by Andrew Price
Corbin shoved the trunk down several times before it latched, but not before another handful of bills fell to the ground. Alvarez picked them up. Fortunately, they had parked behind a convenience store, next to a dumpster, and no one noticed.
“This is a problem,” Alvarez said.
“Ya think?”
“How did we miss this?”
Corbin shook his head. “I don’t know. We had that stack of bills we measured. You were there. The calculations said four duffel bags was enough. Of course, those were crisp new bills. And we are getting more out of the accounts than we expected because of the ATMs.”
“Maybe we should stop asking for twenties?” Alvarez scanned under the car to make sure there were no additional bills scattered around the alley. “Do you think we can fit any more into the trunk?”
“No way. The next time we open the trunk, there’s going to be a waterfall of twenties cascading onto the pavement. I’d rather not open the trunk again until we’re ready to unload the car.”
“Should we stop?”
“No, not yet. The duffel bags are empty again and we have that blanket in the back seat. If all else fails, we can stack money on the backseat and cover it with the blanket. It’s heavy enough, it shouldn’t fall off.”
Alvarez laughed.
“What’s so funny?”
“This. This is the kind of problem I always wished I’d had.”
Several hours later, the two friends headed home. There was money everywhere. The trunk was full of money. The duffel bags were full of money. The backseat was covered in money, beneath the heavy blanket. Money had even fallen onto the floor. It wasn’t until they reached Maryland that it finally occurred to them to buy garbage bags for the loose money. Fortunately, it was dark, so no one saw them filling the bags.
Soon, they pulled into the loading dock belonging to Corbin’s apartment building. As Corbin used the service elevator to haul the duffel bags and garbage bags to his apartment, Alvarez guarded the car. Using the service elevator prevented any potential complications with the ever-present tow truck and also hid the car from view, as apartment buildings tend to hide their loading docks and dumpsters out of sight. Also, at this hour, the chances of running into anyone on the service elevator were slim.
“This is the last of them,” Corbin said, slamming the trunk. “I’ll count it out, and then we’ll distribute.”
“Beautiful. Just beautiful,” Alvarez said. He felt exhausted, but also elated at the same time. He couldn’t stop smiling.
“We did it,” Corbin said. “We beat the system in a big, bad way. I’ll tell you, I’ve never felt more alive in my life than I do at this moment.”
The two friends shook hands.
“Don’t forget the car,” Corbin reminded Alvarez. Alvarez needed to return the rental car to BWI in the morning. They had already replaced the license plates, leaving the New York plates at the bottom of some little-known river in rural Maryland.
“Will do,” Alvarez replied. “I’ll give you a call tomorrow.”
The two friends shook hands again.
Corbin returned to his apartment. That night, he divided the money into three equal piles which would be stuffed into duffel bags once Corbin bought more bags. After separating the money, he took the clothes he had worn and placed them in a box, which he would toss into the building’s incinerator the following morning. He then took the documents, except for the correspondence and the checks he still intended to mail to the credit card companies, and placed those in a separate box. These would be shredded and burned before Alvarez dumped the ashes into Chesapeake Bay on his next fishing trip.
Chapter 16
Alvarez watched Corbin zip up the last of the duffle bags. His bags were already sitting by the door. Corbin’s were sitting against the wall.
“Let me ask you a question?” Alvarez asked cautiously.
“Shoot.”
“You and I know Beckett kept that wallet. That means we can’t trust him.” Alvarez had Corbin’s attention. “Now, I know all about how hard it’ll be for him to use the wallet to cause us trouble, but we don’t really know what kind of trouble he’s planning to cause. But we do know, if he does cause trouble, it could be serious.”
Corbin listened quietly.
“You think handing him the money will get rid of him, but what if it doesn’t? Right now, we can do something about this, to head it off at the pass.”
“Go on,” Corbin said. His mood darkened.
“You know me. I wouldn’t mention this unless I really thought this through.”
“And?”
“Why don’t we make sure this thing can never come back to bite us.”
“Say it.”
“You know what I’m getting at.”
“Say it,” Corbin repeated louder. “Come on, spit it out!”
Silence.
“Shit!” Corbin said dismissively. “You want to murder him, but you can’t even say it!”
“I just think we need to consider it.”
“Are you gonna do it?!”
“I think I can,” Alvarez said, with his eyes downcast.
“I think you can’t,” Corbin taunted Alvarez. “I think you’ve seen too many movies and played too many video games, and they’ve warped your mind. You think killing someone’s easy because you’ve seen it so many times, but real life is a whole different world. The moment you point a gun at somebody, every fiber of your being is gonna tell you to stop. You’ll never be able to pull that trigger.”
Alvarez didn’t respond
His silence angered Corbin. “Let’s test it!” Corbin went to the bookcase where he kept his gun. He pulled the nine-millimeter semi-automatic pistol from its case. He grabbed a magazine and slapped it into the pistol’s grip. Then he pulled back the slide, chambering a round, and let it slide back into place. It made the infamous clicking sound Hollywood finds so fascinating.
“What are you doing?” Alvarez asked.
“Here,” Corbin said, tossing the gun to Alvarez.
