Through the closed door he could hear their voices, still rising and falling without a break. His eye twitched so much he could hardly see to unlock the door. It swung open. Three round buns atop three tiny faces swiveled away as they turned to look at him. Finally, mercifully they fell silent.
He could have cried with relief. All he had to do to keep it quiet was pull the trigger three times.
23
The clock hit half after ten o’clock when Dante held the door open for Cloris, then slid into the black limo after her. She sat in the corner, clutching her purse like it was a life line. Her face was in shadow, but she’d been quiet and jumpy all day. He felt a little bad about deceiving her, but she’d have to understand. He was just trying to protect her. And get his money back.
Abel was at the wheel, Cain riding shotgun as they pulled into the desultory flow of traffic. On the main drag it was still busy, more so on the freeway. New Orleans never completely went to sleep and good thing, too, since he did most of his business after dark. When they got to the cemetery the gates were ajar, as if they were expected. Dante smiled. This was going to be so easy—
Something cold pressed against his temple as the car passed between the gates. Something like a...gun?
“What the— “ he began.
“Did you think I didn’t know what you were planning?” Cloris said, not sounding like herself at all.
He mouthed a string of swear words, while taking care not to move. There was nothing unsteady about the way she held the weapon. Abel wouldn’t lower the window between them until they got to the rendezvous point, so he’d have to talk her out of this himself.
“He’s not worth it, Cloris.” He turned his eyeballs her way, trying to pierce the darkness to gauge her attitude. No sign of tears, plenty of grim determination. Damn.
“You think I don’t know that? I raised you. Remember? Who taught you to run numbers? How to shoot straight? Wasn’t your working mama. I was your stay-at-home aunt.”
“Oh, yeah.” He had forgotten, but now he was remembering a lot of things. “So what are you going to do?”
“I’m going to take care of him myself. And to make sure you and your boys stay out of it,” she said as he felt something land in his lap, “put these on.”
Remaining still, Dante felt around, then held up something metal and cold.
“What the hell?” He had to look at her, even if she shot him between the eyes. “Where you been shopping?”
Headlights flashed in the darkness. The window between the front and back rolled down. Cain turned to speak and found himself nose to nose with a gun.
With an efficiency that did him proud and made him want to kill her, Cloris disarmed them, tossing their guns and the car keys into the dark grass. Then she wove the bondage handcuffs, with its long chain and multiple bracelets, through the steering wheel, around the open window frames and the men, leaving them thoroughly trussed to the car and each other.
“Don’t do this, Cloris,” he warned her. “I make a bad enemy.”
“Put a sock in it, young man,” she told him, then reached in and flashed the headlights at the car that had flashed them. “I can still whup your ass and don’t you forget it!”
The car pulled alongside and a door opened. When the overhead light came on he saw— double...no, triple...no, quadruple?—before the door closed Cloris inside and pulled away.
“What the—? Hey! Come back! Damn! Did you have to leave the window down?” He slapped at the mosquito. Then another. Then he just flailed as every mosquito in a mile radius scented fresh blood and buzzed in for the feast.
Following the instructions in the latest note from Maxwell, Luci took a circuitous route to City Park and the so-called Dueling Oaks, where the exchange of aunts-for-dollars was supposed to take place. She’d studied the map long enough to know he was trying to confuse her with all the twists and turns, discounting the fact that twists and turns de-confused a Seymour. A more direct route would have left her feeling hopelessly lost.
Is there such a word as de-confused? She drove past Storyland Playland, then turned right on Victory Drive. Not in the real world, but in the Seymour Zone, no question, she decided.
There were streetlights, but not close together, so she was glad that the headlights of Delaney’s car cut two tunnels of light into a road lined with moss-draped oaks. As directed, she stopped the car where it intersected the circular road that ran in front of the art museum and killed the motor, but not the headlights.
It was a cheerful, friendly spot in daylight, but the night left deep, sinister shadows where accomplices, or even the ghosts of fallen duelists, could lie in wait.
