“Just coffee, please. Regular.” At the bar, the construction workers broke into raucous cheers, and Kidd flinched.
Waitress Brit didn’t seem to notice. “Right, one coffee, wired. I’ll be right back!” She bounced off, her pigtails bobbing behind her.
We sat in silence until she brought our drinks, and then I waited longer as Kidd added sugar and cream to his coffee until it turned a nice pale mocha color. “All right. Tell me what happened.”
The old ball player stirred his coffee and finally sighed. “Are you a baseball fan, Mr. Dawson?”
“I am. Since I was a kid, actually.”
“Then you know me and my career. You are not new to your business, as I understand. I am sure you can already guess what happened. I was getting old. The new players coming in every season were younger, stronger, faster. Arizona was the first team to keep me for more than two months, and the only one to let me do more than warm up in the bull pen. All I ever wanted to do was play ball, and nobody was going to let me anymore.” He sipped from his cup.
“One night, I was standing out on the mound after a game, just watching the empty stadium and contemplating whether I would retire or take the bump to the minors. All I could hear was the echo of the grounds crew, already back in the tunnels, and the hum of the lights. It was so still…” For a moment, he was lost in the past. I had seen that look many times, on many faces. “I thought I was alone, but then this man walked out of the visiting dugout. He had on a suit, clean-cut. I just figured he was someone’s agent or lawyer. He had that look.” Kidd paused there, and I could see a shudder run through him.
“And then he started talking. It was like his voice was piercing right into my skull. Like… there aren’t any words to describe what it was like.” His eyes, when he finally looked at me, were wide and shocky. Even now, years after he must have made his bargain, that memory threatened to unhinge him.
“Drink your coffee, Mr. Kidd.” I pressed the cup into his hands, and he clutched it like a lifeline. “I know what they sound like.” I had spent more time conversing with demons in the past four years than I wanted to think about. The voices stayed with me long after I banished their physical forms. It was like an oil slick in the mind, a sickly rainbow taint gliding over crystal clear water. No amount of showering would get rid of it, but I’d tried, in the beginning.
“You ever just suddenly realize that someone isn’t human, even though that should be impossible?” He shook his head, dropping his gaze again. “Yeah… I suppose you have.”
“And he made you an offer you couldn’t refuse.” It’s cliche, yes, but it’s amazing how often it applies.
Kidd seemed to think about that before shaking his head again. “No. I could have refused. I mean, that’s what free will is about, right? There’s always a choice? I chose what I did with full knowledge of what I was doing. At the time, I thought, hey, I’m not a religious man, so what does it really matter? And my game came back, and we went to the series and it was everything I dreamed it would be.”
“So what changed?” Normally, they came to me when they were sure they were dying and only had Hell to look forward to. I get a lot of cancer patients.
“My daughter had a baby about seven months ago. My first grandchild. A little boy.” He smiled faintly, and I had to return it. What can I say-my daughter is the light of my life. I understood completely. Kidd’s smile faded, though, quickly. “He screams when I try to hold him. He’s inconsolable. My wife keeps trying to tell me that’s just how babies are, but… He knows, doesn’t he, Mr. Dawson? Just a baby, but he knows.”
The conversation paused as Waitress Brit brought my lunch and refilled Kidd’s coffee, though he hadn’t had more than a sip. I cut into my steak to make sure they’d cooked it right-I loathe overcooked steak-but it was perfect and red in the center. “Yeah… he knows,” I said, talking around my first bite. “Children and animals, Mr. Kidd. They’re not fooled by all the masks and shields. They know. If it’s any consolation, by the time he’s about fifteen or so, he’ll be just as jaded as the rest of us, and it won’t matter anymore.” The fries were good-hot and seasoned perfectly. I didn’t even bother with ketchup.
Kidd watched me with a dazed look as I wolfed down the food. I knew the feeling. Once upon a time, I couldn’t have eaten while discussing these things, either. Now… I’d grown a bit more practical.
