by Keri Lake
Stubborn as fuck.
And the intrigue just keeps on with this girl.
It takes me about twenty-five minutes to get dressed and feed a small bit of tuna to the kitten I’ve named Vince. By the time I catch up with Nola, she’s already a couple miles down Grand Avenue, and I slow my car along the curb, rolling the window down.
“C’mon, I’ll give you a ride.”
She glances toward me for a second. “I told you, I can walk. It’s no big deal.”
“Quit being stubborn. I don’t have time for stubborn. Just get in the car.”
“I know that. You don’t have time. It’s okay. Look, I wasn’t putting this on you. Really, I wasn’t.”
“I get your MO. You don’t ask for help. You asked me, and that was probably a big deal for you, so get in. I’m driving you.” I stop the car alongside her. “I’m not going to ask again.”
“Oh, yeah? What’ll you do, instead? Chase me down and drag me into the car?”
“If absolutely necessary, yes.”
“Fine.” She rolls her shoulders back like she’s brushing off her pride, then throws back the passenger door and slumps into the seat beside me. The way she mulishly crosses her arms beneath her breasts pushes them up toward the low dip of her flannel shirt.
I take off down the street, shaking my head. “I can’t tell if you’re brilliantly manipulative, or just pig-headed to a fault.”
“Well, I’m still getting a feel for whether, or not, you’re a closet serial killer, so I guess we’re even.”
“Did you call Jackson yet?”
“No. I was too busy dealing with a hangover and asking you for a ride. Both of which have only made my headache worse.” She clutches her skull, sadly covering up the cleavage from a moment ago. “I haven’t had a hangover since before Oliver was born.”
“Bloody Mary. Make sure you get the good vodka. Not the cheap shit.”
“I can’t do Bloody Mary’s. For one, they’re gross. And … well, they’re just gross.”
“So, how did you get home last night? Drunken stumble of shame?”
“Someone offered to drive me. Which had me all believing in the goodwill of men when I woke up this morning. Must’ve still been drunk to ask you for help.”
“And this Good Samaritan is a friend of yours?”
“He’s been coming into the diner for a while. All the waitresses know him.”
“All except you?”
“I never really talked to him much, until last night. But he seems like a nice guy. Which is a rarity these days.”
“He’s probably trying to screw you.”
“Excuse me?”
“Is he an older guy? Younger guy?” My question is part curiosity, part ruling out a potential killer.
“Younger than me.”
Too young to be my sadistic uncle then.
“If I was attracted to a woman, I’d play the nice guy angle, drive her home to find out where she lives. If he pops in to check on you, he’s definitely trying to get you in the sack.”
“Well, thanks for that … worldly advice, Voss. That’s my car parked over there.”
I turn into the lot of the Cobblestone bar and pull up behind the white Jeep. “Good luck today, Star Wars.”
“Thanks for the ride,” she says, clambering out of the passenger seat. “Good luck at your … meeting, or whatever you’re doing.”
The moment she reaches the Jeep, I steer the Audi toward the exit, waiting on the rush of traffic. In my rearview, I see her get into the car, and after a good thirty seconds, it still doesn’t fire up, evident in the lack of smoke from the exhaust.
It’s only when the traffic has passed, and I turn out onto the road, that I see her climb out of the Jeep, throwing her arms up into the air.
My guess is that her piece of shit car won’t start.
‘Fucks sake, this woman is one disaster after the next. Everything inside of me says it’s not my problem. She’s not my problem. After all, I didn’t come here to play guardian angel to a woman who doesn’t seem to have her shit together. I came to catch a deranged psychopath, who plans to add a new set of eyeballs to his collection.
And yet, without much prompting from my head, I turn the car back around and, parking alongside her, find her clutching the steering wheel and resting her forehead against it. There’s something about her that I can’t quite put my finger on. She’s strong, but vulnerable in a way that doesn’t come off as pathetic. It appeals to me, somehow. The tenacity of a woman who refuses to break, even when shit keeps weighing her down.
