by K. W. Jeter
“Don’t screw around with me, Kim.” Her voice turned hard. “This is important.”
That didn’t make it much different from everything else that was going on.
“How important?”
“Important,” Ibanez said, “as in your ass is in big trouble important.”
“Tell me something new.”
“Okay. How about important as in you blew up a bunch of people downtown yesterday. Does that sufficiently ring your chimes?”
“Oh.”
That hadn’t taken long. I didn’t know how she made the connection between me and the explosion, but if she had, the police might be able to as well.
“So . . . should we talk? Your call, Kim.”
Or maybe she was the only one with a clue. That was her job, after all – to figure out stuff like this. And she’d met me before, knew who I was. The police probably didn’t even know I existed.
I glanced over at where my backpack was sitting on the couch. I knew it’d be heavy when I picked it up. From the weight of the loaded .357 inside it.
“Sure,” I said. “Let’s talk.”
* * *
I met her at the coffee shop she’d given me the directions to. Blocks away from where Braemer and his equipment-dealer friends had gone up. The way street traffic was back to normal, people on the sidewalks going about their business, you wouldn’t have guessed that there was a corner nearby that was just a blackened hole in the concrete, with construction barriers set up around it.
Ibanez was inside already, in one of the booths. I saw her through the coffee shop window as I leaned the motorcycle onto its kickstand. I strapped my helmet to the seat and went on in.
“You want anything?” She had a half-drained latte in front of her. “My treat.”
“Just a decaf.” I set my backpack down on the booth seat beside me. “I’ve been drinking so much regular coffee lately, I’m about ready to explode. So to speak.”
“That’s because of the people you’ve been hanging around with lately.” She slid out of the booth. “They’re a little over-caffeinated.”
I didn’t ask her what she meant by that. A couple minutes later, she came back and set a Styrofoam cup in front of me.
“How did you get my phone number?” All the way over here, I had been wondering that.
“It was written inside that binder.” She sipped at her drink. “That one with all those backup disks inside it. I wrote the number down when you weren’t looking.” She gave a thin smile. “That’s the kind of thing that people like me do.”
“Okay.” I wrapped my hands around my cup. “So what do people like you want to talk to people like me about?”
“Nothing much –”
“That’s not what you said on the phone.”
“Well, let’s just see if it’s anything big or not.” She dug into the Coach shoulder bag on the bench beside her. “Take a look at this.”
She brought out one of those shiny black tablets, not an iPad, but something smaller. I’d been saving up to get Donnie something like that for Christmas. She switched it on and began poking at its glossy screen with a red-polished fingernail.
“You watch the news yesterday?” She didn’t look up at me, just went on finding what she wanted on the tablet.
“Some of it.”
“Big explosion,” she said. “Right over there.”
“So I heard.” I took a sip of my coffee. “Sounded like not-nice people – I mean the ones it happened to.”
“They weren’t Boy Scouts.” She swiveled the tablet around on the table and pushed it toward me. “Any time something like that happens, especially downtown, the station gets videos in the email. People take them with their cell phones and send them to us. Sometimes they’re interesting. Like this one.”
Another poke and a video started playing on the tablet screen. I leaned over it to watch.
It looked like it’d been taken with a cell phone, shaky and not the greatest resolution. But it was still a pretty clear shot of the corner where Braemer had met up with his dealer friends. They weren’t visible anymore – there was just the post-fireball wreckage scattered about, and the black smoke piling up into the sky.
At least that was what could be seen in the distance. The person who’d used their cell phone to take the video must have been a couple of blocks away, looking along the traffic stalled in the street. There was something closer, though, right at one side of the shot.
A girl wearing a plain white helmet, sitting on top of a motorcycle. She had the helmet’s visor pushed up, so she could hold her own cell phone up to her head –
It was me.
In the video playing on the tablet screen, I could be seen lowering the phone in my hand and gazing stunned at what had just happened down the street. Then hurriedly stuffing the phone into my jacket, turning the motorcycle around and gunning myself away as fast as possible.
“Interesting, huh?” Ibanez reached over and stopped the video with another fingernail poke. “Though I suppose it could be just a coincidence that you were there when it happened.”
“How do you know it was me?” I tried playing the Asian card. “Don’t we all look alike to you?”
“On the same motorcycle, that I looked out of the TV station’s window and saw you riding? Now you’re stretching it.”
I had to think about this. My brain felt as if it were revving up, but not getting anywhere, like whenever I flubbed a gear shift on the Ninja.
“Okay,” I said after a moment. “Maybe I was there when it happened. So what?”
“Well, let’s think about this, Kim. The way somebody like me thinks about it. You come to a TV station and talk to a reporter, telling me how much you want to get back at McIntye for the way he fired your ass. I gotta say it – you came across a little strange. Especially when you found out that the way you’d thought you were going to be able to get back at him wasn’t happening.” She tapped the edge of her cup with a fingertip. “Disappointed people . . . sometimes they do some crazy things. Things you normally wouldn’t expect them to.”
“Like blow people up?” I leaned back in the booth. “Why would I blow those people up instead of McIntyre?”
