The Wild Zone (20 page)

He reached into his pocket for his cell, checked his voice mail for messages, but there weren’t any, so he returned the phone to his pocket, his hand stopping suddenly in midair. As if possessed of a mind of its own, it disappeared back into first his left pocket, then his right, then quickly into each of them again. “Shit,” he said, his eyes closing with the realization that his wallet was missing. He pushed himself out of the booth, searched his pockets a third time and then the red vinyl seat, before getting down on his hands and knees, his eyes scouring the white tile floor.

“Everything okay here, handsome?” the waitress asked as Jeff clambered back to his feet. She was about fifty years old, with ash-blond hair she wore in a high bouffant, making her almost as tall as Jeff.

“I can’t find my wallet,” he told her sheepishly, trying for his most charming smile.

The waitress, whose name tag identified her as Dorothy, regarded him skeptically. Clearly she’d heard that one before.

“I’m not trying to pull a fast one. Honest,” Jeff said, wondering if his wallet had somehow fallen out of his pocket in the car. “Look. Do you mind if I check my car? I’m parked just around the corner.”

“You wouldn’t be trying to skip out on me, would you, handsome?” Dorothy tilted her head to one side, her hair following suit, threatening to topple over.

“No, I would never do that.” He reached into his pocket, laid his cell phone on the table. “How about I leave this with you? That way you know I’ll be back.”

“Not necessarily. You coulda stole that.”

“I didn’t. Please. Look. You can come with me if you want.”

Dorothy paused as if seriously weighing his offer. “Oh, go on,” she said finally. “But if you’re not back in three minutes, I don’t care how good-looking you are, I’m calling the cops.”

“I’ll be back in two.”

“Leave the phone,” she instructed.

Jeff rushed outside, the sun shining in his eyes like a flashlight, blinding him to his surroundings, as the hot, humid air slammed into his face like a well-placed punch. For a second he was disoriented and thought he was back in Afghanistan. A bubble of panic burst inside his chest, ripping through his insides like a bullet. “What the hell is the matter with you?” he asked, breaking into a sweat and forcing himself to take a bunch of long, deep breaths. It was all that damn coffee, he decided, gradually regaining his equilibrium and trying to remember where he’d parked his car. He turned right, proceeding down the first street and picking up his pace as his car came into view.

He quickly searched the front seat, the back, the floor, even the glove compartment, in case he’d put his wallet in there, then forgotten about it. “Shit,” he said, spinning around and catching his reflection in the polished side of the car’s exterior. He saw himself in his bedroom as he grabbed a pair of jeans from the closet, leaving the original pair—the pair with his wallet in the back pocket!—on the floor. “Shit,” he said again, imagining Kristin picking those jeans up off the floor. Had she found his wallet? Had she called the gym? Or worse? Had she tried to deliver it in person? “Shit.”

“So what are you gonna do?” Dorothy was asking moments later. “That breakfast isn’t going to pay for itself.”

Jeff looked around the brightly lit restaurant, still half-full of people, all of them eating, talking, laughing. “I don’t know what to do. It doesn’t look like my friend is going to show up. . . .”

“Tall girl, dark hair, a little on the skinny side?” Dorothy asked as Jeff’s eyes followed hers to the far end of the restaurant.

She was coming out of the ladies’ room when she saw him and she smiled tentatively, the corners of her lips turning down instead of up.

“Hello, Jeff,” Suzy said.

TWENTY

“S
ORRY
I WAS SO
late,” she apologized when they were seated. “Dave took forever to leave the house, and then I got stuck in traffic. Were you waiting long?”

“Not really,” Jeff lied. “I got here a few minutes early, had some breakfast. You sure you don’t want anything to eat? You’re paying for it, after all.”

She smiled, the smile tugging at the mustard-colored bruise on her chin. “Coffee’s fine.” She took a sip, as if to prove her point. “When I didn’t see you, I assumed you’d gotten tired of waiting and left. Good thing I had to go to the bathroom, or we might have missed each other.”

“Good thing.”

