“Is she really okay?” Amy whispers the moment the sound of it shutting falls away.
Looking across to me, Glenda remains silent, ceding me the floor.
“She is,” I say. “Physically, at least.”
There is no confusion about what the comment means. All three of us have spent years at this place dealing with this sort of thing. The resulting marks we carry may vary in size and severity, but they are all scars just the same.
“And you?” Glenda asks. “How are you feeling?”
“I’m okay,” Amy replies, the words out so fast it is clear they are nothing more than rote habit. Glancing down, she draws in a deep breath, her nostrils pulling inward as she lifts her head to stare straight ahead.
The position forces moisture down either of her cheeks, twin lines cleaved across the porcelain skin. “Physically, at least.”
Just a day before, I watched as the woman had a shard of wood jabbed into her back, piercing her kidney. I saw as it was removed in an impromptu surgery and then she was driven the length of the country.
And still she says that physically she’s okay.
This can’t be good.
“Ames, what the hell is going on?” I ask, unable to hold back the question any longer.
Across the bed, Glenda looks at me, her mouth pulled into a thin line. By the set of her jaw, it’s clear she doesn’t quite agree with me rushing right in, though she says nothing.
Clamping her thumb and forefinger around my palm, Amy squeezes slightly. Her grip is weak, the grasp lasting no more than a moment.
“Ham,” she whispers. “Thank you. I didn’t know if the number you gave me still worked...”
Lifting my knee from the floor, I pull myself a couple of inches closer. Pressing her forearm against my chest, I pin it there with my elbow, completely wrapped around the lower half of her arm.
“Amy, what happened? What was all that?”
Laying her head back against the headboard behind her, she allows her gaze to linger on the ceiling. More tears rise to the surface, streaming from the corner of either eye, falling without a sound.
“That was my husband,” she eventually whispers. “And his partner.”
Glenda and I share a glance, neither saying a word, not letting her sense us react in any way.
“They’re after me because I stole their money and used it to hire that guy to find you,” she adds, not knowing that the funds were actually meant to pay me for bringing her here.
“Why?” Glenda asks. “What was going on?”
She is unaware that the price for hiring Mikey and, by extension, me, was half a million dollars. Based on her question, she is still thinking smaller scale, that this is solely a domestic squabble. Relationship woes that reached the point of being irreparable.
What I saw yesterday was much, much more than that.
Just like five hundred thousand dollars is way more than any cop should have just lying around in case of a rainy day.
“Ames,” I ask, “what the hell is that bastard mixed up in?”
Chapter Forty-Two
The motel room is a piece of shit, the type of place T-Boy and his crew would go for meeting up with their women or conducting business. A spot like The Sundowner, run-down and dilapidated, a joint that any self-respecting tourist would drive right past without a second look.
A dive that only the most desperate of society would view as reasonable accommodations.
Making it the perfect place for Detective Jensen Spiers to hide for the night.
After finding the photos at his home the day before, there was no way he was setting foot in there anytime soon. Not with the looming specter of his wife and stepdaughter completely ingrained. Sure as hell not with the knowledge that Hector Lima and his crew had violated it sitting at the front of his thoughts.
Spending another night at the hospital was also not an option, his welcome with Bryce and Esme already worn out. As was his patience with them and Wilton and the uncomfortable chairs he’d attempted to get some rest on the night before.
Which put him at this dump. One of many he’d worked in over the years, the front desk accepted cash and didn’t ask questions, those two things being his only requirements as he checked in.
Now sitting on the edge of the bed twelve hours later, he can’t help but think he should have been a bit more discerning. The coiled wires of the mattress were completely worn out, threatening to poke through in random places, jabbing into his skin. The sheets were threadbare and scratchy. The shower barely had enough hot water for a five-minute blast.
It was a far cry from the night of recovery he needed as he rests with his elbows on his knees. One hand rubs at the back of his neck, kneading the skin.
The first light of dawn passes through the thin curtain hanging over the window, the sounds of traffic drifting in. Down the hall, a woman speaks in broken Spanglish, clearly agitated, her volume much too loud for this time of day.
In the air is a mixture of scents both old and new, ranging from the Carl’s Jr. bag sitting in the trash to the faint smell of cat piss and cigarette smoke embedded in the carpet.
His eyes barely open to more than slits, Spiers can feel the blood and pressure collected in his face. Feeling as if it is pressing against the bridge of his nose, he can only imagine what it will look like once he finally stumbles his way to the bathroom, the thought doing nothing for the mood he is in.
This is not how things are supposed to be. Not for a man in his early forties, two decades with LAPD already behind him, the requisite time in for a pension not that far on the horizon. And not for a man just two years into a marriage, the woman a young trophy bride, her daughter a small down payment to finalize the deal.
