“Where are they right now?”
“Eddy’s living room. They closed up the café and now they’re drinking lattes they forced me to make.” Then she whispered fiercely, but so quietly I could hardly hear, “I hope they choke.” Kate was on the brink, but I was relieved to hear she still had some fight in her.
“Let me talk to them.” I stopped pacing and grabbed onto the back slat of one of the kitchen chairs for support.
Grumbling sounds bled through the receiver, and then Vincent said, “Listen, bitch. We’re through fucking around. We want the nuts and the tape. Now. No, actually sooner than now. Every ten minutes you aren’t here with our stuff your sassy little helper loses a finger.”
It would take at least forty-five minutes on a good day with no traffic to get to the Rabbit Hole, probably closer to an hour. At that rate, Kate would be missing all the slim appendages off one hand and they’d be starting in on the other.
Play for time. “I’m at least an hour and a half away.”
I heard a sharp intake of air and then a disgusted sigh. “Christ. You got an hour. Then little Miss Barista here’ll be whipping up those fancy drinks single-handed. And if we see any cops, she’s dead. Dead with a capital D!” Vincent roared the last part into the receiver. I heard Kate scream, and then he disconnected, leaving me staring at my phone. With great effort I suppressed a sudden urge to slam it against the wall.
“Drive,” Eddy said. The tires hummed as we streaked down Interstate 35. She kept a hawk eye on Dawg, afraid she might be attacked by the vicious canine. Coop rumbled along behind us at a slower clip in the semi with the almonds. I tried multiple times to call JT on her cell, but she didn’t pick up. Vincent’s prior warning about cops still echoed through my head, and I didn’t dare try to alert anyone else.
I said, “What if Kate—”
“Don’t even think it, Shay. She’s going to be fine.”
“But—”
Eddy leveled her eyes at me. “Shay …” The warning in her voice was clear.
On the mutt front, Eddy was slowly caving in. Dawg managed to lay his head on her shoulder. Eddy’s hand rested on top of his neck. It wasn’t moving yet, but I gave her about two more minutes.
We passed the ramp for 694 and zoomed toward 94. 12:40. We’d be at the Hole in another fifteen minutes. With a little more luck, all of Kate’s fingers would still be attached.
At five minutes to one, we rolled off 94 to the Hennepin/Lyndale exit and on to Hennepin Avenue, cut down some side streets, and slowly passed the Rabbit Hole. The lights were off and the closed sign hung in the window.
I turned the corner at the end of the block, parked, and pressed my back against the seat, holding tight to the steering wheel.
Dawg was now wedged between me and Eddy, his head in her lap, and she was smoothing the fur between his eyes with one hand while the other stroked the silky, loose lip that was draped across her thigh. She was a goner.
Unable to sit still, I got out of my seat to pace. Outside of the truck, a wave of impending doom left me breathless. I gasped and said, “I think I should go in. Now.”
“No way.” Eddy could cut a person in two with her glare. “We wait for Coop. We stick to the plan.” We’d hastily concocted what I knew was an absolutely lame-brained plot that involved first Coop and I going into the Rabbit Hole, and then Eddy following a couple of minutes later, making as big a racket as she could. The idea was to distract the bad boys and get Kate out of there. How we were really going to pull it off, I had no idea. But we had to do something.
I gazed at the ground and nudged a loose rock with my foot. My heartbeat thudded triple-time to the second hand on my watch as we waited for Coop.
Eddy had finally decided Dawg was no more a threat than peanut butter. She kneeled on the sidewalk vigorously rubbing the belly he displayed for attention.
“Told you he was okay,” I said.
Eddy gave me another pointed glare. “Much better than some of the other strays that you bring home.” Eddy said. “Now that JT, she’s okay. For a stray.”
I blushed.
After an interminable wait, Coop chugged past us, parked the truck a couple of blocks away in the lot of an old church, and hoofed it back to where we waited.
“Looks like you two made up,” Coop said as he looked down at Dawg, stretched out at Eddy’s feet. Actually, he was lying on top of her feet.
