She was silent throughout, listening raptly; but he couldn’t read her.
Finally he said, “I think you already know about Sherry, and the trouble she’s in. I think you were forced to stand guard on her last night, while your brother and father met with the rest of us, for our final planning session.”
She winced again. Looked at the floor.
“I don’t know what crimes in the past your father has involved you in,” he said, “but this time it’s kidnaping. You’re an accessory. You’re implicated in the mall heist, as well; you’re a conspirator.”
She looked at him, her big blue eyes wet.
“The girl’s all right,” she said. “She hasn’t been hurt or anything. Lyle hasn’t touched her.”
Thank God.
“Good. But your father wants revenge against my friend and me. I think he plans to kill Sherry, eventually. And me. And my friend.”
She thought about that. Then shook her head violently.
“No!” she said. “No, I don’t think he’d go that far. Daddy’s not a bad man, not really . . .”
“Jesus fuck! How did you spend last night again? Or was that somebody else who was hiding in the can from her rape-happy old man?”
“Jon . . . what are you asking . . . ?”
“First, don’t betray me. At the very least, just don’t say anything to your father about us talking.”
He waited for her to nod, but she just looked at him.
He swallowed and went on. “What I want most of all is for you to tell me where they’re holding Sherry.”
“Oh, Jon . . .”
“Where, and under what conditions. I need to know the layout of the place, so we can get her back without anybody getting hurt. That includes Lyle, and your father.”
She was shaking her head no.
“We aren’t murderers, Cindy Lou, Nolan and me. We’re two guys who used to be crooks, who went straight, and something out of our past came back at us and whapped us alongside the head. This girl, Sherry, is innocent in this. She’s done nothing to your father to deserve any of it. She’s not, never was, a criminal. Her only crime was falling in love with the wrong guy.”
“I been there,” she said hollowly.
Tears were making tracks down her cheeks, though her face was oddly impassive.
“I think you should help me,” Jon said. “You should tell me where Sherry is, before she gets hurt. Before she gets killed. You don’t want to be an accessory to murder, do you?”
Now her Kewpie-doll lips were quivering. “Jon . . . please . . .”
“Help me. Don’t say anything to your father. And catch that bus to California—today, tonight, as soon as you can break free from him.”
“I don’t have enough money . . .”
“I’ll tell you what. From here I’m going down to the Greyhound station. It’s in downtown Davenport. I’m going to buy you a ticket to, where?”
“L.A.,” she said, snuffling.
“To L.A. I’ll have them hold it for you at the ticket window, in your name. How’s that?”
“I can’t do it.”
“Go to California?”
“Help you. He’s my daddy, Jon. No matter what he’s done, he’s my daddy. I can’t, I just can’t turn against him. He’s kin.”
Jon reached out and held her hand. “Look. This isn’t a matter of ‘kin.’ It’s a matter of right and wrong.”
Her mouth tightened. “You steal things. How can you say what’s right and wrong?”
“Stealing’s wrong. I don’t do it anymore. At least, I don’t want to do it anymore. Kidnaping is very wrong. Murder is as wrong as you can get.”
“Going against your family is wrong.”
“Not if they’re the Mansons. Help me. And yourself. Tell me where Sherry is—and catch that bus.”
“Jon . . . don’t ask me this . . . we hardly know each other . . .”
“My life’s in your hands.”
The door opened.
Jon withdrew the gun, put a finger to his lips; Cindy Lou sucked in air, brought a hand up to her mouth.
The safety chain kept the door from opening more than a few inches. A voice out there—Cole Comfort’s voice, sounding a little drunk—said, “Let me in, darlin’! What you got this thing locked for? And turn that TV down!”
Jon mouthed, “Please,” to her, and she got up and went to the door, saying, “I got to shut it to open it, Daddy,” and she shut it, turning to Jon and giving him a pained expression and shaking her head no.
Quickly he ducked out the glass doors and sprinted through the snow back to his van, not looking back, gun in his hand and in his pocket. Wondering if he’d blown it.
