The Sexiest Man Alive (23 page)

“It’s infected, all right,” Mazie said. “You need to have a doctor look at that.”

“No doctors!” Shayla said in a panicked voice.

Mazie frowned. “I’ll do what I can. Let’s get it washed first. Feel up to taking a shower?”

“Oh, God, yes. I haven’t been clean in two weeks.”

Mazie led her to the bathroom and showed her how to work the shower. Shayla wearily stripped off her clothes, seemingly too tired to feel embarrassment.

“Won’t the water loosen the bandages?” Shayla asked.

“That’s what we want—so they’ll slide off painlessly. How’d you hurt your foot?”

“I ran out of the Hog barefoot that night.” Shayla stepped into the shower. Mazie handed her a bottle of shampoo and a washcloth. “I stepped on something in the parking lot—broken glass, I think. It hurt like hell, but I didn’t want to stop. If the Skulls caught me, I knew they’d do a lot worse than that. They torture people before they kill them.”

Shayla turned on the water and talked above the noise. “I ran out into an alley. I could hear them back in the bar, shooting up the place. I thought they were murdering everyone. I was so scared, I wet my pants. Then I heard the choppers coming down the alley and jumped into somebody’s yard. I stepped in dog shit—maybe that’s how my foot got infected. I circled back the other way and ran until I came to this gas station. I still had my cell phone with me, in my pajama pocket, so I phoned Daryl.”

“Daryl?” Mazie asked.

“Yeah. I met him one night at the Hog. Brandi always made me stay hidden up in her room, but it was hot as blazes up there, so I’d sneak downstairs to the bar sometimes. Anyway, I was tired of Brandi bossing me around. I didn’t trust her, either. She was on Kit Kat—always looking for her next pop.”

“Kit Kat?”

“Ketamine. Special K. It’s all over these days, a cheap high. Anyways, I met Daryl at the bar, right? He says I’m cute and gives me his number, tells me to give him a call. He was really old—like in his thirties, and no way would I have gone out with him, but when the Skulls were chasing me, Daryl was the only other person I knew in the city.”

The water turned off. Mazie thrust two bath towels in through the curtains. Shayla climbed out, one towel wrapped around her body, the other turbaned around her hair. Mazie had her sit on the toilet seat and examined her foot.

“I’m going to put some antiseptic on this,” Mazie told her. “The non-stinging kind. What happened after you phoned this Daryl?”

“He came over right away,” Shayla said. “Picked me up in his car and drove me to his place. He lived in a duplex not too far away. At first he was real nice—he put Band-Aids on my foot and let me sleep on his sofa, but he turned out to be a creep. I stayed at his place all the next day, but then he started drinking and turned mean. Said if I expected free room and board, I better put out for him.”

Mazie patted Shayla’s foot dry, then gently spread salve on the wound, noting from the
way the girl winced that the spot was tender. She laid a thick gauze pad over the cut and secured it with adhesive tape. “And then?”

“I pretended Daryl was getting me all hot. I told him I wanted a bath first so I’d be all nice for him. I went in the bathroom and turned on the tap. While the water was running I dug some of his stuff out of the laundry hamper—it felt creepy putting ’em on, but I couldn’t run around in my pj bottoms and cami. I climbed out his bathroom window, intending to run, but then I noticed Daryl’s bike in the driveway. The dumb ape had left the key in it, and his boots and helmet were in the seat pouch.”

“You stole his bike?” Mazie said. “Pretty smart.”

Shayla shook her head. “No, it was dumb. See, the chopper was a Triumph, and Ricky Lee always said that model was the ugliest motorcycle ever produced. It looks like it was made from tractor parts and it’s got this bump on top of the fuel tank. Plus it’s orange and black—how hideous is that?”

“I’ve got a car that could beat it,” Mazie said, then remembered she no longer had possession of the Vittles Van. She took her blow-dryer out of a drawer and handed it to Shayla. “Go ahead and dry your hair. I’ll find you some clothes.” Mazie found a bra and underpants, jeans, a red T-shirt, a navy hoodie, and thick white athletic socks that would cushion Shayla’s foot, then stood outside the bathroom door while the girl changed.

“The thing with motorcycle people is, they notice other people’s choppers,” Shayla said through the door. “And a Triumph sticks out like a tank.”

A chill skittered down Mazie’s spine. “You think the Skulls might have seen you driving Daryl’s bike?”

“I don’t know, but I bet they’re out there looking. They’re like the Mafia: if you’re on their hit list, they never stop hunting until they find you.”

