B0056C0C00 EBOK (16 page)

“They needed it more than us.”

“Whatever you say, Mother Mikayla.” Against her will, she smiled slightly at my nickname. She arched an eyebrow at me when I slipped the tequila into her rucksack, but she didn’t say anything.

Climbing on behind me, she wrapped her arms around my waist. I didn’t bother cloaking the light, speed was what was needed now. I wanted to put as many miles between us and the dead men as quickly as possible. I wasn’t really worried about the cops, these hills were scattered with the bones of dead travelers. Reporting a body meant paperwork and one more unsolved case on the books. Most of the fallen lay where they died. Coyotes and vultures would feed off the carrion and the circle of life would continue to spin.

Mikayla was the perfect passenger, she crushed her body into my back, bending when I did, shifting her weight along with mine. The warmth of her breath moved across the back of my neck where her face was pressed. It was nice to feel her there, not that I had much time to think on it, all my concentration was used to keep us on the track while I blasted us across the valley floor.

A half mile up the mountain, we passed the pickup. In the back, the young mother watched me. Her flat Indian face was solid and strong, her eyes held neither gratitude nor fear for me. I was simply one more event in her short, long life. Something in her strength and way she held the child to her made me glad she was coming to my home country. We needed more like her, people with the will to survive the hard strange days our country seemed destined for. Greed and dishonor were tearing at the bones of America and if we had any hope, it would come from women like this solid mother who would risk so much for so little. In my head, I could hear Bono singing about climbing mountains and searching for that unfound dream. I hoped these travelers would find what they were looking for.

An hour later, we were down in the far southern corner of Anza-Borrego National Park land. We had made it to US soil and although the Border Patrol worked the area, two Anglos on a dirt bike wouldn’t raise their suspicions, even looking like we did. The desert was used to freaks, hell it collected them. The temperature had dropped below freezing when I rolled to a stop and leaned against a Joshua tree’s rough bark.

“Give me that tequila,” I said to Mikayla.

“You sure this is the time? We aren’t home yet.”

“We’re never home, you and me.” I twisted the cap off, the smell screamed drink me. Peeling my shirt off my shoulder, it took a good hunk of scab and flesh with it. I clenched my jaw to keep from yelling. Pouring the tequila onto the wound set it on fire.

“Here.” Mikayla handed me a clean pair of cotton underpants, granny panties as the strippers called them. “If you don’t scrub it, it will fester.” She didn’t offer to help me. If I had asked her to, I’m sure she would have, but to offer would have said she didn’t think I could handle my own problems. It was a sign of respect, not a dismissal of my pain.

I don’t know which was worse, cleaning the wound or not drinking the tequila. Mikayla handed me her last clean shirt to tear into a makeshift bandage. Laying down with her ruck sack as a pillow, she smoked, looking up into the sky. It was late, the thought of any more jostling miles that night seemed impossible. We agreed to sleep until sun up and then head for Joshua Tree, take the desert and avoid the San Diego border patrol check points.

Sitting against the tree trunk, I looked up at the star glutted sky. It was a carpet of pinpoints, those stars felt so close I thought I could reach out and touch them. The cold was biting, but at least I wasn’t on that damn bike.

“Come here,” Mikayla’s voice was soft, almost gentle. “Lay down beside me, body warmth will keep us from freezing.” I knew she was letting me closer than any man in many years. I was honored and also thankful for the warmth as she pulled close to me. I draped the poncho over us and we shared her rucksack pillow. Tilting my face so that we were nose to nose I ran my finger over her scar. I don’t know where I got the courage to touch her in such a personal way. Maybe it was exhaustion, or maybe it was the softening in her eyes. I felt her body tense when I touched her, but she didn’t pull away.

“Who did this to you?” I whispered.

“I did.” Her voice was so soft that even in the silent desert night I had to strain to hear her. “In one summer, fourteen girls were taken from my village, taken to be sold as prostitutes. The men came with guns and KGB badges. Anyone who stood in their way was killed. They took my only sister, my father tried to stop them. He died that night. They only wanted pretty girls, so I made myself ugly.” Lifting her shirt, she showed me her bare chest. She closed her eyes, unable to watch me seeing her shame. A long jagged scar ran from her collarbone down to where her left breast had been. The scar spider webbed where her nipple should have been. “I nearly bled to death before the doctor could repair what I had done.” She shivered from more than cold as I traced the scar tissue. Her right breast was small and perfect, I wanted to kiss it, lick her pink erect nipple. I pulled her shirt down and pulled her closer.

Rolling onto her side, she spooned into me, pulling my arm around her. We drifted off to sleep like that. It was the first time in many moons that I wasn’t wracked by my bad dreams. Somehow she made me feel both safe and protective at the same time. With my arms around this strange damaged killer, I felt as if I wasn’t a bad man or a good man, I just was.

