10 Ten Big Ones (21 page)

What's with that?

I said goodbye to Al and beamed the television off. I dragged myself into the bathroom but decided to forego the shower. I brushed my teeth and got dressed in the clothes on the floor.

I was desperate for coffee, but it was almost eight o'clock, and I needed to get out of the building. I clapped Ranger's hat on my head, stuffed myself into the vest and sweatshirt, and took the elevator to the garage. The elevator doors opened just as a car approached the gate. I flattened myself against the side and returned to the seventh floor. I waited in the seventh-floor foyer for ten minutes, and I tried it again. This time the garage was empty.

I left the garage, and I walked to the truck. The sky was overcast and a misting rain had started to fall. The buildings on either side of Comstock were redbrick and cement. No trees, no shrubs, no lawns to soften the landscape. It felt nicely urban when the sun was shining. Today it felt grim.

I drove to the office and parked the truck in full view on the street. Connie was already at work. Lula hadn't yet arrived. I saw no sign of Vinnie.

I went straight to the coffeepot and poured out a cup for myself.

'I haven't seen a lot of Vinnie lately, ' I said to Connie. 'What's the deal?'

'He's got hemorrhoids. He comes in for an hour to bitch and complain, and then he goes home to sit on his rubber doughnut. '

Connie and I both smiled at this. Vinnie deserved hemorrhoids.

Vinnie was a hemorrhoid.

I sipped my coffee. 'So you're the one writing bonds now?'

`I'm doing the low money bonds. Vinnie gets off his doughnut to do guys like Anton Ward. '

`I need a favor. '

'Uh oh, ' Connie said. 'I got a bad feeling about this. '

`I want you to help me bond out Anton Ward. I need to talk to him. '

'No way. Un uh. Nope. No can do. Forget it. '

'This was your idea! You were the one who said I had to find out why I was on Junkman's list. '

'And you think Ward is going to tell you out of gratitude?'

'No. I was planning on beating it out of him. '

The and Lula. You could do it, too, if you want. '

'So let me get this straight, ' Connie said. 'We bond him out.

Then we escort him from the jail to the trunk of Lula's Firebird and take him somewhere for further discussion. '

'Yeah. And then when we're done we can revoke his bond. '

'I like it, ' Connie said. 'Did you think of this all by yourself?'

'Yep. '

Think of what all by herself?' Lula said, swinging through the front door. 'Man, it's crappy out there. It's gonna rain cats and dogs all day. '

'Stephanie's got a plan to bond out Anton Ward and beat some information out of him, ' Connie said.

Lula's mood changed to smiley face. 'No shit? Are you messin' with me? That's inspired. You aren't gonna leave me out, are you?

I'm good at smackin' people around. And I'd just love to smack

Anton Ward around. '

'You're in, ' I said to Lula. 'We just have to figure some things out first. Like, where are we going to take him for his beating?'

'It has to be someplace isolated, so no one hears him screaming, '

Lula said.

'And it has to be cheap, ' I said. 'I haven't got any money. '

'I have just the place, ' Connie said. "Vinnie has a house in Point

Pleasant. It's right on the beach, and no one's going to be around now. The season's over. '

That's a great plan, ' Lula said. 'The arcade will still be open, and in between beatin' on Anton Ward I can play the claw machine. '

'Do you think we'll have to beat him a lot?' I asked Connie. A bunch of her relatives were mob, and I figured she knew about these things.

Pleasant. And I haven't beat on anyone in a while. I'm looking forward to this beating. '

'I've never actually beat anyone, ' I said.

'Don't you worry about it, ' Lula said. 'You just stand back and leave it to me. '

'We have to do this right, ' Connie said. "We don't want anyone to know we have Ward. We're going to have to make it look like he just disappeared. '

'I've already thought it through, ' I said. 'You can call Ward's brother back and tell him we'll bond Ward out if he agrees to wear a personal tracking unit. We just got one in from iSECUREtrac, right?'

'We haven't used it yet, ' Connie said. 'Haven't even taken it out of the box. '

'If Ward agrees to the PTU we say we have to have him released into our custody so we can install the unit. Then we tell everybody we have to install the transmitter here, at the office. We tell them after the unit is in place Anton is free to go.

'We cuff Anton on his release and bring him back to the office, but instead of strapping the transmitter on him, we dump him in

Lula's trunk. All she has to do is back up to the rear door, and

Anton's off to Point Pleasant. Then we pretend Anton escaped. We can say he used the lavatory at the office, and he went out through the window. '

'Brilliant, ' Lula said. 'You're a criminal genius. '

`I like it, ' Connie said. 'Let's do it. '

We all did a high five.