Feeling suddenly vulnerable, Mazie went around closing blinds and double-locking doors. Shayla emerged from the bathroom, wearing the borrowed clothes, and Mazie tried not to mind that her jeans looked better on the eighteen-year-old body than on hers.

“Are you hungry?” Mazie asked.

“Starved.”

“Do you like fried egg sandwiches?”

Shayla grinned. “I’m so hungry, I’d eat fried grasshoppers.”

In the kitchen, Shayla watched as Mazie hauled out bread, eggs, cheese, milk, and pickles. “Help yourself to whatever you can find in the fridge,” Mazie told her. Shayla took out a can of cream soda, popped it open, and took a long, thirsty slug.

“Where’d you go after you stole Daryl’s bike?” Mazie asked, cracking eggs into her cast-iron skillet.

“I didn’t know where to go. I didn’t have any money and Daryl had my cell phone. I hung out at the beach, hid the bike in some bushes, and fished food from the trash bins. I stayed in the park that first night, slept on the ground, and pulled the jacket over me for a blanket, but whenever I started to doze off I’d dream that the Skulls had found me and I’d wake up, terrified.”

Mazie nodded, remembering her own fugitive days. A day in the park wasn’t a day in the park when there were people out there who wanted to kill you. The bread popped up from the toaster and she buttered it, then flipped the eggs onto the toast, laid cheese slices atop the eggs, and added the second layer of toast. “But you weren’t in the park all this time?” she asked.

Shayla shook her head. “I got friendly with this lesbian couple I met at the beach. They lived in this big old house near the university campus, kind of a commune for lesbians and gays. I guess they felt sorry for me because they said I could crash with them for a few days. They let me store the Triumph in their garage and I sort of worked for my keep, washing windows and scrubbing floors.”

Mazie handed Shayla her sandwich and a glass of milk. The milk was gone in a flash and she practically inhaled the sandwich. Mazie handed over half of her own sandwich.

“Then yesterday I heard on the news about Brandi’s body being found.” Shayla picked crumbs off her plate and popped them in her mouth. “Brandi sold me out to the Skulls—probably for a few hits of K. But I don’t hold it against her—I mean, not after what they did to her. I heard about it on the news.” Tears welled up in Shayla’s eyes.

Mazie waited while Shayla struggled to get herself under control.

“After the Skulls killed Brandi, I felt like they were getting closer,” Shayla went on, fisting the tears out of her eyes. “One of the women who lived in the commune was a biker. Bikers know other bikers. They’ve got a grapevine like Twitter, and this woman had a mouth with no
OFF
switch. I had a funny feeling that I needed to split—know what I mean?”

Mazie did. Gut instinct had saved her life more than once.

“So I bugged out. I felt exposed being out in the open again. As long as I wore the helmet
and jacket, no one could tell I was a girl, but word must have got around that I was riding the Triumph because this morning I was driving along the lake and these two guys on choppers started tailing me. I managed to lose ’em, but I knew they wouldn’t stop looking for me. Then I remembered about you, Mazie—how you said you’d help me.”

“How did you find me?” She hadn’t given Shayla her address.

“Asked around. You’re pretty famous, you know. Someone told me you lived on the East Side. I kept asking and asking, until finally I talked to this one street guy, a wino, blind in one eye—”

“Tony?”

Shayla shrugged. “I didn’t ask his name. He said sure he knew you; you always gave him a fiver or a ten when you could spare it. He said he thought you lived in this drag queen store on Brady. So I found Magenta’s store. I checked the mailbox on the side of the building and saw mail addressed to you. I’m sorry I snooped, Mazie, but I had to—”

“Don’t worry about it. All I ever get is Publishers Clearinghouse junk.”

Shayla fished the last pickle out of the jar and ate it. “I came back here after dark, left the bike in your driveway, and knocked on your door. Only you weren’t home, so I hid in that big bush and waited and—well, you know the rest. I don’t know what I would have done if you hadn’t come back.”

“Shayla”—Mazie looked her straight in the eye—“you’re in serious danger. I’ll do my best to help you, but you’re not safe here, either. You have to turn yourself in.”

Shayla bit her lip. “I know,” she said in a small voice. “But I don’t know if I can trust the cops. Ricky Lee said most of ’em are on the take.”

“Is that why you ran away instead of going to the police?”

“I didn’t think the police could keep me safe. I thought they might put me in jail, and the jails are full of gang members.”

