Lucky Charm (2 page)

“Hello?” he said, groggily, rubbing his hand over his face as he tried to pry an eye open.

“Hey, Matty,” a familiar voice said.

Matt’s mood lightened in an instant. After the dream, it was odd to hear Bill’s familiar voice on the other end of the line.

That greeting was an old, old joke between them – a takeoff from some stupid cereal commercial when they’d been little kids and he’d been a picky eater. Once it had annoyed him, as Bill had intended but they’d been eight or so at the time.

That nickname and the voice on the other end made him smile. At least until he realized what time it was and caught the sound of something wrong in Bill’s voice. It was too low, too tight. Alarms went off. Best friends since those grade school days, he knew Bill too well. Unlike Matt, Bill was a creature of habit. Since they’d gotten out of the service one of his habits was to be in bed by eleven sharp, no later. After being up at all hours when they’d been in Afghanistan, Bill had sworn that nothing in civilian life was going to keep him from a good night’s sleep in a real bed. Matt had teased him about it innumerable times.

Something had to be badly wrong for Bill to be calling at this hour.

What Matt wouldn’t tease Bill about was the worry in his friend’s voice.

He sounded rattled…and that wasn’t like Bill.

Back in the day Matt had protected the more bookish Bill until Bill had grown big enough to take care of himself. Since then they’d been through a lot together, including Afghanistan. Bill was the guy who’d stuck by Matt through thick and thin and some of those times had been both. One thing Matt knew, Bill didn’t rattle easily. In fact, it wasn’t like Bill to get rattled at all, he was a pretty phlegmatic guy. He sounded badly rattled now.

Frowning, Matt sat up straighter on the side of the bed.

“Bill,” Matt said, warily, “what’s wrong?”

His voice a little shaky, Bill said, his voice low, “How’d you know, old buddy? Oh, man, Matt, I need you out here. If what I’m seeing is for real, I am in a heap of shit, my man.”

“Where are you?” Matt demanded, alarm going through him at the sound of Bill’s voice.

He was already reaching for a pair of jeans from the heap he’d left them in on the floor. A quick sniff assured him they were clean enough for another wearing.

“The office,” Bill said. “Can you come out here? I really need your help, buddy, and your advice. I don’t know what I’m looking at here. Or I do and it’s bad.”

The office. Bill’s new job. He’d only just transferred when? A little less than a year ago? What the hell was Bill still doing at the office at this hour? Even with the time difference, only an hour, it was still late.

The two of them had gone their separate ways since they’d gotten out of college, the way everyone does, but they still got together now and then, holidays, that sort of thing. Bill had gotten married, settled down and then been relocated. It hadn’t changed anything. Way back when, Matt had gotten into trouble but Bill had been there. He’d stood by and with him until it was over. He’d gone way beyond the call of duty, way beyond friendship. Matt hadn’t forgotten. He owed Bill. Big time.

He didn’t even think twice.

“Look,” Matt said, “it’s going to take a little time to get there. I’ll catch the first flight out.”

He had the time to take, God knew, since he never took it these days – sick days, vacation days, he had it all coming. It was a bitch about the short notice but Darrin would understand.

This was Bill.

When they’d given Matt the choice of jail or the service, there had never really been any question. Bill had stood by him and gone with him into the service. That decision had kept Matt’s record clean. Bill hadn’t had to do it but he had. Nor had he had to follow him to college afterward, too. He’d done that, too. That’s what good buddies did, stick by each other.

“Tell me what this is about, Bill.” Matt was trying to get his woozy thoughts in order as he yanked on his jeans, still unsettled from the dream.

Bill hesitated, clearly considering it.

“It’s too complicated to explain on the phone. I don’t know if I’m right, buddy, you need to take a look at this shit. Maybe I’m making mountains out of molehills. I’m the one with the MBA but you’re the real numbers wiz. I need you to look at these figures. Maybe I’m seeing things that aren’t there. Maybe I’m imagining it’s worse than I think it is. You’d know that better than I would.”

“Come on, Bill, talk to me,” Matt said.

He didn’t like the thread of fear in Bill’s voice.

“You have to see this, Matt. It’s not one thing, it’s a bunch of things.” Bill’s voice sank suddenly to a whisper. “I have to go. Just get out here, Matt, as soon as you can.”

The phone went dead. Bill had hung up. In all the years Matt had known him, his old friend had never hung up on him.

The concern…no, to be honest…the outright fear in Bill’s voice, and the way it had dropped at the end was the only thing that kept him from calling Bill back.

For a minute, Matt stared at phone while he tried to clear his brain.

What in the hell could Bill have gotten into that would have him that frightened?

Bill wasn’t easily alarmed. After Afghanistan, there wasn’t much that could scare him. It wasn’t like Bill and Matt couldn’t imagine what he could have gotten into that would cause that kind of fear. Bill had a nice staid job working for some big corporation out on the west coast. One thing was certain and that was that Bill was a straight arrow. A few drinks, yeah, sometimes he could pack it away like any guy could but nothing else. No drugs. Not even marijuana. He wasn’t drunk and this wasn’t a joke. Bill wasn’t that kind of guy.