“So, now you have decided that you don’t want to go through with it. You want your soul back. Realize, once we start this, there’s no going back and you only get one shot.” He nodded, gazing deeply into his coffee. “Here comes the part where I do all the talking, so listen carefully.”
I nibbled on my food as I talked. I’d given this speech before. I think it’s even gotten better over the years. “I have a wife, Mr. Kidd, and a five-year-old daughter. My wife runs her own small bookstore, and my daughter is starting kindergarten in the fall. I tell you all this so you understand my motivations for what I’m going to say next.”
Although he still wouldn’t look right at me, he was actually listening. You can tell when someone isn’t.
“My base rate is a hundred grand, paid up front. And it goes up from there if things get sticky. This is nonnegotiable.” Before you start thinking I’m a total dick, let me tell you that it is only nonnegotiable for people who have the money to begin with. I wouldn’t turn down someone who couldn’t pay, but those who can… well, they can share the wealth.
Unfortunately, too many of my recent clients fell into the “no pot to piss in” category. Kidd’s hundred would be just enough to pay off the last round of hospital bills and get us back on an even keel.
“I charge money so that I can put a third of it in an account to support my wife and child when I get killed. Make no mistake, I will die one of these days. It may be tomorrow; it may be ten years from now, but it will happen.” Well, ideally that’s what I would do with it. In practice, most of my fees tended to go to cause number two.
“Another third goes into an account to cover my medical bills, because this job comes with crappy health insurance, and I will get hurt. I have yet to be challenged to a game of tiddlywinks.
“The rest goes into maintaining my weapons and armor, because that stuff isn’t common, or cheap.” I sopped up some of the steak juices with my fries. Damn, those were good fries.
“What I want you to understand, and I mean really understand, is that you are asking me to risk my life because you made a mistake out of greed or vanity or pride. If I die, my wife is a widow, and my daughter is fatherless, all because of you. Your job, over the next twenty-four hours, is to think that over real hard. You have to decide if you can live with yourself after something like that.” I wiped my mouth and tossed the napkin on the table. “I’ll call you tomorrow afternoon to get your decision.”
Waitress Brit popped up with that “Do you want dessert” grin on her face, and I just shook my head as I slid out of the booth. I swear, her pigtails actually wilted. She was crushed. “Bring him the check.” I glanced to Kidd. “And you’d better tip well.”
The clock above the bar said one thirty. I had to be at work by two.
As I passed the bar, I noticed the construction workers had vacated, and the television had gone from arena football to the weather. A round fellow in glasses gestured wildly at a map with arrows all over it. “This looks like the largest storm front in the last ten years. We can expect high winds, damaging hail and lightning, and possible tornadic activity, starting early Friday.”
Damn. That was going to ruin Mom’s party.
The bright sun seemed determined to make a liar out of the weatherman, and I felt compelled to whistle a jaunty tune as I walked to my truck. Then I noticed a man standing by the back bumper, obviously waiting for me, and my musical urges died between one step and the next.
He stood up straighter as I neared, but it didn’t hide that he was a good five inches shorter than I. He was clean-cut and baby faced, and his gray suit probably c
ost as much as my house payment. He seemed young, and when I checked his shoes, sure enough he was wearing loafers. I always assume people do that when they’re not old enough to tie their shoes yet. The thought made me smirk to myself, and the man gave me a puzzled look.
“Mr. Dawson.” He offered his hand, which I ignored, and a plastic smile, which I did not return.
“Don’t lean on my truck.”
“Sir?”
“Don’t lean on my truck.” I proceeded to do that very thing. “I don’t know you, so you don’t get to touch her.” Okay yeah, I made the first hostile move. But he looked like a lawyer. I hate lawyers.
“Ah.” He eyed the truck warily but took a step away, wiping his hand on his trousers as if she’d contaminated him somehow. Losing points left and right, my boy. “My name is Travis Verelli. I represent the interests of Mr. Kidd.” He offered me his business card, which I took and read carefully. Ugh, he was worse than a lawyer. He was an agent.