“All right,” I said. “Focus. Remember the plan. Coop and I go into the Hole. We leave the front door unlocked. Eddy, you wait three minutes, call 911, and then come in, make a big racket, yell that the cops are on the way or something. Once you distract Pudge and Vincent, Coop, you get Kate out the back, if you can. I’ll help Eddy out with the cleanup,” I finished with more confidence than I felt. “And then, hopefully, the cops will be there.”
Coop handed his cell phone to Eddy and we synchronized watches.
Eddy said, “Wish I had my Whacker. This is just about too Law & Order for me.”
I felt like I was floating in the trees above, watching a scene in a movie play out before my very eyes. I understood there was risk in doing this, but after what these idiots did to Eddy and now to Kate, I wanted their heads maybe more than JT and Tyrell did. I purposely tried not to think about what could happen to Kate, Coop, Eddy, and me if things went south. Or how furious Detective Bordeaux—and the Minneapolis Police Department and the FBI—were going to be.
Dawg rolled to his feet and chuffed, a deep furrow creasing his brow. He was a sensitive mutt, somehow attuned to the emotions around him. I crouched down and wrapped my arms around his neck, and he pressed his heavy jowls into my shoulder. He gave me a final swipe of his tongue. I coaxed him into the pickup, and he hung his head through the half-open window. His eyebrows were raised expectantly, as if he thought we should get going already. Our last time-out was over. Game on.
_____
Our footsteps echoed in tandem on the cracked sidewalk as Coop and I neared the front door of the Rabbit Hole. As we closed in, he leaned down and whispered, “I’m sorry I got you and Eddy and Kate into this mess.”
“You know I’d do anything to help you, and I know you’d do the same for me.”
He draped an arm over my shoulders. Not for the first time, I thought that one day he was going to make some woman very happy.
I dug in the pocket of my jeans and my fingers wrapped around the familiar outline of the key ring. Reflection from the sun made it hard to see in the windows. I slid the key home, unlocked the door, and pushed it open. The bells banging against the glass clanged ominously.
The tables were all intact, the chairs tucked beneath them. A cozy fire burned in the fireplace, at odds with the situation. Coop followed me inside and shut the door. I scanned the unmanned counter with a pang. What was proper protocol when calling on kidnappers?
Coop yelled, “Hey! It’s Nick Cooper and Shay O’Hanlon.”
We stood in the middle of the café waiting for a response, surrounded by the unsettling yet comforting and familiar aroma of the shop. I felt like a stranger in my own place, a foreigner in my own home. Seconds ticked by like minutes. A low voice finally growled, “How about that. You’re early. Turn around toward the window and put your hands over your heads.” Vincent. He was close. It took me a moment to see he was sitting in one of the chairs by the fireplace, mostly hidden in shadow. It didn’t take nearly as long to realize that a handgun was pointed in our direction.
We raised our arms in tandem and slowly pivoted toward the picture window.
Leather creaked as Vincent rose from the chair and the sound of his footsteps was loud on the hard floor as he walked up behind us. My mouth was parched and my chest tightened, making it hard to breathe.
“Do you have what I want?” It felt like he was breathing down the back of my neck.
“I think so,” Coop told him.
“You think so. You’re a funny guy, aren’t you? Where’s the tape?”
I said, “In the
side pocket of my pants.” Vincent slid a hand down the outside of my right leg. I tried not to cringe at his touch. “No, the other one.”
He moved over to my left leg and tugged the videocassette from my cargo pocket. “Ah, yes. You’ve passed the first part of the test. Now what about my nuts?”
“We’re not telling you that until you let Kate go,” I responded, proud that my voice only quavered a little. “Where is she?”
Silence reigned a moment longer. “Keep your hands on your heads and walk backward. I’ll tell you when to stop. One move I don’t like and I’ll shoot a hole in the back of your kneecaps. Got it?”
We shuffled awkwardly backward following the sound of Vincent’s voice. I wanted to sneak a peek at my watch and see how much of the three minutes had expired before Eddy showed up, but I didn’t have the guts.
Vincent guided us through the café, past the French doors, and into Eddy’s living room. “Okay, now you can turn around. Very slowly.” Coop and I complied.
On the couch sat a very pissed off Kate, apparently unharmed. Her hands were bound in front of her with white clothesline rope, and all her fingers appeared to be intact. Scowling and red-faced, she glared back and forth between Pudge and Vincent. She might be tiny, but she had a strong constitution. I wanted to either cry or shout in relief.
