Time's Up (29 page)

Through the windshield, I saw Niecy on the radio.
Thank God.

An earsplitting squeal sounded at the end of the block. I did what Hank taught me never to do. I took my eyes off the nearest threat and glanced at the Japanese Jeep bucking in place at the end of the block.

Marcus shoved me in the back.

I took a header onto the asphalt, shredding my hands and knees on the pavement. I scrambled to my feet, ready to give Marcus the what for.

The Suzuki Samurai dropped into gear and charged me.

I faked left, the Suzuki swerved. I stutter-stepped to the right and froze as I got a good look at the driver. He had a big white bandage over his ear.

Ferret.

I cut back left again. Ferret cycled the wheel as I threw myself toward a pickup truck, smacking the back of my head on the running board as I rolled underneath the truck bed.

The screech of rubber combined with the crumpling of steel and explosion of glass and plastic was one of the worst sounds I'd ever heard.

I pushed myself up onto my hands and knees and forced myself to turn around and look. The Samurai lay on its side, wheels spinning, engine whining, the Interceptor crushed between the Jeep's nose and a red Ford Taurus.

I got to my feet and ran toward the wreck. “Call nine-one-one!”

The men backed away. No one lifted a finger.
Jaysus!

The glass face was cracked on my phone, but it still worked. “We need an ambulance, police, and fire truck at the Brothers of Allah Prayer Center.”

“Stay on the line, please.”

“I can't!” Leaving it on, I jammed it in my back pocket and climbed on the hood of the Taurus. “Niecy? Can you hear me?” The windshield of the Interceptor was a mangled but intact spiderweb around her. “Niecy!” I couldn't see her. “Niecy, help's on the way!”

Fifty yards away, Ferret fought his way out of the Samurai's passenger window. He glared at me, flipped me off with a latex-gloved finger, and disappeared into the welcoming crowd.

Not a sound. Not a movement from the smashed cockpit.

I couldn't get to her, much less get her out.

Far off in the distance, the faint aria of emergency vehicles sounded. I sank down on the hood. The blare of sirens came closer. I lay back on the Taurus's windshield, waiting for the bright blue and red lights, certain that Niecy was going to be okay.

Had to be okay.

The CPD in its officious blue and white, two ambulances, and the sublime scarlet fire truck arrived all at once. Men of all shapes and uniforms spread out and took over in a display of true American efficiency, freeing the crumpled soda can of an Interceptor from the Samurai.

I swayed.

“Are you hurt?” a detective asked me.

“No,” I said.

He eyed me up and down. “You look a little dinged up to me. Why don't you sit down on the curb and I'll get one of the EMTs to check you out.”

I scanned the paramedics, looking for Ernesto.
Not this call, I guess.

“I got this one,” Tommy Narkinney said from behind me, fingers closing on my arm.

He hustled me away from the noise, bumping and nudging me past the ambulance and the firemen. “Always gotta be the goddamn center of attention, dontcha? Fucking showboat.”

He was too imbecilic to respond to.

Tommy opened the rear door of his squad car and shoved me in, pressing my head down perp-style. “For once in your life, you're gonna stay quiet.” He closed the door and went back to the fray.

The emergency crew peeled back the Interceptor roof like the top of a sardine can. I sat watching from the back of the squad car and realized I couldn't open the damn door.

Paramedics surrounded the Interceptor. One mouthed okay with a thumbs-up and motioned for a stretcher. Between the broad-shouldered navy uniforms, I got a glimpse of Niecy's tiny white hand gesturing to them.

I got my broken phone out and called Hank.

“Maisie? Are you okay?”

“Um . . . yeah. Yeah,” I said, not really knowing. “I'm in the back of Nark's squad car. They're taking me to the station and loading Niecy in an ambulance and Nark—that bastard—”

“Who?”

“Tommy Narkinney. Oh my God! The guy. The Union guy I sapped at the photo shoot. The Ferret. He tried to kill me—
with a Jeep!”

“Say again.”

“Ferret! Idiot Narkinney should've been here after I called him and—”

“Maisie.”

I looked down at my skinned knees peeking through the torn polyester-blend cargo pants. They were shaking.

“Cripes, Hank. A freaking Suzuki Samurai. He tried to kill me with a goddamn high-school shop project! He missed and hit the cart and Niecy's hurt and they're Jaws-of-Lifeing the Interceptor and—”

“It's going to take me two hours to get to the police station.”

“Okay okay okay,” I said. “Jaysus! I'm gonna tear Narkinney's goddamn head off—”

“Maisie!”

My spew of chatter ceased.

