The Kill Riff

by David J. Schow

  Play professional, he thought. Grab the reins and jump ahead of her next question.

  "I think I know where you're going. Let me ease your mind on a couple of scores, Sara-if I can call you Sara?"

  A sound of relief on the far end. "If you can be Burt to me."

  "Great. Lucas isn't at home. He decided on the spur of the moment to get back to nature for a few weeks. Camping. Hiking. You know. Come back to deal with the city after dealing with the great outdoors. I'm sure he'll call you before he calls me."

  A telling silence, then: "He didn't tell you where he was headed?"

  "North was about as specific as he got."

  "San Francisco?"

  "No idea, Sara."

  "That's not… good." She seemed to say this away from the mouthpiece.

  "Anything the matter?"

  "No. No, I'm sure he's just, as you say, getting away from it all for a while. But there's no specific address, no phone number for messages?"

  "I'm it," said Burt. "Sara, forgive me if I presume on such a short acquaintance, but let me submit that the idea of being constantly watched at Olive Grove-not direct surveillance or anything like that, just that everpresent administrative air-probably inspired him to go breathe free for a few days before phasing back into the city grind. I know I'd go a little nuts-you should pardon the expression. But I'm positive he's okay. And I'm positive he's not running away from you, because I think you're important to him, and not just as his shrink. I caught strong vibes. Don't worry."

  "You sound like a lay analyst yourself."

  "Lucas always comes back, Sara. That's it. Simple, huh?"

  "So he probably hasn't been keeping track of the news, or television, stuff like that."

  There was a lot of hiss clogging the connection. Burt wanted the conversation over. "If you want to trade phone numbers, Sara, I'll give him yours if he calls me. You still coming to L.A.?"

  "I do have some other things to take care of in the city. I'll be driving down, then driving back day after next." She reeled off several numbers, including her home phone in the bedroom community of Dos Piedras, near Olive Grove, and several extensions at the hospital. Burt saw no harm in giving her his home phone. He rather liked the idea of Diana lifting the receiver and being sent into a momentary panic at the fluid sound of Sara's voice.

  "Since I thought of dinner, it's on as soon as Lucas resurfaces," he said. "Deal?"

  "That doesn't sound too dangerous. I accept. I assume Lucas will."

  She had not gotten what she wanted, Burt thought after they rang off. Wonder what she was looking for? Lucas himself had been very fuzzy about tacking down the exact location of his cabin, and Burt had a good sense of when not to pry. There was nothing but coastline up there. A cabin snuggled into the navel of some mountain "near" Point Pitt would be a challenge to sniff out. Hell, there were entire towns up there nobody knew existed.

  He decided that mentioning Point Pitt, or the fact Lucas had taken a tape deck, would have no value. He'd idly wondered what Lucas would do with a tape deck, since he was supposedly camping out. But he'd know if he was supposed to.

  He wondered what Sara had seen on the news. But he decided not to worry that one to death, either.

  10

  HER NAME WAS CASS, AND she had been beaten up and abandoned in the mountains by her boyfriend.

  Ex-boyfriend, thought Lucas.

  He'd talked her into a camping excursion, and once they were removed from civilization, he'd reverted to an anthropoid stage and punched the shit out of her. There had been a lot of screaming about sexual misconduct. She saw his massive fist flying toward her face, then sparks, and that was all until she heard his truck speeding away. All her stuff was in it; sling bag, money, ID, everything. The guy's name was Reese. He drove a Datsun long-bed with a fancy camper shell on the back and Montana plates. Lucas remembered passing the truck on his way north. Cass did not remember being passed by his Bronco, and that was just as well.

  She had related all that while sipping hot coffee laced with a lot of sugar. Lucas had switched her from Percodans to stiff codeine pills. Now she was sponge bathing in the outside shower stall while he stood near the barbecue, hoping she didn't tumble and complicate the damage already done. She washed the woods off herself with slow, cautious movements. Her reach was restricted by pain.

  Her rugged clothing had taken some of the abuse for her, but her chest was a disaster area. Reese had used her breasts for boxing practice, and the bruises were vast and ugly. Contusions outlined all her ribs on one side.

