Hard Exit, page 10
She looked gorgeous, which was frustrating. Someone deliberately self-destructing shouldn’t be able to grace the cover of a magazine. It’s easier to work up the requisite concern, or loathing, depending on the circumstances, for a drunk if he or she is disheveled. But Amanda was wearing a pair of jeans that she knew created stirrings in me and a spaghetti-strap, tan silk top that I’d purchased for her. And she looked as though she’d just been touched up by a makeup artist. Knowing Amanda, she probably had been. She was provoking a confrontation, but I wouldn’t give her the satisfaction. Even if I hadn’t been wiped out, I think I would’ve ignored her attempt to start a fight. Because I was exhausted, however, I didn’t even nod hello.
I turned to Game, said, “I need sleep,” and headed for one of the guest rooms and locked the door behind me. It was a little after 4 p.m., and I felt as though I could sleep through the night, although I suspected I shouldn’t.
Before I was fully undressed, however, Amanda pounded on the door and screamed obscenities at me. She was rich, famous, beautiful, and petulant, and she almost always got what she wanted. But she’d told me long ago that one of the things she loved about me was that I was not a pushover, that I would stand up to her and tell her the truth when no one else would, no matter the cost. So, in the name of silently speaking my truth, I stuffed earplugs in my ears, turned on the white-noise machine, put a pillow over my head, and let the din drift into the background. I don’t know how long she pounded and screamed because I fell asleep within minutes—and dreamed of Jami.
I rarely did that anymore because my psyche deemed images of her too painful, pushing them from my unconscious mind the way I tried to shove her out of my waking thoughts. But in my dream that afternoon we were riding a tandem bike along the coast, a gentle breeze nudging clouds across the gorgeous sky. As we rode north on PCH toward where she’d been killed, she shouted witticisms from behind me, making me laugh. I pedaled along, a smile on my face, but then I looked over my shoulder—and she was gone, as was the back of the bike. Somehow, without benefit of a back wheel, I pulled to the shoulder, confused, then awoke in a cold sweat.
After I realized where I was, I glanced at the clock: 12:20 a.m. I’d obviously needed the sleep. I pulled on some shorts and felt refreshed. But then I looked in every room in the house and learned that Game and Amanda were gone.
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
I checked the beach but couldn’t tell if there were fresh footprints leading away from the stairs. I ran to the garage, where I found only the Porsche. I guessed Amanda had taken the Land Rover because she would be driving drunk, and the large vehicle could run over pedestrians without losing momentum. And Game took the BMW because the Berretta was under the driver’s seat and the Mossberg shotgun was in the trunk.
“You idiot,” I shouted, hating myself for not disabling the cars again. Amanda could be wrapped around a telephone pole because I was too lazy, or too trusting, or too stupid to remove the rotors a second time, and Game could be shooting teenagers and cops with my weapons. I cursed at myself again before I ran into the house, got dressed, secured another handgun, and grabbed the keys to the Porsche.
I drove quickly toward Santa Monica on PCH, breaking the speed limit but not setting any records because I didn’t know where I was going. Plus, urgency might not have been necessary—and perhaps was to be avoided—because I didn’t know if I wanted to get caught up in Game’s plan, whatever it was. Therefore, I drove rapidly toward a destination I hoped never to reach.
Amanda might only have crept along Broad Beach Road to a friend’s house, although I didn’t see the Land Rover in any of the driveways in the neighborhood, so that wasn’t likely. If she hadn’t been picked up for DWI and wasn’t sobering up in a holding cell, she was likely ensconced in the Loews Santa Monica or in the Hotel Bel Air. I figured I’d rule out the holding-cell by stopping by the Malibu/Lost Hills Sheriff’s Station on Agoura Road in Calabasas, which required a trip through Malibu Canyon. The way the last day and a half had gone, I surprised myself by remembering to remove the gun from my jacket before I entered the building.
“Well, if it isn’t Jackie Drake,” Billy Denton said as I approached the desk. The burly, bald sergeant and I had had more than a few run-ins over the years. He was proof the department didn’t discriminate against the intellectually challenged.