'It'll take me some time to set this up, ' Connie said. `I'll arrange it for the end of the business day. Then it won't be suspicious if we close the office down and disappear. In the meantime, you two should take a drive to Point Pleasant and make sure it's okay to use the house. ' She took a key from a mess of keys she kept in her top drawer. This is the key to the house. He doesn't have a security system. It's just a little bungalow on the beach. ' She wrote the address on a sticky note and gave it to me.

Lula and I didn't do a lot of talking on the way to Point Pleasant.

Hard to say why Lula fell into silence. Mine was brought on by a mixture of disbelief and terror. I couldn't believe we were going to do this. It was insane. And it was all my idea.

I was driving Ranger's truck, and Lula was reading the map.

We'd reached the ocean, and we were looking for Vinnie's street.

The rain was steady and the little shore houses that seemed cute and colorful in July sunshine looked sad in the dismal gray gloom.

This is like a ghost town, ' I said. 'Not a single house has a light on. '

'Better for us, ' Lula said. 'But it feels spooky, don't it? It's like we're in some horror movie. Nightmare in Point Pleasant. '

I got to the last house on the right and darned if it wasn't painted salmon with turquoise trim. It was a small two-story bungalow that faced the ocean. No garage, but there was a driveway separating

Vinnies house and an almost identical bungalow next to him. At this time of year a car parked in the driveway would be reasonably well hidden.

I pulled the truck into the driveway, and I cut the lights. Lula and I squinted through the rain to the bungalow's back door. Above the door was a hand-painted sign that said SEA BREEZE.

'Bet Vinnie had to think a long time to come up with that name, '

Lula said.

I put my hood up, and Lula and I sprinted through the rain and huddled together on the small back stoop while I fumbled with the key. I finally got the door open, we both jumped inside, and I slammed the door shut behind us.

Lula shook her corn-rowed head, sending water flying. 'Could we possibly have picked a crappier day to do this?'

'Maybe we should wait a couple days until the weather is better. '

The heartfelt, cold-feet statement of the year.

'I don't want to be no alarmist or nothing, but you wait a couple days and you might not be around to beat on this guy. '

Twelve

The back door to Vinnies beach bungalow opened to the kitchen. The floor was yellow-and-white linoleum that looked relatively new. The counters were red Formica. The cabinets were painted white. The appliances were also white. GE.

Midgrade. A small white wood table, covered with a blue-and-white checked plastic tablecloth, sat to one side. There were four chairs at the table.

Beyond the kitchen was a combination living room and dining room. The carpet was gold and showing wear. The dining-room table was white and gold, French provincial. Probably confiscated from a bad bond. The living-room furniture was overstuffed brown velour. Tasteful in an upper-end whorehouse sort of way. End tables were dark fruitwood, Mediterranean style. Handstitched pillows with messages were everywhere. Kiss ME I'M ITALIAN. HOME

IS WHERE THE HEART IS. SUMMER STARTS HERE.

There was a downstairs bathroom and a small downstairs bedroom. Both rooms looked out at the driveway.

'Here's where we'll beat Anton, ' Lula said, standing in the bathroom. 'Just in case there's blood, it'll be easy to clean up with all this tile. '

Lula kept going. 'And there's only that one little frosted window over the tub. So nobody can see us. Yep, this is gonna be good.

Nice and private. No neighbors around. That's important on account of he's probably gonna be screaming in pain, and we don't want no one to hear. '

I sat down on the toilet and put my head between my legs.

'You okay?' Lula asked.

I've been dieting. I think I must be weak from hunger. '

'I remember when I was dieting, and I felt like that, ' Lula said.

'And then I discovered that protein diet, and I was eating all those pork roasts. I felt real good on the protein diet. Except sometimes

I'd overdo it. Like when I found that sale on boiled lobsters. And I was eating all those lobsters and melted butter. I'm telling you that butter went through me like goose grease. '

I didn't want to hear about goose grease right now. I stayed on the toilet, taking deep breaths, and Lula went exploring upstairs.

'There's two bedrooms and a bathroom up there. Nothing special. Looks like it's for lads and guests, ' Lula said, returning to the bathroom. 'Maybe we should get you food. '

I didn't need food. I needed someone to intervene and stop me from kidnapping a guy and beating him bloody. I left the bathroom and walked through the living room to the front door. I opened the door and stepped out onto the covered front porch. There was a minuscule front yard, just big enough for an aluminum and nylon webbed chaise and a small table.

A boardwalk ran the length of the beach for as far as the eye could see. Beyond the boardwalk, the wet sand was the color and texture of fresh concrete. The ocean was loud and scary. Big gray rollers crashed onto the beach, conjuring visions of tsunamis barreling in, gobbling up Point Pleasant.

The wind had picked up, driving the rain across the porch in sheets. I retreated into the house and locked the door. We pulled every shade and closed every curtain and then we left.