One thing for sure, she was feeling alive right now. Almost too alive for comfort. Like Data on his first outing with his emotion chip. Or Spock when he got zapped by the joy flower. On the upside, her senses were stretched out and at full alert, sorting through the night sounds like a high-octane computer.
“He’s late,” she murmured, noting the time.
“He’s probably watching to make sure you’re alone,” Mickey’s voice was soft, but full of reassurance to her ears.
“Good thing you guys have friends in black,” she said.
“There’s a car directly across from you, Luci.” This from Delaney.
As if it had heard him, its headlights came on, nearly blinding her. She put a hand up to shield her eyes, opened the door and scrambled out, her footsteps sounding loud in the silence as she stepped on gravel.
A door creaked on the other car, illuminating the interior too fast for her to count heads or even see heads. He was too far away. Someone got out and stepped up to the edge of the headlights.
“You got my money?” Arthur Maxwell called.
“You got my aunts?” she countered, careful to stay out of the light, too.
Mickey, dressed in the latest in SWAT gear, lifted his night vision goggles and peered around the tree trunk he was using for cover. Luci was a shadowy figure on the other side of Delaney’s car. Across from her he could see the headlights of Maxwell’s car, but he was lost in the shadow behind the light.
“Can you see the old ladies yet?” he whispered into his mike.
“Not yet. Had to take off the goggles because of the light.”
Mickey stepped back into cover and put his goggles back on, scanning the shadows. Something, a flicker of movement, caught his eye, but when he looked that direction, there was nothing. “We the only ones out here?”
“That was the deal,” Delaney said. “Why?”
“Guess I saw a cat or something moving.”
“Let’s try to keep our focus on the human predator? Captain’s gonna fry our asses if we blow this.”
Mickey gave a soft snort. “He’s gonna fry us anyway. We should have told him—”
“Too late now.”
“Could you two shut up?” Luci’s voice was soft and insistent. “I’m trying to hear what the bozo is saying.” Then like stereo, he heard her in the earpiece and for real call out, “I’m not showing you a single bill until I see my aunts are all right!”
“Okay, okay.” Maxwell sounded grumpy and frustrated, like someone whose nerves had been stretched raw by too much time in the Seymour Zone. Mickey grinned. Luci had called it right. He was almost at the end of his tether. “Get in the car and drive toward me. I’ll drive toward you. Stop at Dreyfous.”
Luci got in the car. Just before she fired the engine, Mickey heard her murmur, “I was hoping you’d do that...”
Then the whine of the engine drowned her out. Mickey frowned. She had told them everything, hadn’t she? Of course she had. She’d said he could trust her. Trust involved full disclosure.
He realized she was driving away from him and pulled down his goggles. Keeping low, he followed. He didn’t have to cross the road. Maybe that’s what Luci had meant. That’s it. Had to be. And the twitch between his shoulder blades was just...a twitch.
Luci stopped the car when only the widt
h of the side road separated her car from Maxwell’s. She shut off the motor, then her headlights, when he shut off his.
He got out.
She got out.
“Give me the money,” he snarled, the white of his eyes showing all around the irises, even in the half-light from the streetlight.
“Give me my aunts.”
“Happy to.” His gave a twitchy grimace, then turned and yanked open the rear door of the car. “Get outta the car.”
Luci heard a familiar and most welcome twittering precede the first aunt’s egress. The twitch got worse when she extended a hand for assistance. She noticed, trying not to grin, that he helped her. He growled while he did it, but he helped them all out.
Miss Hermi caught sight of Luci. “Dear little Luci, Reggie kidnapped us! Can you imagine?”
Miss Weena just wriggled her excitement and pleasure, while Miss Theo gave the fake Reggie a glare that had him shuffling his feet until he remembered he had the gun.
“Just stop it!” He turned to Luci, his shoulder and his eye twitching. “They’re fine. Now show me the money!”
“How do I know you won’t kill us as soon as you have it?” Luci asked.
“You don’t!” he snarled, then had to wipe a bit of foam from his chin.
