The Take (5 page)

After throwing
on some clean clothes, he untaped the metal suitcase. It was still there, all
nine hundred eighty-five thousand of it. Reaching inside his small closet, he
pulled out his own worn-leather suitcase, secured with wide straps. He shoveled
the dough into it, siphoning off a couple of grand into his pocket for scat
money. He tossed a few clothes into the bag’s remaining space before buckling
it shut.

After
shoving the heater back into his waistband, he headed for the door, but the
footsteps in the hallway stopped him cold.

Pulling
the .38 out, he gripped it with both hands up alongside his cheek. He froze
behind the door, first heaving with tension, then, as the footsteps came
closer, unable to breathe. With the cold metal against his face, he heard them
stop right outside his room. His heart pounded louder than the sharp knock.

“Eddie.
You in there? Open up.” It was the delicate accent of Felina.

Exhaling
in relief, he opened the door. Her eyes smiled at him as she entered. She had
never looked at him that way before. All at once, his anxieties melted away
into the humid morning. Now, he was warm as the sun, loose and relaxed.

“Holy
Jesus, girl,” he said, returning the weapon to his waistband. “You scared the
living shit out of me, coming up here like that. What’re you doing here?” He
glimpsed the hallway. It was empty. “Where’s Val?”

She
shut the door, then walked over to the couch. Her face grew serious.

“Did
you see this?” she asked, holding out a copy of that morning’s Houston
Chronicle
. Eddie took it from her
without taking his eyes off her lovely face. She tapped the paper to redirect
his attention. He finally looked at it.

The
headline exploded at him out of the front page:

ONE KILLED, ONE WOUNDED
IN SHOOTOUT ON MEMORIAL DRIVE

“A
suspected Houston drug dealer was seriously wounded and his driver killed last
night as they sat in a Rolls Royce on Memorial Drive inside Memorial Park,” he
read aloud, in complete disbelief, “Leonel ‘Chico’ Salazar, 32, is listed in
serious condition at Ben Taub Hospital with a gunshot wound to the stomach. The
driver, Antonio Chávez, 24, was killed with a bullet to the chest and one in
the head, execution- style.

“Salazar,
a Mexican-American, who says he is a foreign car salesman, has long been
suspected of being one of the city’s kingpins of the cocaine trade, with direct
ties to the drug cartels of Colombia.

“Police
speculate robbery as the motive. Salazar’s passport was found on his person,
and a check of the airports revealed he had planned to fly last night in his
private plane to the Cayman Islands, an offshore banking haven frequently used
by drug dealers. It is believed he was carrying a large amount of cash when his
Rolls Royce was stopped on Memorial Drive. A passing police car found the two
men inside the car,
probably minutes
after the attack.

“There
are no suspects at this time.”

Eddie
looked up from the paper, eyes wide, color drained from his face.

“Son.
Of. A. Bitch,” he tried to say from way back in his throat. It almost made it
out.

“The
cops have it figured out,” Felina said coolly. “But like it says, they got no
suspects.”

“Christ,
Salazar is still alive. And he saw us. If he puts it together, we’re dead.”
Eddie looked at the paper, then back at Felina. “What’re you doing here,
anyway? And where’s Val?”

“He
doesn’t know I’m here,” Felina said. “He gave me some money for cab fare and
sent me to my mother’s place out in Channelview to say goodbye.”

“Goodbye?
Where you going?”

“He
wants to leave town now. He says he wants to take me with him. But I know too much.”

“Know
too much? What’re you talking about — why shouldn’t you go? You’re his
woman.” A twinge of regret brushed him as he said that.

“Eddie,
you don’t understand.” Her voice sharpened. “There’s a lot of money at stake. A
lot of money. This is the biggest score he’ll ever make and he knows it. He can’t
afford to leave loose ends lying around.”

“Loose
ends? What loose ends?”
She looked away. “I just … I just can’t go with
him.”

“What
do you mean you can’t go with him? Why not?”