“Good to see you, Billy. You doing something different with your hair?”
“No. Just my natural charm you’re noticing.”
“Must be, Sarge. Any DWIs tonight?”
“It’s Saturday night in Malibu, Drake. What do you think?”
“Any that might be of interest to me?”
“Amanda blotto again, that it? Want me to call The Enquirer?”
“Actually, it’s been too long since we’ve chatted, and I miss you, Denton.”
“You always were full of shit, Drake. But all hatred aside, I’m sorry to hear about Cerveris. Musta got in too deep.”
I stared at him for a few seconds. It seemed out of character for Denton to show sympathy, especially to me. A normal, healthy human would express condolences to someone who’d just lost a friend, but I’d never known Denton to be anything but broken. Was he telling me something? Did he know Chris hadn’t killed himself? Or did Denton mention Chris’ ostensible suicide to rub salt in my wounds while I searched for an intoxicated movie star?
“Thank you for your sympathy,” I said, then asked, “Are you telling me something about Chris’ death? I know he didn’t kill himself, and he didn’t deal drugs. What do you know, Denton? Is the department covering something up? Are you?”
Part of me hoped he’d react violently. The confrontation wouldn’t end well for me, but I’d have an outlet for the emotions roiling through me, causing me to question everything. Unfortunately—and luckily—Denton didn’t take the bait.
He said, “Another deputy who didn’t know you’re such a simpering pansy would feel threatened by you, Drake, and would kick your ass. But I know you’re a moron whipped by a whore drug addict, so I’ll go easy on you.”
Despite almost lashing out, I didn’t take his bait, either. My anger briefly turned to rage, but I rode out the emotion and calmed myself. After shaking my head at him and walking out, I decided to turn my anger into determination. I backed out of the lot and headed down Malibu Canyon, promising to make the changes I had to make to once again be the man Jami had loved.
Or maybe I could at least become a man I could learn to like.
As I drove toward Loews Santa Monica, intending to look for Amanda before I scoured Oakville for Game, I thought Denton had a point about my lack of intellectual heft. If I’d been smart enough to have LoJack installed on the BMW, I’d know where Game was. Or at least I could find my car.
I pulled in front of Loews, told the valet I’d be back in a minute, then asked the pretty, young, blond clerk at the front desk if J.T. National had checked in tonight. She flashed a brilliant smile in case I was Amanda’s agent and was seeking new talent. She nodded and said, “Yes, sir. Would you like me to ring her room?”
J.T. National was the name Amanda used most frequently to check in anonymously. It was a bastardization of Joshua Tree National Park, a fascinating outdoor wonderland in the high desert a few hours from L.A. where Amanda and I camped occasionally—a place to relax anonymously.
Had Amanda not wanted me to track her down, she could’ve used any other fake name. Of course, she was probably lucky to have driven PCH and made it to the hotel in one piece, so covering her tracks was not likely high on her list. In fact, knowing her as I did, I was certain she wanted me to find her, otherwise she’d have gone to another hotel, one I didn’t know she loved to stay in. Running from me only to make sure I found her was the kind of bullshit I’d put up with for seven years.
“No, please don’t bother her. Just checking to see that she made it here safely.”
“Yes, she did, sir, and it was my great pleasure to check her in. I’ve always been a very big fan.”
I wanted to remind her that J.T. National had no fans, but she was just another kid hoping to make the contact that would launch her career so that she, too, could one day check into an overpriced hotel under a pseudonym while inebriated and rich. I thanked her, retrieved the Porsche, and knew that finding Game could prove to be nearly impossible.
But once again I was wrong.
The last place he would be, I figured, would be at his mother’s house, and at least I got that right. I slowly drove down Rachelle’s street and didn’t see the BMW or any lights on in her house. Of course, it was 2:20 a.m., so plenty of houses had no lights on, but Game wouldn’t have stopped by the house simply to go to sleep. Game wasn’t likely to be inside, and neither was anyone else.