Pudge perched on Eddy’s coffee table. He held a dull, black semi-automatic gun on Kate. Eddy was going to be one knotted Knitter when she heard her precious crafting glossies had been violated by the gangster’s sizable ass. However, she’d be happy to see he had a hell of a robin’s egg on one side of his head, laced with a jagged cut that had scabbed up in clotted bumps, and the beginnings of a beautiful shiner.
“You okay?” I asked Kate, and made a move to step toward her.
“Don’t.” Vincent barked. “Stay right there.”
I froze in place as Kate glared at Vincent. She said between gritted teeth, “They owe us for two lattes, a biscotti, and a piece of lemon cheesecake.”
“Christ,” Pudge muttered, “everyone wants a piece.”
Vincent nudged me in the shoulder with his gun. “So there she is. Where’s my fucking nuts?”
“We said we’d tell you that when you let her go,” Coop said. “As in, after she walks out the door.”
Before Vincent or Pudge could reply, the bells on the front door chimed. Eddy’s voice floated to us loud and clear. Her singing was garbled but the words sounded familiar.
Pudge stood abruptly. “What the—” Eddy’s magazines cascaded to the floor in a heap.
Like lightning, Vincent thwacked me in the back of the head with an open palm, hard enough to snap my head forward. I yelped as Vincent hissed, “Didn’t you lock the goddamn door when you came in?”
I rubbed the back of my head. “You didn’t tell me to do that.”
“Jesus Christ. Sit your asses down.” Vincent motioned at the couch with his gun.
I sat next to Kate, with Coop on her other side.
Weird and bizarre couldn’t begin to describe what was happening. I suddenly realized Eddy was belting out Pat Benatar’s “Hit Me with Your Best Shot” at the top of her lungs. Completely out of tune. I didn’t think she even knew who Pat Benatar was. I fought to bite back hysterical laughter.
Vincent made a guttural sound in the back of his flabby throat. “Pudge, keep an eye on these jokers. I’ll go out and deal with this.” He hitched up his pants with one hand and stomped toward the door, gun in his other beefy hand, hidden behind his back.
Pudge followed Vincent to the double French doors and positioned his rotund body mostly out of view of the front of the shop. His head bobbed right and left between us and the café, like some kind of deranged pelican on crack.
Vincent said, loud enough to be heard above the screeching, “Well, if it ain’t the old bat.”
Eddy ended her completely slaughtered karaoke attempt and said, “Mouthta fobo dimdum simsum.”
Vincent boomed, “What the hell—”
Eddy drowned him out with another flood of mishmashed words. Kudos for creativity.
Pudge’s attention was focused on the commotion out front, I caught Kate’s eye and jerked my head toward the kitchen. She nodded and gathered herself to rise, but Pudge shot a glance our way. She froze. Then he zoned back in on the confrontation between Vincent and Eddy.
Vincent said, “Shut up! I’m telling you—”
Eddy screeched like a hen in heat. In the most bizarre voice, totally unrecognizable, she said, “How dare you kidnap an innocent dame!” She reverted to spewing out more insanity. If I didn’t know her better, I’d have sworn she was loony tunes.
Praying that Pudge didn’t look back, I mouthed, one, two, three. Kate jumped up from the couch like a popped cork and zoomed out of the room. Pudge didn’t even notice. His hand had gradually relaxed, and now he held the gun almost casually at his side.
Eddy continued with her only semi-comprehensible tirade.
Vincent said, “Listen, you old hag—”
“Don’t you call me an old hag, you nasty ’napper.” Eddy must have had enough. “No one messes with Edwina Quartermaine and gets away with it! How do you like this?” There was a muffled clunk.
Vincent yowled. “That was my shin, you bitch!”
Oh shit. The woman was going to get herself shot.
I nudged Coop and motioned toward Pudge. My gaze settled on a heavy book lying on an end table beside the couch. It was
A History of Crocheting and Knitting around the World. I’d bought the book at the indie-feminist bookstore, True Colors, for Eddy last Christmas. The tome had to weigh ten pounds. Holding my breath, I picked up the book and gripped it tight.
Pudge was now completely absorbed in the argument in the other room. I mouthed to Coop, “Ready?”