“An honest, if intimidating response.” Well, faint heart never won anything. She lifted the whistle she’d hung around her neck and blew it hard.
The sound blasted through the microphone with painful intensity. Mickey cursed and pulled it out of his ear.
Delaney did, too. He knew, because he heard a tiny cursing from the dangling piece.
Artie cursed, jumped and looked wildly around. “What are you doing?”
Luci looked surprised. “Summoning your money.”
“It ain’t in the car?”
Luci tapped her temple. “Think about it for a minute— “
Her words were lost in the roar of a truck. It almost, Mickey thought with awe, sounded like a...dump truck. Red taillights appeared in the dark tunnel of Dreyfous Drive. The roar got louder and the lights moved closer and closer until Mickey could see that it was indeed a dump truck.
Luci stepped toward it, using the whistle and her hands to guide it toward them.
“Who’s...driving?” Then he realized he was missing his cue. He shoved the ear piece back in. He almost had to shout to be heard over the roar. “He’s distracted, Delaney. Can you get the old ladies?”
“Yeah, sure.” He sounded as dazed as Mickey felt.
Mickey crouched and moved around to the back of the car Luci had been driving. He could see Maxwell shouting something. Luci indicated she couldn’t hear him, then gave a final, long blast of the whistle. He saw Delaney reach the old ladies, but none of them seemed able to move as the rear of the truck began to tilt up.
24
Maxwell jumped forward and grabbed Luci, shoving the gun into her side as the contents of the truck rushed toward the point of no return.
“Nobody move!” he shouted, but what was in the truck wasn’t listening or intimidated by his firepower.
Mickey had only time to curse himself before the contents shifted, then rushed out of the swinging gate and over the top. “What...?”
Bills. Dollar bills. Hundreds of thousands of them. All of Artie’s ill-gotten gains roared toward him like the wrath of God. One minute he was shouting at Luci, then they were gone.
It seemed to take forever for the bills to stop coming, but as soon as it slowed, Mickey and Delaney leaped on the pile and began digging. Mickey saw a hand pop out of the mass. A woman’s hand. He had crawled forward and started to grab it when the bills under him shifted, then Maxwell erupted from the mass, knocking him onto his back.
He still had the gun, pointed it right at Mickey and started to pull the trigger. Mickey heard Delaney yell, saw Maxwell turn toward him. Mickey knew he yelled “No!” but he didn’t hear it, just felt it erupt from his mouth as the gun flashed once, then again. He saw Delaney drop out of sight and the gun swivel back toward him, but before he could fire again, a new voice spoke out of the dark.
“How many people are you going to kill Maxwell?”
Mickey saw Maxwell falter and started to move, but Maxwell snarled at him, “Don’t move! I’ll shoot.” With his free hand, he rubbed the sweat from his face. “Who’s there?”
“You know who it is, Maxwell, or whatever your real name is.” Mickey saw a woman, also dressed in SWAT gear, step into the light. He heard the creak of the dump truck door and another figure climbing down from the cab. And other figures, all in black, moving into a circle around them.
“H-Helen?” Artie swallowed, the sound loud and dry in the silence. “What-what are you doing here?”
“Well, if the wanted poster the police sent hadn’t done it, the phone call from Luci would have. Do you have shit for brains?”
“W-What do you mean?”
“Did you really think I wouldn’t find out about your other wives?”
Maxwell staggered off the money pile, pulling Luci with him, pointed the gun at Mickey and snarled, “Get back, cop!” Then he faced Helen. “Love bear, honey, they meant nothing to me— “
“Nothing?” One of the dark, waiting figures stepped forward.
“C-Cloris?” He tugged at his collar. “Is...Dante with you?”
“What, you think I can’t deal with a little weasel like you all by myself?” Cloris demanded. She looked at Luci. “By the way, thanks for those handcuffs.”
“Handcuffs?” Mickey looked at Luci. If he hadn’t been frantic with worry about Delaney, he’d be laughing at the way Maxwell cowered in front of the two women.