“Do not say a single word. No name, rank, and serial number bullshit. Nothing. Can you do that?”

I nodded furiously at the phone.

“Maisie? Say yes.”

“Yes.”

“Not another word.”

He hung up. I switched my phone off and put it away.

The driver's door opened. Narkinney got in behind the wheel. He cracked his knuckles in that riffling fist-at-a-time way and caught my eye in the rearview. “Now would be a good time to call your daddy, Maisie-Daisy.”

You'd love that, wouldn't you?
I ducked my head and latched the seat belt.
Hank's Law Number Ten: Keep your mouth shut.

Peterson got in, smelling of onions, Afta, and dirty socks. “Where we takin' her?”

“To the station,” Narkinney said. “Where else?”

 

Keeping your mouth shut is surprisingly hard to do. Especially when you're trying to come down off a fight-or-flight adrenaline overload. Tommy knew it, and revved his sweet self up to moderate dick, laying out some easy lines that were hard to pass up.

I thought about what Hank told me. Nothing different from what anyone in my family would have said to anyone in the squeeze. Still, I wasn't the one in the vise....

I sat for thirty-five minutes on a chilly metal folding chair in a squalid interrogation room. Two hours till Hank was starting to seem like a
Waiting for Godot
retrospective.

I hadn't made a sound.

Narkinney was fuming. Thoroughly pissed. Peterson couldn't quite figure it out, staring across the steel table at me like I was some sort of circus freak.

The courtesy knock at the door didn't help.

A uniformed officer ushered in a slim, six-foot-four, redheaded, freckle-faced man-boy, with an “aw-shucks” smile and laser-bright blue eyes.

“Good day, y'all. I'm Beau Stadum. Miz McGrane's legal representation.”

“Huh?” Peterson said. Which was pretty much what I was thinking.

“I'm her lawyer.” His molasses-sweet Southern drawl thickened. He set his briefcase on the table. “Now, I just moved on up here from Alapaha, Georgia, an' I'm findin' y'all do things a lil' bit different 'round these parts.”

“Yeah.” Tommy sat back and put his hands behind his head. Using a fair bit of restraint not to prop his feet up on the table. “Here in Chicago, witnesses don't lawyer up.”

Beau didn't seem to hear Narkinney. “Miz McGrane? Gracious! Are you shiverin'?”

Before I could decide if I was, he'd slipped out of his suit coat and slung it around my shoulders. The jacket was warm and carried the faint scent of pine needles.

“One o' them cultural differences, I s'pose,” he said. “Down South, we don't normally take a witness's statement in an interrogation room, neither.”

“She hasn't said a fucking word,” Peterson spat.

Beau smiled and squinted across the table at his nameplate. “Officer Peterson, is it? I thought I spied a couple of vending machines down at the end of the hall. Do y'all think you'd mind fetchin' Miz McGrane a Coca-Cola?” He sat down next to me, removed his billfold and took out a couple of five-dollar bills. He set it on the table in front of Peterson. “Maybe bring back a round for us all?”

Peterson looked at Narkinney, then snatched the money and lumbered out of the interrogation room.

“Miz McGrane.” Beau eyed my ripped cargo pants and scraped hands. “Why, you sure do look all tore up.” He nodded at me slowly. Hypnotically. “Am I right in thinking you took a knock to the head in whatever altercation it was you witnessed, ma'am?”

I nodded.

“And not even a Band-Aid.” Beau shook his head and shifted his attention back across the table. “Funny thing 'bout cultural differences, Officer Narkinney. Down in the Peach State, we don't take a shiverin', tore-up, head-banged
victim
into an interrogation room to make a statement until she's been seen by a trained medical professional. Why, I'll wager my client's suffering from a concussion and non-progressive shock at the very least.”

Tommy looked away, tongue popping out his cheek.

“I think we all know we're done here.” Beau rose and helped me from my chair. “I'll be damned if this ain't exactly the kind of tiddlywinks that would stir up a hornets' nest of unwanted media attention back home.” He opened the door for me. “Miz McGrane will make a statement next week. Y'all have a nice day, now.”

Peterson met us in the hallway, four cans of soda in his arms.

“Thank you kindly, Officer, but I'm afraid we can't stay. Y'all enjoy those.” Beau raised his briefcase, effectively blocking Peterson from comment, guiding me toward the exit. “This way, ma'am.”

We rounded the corner. Beau smiled at me. “Good golly and a gray cat, it's one of life's simple pleasures working with a client who takes direction.”

I took his suit coat from my shoulders and handed it to him. “Thanks.”

“My pleasure, Miz McGrane.”