  Her calves were firm and rounded from exercise; her thighs were almost muscularly expressive. The grace of her legs was interrupted by a ladder of welts. Once she fumbled and fell heavily into the side of the stall; Lucas was across the patio in a shot to catch her. She wiped a fat sponge along each arm, sluicing water down her body, rinsing away dirt and scabs and pain. She toweled off clumsily; she had trouble turning her head and was still using only her right eye for the most part. It obviously hurt like hell to move at all. Yet she had insisted on cleaning up.

  "I can smell myself," she'd said. "Gag. You'll have to fumigate your sleeping bag." When Lucas had told her about flinging her socks out the back door, she'd almost laughed. "Yeah. Bet they were real killers. Maybe we should just stuff my clothes into the fireplace. They're beyond detergent by now."

  With Lucas' help, over the tub sink, she'd managed to get the dry blood out of her hair.

  Seeing her naked in the shadows of a sun creeping toward noon, Lucas felt a nagging stab of deja vu. It wasn't just the idea of a surrogate daughter. It was the physical damage. Something about Cass' wounds keyed a nonspecific memory in him, a feeling of familiarity tied to Kristen.

  But no positive connection. He would never think of wreaking such injuries on Kristen, not the Kristen he remembered.

  Under normal circumstances, he realized, Cass would be very attractive. Not pretty. Pretty described twelve-year-olds in Easter dresses or costly trifles that were mostly frills and flowers. Cass would be attractive, with those eyes so direct and startlingly colored, with all that auburn hair untrussed, with her appealing shape and physique. She made no fuss about her nakedness; there were graver matters to be dealt with. He watched her fight her way determinedly into the merchant marine sweater.

  When her head and one arm were trapped inside, he rescued her. "Here. Hold your right arm still."

  "The sweater is winning," she said timidly.

  He guided her into the garment. "Don't bend your other arm back so far."

  "I can't, anyway." Her head poked through. "Jesus Christ, I never thought I'd wish for a bra, you know? But every time I move, my tits countermove, and it's like torture. Like what I imagine being gut shot feels like. Only higher up." She folded her arms, framing her breasts.

  "Like being kicked in the balls."

  She looked into his eyes to see if he was putting her on. "If you say so. My dear Reese never called them balls. It was always nuts, a kick in the nuts."

  "I don't like that word."

  "Aha-so you do have a delicacy threshold. The mark of the mature, older man." Once unclogged, her voice was low and resonant. He imagined her steering chat, kicking that voice over into sultry when she needed to. She spoke intelligently and did not trip over the English language the way her peers might.

  "One of Reese's big hangups was getting kicked in the balls," she said. "He got that gleam in his eyes. I knew I was going to get stomped, and there was no place to run, so I let him have it. Boom-he folded up like a card table hit by a falling safe. Unfortunately, he also got back up. I kept thinking, What do I do now? He had the car keys in his pocket. He can run faster and jump higher. And he got up. And I stood there like a heroine in a bad horror movie, you know, screaming at the monster instead of running like hell? And the monster pounded the shit out of me, jumped in his rig, and sped away into the sunset. I suppose he thought I'd die from the exposure. More likely he just got crazed, and ran. Whic
h is why I started blundering through the woods in the dead of night. He might have come back for more." Lucas helped her into the bib coverall with the Rolling Stones patch on the butt. Before buttoning her up, he said, "Maybe we could use an Ace bandage to bind your chest as well as your ribs. I've seen it for breast operations-the idea is to immobilize the breasts so you don't open up sutures."

  "Yowtch." She grimaced. "Is that for real?"

  "Yeah. My wife had breast surgery once. Nothing serious. That's where I encountered it. Uh, my ex-wife."

  "How ex is your ex-wife?"

  "My late ex-wife." It hurt not at all to say it.

  Cass paused. "You a widower?"

  "No. She was an ex before she was-"

  "What was her name?"

  "Cory." He looked around, almost guiltily. "Yea or nay on the breast-binding technique? It'll be pretty warm inside all the clothes and bandages."