“I’m glad you waited.”

“Why?” Jeff asked.

“What?” Suzy asked in return.

“What are we doing here, Mrs. Bigelow?”

Suzy winced at the sound of her name, as if Jeff had reached over and pinched her cheek. “I don’t know.”

He studied her as she lifted her coffee cup to her lips and took another long sip. She was wearing a simple white blouse and her hair was pulled back into a low ponytail and secured by a jeweled clasp. Her fingernails were polished a faint pink, although several had been chewed to the quick. Makeup hid most of her bruises. Jeff longed to reach across the table and take her hand, stroke her face. He literally ached to touch her. Why? There was nothing all that special about her. Tall girl, dark hair, a little on the skinny side, to use Dorothy’s words. Oh, she was pretty enough, to be sure, but Jeff was used to pretty girls. They threw themselves at him all the time.

What made this one different?

Was it because she
hadn’t
thrown herself at him, had in fact chosen his brother over him, not once, but twice, that made her so unbearably attractive to him? That he had no idea where he stood with her, if indeed he stood anywhere at all? That she was equal parts mysterious vixen and vulnerable waif?

“Do you always wear black?” she asked suddenly.

“What?”

“Every time I’ve seen you, you’re always dressed in black.”

“Is that why you asked me to meet you? To inquire about my wardrobe?”

“I was just curious.”

“There’s no big mystery,” he told her, his voice purposefully sharp. “I wear black because I look good in it. Why did you call me?”

“How do you know I was calling
you
?”

Jeff sank back in his seat, trying not to look too taken aback. The thought that she might have been calling Will had never occurred to him. “You saying you were calling my brother?”

Suzy returned her cup to its saucer. “No,” she acknowledged after a pause. “I was calling you.”

“What if Will had answered?”

“I don’t know.”

“Would he be sitting here now instead of me?”

“No.”

“Why did you call?” Jeff asked again.

“Because I wanted to see you.”

Jeff nodded, as if now that that fact had been established, there was no need for more questions.

Suzy took a deep breath, released it slowly. “To clear up any misconceptions,” she added after a moment’s thought.

“Misconceptions?” Jeff leaned forward, putting his elbows on the table and twisting one hand inside the other. He didn’t like the sound of that.

“Yesterday, at your apartment. I said some things.”

“What things?”

“Things I shouldn’t have.”

“I don’t remember you saying anything particularly regrettable.”

“You weren’t there,” Suzy said. “It was later.”

“You said something to Will?”

“And your friend from the bar, I forget his name.”

“Tom?”

She nodded. “He came over. He was obviously upset. He had a gun that he kept waving around. I thought I better get out of there. He said something about shooting me in the foot to make me stay.” She cleared her throat, looked to the ceiling, then back at Jeff. “Which is when I suggested he shoot my husband instead.”

Jeff nodded, not letting on he’d already heard all about this from Will and Tom. “Interesting suggestion.”

“That’s just the point. I didn’t mean it, and I never should have said it.”

“I wouldn’t worry about it. I don’t think anyone took you too seriously.”

“I’m not so sure about that. The look on Tom’s face when I mentioned it . . .”

“Intense, eager, slightly crazed?” Jeff asked.

“Yes. Exactly.”

“Tom’s normal expression,” Jeff said with a laugh.

Suzy looked unconvinced. “I don’t know. He seemed pretty gung-ho.”

“Did you offer him anything?”

“What do you mean?”

“Money? Sex? A gift certificate to McDonald’s?”

“This isn’t a joke, Jeff. I’m really worried.”

“Tom wouldn’t kill your husband just because you suggested it might be a nice thing to do,” Jeff said. On the other hand, he thought, if
I
suggested it . . .

“I don’t know. I got the distinct impression he thought it would be fun.”

“And fun it might very well be.”

“Don’t talk like that.”

“Are you saying you’d be upset if something
were
to happen to the good doctor?”

Suzy looked away, mumbled something unintelligible beneath her breath.

“What?” Jeff asked.