16
BUSINESS WAS slow, at Nolan’s, even for a Thursday night. It was cold, particularly for early December, and the roads were slick from the light but persistent snow. This was no blizzard, but people weren’t used to the winter driving conditions yet, and a lot of them stayed home. Tonight it was mostly singles, out dancing to the monotonous beat and nasal sounds of some British synthesizer band. Nolan had turned the alleged music down lower than Sherry would have liked. Sherry thought loud music encouraged dancing, which encouraged general socializing, all of which encouraged drinking. It was his thinking that the couples lingering here, after a late dinner, sitting in the bar, might want to talk, or anyway hear themselves think. The loudness of the sound system was a bone of contention between Sherry and Nolan. He usually let her have her way—as long as the customers didn’t complain, and they never seemed to. Without her here, he did it his way.
The regulars were asking for her: “Where’s Sherry?” “We really miss her!” “You’re a poor substitute for a pretty face, Nolan!” He told them, including several of his Chamber of Commerce pals, she’d gone home to visit family. Since her family was all dead, he hoped that wasn’t really the case.
Being at the restaurant was worse, in a way, than being at home; her touch was here—the plants, the decor, even the way things were run, much of it had come from her, or from them both, talking things out, planning together. They had shared the restaurant more than the house. Funny, how the worst waitress in the world could turn out to have such a knowing touch where managing was concerned. Strange, how he could sleep in that bed and force her from his mind but in Nolan’s, he couldn’t. She was everywhere.
Except in the back room. That was where Cole Comfort waited.
JENNIFER WALLACE liked her job. She never admitted it to anybody, because she was, after all, just a glorified janitor. And not particularly glorified, either.
But she liked solitude—she’d grown up in a big family and hadn’t had near as much time to herself as she would’ve liked, and now, only twenty-five years of age, she was working on her own big family, with three at home, ages two, four and seven, which was the life she’d sought, the life she loved, but solitude wasn’t part of it.
She was a small but sturdy woman, with dark brown hair in a short tight perm, small dark eyes, rather large nose, pleasant smile; wearing a light brown shirt with the Brady Eighty logo on it, and dark brown slacks. It was almost a uniform, giving her a military look, and she liked that. It made her feel less a janitor, as the term bothered her a little, even though she liked the work just fine.
A lot of people wouldn’t have. But all the mopping of floors and Windexing of storefronts (which was pretty much the sum of her duties between now and seven, when the shift changed and the doors opened) had a hypnotic effect on her. She got into it. She liked the feel of her muscles being exercised. She liked working hard but unsupervised, taking her time.
And she varied it. She could finish up the place in five hours, if she pushed it. In which case, she could sit in the maintenance shop—a big cement supply room, like a garage only without a garage door—with her feet up on the workbench, reading a book, or listening to the radio, or watching a portable TV.
Other nights she would take her time. Those were the nights when she was in a thoughtful mood, and
let the motion of mopping and Windexing lull her. She could get drunk on work when she took it at that slow, steady pace. But not so drunk that she wouldn’t think about her kids and her Doug.
She had a terrific husband and terrific kids. Doug was blond and chubby and cute as a bug’s ear; they got married out of high school—a “have-to,” but they neither one had regrets, at least not that Jennifer knew. Doug worked at Oscar Meyer, day shift, and she took the kids to day-care when she got home from work around 7:30 A.M. and then she’d sleep all day. She and Doug and the kids had all evening together; she came on at ten, so they’d get the kids in bed at eight-thirty or so, and have a roll in the hay, and she’d go off to work with a glow.
She loved her life.
Tonight, she’d come on, as usual, right at ten, nodding to Pete, whose maintenance shift was just ending, and Scott, that cute security guard, who was going off duty. As usual, Pete had a pot of coffee waiting for her. She needed her caffeine; that’s one thing you needed in this job. That and a good attitude.