  "I say let's try it. It can't feel worse than it does already. Hike up the sweater." She dropped the bib and held out her arms. She was full-breasted but not heavy, and her small nipples shrank at the shock of air. Up close, the bruises were much uglier. Blood had been forced through the skin.

  Lucas slowly mummified her with an Ace bandage. "Why did Whats is name-Reese. Why did he go berserk?"

  "Thought I mentioned it," she said. "We got into a tiff about who was sleeping with whom. Reese had formulated this unbelievable set of rules for me. It might have helped if I'd known what the hell they were. I guess, to Reese, worthy women knew his rules instinctively. Ouch!"

  "Sorry."

  "His ego required utter fidelity. At the same time, his ego was so huge that it made him fuck as many girls as he could pounce on. When I discovered how extensive Reese's pouncing had gotten, I brought it up. That was the first time he smacked me. Stupid me, I thought I had overreacted.

  "I was doing temporary work for an accounting office, and I met this guy there, Jonathan. We'd had coffee a couple of times, nothing heavy. He told me about his separation, and I told him about Reese. Jonathan was frighteningly normal, almost boring. The type of guy you absolutely ignored in high school. But he turned out to be very considerate and caring."

  Lucas furrowed his brow. She interpreted it as disapproval.

  "Oh, no, it's not as if we met on the sidewalk and jumped into the nearest bed," she said. "It took a long time for anything physical to happen. And I never thought of anything physical happening, because Jonathan struck me as the type of guy who was a virgin on his wedding night, and I didn't need him for sex. Not at first."

  "Reese found out about Jonathan?"

  "I don't know. I don't see how. Maybe he was just guessing and read guilt in my eyes or something. Or sniffed it out, like they say a wolf can sniff out fear. I've heard some people can do that. Reese smoldered for a while. Nonspecific. Then, when we came out here, he brought it up."

  "Convenient." He was nearly finished. The bandages were more attractive than the bruises.

  "It scares the shit out of me to think he was planning to beat me to death the whole time we were

  driving up here. Just beat me, and leave me here to die. I never felt so removed from help. In the big bad city at least you can con your way into an ambulance, even if you're broke. Out here, the trees suck up the sound before you can even scream."

  He buttoned her into the overalls. Back in the cabin, she swallowed two more codeine tablets with coffee.

  "I was lying on the ground. I could feel my blood mixing with the dirt. And Reese said, 'You can stay up here and fuck the grizzly bears, puss.' And the goddamned thing is, when I finally was able to stand up, I was more scared of imaginary grizzly bears than I was of Reese. Although I'm sure a grizzly bear has better table manners. I just motivated myself the hell away, as fast as I could crawl. I'm not even sure there are grizzly bears around here, anyway."

  Lucas shook his head slowly from side to side. "I don't understand how somebody like you could get tangled up with… with such a…"

  She saw him groping for the word, avoiding it, perhaps, so she provided one. "Such an obvious psycho?" She pulled in a deep breath and released it in a sigh. "I really can't tell you. A girlfriend of mine, Tanya, used to go with a biker. A member of the Axemen, went by the handle T-Bone. A real righteous iron horseman. Had a lot of those pin-and-ink tattoos-a teardrop by his left eye for each prison stretch he'd served. T-Bone had four teardrops the last time I saw him. He'd killed at least two other guys in prison, in self-defense. The most humorless dude I'd ever seen in my life, and here he was going out with Tanya, who used to be Miss Super Yuppie, Miss Valley Girl. She was crazy about him; no explanation. How did I wind up with Reese? Maybe because I'd had a lot of guys who were all talk and nothing beyond. You know-if some junkie tried to knife us in a movie theater, my boyfriend would try to talk it over with the guy. Civilized behavior. And I'd be lying there with my trachea in my lap. Maybe Reese was my way of acknowledging the hazards of city living, my man of direct action. He'd take the junkie and turn him inside out while he was mouthing off, pumping up for the fight." She tried to turn her head to look out the window. At a stab of pain she gave up. "And look at all the benefits I reaped. I suppose you really do live and learn. Reese, I guess, was another in a long line of mostly failed experiments."