She
lifted her head up to look straight at him with those
big, big dark eyes. “He wants to kill me.”

Eddie
dismissed this, waving the back of his hand.

“Aw,
you’re nuts. Why would he wanna do that?”

“He
wants to,” she replied. “I know he wants to. Because I know the whole story. As
long as he thought he was only gonna get thirty or forty thousand dollars, he
didn’t care if I knew. He thought Salazar would let the whole thing drop. But
now … now, with the shootings and … and all this money. Well, Val can’t afford
to have me around. With me out of the way, that’s just one less thing he’s got
to worry about.”

“Felina,
you’re blowing this way, way out of proportion. You’re his woman. He wouldn’t
hurt you.”

Acid
crept into her voice. “Yeah, I’m his woman, all right. He’s fucking three other
bitches that I know of right now. Probably more. Are they his women, too? Tell
me, Eddie. Are those bitches his women, too?” The sweet lilt was gone from her
accent, elbowed out by this feverish anger.

Eddie
didn’t want to get into any of this.

“Felina,
I don’t know what he does in his spare time. I —“

“Listen.
What I know could put him right in the death house. As long as I’m alive, I’m a
threat to him. He thinks I could give him to the cops. Or worse yet, to
Salazar.”

“Shit,
you wouldn’t do that.” It was more of a question. But by now he wasn’t sure
what she would do.

“No,
but he thinks I would. He thinks I’d rat him out. Last night after you left, he
warned me not to try it.”

“Well,
I think he knows you well enough to —”

“Eddie,
wait. You don’t understand.” She put a hand up to silence him. “I’m like, a
witness, you know? For a million
dollars,
he’s not gonna leave any witnesses.” Then she said softly, “You, Eddie. You’re
a witness, too.”

His
head moved forward a little, in sync with the slight dropping of his jaw. He
didn’t say anything for a few seconds. Then, “What the hell are you talking
about?”

Her
tone ratcheted downward, becoming steely. “He’s gonna kill you. Today, in Denny’s
parking lot when you go to meet that loan shark. He’s gonna be laying for you.”

He
grabbed her arms, then jostled her a little. She yielded, turning rubbery in
his grip. “What do you mean, he’s gonna kill me? Why’re you saying this?”

“`Cause
it’s true!” Her eyes flared, as she shook loose from him. “He told me he was
gonna take care of you today and grab your share of the money. He knew you’d
have it with you.”

She was
right. He wouldn’t leave it anywhere, especially now that he knew Salazar had
survived. His only choice was to skip town, pronto. Val knew it, too. Val also
knew that before Eddie went anywhere, he had to get straight with Raymond
Cannetta. “He told you he was gonna do that?” His voice was ice.

“This
morning. As soon as he found out about Salazar. He said he was gonna go to
Denny’s and ‘take care of a few things’ was what he said. Eddie, don’t you see?
The prick wants it all. He fucking wants it all. And with the both of us out of
the way, he’ll get it!”

He
believed her. Shit, he wanted to believe her. Her quick eyes and hard manner
belied her childlike face. It was an
innocent face, one that veiled the fiery woman he wanted. And when he
looked at that face, his fantasies took him straight into the swamp.

Just
one look, that’s all it took.

“Why’re
you telling me this? Why’d you come here?”

“He
treats me like shit,” she exclaimed. “He fucks those other women whenever he
wants to, and then he comes home and slaps me around. He hurts me bad, Eddie.”

His
heart sank at this thought. How could she ever put up with it? Was Val’s sway
over women that powerful? “H-he hurts you?”

Turning
on the sofa to face away from him, she undid the first couple of buttons of her
gray cotton blouse. She pulled it down over her shoulders to reveal wide red
welts and healing scratches across her back. Eddie gasped for real. Then she
looked back at him.

“From
his belt. And his buckle, too. When I wouldn’t give him head the other night.”