A sadist’s wet dream.
The moment she catches sight of me, she turns her head, as if to keep me from seeing her, and wipes at her cheeks.
Leaning onto my elbow, I stroke my chin to bury the chuckle begging to escape. Not at her, but at the ridiculous nature of it all. If this were a cartoon, the vehicle would fall apart all around her, and she’d still be left stubbornly clutching that steering wheel. “What’s the problem?”
“It’s nothing, Voss. Really. I called my brother. They’re just getting home from church, but he’s going to come get me. So, you don’t have to stay here.”
“What’s happening with the vehicle?”
“I tried to turn the key over, and it’s not starting. I don’t know what’s wrong with it.”
“Have you called a tow truck?”
“I’m waiting for my insurance to tell me if it’s covered.”
“And if it’s not?”
“I’m just trying to take this one step at a time, so I don’t lose my shit and end up in a straitjacket. But either way, I’ll figure it out. So, just go.”
“How about I give you the rent and security deposit we talked about, but never finalized. Three thousand, I think? You call a tow truck, a therapist, whatever you need to deal with the problem.”
“It was only the security deposit and the first month’s rent. Twenty five hundred.”
“Well, I haven’t yet gotten rid of the cat, so consider the extra a pet deposit.”
“The cat is the least of my worries right now. If this ends up being the starter, I’m probably going to need a case of Xanax, more than anything.”
“Well, before you get drug-happy, you need to get your car out of this lot.” I reach into the glovebox and pull out my wallet, counting out ten hundred dollar bills that I hand off to her. “Here’s a thousand. I’ll transfer the additional two thousand. Can you receive cash payments to your phone?”
“Like, Apple pay? I think so.”
I pull up her phone number and transfer the funds in a matter of a couple clicks. “Done. Now do whatever you need to do to get your son.”
“Voss … I can’t …. This isn’t right.”
I don’t bother to tell her that my time is more valuable to me than the few extra bucks I’ve offered. That I’d much prefer to part with the cash, than sit and watch her ponder all the ways she can stubbornly refuse what I owe her anyway. I get a sense that Nola is the type who’d bleed out for someone and reject the tourniquet that’d save her from hemorrhaging to death. “Are you all set, then?”
Still teary-eyed, she swipes at her cheek again and nods. “Thank you for this.”
There’s a strange sensation humming through me when I stare back at her half-cocked smile and shiny eyes. A zap of something foreign and gratifying at the same time. The way one might look upon a small bird that has just eaten from the palm of his hand.
The very thought has my fingers curling into tight fists, just as they would with a bird so trusting.
With a nod, I throw the car in drive and attempt to get on with my day.
Goodwill of men.
Bullshit.
The Royal Roadway motel has to be the seediest joint in Chicago, located at the intersection of Jackson Boulevard and Highway 50. The kind of place that takes cash and rents by the hour. Scanning my surroundings, I stride up to the room number that’s written on the inside flap of the matches and check the d
oor. Peering through the narrow gap in the curtains shows an empty room inside, bed made as if it hasn’t been slept in, at all. A Do Not Disturb sign dangles from the doorknob, which I attempt to turn.
Locked.
The maid cart, two rooms down, draws me to where an older woman, maybe sixty, gathers up sheets from the room’s unmade bed.
“Excuse me,” I say, interrupting her cleaning.
She swings around, frowning. “Can I help you?”
“I left something in my room. Locked myself out. Just wondering if you could let me back in?”
“I’m sorry, you’ll have to get a key from the office.”
Tugging the fifty from my pocket, I flash it in front of her. “It’ll take only a minute.”