“No,” she admitted, her eyes suddenly welling up with tears. “To be perfectly honest, I’d welcome it. God, that’s so awful,” she gasped in the next breath. “I can’t believe I said that.”

“Said what? I didn’t hear anything.”

“How can you bear to look at me? I’m horrible. I’m a horrible, horrible person.”

“You’re not horrible.”

“I as much as told you that I wish my husband was dead!”

“Which is completely understandable, considering the fact he uses you as a human punching bag.”

“I have such terrible thoughts,” Suzy continued unprompted. “He’ll be sleeping, and I’ll think about going into the kitchen and getting one of those big, long knives and stabbing him right through the heart. Or setting fire to the mattress. Or running him over with my car. Sometimes I imagine how wonderful it would be if an intruder were to break into the house and shoot him. Sometimes, if I’m being generous, I just wish he’d have a heart attack and drop dead. I even have his funeral all planned out.”

Jeff couldn’t help but smile.

Suzy’s eyes acquired a distant glaze, as if she were looking into the future. “I’d invite everyone from the hospital, all those doctors who admire and respect him, who treat him like some kind of god, and I’d get up in that chapel and tell them their god was really the devil. I’d tell them the truth about their precious Dr. Bigelow, how he tortures me, and beats me, and rapes me. . . .”

“He rapes you?” Jeff’s voice so quiet it was almost inaudible.

“And then I’d have him cremated,” Suzy went on, as if he hadn’t spoken. “And I’d take his ashes and dump them in the first godforsaken swamp I see.”

Jeff reached across the table, took her hand in his. “Bastard deserves to die,” he said.

Suzy nodded. “People rarely get what they deserve.” She withdrew her hand, wiped the tears from her eyes. “Anyway, I shouldn’t be laying this on you. It’s my problem, not yours.”

“I won’t let him hurt you anymore,” Jeff said.

Suzy smiled. “How can you stop him?” She paused, looked deep into his eyes. “Do you want to know why I really called you?”

Jeff nodded.

“Because I can’t stop thinking about you. Because no matter how hard I try, I can’t stop seeing your face. Because I haven’t been able to get you out of my mind since the first night I saw you in the Wild Zone, and I knew right away you were going to be trouble. Because we both know you were right when you said I picked the wrong brother. Because I want you so badly I can’t think about anything else. And I don’t care if I’m just a bet to you—”

“You aren’t.”

“I don’t care if you tell the others—”

“I won’t.”

“Can we get out of here?” she asked, tucking a twenty-dollar bill underneath her coffee cup and pushing herself to her feet.

“Where are we going?”

“There’s a motel around the corner,” she said.

TOM HAD BEEN
watching the woman ever since the store opened. Up and down, back and forth, into every nook and cranny of the clothing-littered aisles she went, her hands brushing up against the floral-print summer blouses hanging neatly in ascending order of size, her fingers checking for softness in the stacks of multicolored velour hoodies on the various display tables, her eyes on the alert for anything she might have missed, any piece of sale merchandise she might have overlooked.

“Is there a problem, Whitman?” the store manager asked, coming up behind Tom.

Tom spun around, startled by the reedy sound of his supervisor’s voice. He hated when people snuck up behind him. “Nothing I can’t handle.”

“What’s to handle?” Carter Sorenson asked. Carter was barely five feet, five inches tall, nearsighted, and twenty-eight years old. Tom hated that he was short, that he wore round, wire-rimmed glasses, and that his voice was pitched like a girl’s. He especially hated that he was younger than Tom and in a position of authority over him. He also hated his name. What kind of name was Carter anyway? Carter was a last name, for shit’s sake, not a given one. Although Carter seemed to like it, which made Tom hate him all the more.

“Just keeping an eye on that woman over there.” Tom indicated the middle-aged woman in question with a nod of his head.

“Really?” Carter asked. “Because it kind of looks like you’re just standing around doing nothing.”

“Is that what it looks like?” Tom fought to keep his hands from wrapping themselves around Carter’s throat and squeezing as hard as he could.

