Authors: James W. Hall
An older woman moved behind the boy, put a hand on his shoulder.
“There some kind of problem here, Anthony?”
He shook his head at his boss.
“Is there a problem, sir?” she said to X-88, bending forward to see him.
“Your business is an abomination. Do you consider that a problem?”
X-88 didn’t wait for an answer. He rolled out of the drive-through and eased across the parking lot.
Turning onto the highway, he stripped the burgers from their buns, rolled down his window, and tossed the bread and paper sack out the window and stacked the three warm patties on the passenger seat. Sickening smell.
A mile down the road he saw right away that Twelve Mile Swamp wasn’t going to work. He’d been picturing a wild, deserted marsh where human flesh decomposed fast. Instead it was a state park, high fenced, with all its entrance roads blocked with gates and guardhouses.
So X-88 circled back and cruised past the cluster of motels and fast food joints and kept heading west onto the narrowing two-lane, leaving behind the 7-Elevens and gas stations and stoplights, the glow of civilization, driving out into the piney woods that covered most of Florida when you got fifteen miles inland from the coast.
A few sandy roads sprouted off the main highway. Hardly any traffic. A house or two, then not even that. Just dark woods and empty sky. No moon, no scattering of stars.
Brights on, X-88 drove another mile into the wilderness, chose a side road, pulled off, bumped over potholes and rocks and lumps that scraped the undercarriage, went about a half mile as the road tapered, branches brushing both sides of the car. No mailboxes or house lights through the trees. He’d have to back all the way out, but overall it felt right.
He shut off the ignition, cut the lights, lowered the windows. Listened to the crickets celebrating the darkness, the whir of insects, a distant car passing on the lonesome highway. He sat for a while staring out the windshield into the night until he heard a muffled thud that woke him from his daze.
He left the parking lights on, picked up the three patties, and got out, went to the trunk. He stuffed the meat into his trouser pocket, then opened the trunk and stepped back. You couldn’t be too careful with a woman like this. But the gag had held and the flex cuffs were still locked around her wrists and ankles.
“I’m going to let you out. Don’t fight me. I’ll get rough if you do. That’s not what I want. Do you understand?”
She stared at him. Unbelieving. X-88 patted her arm, what he meant as a reassuring gesture, but she cringed.
“Do you understand what I just said?”
She stayed frozen.
“I regret you had to spend so much time in the trunk. There was no way to avoid that. You’re probably dehydrated, dizzy, confused.”
She grumbled something rude through the gag. Still not trusting him.
“Okay, here we go. I’m going to stand you up.”
He cradled her body, lifted her over the lip of the trunk and set her on her feet on the sandy roadway. Holding her steady until the wobble had gone from her legs. Little woman, mussy blond hair cut short. He couldn’t see her face that well in the light from the trunk. But he’d gotten a good look at it before when he hauled her out of the stolen car. She was in her fifties, showing some road wear. A pugnacious attitude. Smart mouth.
“Now let me get this off.”
He unknotted the gag, squatted down, flicked out his knife blade, and freed her ankles. She was breathing hard, still swaying.
“I’ll cut loose your wrists, but first we come to an understanding.”
“Like what?” Her voice hoarse and breathless.
Something rustled in the woods, an animal moving through the brush. X looked toward the sound, made out a clumsy shadow and caught its scent. Woodsmoke and musk clinging to its fur, the pungent tang of spoiled garbage. When he was a kid he’d smelled the same scent at a roadside zoo. Black bear.
A needle-sharp ping stabbed him in the frontal lobe. He breathed his way past the pain and shifted back to the woman, put his knife in his pocket.
“Why’re you doing this?” the woman said. “What did I do wrong?”
“Not a thing.”
“You work with Cruz, I met you in Key Largo.”
“Now see, that right there is the entire issue. You met me, you saw me, and you recognized me. That, Tina, is the reason we’re out here right now.”
She couldn’t speak for a moment, swallowing. Looked X-88 in the face, then stumbled backward, bumped the car fender, nowhere to run.
Again he got a whiff of the bear. Crushed grass in its coat, its teeth moldy and rotten. An old fellow, not long left either.
“Tell me what you want. Money?”
X was looking off at the woods. Enduring this out of respect for the victim. If she wanted to prolong her last moment, try to bargain her way out of this, who was he to deprive her of a little extra time?