“And is there a reason you’re lurking out here by my truck, Mr. Verelli?” I had to squash the urge to call him something snide. Junior and Skippy were the two favorites at the moment.
“Mr. Kidd asked that I wait outside while he met with you.”
“Good puppy. What do you want now, a treat?”
The smile he was fighting to keep wavered at the edges. “I would like to ask you to leave my client alone.”
That earned him a raised brow. “And does Mr. Kidd know you’re out here asking me that?”
His smile turned into a distasteful grimace. “Mr. Kidd is well aware of my opinions of his… situation.”
I crossed my arms over my chest and shook my head in amusement. “And just what do you grasp as his ‘situation’?”
His eyes hardened, and I mentally tacked another five years onto his age. “My client is no longer a young man, Mr. Dawson. And at times I believe he is… confused about certain things. This would make it easy for someone unscrupulous to take advantage of him, and I intend to prevent that.”
I couldn’t help but snicker. “Let me get this straight. You think he’s going senile, and you are protecting him from the big bad world. Doesn’t hurt that your income is protected, too, so long as no one knows the old man’s gone batty.”
“I have my client’s best interests in mind. You, on the other hand
…” A bit of petty triumph gleamed in his eyes. I wanted to smack him. “I have done some investigating into your background. I have connections, Mr. Dawson. You have minimal discernible employment for the last four years, and yet you consistently deposit large sums of money into several bank accounts. You have been hired repeatedly as a ‘security consultant’ by people who have had their own security forces for years, and you seldom remain on the payroll longer than a month. It leaves me to wonder just what services you are performing.”
“I give windows a sparkling, streak-free shine.” I said it with a straight face, and he glowered.
“I have been dragged all over the country in the last few months, dealing with Mr. Kidd’s… we’ll call it a dilemma. I do not now, nor will I ever, believe these delusions of his, and if you will not stop feeding them, I will be forced to take legal action.” He said it with the same menace I might use when threatening to run a sword through someone’s guts.
Did I mention I don’t like being threatened? “You take whatever action you like. I’m doing nothing illegal, and you’re going to make me late for work. Good day, Mr. Verelli.” I slid into the truck and slammed the door before he could answer. Slimy little weasel. He’d piss himself if he ever saw the things I’d seen.
I gave him a finger-fluttering wave as I pulled out of the parking lot, and I could feel his scowl all the way down the block.
5
I had to walk seven blocks from the designated employee parking lot just to get to work. I’d be so much happier once they finished the new parking garage, but that project had languished in limbo since the early freeze last fall. I personally believed the contractors had made off with the money, never to be seen again. Management kept insisting that construction would resume in the summer, but in the meantime, we were left with a roofless shell of a garage, piles of rusting construction supplies, and rivers of yellow clay mud every time it rained. When it wasn’t raining, the wind blew clouds of dust into all the shops, coating everything in a fine yellow powder. I mostly watched the weather to see if I was going to be slogging through muck or eating grit on any given day. So much for Sierra Vista, the latest and trendiest in outdoor shopping meccas.
Don’t ask me why a shopping mall in Kansas City, Missouri, was named Sierra Vista when there isn’t a mountain in sight for hundreds of miles. I wasn’t consulted. I suppose the faux sandstone facades and orange clay tile roofs could be reminiscent of a quaint Hispanic village. Y’know-one with a Starbucks on the corner and a Japanese steakhouse at the end of the block. I passed a day spa, a Victoria’s Secret, two competing comedy clubs, and the garish neon sign proclaiming the newest restaurant to be named Moonlight amp; Roses. The hot pink moon and violently purple roses were bright enough to sear through eyelids, even in the daylight. I was never going to get the ghastly sight out of my head.
Even though it was an early Monday afternoon and school didn’t get out for summer for another four weeks, the place was crawling with teenagers. I had to wonder if their parents knew they weren’t in school. That’s the father in me talking. It’s an attitude I’m cultivating in preparation for Annabelle’s teen years.