I drove the quiet streets of Oakville slowly. Only two all-night taco stands, a diner, and a few 7-Elevens were open. In twenty minutes of driving, I saw fewer than a dozen moving vehicles, none of them owned by Amanda or me. Three of them were police cars. At a red light, an Oakville Police Department patrol car pulled alongside, and the driver stared at me. I don’t know if he was worried about securing probable cause for a stop—because driving a Porsche through Oakville at nearly 3 a.m. was proof that I was either up to no good or was about to be the victim of a crime—but he decided his glare was bracing enough to scare me straight. He drove next to me until I turned into the parking lot of a 7-Eleven. The cop drove on, so I sat there for a minute, then headed in the other direction.
Just as I started to believe my search was pointless, I thought to drive by Crispus Attucks Park. I didn’t know what I hoped to find, but I drove down Mallory slowly. The park was quiet—no cops or news crews, and someone had removed the crime-scene tape. I turned left at the corner and saw my BMW parked at the curb.
I parked and walked toward the driver’s side. The door opened and Game said, “Where you been, man? Called you three times.”
I patted my empty left pants pocket and realized that in my rush to leave the house in pursuit of Amanda and Game, I’d forgotten my phone.
“When’d you call?” I was glad to have found Game but pissed he’d stolen my car.
“I don’t know, ’bout a hour and a half, then again and again. Been sitting here wondering if I gotta do everything myself.” He rubbed the knuckles on his right hand with his left palm.
“You stole my car.”
“Didn’t steal shit, Jack. You asleep, Amanda gone, and my boys text me the plan worked. Been waiting to hear what a professional do in a case like this.”
“A case like what?” I admitted that not only did I not have a right to be pissed at Game, but I also respected him. If pressed, I’d admit I liked the kid.
He said, “Follow me.” The only illumination came from the nearly full moon and two streetlights—about a hundred yards from each other—that had not been shot out, as the others had. I followed him across the cracked blacktop toward the four basketball courts. As we approached a court on the left, I noticed in the limited light that there was something unusual about the stanchion nearest us. The pole that supported the backboard and rim had a dark mass at its base. When we came within forty feet of the court, the mass began to transform into definable shapes.
On either side of the pole, handcuffed to it and squatting in what appeared to be uncomfortable positions, were two young Black males. Game opened the flashlight app on his phone and quickly waved it near their faces. They looked scared and pissed off. I leaned in close enough to see their faces and noticed they’d been beaten—enough to be bloody and swollen. They both wore sagging jeans and white t-shirts. One had a red bandana tied around his right biceps, and the other wore a red ’do rag on his head. The Nike running shoes on the feet of one of them and the work boots on the feet of the other stood in a puddle of urine.
Game said, “Here the punks that shot me.”
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
I walked about twenty steps away so the captives couldn’t hear us. Game hesitated, then followed me but said nothing. I waited. Still nothing.
He said, “Don’t ask. You know nothing and ain’t even here, come down to it.”
“You had the guys in Popeye’s snatched, then traded them for these two, who obviously aren't worth much, just button men.”
“Ain’t The Godfather. This Oakville. But, yeah, these busters ain’t shit. They called soldiers or shooters.” He pushed out his chest and rubbed his knuckles, revealing he was the one who’d hit them.
I don’t think I’d hit guys handcuffed to a pole, but I’d never been shot, then had the opportunity to exact revenge on the shooters. And I wasn’t sixteen. I didn’t mention the beating.
I asked, “The plan is we disappear, then make an anonymous call to the police?”
“Something like that.”
“This scheme of yours rates a success in your mind?” A big dog barked in the distance.
“You say you gonna solve the shooting, but don’t. Then I serve the bitches up in no time. Case closed. Looks like I should have a license.”
“I’ll admit your plan was efficient. The MLKs work quickly. If my hunch is correct, no one else was shot while enacting the plan. The two sides negotiated. Very adult. You obviously snatched the right two guys.”