Alvarez caught the gun in mid-air. His heart pounded in his ears. He had never held a gun before. The gun was heavier than he expected and colder.
“Point it at me.”
“What?”
“Point it at me,” Corbin said, emphasizing each word.
Alvarez looked at the gun. He looked at Corbin and then set it down on the table.
“That’s what I thought. And you want to kill Beckett?!” Corbin said derisively. Corbin retrieved the gun and jettisoned the round from the chamber. He returned the gun and the spare round to the gun case. “It doesn’t matter anyway, because we can’t kill him because we can’t be sure that solves our problem.” Corbin’s tone softened as his anger abated.
“What do you mean?”
“I already told you this before. We can’t guarantee we get the wallet back before we shoot him. For all we know, it’s sitting in some lawyer’s office right now, with instructions to forward it to the cops unless Beckett calls by some date. If we shoot him, we just add a murder charge to our list of crimes. That’s one they will pursue.”
An uncomfortable silence passed between them.
“What time are you meeting him?” Alvarez finally asked.
“Three thirty.”
“Do you still want to go alone?”
“I think it’s best.”
“If you see any hint of cops—”
“Then I don’t even stop the car.”
When Corbin reached the rest stop in Delaware, he found Beckett already waiting for him. To make sure this wasn’t a setup, he instructed Beckett to follow him. A few miles down the road, he turned off the highway onto a rural road. A few miles down that road, he pulled over by a thick stand of trees. No one followed them. He now sat on the hood of his car. Beckett’s car stood parallel to his, about six feet away.
“I thought we were meeting at the rest stop?”
“The cops patrol rest stops looking for drugs and pervert
s.” Corbin looked at Beckett’s beat up old car. “Man, if you look closely, you can actually watch your car rust.”
“You don’t like my car?”
“What’s not to like? What happened to your Chrysler?”
“We sold it. It was too expensive. . . this money couldn’t have come at a better time.”
“Remember, you can’t spend it for six months.”
“I know, but just having it will ease my mind.”
“Speaking of laundering, remember how we figured one duffel bag each?” Corbin walked toward the rear of his car and pulled out the first of the three duffel bags from the backseat. He tossed it onto the ground before Beckett. Thunk! “Turns out we got that part wrong.” He tossed the second one. Thunk!
“Holy cow!”
“We were pretty amazed ourselves.” Thunk!
“I’ll bet. Any problems?”
“Nope, everything went smoothly.”
“Have you heard anything?” Beckett asked, as he loaded the duffel bags into his trunk. He opened one to look at the money.
“No, all’s quiet on the southern front.”
“How’s the new guy?”
“Total bobo. Stuart misses you by the way. He sends his thanks for the UFO books you sent him.”
“A client of mine gave them to me when they shipped him away for a very long time. I figured Stuart might like them. How’s Kak?”
“He sends his love. How’s the new-old job?”
“I enjoy it, I just can’t afford it.”
“Remember, six months, then launder. Follow the plan we discussed.”
“I remember.”
“Well, I gotta head back. You know how to reach me if something comes up.”
“Same here.”
“So long, Evan Beckett.”
“So long, Alexander Corbin.”
They shook hands. The issue of the wallet never came up.
Over the next two months, Corbin dutifully drove to Philadelphia several times to mail off payments to credit card companies. He planned to call in address changes for each card to a series of non-existent addresses in Phoenix in six months. After that, the cell phones would meet their fiery fates. However, events would supersede his plan.
Part Two
Chapter 17
It was August, but surprisingly mild. Two months passed since Beckett and Alvarez visited Philadelphia. Corbin now played two nights a week (Tuesdays and Fridays) at Blue’s bar and was considering adding a third. More people came to see him play every night. Blue kept encouraging him to play professionally, but Corbin refused. He played because he loved playing, not because he drew a crowd, and ever since freeing himself from the restrictive playlist, he loved playing all the more.
Corbin finished his set and returned his instrument to its case. He made for the bar, where Blue tried handing him a check. Corbin refused to take it, as he did every night.
“I wish you’d take this,” Blue said, offering the check again.
“It’s your bar,” Corbin replied, pushing Blue’s hand away.
“But it’s your crowd.”
Blue returned the check to the front pocket of his guayabera shirt, the only type of shirt he owned. “When you gonna quit your day job and come play for me? I’ll pay you.”
“I’m a lawyer, not a musician.”
“You got that backwards.”
Corbin considered Blue’s words. He wondered the same thing recently. “Maybe you’re right? I don’t know.”
“’Course I’m right.” Blue leaned one elbow on the bar and waved the other arm toward the raucous crowd. “This crowd is proof of that. You think I had thirty people in here on a Tuesday night before you started playin’?”
“Let me think about it.”
“Ain’t nothin’ to think about,” Blue grumbled. “I see your lady friend is back.”
Corbin looked over his shoulder at the woman with the pink rose. For weeks now, she hadn’t missed a single one of his performances. He flirted with her a couple times, but still hadn’t truly spoken to her. He was fascinated by her, but he sensed she wasn’t the kind of woman to be picked up in a bar. Since this was a bar, he felt a little perplexed about how to proceed. She’d also increased the difficulty level for Corbin by playing coy. For example, she never told him her name, saying only “life is full of mysteries.”