“Beats the heck out of me. But they were people – at least a couple of them – who had connections to McIntyre. Business dealings. Given that you used to keep his accounts, I would’ve thought you knew that.”
She had me there. Maybe not to Braemer, but I was actually pretty sure I’d made out checks to some of his equipment dealer friends.
“So those are some pretty intriguing pieces, Kim. You’ve got something going on inside your head, about wanting to do something to McIntyre. And you’re there when people he knows go up in smoke.” Ibanez shrugged. “Maybe those things hook up, maybe they don’t. What do you think?”
“I think maybe you’d better back off.”
“Ooh. Very scary.” She smiled. “You know, you’re a lot different from the girl who came and talked to me at the station. As makeovers go, this is wild.”
“You don’t know the half of it.”
“Let me give you some public relations advice, Kim. When you talk all spooky and weird like that, you’re not exactly convincing me there’s nothing going on. When somebody like me hears somebody tell them to back off, that’s pretty much confirmation that whatever’s going on, it’s worth snooping into.”
“There’s nothing going on,” I said. “Nothing you need to know about.”
“Maybe not at the moment. But maybe soon. And that’s what I wanted to talk to you about.”
“Why?”
“So when it happens, I’ll be ready.” Ibanez coolly regarded me. “Let’s say you’ve got something going on. I wouldn’t have thought it before, but stranger things have happened. Otherwise there wouldn’t be any news at all. Or at least not the kind that other people want to know about –”
“They can mind their own business.” I was feeling sullen.
“Yours is m
ore interesting. And look at it this way. You find a way to get back at your old boss McIntyre – maybe you’ve already found a way – then don’t you want people to hear? That you fixed him good? It’s one thing to get back at somebody. That’s a private matter. It’s another thing to let everybody know. That’s humiliating – especially for a prick like McIntyre.”
I had to admit to myself that she had a point. Though it wasn’t exactly humiliation that I had in mind for him.
“So it’s not a one-way arrangement,” she continued. “I can help you out. Make it a more . . . satisfying experience. For everyone. That’s what the news is good for.” She took a sip from her cup, then set it back down. “So. If there is something you’d like to tell me about . . .”
“Yeah,” I said. “There is. But not here. Where everybody can listen in on us. Let’s go outside.”
Ibanez followed me to the alley at the side of the building. We went far enough down it, that nobody could glimpse us from the street.
“Let me see that video again.” I pointed to her shoulder bag. “There’s something I want to show you.”
She fished the tablet out of her bag, started up the video again and handed it to me.
“Thanks.”
I reached into my backpack and took out the .357 that Cole had given to me. Holding the gun by its barrel, I set the tablet against the alley’s wall with my other hand, then smashed it to pieces.
“Damn it, Kim. That was just childish.” Ibanez looked down at the broken bits and piece scattered at our feet. “I just got that thing.”
“So? I bet the station paid for it.”
“Even so,” she said. “I’ll have a hard time getting another one from them.”
“I don’t care.”
“Do you really think you accomplished anything by doing that? I’ve got the video on my computer back at the station. Why shouldn’t I just send it on over to the police, with your name and phone number attached?”
“This is why.” I still had the gun in my hand. She was at least a head taller than me, so I had to stand on tiptoe to bring the muzzle up under her chin. “You’re right. There’s something going on.” I jabbed the gun into her throat, forcing her head back against the wall. “But if you say anything about it – to anyone – then I’ll take care of you first.”
She managed to keep her cool. Maybe it wasn’t the first time somebody had threatened her like this. In her line of work, maybe it happened all the time – I didn’t know.
“Why not take care of me right now?”
“It’s tempting.” I glanced over at the mouth of the alley – people were passing by on the sidewalk beyond – then back to her. “But maybe it would just make things worse for me. I don’t know what you’ve got sitting on your desk. You get found dead, one of your buddies at the station finds my name on your notepad, then the video in your email – you’re the one who said that people like you are good at making connections. It’s your job.”
“Could you put that away, then?” She nodded down toward the gun at her throat. “It’s making me twitchy.”
“Sure.” I pulled it away. “I just wanted to get it across to you that I’m kind of a serious person.”
“Oh, you are.” She rubbed her neck. “You are, Kim. I have no doubt of it.”
“Good.” I slid the .357 into my backpack. “Then I’m glad we had this little talk.”
“You know . . . I’m not sure all the change in you has been for the best.”
“Probably not.” I hoisted the backpack’s strap across my shoulder. “But it was the only makeover I could afford. I’m on a limited budget.”
Ibanez finished pulling herself together, brushing off her jacket where it had rubbed against the alley wall. “Can I ask a favor?”
“Yeah, sure.”
“Just let me know – all right? When it happens.”
“I can’t make any promises.” I shrugged. “Things might be . . . a little rushed then.”
“If you can.”
“All right. I’ll try.” I turned away and headed toward the street.
THIRTEEN
I was so tired when I got back to the apartment, I was glad everything was quiet there. Made for a soothing change of pace from spending the day going through Cole’s hit man boot camp experience.