The partnership with Lima was working. It was perfect. It had made him and his crew stars, the envy of the LAPD system. Awards were constant. Discretionary funding was free-flowing. There was even talk of further promotions, putting them downtown, where they could really start to reshape things in their image.
And then this shit happens.
Extending a hand, Spiers takes up his phone from the nightstand. Checking his messages, he sees a single text from Hendricks. Short and free of context, it merely states: Arrived safely. Call when can.
Exhaling loudly, Spiers stands. Every major joint he has seems to pop in unison as he does so, the combined effects of the last week and his night on the torture device known as a bed. Stepping gingerly across the threadbare carpet, he holds the phone out, clicking on Hendricks’s name at the top of the screen.
A moment later, ringing sounds out.
Keeping the call on speaker, Spiers heads into the bathroom. Out of sheer habit, he reaches for the light switch, catching himself just before his hand gets there. Not yet ready for the searing pain of direct light, he instead allows the thin glow passing through the frosted glass of the window to be enough, assessing himself in the mirror.
The first thought that comes to him as he takes in his own reflection is that he resembles a Klingon. Like one of the creatures found in the old Star Trek movies, his forehead and the bridge of his nose are swollen into one solid plane.
No indent visible, no bone structure present.
Streaking straight out from the underside of either eye are dark arrows, black and purple, running diagonally over his cheeks.
Everything is so swollen he can barely see his eyes peering back at him, his nostrils half their usual size.
“Boss,” Hendricks says, snapping the call up mid-ring.
Taking a moment before responding, Spiers forces himself to stare at the person before him. To take in what the woman in the hotel room did to him, adding to it the violation that Lima and his crew pulled off the day before.
Since arriving at the motel, he’s had to push aside the animosity, the anger within, shoving it away in the name of recovery.
That moment is past. Now it is time to pull it back to the surface, concentrating it into something he can use.
“Where are you?”
“Ketchum,” Hendricks replies.
A dour expression rises to Spiers’s face, the response not quite what he was looking for.
“Where in Ketchum?”
“Oh,” Hendricks says, a slight bit of dawning in his voice. In the background is the sound of a semitruck rolling by. “We’re parked at a rest stop right now. Got some coffee, awaiting word from you.”
Never before has Spiers been to Ketchum. He’s heard of the place a couple of times as a preferred hangout for aging Hollywood stars and the place where Hemingway went to kill himself, but otherwise, he doesn’t know a thing about it.
Not how large it is or how conspicuous a pair of Los Angeles detectives drinking coffee along the side of the road might be.
For now, he has no choice but to defer to them.
“The target?” he asks.
“Stationary for most of the last day,” Hendricks replies. “Small place out in the woods.”
“You get eyes on?” Spiers asks.
“Negative. Looks like some sort of hideout, sits way back off the road in thick trees, has a gate across the entrance.”
Unable to sit still, Spiers rises. His hand again goes to the back of his neck, working at the loose skin there. His feet beat out a steady pace across the cheap linoleum floor, able to take no more than a step or two before being forced to turn and head the opposite direction.
“You said most. She’s been stationary most of the last day,” Spiers says.
“Right,” Hendricks answers. “A few minutes ago, she finally started to move.”
Pausing, Spiers pulls his hand away. His face lifts toward the ceiling, every bad outcome running through his mind in short order.
The tag Lucas put on her has a half-life of four days. After that, it begins to fade, eventually becoming undetectable after a week.
If they are content to keep running, there is only so long he’ll be able to track her before they disappear permanently.
“And you’re not on them?”
“No need,” Hendricks says. “They didn’t go far. They’re currently at a farm and supply shop a mile or two from where we’re now sitting.”
Letting the information process, Spiers nods, slowly beginning to pace again. Supplies are good. Supplies mean they are likely stocking up to stay in one place a while.
“You want us to move on her?”
Remaining silent, Spiers continues to think on things.
The place Hendricks described sounds like it has all the earmarks of a compound. A place where people are generally fortified, able to hunker down. Once they are back inside, it won’t be difficult at all to ride things out until the signal from the tag has diminished beyond use.
Not to mention, trying to gain access in the meantime — especially with only two men — could be ugly. And be quite a bit more visible than they are willing to concede.
“Get eyes on,” Spiers says. “Confirm target. If there is a way to make a move quietly, do it.”
Chapter Forty-Three
The interior of the Forester feels especially strained. Despite three of us filling the space, nobody has said a word since leaving the farm, all of us locked deep in thought.
Amber in the back, still a bit put out that she wasn’t able to spend more time with her mother while she was awake. Glenda beside me, her attention aimed out the window, jaw set in her standard pose whenever she’s chewing on something big.
And me, curled up behind the steering wheel. Every muscle and tendon in my upper body is contracted, like a rattlesnake preparing to strike. Concentrated in my two fists clutching the steering wheel of the Forester, every emotion I’m still capable of resonates just beneath the surface.
