Jackie Brown (13 page)

Be better to look the motherfuckers in the eye. Call the play.

"He's getting out," Tyler said.

Nicolet thought the kid was going to come back to their car with some kind of bullshit story. The kid knew who they were. But what he did was stand by the Firebird showing how cool he was, right arm on the open door, his left arm on the roof of the car. Waiting for them. About thirty feet away.

"Keep your door in front of you," Nicolet said, "till I cover him."

"You sure he has a gun?"

"I'm positive."

"What if he doesn't?"

"Then don't fucking shoot him."

He watched Tyler slide out of the car to stand behind the door and lay his Beretta on the sill of the open window. Nicolet got out and started toward the right side of the Firebird, moving a few steps away from the cars to get a cross-fire angle, his pistol held against his leg.

The kid looked over the low roof at them.

Tyler said, "Keep your hands up where I can see 'em.

The kid, posed against the door, turned his palms up. Too cool. Maybe high.

Tyler said, "Step away from the car."

The kid said, "You police? What'd I do?"

"I said step away from the car."

Nicolet saw the kid glance this way and then back to Tyler, saying, "You want to look at my driver's license? Lemme get it for you," and ducked his head into the Firebird.

Nicolet was moving. Heard Tyler yelling again to get away from the car. Saw the kid's head and shoulders come up and saw bright metal flash in the sunlight, the kid firing what looked like a Magnum at Tyler, firing again, coming around now to put the gun on the car roof, and Nicolet brought up the Sig and squeezed off three at him fast. Saw the kid duck down maybe hit, maybe not. Nicolet moved. Got to the off side of the Firebird crouched, looking straight at that fucking smoked glass you couldn't see through, and blew it out firing three quick ones and three more, catching a glimpse of the kid through the shattered window and heard him scream. Nicolet went over the hood, rolled over it, and hit the door as the kid was getting to his knees and he screamed again, wedged against the front seat, his shiny .44 Mag on the ground. Nicolet kicked it under the car

and put the barrel of the Sig Sauer against the kid's head, the kid's eyes dazed looking up at him, the kid saying, "Man, I'm shot."

Nicolet turned his head to look toward the Chevy. He saw two bullet holes in the door and Tyler lying on the ground on his side, holding himself.

12

Max had that effortless feeling of a natural high. He couldn't wait to see her. But the moment Jackie opened the door, looked at him and said, "Oh," he felt his high begin to nose over.

All right, she was surprised, no question about it. He said, "You're expecting someone."

She said, "No ..." not sounding too sure. She said, "Well, yes and no, but come on in."

At this point there was still hope. She looked great.

"It's okay?"

"Yeah, really."

But then closing the door she said, "You want your gun, don't you?" and the good feeling sunk all the way to hit bottom as she went to the bedroom in her loose T-shirt and tight jeans saying, "Let me get it."

Like going to get change for the paper boy.

No apology or acting sheepish about it, wanting to explain. No-you want your gun? And goes to get it. He had come here prepared to treat it lightly. "You get a chance to use that gun you stole on anybody?" Like that, with a straight face. Well, no fun and games now. It pissed him off, this act she put on, so fucking casual about it. Ask her how she'd like to go back to the Stockade, since Ordell hadn't paid the bond premium. See how casual she was then.

Jackie came out of the bedroom with his gun in her hand and kind of a sad smile, saying, "Max, I'm sorry," and he felt his mood begin to swing up again, hope stirring in him. "I was afraid if I asked to borrow it you'd say no, and you'd have every right to. Would you like some coffee?"

Just like that, back in the game.

He said, "I wouldn't mind," following Jackie to the kitchen. "You get to use it?"

She gave him the smile again. "I felt a lot safer having it. I hope you don't take milk. It turned sour while I was in jail."

"No, black's fine."

He watched her lay the Airweight on the kitchen table, bare except for an ashtray, and go to the range. She looked even slimmer in the jeans than she did last night. Not slim exactly, just right.

"You want to hang on to it for a while? It wouldn't be legal but, you know, if it makes you feel better to have it . . ."

She said, "Thanks," pouring their coffee, "but I have my own now." She came over to the table with two ceramic cups, plain white. "Do you take sugar?"