Blue handed Corbin a beer. “What make this lady so special?”
“You know what, Blue? I’ve had lots of dates in the past couple years, and every single one of them bored me to tears. I’m not saying they weren’t nice or they weren’t attractive or whatever, but they were all just boring. If I lined them all up, you’d swear they were clones.”
“They all look alike?”
“No, that’s not what I mean. They looked different, but they weren’t different. They all had the same beliefs, the same wants, the same expectations. If you asked them to name their ten favorite things, you’d get identical lists. It’s like they’re being stamped out in some factory.” Corbin took a swig of his beer. “I can’t take that anymore. . . I don’t think I ever could. I want someone with a real personality, not someone who gets their personality from sit-coms.”
“You think that’s this lady?”
“Yeah, there’s something about her. It’s in her manner. When I see her, I see someone different. Look at her confidence, her grace. She’s her own person. Do you know how exciting it is to meet someone who charts their own course?”
Blue nodded his head. “Ok, I get it. I’m even gonna help you out.”
“How?”
“I’m gonna tell you why you ain’t had no luck with her.”
Corbin raised an eyebrow.
Blue looked him straight in the eyes. “You ain’t your own person yet.”
Corbin stared at Blue for several seconds. He frowned, but nodded his head. “You may be onto something.” He snuck another peek over his shoulder. “I think I’ll give this another try. Wish me luck.”
Blue grabbed Corbin’s arm. “You make your own luck.”
To avoid acknowledging the new guy, Molly began sitting on Corbin’s desk whenever she came to visit. This quickly became a habit, even when the new guy wasn’t in the room. It didn’t annoy Corbin that she sat on his desk. After all, it wasn’t like he used it much and he did like Molly’s perfume. What did annoy him though, was that two weeks ago, she started pulling the extra chair around next to him so she could prop her feet up on the chair. Not only did this make the chair dirty, as she didn’t remove her shoes, but she never returned the chair to its proper place when she left. This meant Corbin had to return it, if he wanted to leave his desk. Today, true to form, she sat on the edge of his desk with her feet propped up on the extra chair.
“You’re going to put that chair back this time, right?” Corbin asked, as he always did.
“Of course,” Molly assured him, as she always did.
“What’s with the toothpaste?”
“This?” she asked, holding up a box of toothpaste she had been rotating in her hands.
“No, the other toothpaste,” he replied sarcastically.
“I was downstairs at that little shop, minding my own business, when I saw this. They had ‘fresh mint formula’ and ‘vanilla formula’ and then this little gem, ‘special nighttime formula.’ I couldn’t resist, I had to find out what nighttime tastes like.”
“‘Nighttime,’ huh? Did they have ‘Vegas Morning’ or ‘Summer Dumpster’?”
“Not in stock.”
Corbin chuckled. “May it be everything you hoped it would be.”
“How are things going with your roomie?” Molly had yet to say anything nice to, or about, the new guy, though no one protested as he hadn’t endeared himself to anyone. Indeed, he barely spoke to anyone, including Corbin. By this point, Corbin saw him mainly as a silent apparition that haunted his office.
“Fine. How are things with ‘Clerk Guy’?”
“That’s not his name,” Molly s
aid, rolling her eyes and trying to sound annoyed, though she struggled to suppress a smirk. “I told you, I may have been a bit hasty when I called him that.”
Molly met Clerk Guy at a bar in Georgetown. He worked as a salesclerk at the mall, causing her to name him “Clerk Guy” and to rhetorically question whether he earned enough to afford their dates. When she continued dating him regardless, Theresa quipped that “he must get one hell of an employee discount.” Though Molly later claimed to regret naming him “Clerk Guy,” she clearly got a kick out of using the name and implying that he made significantly less money than she did.
“Have you given ‘Shoe Guy’ the boot yet?” Corbin grinned.
Despite the derision Molly initially poured onto Shoe Guy, she ultimately kept dating him. Corbin never did understand why. Indeed, not a day passed where she didn’t mention some new flaw of his, followed by a short dissertation on how little she liked him. After she met Clerk Guy, Molly even assured Corbin she would dump Shoe Guy “post-haste,” but as the days passed, he hung in there.
“Ha ha, very funny,” Molly replied drolly.
“Sorry, no pun intended. . . it just slippered out.” Corbin chuckled.
Molly punched Corbin on the shoulder.
“I’m sorry, I’m sorry,” Corbin laughed, throwing his hands up in mock-surrender.
Molly punched him again.
“Ouch!” Corbin exclaimed to prevent Molly from thinking she needed to throw another punch to make her point. He struggled to stop laughing.
“I’m going to tell him next week.” Molly readjusted her blouse and her bracelet from the aftereffects of throwing the two punches. “Speaking of getting rid of people, how do we get rid of the F-N-G?”
“I don’t think that’s within our power.”
“We should do something. I’m sick of him and his blue suits. Doesn’t he know they sell other colors?”