by Alan Lee
One of Eddie’s friends, a guy who looked a little like a roughneck Tiger Woods, said, “You’re a dead white man.”
“Probably.” I thumbed the hammer back. “Tell me what I want to know and I’m going to close the door and leave. Sound good?”
No answers.
“I’m looking for a sophomore in high school. Her name is Megan Rowe. Wears glasses. I have a hunch your boy Nate Silva took her.”
Once again, no answer. But I saw it in their eyes; they knew. They’d heard about the girl. My hunch was right. Silva had her, because of me. I felt rage and sorrow building up as pressure somewhere inside.
“What’ll it be, kids? You took my favorite student. Shall I phone the police and we all wait till they arrive? Or you talk now and then you run and I forget what you look like?”
Eddie Backpack’s other friend, who did not look like Tiger Woods, went for his gun. A pistol in his pocket, which would require a full three seconds to retrieve. I took one step and threw a hard left into his jaw, where the bone connected under his earlobe. Something cracked, and it wasn’t my hand. He slid off his chair and didn’t move.
The assault rifle rested too far away for them to reach.
“Talk,” I said. Silence. Eddie Backpack was showing greater fortitude than during his encounter with Manny.
I fired my pistol into the cocaine bricks. The blast magnified in our enclosed space and my ears rang. Eddie and Tiger ducked and came up pale.
“Last chance,” I said. Or at least I think I did. I couldn’t hear myself.
“Listen, man. Calm down, okay? We don’t got her.”
Tiger’s voice sounded as though he spoke underwater.
“Who does?”
“Dunno.”
“Not good enough.” I stepped closer and leveled the barrel of my Kimber at his knee.
“No! Shit, no, man, I dunno, Jesus. Eddie, you know?”
“Unh uh.”
“Man, come on, point that someplace else.”
“You think you matter to me? You don’t,” I said. “And at the moment, neither does your cocaine. I can shoot you all day long without any guilt, because there’s an innocent girl at stake. Is she alive?”
“I swear. I swear I don’t know.”
“Watch carefully, Eddie,” I said. “Because you’re next. And you’re going to wind up like your friend here if you don’t find a way to locate Megan Rowe.”
“No, man! Shit no!” Tiger Woods spasmed and jerked his knees to the side, squirming away from the barrel.
“Hold still. It’s in your best interest. Else I’ll shoot you in the crotch.”
Tiger’s knees were saved by their phones. All three phones sat on the table and they began beeping simultaneously. I saw the incoming texts.
>> whos that
>> shoot that mother fucker
>> we coming
I glanced upwards. Another security camera was bolted in the corner.
“I’ve been spotted,” I noted, intelligently. “Your salvation draws near.”
“Like I told you. You a dead white man,” Tiger said.
I hit Tiger in the nose. Blood spurted and Eddie flinched and stared.
“It’s been a long day,” I explained. “My girlfriend dumped me. So.”
He didn’t say anything.
Like all brave heroes do, I fled. We coming, the phone said. Plural. And there was only little ‘ol me. Live to fight another day. I was still in academia attire, which included topsiders, less than optimal for sprinting.
I reached the two-story brick office building and peeked around the corner. Just in time to witness my trusty Honda Accord being driven away. There goes my means of escape, at the hands of a hoodlum. Argh. He probably wouldn’t treat her with the loving care she deserved.
Big Will had arrived. So had six of his friends. They wore jeans and red T-shirts, but Big Will wore the same hoodie I’d seen him wear before. Big guys, big arms. Perhaps what I found most daunting, however, was that each gentleman carried a shotgun. Every one of them, as though it was standard issue. It was like these guys thought ten million dollars’ worth of cocaine was worth fighting for.
My heart, the coward, betrayed me and began to beat faster.
They came on. And I suspected more would arrive soon. How’d they get here so fast?
