Shelter

by Harlan Coben

  Buddy Ray turned to his big bouncer. "Pick him up, Derrick."

  "He's just a kid, Buddy Ray."

  "Pick him up."

  Air. I finally managed to gulp down a few breaths. Derrick's big hands bunched up my shirt near the shoulders. He lifted me as if I were a light load of laundry.

  "Pin his arms back," Buddy Ray said.

  I could tell Derrick didn't like it, but he did as he was told. He laced his massive arms through mine and pulled back so that my stomach and chest were totally exposed. He tightened his grip, locking me in place. I could feel the tendons ripping across my shoulder sockets. Buddy Ray was still licking his lips, enjoying this way too much.

  "Please," I said as soon as I could gather enough air to speak. "I don't know Antoine LeMaire. I'm looking for him too."

  Buddy Ray studied my face. "Is your name really Robert Johnson?"

  I didn't know how to answer that one.

  He reached into my pocket and took out my cell phone. "I bet this will give us your real name and home address." Another smile. "So Derrick and I can visit you whenever we like."

  I struggled, but that just made Derrick mad. Buddy Ray flicked my cell phone on--and then his face froze. He looked back at me, his face twisted in rage, and then he turned the camera in my direction.

  It was the picture of Ashley.

  Buddy Ray's body started quaking. "Where is she?"

  "I don't know."

  "You're lying to me," he said, keeping his voice low. "Where. Is. She?"

  "That's why I'm here. I'm looking for her."

  "So you're here for Antoine?"

  "I'm here," I said, "for me."

  Buddy Ray took a few deep breaths, and I didn't like what I was seeing on his face. He looked at Derrick. "We should take him to the dungeon."

  The dungeon?

  Even Derrick looked shell-shocked when he said that. "I don't know, boss."

  Buddy Ray turned back to me. "Here's what's going to happen," Buddy Ray said to me, again his voice a quiet lisp. "With Derrick holding you in place, I'm going to sock you in the gut again. Harder this time. Then, much as you're going to want to bend and fall back on the floor, Derrick is going to hold you up. And then, if you don't talk, we will take you to the dungeon."

  The fear on my face made his grin widen. "Wait," I said. "I don't know anything."

  "Maybe, maybe not. But really, I should be sure, right?"

  I started to buck, but Derrick held me firm. Buddy Ray took his time, milking the moment. He licked his lips some more and then he took out a pair of brass knuckles.

  I shuddered.

  Derrick said, "Uh, Buddy Ray?"

  "Just hold him."

  Buddy Ray slipped on the brass knuckles and slowly made a fist. He showed it to me, like it was something I might want to study before he unleashed it. I didn't know what to do. I tried to tighten my stomach muscles, but really, how would that help? Then, with the maniacal grin at its widest, Buddy Ray began to cock back his fist. He was just about to let it go when the door behind him, the one he had come through a minute ago, opened. A bikini-clad dancer entered.

  "Buddy Ray?" she said.

  "Get out!"

  It was now or never.

  As I mentioned before, I had been trained in combat. In most martial arts schools, you are taught how to punch or chop or kick, how to grapple or use holds or escape them. But for the most part, a fight is about the early tactics. It is about distraction and camouflage and surprise and timing. The girl opening the door had shifted attention away from me for a brief second.

  So I had to strike now.

  Derrick the bouncer still had me in a killer grip, but we were nearly the same height. I bent my neck forward, tucking my chin to my chest, and then snapped my head back with all my might. The back of my skull landed on his nose like a bowling ball. I heard a crunching sound, like someone stepping on a dried bird's nest.

  Derrick cried out and let me go. I didn't bother with a follow-up blow. No need. It was more important that I didn't stay still. No hesitation. There was an open door where the dancer still stood. Moving with everything I had--moving before Buddy Ray could react or Derrick could recover--I leaped over the desk, snatching my phone away from a stillshocked Buddy Ray, and sprinted toward the open door.

  No hesitation.

  The dancer was in my way. That meant having to run her over, if I had to. A second lost could be the difference between making it out and getting caught. I didn't want to hurt her, but there was simply not enough room to get by. Luckily for both of us, she saw me coming and slid to the right.

