Exit, page 13
“You have to help me out here, Joe. I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“Dorothy LeMay, dude. Porn actress from the 70s, 80s.”
“Okay…”
“Cassie knows how much I appreciate the history of the art.”
“Right.”
“We got a letter in the mailroom. It just sat there because we couldn’t figure out who to deliver it to. Chick’s name wasn’t in the corporate directory. No one knew who she was. It took me awhile to put it together.” He paused. “Dorothy LeMay,” he said, picking the envelope from the floorboard. “Don’t you get it? This letter’s from Cassie.”
Michael’s heart started to pound. “A secret message, you’re saying?”
“Yes, dude.”
“And Cassie mentioned something about Ketamine in the letter?”
“Yes, yes. I didn’t get it. The letter wasn’t making much sense. It started out as a confession. It turns out she’s been doing the horizontal tango with ’Roid Rage from the Bellatoris.”
“Merriman?” Michael couldn’t hide his surprise.
“Yeah, dude.”
“Go on.”
“Dude’s balls are like marbles, she says.”
“I don’t care about Merriman’s testicles, Joe.”
“As if I do?”
“Go on, please.”
“Anyway,” Joe continued, “she confesses to that. Then she warns me about how dangerous they are. ’Roid Rage is talking a lot of jazz to her about some brilliant plan.”
“Plan?” Michael said.
“Yeah. And she says if anything happens to her, I should warn you.”
“Wait a minute.” Michael pulled to a sudden stop. Then eased to the side of the road. More cars honked as they swerved around him. “If anything happened to her? She goes from confessing a relationship with Merriman to worrying about her own safety?”
Joe nodded. “Three-page letter, dude. First page was black ink. Next two were blue. I think she wrote ’em at different times. By page two she was sounding paranoid.”
Michael nodded. “Warning me…”
“That you’re part of the plan. They’re gunning for you, dude.”
Michael licked his lips. “Okay.”
“You’re taking this pretty light, dude.”
“Thinking,” Michael said. “Thinking?” Joe said, with a rise in his voice. “I think you’re forgetting something?”
“What?”
“The Ketamine, dude.”
Oh, that.
“What about it, Joe? What did Cassie say?”
“That’s what messed up the big boss?”
“Yes.”
“Cassie said that was part of the plan but she wasn’t sure how.”
“Okay.”
“You’re still not getting it, dude.”
“Help me out, Joe. What am I not getting?”
“The warning. Cassie said they’d pin the Ketamine on you. Something about invoices with your signature. A trail with Accounts Payable. I didn’t know what that meant.”
Michael didn’t hear another word.
Pinning the Ketamine on him.
Shit.
He glanced at Joe, tired, disturbed, resigned to his fate, sure for the first time of what had to be done, what steps to take. He said, “I have to get something from your car.”
CHAPTER
ONE
The house was a modest wood-frame with faded yellow siding. The metal fence that bordered the property was painted in a black powder-coated finish the manufacturer claimed resisted chipping and fading. Pure propaganda on both fronts. At the street side of the property was a stamp of dry lawn hardened by the cold. And beyond that, on the house itself, two mismatched window treatments. One with a dirty shade pulled down. The other with blinds snapped closed. Three dented garbage cans set by the concrete steps that led up to the front door. Last year’s Christmas wreath still nailed to that door.
An old Plymouth in the driveway.
Michael climbed the steps, opened the screen, rapped hard on the wood door.
Morning birds propped themselves on the branches of bare trees and sang in a chorus. Other than that, pure silence carried on the slight breeze. The street was only a few hundred paces long. Three other houses on top of one another. One the victim of a relatively recent fire. All of the houses dark inside. All with empty driveways. Empty curb the length of the block other than Michael’s Chrysler and an orange Dumpster used to remove debris from the burned house.
The door Michael knocked on opened a crack. No security chain held in place. One dark eye peering up at Michael from the cover of darkness.
Michael said, “I’m sorry. Is Ridley in? I’m—”
“I know who you are,” the dark-eyed person said. A woman. She opened the door all the way, flicked on a switch in the hallway. The lights flickered and then went nearly bright. The woman’s hair was the color of rum, her skin the color of condensed milk. Her eyes dark, of course. Heart-shaped lips. Small in stature but thick in the breasts and hips and thighs. Probably in her fifties but she could easily lie a decade or more off of her age.
She was wearing a man’s dress shirt and no pants. The shirt reached down to just above her knees. Nice, toned legs. She wasn’t wearing sunglasses but she wanted to be.
“You’re Michael,” she said.
He nodded, smiled. Didn’t speak any words out of awkwardness. Who was she?
“Wondering who in the hell I am?” she said, crinkles at the corner of her eyes.
Michael nearly winced. “Am I that obvious?”
“Not at all, honey,”—she shook her head, smiled—“yeah, pretty obvious.”
“You and Ridley must get along just fine,” Michael said. “He can read people pretty well, too.”
Her smile held. “We have our moments, Ridley and I. Sometimes it gets wild. I’m Jacqueline, by the way.”