I inched away from the corner and ran for the fence. Thankfully the fence wasn’t crowned with barbed wire or anything sinister. I summoned my youth and leapt higher than I had in years, got my hands on the top of the fence, and landed on the far side.
A cry raised behind me. Big Will and his merry men rounded the corner and witnessed my glorious leap. Big Will made eye contact with me. They were inside the fenced complex and I was out, standing on the circumventing sidewalk.
No sign of the trusty Honda. And I was a stranger in a strange land.
I bolted for the train tracks. Ran like a madman. I had to clear another fence, this one lower and constituted of chickenwire and old fence posts. I landed on the far side and a shotgun erupted nearby. Grains of shot tore into the fence post and tall grass and my shoulder.
“August!” Big Will called in that surprisingly high-pitched voice. “Get back here!”
“NO.”
I stumbled and rolled down the embankment. Embarrassing. That never happened to Batman. I got to my feet on the gravel and ran south, parallel to the tracks. Big Will and at least three gunmen had come over the fence too.
The Norfolk Southern train was still there, but no longer in motion. Another shotgun fired, by the sound of it thirty feet back. The shot sparked against the steel alloy ahead of me. I slid between cars, climbed over the coupling, and moved deeper into the congested rail yard. One option was for me to stay there and shoot anyone emerging between the train cars but the odds weren’t good. Running seemed the more sane choice.
This section of the railway yard was at least twenty lines deep, and therefore an ill-defined maze. I went over thirteen couplings and ran a half mile south before pausing to catch my breath. Distant voices called to one another and locomotive wheels squealed somewhere in this world of steel. My shoulder muscles burned from the metal pieces lodged within.
I found a black car with a ladder and I climbed. The car was empty and lined with coal dust. I let myself over and slid down inside.
I dialed the sheriff again.
“Pick up, Stackhouse,” I panted.
But she didn’t. Worthless public servant.
I waited for the beep. And then I told her voice mail, “Stackhouse, there’s a cocaine warehouse on Shenandoah, near 18th Street. Millions worth of coke. If I get shot, and the chances are escalating, then you should check it out pronto. Oh, and I think Nate Silva took Megan Rowe.”
I hung up.
I could call 911, but what kind of wuss does that? It’d be hard to explain anyway. I needed to alert someone germane to the situation.
The voices grew near. The voices and the shotguns. It was impossible to accurately estimate the distance because of the metal sound box I sat in, but they weren’t far. I should have kept running.
I had a pistol, and I would be the better shot, but Big Will brought at least three men with him and perhaps more. Bravery and idiocy were not the same thing.
Suddenly, something happened. At first I couldn’t tell what because the entire world shook and moved.
The train I was on began churning. South, toward downtown. Slowly at first, and all the couplings clanged as the distant locomotive took their strain, but soon I moved at a brisk five miles per hour.
Hah. Saved by an engineer, unaware.
Still no return call from Stackhouse.
What about Sergeant Sanders? The Rottweiler-looking guy, big forearms. Should have remembered him earlier, I had his number. I rang him up.
“Sanders,” he answered. Sounded like he was outside.
“Sanders, it’s your friendly neighborhood drug hound. Got a hot tip for you.”
“Whaddaya got
.”
“You’ll be happy to know I’ve been shot at.”
“That does make me happy,” he said. “Shame they missed.”
“I went looking for Megan Rowe, the missing teenager from Patrick Henry, and I found Big Will’s cocaine stash. And Sanders, it’s a doozy.”
“Oh yeah? Where at?”
I described it for him, as best I could without having the actual address.
“Make sure you go to the back corner. A loading dock with four doors. When last I was there, which was ten minutes ago, there were many shotgun-toting ne’er-do-wells,” I said.
“On my way,” he said. “Radioing for extra cars. Thanks Mack.” He hung up.
I rode the train to freedom. With a small amount of satisfaction. But it’s hard to be smug about one’s accomplishment when sitting crisscross in a coal car.