He
gathered her in his arms, then stroked her bare brown shoulders, easing his
fingertips over the raised welts. She felt good. Better than good. Better than
he’d ever imagined, and he had imagined this moment many times.

She
whimpered a little, as if she were about to cry, so he held her just a little
tighter to guard against it.

“It’ll
be all right, baby,” he said. “I won’t let anything happen to you.”

“Eddie,
we’ve gotta do something. He plans to kill us both.”

He
continued caressing her shoulders, pulling her blouse down just a little
further. She didn’t stop him.

“I’ll
get there early and wait for him,” he said. “I’m packin’ heat, so if he tries
anything, I’ll just plug him right there.”

Felina
sat up straight. She pulled her blouse back in order.

“I
don’t think that’s a good idea,” she said.

“Whaddya
mean? Why not?”

“Because.
You don’t want to turn Denny’s parking lot into the OK Corral. The cops’d be swarming
all over the place in no time. You might not get away. There would be witnesses
for sure and somebody’d probably get your license number. Besides, he might get
you before you got him.”

“You
got any better ideas?”

“Well
…” Her arms tightened around him; she buried her head in his chest.

“What?”

“He can’t
hurt us if we’re not here, can he?” she murmured into his shirt.

“N-not
here?”

She let
out a single giggle. Then she pulled away to face him, as a trace of a smile
cracked open. “Not here. As in gone.”

“You
mean. … you mean, leave town? Together?”

“We’re
in this together, Eddie. We both need to get away. If we leave together right
now, he’ll never find us. It’s a big country.”

“But he’ll
come after us for sure. Especially if he knows I’ve got you and the money. And
then there’s Salazar. Shit, he’ll never stop lookin’ for us.”

“Salazar?
Where’s he gonna look? He’s never gonna know where we are. Think about it. How’s
he even gonna know
who
we are?” She
was now referring to them as a unit: we. It sounded good. He was growing to
like it.

“Where
we gonna go?”

As he
started to think about it, he became distracted. She moved just a little closer
to him. He searched the deepest part of her eyes and found what he was looking
for. At long last!

“Far
away,” she breathed. Her lips moved next to his, then her eyes began to close. “But
… oh Eddie, right now, right this minute, just promise me you won’t let
anything happen to me. Ever. Promise me. Please …”

His
mind reeled. He whispered, “I promise, nothing will ever happen to you, darlin’.
I’ll never let —”

She
shushed his lips with her slender index finger. “Please protect me, Eddie.
Please don’t let him get us.”

She
kissed him long and wet.
He
reached for the top button on her blouse. Her hand came up to hold his.

“No
Eddie.” Her voice was so soft now, so feathery. He could’ve sat right there and
listened to it forever. “Not here. Not now. We’ve got to get out of here.”

Eddie
kept fiddling with the button, more quickly now, but just couldn’t get it undone.
She pulled his hand away.

“No
Eddie, please. We can’t. Please.” She slipped from his grip, but still held his
eyes. “I’ll make it all up to you, Eddie. I promise. I promise you …”

She
melted into his chest for another urgent kiss. Finally, all he had ever
hungered for in a woman was right here in his arms, her writhing chest pressed
against his, wanting him … only him.

E
ddie punched up
the numbers on his cell phone.

“Raymond?
This’s Eddie. Listen, I got your money, Raymond. All of it … yeah. Yeah, but I
can’t meet you at our usual place today. I just can’t, man … No, no, I’m in a spot,
Raymond. I’ve — I’ve gotta … No. You can’t come here. I gotta lay low for
awhile. I know, I know what I promised. This isn’t an excuse, Raymond. I got
all your money — the whole load. Right. Vig and all. Maybe I can send it
to you — you know, registered mail or something? Shit, I know you don’t
do business that way, but I’m in a jam, Raymond. No, I wanna pay you back, I
swear, I got it all right here. It doesn’t matter where I got it, I just got
it. All of it. Raymond, I’m not trying to … Raymond?” Click. “Raymond? Raymond?”