by Glenn Trust
At the corner of the Lopez’s street, Ricardo turned sharply, spinning the tires as he accelerated rapidly. He had people to see, people who knew him, who would talk to him, who would understand that this was family. They would help if they could, if only to recall the favor later for their own benefit. But time was short. It would only be a matter of hours before the car disappeared, chopped, dismantled and sold for parts. Until then there was a chance. Someone would see. Someone would know. That someone would talk to Ricky Sanchez. He would see to it.
23. The Logical Thing to Do
“I drive, I do the talking. Everyone else shut up.” Turning his head, Darren stared at the two hulking brothers in the back of the furniture van waiting for some argument, some objection to his confiscation of their vehicle for the night’s activities. There was none. They stared at the floor where the girl lay drugged between them. “Good.”
Pulling his way slowly into the nighttime Atlanta traffic, Darren took a circuitous route to a warehouse district in Forest Park on the east side of Atlanta’s Hartsfield-Jackson Airport. The name seemed incongruous. There were no forests and most of it was not very park-like. What it was, was part of the sprawling Atlanta metropolitan area made up of fourteen counties spreading fifty miles in all directions from the State capitol. The actual city limits of Atlanta were in Fulton County and part of DeKalb County. But for all intents and purposes, the huge metro area was the real city, encompassing everything from inner-city ghetto to affluent neighborhoods to high end suburban settlements. The City was multicultural, multiracial and multi-economic status. There were some very rich, some very poor and many living somewhere in the middle. Darren and his younger brother Dale were entrepreneurs. They were determined to use their burgeoning criminal skills to pull themselves up from the edge of the very poor to the ranks of the very rich, or somewhere close. Not lacking in resolve, they were working hard at it.
Dale’s errors in the robbery-carjacking were learning experiences. Darren had discussed them with him at length during the day as they waited for nightfall. He had also issued a stern warning to his brother not to repeat those errors. Brotherly love only went so far.
Wheeling the van through a series of dark streets, lit by the pinkish glow of the mercury lamps on the sides of large block buildings, Darren made an abrupt turn to the right, bumping into a parking lot where grass grew up between cracks in the pavement. Cutting the van’s headlights, he pulled to the rear of the building and stopped. He flashed the lights once, twice a pause and then three times in quick succession, then waited. Ten seconds passed. Four quick flashes from a vehicle a hundred yards ahead signaled that he could proceed.
Stopping the van with a slight jerk, Darren peered through the windshield. The truck, with the cargo box on the back, was about fifty feet ahead. He spoke over his shoulder. “Stay here.”
“I’m coming with you.” Dale grabbed the handle of the passenger door.
“Sit your ass down. You ain’t going fucking nowhere. Just get over here in the driver’s seat when I get out.” Darren lowered his head and squinted trying to see into the dark to make out the men around the truck. “They don’t know you. They don’t know this piece of shit van. They only know I gave the right signal. There’s probably four or five guns on us. Wrong person gets out, says the wrong thing and we are all dead.” He looked at his brother. “You understand? You have dragged our asses into some serious shit. I gotta talk us out of it. They know me. They’d cap you before you got two words out. Stay the fuck put and wait. Anything happens to me you bang this thing into reverse and run like hell. You might get out.” He opened the door and stepped out. “Don’t do anything else or we’re all dead.”
The door closed with a soft click. Darren approached the box truck; his hands spread wide indicating that he was unarmed. A flashlight beam scanned his face, hands and body. He stopped ten feet from the person holding the light. It was clear that he was talking, fast. After a minute, the light motioned him forward, and he followed the man out of sight to the front of the box truck.
“How’s she doing?” Dale turned his head to the brothers in the back.
“Huh?” Sam said as if roused from a drowsy nap.
“The girl, dumbass. How is she? Alive?”