“Pleased to meet you, Jacqueline,” Michael said.
“Likewise,” she said, and started walking.
Michael closed the door behind him, locked up, and followed Jacqueline through the small kitchen into an equally small living room. An entertainment center for Ridley’s television and a tattered couch were the only furniture.
“Price Is Right’s on,” she said, plopping down on the couch, remote control in hand. “I might like to catch it. Ridley’s in the bedroom. You can go right on in.”
Michael nodded and turned to leave. The bedroom was right off of the living room. Several pictures hung on the wall outside of it. Snapshots of Michael from adolescence to adulthood. A picture of Michael’s father in uniform, shoulder to shoulder with Ridley. A picture of Michael’s mother and father, taken at a picnic of some sort. Michael’s parents smiling bright for the camera. Michael paused on that one, swallowed.
“He sure enough sticks to type, doesn’t he?” Jacqueline called from the couch.
Michael eyed his mother in the photograph. Light skin, hair the color of rum. Heart-shaped lips.
“I suppose he does,” Michael admitted.
Jacqueline snickered.
Michael eased the bedroom door open, stepped inside, closed it tight behind him. Flicked on the lights.
Ridley lay sprawled on the mattress, forearm covering his eyes. Pajama bottoms, naked from the waist up. Soft in the middle, a forest of gray hairs on a muscle-hard chest. Breathing somewhere between easy and labored. That is, in the split second before the light surprised him. He shot up then, startled. Breathing heavy. Definitely heavy.
“It’s me,” Michael said. “Sorry.”
Ridley touched two fingers to his chest, probed the area, all the while nodding. It took a moment but the rise and fall of his chest calmed. His shoulders relaxed. So did his face.
“Sorry to disturb you,” Michael said.
“You’d’ve come in fifteen minutes ago you would’ve disturbed me,” Ridley said.
The room smelled heavily of sex.
“Took your aspirin?” Michael asked.
“I did.”
“You look spent.”
“I am,” Ridley said. “Reason I limit this to once a week.”
“Jacqueline doesn’t look like the type to be satisfied with that for too long.”
Ridley smiled. “Okay, you got me. Twice.”
Michael arched an eyebrow.
“Thrice. I swear ’fore God on that. With a day in between for recovery, like lifting weights and whatnot.”
Michael nodded. Sat down heavily on the corner of Ridley’s bed. Ridley scooted up on the mattress, touched at his chest again, by the heart, with the same two fingers, a frown on his face.
“You’ll live into your nineties if I know anything,” Michael said.
Ridley didn’t speak.
“When did you have it?” Michael asked.
“What’s that?”
“Your heart attack.”
“Boy, I ain’t never—” Ridley noticed the look on Michael’s face, probably, stopped cold and sighed. “How’d you find out?”
Michael shook his head, and then shrugged his shoulders. “My awareness is sharpening, I would suppose. It just dawned on me right now, actually. I’ve noticed little things that went beyond you just having concerns because of my father’s heart attack.”
“I’ve slowed.”
Michael nodded. “Some. When did it happen?”
“Three years now,” Ridley whispered.
“Why didn’t you tell me? I should’ve been there to help you through it.”
“You were still dealing with your mother’s… And things weren’t too great with you and Rachel then, either.”
“Doesn’t matter,” Michael said. “Don’t ever go through something like that alone, Rid. You hear?”
“Yes, sir,” Ridley said, nodding slowly. “Yes, sir.”
“There any worries about…another one?”
“Worries? There’s always worries. But I take better care of myself now than I ever did before. It was a wakeup call.”
Michael nodded, retreated into silence.
Ridley gave it a moment. Then: “Tell me, boy.”
Michael looked at him. “I’m in trouble, Rid.”
“I see that. Rachel?”
“No, no. Not that.” He sniffed out a near laugh. “Well, actually, probably a bit of that, too. But my trouble is bigger than that even.”
Ridley frowned.
Michael formed a brave smile. “Was reading this article in Wired magazine, about a guy trying to get away. It’s hard because everything is electronic nowadays. We leave footprints everywhere. I envied the guy. Think maybe that would be the move for me.”
“This trouble got you thinking about running away?”
“Yes,” Michael admitted.
Through an ever deepening frown, Ridley said, “Tell me.”
Michael cleared his throat. “I believe I’ve mentioned the security team at work. Everyone calls them the Bellatoris…”
“This Cassie girl just sounds like a flake that got burned out,” Ridley was saying a moment after Michael had told most of the details. “She’ll turn up.”
“What about her claims that they’re out to get me?”
Ridley shook his head. “I don’t see it. You’re valuable to that company.”
“Malcolm’s stroke is no accident. I heard what the doctor said.”
Ridley played at the gray hairs on his face. “That is troubling. But…”
“But?”
“Those rich folks are some deeply troubled people, boy. It ain’t beyond the realm of possibility the old man was putting a lil’ something sweeter than tobacco in his pipe. Rachel’s the only sane one of the bunch. And they’ve done their best to even make that not so. The way she’s been treated.”
