by Joe Ide
Angus wasn’t hungry anymore and pushed his plate away. He was in a rental car backing out of the parking space when a car pulled up next to him. Lok was in the passenger seat aiming a gun.
“What the hell is this?” Angus said.
“The end, motherfucker.”
Angus saw the flashes but didn’t hear the shots. He slumped sideways and hung there by the seat belt. He was numb, his vision dimming, and in his last moments of life, he wished he’d finished the sandwich.
Grace was relieved Angus was dead but nothing was finished. That big guy from the Starks especially. Isaiah had corrupted his son and he would take his revenge sooner or later. The rest of the Starks, Manzo, and a thousand other cutthroats were hunting him as well. Grace heard from Deronda that a bounty was on Isaiah’s head and special hit teams were searching for him everywhere. Manzo even put up WANTED posters: A twenty-five-thousand-dollar reward and much respect, for Isaiah dead or alive meant cabdrivers, mail carriers, hookers, dope dealers, busboys, janitors, crackheads, security guards, store clerks, and entire families would be looking for him too.
Isaiah had to leave town; he had no other option. At first, Grace thought there was a way around it. That they could live somewhere else in LA—it’s an immense area—but word would get around. IQ, the unlicensed, underground PI who made things right when no one else cared, was living in Culver City or Hollywood or the San Fernando Valley. He could lie low but she knew Isaiah wouldn’t do that. He wouldn’t hide. He’d go someplace where he could be himself.
Her life was here. She wasn’t going to run and wasn’t going to live on the road. She thought Isaiah could come back someday and everything would be the same and she’d repaint the house and get some furniture and they’d have a baby and—no. That wasn’t going to happen. She’d seen her friends go through it. Living apart from their spouses or lovers, pledging their loyalty, calling and emailing every day until that faded to nothing as they created new lives. So would Isaiah. She couldn’t imagine what that life might be but it would happen. He couldn’t be rootless forever. He would meet someone else, but she couldn’t think about that. There was that saying, It was better to have loved and lost than never to have loved at all. Maybe that was true, she thought, but there should be a door prize for the anguish, something besides memories. Memories were gossamer and momentary. Isaiah was flesh and blood and there was no one else like him.
She drove through the neighborhood, tears spilling from the pale green eyes he cherished so. She drove past places they’d taken for granted, where small things happened that now seemed so meaningful. Shopping together at Vons, playing basketball at McClarin Park, ordering takeout from the Mandarin Palace, eating warm croissants at the Coffee Cup and the movie theater where they didn’t watch the movie and the nightclub where she’d danced and danced and loved Isaiah. She thought about drinking beers on the back stoop and her painting on the bedroom wall and Ruffin sleeping under the lemon tree and the kitchen where they’d washed dishes side by side and made out with soapy hands and went to bed in the middle of the day. All the things that were no longer theirs.
The evening was appropriately gray and washed out. She drove into the wrecking yard and there he was, waiting for her with his hands in his front pockets and leaning against a battered Jeep with a canvas top. With a single look, she knew he was leaving without her, no matter what she said or did. He was thinking of her. He was Isaiah after all.
She went to him and put her head against his chest and his arms enclosed her for the last time. Their hearts matched beats. Her insides felt carved out as if they knew there was only emptiness to come. He didn’t say anything. It was one of the best things about him—not asking questions that didn’t have answers. Not saying what didn’t need to be said. The moment was the moment, and it didn’t need elaboration or even goodbyes. Let the pain breathe of its own accord. Let their love ebb in silence. After a long time that wasn’t long enough, he raised her chin. She was trembling and so was he.
“I owe you,” she said.
“Owe me? For what?”
“Ruffin. He was your dog. You gave him to me. He kept me safe, just like you said, remember?” She slipped the keys into his hand. He turned, threw a duffel bag into the Mustang and drove away.
She lingered, remembering how she’d driven away from him and how he’d looked bereft and forsaken and she supposed she looked that way now. Ruffin came over and sat down next to her. “Hello, friend,” she said. Then she kneeled and hugged him and breathed in his smell and held on to him for dear life.
Epilogue
It was late and the traffic was light. The Mustang’s engine droned but it helped him not to think. He’d heard Angus was dead and he’d seen on the news that Gia had turned herself in. That was something at least. He’d texted Stella, telling her she wasn’t in danger anymore. She didn’t answer back.
Isaiah thought about Beaumont. His store closed, the windows boarded up, the last vestige of him a green apron torn through with bullet holes. Earlier, he’d called Merrill. He told him that the man behind his father’s murder had been killed by a rival. There was silence. Merrill said without inflection, “Oh. Well, thanks for telling me,” and he ended the call.
Isaiah felt deflated. He had expected to hear some sense of relief or satisfaction. Instead it felt more like despair. Well, why wouldn’t it? he thought. Pointless killing after pointless killing. It made Beaumont’s death seem more meaningless than it already was. But wasn’t that a fitting end for Angus? Wasn’t that only right? Wasn’t that justice? Poetic justice if there was such a thing? Yeah, maybe, Isaiah mused. Or maybe it was nothing at all.
Christiana had hung herself from a closet rod. Not with rope, but with wire from a coat hanger. Carter Samuels, a police officer and former client, told Isaiah there was a note but no one could decipher it. It appeared to have been signed by Christiana and five other people. It was as if they’d made some sort of pact, some group decision, but the five others couldn’t be located and none of the neighbors seemed to know who they were. Another odd thing, Carter added. There was a crumpled photo in Christiana’s hand that hadn’t been dislodged even in the agonies of suicide. The photo was of a small house at the edge of the sea, a dark forest behind it. Who it belonged to and why Christiana wouldn’t let it go, the police had no idea.
Isaiah drove on in a strange car with no woman, no past, no future and nothing to go back to. He didn’t know where he was going and he didn’t know what he would do. There was only the road and the taillights in front of him and the empty darkness beyond.
Acknowledgments
My thanks to Elyse Dinh-McCrillis, a specialist in finding lost stories and bringing them home again, and to Felix Zayde, for his keen, discerning insights into many aspects of the book. My unending gratitude to the good folks at Little, Brown and Mulholland Books. They continue to endure my quirks, misgivings, missteps and shortfalls with unwavering patience and kindness. My debt to them has grown and accumulated interest to an amount so enormous I could never pay back an iota of what I owe. Hi Five was another collaborative effort with Josh Kendall, an experience that was no less enjoyable and edifying than with the previous books. I am lobbying to have his name put on the covers. My deepest appreciation to Dr. Steve Marmer. His vast knowledge and understanding of multiple personality disorder were absolutely invaluable to the writing of Hi Five. Any mistakes, inaccuracies, flights of fancy or dramatic license are mine and mine alone. And to Diane. The sweetest person in the world.
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About the Author
Joe Ide is of Japanese-American descent. He grew up in South Central Los Angeles and worked in a number of different fields before writing his first novel, IQ, and its follow-ups Righteous and Wrecked. He lives in Santa Monica, California.
Also by Joe Ide
IQ
Righteous
Wrecked