  She fumbled the pill vial, and as it rolled to the edge of the table Lucas caught it. Her hands toyed with themselves in her lap. "I'm a tad woozy. All my friends use dope regularly, like jam on toast. I don't even touch the weed anymore. So any time I take a painkiller it knocks me on my ear. No fair, says I."

  She was aware of Lucas's voice saying, "How old are you?" But she had not looked at him for a long time, and the voice seemed to come from a great distance. The effect was that of a gentle interrogation, on the fringes of sleep.

  "Twenty-three. Twenty-three and a half."

  "You look younger."

  "People tell me I talk older. They always say that, like it compensates for something."

  "Well, you're unusually articulate." Lucas leaned back, and the front legs of his chair disengaged from the floor, to hover. "You don't seem handicapped by the seven-word vocabulary most kids use these days."

  "Oh, you mean fuck this, fuck that, fucking-A, in-fucking-incredible?"

  He laughed lightly. "You remind me of my daughter."

  You're my favorite asshole, dad.

  "You have a daughter?" Now she looked at him with her good eye. The other one moved around inside the swollen eyelid, trying hard to see him. "You don't look that old. Old enough to have a daughter my age, I mean."

  "Her name was Kristen. She would have been twenty this year. She's gone, too."

  "Oh, god, I didn't-"

  "Don't apologize. It's okay."

  After a beat, she said, "I'd ask if you knew anybody among the living, but I'm afraid you'd have to include me out."

  "Sam Goldwyn used to say that." He saw the nonrecognition in her expression. "Never mind."

  "Think I'll live, doctor?"

  "I don't think we need to check you into an ICU. Reese didn't spend too much time bashing you, but he made the most of the hits he got."

  "He's built," she said ruefully.

  "If you're seeing and breathing okay today, I'd take a chance on your pulling through."

  "I don't want to go back to the city," she said. "For what? Reese has trashed my stuff; I'm positive. And he's laying for me. No thanks. Cops can't protect you from someone like that. If he's blown town, there's still no rush-he's still trashed my stuff."

  "The charges would be pretty serious," said Lucas.

  "I have no burning desire to spend my life looking over my shoulder." Then, with an abrupt detachment that was chilling, she added, "If I ever see Reese again, I want to be whole, and functional. And ready."

  "I could go with you," Lucas offered, strictly spur of the moment. "If he was around, and thought you weren't alone, then maybe-"

  "That's sweet of you, but no good. It puts us in the
position of fear, see? Besides, I'm in no hurry to leave here. Though that depends on how long you'll allow me to impose on your hospitality."

  She was leading him. He could feel it. Like the feeling he'd gotten with Kristen sometimes. She was steering. He dismissed her gratitude. "No imposition, Cass. You were, and still are, in need of serious-"

  She overrode him. "Come on, Luke, lighten up! That's my ploy. I'll be more flagrant: I want to hang out at your mountain retreat for a while. I know I'm not very formidable right now, but in a few days I'll be on the road to recovery, and-bingo!"

  "Bingo?"

  "You'll have a faithful Indian companion. Girl Friday. Whatever you want. I'll even launder my own irreclaimable socks. You've already told me I'm a terrific conversationalist, and I'm a person you know who's not dead. Think carefully before you turn down an offer like this."

  It cut to the marrow; it seemed very correct. Lucas felt an undeniable sense of rightness while speaking to her. It was not just the vague echoes of Kristen. It was as though Cass was supposed to be part of what was happening. As logic, it was specious. As a healing thing, it seemed to hint at a vast good. She was very much like Kristen in the best ways: sharp and attentive and able to catch him off guard with wit. His mind raced ahead.

  "You're welcome to stay as long as you want, Cass," he began, formulating a back story as he went. "But if you do… there's something I may need your help with."

  "Anything." She said this with absolutely no hesitation. "I'm entitled to say 'anything' because I owe you my life."

  He let it pass without protest. He did not feel like objecting. "Let me put it simply. There's a very remote possibility that my ex-wife will be looking to harass me. She may eventually sleuth up the location of this cabin. And when she does, she may come up here to cause a scene, possibly with her attorney in tow."