The source of so much bottled angst being the story my sister just shared.
And no small amount of self-loathing that anything she described ever got as far as it did.
“Same place?” I ask, the first words since we pulled out of the drive.
Neither of them so much as glance over, Glenda pulling the hand her chin is propped on away from her mouth just long enough to say, “Yeah. Murph’s.”
Grunting in response, I, too, retreat back into my thoughts, needing the next few minutes of drive time — and likely a whole lot more — to wrap my head around everything I just heard.
The last time I had seen Amy was three years prior. At the time, I was still in the life, so while I didn’t often bother her, I was always aware of where she was and how she was doing.
Always.
When I decided to get out, knowing I needed to sever that connection was at once both the hardest and the easiest part. Every bit of me hated the idea of not having that bond, of not feeling like I could look out for her if need be.
At the same time, there was no way I would ever run the risk of putting her in danger. Just because I didn’t want to live that way any longer didn’t mean some of the enemies I’d picked up along the way would suddenly just accept that I was now nothing more than an aunt.
They wouldn’t see the changes in my life as a concerted effort to be closer to family. They would see opportunity.
People like me don’t get to just check out. There’s a reason Mikey lives the way he does and will until the day he retires to a beach in Belize. Or Costa Rica. Or Siberia.
Because that’s the only way we — and the people we care about — get to sleep at night.
That was my thinking in leaving Los Angeles, heading to Mexico and leaving nothing more than a do-not-call-unless-you’re-in-mortal-danger number in my wake.
A number I never believed she would actually need to use.
The man’s name is Jensen Spiers, a detective with the Los Angeles Police Department. The first time Amy ever met him was about six months after our last encounter. The man was dispatched to investigate an incident that had taken place at the facility where she lived.
What the incident was, whether it was real or simply a staging on his part, we didn’t get into.
More important things to cover.
What started as a simple interview soon became a second, and then a third, the irony of repeatedly asking a blind woman what she remembered from a particular night not lost on any of us. After that was dinner and then meeting Amber and all the usual trappings of the typical romantic comedy movie.
Mercifully, she skipped past most of those.
In total, the courtship lasted just six months before the man popped the question. Going through all the proper paces, he even made a show of asking Amber her permission before doing so, made sure she was there to see it, the works.
Listening to Amy talk about the courtship, I couldn’t help but feel conflicted. Even knowing how it all turns out, what that bastard ended up putting her through, it was clear to see the joy she found in those memories. There was a time when she was genuinely happy, that every childhood fantasy she used to share with me while sitting out on that front porch swing had come true.
After they were married, she and Amber had moved to his place in Burbank. There, they had been reasonably happy until he was tasked with putting together a Special Investigation Division.
It was at that point that my ears had perked. While never tied to any one government entity, I’d been around them and their employees enough over the years to know how such things work.
Carve-outs like the one she was describing are generally done for the purpose of operating without stricture. They are headed by people with higher aspirations in mind, tending to leave the world of black and white far behind, reveling in shades of gray.
Despite my gentle prodding, she didn’t know what division he was working out of or even what they were specifically designed to do.
What she
did know was that it was not long thereafter that a clear shift in demeanor ensued. He was no longer home as much, and his temper was much shorter. Any interest in her or Amber evaporated, the resentment he felt for them palpable.
Phrases such as “doing this for you,” and “what more do you want from me,” became commonplace.
Six months ago, he struck her for the first time. Three weeks later, the second.
Replaying her words in my mind now, I can feel wrath pulsating through me. Every muscle striation stands vivid the length of my arms, veins popping from wrist to shoulder.
Had I known any of this, crushing the man’s nose in that hotel room would have been the least of his troubles.
Barely able to concentrate on the road ahead, I turn back onto the same highway we entered on yesterday. Heading north, I remain in the slow lane. The traffic thin, we’re not going far, the extra minute or two needed to continue sorting through things.
The clock on the dash says it is just after ten, but already it feels so much later than that. After the events of the morning, it feels like I’ve been up for days, nervous energy roiling through me, almost compelling me to keep moving.
Now that I know what we’re facing, what caused Amy to come to me, I can’t help but want to act on it right now.
No matter how much I know that that feeling is steeped in anger.
The tipping point was first reached three weeks ago. Not long before, they had moved to a new home, a big, stately place in one of the nicer areas of the city.
One afternoon, she and Amber were in the basement going through things when they discovered a black plastic bag filled with loose bills. All fives and tens, it was a pile that added up to more than fifteen thousand dollars.
A few days later, they found another.
Even in just the short time it took her to explain things, already I could see the connections from the bags to the new unit he was in charge of to the awards he was suddenly garnering, being hailed for cleaning up the streets. How exactly they all came together I had no way of knowing, Amy still in the dark on so much herself, making the wise decision instead to one day snatch what she could and get away.
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