scattered wheels, Kirk trapped beneath the wreckage. Justin unconscious.

  At least, she thought he was unconscious.

  “Jesus,” she said.

  She knelt down, put her hand on Justin’s chest. He was out cold, but alive. She could feel him breathing under her palm.

  Kirk was alive, too. He made a weak coughing sound.

  “Babe,” he said. “I can’t … I can’t move.”

  He made a gagging sound. Keisha moved toward him, put one leg over one of the shelving unit’s vertical posts, straddling it so she could get a look at Kirk. She could see one eye behind the wheel, saw how the rim was pressing against Kirk’s windpipe. The shelf had landed on top of the wheel, pinning it into position.

  Keisha would have to move the shelf before she could get the wheel off him.

  “Hey,” Kirk said. “Get this … get this off me.” He was trying to use his hands to move the rim, but one was caught behind his back, and he couldn’t get any leverage with the free one.

  Keisha thought.

  Surveyed the situation.

  Thought about Matthew.

  Maybe there was still a way out of this. A way for her to stay out of trouble, stay with her boy.

  “Hey!” Kirk said. “You … fucking deaf? I need … help here.” He coughed.

  There was a lot to figure out in a short time. She’d have to have it done before Justin woke up.

  But what she had here was an opportunity.