  I dived through the door and into what might be called a dressing room. There were costumes and boas and lots of dancers crowded in front of one mirror. I expected them to shriek or something like that when I broke through, but they barely looked up.

  "Stop him!"

  It was Buddy Ray.

  I kept moving, running across the dressing room, banging through another door, and finding myself . . .

  . . . onstage?

  The patrons looked surprised to see me onstage. Then again, so did I. One of the men cupped his hands into a flesh megaphone and yelled, "Boo!" The other men joined in. I was about to jump down, but now I saw the other two bouncers rushing toward me. I turned back, but Buddy Ray was there, Derrick following, holding his nose. Blood leaked through his fingers.

  Trapped.

  Distraction, camouflage, surprise, timing.

  I stayed onstage and ran down it, kicking every beer bottle I could. I didn't have a plan other than to create a distraction to the point of chaos. The dancers onstage screamed. The patrons started jumping back, crashing into one another, pushing and shoving. It wouldn't take much. You have a room filled with inebriated, frustrated men who were spending too much money on what really, in the end, was a pretty pathetic Plan B. Testosterone flowed like the watered-down drinks.

  Fights started breaking out.

  I leaped off the stage, hurdling a group of men. I landed on one, rolled off him, kept moving. The sea of humanity behind me provided a wall. Buddy Ray and the bouncers were trying to get through to me. I turned and looked for an exit.

  Nothing.

  Buddy Ray and the bouncers were getting closer. I was cornered again.

  "Psst, this way."

  I spotted the fire-engine-red hair first. It was Candy. She had ducked under a table. I got down on my hands and knees and started crawling toward her.

  Someone grabbed my ankle.

  I didn't bother to look. I kicked out with my foot, mulelike, and somehow I pulled away. I crawled faster, following Candy on all fours. She opened a half door, like an escape hatch, and slid through it. Again I followed her. She was already up on the other side. She helped me to my feet.

  "This way."

  We were in a blue room with tons of throw pillows on the floor and a small round stage with a pole in the center. I heard a noise behind us and started for the nearest door. Candy put her hand out to stop me.

  "Don't," she said with a shudder. "That leads to the dungeon. You don't ever want to go down there."

  She didn't have to tell me twice. I had no interest in visiting the dungeon, thank you very much. I signaled for her to lead the way. We hurried to the other side of the room and pushed against a heavy metal fire door.

  I was outside!

  Candy grabbed my arm. "You don't work for Antoine, do you?"

  "No," I said. I held up my phone. "I'm trying to find this girl."

  Candy gasped. There was no doubt--she recognized Ashley.

  "You know her," I said.

  "Ashley," Candy said. "She was so special, so smart. She was my only friend here."

  Was?

  "Where is she?" I asked.

  "She's gone," Candy said in the saddest of voices. "Once you get into Antoine's van, you're gone forever."

  There was a commotion coming from the other side of the door. Buddy Ray and the bouncers weren't far away.

  "R
un!" Candy said.

  "Wait. What do you mean, she's gone?"

  "No time."

  "I have to know."

  Candy put her hands on my chest, grabbing my shirt. "Antoine LeMaire got her months ago. The White Death. There's nothing you can do for Ashley. She's gone, just like the others. All you can do now is save yourself."

  I shook my head. "She goes to my high school. She was fine last week."

  Candy looked puzzled, but now there was more noise coming closer. "Run!" she shouted, pushing me away as she ran down the alley. "Just run and don't come back!"

  I took off in the other direction, toward the street, running hard and fast.

  I didn't stop until I was back at the bus station, back on the 164 heading home.

  chapter 16

  UNCLE MYRON WASN'T HOME.

  That was fine with me. I looked at my hands. They were still shaking. I had no idea what to do. I couldn't tell him--what would I say? See, I sneaked into this go-go bar with a fake ID, and then, well, the bouncer and some guy named Buddy Ray assaulted me. . . . Right, sure. Who'd buy that? I didn't have a mark on me. Buddy Ray and the big bouncer would probably both swear that they threw me out when they realized that my ID was fake.

  No, that wasn't the answer.

  Candy's words kept echoing in my head. There's nothing you can do for Ashley. She's gone, just like the others.