She sat in her swivel executive-style chair, which had been abandoned by one of the businesses out here and which Pete had salvaged and repaired, with her feet up on the workbench, trying to decide whether tonight would be a high-energy, five-hour night, followed by some relaxation (she had a historical romance paperback tucked in her purse, Love’s Savage Sword by Linda Benjamin); or a reflective, slow-and-steady worknight, where she could get lost in the circular motion of mop and rag, and contemplate her kids and her old man. She sipped her coffee, and thought: I think tonight I’ll whip through this place like a female Mr. Clean; maybe I can beat my record and come in under five hours—and finish reading my romance.
With that, she was deep asleep.
NOLAN SAT at his desk. White-haired, blue-eyed Coleman Comfort sat on a box of whiskey bottles nearby; he was wearing his coveralls with a plaid shirt underneath, looking folksy as a postcard from the Grand Ole Opry. He seemed to have developed a bit of a paunch; Nolan didn’t seem to be the only one age had put a spare tire on. One odd note was struck: his high-topped black tennis shoes, over which cream-colored longjohns rose into the coveralls. Nolan understood the shoes, though: he’d suggested to all of them, last night, that they wear something comfortable and suited for the long night of physical labor ahead. And Cole Comfort had obviously taken Nolan’s footwear advice to heart, and sole.
“I guess it’s time,” Cole said, smiling; he had such a nice smile.
Nolan glanced at his watch. Ten after ten. “I’d say the maintenance girl’s out, by now.” He had gone in just before Pete went off and chatted with the man, slipping Seconal in the pot of coffee. The last three nights Nolan had, just after ten, entered the mall the back way, walking past the maintenance shop’s double doors, which were invariably ajar; each night he noticed the night girl sitting having a cup of coffee before getting to work.
Three nights in a row suggested, but did not guarantee, a pattern.
“How do we know she’s out?” Comfort said, just a little irritably.
“We’ll know for sure soon enough. Before this goes any further, you’ve got a phone call to make.”
And Nolan pushed the phone on his desk toward Comfort. Comfort rose and went to the phone and pushed some buttons and, phone to his ear, stood and smiled at Nolan. It was a smile that seemed pleasant enough, but Nolan could see the smugness, the cruelty, that lurked behind Comfort’s good-ole-boy veneer.
“Hello, son,” Comfort said, his voice warm. “Time to put the girl on.”
He listened for a while, and handed the receiver to Nolan.
“Nolan?”
Her voice was breathy; there was fear in it, but also relief.
“Sherry,” he said.
“They’re using me to make you help them, aren’t they?” Her bitter tone of voice conveyed what she couldn’t add: And I hate it.
“You know about the mall heist?” he asked her.
“I’ve picked up on it. You could lose everything.”
“I’m not going to lose you.”
“The life you’ve made . . .”
“No. I did the planning. It’ll go down smooth. You’ll be returned to me and we’ll even get a piece of the action for our trouble.”
Nolan didn’t believe that, but he needed Comfort to believe he did, and it wouldn’t hurt Sherry’s state of mind to believe that, either.
“They haven’t hurt me. They keep saying once you’ve cooperated, I’ll be released.”
“We’ll be together in a few hours.”
That Nolan believed; or at least, he believed it to be a possibility. He and Jon already had something in motion.
“I love you, Nolan.”
“I love you, too.”
“That’s . . . nice to hear.”
Was she crying?
He said, “I’ll take you to Vegas when this is over and prove it.”
He told her to hang on, and then he hung up.
Comfort, who again was perched on the liquor boxes, hands on his knees, smiled paternally. “She didn’t complain about the treatment none, did she?”
“No.”
“You’re a lucky man. She’s a nice girl. A pretty girl.”
Nolan didn’t like to hear Comfort talk about her, but he didn’t say anything.
Comfort did: “When this is over, we’ll be even, Nolan. We can put all our differences behind us.”
“It’ll be history,” Nolan agreed.
“History,” Comfort repeated, smiling, standing, clapping, once. “So! Let’s go open the door and let our friends in, what do you say?”
Nolan remained seated. “Soon,” he said.
