DIVA

by Susan Fleet

  AK shouted something and they split up. AK veered east, away from them, Dead-Eye ran north toward the Shell Station.

  “Take Dead-Eye,” Frank said. “I’ll go after AK. Be careful!”

  Miller took off as ear-splitting sirens filled the air. Frank rammed a fresh magazine into his SIG. If he cornered AK, he wanted a full clip. He vaulted a low split-rail fence between two cottages, entered the backyard and stopped. Blood smeared a six-foot rustic pine fence, no telling what was on the other side. AK might not have his AK-47, but that didn’t mean he was unarmed.

  A softball-sized rock lay on the ground near a downspout on the house. He ran over and grabbed it and lobbed the rock over the fence.

  Bam-bam-bam. Three shots in rapid succession hit the fence.

  On his hands and knees, he crawled to the spot where the fence met the house. Put one eye to the two-inch gap.

  AK sat on the ground, back pressed against a tree trunk, legs splayed. Bright red blood soaked his white shirt. The maggot held a semi-automatic pistol in one hand, clutched his shoulder with the other.

  He heard more sirens. Help was on the way, SWAT probably, and more patrol cars. He could call in AK’s location and wait for backup.

  But screw that. He wanted to take the fucker himself.

  “Put the gun on the ground and put your hands on your head.”

  “Fuck you!” A bullet shattered one of the pine slats.

  “You’re surrounded by cops. Put the gun down.”

  “That you, Renzi?”

  “Right. Give it up, AK. Put down the gun.”

  “What then? You gonna shoot me?”

  “Not if you put down the gun.”

  But he had no way of knowing if the bastard did or not. He saw a loose knot in a pine board two feet ahead of him, crawled forward and punched it with his fist. The knot fell into the yard.

  Blam! A shot penetrated the wood above his head.

  “Drop the gun, AK. I can see you. If that gun’s not ten feet away from you in five seconds, you’re gonna lose your fucking gold tooth.”

  Five seconds passed. Ten. Fifteen seconds of silence. He gave it another thirty seconds and cautiously peeped through the knothole.

  AK’s head lolled forward on his chest, eyes closed. His right hand lay in his lap, fingers curled around the semi-automatic. Tempting. AK was holding a recently fired gun, GSR on his hands. No wits, no worries.

  The King of Iberville had slaughtered Chantelle and disfigured her face, had suckered Antoine into a crime he would never have committed on his own. Now Antoine might be dead. But if he shot AK, he would be no better than the lawless little maggots that were roaming the streets, administering their twisted brand of justice and terrorizing innocent people.

  He hauled himself upward, rolled over the top of the rustic-pine fence and dropped to the ground on the other side. AK opened his eyes. Raised his blood-smeared hand. Tossed the semi-automatic on the ground.

  “Don’t shoot, man. I give up.”

  CHAPTER 34

  10:02 P.M.

  “Today New Orleans police arrested the man they believe robbed a Lakeview convenience store last month,” said the television reporter, a somber-eyed woman with long dark hair and a narrow face. “Twenty-two-year-old Atticus Kroll has a lengthy arrest record, but no convictions. The woman taken hostage during the robbery later died.”

  Speaking over footage of the bullet-riddled NOPD surveillance van, she said, “Kroll’s arrest came at significant cost. One police officer died and three others were wounded, one seriously. Another man, believed to be a member of Kroll’s gang, also died. Police have not released his name.”

  When footage of NOPD officers taking AK and Dead-Eye into the lockup appeared, Frank grabbed the clicker and shut off the television.

  “I hate when they put my picture on TV.”

  Beside him on the sofa, Kelly curled a leg underneath her and faced him. “They were shooting at you with fucking AK-47s. It’s a miracle you’re alive.”

  He felt a flick of anger, then a twist of guilt. He didn’t consider it a miracle, but he felt bad about Chuck Duncan. Thirty slugs had penetrated the surveillance van. Duncan had died at the hospital.

  With an angry motion Kelly drank from a bottle of Bud Light and set it on her coffee table. “These little shits kill people for no reason.”