In the gray predawn, I awoke. Mikayla was sleeping in my arms. The desert stretched out around us, empty and peaceful. The pain in my shoulder had subsided into a dull ache. When I moved my arm, Mikayla snapped into consciousness. She popped her elbow back, catching me in the bridge of my nose. Rolling away, she leapt up ready to fight me.

“Whoa, Killer, it’s me, Moses. Remember?” I felt the warm trickle of blood flowing from my nostrils.

“Oh, no.” She looked at what she had done.

“Forget it.”

“I thought...” She let it hang in the air, unfinished.

“Been broken before, but never by so pretty a lady.” She looked away, stung by the compliment. The softness that had overtaken her at night was gone, her shields were up now. She looked out across the barren desertscape, her back to me.

Standing, I stretched to loosen the kinks the hard ground had given me. Wiping my face on my shirtsleeve, I removed the blood.

“Let’s ride.” I kicked over the bike. Mikayla climbed on behind me, pulling herself close.

“I’m sorry,” she whispered into my ear as I took off.

We dumped the bike outside of Twentynine Palms. It wasn’t street-legal, and it was hot. Not a good combination if we wanted a casual entrance into LA. We bought two tickets on the next bus to Los Angeles, and spent the next hour in a small diner eating steaks and eggs, and sharing a pot of coffee. We didn’t talk about the night before, her scars, the tenderness I felt for her. We ate instead in silence.

From a pay phone, I called Helen. Peter had arrived safely, he had then locked himself in Helen’s den and been on her computer ever since. There had been no time on the road for notes, he was reconstructing the events and attempting to write the story while it was still fresh.

Helen told me the girls were fine, a bit freaked out, but other than that, fine. She had been working the phones, calling on contacts to find out what to do with them. “There’s a group called Project Angel, out of Moscow, they have a local chapter. They work with trafficked girls. They may have some ideas,” she said.

“Sounds good. Tell Peter I’ll be around tonight, and Helen, watch your back. These Russian bastards aren’t going to be overjoyed with any of us for what we did down in Mexico.” After I hung up with her, I tried Gregor’s cell but got voice mail. His mother’s phone rang without being picked up. I knew Gregor could handle himself, but it still worried me. He should have picked up his phone.

Mikayla sank down into the soft seat on the bus. For the next few hours we were safe, there was nothing to do but try to relax and not worry about what was coming. Putting her hand on mine, she looked out the window. “I’ve never been with a man,” she said to the glass.

“Don’t think you’ve missed much.”

“I like you, Moses, but I don’t...”

“You don’t have to do anything. I’m too old to date, and too tired to fuck.” Leaning my head back, I let my eyes drift closed.

CHAPTER 17

D
OWNTOWN
LA
IS A HUMAN CESSPOOL.
By day, it’s populated by high roller power boys of the stock market, lawyers and political creeps. At night, the art-damaged hipsters and twenty-something slum Sinatras take over. And around them all swirl the homeless, the sad, broken, forgotten men and women. Some came here by choice, others were driven by madness or addiction. This was where you ended up when you ran out of gas, looks or luck.

In the bus station, I tried Gregor again without any luck. I called Piper at home, got her machine and dialed Club Xtasy. When Doc answered, he wanted to know where the fuck I was and when I was coming back to work. Turaj was still in the hospital, Gregor was MIA and Doc was pulling doubles. “I’m not sure Uncle Manny wants me back. Now put Piper on the line.”

“She’s on stage, you want her to call you?” He sounded petulant, which isn’t pretty on a large bald black man.

“I don’t care if she’s blowing the Pope’s ghost. Get her on the phone.” I could hear him shouting for her. It was still early, I doubted if they had more than two customers.

“This better be important.” Piper was out of breath. From her tone of voice, I would have bet one hip was cocked and her fist was on it.

“It’s me, baby.”

“Mo, where the hell are you?”

“Have you heard from Gregor?”

“No, he’s not answering his cell, I don’t hear dick from him, from you. What the fuck’s going on?”

“I’m at the bus station, downtown. I need a ride. Come get me and I’ll tell you everything.”

“What, you never heard of a cab?”

“I’m broke.” It wasn’t exactly true. Between Mikayla and me, we had a small fortune in pesos. And under twenty bucks in greenbacks. It took some more sweet tough talk, but Piper finally agreed. Doc would give her a ration of crap for leaving, but she could handle him. One of her killer smiles and the big guy would be a puddle on the floor. Mikayla was watching me when I hung up.

“Do you have many girlfriends?”

“Some, not like that, though.”

“Why not like that?”

“They won’t have me.”

“I don’t think that’s true.” She was looking at me as if I was some sort of interesting alien creature.

I walked up the block, hoping to find a currency exchange. Found several guys wanting to sell me chiva and a Korean man selling short dogs from a rusted shopping cart. But no one was willing to trade pesos for dollars.