“I’m not motivated by money.”
Her wild eyes roved his face.
“Christ almighty. She double-crossed me.”
X-88 sighed.
“What’s your name? Tell me your name.”
“Not relevant.”
This was a woman used to talking her way out of things.
“Look, I did what she asked me to. Everything, exactly the way she said. I dropped that postcard in Sugarman’s mailbox, it got them going like she wanted, and there at the gas station she pulls out her badge, and I make a run, steal that car, that green car, and she said that would be the end of it. I drive to Key Largo, leave the car in a lot somewhere, walk home. She never mentioned you forcing me off the road, grabbing me, holding me hostage.”
“Plans change.”
“I did what I was supposed to. Now I’m supposed to go home and wait. This isn’t how it goes. She and I worked it out. The step-by-step process. I cooperated. I was a hundred percent certain Sugar would go along with Thorn, and before he left the island he’d call me and tell me he was leaving, and I had my story ready. It was all planned out. It went off without a hitch. Until now.”
“You talk a lot.”
“Did you hear what I said? Cruz is a federal agent. She’s tracking terrorists. She’s after Thorn’s son. I was just helping out her investigation.”
“Sure you were.”
“I was being a good citizen.”
X-88 said nothing.
“You’re not going to let me go. You’re going to murder me.”
“Don’t take it personally.”
“Does Cruz know you’re doing this? Does she?”
“This is you and me, Tina. Is Cruz here? Do you see her? We’re off the reservation, you and me. This is my play.”
A tear broke loose from one of Tina’s eyes. Then a second tear.
“Did you hear what I said? This isn’t the plan. I did what Cruz asked, every single thing. She’s your boss, right?”
“Nobody’s my boss.”
“You got to let me go. I won’t tell anybody about all this.”
“Let me ask you something,” X said. “I were to let you go right now, what would you do? Give it to me, the play-by-play. What would you do?”
“Find some way to get home, ride a bus, whatever. And I’d never say a word to anybody. Never a word.”
“This guy, your boyfriend, Sugarman. He cuddles up to you later on, it’s late at night, you’ve made some sweet love, and he whispers in your ear, asks you real nice, what’s the deal, Tina? You’re not going to tell him anything?”
“Nothing,” she said. “I’d never say a word.”
“Yeah, yeah, you say that. But, Tina, you’re a talker. I’m around you two minutes I can see that. You like to gab. Am I wrong?”
She licked her lips.
“No,” Tina said. “I’d never speak to a soul about any of this.”
“But see, I can’t trust your word. And I’m in an awkward position. This woman, Cruz, she’s got one thing on her mind and one thing only, like Ahab and his great white shark. And she’s in such a goddamn hurry to accomplish that one thing, she forgets about loose ends. She never thinks what might come back to bite her. And that’s fine for her, maybe nothing will ever bite her. But I’m not that way. I don’t like loose ends, see. Because sooner or later one of them is going to come back, and before you know it that loose end has wrapped itself around your throat and you’re hanging from it.”
“It was a whale, not a great white shark. Ahab and his whale.”
“Really?”
“Really. It’s a book about whales.”
“I been saying it wrong all this time?”
“You’re thinking about
Jaws,
that’s the one with the shark.”
“Ahab and his whale,” X said. “Well, thank you.”
“Look.” Tina put her hand on her heart. “I swear on my mother’s grave I won’t say a word, never, ever.”
“I’m sorry, sweetheart, but that part’s over, we’re finished with it, okay?” X looked up at the dark sky, easing into this. “So listen, Tina, you familiar with ‘gavage,’ the word?”
Since she seemed confused he spelled it for her.
She drew back, eyes tightened as if peering at him from a great distance.
“Before Raiford, I didn’t know it either. What it means is force-feeding. You know, how they handle a prisoner on hunger strike, jam a tube down his throat. And how they do ducks and geese to fatten them up for foie gras. Gorge, that’s the literal meaning.”
“Look, I know what,” she said. “You got a cell phone. Let me call Cruz, talk to her. At least let me do that. Maybe you misunderstood something, she can straighten it out.”
“Tina, Tina. Don’t you hear me? Cruz isn’t here. This is you and me. We’ve moved on. We’re done haggling. Look around you, look at the sky overhead, the stars, take it in. It’s time to say good-bye to all this.”