Stevie nudged her with the toe of his shoe. Her head rolled slightly on the steel floor and a snorting breath followed by a soft moan could be heard. “Yeah, she’s alive, and who the fuck you calling dumbass. You the one got us into this.”
“Yeah, well my brother’s gonna get us out, and make us rich too, you wait and see.” He turned his head back in time to see Darren yank open the van’s driver’s door.
“All right, let’s do it,” Darren said quickly. Leaning over Dale, he looked at the two in the back. “They bought it. We gotta load her in that truck. You boys open the side door and get her out.” He nodded at two men walking from the truck to the side of the. “You come with me.” He grabbed his brother by the shirt and jerked him out of the van.
“Where we goin’?” He stumbled as Darren jerked him away from the van. “Damn, Darren, what’s the fucking hurry? Quit jerkin’ at me.”
“Come on. We goin’ to get paid.”
The two walked to the front of the box truck past two men standing at the rear, Darren nodded. One of the men at the truck spoke in a deep drawling voice. “This is a onetime deal, boy. You got it. Don’t pull this shit again.”
Walking more quickly beside his brother, Dale whispered breathlessly, “What’s he mean, Darren?” Darren’s pace quickened, and Dale spoke rapidly, trying to catch up. “What’s he fucking talking about?”
At the front of the truck, Darren broke into a wild run, arms and legs moving like a windmill, as fast he could make them. Skill position player, wide receiver, criminal mastermind, brother Dale had no trouble keeping up, but no questions were being answered, and it was clear Darren was not stopping now to explain.
The two men from the box truck waited beside the van as Sam and Stevie dragged the girl across the rough steel floor to the door.
“Gracias.”
The brothers turned to stare into the face of the man who had spoken. He smiled at them, holding up a nine-millimeter pistol that he waved back and forth in front of their faces.
“Step away from the van,” the other man said, in a thick drawling accent. He was stocky, his face like stone, pale marble glowing in the dark.
“What the fuck you mean…”
Stevie was answered with a hard rap in the mouth from the barrel of the man’s pistol. Blood trickled from his lip, and he put the back of his hand against it to stem the flow.
“I mean step away from the van.” He motioned with his gun hand. “Over there, by the dumpster.”
Dimwitted as they were, the light went on for the two brothers. Things were not working out as they had expected, and that seemed to be a very bad thing.
“Stevie, what’s going on?” Sam asked, just before the pistol of the man who spoke Spanish fell on the back of his head raising a large swollen lump.
“Por favor.” He motioned towards the dumpster politely with a smile that seemed almost gracious and courteous, as if directing the youths towards the restroom.
“Get down.” The stocky Georgian kicked Stevie behind the right knee causing his leg to buckle. He went down hard landing on his face and then pushed himself up to his knees.
Seeing his brother’s example, or fate, Sam knelt, without having to be forced. Turning his head to his brother, he could only ask in dazed confusion, “Stevie?”
Stevie only had time for a one-word reply. “Fuck.”
Echoing loudly between the block walls of the loading dock and the dumpster, the shots sounded like thunder trapped in a cave, reverberating for several seconds. The bullets struck each brother in the back of the head. Both fell forward, their heads thudding with a smack into the pavement. Stevie’s struck the side of the dumpster before coming to rest open-eyed beside his brother. The dead empty eyes of
one stared into those of the other.
A quarter mile away, the popping crack of the two shots made the other brothers run harder and faster.
“Why they do that?” Dale asked panting as he ran. “Why they shoot them boys? Why we runnin’ and not there with ‘em?”
“It was the deal,” Darren replied, gasping not nearly in as good a shape as his younger brother.
“What you mean, deal?”
“I mean, dumbass, I told them that them two fat ass white boys stole the girl and killed her boyfriend and brought her to us to sell. We wasn’t no part of it. Said they could have the girl, no charge if they would let us go. We’d bring ‘em another girl next time like normal”
“But that ain’t how it happened, Darren. You know that.”