  I had no idea what she meant by that. Or by the fact that Antoine LeMaire "got her months ago. The White Death." Ashley had been in school. She had smiled and laughed and been so wonderfully shy and--and hadn't Candy said that Ashley was her only friend?

  What was going on?

  One thing was clear. Ashley had secrets. Candy did indeed know her. Worse--a lot worse--so did Buddy Ray.

  So now what?

  I didn't know. What had I really learned here? Not much. The answer, it seemed, still came down to Antoine LeMaire. I had to find him. But that raised a few questions. Most obvious: How? I didn't think it best to go back to the Plan B. Maybe I could hang around and run some kind of surveillance, but really, was that going to work? And that led to my second question: When I find Antoine--the White Death?--then what do I do?

  I started boiling water for pasta, my mind still trying to take it all in. Something played at the edges--something I couldn't quite see yet. But it was there. I sat by myself at the kitchen table. My stomach still hurt from that punch. It would be sore tomorrow.

  That niggling in the back of my brain picked up steam. I got the laptop and booted it up. I wanted to take another look at my buddy Antoine LeMaire at Ashley's locker. I watched the tape. Antoine opens the locker, looks inside, sees it's empty, gets upset. I watched the tape again. Then I realized what was bothering me.

  The locker was already empty.

  Antoine had hoped to find something inside the locker--but whatever it was, it was already gone. That probably meant that Ashley herself had cleared it out. I wondered when. And more than that, I wondered if I could see that moment, if I could see exactly when she had last been in the school. If she had cleared out her locker, it goes to figure that she'd planned to run--that she hadn't met up with foul play or the White Death or whatever other horrible thing could happen to a girl who had some connection to the Plan B Go-Go Lounge.

  It stood to reason that Ashley had emptied out the locker and was on the run.

  Or did it?

  I called Spoon. He picked up on the first ring. I expected him to open up with one of his crazy non sequiturs. But he surprised me.

  "Did you find Antoine?" Spoon asked.

  "What?"

  "You must think Ema and I are morons. A basketball game? Please."

  I had to smile at that. "I didn't find him."

  "So what happened?"

  "I'll tell you tomorrow. In the meantime I have a favor." I told him what I wanted--my theory on Ashley's last visit to the locker being important.

  "Hmm," Spoon said, "we don't know when Ashley was last at the locker."

  "No."

  "And it could have been during the school day."

  "Could have been."

  He considered that. "I guess we could hit speed reverse and see if we can come up with something. Assuming I can get into the security files again."

  "Do you mind?"

  "I'm all about the danger."

  Spoon hung up. Three minutes later, Ema called me. "Have you eaten yet?" she asked me.

  "I'm boiling water now."

  "Do you know Baumgart's?"

  I did. It was Uncle Myron's favorite restaurant. "I do."

  "Meet me there."

  There was something funny in her voice, something I hadn't heard before. "I didn't find Antoine."

  "Spoon told me. But that's not what I want to talk to you about."

  "What's up?"

  "I did some research on that tombstone."

  "And?"

  "And something is really wrong here, Mickey."

  Half a century ago, Baumgart's was a Jewish deli and old-fashioned soda fountain--the kind of place where Dad might order a pastrami on rye while the kids sat at the Formica counter and twirled on stools while waiting for a root beer float. Sometime in the 1980s, a gourmet Chinese chef bought the place. Rather than alienate his base, he simply added to it. He kept all the Jewish deli and soda fountain touches and then added nouvelle Chinese to the menu. It made for an intriguing hybrid. Since then, three more Baumgart's had opened up in various New Jersey locales.

  Ema sat in a corner booth nursing a chocolate milk shake. I sat with her and ordered one too. The waitress asked whether we wanted something to eat. We both nodded. Ema ordered the peanut noodles, Myron's favorite, and something called sizzle duck crepe. I went with Kung Pao chicken.

  "So," she said, "what happened when you went after Antoine LeMaire?"

  "Why don't you go first?"

  She played with the straw in her milk shake. "I still need time to wrap my head around this." Ema took a sip and leaned back. "By the way, do me a favor: if you want to play overprotective daddy with me, just say so."