“No, no, you’re a good man, you’re good. Please.”
They always said please. Every one of them.
Please, please.
Like if you got polite, made nice, the abracadabra word they’d learned when they were kids, that would set them free.
Please, pretty please.
Never once had X-88 said the word, not in his entire life. Never heard it in his house growing up. Lots of other words, but not “please.”
“Oh, mother of Christ.” Tina looked away into the dark woods, swallowing again, buying a few seconds, then in a defeated voice said, “Look, do this for me, at least do this. Will you? Tell Sugarman something, will you?”
X was quiet, waiting for her.
“Tell him I meant no harm. Cruz came, I told her what I knew, the postcards Thorn gets. She offered money if I’d help. I needed it. My shop, I’m bankrupt, can’t pay my lease. Tell Sugar, okay? Will you? I didn’t mean for anyone to get hurt. Tell him I love him. That’s the truth. Tell him that for me, I love him, I really do. Will you do that for me?”
“If I meet up with him, sure, I’ll repeat every word of that speech. Now, you ready for this, or you going to talk some more?”
“Oh, holy Christ.”
With his left hand he clutched Tina’s hair and rocked her head back. She fought him, twisting side to side, but X outmuscled her, got her still.
“Think of this as drowning,” he said to her. “Everybody says drowning isn’t such a bad way to go. So this is drowning, only not in water.”
Using his free hand, he dug out the three hamburger patties.
He balled up the meat one-handed and crammed it into Tina’s mouth. When most of it was inside, he clamped his hand over her lips.
Tina gagged, snorted, tried to bite the palm of his hand. But X held his hand firm against her flailing, plugging up her airway to a count of ten, to a count of twenty.
When he felt her weakening, he released her hair, pinched her nose shut, cradled her in the crook of his arm like a waltz partner until Tina’s struggling slowed and she grew still. Her weight slumping against him.
That’s the technique Manny Obrero taught him at Raiford finishing school, the hands-on, natural way to keep the target from howling for help. Brutal and simple. Steal something solid from the cafeteria, ball it up, back the target in a corner, no tools, no blade. A mouth packed with food, keep the lips shut. A reverse Heimlich. Manny liked to say killing this way sent a message to the intemperate indulgers, the gulpers. Put the fear of god into them. A method so quick and outrageous, some didn’t even put up a fight.
X-88 hadn’t thought to bring a shovel.
He dragged her body fifty yards through lashing branches and spiderwebs, so far into the forest he could barely make out the parking lights.
He laid her out flat. Looked at her body for a moment. He spoke her name,
Tina Gathercole,
like a last rite, then he turned and left her remains behind.
Fresh meat. An offering to that sick old bear waiting in the shadows.
SEVEN
JUST AFTER EIGHT, CRUZ TOLD
Sugar to take the next exit, look for a motel, Holiday Inn, Hampton, one of those.
“We’re driving straight through,” Thorn said. “Sugar’s on a schedule.”
She turned, flashed a hard smile and said, “Pine Haven is not a town you want to arrive in the dark.”
Sugar said, “I’ll stop, but you level with us or we’re ditching you here.”
“It’s very simple. To locate Thorn’s son, you’re going to need my help. You barge into this without knowing the cast of characters, chances are very good Flynn’s a dead man.”
Thorn and Sugar shared a quick look. Neither trusted her, but damn it, this wasn’t a risk they could take.
Along motel row, Cruz pointed them to a Best Western. A Waffle House on one side, burger joint on the other.
They carried their bags inside, Cruz handling the duffel. She set it in her room, unlocked the door on her side. Sugar did the same and swung it open.
Thorn stood in the center of the motel room, eyeing the anonymous furniture with a nagging sense of dread. A hard pressure was growing in his chest, and the atmosphere seemed to have thickened as it does just before a thunderstorm, a density and weight to the air that registered against the skin as lightly but as surely as the first brush of a bull shark.
He sat on the foot of the bed, absently ran a hand across the bedspread, its surface tacky from the fluids of the strangers streaming through the room. There was an undertone of mildew.
“Listen, guys, I’m starving,” she said. “Would you mind, Sugar?” Cruz motioned through the open drapes at the burger joint glowing in the night across the parking lot. “I’ll lay out the details over dinner.”