My backpack landed on the floor with a clunk – that was the .357, that I’d unloaded doing more target practice against the defenseless warehouse wall – as I dropped myself limp on the couch. I rolled my head back and closed my eyes. It’d been another long day. If I’d expected this whole killing people thing to be less work – and shorter hours – than my old job as an accountant, I had been severely fooling myself. I should’ve figured it out back when I’d still been working for McIntyre, from seeing how late at night Cole would come into my cubbyhole office to pick up a check for services rendered. Maybe I’d just thought he was a night owl type, keeping vampire hours. Finding out that he had a total work ethic thing going on, at least as diligent as mine had been back when I was still Little Nerd Accountant Girl – that was kind of a revelation. It didn’t make me like Cole any better, but he was earning a bit of my respect. And not just for how good he was at the killing thing.
Keeping my eyes closed, I tried not to fall asleep – though I could have. I supposed I’d have to get up and fix dinner for me and Donnie. But not just yet. Usually my younger brother was awake whenever I came home – even at night, as though he were keeping vigil for me. Like he couldn’t go off guard duty until he knew I was safe and sound at home again, at least for another day.
And then I’d have to stay up and talk with him, no matter how tired I might be. Or not talk, just be with him. Which I didn’t mind. What would it have been like if I came home, and he wasn’t there? Then where would I have been? I wouldn’t even have had any reason at all for coming home. There were plenty of people like that in the world, I knew. In some weird way, I still felt sorry for that old man Pomeroy, even though I’d had to kill him. Maybe he wouldn’t have become such a mean old bastard if a light had been on whenever he came home. A light that he hadn’t switched on himself when he’d left that morning . . .
I didn’t want to wind up like that. Any minute now, I’d get up and go over to the kitchenette and start fixing dinner. Something with rice, I supposed. Mainly because it was cheap. Considering how much money I’d stolen lately, you might’ve thought our dining standards would’ve raised at least a little bit. Maybe I’d cut out the ramen noodles for a while, toss them into the trash soon as I got up from the couch.
But not just yet. I winged my shoulders back, trying to work a kink out of my back. A smile came to my face. Thinking about something funny –
That bit about Cole’s hit man boot camp experience. Maybe there was some actual potential there. People paid good money to go to stupider things, like some dorky rock ’n’ roll fantasy summer camp. Obviously, that kind of place was for adults who had more money than brains – my idea of a fantasy experience was one where I didn’t have to worry about paying the rent – but still, as long as they had a good time – and paid up – then what was the problem?
The idea started to pick up some momentum as it rolled around inside my head.
After all, I had to think about the future, for both Donnie and me. So I had to come up with something.
I mean, this killing people thing had to come to an end, eventually. Not like it came with a weekly paycheck and benefits, either. So the motivation for sticking with it wasn’t all that great. Unless you were a total psycho like Cole, and I was kind of hoping that I hadn’t quite reached that point yet.
So a fantasy hit man boot camp experience . . . yeah, that might work. I nodded a little to myself as I lay back on the couch. People might pay for something like that. Or maybe they already were – I’d have to go online and do a little market research.
Because after all, wasn’t killing people what everybody wanted to do? In their heart of hearts? I hadn’t met anybody ye
t who didn’t have a list kept inside their heads, of people they figured the world would be better off without. Granted, I hadn’t met the Pope or the Dalai Lama yet, but I’d bet anything that even for them, there were moments when they got just a little sniffy about how worthwhile certain other people’s existence was. I mean, I’ve met hardly any people at all, and I was already knocking off some of them. Those guys probably meet hundreds of new people every week – what are the odds that there aren’t at least a few that they would kinda like to blow away? Just a little bit? I’m a nice enough person – okay, maybe not Dalai Lama nice, at least not lately, but still – and I’d gotten to this point. So I’d have to assume that it was more or less a general thing with everybody. Comes with the territory, when you’re a human being.
I frowned with my eyes closed, mulling over some of the practical aspects. Of a business like that. Obviously, if you want to run a successful fantasy rock ’n’ roll camp, you need some old burnt-out rock types to hang out with the campers. Ones who were so over the hill that they couldn’t make a living even on the nostalgia circuit, rehashing their one big hit at state fairs and supermarket openings. I imagined having people like that on staff was the sort of thing that added an air of authenticity to the fantasy camp experience.
Not quite sure how that would work with a fantasy hit man boot camp experience, though. I mean sure, Cole was still pretty impressive, even rolling around in his motorized wheelchair – so if I cut him in on a share of the take, he might agree to hang around and give the campers a thrill with some of his old war stories. But if I advertised that I had somebody on staff who’d actually killed people, what was to stop the police from swooping in with their cold-case files and taking Cole away? Then where would I be? Handing out refunds to my fantasy campers, that’s where.
That’s the problem with all these government regulations. Always interfering with small businessmen like me.
Sure you could kill people, and maybe even get away with it – but try to make some money from it? Good luck with that.
I stopped brooding and pushed myself up from the couch. I could think about all this later. Right now, I had to make dinner.