“Has she done anything to arouse your suspicions?” Carter asked.

“Look,” Tom answered, his smile not altogether masking the condescension in his voice. “I’m a veteran of a foreign war, and you kind of develop an instinct for this sort of thing.”

“You’re saying your soldier’s instincts are telling you she’s a potential shoplifter?”

“Combined with my experience in retail, yes. I consider it a distinct possibility.”

At precisely that moment, Angela Kwan, a young Asian salesclerk with long black hair and an irritatingly sunny disposition, approached the woman and asked if she required any assistance.

“Yes, thank you,” the woman said gratefully. “I’ve been waiting for someone to help me, but you were all so busy.” She glanced in Tom’s direction, as if to say, Except for him. He was just standing there.

“Perhaps you could lay off the surveillance for a while and concentrate on helping the customers,” Carter suggested, his thin voice bending with the weight of his sarcasm. “I believe those gentlemen might benefit from your professional expertise.” He pointed to two teenage boys who had just entered the store.

“I’m on it,” Tom told him. “Jerk-off,” he added under his breath as he left Carter’s side. “You guys need any help?” he asked the pimply-faced teens. If there was one thing he hated more than middle-aged women, it was teenage boys. Both groups thought they knew everything.

“Just looking,” one of the boys said, laughing and cracking his gum. Tom thought he heard the word “loser” as they headed for the back of the store. It was all he could do to keep from running after them and pummeling them into the ground.

Instead he stood there for several minutes, feeling Carter’s eyes burning holes in the back of his red and black checkered shirt. What are you staring at? he was tempted to turn around and shout. I asked them if they needed help, didn’t I? If you think I’m going to bust my ass chasing after teenagers for less than eight bucks an hour, you’re out of your mind. If you think I’m going to suck up to every middle-aged broad who comes in here, like that dumb Asian twat you think is so terrific, then think again. When you pay minimum wage, you get minimum results. Did they forget to teach you that at the Wharton School of Business? Tom demanded silently, spinning around on his heels, preparing to stare Carter down.

Except that Carter was no longer looking at him. In fact, Carter was nowhere in sight. Tom released a deep, audible breath into the air, deciding that despite the fact the store had just opened, it was time for his break. He headed out the front door, grabbing a cigarette from his pocket and lighting it before he was even fully outside.

The wide pedestrian walkway that was Lincoln Road Mall was even busier than usual. Tourists, Tom thought disdainfully, taking a deep drag off his cigarette. Why couldn’t they just stay home? They were noisy and demanding and overly enthusiastic about damn near everything. He noted an elderly couple on the corner consulting a map and a couple of gay guys across the street arguing over directions. An attractive woman with ebony skin and silver stiletto heels sauntered by, carrying three bags from Victoria’s Secret. One of the bags brushed against Tom’s cigarette as she walked by, and she turned around and scowled, as if she thought he’d placed himself deliberately in her path. Bitch, Tom thought. You think I’d try to set fire to a bunch of thongs and push-up bras?

What was it with women anyway? Was he supposed to snap to attention just because he might be in her way? It was almost like they expected you to read their minds, he thought. Like that woman in the store—how was he supposed to figure out she wanted help? Would it have killed her to ask? And this bitch in the stilettos—if she’d wanted him to move, all she had to say was “Excuse me.” A little politeness never hurt. And Lainey, for shit’s sake. If she’d wanted him to spend more time at home, if she’d wanted him to be a more attentive father, if she’d wanted . . . hell, who knew what she wanted? He wasn’t a mind reader, for fuck’s sake.

Or that girl in Afghanistan, he thought, her image appearing in a puff of cigarette smoke, undulating seductively in the cloudless blue sky. Hadn’t she smiled when he and several other soldiers, including Jeff, had entered her tiny, barely furnished house, searching for signs of the enemy? Hadn’t she lowered her eyes—the only part of her he could see under that damn burka—and giggled coquettishly, a sure come-on? How was he to know she was only fourteen years old? How could he understand that she was saying no when she refused to speak English?