Comfort’s smile disappeared, and his mouth pulled itself in a tight line across his leathery face, but he just sat down. He’d put Nolan in charge; he had to live with it. For the moment.
JON, wearing a Space Pirates sweatshirt, peeked in the maintenance room. The woman in the brown uniform was slumped in a swivel chair, feet up on a workbench; she was sawing logs. He had a large gym bag with him, from which he took a pair of handcuffs and some clothesline and a roll of wide-width adhesive tape. He left the woman in her chair, but slipped her feet from the bench onto the floor. He cuffed her hands behind the chair, and tied her feet to it, snug. He ran the adhesive over her eyes and around behind her hair, grimacing with the thought of how removal would hurt the poor woman. But it beat being dead, and Comfort might just as easily killed her, which was why Nolan kept this job for Jon and himself. Jon slapped another piece of adhesive over her mouth, which didn’t quite silence the snoring; her fairly large nose could saw its share of logs on its own.
In the bottom of the bag was a long-barreled .38 and an UZI submachine gun and a box of ammo for the revolver, and half a dozen clips for the machine gun. Jon zipped the bag and stowed it in a corner of the maintenance shed, behind a big shiny golf-cart-like thing, which seemed to be a floor buffer.
The guns were against Comfort’s rules. Despite what had been said at the meeting last night, Comfort had told Nolan privately that he and Jon were to go into this unarmed. Nolan hadn’t protested. He and Jon would go into it unarmed, all right; they just wouldn’t come out that way.
“We’re probably going to have to do some shooting,” Nolan said.
“Oh, Christ. Isn’t there ever an end to it?”
“There is if Comfort gets his way. He plans to kill us all.”
Jon swallowed thickly. “You and me and Sherry, you mean.”
“Possibly some of the others as well.”
“Why, for Christ’s sake?”
“Not for Christ’s sake. For the sake of revenge, in our case. In the others, for the sake of greed; for the sake of self-protection.”
Jon pulled at his own hair till it hurt. “Goddamn, I blew it, I really fucking blew it. We should have tried what you said—we should have grabbed Cindy Lou and tried a trade.”
“That’s hindsight; don’t torture yourself, kid. Besides, it might not h
ave worked. We may have a better chance, tonight.”
“How?”
“It all hinges on Lyle showing up. And judging from his father going to the trouble of including him in our planning session last night, I think the boy will show. And once he has, that means one of two things.”
“Which are?”
“Sherry’s already dead.”
“Jesus.”
“Or she’s being baby-sat by your friend Cindy Lou.”
Jon found a smile. “Who isn’t at all dangerous—who wouldn’t begin to hurt her.”
“I’ll take your word for that. Like I got to take your word she won’t sell us out, after what you told her. There’s no other Comfort or Comfort crony in the woodpile, is there?”
“No. From what Cindy Lou said, it’s just the three of them—father, son, daughter.”
Nolan shrugged with his eyebrows. “Then once Lyle is here, all we have to do is get him and Cole together and under gunpoint and make them take us to her.”
That sounded like fun; if you liked skydiving without a parachute. “And we do that as soon as Lyle shows?”
Nolan shook his head. “Once the heist is under way, it’ll be hard to stop. Even though they’ve lined up with us, Fisher and Winch and Dooley aren’t going to relish working half a caper and then having it get shut down. They could even turn on us.”
“You promised them fifteen grand . . .”
“They could take home a hundred grand each from this job, if it goes the way it could.”
“Nolan—there’s no part of you that wants to do this job, is there?” Jon hated to say it, but Nolan did seem caught up in the momentum of it; could it be, now that he’d planned it, he couldn’t stand not to see it go down? To see if an entire shopping mall could be looted?
“All I want is Sherry back,” Nolan said.
And Jon dismissed those other thoughts; he believed Nolan. Sherry was what this was about.
“We wait till the Leeches have their trucks loaded up and have taken off,” Nolan said. “Then it’s just the two Comforts against our side. We grab father and son, and they show us where they’re keeping my girl. Or we kill one of them.”
Spree Page 16