Children of Paranoia (12 page)

“Fine”—the voice on the other end of the phone began to whisper. “It's Brian. My name is Brian.” He was telling the truth. I don't know how I knew. I just knew.

I almost started laughing out loud. “Your name is Brian and they make you use Matt. What the hell's the difference?”

“Matt's a rank, a third-tier Intelligence officer. When I get promoted I'll move up to Allen.”

“Listen, Brian.” I used his real name. It felt liberating. “I really need to speak to Michael. He saved my life. If it weren't for him, I'd be buried in a shallow grave right now having my eyeballs picked out by seagulls. Saving my life got an eight-inch knife punched into his gut. You want to know what I did then? I ran. I left him alone at the hospital and ran. I need to make sure that he's okay.”

“Jesus, Joe. I'm sorry, but I wouldn't even know where to start.”

“Do you know who his contact is?”

“Sure.”

“Start there.”

There was a heavy sigh on the line. “I'll see what I can do. Call me again tomorrow. Same time. But don't expect miracles.”

“I stopped believing in miracles a long time ago, Brian.”

“Terry Graham. Annie Campbell. Jack Wilkins.” Brian hung up the phone.

 

 

I woke up early again the next morning. A good night's sleep had become pretty rare for me over the past two years or so. I usually just chalked it up to anxiety. I had gotten pretty accustomed to it, moving through the day on three or four restless hours of sleep. That morning, I knew that anxiety wasn't the only culprit keeping me awake. It was anxiety mixed with guilt. I got out of bed and headed out for another run, running hard, trying to burn off the stress. When I got home I still had another twenty minutes before I was due to call Brian. I picked up my calling card and dialed the phone anyway.

Eventually, a female voice answered. The voice was no less sing-songy than yesterday. “Hello.”

“Hey, Ma, it's me,” I responded.

“Joey! It's about time you called me. It's been weeks.” I had a clear picture in my head of my mother scampering around in the tiny kitchen of the house that we moved into after my father died, donning her robe, making coffee. I knew she'd be up. My mother never slept past five.

“I know, Ma. I'm sorry. But you know that I'm not allowed to call from the safe houses and sometimes it's just hard to find a secure place to call from.”

“I know. I know. Now that everybody's buying cell phones, just a plain old regular phone is so hard to come by.” I was happy to have her make up excuses for me. I never would have thought of that one. It must have come to her after hours of rationalizing why I didn't call more often. “How are things, Joey?”

“Things are good, Mom. Same old, same old. How are things with you?”

“Things are okay. Jeffrey passed away.” Great, more death. Jeffrey was our cat. He had been at least seventeen years old.

“What happened?” I barely cared. I was just making conversation. After all the death that I'd seen, it was difficult to mourn for a cat, even if it was my own cat. My mom was probably pretty broken up, though. Now the house was completely empty.

“I don't really know. He went out one day and came back all beat up. Part of one ear was missing and he had scratches on his nose and blood all over him. You know Jeffrey, always a fighter. Anyway, he came home, and at his age, it was too much for him. He fell asleep in my lap and never woke up.” I could hear her voice beginning to choke up as she spoke.

“Well, at least he made it home. Knowing Jeffrey, whatever he was fighting didn't fare so well.”

“Oh, poor Jeffrey,” she said in a barely audible sigh. Then she paused, switched gears, and asked in a cheerful voice, “So, how's work?”

“Work is good,” I lied. “More of the same.” My mother knew what I did for a living, but I never gave her details. It wasn't that I thought it would be dangerous for her to hear. It's just didn't feel right describing to my mother the things that I did.

“You're too modest, Joey. ‘More of the same.' And all the while you're out there saving the world.”

“I wouldn't say that I'm saving the world, Ma.”

“Well, I would,” my mother said sternly, rebuking me for my modesty. “But I hope you're finding some time for yourself. I hope you're not working too hard.”

“Actually, I just got back from a vacation.”

“Really? Where'd you go?”