Lips tightened, she huffs and hobbles toward me, swiping the proffered money on the way, and leads me back toward the other door. Two seconds later, I have full access to the room and don’t waste any time in my search. Under the bed. In the nightstand. The maid stands in the doorway the whole time, watching me. It’s not until I reach the bathroom that I find what I’m looking for. Set out on the counter is a cheap men’s watch. I lift it from the sink, examining it for any sign that it might be the ignition switch for an explosive, or something. On the back, etched in its gold plating: To the moon and back is all that’s written.
I don’t have time to disassemble the thing here, to make sure there’s no tracking device inside, so I stuff it in my pocket and offer a smile as I pass the maid. “Thank you,” I tell her on the way out.
“No problem.”
Once inside my car, I remove a small pocket knife from the glovebox and pop the back cover that holds the dedication. The likelihood of something being small enough to attach inside is slim, but I don’t take any chances. Nothing but gears. After replacing the back, I stuff it into the console beside me and fire up the vehicle. I don’t leave, though. Instead, I park a few lots over, alongside the curb, where the door to the motel remains in view, and I wait.
Ten, twenty, thirty minutes pass with no disturbance.
When a thought strikes me, I exit the vehicle, pulling a pack of smokes from my pocket as I do so, and I pretend to drop my lighter, elated when it falls beneath the car. I steal a moment to make a quick sweep of the undercarriage and find a small black device attached there.
A tracker.
Bastard must’ve watched me enter the room and planted it then. No doubt, he’s watching me now, so I leave it in place, retrieving my lighter, instead, and keeping on with my ruse by taking a few quick puffs of my cigarette.
“Good one, asshole. But not good enough.”
If it were me, I’d have taken a shot already, but I know that’s not how he works. Carl doesn’t want fast and easy. He wants me to play his game until the end, drawing each moment out with the same agony with which he torments his victims. Having been one once, I know this about him. Unfortunately for him, I’ve come to enjoy games just as much.
I click an app on my phone, one designed by a friend of mine I met in the military, who went on to study at MIT. He provided me with the VPN app I use to conceal my IP address, but it also contains a GPS spoofer.
The first step is to jam his tracker, which will merely look like a delay in movement.
With the phone set out on the seat beside me, I leave the parking lot and head toward the nearest mall, keeping an eye on the traffic in my rearview, in case anyone is following behind.
Choosing a crowded part of the mall’s lot, I steal the last spot between two large SUV’s, then make my way into the mall. Once inside, I pop in to the nearest rest room and set the spoofer’s location to the Jansen estate, my old house, about ten miles north—only address I can think of off the top of my head. After a good five minutes, I execute it, before taking my time walking back to my car.
The dot on his tracker should’ve set back into motion and will appear like I’m on my way toward the old house. I am, but not before he gets there first.
A block up the street from the Jansen estate, I wait inside my idling car for a vehicle to arrive. Two minutes later, a white panel van pulls up in front of the house and sits in the driveway.
I snap a quick pic of the license plate.
Instead of climbing out of the vehicle, though, the driver backs out of the drive, and I miss the opportunity to plant the tracker back on him.
Fuck.
He takes off the way he arrived, and as I pass the house, following after him, I toss the tracker out the window.
Keeping about five car lengths behind, I follow him through the streets, until we reach a place called Duli’s Diner—the same diner noted in Nola’s progress notes by her psychiatrist.
Parked across the street, I watch him clamber out of the van, his face concealed by a black hoodie. Minutes later, a couple exits the diner. They don’t even register on my radar at first, since the guy is taller and isn’t wearing a hoodie, until the two of them jump into the same damn panel van. Suddenly, my what the fuck sensors go off.
Where the hell did hoodie go? And who the hell is this couple now?
The two drive out of the diner parking lot, leaving me to decide which one to go after. Dude in the hoodie is still in there, and he’s the one I’ve been chasing this whole time.
Instead of following after the couple, I make my way across the street and enter the diner, scanning over the handful of people inside. Not a single one wearing a hoodie.
The guy in the booth across from me gives me a once-over, his burger halfway to his mouth.
“You seen a guy come through here wearing a hoodie?” I ask him.