I called Connie when we hit White Horse. 'What's up?' I asked.

'It's all set, ' Connie said. 'Ward and his brother bought the whole enchilada. Ward's being held at the prison on Cass Street. I have to get there before four o'clock to bond him out. '

I picked Connie up at three thirty and dropped her at the prison.

We decided Ward might not be happy to see Lula and me, so we waited in the truck. In a half hour, Connie emerged with Ward cuffed behind his back. Ranger's truck was a four-door supercrew cab with a full backseat and steel rings conveniently bolted into the floor, just right for securing leg shackles. Connie got in back with

Ward, and I swung the truck out into traffic.

Ward didn't say anything. And I didn't say anything. And Lula didn't say anything. All of us being careful not to rock the boat.

I parked curbside when I reached the office. We took our time off-loading Ward, making a show of it as best we could in the rain.

We wanted people to witness the fact that we'd brought him this far. The whole time I was having heart palpitations, and I couldn't get the phrase 'harebrained scheme' out of my head.

We finally brought him inside and sat him in the chair in front of Connie's desk. The plan was to give him a shot at talking to us.

If he refused to cooperate we'd hit him with the stun gun, blindfold him, and trundle him out to the Firebird.

'I want to know about Junkman, ' I said.

He was slouched in the chair. Hard to do when your hands are cuffed behind your back, but he managed. He cut his eyes to me under half-lowered lids. Sullen. Insolent. He didn't say anything.

'Do you know Junkman?' I asked.

Nothing.

'You better answer her, ' Lula said. 'Otherwise we might get upset, and then I'd have to sit on you again. '

Ward spit on the floor.

That's disgusting, ' Lula said. 'We don't put up with that. You don't watch your step, I'll give you enough volts to make you pee your pants. ' And she showed him her stun gun.

'What the hell is this?' Ward said, sitting up straighter. 'I thought

I was supposed to get hooked up to a monitor. What's with this stun-gun bullshit?'

'We thought you might want to talk to us first, ' Lula said.

'I got rights, and I'm being violated, ' Ward said. 'You got no business keeping me cuffed. Either put the fucking monitor on me or turn me loose. '

Lula got into his face and wagged her finger at him. 'Don't you use that language in front of ladies. We don't tolerate that. '

'I don't see no ladies, ' Ward said. 'I see a big fat black... ' And he used the c word. The mother of all swear words. Even better than the word.

Lula lunged at him with the stun gun, and Ward jumped out of his chair.

Connie was on her feet, too, trying to contain the disaster. 'Don't let him get to the door!' she yelled.

'I got him. I got him, ' Lula shouted.

Ward lowered his head, and gave Lula a head butt to the stomach that knocked her on her ass. Connie rounded on him in a crouch, and they sized each other up. Ward sidestepped and bolted around her. He wasn't smart, but he was nimble.

I took a flying leap and tackled him from behind. We both went down, I rolled off, and Connie swooped in and tagged him with the stun gun.

'Unh, ' Ward said. And he went inert.

We all popped our heads up to see if anyone was looking in the front window.

'We're in the clear, ' Connie said. 'Quick, help me drag him behind the file cabinets before someone sees him. '

Ten minutes later we were set to go. Ward was cuffed and shackled. We wrapped him in a blanket and carted him out the back door to Lula's car. We dumped him in the trunk, and we all made the sign of the cross. Then Connie slammed the trunk lid shut.

'Holy Mary Mother of God, ' Connie said. She was breathing heavy, and her forehead was beaded with perspiration.

'He isn't going to die in there, is he?' I asked Connie. 'He can breathe, right?'

'He'll be fine. I asked my cousin Anthony. Anthony knows these things. '

Lula and I didn't doubt for a moment that Anthony knew all about stuffing bodies in trunks. Anthony was an expediter for a construction company. If you treated Anthony right, your construction project moved along without a hitch. If you decided you didn't need Anthony's services, you were likely to have a fire.

Connie locked the office, and we all piled into the Firebird.

Twenty minutes into the trip Anton Ward came to life and started yelling and kicking inside the trunk.

It wasn't that loud from where I was sitting, but it was unnerving. What must he be feeling? Anger, panic, fear. What was

I feeling? Compassion? No. In spite of Connie's expert assurances, I was worried Ward would die, and we'd have to bury him in the dark of night in the Pine Barrens. I was going straight to hell for this, I thought. It was all adding up. I was for sure beyond Hail

Marys.

This guy's creeping me out, ' Lula said. She punched a number on her CD player and drowned Ward out with rap.

Ten minutes later I could feel my cell phone vibrating. It was hooked to my Kevlar vest, and I couldn't hear the ring over the rap, but I could feel the vibration.

I flipped the phone open and yelled, 'What?'