“I went down to Saint Martin with Jared and Michael,” I replied. It was the safe answer. I wished it had been true.

“Really? And how are the boys?”

“They're good, Ma.” I checked my watch to see how much time I had before I could call Brian to find out if I was lying.

“That Jared is a fine young man. He's really going to make something of himself. You stick with him, Joey, and you'll go places.” My mother loved Jared. She always thought that Michael was a bad influence.

“Anyway, I'm going to have to go, Ma. I have some things to take care of.”

“Okay,” she said with another sigh. “I know you're an important man.”

“Stop with the guilt, Ma. I really got to go.”

“I know. I know. But don't make it so long before you call again.”

“I won't.”

“Promise?”

“I promise.”

“Okay. I love you, Joey. And I miss you.”

“I love you, too, Ma.”

“Stay safe.”

“I'll do my best.”

“And never forget how proud I am of you. And your father too. Your father would be so proud.” Now it was my turn to begin tearing up. The reaction surprised me. I went to say something but the words got caught in my throat. All I got out was a small grunt before shutting up again. I took a deep breath and fought off any real tears.

“You okay, Joey?”

“Fine, Ma,” I finally got out. “I really got to go. I love you.” Then I hung up and checked my watch. I still had four minutes until I was supposed to make my next call. So for four minutes I just sat there on the edge of the bed, staring down at my empty hands. They were shaking.

When it was time, I picked up the phone and dialed. Terry Graham. Annie Campbell. Jack Wilkins. I went through the process again, past all of the chipper receptionists and waited for the phone to be answered for the fourth time. It rang; each ring seemed to go on forever. Finally, after the sixth ring, someone answered the phone.

“You owe me.” It was Brian.

“I guess that means you found him.”

“Yeah. But you have to promise me you'll pay your debts before I let you talk to him.”

“All right, so what is it that I owe you?”

“Your next job. It's the one in Montreal. I need you to lay low for two more weeks. Just stay where you are.”

“Here?” I asked, looking around my dank motel room.

Brian ignored my question. “I'll arrange a flight for you in two weeks. Take the time to get your head on straight. The job in Montreal is an important job. It's a tricky job. You've got to do it right. No mistakes, no drama. You get in, you study the job, you do the job, and you leave.”

“That's how I operate.”

“Yeah. That's how you used to operate before you attacked a woman in public and left three corpses on a beach.”

“They found the cabbie?”

“Yeah, what was left of him. Sharks made off with all the good stuff. Some guy hooked the rest of the body while deep sea fishing yesterday. Betchya that's not the catch he expected.” There was a chuckle in Brian's voice. “Anyway, you owe me a clean job. That's all I ask.”

“You got it. There's nothing in the world that I want more than to get things back to normal.” Brian started laughing. “What's so funny?” I asked.

“Your normal is pretty fucked up. You know that, right?”

“The concept's not lost on me,” I replied. Brian proceeded to give me the details of the Montreal job. It was a tricky hit. The guy was a player. He ran with protection. His house was wired to keep people out, to keep me out. I didn't ask who he was or what he did. After what had just happened, I didn't need the motivation. I was to go to Montreal and scout the job for six days. Then I had a couple of days to pull it off. I wasn't to call in again for another ten days unless I needed something. “Try not to call me until you're standing over a body,” Brian said.

“Okay,” I replied, trying my best to sell the reply. “Now, how do I get in touch with Michael?”

“Stay on the line. I'll patch him through.”

“Thanks, Brian.”

“Listen, Joe, don't call me Brian. It's Matt. It has to be Matt. Victor Erickson. Leonard Jones. Elizabeth Weissman.” There was a click and then dead air on the line. I waited for a few seconds and then there was another click.

“Hello?” Michael's voice came through. He sounded confused.

“Michael? It's Joseph.”

“Joe!” Michael sounded genuinely excited. There was no anger or bitterness in his voice. “Look at you, breaking rules. How the hell did you arrange this?”