“Know all this. Time to grab me a shorty and get busy.”
“Okay, tough guy. What your plan fails to take into consideration is that you’ve turned murders—which, I admit, would not likely have been solved by the local authorities—into a federal crime. Kidnapping is federal, unlike homicide. Those two punks didn’t cuff themselves to that pole, and after standing in their own piss, they might be more willing to talk to authorities than you think. But I’m betting Oakville’s finest, even while beating them, won’t get them to sell out anyone.
“The Feds, however, may offer these guys immunity or knock their sentences way down. If they mention the hijacked drug deal, and the Feds decide to go after the higher ups, these two could get minimal time, and the MLKs could be looking at federal kidnapping charges.”
Game glanced over his right shoulder at the guys squatting in the distance. I didn’t like us standing in the park near bangers who’d been kidnapped, even if we were in the dark. Anyone looking our way probably wouldn’t see the odd shapes at the base of the pole or see us. But I still didn’t like being there.
“What you saying?” Game finally asked.
“I’m not sure. I’m just clarifying some points you may have overlooked in the Popeye’s parking lot.”
“They ain’t gonna talk, for real. You get pinched, do your time, stand up, be strong, come out with major props. They’ll be heroes. Then they ain’t punks no more.”
“I understand. But how silent would they be if the Feds sprung them immediately?”
“Very silent, ’cause they be dead. The only leverage they got is the set. They give up someone in da Posse, or the supplier or whatever, you think da Posse gonna wonder where that information came from? Gonna be pretty obvious, right? These busters will be dead by morning, painfully dead, and they know it. They dumb as shit ’cause they in da Posse, but they ain’t that dumb.”
“It’s your world, so I’ll take your word for it. But can the police make a case against these guys for the shooting? Because they won’t confess, what evidence do the cops have on these guys? There probably aren’t any prints on the guns that already came up stolen, as did the getaway car. All they have are the witnesses, who were running or ducking, trying not to get shot. Any decent defense attorney could discredit the shoe prints as being inconclusive. It’s a public park, so they could have visited it anytime, and there’s nothing illegal about that. Or the lawyer could say his clients weren’t wearing them that day. And do you think anyone who saw them do the shooting would come forward? Not a chance.”
“You starting to see how things play out in the ’Ville.”
I looked at Game, confused. If I understood him, we were just spinning our wheels.
“Meaning?”
“Meaning it all one big joke. Turning these clowns over to the Oakville pigs a waste of taxpayer money. But what ain’t?”
“‘I can’t go on. I’ll go on.’”
“What’s that?”
“One of my favorite quotes by a writer named Samuel Beckett. Sums up pretty much most of life.”
“This from a man who lives in a beach mansion with a fine movie star.”
“Let’s get out of here. We’ll call the cops from a burner.”
I locked the Porsche, and we got into the BMW. If the cop who eyed me from his patrol car earlier saw the same Porsche still prowling Oakville in the wee hours, he’d light me up, and who knows what fresh hell he’d contrive?
I pulled away and said, “I don’t understand something. Why is it okay for you to beat those guys but not to kill them? They’re sworn enemies, you’re a bad-ass gunslinger, and you’ve never avenged the deaths of your brothers. You had your chance. The cops just as easily could’ve found two dead guys at the base of that pole, and the park shooting would effectively be solved, without wasting taxpayer money. Because the cops weren’t likely to solve the shooting, they’d be even less likely to solve these murders, if they even pretended to try.”
“All white people think like you, or you dumber than most?”
We were rounding a corner when he asked the question. I considered backhanding him across the face. My frustration with all of it—Amanda’s drinking, Chris’ murder, and what I believed to be Jami’s contempt for the man I’d become since her death—almost got the better of me. I caught myself before my hand moved two inches, but Game saw it leave the wheel.
“You gonna hit me ’cause I break your balls? That how it is? I coulda split, got a gun, and shot you when you found me, but didn’t ’cause I thought we almost like friends, man. But you been wanting to hit me all this time?”