He hikes a thumb over his shoulder and gives a nod. “Think he went out the back door.”
With quick strides, I make my way down the adjacent hall, where the bathroom and kitchen doors line the corridor. At the end of the hall stands an exit, but the squeal of tires from behind has me spinning around, and I race back to the front of the diner.
Before I get a chance to see the vehicle, it disappears out of the lot.
“Fuck!”
The older couple sitting in the booth nearest to me look up with a shocked expression, but instead of offering an apology, I slam through the door.
Lost again.
11
Nola
I stare down at the cash that fills my purse. One thousand dollars. Another two thousand sits in a wallet on my phone. In seconds, Voss turned my world from impossible, to what every white collar in the world must feel like. How liberating it must be to deal with issues so quickly and efficiently that they hardly make so much as a hiccup in the day. That’s what I imagine Voss’s life must be like. If something is broken, he has the means to fix it. When he wants something, he has the means to get it.
I sign the paperwork for the tow and hand over a hundred-dollar bill, waiting on the change. Hell, when was the last time I waited on change, instead of counting out pennies to meet the required charge?
The garage is going to keep the car and have offered me a rental in exchange, and a shiny red Explorer pulls up to the front of the building. The driver from the rental place conveniently located next door tosses me the key. “All set.”
All set.
The only reason any of this is all set is because of Voss. Had he not given me the cash, I’d probably be scrambling to figure out how the hell to pay for everything, because apparently my insurance doesn’t cover rental.
I drive the new car, which rides like a dream, to Jonah’s house, and smile when Oliver walks up with a confused look on his face. “Hey, Champ, how ya like my new wheels?”
His brows furrow deeper, and I chuckle.
“Just a rental. The Jeep took a shit, so I have to drive this until it’s fixed. Hop in.”
Jonah strolls up behind him, holding a mug that says Not all heroes wear capes. “Everything work out with the Jeep? I’d have come picked you up, you know.”
“Everything is great. Voss helped me out.”
“Voss, huh?” Eye squ
inting, he takes a sip of coffee. “So, how is the new roommate?”
Oliver’s head snaps in my direction, and I catch Jonah’s flinch.
“Sorry. I forgot he hasn’t heard the news yet.”
Licking my lips, which suddenly feel as dry as cotton, I scratch the nape of my neck and smile back at Oliver, unsure of how he’ll feel about another man in the house. I meant to tell him and introduce him to Voss. Eventually. “So … there’s a guy. He’s going to be living in the apartment behind the house.”
Oliver’s pale blue eyes glower with the kind of anger that could peel the paint right off the walls, and when he directs his attention toward the windshield, crossing his arms, it’s a sure sign he isn’t thrilled with the idea.
“It’s only for a month, Oli. And we’ll have some extra cash. In fact, I was thinking we could order some pizza tonight. How’s that sound?” I haven’t ordered a pizza in months, thanks to being flat ass broke after groceries and bills.
“Um. Diane … she ordered pizza the other night.” There’s a sheepish quality to Jonah’s voice, as if he still feels bad for ruining the surprise. “Sorry, Nola.”
“No. No, that’s fine. Maybe I’ll make dinner tonight. Something good that you used to like as a kid.” I ruffle his hair and force a smile. “You still like spaghetti, right?”
Eyes sliding to the side, Oliver nods and unravels his arms.
“Good. Spaghetti, it is!” Twisting the key, I fire up the Explorer, trying not to let Jonah see the look of relief on my face. He’d tell me that I don’t have to try so hard to make Oliver happy all the time, that everything I do is enough, but Jonah doesn’t know what it’s like to go to bed every night feeling like it isn’t. He doesn’t understand that a parent’s worst fear is watching a child try to deal and silently process the brutal and unforgiving nature of some human beings.
I try to put myself in Oliver’s shoes every day, and it makes me angry, too. The betrayal, the fear, the untimely annihilation of innocence.