“I got them in this little bondage shop in the Quarter,” Luci said.
“Shut up!” Maxwell’s whole body was twitching now. “Everyone just shut up. I need to think.”
“You’ve only got four bullets left,” Luci pointed out.
“Well, I can just beat the old ladies to death,” he snarled back at her. “Can finish you,” he said, pointing the gun at Cloris, “the cop and you.” He gave a Luci a shake. “And still have one left over.”
“But that doesn’t take into account the others,” Luci said.
“Others?”
Mickey sensed Maxwell’s will faltering and tensed.
“All those wives you left. They’re not happy with you.”
More dark figures moved in like Heralds of Doom. Maxwell couldn’t keep them all covered. There had to be, Mickey looked around amazed, at least twenty of them. They pushed past him. He tried to back up, but they were behind him, too. He let go of Luci.
“I’ll shoot!”
“Go ahead, Arthur. Use up more bullets,” Helen said. “You can’t escape the judgment of the stars.”
The circle closed in, hiding him from sight. He could hear Maxwell’s howls of pain as he and Luci scrambled over the pile of money to where Delaney lay, surrounded by aunts.
Miss Hermi cradled his head in her lap while Miss Weena ripped lengths of what looked like her petticoat into pieces. Miss Theo had her hands pressed against his wound, pressing with all her fragile strength. She looked up.
“Hurry.”
Mickey tossed Luci his cell phone. “Dial 911. Tell them we have an officer down.”
He dropped to his knees and added his hands and strength to Miss Theo’s trying to stem the tide of red flowing onto the ground. He looked at Luci kneeling beside him, then nodded toward the circle of ladies. It was quieter now. Just some moans from the center of the mob. “What was that all about?”
“Old men for counsel, pissed off women for war.”
“What?”
Luci shrugged. “It’s a quote I heard somewhere.”
Mickey looked at the now silent women. “Sounds more like a prophecy.”
In the distance, they heard the wail of the ambulance siren.
“Hang on, buddy. Hang on.”
The area in front of the museum looked like a police parking lot. O
r a K-mart blue light frenzy, Luci decided. Someone had taken the aunts home. The wives had been divvied up between cops and were giving statements. Those not taking statements were shoveling dollar bills into boxes. The ambulance carrying Delaney had pulled out some time ago, but Mickey hadn’t moved from the spot where it had been. She’d urged him to ride with him, but the attendants had closed the doors and sped away, as if they knew his time was running out.
Another ambulance had arrived and left carrying a bruised, bloodied and bowed Arthur Maxwell. Two cops and a multitude of dirty looks had accompanied him. Luci suspected he’d pick up a few more bruises on the trip.
Luci had retreated to the cab of the dump truck. It was quiet there, nothing to interrupt her guilt trip. So this was Life. This was living. This pain. This guilt that twisted her insides, ripping and tearing in its rampage. She’d planned for injury to self but not to Delaney, who she’d blackmailed into following her plan. Delaney, who’d been trying to save her life.
It was so unfair! So bloody unfair!
The air around her was thick from heat and humidity and her chest hurt with the effort of breathing, only she was cold, too. Shuddering with it. She wrapped her arms around her middle, but it didn’t help. The chill burrowed deeper, turning over more and more furrows of pain and guilt. Something wet splashed on her hands and she realized she was crying.
She wasn’t very good at it, so it hurt, like someone was stabbing her in the chest. She wanted to go to Mickey. Be held by him, but he hated her. Hated her for what she’d done. For her wonderful plan. She wanted her father, but he probably hated her, too. Then she saw him getting out of a car, his face grim and cut with deep lines. Mickey started toward him, “the” question on his face. When Pryce shook his head, Mickey reeled back, then turned and stalked into the dark.
Tears blurred the rest. Luci sagged back. “If this is living, let me die now, God,” she whispered, “Let it be me instead of Delaney. I’m useless. No good to anyone.”
But God didn’t strike her down. He probably figured it was more punishment to let her live, she thought dully.
Do Wah Diddy Die Page 25