The
Womens’ sign triggered a powerful Pavlovian response. If I didn’t get to a
toilet this instant the factory was going to suffer a massive flood. Groping my
way to the women’s room, I found a stall and peed for what felt like a half
hour. Muffin trotted into the next stall and lapped thirstily out of the
toilet. Another first for Vanessa’s pampered pooch.
By
the time I emerged from the womens’ room, my pupils had enlarged and I could
pick out shapes in the dark. Which was why I was able to see, directly across
from the restrooms, a row of battered steel lockers. Adrenaline washed away
fatigue. “We found them!” I yelled to Muffin, then clapped my hand to my mouth.
Whatever was sleeping here in the shadows, I didn’t want to disturb it.
“Ten nineteen,” I
whispered, creeping along the row of lockers. The locker numbers were too small
to read in the dark. Maybe there was a light switch here someplace?
As I fumbled for a switch, a sound from
the brining room made me jump. Muffin growled. The door to the lunchroom
creaked. I whirled around, heart in throat, watching in terror as it slowly
opened. Someone stood in the doorway watching me, a dark shape silhouetted
against the murky shadows. Judging by the size, it was a man. He flicked on a
flashlight and stabbed the light in my eyes.
“Gotcha!”
Escape tip #27:
If
you can’t use your head,
use your feet.
Muffin
shot forward and attacked, snarling canine curses. The man yelped in pain;
hopped on one leg, lost his grip on the flashlight.
“Get
him off me!”
Blood
resumed pumping through my heart chambers. “Labeck?
“Mazie?”
“What’re
you doing here?”
“Rescuing
you, what’s it look like?”
I
hurried over and peeled Muffin off him. Reluctantly allowing himself to be
restrained, Muffin continued to growl deep in his throat, warning Labeck that
if he put a single foot wrong, his intestines were going to be Muffin’s bedtime
snack.
Labeck
stooped for the flashlight, shone it on me, gave a visible start. “What
happened to your hair?”
“Kim
Jong Zippoed it.”
Labeck’s look of bewilderment seemed
genuine, but being drugged, buried alive, and kidnapped by giant sausages had
made me paranoid. I backed up, keeping an arm’s length between me and Labeck.
“Bear’s guys. The Janitors. They were going to burn me up.”
“Jesus,
Mazie.”
“But
then the brewery sort of caught on fire.”
“The
old Brenner brewery? You can see the fire all over the city.
You
started
it?”
I
was tired of being blamed for things I hadn’t done. “I just told you,” I
snapped. “It was the Janitors.
And stop shining that thing in my face.”
He
aimed the beam down. We stared at each other, our faces skull-like in the
backsplashed light.
“We
can hash this out later,” Labeck finally said. “Let’s get the locker first.”
“You
know about the locker?”
He
started moving along the rows of lockers, shining the flashlight at the
numbers.
“The station sent
me to the stadium to film the sports idiot doing player interviews. When I came
out, the parking lot was empty—except for my car. The car you
stole—
”
“Borrowed.”
“Oh,
excuse me. Big difference. Anyway, these two kids were standing next to it,
arguing—”
“Eddie
and Rico?”
“Yeah.
They weren’t too happy when I showed up demanding to know what the hell they
were doing with my car. The kid with the weird hair jumped me, said he’d kill
me if I didn’t tell them what I did with you. But we got it all straightened
out, once I had them both down on the ground with my knees in their
kidneys—”
“God,
Labeck—you didn’t hurt them, did you?”
He
snorted. “Mazie, that Arguello kid isn’t exactly a cream puff. Anyway, they
told me how you suddenly disappeared while they were in the can. They figured
those guys you called Janitors must have taken you. The only thing we had to go
on was the pickle factory. I figured I’d rush over here and play superhero. I
told the sports prettyboy to drive the truck back to the station, then I took
off in my car. Great plan, except for the part where the car runs out of gas
two blocks later.”
“Uhh
. . . I guess that was sort of my fault.”
“It
took me an hour to walk to a service station and come back with a can of gas.
Then I headed onto the freeway and got locked in the world’s worst traffic jam.
Total gridlock. I-Forty-three was closed down because of blowing smoke. They
said on the radio that traffic’s backed up to the Illinois border. It took me
two hours to get to an off-ramp.”
He aimed the
flashlight at a locker. “I think this is it.”
We both gazed at
locker number 1019. It was an ordinary-looking locker. Gray metal, about the
size of a file drawer, with a built-in keyhole lock.
“It’ll
be empty,” I said gloomily. “It’s been four years.”
“Don’t
be too sure.” Labeck yanked on the door, which didn’t budge. “I’ve seen
calendars in this place dating from 1978. Where’s the key?”
“Kim
Jong and General Custer took it.”
He
heaved a deep sigh. “I’m not even going to ask. Move aside.”
He
reared back, raised his right leg, kicked the locker in.
“Jeez—why
don’t you just destroy the whole place?”
He
yanked open the stove-in door and dragged out the locker’s contents. A denim
jumpsuit that smelled like fermenting pickles. A pair of beat-up sneakers. A
handful of coins. A crumpled time card. Labeck shone the flashlight on the
card. “Luis Ruiz,” he said softly.
Labeck
handed me the coins. This was it? Disappointment washed over me, leaving me
feeling sick. Two quarters and a dime? That’s what I’d been risking my life
for?
