Authors: Francis Porretto
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Part Two:
The Fledging
Chapter
19
Louis woke slowly, regaining consciousness by gentle degrees. Late morning sunlight streamed through the bedroom window, bright and strong. He hadn't risen so late in the day in years.
Christine lay at his left, her arm across his chest, her face half obscured by her cloud of hair. She was still asleep.
It really happened.
His body felt strange. It was a sensation he could not account for from his illness or his recent surgery. He was permeated with a sense of completion, as if he had been running a race for some incredible length of time and had finally reached the finish line, declared the winner. It was a feeling of warmth and softness, of relaxation and contentment. It was completely outside his experience.
He wondered if it ought to frighten him.
I killed two men and threw their bodies into an alley. I came back here and had unhallowed carnal relations with a helpless woman for most of the night. Two of the worst things I could have done, and I don't feel a twinge of guilt or regret. What's happening to me?
He probed at himself from every direction he could think of. It didn't matter. He couldn't make himself feel anything but happiness and peace.
I'm about to die. I'm going to have to stare God in the face with all this on my soul, and I can't find it in me to regret it!
It didn't work. He was stuck with feeling good.
I wonder how long it'll last.
He sat up and tried to slide out of bed without waking Christine. That didn't work either.
"Louis?"
Her eyes were wide, but there was no fear in them.
"It really happened?"
He nodded and reached down to caress her face. His fingertips traced the lines of scar tissue that latticed her cheek.
"Yes."
She reached out and pulled him against her before he could say another word. Within seconds, he was inside her again, his whole being aflame with fulfillment. Her embrace was unbreakable. The warmth and softness of her flesh became his whole world.
This cannot possibly be wrong.
***
"Louis, are you all right?" Christine laid her hand on his. The kitchen was golden with the brilliant spring sunlight, redolent with the aromas of coffee and blossoming flowers.
He smiled. "Never better."
She snorted. "Why do men think we can be fooled so easily?"
He laughed and sat back in his chair. "What men, Chris?"
"You and the Father."
That got his attention. "What are you talking about?"
"While you were away, Helen and I went to see him. Did you know he was worried about you? He said you never missed Mass if you could help it, and he had no idea where you were. He tried to reassure us that everything was all right, that you were excellent at taking care of yourself. All he did was scare the living shit out of us."
He opened his mouth to reprove her for the vulgarity, but gave up on it before he started. "What did he say that scared you?"
She made an irritated gesture. "It wasn't what he said, dummy. He said all the right things, if you could ignore what his face and body were practically screaming. He even smelled scared."
"But here I am, Chris. Maybe his confidence wasn't misplaced after all?"
She shook her head violently. "He had no confidence. He knew something about you that scared him. He didn't say what it was -- you knew he wouldn't, or you wouldn't have told him, right? -- but that didn't keep Helen and me from catching the fear."
He interlaced his fingers with hers. "Those callers we had yesterday, Chris. Did you know their names?"
She frowned. "Yup. Tiny, Rollo, and Duffy. Why?"
"Were Rollo and Duffy tough guys?"
"You bet your ass. Rollo was Tiny's second in command, and I once saw Duffy kill a guy with one swing of that pipe of his."
He nodded. "And there was Tiny alongside them. The three of them against delicate little me. What were they here for, Chris?"
Her lips parted, but she said nothing.
"For you, wasn't it?"
She looked away.
"But here we sit, warm and cozy in my kitchen, with an English muffin each and a fresh pot of coffee. And where are they?"
"Louis, why did you let Tiny live?"
Well, at least it's a change of subject.
"Would you have preferred to see him die too?"
"Yes." Her whisper quivered with memories of pain.
"I understand. Now, imagine that I'd killed all three of them, instead of sending Tiny back with his tail between his legs. Don't you think the others would have eventually come out here to find out what happened to their fearless leader?"
She turned back to him, comprehension dawning on her face. He rose and poured himself a fresh cup of coffee.
"The lawn's only so big, Chris. If they all showed up, I wouldn't have space enough for the bodies."
He came back to the table, sat beside her, and took her hand.
"I don't like to kill, Chris. But you saw me do it. I know you've seen others do it. Would you say I do it well?"
She nodded.
"But that doesn't mean I want to do more of it than I have to. Three big, tough guys found out yesterday what can happen when you judge a book by its cover. Two went down for keeps, and the third took the news back to about twenty others I never want to meet. I expect they'll believe him. I figured that gave us our best chance of being left alone here. I don't want to have to mine the front yard."
He squeezed her hand and waited for her to absorb it all.
"Louis, could you have taken the whole pack?"
He looked off through the kitchen window at the rhododendrons and honeysuckle that grew in profusion along the eastern run of his fence. He thought of things Malcolm had taught him, had insisted that he learn thoroughly, but that he had never had occasion to use. He thought of the cache of heavy weapons Malcolm had helped him acquire and had trained him to wield. He thought of the way his blood had risen to propel his killing rage, once he'd set his intentions and summoned it to his need.
He said I was better than he was.
All the skills Malcolm had insisted that he master had risen to his hand smoothly and naturally. There had never been any doubt how it would turn out.
Such a terrible thing to be good at.
"They wouldn't have had a chance in a hundred, Chris. My worst problem would have been getting rid of the corpses."