“You wanna go back there with them and explain, go ahead. I done what I could to save your stupid ass. Now there ain’t no witness to no murder and the girl is gone. She ain’t never gonna be seen again. It’s done.”
Dale thought it over as he ran. Unconsciously, he increased speed moving his legs even faster causing Darren to struggle to keep up with his athletic brother. It seemed the logical thing to do.
24. You’d Best Do It
“Who was that?” Deirdre Barnes put the newspaper on her lap and watched her husband lean back in his recliner with a look on his face that she knew.
“Bob Shaklee.”
“Oh?” Her curiosity piqued, she took her feet off the ottoman and sat up straight. “You going to tell me what he wanted?”
The look was still there. Eyebrows furrowed, eyes not looking at anything in particular, it was Andy’s look of concentration before making some big decision. His head turned towards Deirdre. “He wants me to join his team.”
“His team? Another taskforce?” Now her brow furrowed and a small frown crossed her face remembering the last time her husband had worked with Shaklee on a GBI taskforce. It was during the conspiracy investigation that had ended with Andy in a deadly confrontation in a south Georgia marsh. Her husband had done enough. Murder investigations with Atlanta Homicide were one thing. The crimes were disturbing, but the criminals were usually gone when Andy got the call. This taskforce thing had been something else, too many unknown variables. She was not happy and was immediately pissed at Shaklee for bringing this to her family again. “What did you tell him?”
“I told him I would have to speak with you.” Andy smiled. “You know, to get your permission.”
“Permission my ass.” Andy loved the way his prim and proper wife could slip into coarse street talk in mid-sentence. “You’ve already made your decision. You’re just trying to figure out how to let me know without being brained by a frying pan.”
“Seriously, this is not what you think.” He sat back in his chair and began explaining the governor’s creation of the Office of Special Investigations and appointment of Shaklee to head it. “It’s a chance to make a difference,” he concluded. That seemed to be the phrase that Shaklee was using with everyone in his recruitment efforts. He crossed his legs and waited for Deirdre’s response.
It came quickly. “You already make a difference. You investigate murders. You catch murderers.”
“True, I thought about that, said so to Shaklee.” He looked across the room staring at the family pictures on the far wall. “This is different though.” He paused trying to find the words to explain. “The murders happen. They’re terrible, but they will always happen. There will always be investigators to work those cases. This new OSI will have resources to work cases that get pushed to the bottom of the pile, the type of cases that could change things for the better. Cases that get lost or ignored, but shouldn’t.”
“You mean political cases. You’d be the governor’s flunky, working on cases that would help him get reelected. Right?”
“Bob says, no. I asked him that. He said the governor has given him complete autonomy to choose the cases the OSI will work on and to follow them no matter where they lead.”
“You trust the governor?”
“I trust Bob.”
Deirdre thought about this. She had gotten to know Bob Shaklee after the task force closed down. “I suppose if anyone can handle the politics and the governor, Bob can.” She looked into her husband’s eyes. “You want to do this, don’t you.”
Andy thought for a few seconds and nodded. “I think I do.”
“Then you’d best do it.”
“You sure?”
“I want no regrets in our lives, Andy.” She lifted the newspaper from her lap. Case closed.
25. Reaching the Light
“What does he do?”
“Who?”
“Fel.” Lying bare-chested against George, Sharon pushed herself close so that her breasts pressed against his side, her arm thrown over his chest.
“He mows.” Wrapping his arm around her, George stroked her side and hip. It was peaceful, lying in the dark, the two of them, no other thoughts, no other worries. “All day long, he mows. It’s what he does.” George smiled at the thought. Fel’s mowing was like an anchor in their lives, something to count on.
“I know that.” Sharon snuggled closer, stretching and throwing a leg over him. “I mean now, at night, when we leave him on the porch.”
“How should I know.” George shrugged. “I reckon he goes inside and goes to bed.” His hand patted her bottom softly. “Like us.”