Mikayla stood on the corner smoking. The sea of human sadness washed around her. She watched them without judgment. She’d seen worse places.

Fifteen minutes after the phone call, a white panel van threaded its way through the traffic towards us. Two dark skinned men sat in the front, the passenger was scanning the sidewalk with a little too much concentration for my comfort.

I stepped to the curb, when the man in van saw me he froze for the briefest moment, but it was long enough for me to know it was me he was looking for.

“This is wrong, let’s go,” I told Mikayla as I rushed past her. I heard tires squealing as we rounded the corner. Over my shoulder, the white van skidded through traffic. At the next corner, I turned up a one way street. It was going the opposite direction.

The van slid to a stop and four men jumped out of the side door. They were dressed in jeans and windbreakers and looked Middle Eastern.

We had a block lead when we hit Broadway. The crush of quitting traffic slowed the streets to a crawl and flooded the sidewalks. I plowed through the pedestrians with Mikayla running in my wake. A red Metro sign glowed ahead of us. Swinging down the stairs, I pushed my way down into the subway. We hit the red line just as the train pulled in. We were swept into the car with the swarm of commuters. As the train pulled away, I saw the dark skinned men moving on the platform, searching the crowd for us.

When we hit the dark of the tunnel, I looked at the map to see where we were headed. Hollywood, that would do fine. Any place with crowds to get lost in.

“What did we do to piss off the Arabs?” I asked Mikayla as we stood rumbling along.

“Israeli, I think they were Israeli,” she said.

“If you say so. Why are they after us?”

“I don’t know.” She was hiding something.

“Have anything to do with that whorehouse fire in Tel Aviv Peter was talking about?”

“Maybe.” She didn’t elaborate.

“Any other baggage you want to tell me about? Mexicans, Russians, Israelis... anyone else want to kill you? What about the Canadians, you ever do anything to them?” People in the car were starting to stare. I didn’t care.

“You know who I am. You know what I do,” she said softly.

By the time we reached the Highland station, my adrenaline had eased up enough for me to think a bit more clearly. Moving through the happy tourists in front of Grauman’s Chinese Theater felt completely surreal. A towhead boy put his feet over Bogart’s cement footprints while his mother snapped a picture. I winced with every flash bulb, reminded of the guns in the borderland. Mikayla took it all in with her same stoic calmness.

I found a cab in front of the Roosevelt Hotel, gave the driver an address in North Hollywood. I spent the entire ride watching for white vans and black Mercedes, LA had never looked less like home.

“Where the fuck is my truck?” Jason B was not a happy camper to see me walk up without the Scout. The cabby had been convinced to take the last of our US dollars and a small stack of pesos, he let us off up the block from Jason B’s shop. I had left Mikayla on the street, no need for Jason B to see her with me.

“Gone.”

“Gone? Gone? Forty grand’s worth of rolling stock, and all you can say is ‘gone’?”

“I need the Crown Vic.”

“How the fuck are you planning to pay for this destruction? You got cash? Didn’t think so. Fuck!”

“You know I’m good for it.” I was trying to remain calm.

“No, what I know is you look like a fucking bum on his last bad run. What I know is I’m out a primo ride worth a wedge of cash and now you want another car. Do I look like your bitch? You see a dress on me?” Spittle flew from his lips.

“Go get my keys before I forget I like you.” I kept my eyes flat and my voice even.

“You threatening me?” He was trying to keep his bravado up, but I could see a crack of fear appearing under it.

“It’s been a rough couple days, one more body won’t dent my karma one way or the other, so get my keys.”

“Alright, big man, chill, I know you’re good for it.” He reached into his desk drawer. I grabbed the drawer, pinning his hand inside it. He let out a small yelp. With one hand locked on his wrist, I opened the drawer; in his hand was a Beretta 9mm. He looked up at me with a sheepish grin. I backhanded him hard enough to knock him off his chair.

“Deal remains the same,” I said, towering over him. “I take my car, I will make good on the Scout.”

He was finished, tail between his legs. He found the keys and led me to the Crown Vic. “I tuned her up, and she has a full tank.” His eyes wouldn’t meet mine.

“I’ll see you around, Jason.” Climbing behind the wheel, it felt good to be back in the road beast.

On the street, I picked up Mikayla and drove to a liquor store to make a call. Gregor was still not answering his cell and there was no answer at his mother’s. We drove to Glendale without speaking. I slipped Dropkick Murphys into the stereo, Celtic punk to take my mind off worrying.
Cruel
came on; no, they weren’t the Pogues, but they would do. I was glad to see Jason had left my CDs unharmed, if he hadn’t, I might have had to waste his skinny ass.