  And drag innocent people into their muck-filled orbit, Frank thought, recalling Antoine’s terror-filled eyes when he threw a blanket over his head to shield his face from the cameras and hustled him into Miller’s car.

  “AK and his thugs were gunning for us. I think AK’s posse saw the van drive past Iberville and tipped him off. Antoine said Chuck saw AK coming, pushed him on the floor, climbed forward and got behind the wheel.”

  “And they shot him. Jesus, he’s got a wife and three kids.”

  “He didn’t deserve to die, and I’m sorry he did. But at least we got AK and two of his thugs off the street.”

  Her mouth quirked. “Right. Spider’s dead, and Kenyon captured Dead-Eye while you were doing your hero act with AK.”

  “What do you mean, hero act? I was doing my job.”

  He hated it when people second-guessed him. His ex-wife had done it for years: Why do you take these dangerous assignments? If you cared about me and Maureen, you’d stop trying to be a hero. Conveniently forgetting that she’d known he was a cop when she married him.

  “Why didn’t you wait for backup?” Kelly said. “AK wasn’t going anywhere, bleeding the way he was. He could have shot you!”

  And I could have shot him, Frank thought. He was glad he had resisted the temptation. Split-second decisions made in the heat of battle could give you nightmares for the rest of your life.

  She touched his cheek. “I was worried about you.”

  “I base my decisions on the situation. You’re a cop, Kelly. You should understand that.”

  “I understand the cop part, but I’m not sure I understand you. You act like you’re the only one that wants to get the badasses off the street. I do too, but I don’t go one-on-one with an armed killer when other cops are around.”

  “Lighten up, okay? It’s the testosterone factor.” He grinned. “Back in the dark ages, the guys inherited the go-for-the-jugular-gene.”

  No smile, but her expression softened. “What did the girls get?”

  “They got to go home with the hero and make love and enjoy life.”

  They didn’t expect the hero to hide from the bad guys.

  “I did that before, Frank. That’s not how it turned out.”

  Acid roiled his gut. She couldn’t forget what happened to Terry. Now she was afraid it might happen to him. If this continued to be an issue, they were in serious trouble. Cops were trained to run toward danger, not away from it. His basic nature was to take risks, not play it safe. He wasn’t going to stop doing what made him feel most alive, flirting with danger and winning.

  “I can’t change who I am, Kelly. I took a risk today and lived to tell the tale.” He traced her lips with his finger. “You might do it too someday, if someone you care about is in danger. We all take risks. You took a risk when you invited me over for dinner last Saturday. That turned out okay, didn’t it?”

  A smile played over her lips. “I can’t argue with that.”

  “No reason to argue. This was a rough day. We’re alive. Let’s enjoy it.”

  She pulled him close and said, “You’re right, Frank. Let’s enjoy it.”

  ______

  Belinda shut down the computer and yawned. Almost eleven. Where had the time gone? Still, this had been a productive day. After lunch she had emailed her prospective business agents, noting the dates she would be in New York to interview them. Then she’d phoned the managers of the orchestras she would solo with during the holidays and asked them to send the rehearsal schedule.

  She was taking charge of her life and it felt good. Her confidence was growing. It was like learning a new solo. The first time thr
ough, there were mistakes, but after hours of practice she perfected the piece.

  This afternoon she had played the Zwilich and the Gershwin twice, perfectly. Anticipating the reaction to her performance, she smiled. The Louisville audience was certain to love both pieces.

  She rose from the desk, made sure the curtains were closed, shut off the light and left the office. Checking the curtains was now a nightly habit. The only unpleasant part of her day had been the call from Silverman, begging her to answer, saying it was an emergency.

  Nonsense. It was a ploy to get her to talk to him. And she had.

  In no uncertain terms she had told him he couldn’t have his job back. His threat to tell her fans she’d been mean to him was ludicrous. And she had no intention of taking out a restraining order. According to an article she’d read, that might make things worse. No, she had handled it perfectly.