He nodded.
I exploded up from my seat. In two long strides, I was across the carpet. I swung the heavy book with all my might and felt horrifying, primal joy surge through me as it whammed into the back of Pudge’s skull. His forehead smashed against the doorjamb with a sickening thud. He slithered down the doorframe like a cartoon character. I dropped the book and wrested the gun from his limp fingers.
Coop and I stampeded through the French doors. Vincent stood in the middle of the café, sighting down the barrel of his gun at Eddy. She was near the front door, holding up a chair, lion-tamer style. Vincent glanced our way. In slow motion, he swung the gun toward us.
A freight train roared in my ears. I forgot the gun in my own hand and had no idea where Coop was. I blindly charged Vincent. His mouth opened, and I saw his eyes widen a fraction of a second before I hit him with a tackle that Chicago Bear “The Fridge” Perry would have been proud of. Vincent’s gun flew from his grasp in an arc that seemed slow and graceful. I didn’t hear it hit the floor. Didn’t hear anything but the cacophony in my head. My vision was muted and fuzzy around the edges. All I could focus on was a tunnel filled with the body of an evil thug.
We hit the polished wood of the Rabbit Hole floor hard. I landed heavily on top of Vincent, and I heard air whoosh out. I tried to knee him but caught his thigh instead. He grunted. One of his hands grabbed under my chin, squeezing my windpipe. I tried to suck in a breath, no luck. I took a wild swing at his head with my gun hand. I barely registered the fact I still had the weapon. Vincent let go of my neck and brought up his hands to block the blow just before I clipped his nose. He grabbed my hand and we struggled for the gun.
I frantically grappled with him, panicked to keep control of the gun. I tried to head-butt him but couldn’t manage enough force to get past our arms. Tied up in a deadly tug-of-war, I vaguely registered a growling noise. Was I making that ghastly sound, or was it coming from Vincent?
The metal edges of the gun felt knife-sharp against my palm as he desperately tried to pry it from my grasp. Then there was a violent explosion. The gun jerked hard in my fist, recoil traveling up my arm to my shoulder like lightning.
I
shifted right, off-balance. Vincent bucked and rolled out from under me. I fell to my side.
It took a moment to realize he wasn’t coming at me again. He was curled in a fetal position screaming. Mutely, I scrambled backward as the fuzzy room reconstituted itself and once again became the familiar Rabbit Hole.
Despite a strange sucking sound in my ears, suddenly I could hear. I used a table to boost myself off the floor.
Vincent shouted, “—SHOT MY PINKIE OFF, YOU CRAZY BITCH! YOU, YOU …” He trailed off in a wail.
I looked at the gun miraculously still in my hand as Vincent howled. I caught motion out of the corner of my eye, and saw that Eddy stood over Vincent with her chair raised.
She said, “Come on, you big oaf, give me a reason to give you another lump.”
“SHE BLEW MY FUCKING FINGER OFF!”
Coop stood near the French doorway, his eyes wild. “Shit oh shit oh shit. You okay, Shay?” He held Vincent’s gun on Pudge, who sat slumped unresisting on the floor, awake but dazed, blood running down the side of his face.
“Jesus,” I croaked. “What—”
“Shay, you’re not shot, right?” he asked.
“No, no, I don’t think …” I gasped for air and looked at my midsection and legs, saw one knee covered with a dark, sticky substance. My stomach bottomed out until I touched the goo and realized it wasn’t blood. I gingerly sniffed then licked my finger. Thank God, I’d just rolled through a particularly gummy caramel mocha latte spill. “No, I’m okay.”
“Holy shit, little Miss Tenacious Protector,” Coop said, his gaze locked on Pudge, “He could’ve killed you!”
“But he didn’t.” I said. Suddenly my legs went noodly. I slid into a chair, panting and light-headed.
JT, Tyrell, and what looked like an entire SWAT team chose that moment to barge in the front door, and more chaos descended upon the coffee shop.
_____
By quarter after one, the semi-conscious Pudge and a bandaged Vincent were in the capable hands of the authorities. Eddy, Coop, Kate, Dawg, and I crowded in Eddy’s kitchen and sipped Eddy’s hot chocolate.
Bingo Barge Murder Page 17