“Do you know Johnny Hoolihan?”

Shayla shrugged. “A little. I heard he’s one of the better cops.”

“You can trust him. I’m going to phone him right now. My phone’s down, but I’m going to go use the phone in the shop out front.”

Shayla looked terrified. “Then what’ll happen?”

“They’ll put you in protective custody, I think.”

“That sounds like jail.”

“You’re not going to jail. They’ll put you up in a decent hotel and assign a female police officer to guard you. Listen—don’t even think of leaving while I’m out. Promise?”

Shayla nodded. She looked so exhausted Mazie wasn’t sure she was even capable of running. “Hold Muffin if it makes you feel calmer,” Mazie said. “Just don’t let him get up on the counter because he’s a slut for butter.”

“Okay.”

Mazie grabbed her keys and let herself out of her flat. The air had cooled, and she shivered in her light top and skirt. The panty hose that she’d been sweltering in earlier now felt pleasantly warm on her legs. There, half-hidden behind a row of trash cans, was Shayla’s motorcycle. Anyone who was seriously searching for it could easily spot it. Talk about a dead giveaway! She’d wheel it into the backyard, Mazie decided, but when she attempted to move the bike, she discovered that it wouldn’t budge. Were its brakes on? Motorcycles were foreign territory to her; she’d have to ask Shayla how to maneuver it.

As Mazie turned to go back inside, an arm came up around her throat.

“Be quiet”—a voice hissed, and something sharp pricked her throat—“or you’ll die.”

He smelled like engine oil and sweat. He was huge, his voice seeming to come from miles above her head. Another man rose up out of the shadows and loomed in front of her—she just glimpsed a bandanna-covered face before a flashlight stabbed her eyes, blinding her.

“It’s her, all right,” said the bandanna guy.

The knife was abruptly withdrawn. Something large and plastic was flung over her—a tarpaulin? Mazie was shoved roughly to the ground, then rolled over and over inside the tarp until she was cocooned in it, arms pinned to her sides, the heavy vinyl obstructing her mouth and nose. She panicked, trying to wriggle free, struggling to breathe.

There was the sound of an engine, the
beep beep beep
of a large, reversing vehicle, then the scrape of brakes as the vehicle stopped. Mazie felt herself being hoisted, carried, dropped onto the hard surface of what she guessed was a truck.

“Check the house,” said the bandanna man, keeping his voice pitched low.

A moment later she heard Shayla scream. Something shattered; Muffin barked; a man cursed. Using every ounce of her strength, Mazie bucked and writhed, tore with her teeth, clawed with her nails, fought to free herself from the tarp.

The sound of scuffling bodies, booted feet, Shayla’s voice, muffled by something—a hand over her mouth?

“Found another one,” rumbled a bass voice. “Now what do we do?”

“Take ’em both,” ordered Bandanna.

She felt the impact as Shayla, crying out in pain, was shoved in next to her. Muffin was nearby, too, barking frenziedly, sounding as though he was on the driveway beneath the truck.

“Shoot the little fucker,” snarled the big man.

“No!” Mazie tried to yell, but the tarp muffled her voice.

“No guns.” A third voice, apparently the truck’s driver. “You want every geezer around here calling the cops?”

Muffin must have jumped up into the truck because suddenly she could feel him right next to her, whining and scratching at the tarp.

“What about the girl’s chopper?” asked the guy with the mine shaft voice.

“Get rid of it. Toss it over the fence,” the driver said.

Curses; grunts; a dull, metallic-sounding crash. Hurrying footsteps, a reverberating thump as the truck’s rolling overhead door slammed down. The engine revved, the brakes released, and they were moving.

“Oh, Jeez, oh God—I’m so sorry I got you into this, Mazie,” Shayla babbled, ripping at the tarp. Mazie shot her arm free, then her leg, and at last her head. She gulped in air and rubbed her eyes, trying to see. But no matter how wide she opened her eyes, everything stayed pitch-black. Kicking off the rest of the tarp, Mazie lurched to her feet and began groping around. They were inside the cargo hold of a large truck.

“I led them straight to you. I thought I’d lost them, but they must have tracked me down to your place.” Shayla’s voice broke. “Now they’re going to kill us both.”

Distressed by Shayla’s panic, Muffin whined. “Shh, baby,” Mazie said, picking him up, holding him close.

“They must have thought you were me.” Shayla’s voice trembled. “We’re about the same size, with dark hair. I didn’t know what was happening until they suddenly busted in and grabbed me.”