Chapter Thirty
Stackhouse finally returned my call as I climbed down the car ladder and hopped off at Wachovia Tower. An October sun dropped toward the horizon and threw angry fall rays in my face. I scaled the fence and waited for her. Several hipsters walked by wearing suspenders, and they inspected me as though I was the funny-looking one.
Sheriff Stackhouse arrived. Her window was down and she said, “You look ridiculous.”
“I am a fossil fuel. Where you been?”
“Problems out in Glenvar. Archery season. Guy shot his neighbor instead of a deer. Brush yourself off and get in.”
I did. The resultant coal dust could have powered a city a few minutes.
She said, “Where’s your car?”
“A mean guy took it.”
“You let a mean guy take your car?”
“He was meaner than usual,” I said. “Don’t judge me.”
“Sanders radioed. Told me he’d arrived on scene, following your lead. Maybe you should tell me the whole story.”
“Good idea.”
“My office. Over coffee. And we’ll get a report from Sanders soon.”
I rang Roxanne and told her I’d be late.
* * *
The sheriff’s office connected to the city jail. A utilitarian establishment, not given to cheer or decoration. Amidst the dour-faced courthouse guards and receptionists and stern deputies, Stackhouse stuck out. Like I would at the Playboy Mansion, except exactly the opposite.
We went into her office and she fetched two Styrofoam cups of bad coffee.
“You look terrible,” she said.
I coughed, and out came coal dust.
“And I’m not talking about the coal.”
I said, “Didn’t sleep much last night. And you should be nicer to your constituents.”
“I don’t need your vote. I won by a landslide.”
“This coffee is not great, Stackhouse.”
“Not why they hired me,” she said. “Now. Tell me. All of it.”
So I did. About spying Eddie Backpack on campus, trailing him to Cave Spring High School, finding Big Will at the decrepit lot off Shenandoah, being attacked at my home, Nate Silva’s warnings, the Addisonian, Megan Rowe, the cocaine, and finally the shootings and train cars. She took notes on a legal pad, holding up her hand to slow me down occasionally.
“Manny Martinez help you with any of this?” she asked.
“Couple things.”
“He’s a good marshal. He bagged what’s-his-name, Robin somebody, been on the run five months.”
“Figured he be good. Taught him everything he knows.”
She said, “You didn’t mention your car.”
“Big Will had it removed from the lot.”
“An old Honda? License plate numbers?”
I told her, and she spoke into her radio and repeated the numbers. Then she told me, “Doubt we’ll find it. Lotta junkyards in that area, so it’s probably already in pieces. But we’ll look.”
“Thanks.”
She leaned back in her chair and blew a lungful of air at the ceiling. “The Megan Rowe girl is probably dead.”
“I know. But I have hope. Or at least desperation. Have you heard of Big Will before?”
“He’s in here about once a year. Failure to pay child support, drunk in public, assault, that kind of thing. Nate Silva has been squeaky clean, though. Could he be our guy?”
“The Bloods leader? Maybe. I dunno. Seems too unstable to run a big operation.”
The door opened and Sanders walked in. Looking like a grumpy Rottweiler. It’d been an hour since I called him. He had on one of those long overcoats with the sleeves pushed up.
“So? Are we rich in cocaine?” Stackhouse asked.
“Got nothing. Zip.”
I said, “Beg pardon?”
He dropped a set of Polaroids on the table. “This the place?” That was my loading dock and those were the doors. But the bays were empty. “Like I said, wise guy. Nothing.”
Despite my professionalism and steely demeanor, I was stunned.
“What was I supposed to find?”
“A mountain of coke.”
“Details,” Stackhouse said. “I need details.”
“Buncha kids in the lot when we pulled up and they scattered like rats. Someone had been there, that’s for damn sure. Tire tracks and surveillance equipment. I called for the science guys to look at tracks and the electronics. I still got three cars there and a K-9 unit, searching. But right now? Bupkis.”
“Nothing,” I said.
“You got it, Mack.”