If they had gotten to Gregor, they would have his house under surveillance. I parked two streets away from the pre-war court and we worked our way across backyards. Mikayla must have felt my tension, the razor was in her hand. The front door to Gregor’s mother’s cottage was splintered at the jamb. Gripping the Beretta, I pushed the door open. The living room was a mess, the coffee table had been upended, a china hutch lay on its side, spilling out a broken teacup collection. The bedroom was empty and untouched. There were more signs of struggle in the kitchen, plates with half-eaten breakfast were scattered on the floor. Under the table was a smear of blood, bullet holes pocked the floor.

“No, no, no, no.” I stared at the blood stain.

Mikayla picked up a spent 9mm shell, reading the imprint on the bottom, “IMI, Israeli military.”

“Israelis? FUCK. I don’t give a fuck if they’re Martians. They’re dead men.” A smeared trail of blood ran out the back door. We followed the scuffed brown tracks across the small yard and into the garage.

Folded up behind a dented Toyota, I found them. An elderly woman curled up, holding a bloody Bullmastiff. She covered her face. Guarding from the blow she was sure was coming.

Dropping to my knees, I clutched Angel, burying my face in her blood stiff fur. She was warm and I could feel her chest pulling shallow breaths. Her eyes rolled open, looked up at me, begging me for relief.

Mikayla helped Gregor’s mother gently to her feet. All the blood on her was Angel’s. While I held the dog, feeling for her wounds, I heard them speaking. When Gregor had seen the strangers coming, he had sent his mother out the back and told her to hide. That nice Russian girl had been in the shower. The old woman had heard gunshots and screaming. She obeyed her son and stayed hidden. Late in the night, she had crept into the house and found the dog. Gregor would come for them. He always did. She had been hiding all night and all day. She knew he would come for her.

“Who the heck has been using a beautiful bitch like this for target practice?” Bernie was a cross-dressing vet I had met in Lebanon. I had saved his ass, literally. He owed me. He was a good man for a freak. He’d keep his mouth shut.

“Don’t let her die.”

“She’s not looking real good.”

“Just don’t let her die.”

We took Gregor’s mom to a sister’s house in the Valley and promised to have Gregor call her. She didn’t ask me to save her son, she assumed he wouldn’t need it. She believed in him that deeply.

Driving back down the 5, I tried to quiet the rage and think.

“Can you turn that noise off?” Mikayla asked, lighting a butt.

“No. It relaxes me.” The Clash’s
Give ‘em Enough Rope
was rattling the windows. It gave my anger someplace to go while I tried to think. Who had taken Gregor and Anya? The same bastards shot my dog. They had to die. No, ease off. Think. The white haired Russian. Who else? Israelis. Minutes after I spoke to Piper, the white van came hunting me. PIPER. Fuck. Piper.

“This stripper, is she your girlfriend?” Mikayla asked as we waited down the street from Club Xtasy.

“Did I fuck her? Is that what you want to know?”

“I don’t care who you have or have not fucked. What I want to know is will you be ok questioning her, or should I do it?”

“Questioning?”

“You know what that means.” She was right, I did. I thought about her question without answering. Mikayla had made it clear the only thing she hated worse than pimps were those she called collaborators, women who sold out their gender for personal gain. She had a simple worldview that only included three types of people, victims, bad men and collaborators. I knew it was much more complicated than that. Most of the world was populated by noncombatants, men and women who were just trying to make it from birth to grave with the least amount of pain.

At 2:15 the girls came out, with Doc standing guard from the top of the stairs. He watched until they were safely to their cars. Piper got into her baby blue Ford Falcon. When she pulled out I counted to twenty and then rolled out after her. I gave her a long leash, figuring she would be heading home. I wanted to brace her in a non-public place, limit the chance of the cops getting involved.

Ten minutes later, she was unlocking the door to her small Silver Lake house. I hit the door and pushed in before she could lock it.

“Moses, what the hell?” She gasped as Mikayla closed and dead-bolted the door.

“Who the fuck are you working for?” I was screaming. She reached in her purse. I slapped it out of her hand. A small canister of mace rolled out onto the floor.

“What happened downtown, Piper?”

“You tell me. I left a suit worth two hundred bucks in lap dances, drove down there, waited in that creepy neighborhood and you never showed. Who is she?”

“Don’t fucking lie to me, girl.” I wanted to grab her throat. Gripping her kitchen table, I tossed it across the small room. “I’m running crazy, real unpredictable. If I don’t get the truth this whole deal gets ugly fast. Who did you tell?”

Looking into my eyes, I could see fear taking hold of her. “What happened Mo? It’s me, talk to me.”

“Who did you tell?” I kept the intensity up, moving into her face.

“No one, Mo, believe me, no one.”

“Bullshit. Somebody knew and you’re the only one I spoke to.”

“I didn’t tell anyone, only Uncle Manny, he wanted to know why I was leaving in the middle of my shift.”