Matt started hauling clothes out of drawers, speed-dialing the airline the company used most of the time. In minutes he was gunning his little MG down his long dirt drive, a plume of dust billowing behind him as he headed to the airport. A few hours later, the longest hours in his life since he’d come back from Afghanistan, and they were touching down. A rental car waited, a nice little red convertible. Not as nice as his MG but hell, he was paying for it, so he might as well enjoy himself.

Darrin – stepfather, friend and boss – had told him to go, do whatever Bill needed, however long it took.

In that Matt was luckier than any man had a right to be. Darrin hadn’t asked any questions but he wouldn’t have. He didn’t need to. He remembered, too.

The company didn’t have anything hot going on or Matt would already have been on it. There were no major fires to put out, not since their last big case had closed so he was free and clear. There were probably other cases Darrin could have dropped Matt into but nothing urgent.

Which left Matt free to find out what was going on with Bill.

Or at least so he thought until he turned the corner onto Bill’s street.

A cold chill went over him. All the blood drained out of his head. He pulled the car over to the side of the road even as he tried to deny what he saw.

A cop car sat up the street.

It wasn’t, it couldn’t be, parked where he thought it was. Even as he thought it, he knew it was true. Knew what it was he felt. Denial.

I’m too late.

Putting the car in gear, he started up the road.

It was some sick nightmare, some strange twilight zone. It seemed like the car moved through some thick clear substance, everything appeared vaguely unreal, a little too sharp, too clear. He tried to fight the knowledge with every foot he drove closer he was more certain it was true.

Then he saw the officers step out of Bill’s house with their hats in their hands, their expressions grim and he could deny it no longer. With a sinking feeling in his gut and acid grief burning inside his chest, he knew it for certain.

In some un-numb part of him, acid grief poured through him.

The cop car pulled away even as Matt brought the rental car to a stop.

Going up to the house, he knocked on the door. Bill’s wife Penny opened the door, her eyes red-rimmed and shocked. Matt’s heart clenched.

That was when he knew. That was when he knew for certain.

Bill had been there for him when Matt had needed him most but time had run out for Matt to return the favor.

All he could do now was find out how and why his friend had died.

It was late, the office building’s halls were dark save for a few lights and Ariel was lost. Not that any of that was unusual, not in these huge glass towers with their multiple banks of elevators that went to different floors. They were like mazes. There should have been signs that said, ‘This way to the parking garage’ with an arrow pointing in the right direction but so far she hadn’t seen one. It had been hard enough for her to find the elevators.

At this hour of night, the offices she passed were dark as well. Only the faint glow of emergency lights illuminated them. She couldn’t even find a cleaning crew. If she had, though, and they’d given her directions, it would have been in terms of right and left, both of which were meaningless terms to her. She couldn’t tell the difference. She’d never had been able to. It was a disability no one had a name for and few even believed existed.

For her it was real enough, all right. She was also tired, exasperated and frustrated.

It had been a long day of finding out that the office here wasn’t as prepared as they’d said they were and then chasing down everything she needed before she could settle down to do the job she’d been hired to do.

Going back to the office she’d left wouldn’t have helped as there was no one left there to ask, they’d all gone home for the night hours ago. She hadn’t been able to bring herself to explain to anyone her tendency to lose her way. It was just too embarrassing. Once she’d been in a small single-story office and even then had gotten lost, stepping out of one room only to find she couldn’t remember the way out.

Numerous people had tried to explain the neat little trick of holding your hands up and sticking your thumb out so one would make an L for left. That only helped if you had time to do it, if left took you where you wanted to go and if the logic of it penetrated. For her it didn’t. Now though the important thing for her was to find her way out of this damned building. Somehow, though, she always did. Eventually.

She sighed. This one would just take a little longer.

Resigning herself to the inevitable, she began to search.

Turning a corner, she closed her eyes for a moment in gratitude. More elevators. She breathed a sigh of relief. Maybe now she could find the damned garage. She looked at the buttons. None were labeled Parking. In fact, this elevator would only take her to certain floors.

Swearing softly, she walked inside and pushed the button for the lowest.

When the doors opened she stepped out cautiously and looked at the signs on the new bank of elevators.

Okay, maybe that was better. At least it was down. There were still no signs for the Parking Garage but L1 looked promising. If she remembered right the parking decks had been below the building. They’d also had elevators for the various levels into the building. Lower one seemed logical.

She stepped out of the elevator into another featureless hallway. Right, left, a set of double doors, beyond which was darkness. Which way? She chose a direction at random. Nothing here seemed familiar but she was in and out of so many office buildings. A different city every week, a different office building. Sometimes two or more offices in the same week.

After a while the people, places and things all blended into a meaningless blur.

The longer she walked down the hallway, though, the more it seemed wrong. The walls were unpainted. Plastic draped unframed doorways. Construction or remodeling. She would have remembered that as a landmark. She didn’t. Her heart sank.

Think. Work it out logically, she told herself.

She couldn’t. She couldn’t remember the way out of the damn building.

Then something caught her attention.

A sound. Or rather, sounds.

Was that a voice?

Voices, definitely. A low rumble, a man’s voice, but it was people talking. They didn’t sound happy. At this hour, she didn’t blame them. A second shift working late maybe?

People meant directions, though. Or so she hoped.