  Calmly and politely, she had told him she didn’t want to talk to him, didn’t want to see him ever again. Well, maybe not so calmly. She recalled raising her voice at one point, something she tried not to do, even when she got exasperated with a clerk over a bill.

  But Silverman was worse than any clerk, begging and pleading, saying he needed money. How pathetic. She pictured his acne scarred cheeks, pale blue eyes and frizzy brown hair. Silverman clearly had problems with women. She couldn’t believe she had ever considered rehiring him.

  Frank had left a message asking her to call him. She hadn’t. She wasn’t going to obsess about Frank and his girlfriend. Frank was history. There were plenty of attractive men out there. She might even meet one in Louisville.

  She checked to make sure the security system was armed, shut off the lights in the foyer and went upstairs to her bedroom. Encased in clear plastic, her royal-blue performance gown hung from the hook on her closet door. She still hadn’t decided which of the outfits spread out on her bed to bring to Louisville. She picked up the aqua pantsuit. A silk outfit might be too light and frothy. Kentucky could be cold in November.

  An odd sound sent her stomach into sickening freefall.

  There it was again. A loud thump.

  Her mouth went dry and her heart pounded in terror. She dropped the pantsuit on the bed and massaged her fingers. They were icy cold and goose bumps ran up and down her arms. Willing herself to be calm, she expanded her diaphragm and drew a deep breath the way she did before performances to control her breathing.

  All the doors were locked. The security system was armed.

  No one could get in her house without her knowing it.

  Padding barefoot over the rug, she went to the bedroom door and stuck her head into the hall. Silence. No thumps, no bumps.

  “You’re being silly,” she said aloud. “Stop imagining things.”

  She returned to her bed and studied her outfits.

  Stop dithering. Make a decision, go to bed and get some rest. Her teal-green dress would be perfect for the after-party. She would take two pairs of slacks, one for the plane, one for rehearsal, and two light-weight tops to go with them.

  An image of Jake sprang into her mind: his dark eyes and sweet smile. Unwilling to give in to grief, she shook her head. Her dearest friend was gone, but if Jake were here, he would be proud of her. His untimely death had forced her to grow up and take control of her life. Now, a week later, she was not only mastering it, she was enjoying it.

  Everything would be perfect in Louisville.

  ______

  Thursday, 16 November -- 2:10 A.M.

  He scooped ringlets of brown hair out of the sink, flushed them down the toilet and studied his image in the medicine cabinet mirror. With his head shaved, he looked a bit like Robert DeNiro in Taxi Driver. “Who you talking to?” he said to his reflection in the mirror. “Are you talkin’ to me?”

  He uttered a sardonic laugh. Maybe he’d run that line past Belinda.

  Are you talkin’ to me?

  The Diva didn’t want to talk to him, but she would.

  Her fans could eat their hearts out. From now on the only person she'd be playing for would be him. Once she came to her senses and realized they were meant for each other, she would kiss him and fondle him and rub her luscious body against him and beg him to fuck her.

  He took a bottle of extra-strength ibuprofen out of the medicine cabinet and dry-swallowed four capsules, hoping to ease the massive headache that pounded his temples. He scooped the other meds in the cabinet into a plastic bag, shut out the light, walked down the hall to the kitchen and opened the refrigerator. Nothing but bare shelves. Only a half-empty quart of orange juice and plastic containers of catsup and mustard remained.

  Earlier he had shredded the Belinda memorabilia he’d collected over the years. His painstaking labor of love. Twenty folders full of concert reviews, newspaper and magazine articles, and his handwritten notes about items on her website. He had even shredded her photographs, glossy full-color prints that reminded him of happier days. Days when his beloved was only a yearning in his heart. Days when he’d finally made her notice him. Days when he had happily served in her employ.

  But she had dismissed him as if he were a cockroach.

  After all he’d done for her.

  I don’t want to talk to you ever again. I don’t want to see you again, either. Not ever.

  How could she abandon him in his hour of desperate need?