Hank stood waiting in the lobby. Beau met him with a two-handed handshake. “Bannon, ain't you a sight for sore eyes.”

“Appreciate this, Beau.” Hank put an arm around my shoulders.

“Nothing doing. Happy to be of service. This here gal's tough as whit leather.”

“I owe you,” Hank said and we started toward the door.

Beau chuckled. “Y'all don't be strangers now.”

 

The Super Bee was double-parked in front of the police station. No ticket.

Hank opened the passenger door and tucked me into the car. “Your partner's going to be fine,” he said. “Northwestern Memorial. Broken wrist, broken femur, concussion. They're keeping her over the weekend.”

I closed my eyes, feeling as wrung out as a Cello Mop. When I opened them, we were on the freeway.

“You all right, Buttercup?” A tic pulsed at the base of his jaw.

Not by a long shot.
“Yeah,” I said, my voice weirdly hoarse. I rubbed my forehead.

“Sure you are.” He sliced across four lanes of traffic and hit the exit. Anger rippled off him in waves.

 

Hank marched me into his office, hooked an additional chair around the corner of his desk—a glass-topped airplane wing of a B-25 bomber—and sat me down in it. He flipped on a couple computer monitors and after several clicks and password entries, a program titled Solomon EFIT-V v5.6 popped up. “Ready?”

I felt grubby and sick. “For what?”

“To show me the guy who tried to kill you.”

Talk about a little perspective.
Game face back on. Check.

The program was a marvel, really, generating sets of faces that progressively evolved as I answered Hank's questions. “Wow,” I said.

“Yeah. EFIT's effectiveness is based on recognition versus recall. The program corrects from the rejected features as well as the ones you've chosen.”

Within an hour, a disturbingly accurate composite photograph of the hired gun spat out of the printer. Ferret definitely hadn't attended Nawisko's memorial service.

Hank slipped the picture into a manila envelope and pulled open a drawer from the credenza behind us. A dozen cell phones were jumbled together. He selected one.

“What are you doing?”

“Making a phone call.” His face was stony. “Stay or stay blind. Up to you.”

He took pity on me. “Why don't you go get us a beer? Take your time.”

It took me all the way to the kitchen to realize I wanted to stay. I ran-walked back two Buds. Hank had moved to the couch across the room. I sat down next to him. He reached over, twisted the tops off both beers, and took one.

“Okay.” He pressed Call on the cell, hit Speaker, and set it on the coffee table. It rang three times.

“What?” whined a male voice.

“I want to talk to Eddie.”

“Yeah? So does the president and my old lady. Who the fuck are you?”

“A friend of Vi's.”

The voice sneered, “How
friendly
are you?”

“Not very. I'm the electrician.”

The attitude evaporated instantly. “One moment, please.” The phone muted.

Hank took a swallow of beer.

A click, then, “This is Eddie.”

“You got a live wire,” Hank said. “Needs to be grounded. Or clipped.”

“I didn't think you black-bag boys worked local. Are you bidding the job?”

“No. I'm sending over a schematic.”

“And if I don't want to fix it?”

“Up to you,” Hank said, “but it's the kind of thing that can burn a house down.”

There was a pause. “Thanks. I'll let Vi know you called.”

Hank flipped the phone over, pulled the SIM card, and snapped it in half.

I took a swig of beer, choked, and rested my elbows on my knees, trying not to look like the complete rube I was.

He put his hands on my shoulders and massaged my shoulder blades with his thumbs. It felt so good I started to pass out.

I let my head loll forward. “Oh my God!” I snapped upright. “I gotta call my mom.”

My mother answered on the second ring. “While I understand the difficulties of your situation and I appreciate Mr. Bannon's keeping me abreast of what's happening, I expect to hear from my baby's own mouth that she is okay.”

“I know, Mom. I'm sorry. And I'm okay. Perfectly fine.” I prattled on, cringing at my inability to stop. “Great, in fact.”

“That's nice for you, honey,” she said in a flat voice that made my stomach clench. “You do realize the rest of us are choosing up sides in the McGrane Civil War.”

“What?”

“Your father and I expect you tomorrow night. Whether or not you bring Mr. Bannon is up to you.”

 

I squinted at the clock. 2:37 a.m. “Hank?”

He padded out of the closet in jeans and a T-shirt. “Shhh.”

I was too sleepy to stop myself from asking questions. “Why are you up?”

He sat down on the edge of the bed and laced up his boots. “A CUB needs rewiring.”

“Huh?”

“I'll be back before you wake up.”

And before I could remember that CUB stood for completely useless bastard, he was gone.