A Thousand Falling Crows (10 page)

The overhang of the roof kept the weather from her as she pushed the key into the lock. What remained of the storm was weak, gentle, the aftermath not so threatening and severe as it had been. The wind had weakened into an intermittent breeze. The pelting rain was nothing more than a soft drizzle, almost a fog.

She could still see the lightning coming from inside Lancer's Market in her mind, the flash of a gunshot, followed by another, along with two defining booms.

No one was supposed to get hurt. Eddie had said he wouldn't shoot anyone. They just needed money for rent and gas to deliver the gin. Then everything would be golden. Just her and him on their own. No more Tió. No more gin. A new life, a new kind of love away from the small town that she felt trapped in, suffocated by—they could be anybody they wanted to be, not Aldo Hernadez's daughter, or Eddie Renaldo's girl, just Carmen and Eddie, in love, the world theirs to be had. K. I. S. S. I. N. G. Eddie, behind a tree . . .

“I didn't mean to kill him” Tió had said. Kill him. Somebody was dead. The boys were in big trouble now. More trouble than Carmen ever thought was possible. All because of Tió. That didn't surprise her. She shivered, shook the key. The door fought her, wouldn't open.

Eddie had slid into the driver's seat, and the car had sped away. The road was too wet for the tires to squeal, but the immediate thrust of the motor echoed on the breeze, the accelerator pushed all the way to the floor, the desire to flee not isolated only in Carmen's mind or heart.

She was glad she hadn't seen the shooting, the dead man. The only memory she would have were the flashes in the rain and the smell of fear and blood when the boys had run back to the car, tossing their guns into the backseat, Eddie yelling, “Go, go . . .”

She glanced over her shoulder before pushing the door harder. It opened with a knee. Behind her, the car was gone. The road was empty. Only the lights in Felix Massey's office burned against the fog—a light she wished didn't exist.

Carmen slammed the door behind her, locked it, and stood staring at the mess in the room. The bed was unmade. Eddie's clothes, from the day before, were strung over the lone chair that sat cockeyed next to a cluttered desk. A makeshift sleeping pallet, a tangle of used blankets and sheets pilfered from the maid's cart, lay in front of the bathroom door. Tió's bed. The sight of it made her stomach queasy, made her feel like she was going to vomit. He was a killer now. She had smelled his breath. Touched his hand once, mistaking him for Eddie in the darkness.

There was no escaping the smell of aging gin in the small room. Rotting fruit and juniper berries coated her throat, attacked her hair, clung to her body like a magnet. A scream gurgled in the bottom of Carmen's stomach, or maybe it was bile; either way she forced it back, swallowed deeply, knowing full well that it was her pride that she was tasting. She refused to sob, to cry out loud any more than she already had.

Without any more hesitation, Carmen began to collect her clothes. She stuffed them in a pillowcase as quickly as she could. It didn't matter whether they were clean or dirty. She had to get out of there. Get out before Eddie came back. Something told her it would just be Eddie. He was going to ditch Tió—one way or another. She didn't want to know how, didn't want to see any more blood on his shirt, on his hands.

Eddie had promised her before they'd left for the robbery: “
No one'll get hurt, I promise. You just need to drive, Carmen. Can you do that?
” She'd nodded. Yes. She would do anything he wanted her to. But that was then. Now she was alone with her memories and fears, death on her heels.

Her brushes were on the desk. She had to step over the pallet on the floor. They were the last of her things. She had all she needed, all that mattered. Not that she'd ever had that much to begin with. She'd run off in the middle of the night, sliding down the tree outside her window under the light of the moon like a cat in heat, a molly in search of a tom to rub up against. She'd been lonely then. Lonely and trapped. Nothing had changed. Eddie's thumb was like her father's. Only now she was afraid. More afraid than she'd ever been in her life. She didn't want to end up like Bonnie Parker, ambushed on the side of some road with so many bullets in her body that her flesh was nothing but mush. She didn't want that. She was just a girl with her life ahead of her. Tears threatened again, but she pushed them back just like she had the bile.

Carmen scooped her brushes into the pillowcase and headed to the door.

But a loud thump stopped her. Somebody was knocking on the door.
Boom
,
boom
. Another knock.

“Open up, girl. I saw you go in.”

Damn it
, Carmen thought, but didn't say it out loud. She stood frozen, clung to the pillowcase like it was a Teddy Bear, and tried not to make any noise at all. Her heart beat so loudly she thought it was going to jump out of her chest.

It was Felix Massey come to collect the rent.

The bottom of the pillowcase teetered back and forth like the pendulum of a clock. Carmen eased her hand down and stopped it as quietly as she could. There was no other way out. A front window faced out, next to the door, curtains closed. The bathroom window was too small to climb through and only cranked halfway open. That was it.

She would just have to wait him out. Wait until Eddie got back. Everything changed so fast. Her head was spinning like a top, coming to stop in the same place: no options, no place to run.

Boom
,
boom
,
boom
. Three more knocks so loud inside the small room that Carmen wanted to put her hands to her ears and pretend she didn't hear them.

Felix Massey said nothing. Quiet returned. The weather was faint, the storm so distant that it was almost like it had vanished, too. Maybe it all had just been a dream, a nightmare.

The knocks were replaced by the heartbeat of a girl so afraid that she thought she was going to pee herself, just like Tió had when Eddie had pulled the trigger of the empty gun.

A new sound quickly replaced her heartbeat. It was the sound of metal against metal. A key sliding slowly into the lock. Carmen dropped the pillowcase where she stood. There was no place to run. The bathroom door had no lock.

Felix Massey pushed in the door and stopped just inside of it. “I thought I smelled somethin' a little sour coming out of this room,” he said, staring at Carmen.