  The pain of unrequited love crushed his chest like a boa constrictor. That’s what love was about: pain. Pain worse than a root-canal without Novocain. The few times in his life he’d grown to love someone, the result had always been the same. Rejection and pain.

  He checked the file cabinet to make sure it was empty. No more worries about utility bills and credit cards now. Turning to the CD rack, he removed his Belinda CDs and four of his other favorites, and tucked them into his knapsack. The safe house he’d found had no electricity, but he had bought a battery-powered boom-box at a drug store. The water was disconnected, too. He’d be roughing it, but he had endured worse on Special Ops missions.

  He had also emptied his Doomsday storage locker. The cash and his survival kit were locked in the van. His arsenal was hidden at his new abode. Recalling his landlord’s threat, he smiled a grim smile of satisfaction.

  Ortiz would find nothing of value here, just ratty furniture and the Oz droppings he’d taken pleasure in scattering over the carpet. Ortiz would probably take his remaining classical CDs and sell them, but so what? He had the ones he wanted. The Diva’s CDs would keep him company until he had the real thing. He pulled a black-knit cap over his newly shaven head. From inside his cage, the Wizard of Oz gazed up at him with his sky-blue eyes.

  His precious little bunny. Alert. Ever watchful for predators.

  At this hour Oz was usually asleep, but this was a special night.

  “Time to hit the road, Oz.” He picked up the cage and left.

  CHAPTER 35

  Thursday, 16 November

  When the phone rang, she lowered the spoonful of cottage cheese and pineapple into the dish. Unwilling to miss any business calls, she had reconnected her landline this morning. Each time it rang, her heart jolted and her palms dampened with sweat.

  She rose from the table, went to the wall-phone and checked Caller ID. Not Silverman, but not someone she wanted to talk to, either.

  “Hello,” she said crisply, “Belinda Scully speaking.”

  “Belinda, it’s Frank Renzi. How are you doing?”

  I’d be fine if I didn’t keep getting phone calls from people I don’t want to talk to.

  “Okay. I’m eating lunch.”

  “I called you yesterday. Didn’t you get my message?”

  She gritted her teeth. He was acting like an inquisitor, badgering her. If he started an argument, she’d hang up on him.

  “I’ve been busy.”

  “I just found out Silverman isn’t who he says he is. His real name is Benjamin Stoltz. Do you know anyone by that name?”

  Her headache throbbed. She rued
the day she’d met the man.

  “I don’t think so.”

  “Think, Belinda. It might be important.”

  “I meet a lot of people. I don’t remember a Benjamin Stoltz.”

  Still, the name did sound familiar. Nagged by a vague recollection, she closed her eyes. In a flash it came to her.

  “I knew a violinist named Stoltz. We played in an All-State orchestra together in high school. I forget her first name. Ruth, maybe? Roberta? No, I think it was Rachael.”

  “Rachael Stoltz?”

  “Yes. I didn’t know her well. I think she had a brother, but he wasn’t in the orchestra.”

  “Did you ever meet him?”

  “If I did, I don’t remember it. That was ages ago.”

  “What did Rachael look like?”

  “She was very attractive. Long dark hair, green eyes. All the boys were gaga about her.”

  “No resemblance to Barry Silverman?”

  She laughed aloud. “None. He’s got frizzy brown hair and blue eyes.”

  “Remember that voicemail message you told me about, the one with the threat?”

  Chills danced down her spine. She would never forget it. “I remember.”

  “Did he ever call again?”

  “No, just that one call.”

  “Tell me about the voice.”

  “It’s hard to describe. A raspy whisper, sort of like one of those mafia mobsters in a B-movie.”

  “What about Silverman? Have you heard from him?”

  “Yes. He called me Monday afternoon after I got home from New York.”

  “New York?”

  “Yes,” she said, irritated. “I went to Long Island for Jake’s funeral.”

  “Oh. Sorry. I forgot. That must have been difficult.”

  Difficult? Was that all he could say? How about an emotional ordeal that she’d carry with her the rest of her life? Jake’s parents grief-stricken over the death of their only child.

  “It was. Did you get the results of the toxicology tests?”