The music from It, the place where I worked, pulsed through the soles of my feet long before I passed the chain bookstore and overpriced ice-cream shop next door. The sign propped out on the sidewalk proclaimed IT’S SPRING CLEARANCE! and I cringed inwardly. Just as I expected, the small store was packed solid. I squeezed my way through the door, nodding slight apologies to the tattooed and pierced customers in my way.
The roar of confined life-forms echoed off the ductwork in the unfinished ceiling above, tripling the noise level in an instant. People were stuffed into every conceivable space between the already cramped clothing racks. Strobe lights and black lights flickered everywhere, promising headaches to the unprepared. Behind the artfully arranged display merchandise, the black brick walls were splashed with fluorescent blobs of color, glowing happily under the strange lighting.
“Hey, old dude!” Kristyn’s voice carried over the heavy metal music somehow, and I realized she was actually standing on the counter to see over the crowd. Her hair was dyed raven black again, with streaks of hot pink fading into a deep purple. Two days ago, it had been green and blue.
“Nice hair, Kristyn!” The music thumping through the speakers changed to “Voodoo Child,” and I waved to whoever was deejaying in acknowledgment. We all have our theme songs, and that had been deemed mine because they knew I liked Hendrix. (I suspect it was also the oldest music they could think of. Most of the kids I worked with were too young to remember the eighties, let alone Jimi Hendrix.)
By hook or by crook, I skirted the ever-rotating tower of body jewelry (for the piercing of your choice) and worked my way to the back and the relative sanity of the break room. I lingered only long enough to dump my wallet into my employee locker and grab my lanyard with my name tag and assorted snarky buttons. The name tag, too, said OLD DUDE. At thirty-two, I was the oldest employee in the district. Even Kristyn, ostensibly my boss, came in a few years shy of thirty.
Between the back room and the front counter, I handled three questions on prices, and one on fashion (which is such a bad idea, trust me). Abe was manning the stereo at the back of the store and trying to keep the shoplifters from making off with our CDs. I stopped long enough to have him nod me toward a couple he was keeping a particular eye on, then moved on. I finally arrived at the register to find that Kristyn had made a new friend. The dark lanky teen gave me a sullen look as he leaned against the wall.
“Rook for you to train, old dude.” Kristyn gave me a wicked grin. “This is Paulo. Pa
ulo, this is old dude.”
I stuck out my hand to shake. I’m not totally devoid of manners. Paulo took it, glaring at me from under a mop of shaggy black hair and squeezing harder than was strictly necessary. Ah, so that’s how it was going to be. I held his grip, sizing him up. There was a distinct lack of piercings and tattoos about him, unusual for employees of It. He was of a height with me, all lean whipcord muscle, but there was no tone to it. Most likely he was a runner; maybe he lifted weights in a high school gym class. But he didn’t move like a fighter. I wasn’t worried. “Nice to meet you, Paulo.”
“Encantada. ” It was said with a sneer of sarcasm, but the accent of a native Spanish speaker. I made a mental note to have Mira brush me up on Spanish cuss words. Never hurts to know.
“Now, don’t let his age fool you,” Kristyn advised Paulo. “Old dude is a baaaaad man. He works security consulting on the side. All kung fu and stuff.” Well, at least she thought that’s what I did on the side. It was as good an explanation as any for why I left town abruptly and came home in bandages on a regular basis. I even had permits and licenses to make it all official, thanks to Ivan.
If Paulo was impressed, it didn’t show.
Kristyn was rapidly getting swamped, and I slid into the register next to her. “I didn’t know we were hiring.”
“Chelsea no-called again today, and I’d had it. Then Paulo walked in. It was like destiny!” My punk-haired boss gave me a cheeky grin, and I could only chuckle.
“Does he at least have some retail experience?” I hated training rookies from scratch, and she knew it.
“Nah,” she said, and my heart sank. “But he’s hot, and that’s what the girls want.” True enough, our young, brooding Latino was getting more than his share of admiring looks from the panting throng.
“If being hot is a hiring requisite, how the hell do I still have a job?”
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