“Not like us, I think,” Sharon said, smiling. Then pushing up on an elbow she looked at George, forcing him to turn his head towards her and take her question seriously. “You lived with him eight years before I got here. Are you telling me that you do not know what he does in that house by himself? Just that he mows all day, sits on the porch and drinks beer with you other times. That’s it?”
George thought about it, her words making him feel guilty. It had never occurred to him to wonder or worry what Fel might be up to on his own any more than he expected Fel to worry about what he was up to in his little apartment over the barn. “I guess that’s about it,” he said. “I really don’t know what he does on his own…alone.” Spoken like that, the word sounded sad, full of melancholy. Alone. Lonely. Without anyone. Sad.
They lay side by side, pressed against each other in the dark, listening to the hum of the insects and nightlife. A billion living creatures were within their hearing outside the window, all going about their business, living, eating, mating, giving birth, dying. One of those living creatures was in the house across the yard. They had no idea what he did alone in the house. That they did not know seemed to make the old man’s aloneness even worse, even sadder. The thought made Sharon tremble slightly and pull George closer.
The forty-watt bulb in the overhead ceiling light cast a yellow glow over the kitchen. Dim as it was, it was enough to attract a moth that beat itself against the window screen, trying futilely to reach the luminescence that guided it through the dark. The moth would die; the fine silvery powder beat from its wings from hitting the screen ten thousand times in the night. It would be dead by morning, never reaching the light, its goal, its god.
Fel Tobin watched the moth for a while, feeling its frustration and the futility of its quest for the light. His eyes roamed around the kitchen. He breathed deeply of the house’s scent. It was like taking in the scent of a lover. Warm and rich, the house smelled of the life he and Colleen had shared there.
At the table in the only remaining kitchen chair, his eyes dropped to the formica top. His two arms rested on the surface, between them a pad of white, ruled paper. It had been years since he had written a letter, or anything else for that matter. What would he write now?
He thought about that for a long while. Sometime after midnight, he picked up the pen. His hand moved slowly at first, taking time with each word, the words making sentences. As the words came, he wrote more quickly. When he was done, there were three pages filled with blue ballpoint ink. Carefully tearing the pages from the pad, he took them upstairs to the bedroom and placed them
in a drawer of the nightstand. Stretching out on the bed in his clothes, he waited for the morning, dozing on and off through the remainder of the night.
The first orange glimmer of sun through the window struck his face and roused him from what passed for sleep in his world. By the time Sharon and George came down to leave for work, Fel was on the mower waving good-bye to them at the road.
26. A Clear Conscience
Stepping into the shadow of a building, Darren jerked his brother to a stop beside him. He stepped back against the wall, eyes scanning both directions. Dale followed suit leaning his head back against the bricks, breathing heavily, not so much from fatigue as from the adrenalin surging through his body. The ‘fight or flight’ instinct is a powerful one. In this case, it had been all flight. The brothers had covered a good three miles since leaving Sam and Stevie at the back of the warehouse.
Figuring they were safe, Darren reached in his pocket for his smokes. The lighter’s flame followed by the red-orange tip of the cigarette was the only light. The street was empty and dark. Darren had kept them off any main streets, taking back alleys and side streets as they wove their way back towards Atlanta’s south side and his apartment.
The cigarette glowed brightly for a second as Darren inhaled deeply. The orange light illuminated their faces softly in the dark and then faded to black as he lowered the smoke to his side, cupping it in his hand.
“I got to know.”
“You got to know what?” Darren asked, turning his face towards his brother. In the dim light of the cigarette, he could see that Dale’s head was leaned back against the building, mouth slightly open. The glow reflected off the sheen of perspiration covering his skin.
“Did you know?”
“Know what?” Darren knew exactly what.
Dale turned his face towards his brother. “Did you know what you was gonna do? What them boys from down south would do? It was your plan all along, wasn’t it?”