He crossed his arms. Stackhouse stared out her window and seemed to lose some of the air which bolstered her posture. I did my best not to look sheepish.
“I got shot,” I said. “So that’s good.”
“You’re shot?”
“Thought you said they missed,” Sanders said.
“Mostly missed. Shotgun pellets in my shoulder. I’ll swing by urgent care on the way home.”
“You don’t look so good, Mack. Maybe you dreamed this up?” he said.
“Sure, and then I shot myself in the back of my shoulder from long range with a shotgun.”
“He didn’t dream this up, Sergeant. We simply didn’t get there quick enough,” Stackhouse said. “Vice will open the investigation and maybe we’ll get lucky. Mackenzie did his best.”
“Best? Gave us nothing. Other than Big Will, who is a known commodity. The warehouse won’t give us anything. We got zip.”
“And Megan Rowe is still missing,” I added helpfully.
“Who?”
“Missing teenage girl from Patrick Henry.”
“Bah.” He waved her away with a beefy hand. “She’ll turn up. Probably ran away.”
“Even so, I’m bringing Nate Silva in for questioning. He’s in the back of a police car on his way here,” she said. “Mackenzie, I’ve only just noticed the back of your shirt is caked with blood. I’ll have you driven to urgent care and then back home. Sound good?”
“Sounds like a fitting way to end this day,” I said. “Shrapnel extraction.”
* * *
A deputy drove me to the Lewis Gale emergency room, where a physician’s assistant named Nick Floyd sewed me up and advised me not to get shot again. I got home in time to eat a little dinner and put my son to bed. I read Kix a book and laid him in his crib. He held on to my finger and closed his eyes and drifted away.
The innocence of babes.
Dad lay on his bed watching Netflix, still wearing his tie and loafers. I waved and went for a beer.
Manny sat in a rocking chair on our front porch, drinking a beer and reading a Gabriel García Marquez novel, Love in the Time of Cholera. His bare feet were crossed and propped on the porch railing. I sat opposite and released a great weary sigh.
“That was a big sigh, amigo.”
“It was intended to be great and weary, so you’ll know how tired and important I am.”
“I didn’t get all that,” Manny said. “I heard some excitement on the radio today. Sergeant Sanders. Was that you?”
“That was me.”
“Is your mission complete?”
“It is not. I have possibly made it worse.”
“What about Ronnie?” he asked.
“She has not called.”
“You are having a bad twenty-four hours.”
“Thank you, Manny. I noticed. You heard about the missing girl?”
“Sí.”
“She was my student. I pissed off Nate Silva and he kidnapped her.”
“You prove this?” he said.
“No. Not even circumstantial evidence.”
“Wow. For this you are getting paid? Maybe you should give some of the money back.”
“Already spent it.”
“Want me to rough up Nate Silva?”
“Easier said than done,” I said. “The police brought him in for questioning earlier. They won’t find anything, he’s too oily.”
“You’re going to do it yourself. I know you, seńor.”
“First, I’ll get some sleep. I’ve been up thirty-eight hours. Tomorrow morning I’ll find Silva’s house and punch him in the mouth until he tells me what happened to her.”
“You, jefe, are diplomatic and tactful.”
“I don’t know what else to do. So I’ll try diplomacy until he bleeds.”
Little Stevie our neighbor came sprinting down the sidewalk. Probably it should be past his bedtime, but I guessed Stevie had very few boundaries set. It was certainly past mine. He leapt over the shrubs without breaking stride and cried, “They took him, they took him!” His eyes were wide, but they often were.
“Who took who, Stevie?”
“They came,” he panted, standing on our stairs. “He didn’t want to go but they took him.”
“Your brother?”
“Yessir. Foster brother.”
Manny placed a bookmark in his novel and set the book down. “Who took him?”
“His gang. He told them, he said he didn’t want to be in the gang anymore. But they said he had to join. Tonight, Mr. August, and they took him. Just now.”