Labeck
turned the jumpsuit’s pockets inside out, but found nothing.
I peered into the
locker and spotted something stuffed into the back. Groping for it, I retrieved
a battered Spiderman backpack. Labeck hovered as I unzipped it, fingers shaking
with excitement. Inside was a plastic 7-Eleven bag, knotted at the top,
probably containing the moldy remnants of a lunch Luis had never gotten to eat.
“We’ll
look at it later,” Labeck said. “Let’s go.”
Labeck hauled the locker loot while I
carried Muffin. Moving cautiously, we left the building and crossed the parking
lot to his car. The passenger-side window of the Volks was smashed.
“What
happened?” I asked.
“I
punched it out.”
“I
think you have anger issues.”
“I
have don’t-want-to-stand-around-waiting-for-a-locksmith issues. I smashed the
window so I could get in the car.” He tossed Luis Ruiz’s stuff into the backseat,
then turned to me. “You do have my car keys, right?”
I folded my arms
and gazed off toward the canal.
“Never mind. I
suppose Wild Bill Hickock took them. Here, hold this.” He thrust the flashlight
at me.
I slapped it back
at him. “Want me to tell you where you can shove that?”
Labeck stared at
me, bewildered.
“
Hold this!
Move aside! I’m here to rescue you!
I’m sick and tired of you giving me
orders.” I was hissing like an angry cobra.
Labeck looked
around nervously. “Mazie, quiet down—”
“Don’t tell me
what to do!” I knew he was right; I knew I ought to be quiet, but suddenly
everything I’d endured over the last twenty-four hours bubbled up and I was so
furious I wanted to run around like Muffin, biting and snarling. “I was doing
just fine until you arrived and started bossing me around!”
“Mazie, there’s a
guard not fifty feet away—”
“How do I know
you’re not one of
them
?
You might be planning to bump me off now
that you’ve got the locker contents.”
Labeck matched my
scowl with one of his own. Then he took a deep breath and muttered, “I have no
plans to bump you off, Mazie Maguire—you’ll just have to trust me on
that. Now will you please shine the light on the dashboard so I can start the
damn car—notice the
please
—a
request, not an order.”
That was as close
to an apology as I was likely to get, I figured. Snatching up the flashlight, I
shone it into the car’s interior. Labeck, who was built way too big for a small
car, grunted with the effort as he squeezed into the space beneath the
dashboard and began jabbing wires.
Something
sparked. Labeck cursed, sucked on a finger, and the engine started.
“Where’d you
learn to hot-wire a car?” I asked.
“From
the president of your fan club.” He uncurled himself from beneath the dash,
backed out of the car, and worked his cramped shoulders.
“From
Eddie? Where is he?” Using Luis’s backpack like a whisk broom, I swiped broken
glass off the passenger seat. “If the Janitors go after him and Rico—”
“Mazie,
relax. Get in.
Please
get in. Those two will be okay. I told them they
ought to hide out until things cool down. They’re going to stay with one of
Woody Woodpecker’s relatives for a couple days.”
I
hoped Eddie and Rico had enough sense to keep a low profile, but neither of
them had exhibited much common sense so far, so my expectations weren’t very
high.
“Where are we
going?” I asked as Labeck got behind the wheel.
“Back to my
place.” He shot me a look. “Or is that being too bossy?”
I shrugged, secretly
grateful Labeck was willing to take me in again, but not in a
mood just now to express my gratitude. We
pulled out of the factory parking lot, Muffin in my lap, Luis’s pack in the
backseat, and Labeck driving at exactly the speed limit, not wanting to risk
being stopped by a cop. He kept to side streets, probably because the freeway
was still a mess. He looked over at me. “You okay?”
“Peachy-keen.”
“Your
hand is bleeding.”
“Oh,
it’s nothing. It’s just where they tried to chop off my fingers.”
“Christ,
Mazie.”
I
smiled to myself in the dark. Labeck cared. I was pretty sure he was on my
side.
“Tell
me what happened. Start at the beginning.”
I
did. I was too tired to care whether I could trust Labeck 100 percent. I was
willing to shoot for 90 percent. He was a careful driver, but a couple of
times, as I described the events of the past thirty-six hours, he almost ran
into parked cars.
“Brenner?”
His voice rose. “Brenner as in United States
Senator
Brenner?”
“He
said I was nothing but a big disposal problem.”
“That
son of a bitch. I’m going to kill him.”
I
knew Labeck was indulging in a bit of testosterone-fueled chest-pounding, but I
appreciated the sentiment nonetheless. A guy going off to slay giants on my
behalf—if I hadn’t been so exhausted, it might have been kind of sexy.
The
sky to the north was a smoldering rose, the fire reflecting off the plumes of
smoke rising high into the night sky. It was spectacular, but looking at it
made me feel sick. That could have been my ashes floating upward in those
clouds of smoke. By the time I’d brought Labeck up-to-date on
everything—being rescued by Claudette and Bobby Ray, escaping from the
hospital, meeting up with Rico and Eddie, being kidnapped by Racing
Sausages—we were nearly back at Five Points.
“What
did you do to this guy?” Labeck asked, sounding dazed.
“To
Bear? I don’t know. But it has something to do with the Instamatic snapshot.
You were right about Brenner, Ben—I never should have trusted him.”
A silence, then: “So you’re calling me
Ben
now?”
“I’m
calling you the name that was on your shirt. It
is
your name?”