He rose again and took his cup and dish to the sink. Over the hiss of running water, he said, "You've still got some of my old clothes, don't you?"
"Yes, why?"
"Because you're going to need them. You need to know how to do this stuff more than I do. A lot more. And you're going to learn it. Which is not something you can do in a tailored linen suit and high-heeled pumps."
"Louis, Helen is expecting us this afternoon."
"Then we'll start tomorrow."
***
The barracks was edging toward panic. No one had been much worried the previous afternoon. As the sun set, the Butchers began to ask themselves what could be taking so long. As the night wore on, they began to ask one another. Morning found them all together, all strung wire-taut. No one dared to leave, even for a few minutes.
Rusty's emotions were tangled. He didn't much like Tiny. If the Butcher chieftain had decided to abscond with his prize, Rusty wouldn't mind. But if that were the case, why hadn't Rollo returned yet?
If Tiny had somehow managed to get himself killed, that wouldn't affect Rusty much either. But Rollo was committed to Tiny. Tiny's death would necessarily have been accompanied by Rollo's. Rusty wouldn't want that at all.
Supposing all to be well, the strike group could only have gone to ground somewhere, to enjoy themselves awhile with Christine before bringing her back to the barracks and letting the rest of the pack have at her. Rusty didn't much like the thought of that. Rollo was his. But the Butcher lieutenant would have to keep up appearances, an idea which Rusty had begun to find distasteful. He didn't think it likely, but he brooded on it anyway. It was the best of a bad set of possibilities.
It was a few minutes before noon when the front door of the barracks opened. Every head turned to the sound. Tiny stumbled into the room, battered, bedraggled, and alone.
Rusty restrained himself as the rest of the Butchers rushed to their leader's side. The others wanted to give aid and comfort. He wanted to beat the man senseless. The others wanted the story of the encounter. He wanted to know what had become of his lover.
Two Butchers half-carried their chieftain to the old sofa he favored and laid him down upon it. Two others pulled off Tiny's boots for him. The man stank as though he'd bathed in a sewer. The left side of his face was purple and grotesquely swollen. No one said a word until Tiny's voice rose.
"They're all dead, guys." The damage to Tiny's face made his words indistinct. The pack pressed close around him.
"Christine and her fancy man were pulling out of his driveway as we approached. Hell of a coincidence. They saw us and took off. We chased them down fifty-four for nearly thirty miles at top speed."
Tiny paused to shake his head in rueful admiration. "The little shit could drive, I'll give him that. He attacked the road like a pro. In a pickup truck, he kept ahead of us better than most guys could have done on a damn hot bike. Maybe the truck was worked. But just outside Oakleigh he hit some kind of slick, lost control, and went sideways."
The boss Butcher's voice went hollow. "I managed to pull out. Rollo and Duffy didn't. They plowed straight into him. They might have survived the collision, but the truck had pannier tanks. They went up like the fucking Fourth of July. There's nothing left of the bikes or the bodies."
Tiny spoke into a stunned silence. "I went down hard, trying to stay out of it. Landed on my face. Got some broken teeth, maybe a broken cheekbone. Laid in the weeds next to the road till about an hour ago. Got to watch the fuzz clean up and everything. They never even looked my way. Guess I was lucky. Hard to believe my bike started when I kicked it."
No one spoke for a long interval. It was Hans who first found his voice.
"Jesus. That's three good guys we've lost because of that bitch."
Tiny exhaled. "At least there won't be any more." He pulled himself to a sitting position and faced his pack.
"We gotta get out of here, guys. We've been here too long. It's bad luck. We ride tomorrow."
"Where to, Boss?" Mac Swanson's voice was hesitant.
"Ask me tomorrow." With assistance from Hans, Tiny hoisted himself off the sofa and limped toward the bunk room. Every eye followed him.
Low-pitched conversations broke out everywhere among the rank and file Butchers as the door to the bunk room closed. A few made plans for their last evening in Onteora. A few others speculated on the state of Tiny's health and his continued tenure in command. Two riders talked in low voices about the merits of leaving the pack.
Rusty had no interest in any of it. It was Rusty's good fortune that he had been at the back of the gathering, and that Tiny's gaze had never lit on him. The newest Butcher had murder in his eyes. He was screaming
your pussy hunt killed my guy
from every cell in his body.
==
Chapter
20
"Yaaaaaaaaa-AHHHH!"
Christine's grunt was accompanied by a loud clank from the weight train on the universal as she forced her elbows to lock. Louis clucked and shook his head in disapproval.
"You're not supposed to jerk it that way."
She lowered the lift bar until it rested against its low stops, just above her heaving chest. "Why not?"
"Because it doesn't have the muscle-building effect when you do that. And if you jerk it sharply enough, you can tear something, and then you're in real trouble."
"Louis, just where did you learn all this stuff?"
"I had a trainer, just as you do now."
"Did you ever check up on him?"
He snorted. "At first, always, until I became convinced he knew what he was talking about. After that, I just did what he told me." He leaned forward and pulled up on the lift bar, allowing her to slide past it. "Go look at how much you just pressed."
She rose to a sitting position, grabbed the front of her shirt -- one of his old flannel checks, too frayed at the collar and elbows to be worn outside the house -- and flapped it, hoping to cool off. She could feel runnels of sweat pooling in all her hollows and crevices. It would be good to shower.
"Well?"