Max said, "No, thanks. You went out this morning and bought a gun?" It was possible if she drove up to Martin County; here, there was a three-day wait to buy a handgun, a cooling-off period.

"Let's just say I have one," Jackie said, "okay? I don't want you to be concerned about it."

"Somebody loaned it to you."

"Right," Jackie said, leaving the kitchen.

Max pulled a chair out from the table and sat down, wondering what kind of gun it was and if she knew how to use it. He thought of asking as Jackie came back in with cigarettes and the tan lighter and sat down across from him.

She said, "I couldn't wait last night to get in the shower and wash my hair."

And he forgot about the gun.

"It looks nice."

"I called in sick. As far as the airline knows, I'm still available."

"Are you?"

"I don't know yet. I'm going to see Tyler, and I suppose Nicolet, later on today and ask them." She paused to light a cigarette. "Do what you suggested. Offer to help and see what happens."

"What I meant," Max said, "was have a lawyer do the negotiating for you. If you can't afford one there's a good friend of mine, semiretired, I think would do it as a favor. He doesn't need the fee as much as you need a lawyer."

She was staring at him over her coffee mug and it reminded him of last night.

She said, "Maybe not. Let me talk to them first, about Ordell's money."

"That'll interest them, but only up to a point."

"All of it in Freeport. I mean a lot. Like a half million in safe-deposit boxes and more coming in."

"How'd you find that out?"

"He told me last night."

"Ordell called you?"

"He was here when I got home."

Max said, "Jesus Christ," and lowered his coffee mug to the table. "He broke in?"

"He picked the lock."

"You call the police?"

"We talked," Jackie said. "He had some doubts at first. But he's always trusted me and wants more than anything to believe he still can. You know why? Because he needs me. Because without me all that money is going to sit in Freeport. There may be other ways to get it out, but I'm the only one he's ever used, and all the other people he deals with are crooks. Put yourself in his place."

Max stared at her. "How do you get it out?"

"The same way I've been doing it. But first they have to let me go back to work."

"You're offering to set him up."

"If they let me off. Otherwise no deal."

"You understand the risk involved?"

"I'm not going to prison or do that probation thing again."

He watched her studying her cigarette, carefully turning the tip of it in the ashtray. "Well, you said you might have more options than you thought."

Jackie was concentrating on the cigarette, bringing the ash to a point. She said, "You know how many miles I've flown?" and looked up at him.

Max shook his head. "How many?"

"About seven million, jetway to jetway. I've been waiting on people for almost twenty years. You know what I make now, starting over? Sixteen thousand, with retirement benefits you can stick in your ear. How do you feel about getting old?"

"You're not old-you look great."

"I'm asking how you feel. Does it bother you?"

"It's not something I think about. I look in the mirror, I'm the same person I was thirty years ago. I see a photograph of myself-that's different. But who's taking my picture?"

She said, "It's different with guys. Women get older at an earlier age."

He said, "I guess they worry about it more. Some women, all they have is their looks. They lose that . . . But you've got way more than looks."

"I have? What?"

"You want to argue about getting old? What's the point?"

"I feel like I'm always starting over," Jackie said, "and before I know it I won't have any options left. I'll be stuck with whatever I can get." She said, "I told you last night I've been married twice? Actually I've had three husbands, but two of them I think of as the same guy, at age twenty, and then a much older version. Their names were even the same. So I say I've been married twice. I was nineteen with the first one, going to school in Miami, U of M. He raced dirt bikes, did the hill climb?"

"That's pretty young to get married."

"I wouldn't live with him otherwise. That's how smart I was then."

"Times change," Max said, "but that's generally the custom."

"We were married five months ... he was killed racing a drawbridge going up, trying to jump his bike across the opening. Like in the movies. Only he was drunk and didn't make it."

Max kept his mouth shut.

"My second husband was hooked on drugs, started dealing to pay for his habit and went to prison. Before he got the airline job he was a fighter pilot in Vietnam. Are you getting the picture? The last one was fifteen years older than I am, about your age. I thought, Ah, here's one with some maturity. Not knowing he was the dirt biker come back to life."