She looked for a weapon, saw nothing until her eyes landed on a letter opener lying on the cluttered desk. “Eddie's not here. He'll bring you the money when he comes back.” Her voice sounded like shattered glass tinkling to the floor.

Felix Massey closed the door behind him and locked it. “I got all the money I need.” His eyes were glassy and cold. He was still dressed in the same work pants, same ugly stained white shirt, and muddy shoes. An unlit cigar dangled out of the corner of his mouth. He had just put it out. The smell of cheap tobacco touched Carmen's nose, causing her stomach to lurch again. She didn't have the will or the strength to stop it this time. She bent over and puked.

A look of disgusted surprise crossed Felix Massey's face. “That'll cost you. I‘ll have to have it cleaned up.”

“I don't have money.”

“Sure you do.” Felix smiled. The cigar stayed put, like it was glued to his lip. He looked her up and down, from toes to breasts, stopping at her chest with a leer that was unmistakable.

Carmen felt naked, violated. She crossed her arms over her chest and backed up until she came to a stop against the bathroom door. She could taste her own vomit, and she spit it out at Felix as he stepped toward her.

The spit fell short, landed on the tip of his right shoe. It didn't stop him.

“I‘ll scream,” Carmen said.

“Go ahead. There ain't no one to hear you for miles, or in the next room if that's what you're hopin'.”

“Eddie'll kill you if you touch me.”

“You think I‘m scared of a gin-runnin' spic?”

“You should be.” Eddie and Tió knew how to kill—she knew that now. But even in her state of fear, she knew better than to confess such a thing. She might've been afraid, but she wasn't stupid.

Felix Massey stopped inches from Carmen. “Don't make this hard girl. It ain't gonna hurt. Be better for both of us if it's fun.”

Up close, Felix Massey was even more foul than he was at a distance. He probably weighed two hundred and fifty pounds and sweated like he had just run a sprint, smelled like he hadn't had a bath in a week. He was a whale come to swallow her up. His shadow took up half the wall.

Carmen opened her mouth to protest, to scream, but Felix pushed in quickly and covered her mouth with his skillet-sized hand. Her scream was corked. She was trapped with nowhere to go. His hardness pressed against her, announcing the seriousness of the threat.

He started to writhe, hump against her belly slowly. He was in no hurry, not afraid that Eddie would show back up any time soon. “Take it out,” he whispered. “Touch it. We'll be even then. You won't owe me nothin'.” He was breathing hard. Each word seemed difficult for him to say. His other hand pushed up under the hem of her simple cotton dress, rubbing her leg, fingers searching inward, toward her private place. “Come on,” he insisted, “touch it. I promise, we'll be even.”

It was a lie and Carmen knew it. He would want more. The only way out was to give in, or make him think she was giving in. It was all she knew to do, so she surrendered, relaxed, allowed the tension in her body to deflate. “I can't move,” she mumbled through his hand.

A slow smile crossed Felix's face, and he pulled away two of his fingers, the ones pressing on her lips, like he was changing chords on a guitar.

“How can I touch it if I can't move?” Carmen asked.

Felix Massey drew in a deep breath and looked her in the eye for a long second, like he was trying to decide if he could trust her.

Carmen pouted, stared up at him innocently. Being a girl was the only weapon she had.

Felix relented and pulled back six inches, giving her just enough room to drop her arms, allowing her hands to relax across her chest and drop to her side. It also gave Carmen just enough room to raise a knee—which she did with as much power as she could, pushing Felix Massey backward at the same time.

He screamed out in agonizing pain as her knee slammed against her target, his ugly bulge. Bone beat flesh every time, no matter the level of excitement. Felix Massey wasn't the first man, or boy, she'd had to fend off in her life, and something told her he wouldn't be the last.

Felix toppled over like an egg rolling off a shelf, giving her just enough room to dart to the side and grab the letter opener off the desk.

He moaned, then hissed, “You'll regret that, you little whore.”

Carmen gripped the letter opener like a knife and thrust it toward him, slicing at the air, coming nowhere near cutting his skin. “I‘ll cut your balls off you come for me again, you fat bastard. Then I‘ll send Eddie after you to finish you off.”

Felix Massey struggled to stand up and Carmen knew she only had a second or two to make a run for it. In as graceful a move as she could mount, she hopped across the floor, dodged the puddle of puke, picked up the pillowcase and dashed for the door. She was a ballerina escaping a troll. Freedom lay beyond the castle. She wasn't so many years from believing in fairy tales. She felt like Rapunzel freed from the tower.

Carmen heard Felix try to stand as she fumbled with the lock. Felt him lunging after her as her fingers pulled the knob down. It clicked open and she glanced over her shoulder.

Two seconds, maybe three, then he'd reach her. She knew what he'd do to her once he wrestled her to the ground, and she couldn't bear the thought. At that very moment, she understood how easy it was to kill a man. The world would be a better place without a monster like Felix Massey. Still, something deep inside her wouldn't allow her to use the letter opener—she didn't want to cut him. Instead, she swung the door out, and slammed it into his head, clocking him hard, stunning him like a charging boar hit with a club.

Felix Massey groaned again, stumbled back, taking the hit without crashing to the floor. He was dazed, but he would recover quickly.

The stumble was all Carmen needed. She bolted out the door, unsure where she was going but running faster than she ever had before.

Felix yelled for her to stop, cussed, offered threats until she was out of earshot. She swore to herself that she wasn't going to stop running until she reached Dallas.

CHAPTER 12

The crows had begun to follow him like they did a wolf or a coyote. There would be blood left in his wake. Sooner or later he would kill again leaving them a bounty to feast on. The crows were sure of it. Just as they were sure that the moon would rise into the night sky offering them light in the darkness to see what was coming their way.