“I've got friends in high places,” I replied. “They didn't tell you that I was trying to reach you?”

“Nope, my connection just told me to stay on the line, so I stayed on the line. How are you? Where are you?”

“Georgia,” I replied.

“No shit. Hotlanta. You can have some good times down there.” I wasn't really in the mood for good times. “What's up, Joe?” It was like Beach Haven never happened.

“I just wanted to make sure that you were okay. I felt bad about leaving you like that.”

“That's pretty sweet of you. Checking up on me.” I could deal with the ribbing. Michael paused for a second, considering his own wellbeing. “I'm good. There were a few scary moments but they all make for a good story now. Right after they stitched me up, a couple of cops came in, dragged me out of bed, threw me in their cruiser, and told me they were taking me in. Real cops too. Real cop car. It was crazy. It turned out they were on our side. Go figure. Who would have thought that? Real cops? Anyway, they told me that they got a phone call from pretty high up in Intel and were ordered to get me somewhere safe, somewhere where they could finish patching me up. You use the same connections to save me that you used to set up this call?”

“No,” I replied. I wished I could have said something different. “Digging you out of that hole that I left you in back there was all Jared's doing.”

I could feel Michael nodding at the other end of the line. “That guy's really got his shit together. We make a pretty good team, the three of us do. I've got the enthusiasm. Jared's got the plans.”

“Yeah,” I replied, wondering what it was that I had. Wondering why these guys were still friends with me. Even though I didn't ask the question out loud, Michael sensed it.

“You've got the heart, Joe. You even called to check up on me.”

“I'm sorry I left you at the hospital, Michael.” I had to apologize. I had to spit the guilt out of my mouth. It was a poison that I'd been holding there for days. I wish I could say that it made me feel better.

“Don't worry about it, Joe. What choice did you have? Staying would have screwed everything up. The cops—those cops who helped me escape—they were only able to lose me because I was alone. Losing both of us would have been tough to cover up. You had to go. Jared would say the same thing.”

I didn't care what Jared would have said. “Jared doesn't know everything.” I wanted to ask him why he was so much braver than I was. Instead, all I could ask was “Why'd you come back for me?”

“Because I'm stupid. I'm a stupid man who likes a good fight.” Michael laughed through the phone.

“Seriously. Why'd you come back for me?”

“We've all got our reasons, Joe.” Michael paused for a moment before he answered to make sure that I was serious.

“What does that mean?” I said.

“We've all got our reasons for fighting. I fight for you guys. I fight for my friends.”

“You don't wonder about the bigger picture?”

“Sure, I wonder,” Michael replied, “but as long as you guys are fighting beside me, it's all secondary. You and Jared saved me when I was a kid. I owe you both.”

“Well, if you did owe me anything, the debt's been repaid.”

“No, that's a debt that I'll never be able to repay, pal. Don't feel bad, Joe. You did the right thing.”

“I'm starting to think that sometimes the ‘right thing' is for suckers.” There was an awkward pause on the conversation. Michael wouldn't say it, but the pause told me everything I needed to know. Michael agreed with me. “So, you're going to be okay, then?” I asked, breaking the silence.

“Fine. Better than fine. I'm almost back to a hundred percent already. I'm going to have a nasty scar, but what do they say? ‘Pain heals. Chicks dig scars. Glory lasts forever.'”

I shook my head in disbelief. “
They
don't say that, Michael. Keanu Reeves said that in
The Replacements.
And that movie was a piece of shit. You do know that you kill people for a living, don't you, Michael?”

“Yeah, so?”

“So maybe you should get some of your own lines.”

Michael laughed. “I'll work on it. Next time, we're really making it to Saint Martin,” Michael said. “We're going to find some beautiful women, and we're going to have the time of our lives.”

“I'm there,” I replied. “I just want you to know, Michael, if I'm ever in that situation again, I'm not leaving you behind.” I promised myself right then that I would never leave anyone I cared about behind again. That's a promise, Maria.