Max said, "I'm only twelve years older than you are."

She seemed to smile-for whatever reason, he wasn't sure-and then was serious again.

"It bothered him being older, or getting old. So he'd run I don't know how many miles every day. He'd swim out into the ocean alone, until you couldn't see him. He drove too fast, got drunk every night. . . . He was funny, he was very bright, but, boy, did he drink. One evening we were sitting out on the balcony, he hopped up on the cement railing and started walking it, his arms out, one foot in front of the other. ... We were on the sixth floor. I said, 'You don't have to prove anything to me.' I remember I said, I'm not watching, so you might as well get down.' I turned my head, I couldn't watch." Jackie stopped for a moment. "When I looked up again he was gone. I don't know if he fell or stepped off. He didn't make a sound."

It was quiet in the kitchen.

She said, "That's my history. I've logged seven million miles married to two drunks and a junkie."

Max cleared his throat. "You know, you didn't refer to any of them by name."

"Mike, Davey, and Michael," Jackie said. "What difference does it make?" But then she said, "They were nice guys, really, most of the time, and yet I wasn't surprised. . . . You know what I mean? My big mistake, I let myself get into situations I know can be trouble, my eyes wide open, and then have to figure a way out." She paused, stubbing her cigarette in the ashtray. "But you know what I'm more tired of than anything?"

"Tell me," Max said.

"Smiling. Acting pleasant."

"Now you're talking about your job."

' 'Have a wonderful time in the Bahamas and thank you for flying Islands Air/ Or thank you for flying Delta, or TWA. 'Sir, would you like another cup of TWA coffee?''

Max grinned at her, seeing it coming. An old one.

" 'Or would you prefer TWAT?''

"You like it though, don't you? Flying?"

"Not anymore."

"You get a lot of guys hitting on you?"

"Enough."

"How about when you were a young girl," Max said, "were the boys rough with you?"

She looked at him over the coffee mug with that gleam of fun in her eyes.

"How did you know?"

13

Ray Nicolet called at four in the afternoon. By this time she had already tried to get hold of Tyler. The FDLE office told her he was on the street, and when she dialed his beeper number and waited there was no response.

"I'd like you to drop whatever you're doing and come to Good Samaritan," Nicolet said, his voice quiet and, she felt, grim. Maybe putting it on. "If you want I'll send a car for you. What do you say?"

"Why do you want me to come?"

"See what one of Ordell's guys did to Faron. Then I want you to look at the guy and tell me if you know him."

"Where are you?"

He told her the third floor, east wing.

And was standing by the nurse's station when she walked up to him less than forty minutes later, wearing a man's white shirt with her jeans now, tan bag hanging from her shoulder.

"Thanks for coming," Nicolet said. It surprised her.

He stared for a moment not saying a word, then walked off, and she trailed after him along the hallway to where two deputies in dark green stood by the open door to a room. The deputies stepped aside, looking her over as Nicolet gave them a nod and Jackie followed him in, past the first bed, empty, to a young black guy lying in the second bed, his eyes closed. There were tubes in his arms, one coming out of his nose, another from under the sheet to a catheter bag hooked to the side of the bed.

"What happened to him?"

"I shot him," Nicolet said, "after he shot Faron."

Jackie turned from the young guy in the bed to the ATF agent. "How is he?"

"Which one?"

"Tyler. Is he all right?"

"I want you to look at this guy first. You know him?"

Jackie stepped closer. "No."

"Have you ever seen him before?"

"I don't think so."

"Maybe one time with Ordell?"

She shook her head. "No."

"I wonder," Nicolet said, "if this is another one of those times you don't know him but he knows you. Like with Beaumont."

"Is he Jamaican?"

"No, this one's a homey," Nicolet said. "His street name, according to one of the deputies outside, is Cujo. And Cujo, I find out, is fairly well known in criminal court. His driver's license says he's Hulon Miller, Jr., but I doubt if there's anyone outside of his mother calls him Hulon." Nicolet put his hand on Cujo's shoulder and gave it a shake. "Isn't that right? Open your eyes, I want you to look at somebody here's come to visit you."