  "Okay," I said.

  "Don't lie."

  "You're right. I'm sorry."

  "Good," Ema said. "So what happened with Antoine?"

  I told her about my visit to the Plan B Go-Go Lounge. The waitress came and brought our food, but neither one of us noticed. When I finished, Ema said, "I won't even bother with the 'whoa.' This is beyond whoa. It's like whoa on steroids. It's like whoa raised to the tenth power."

  The smell of Kung Pao chicken rose up from the plate and suddenly I realized that I was starving. I grabbed my fork and started digging in.

  "So," Ema said, "you think, what, your prim and proper Ashley danced in a go-go bar?"

  I shrugged mid-bite. "So what did you learn about that tombstone?"

  Her face lost a little color. "It's about Bat Lady."

  I waited. She hesitated.

  "Ema?"

  "Yes?"

  "When Chief Taylor was dragging me away, I saw Bat Lady in the window. She was trying to tell me something."

  Ema's eyes narrowed.

  "I can't swear to it," I said, "but I think she was telling me to save Ashley. I know that makes no sense. But whatever it is, whatever you've learned, I need to hear it."

  She nodded. "We already know about that Jefferies quote, right?"

  "Right."

  "So I searched the other stuff. That line about a childhood lost for children."

  "And?"

  "I found nothing on that exact quote, but I did find this website on . . ." She stopped, shook her head as if she couldn't believe that she was about to go on. "On the Holocaust."

  I stopped with my fork half in the air. "As in Nazis and World War Two?"

  "Yes."

  "I don't understand."

  "It was a reference to some of the Jewish children who joined the underground resistance in Poland. See, some of the kids who escaped the death camps lived in the forest. They fought th
e Nazis in secret. Kids. They would also smuggle goods into the Lodz ghetto, for example. Sometimes, when they could, they even rescued kids heading toward Auschwitz, the Nazis' biggest and most notorious concentration camp."

  I just sat there and waited. Ema picked up her milk shake and took a deep long sip. "I still don't understand," I said. "What does this have to do with the tombstone in Bat Lady's garden?"

  "You've heard of Anne Frank, right?"

  I had, of course. I had not only read The Diary of Anne Frank, but when I was twelve, my parents took me to the house in Amsterdam where she hid from the Nazis. The two parts I remember best: One, the moveable bookcase that hid the stairs up to the secret attic where the Frank family stayed. Two, the Anne Frank quote you see as you leave this somber memorial: "Despite everything, I believe that people are really good at heart."

  "Of course, I've heard of her," I said.

  "There was another girl. A thirteen-year-old Polish girl named Lizzy Sobek who escaped from Auschwitz and worked for the resistance."

  The name rang a bell. "I remember reading something about her."

  "Me too. We talked a little about her in eighth-grade history. Lizzy Sobek's family was slaughtered in Auschwitz, but somehow she escaped. She is credited with saving hundreds of lives. In one documented case, Lizzy ran a February raid that slowed down a cargo train loaded with Jews heading for the death camps. More than fifty people escaped into the snowy woods--almost all under the age of fifteen. And some of those she saved claim"--Ema stopped, took a deep breath--"that when they escaped, they saw butterflies."

  I swallowed. "Butterflies?"

  She nodded. "In February. In Poland. Butterflies. Hundreds of them leading them to safety."

  I just sat there.

  "Lizzy Sobek became known as the Butterfly."

  I may have been shaking my head, but I can't swear to it. I knew that we were both thinking the same thing. Butterfly--like on those T-shirts in the old photograph, at my father's gravesite, on the tombstone in Bat Lady's backyard. It couldn't be a coincidence.

  "Lizzy Sobek," I said--and suddenly my blood went cold again. "Lizzy could be short for Elizabeth."

  "It was," Ema said.

  Elizabeth Sobek. E.S. The initials on that tombstone. Another coincidence? I asked the obvious question: "What became of Lizzy Sobek?"

  "That's the thing," Ema said. "No one really knows. The vast majority of scholars believe that she was captured during a raid to free a group of children starving to death near Lodz. They believe that she and other resistance fighters were shot and buried in a mass grave, probably in 1944. But there has never been any proof."