“I’m worried.”
“Keep your eyes open, is all.” Ridley paused, chuckled. “You’re getting pretty good at seeing the unsaid.”
“They’re dangerous, Rid.” Same words he’d used to forewarn Malcolm.
“You talk about ‘em like this is some back alley bullshit. I can’t see them shooting up the corporate offices. Cordite rising above the cubicles and whatnot.”
And just as he’d done with Malcolm, Michael elected to keep a crucial factor of the equation to himself. He’d personally witnessed the Bellatoris’ brutality. He’d seen them kill without provocation and without any seeming guilt. Cold-blooded killers they were.
“They’re dangerous,” he weakly repeated.
“So is crossing a busy street, but usually we make it across.”
Michael’s shoulders went slack.
Ridley sighed. “I know some of the newer blood on the force. You want me to see if I can find out anything? If the hospital suspects some kind of foul play, the law is bound to get itself involved. I can see what’s happening with it. That’d ease your mind?”
Michael thought about it. Nodded. “What do I do in the meantime?”
Ridley smiled. “Now that’s an easy one, boy. Go get in at least one of your three with Rachel.”
CHAPTER
TWO
Michael moved from Ridley’s house moments later, calmed by their exchange. Rid was likely correct in his belief that Michael was a bit paranoid. After all, Michael had been in the motel room with the Bellatoris. He’d witnessed them at their absolute worst. Why would they intentionally antagonize someone with that knowledge of their behavior?
They wouldn’t.
The pressure they’d been applying was understandable when Michael really thought it through. They needed to keep him in line. They needed to make sure he didn’t crack. They needed to keep his mind off of roach motels and creaky chairs and serrated knives and blue mailboxes. Why would they set him up when he could turn around and point a finger of his own?
They wouldn’t.
The streets that led from Ridley’s quiet little neighborhood fed into a highway route littered with commercial businesses and state troopers hidden in the brush with their speed radars cocked. Speed traps. Michael slowed the Chrysler as he eased onto the highway, powered up his CD disk changer and listened to the Beatles and Howlin’ Wolf and Coltrane.
Calm.
He pulled off of the speed trap route fifteen minutes later, winded through another quiet residential area. A two-lane. One lane for each direction. The back way he often took home from Ridley’s. He slowed again. Relaxed and at-ease. Glancing at the homes at the side of the road as he passed them. Making mental notes of the different styles of architecture he had fondness for. Then quickly erasing those mental notes. The house hunt would be Rachel’s department. No use in fooling himself. He’d be lucky if she allowed him input on what decorations to hang on Halloween and Christmas.
He smiled at the thought.
The vehicle pulled from a side street, nearly colliding with the front end of Michael’s Chrysler. A bulky black SUV. A Yukon, Michael believed. Michael mashed down hard on his brakes, turned the Chrysler’s nose toward someone’s lawn. The black SUV that had caused the near accident stopped dead ahead in the roadway, straight across so it blocked the entire lane. Michael looked over there, a frown of disgust masking his face.
The frown remained as the other driver opened his door. The frown deepened as Michael took in the form emerging from the vehicle. Thick neck. Big hands. Powerful build from head to toe. Biceps like grapefruit. Michael swallowed as the driver smiled.
Merriman.
The steroid freak in the Bellatoris.
Michael struggled to shift the Chrysler in reverse. His hands trembled like a washing machine. His heart hammering his chest as the Chrysler’s tires fought for purchase with the roadbed. His heart continuing to hammer as he finally righted the Chrysler, and, its tires squealing, sped a wide circle around Merriman’s black SUV.
Heart hammering away as he glanced at his rearview mirror and saw Merriman back behind the wheel of the Yukon, giving chase.
Michael was familiar with the roads but the anxiety of the moment erased the physical map from his memory. He struggled to work his way through the fog, eyes narrowed, teeth gritted. A fork at the end of this road, left prong leading to roads he’d never traveled. Right prong leading to… Think, think. A small bridge, he believed. Then a right turn to more roads he’d never traveled. Or a left into a maze of winding roads he’d traveled often.
The Chrysler’s tires ca-clunked as they hit the start of the bridge. He crossed it at a dangerous speed. Made the left into the maze of roads just as the Yukon reached the mouth of the bridge.
There were signs that warned of deer. Signs that warned of concealed driveways. Yellow in both cases. The color of hazard.
Hazard, for sure.
He blew past everything, taking curves with reckless abandon.
For a moment he didn’t spot the black Yukon in his rearview, but his heart still didn’t settle down. It tapped at his ribs like a hammer driving a nail through pitted wood. His mouth was dry as well. He licked his lips, coaxed up enough spit to try and chase away the cottonmouth. And no sooner than he’d done that, a moment before he would have truly relaxed, the black Yukon filled his rearview mirror again. He groaned and pressed down the gas, sinking it to the floor.
Merriman must’ve done the same because the Yukon ate up the distance between them. The sights at the side of the road, sights Michael had been enjoying minutes before, were now blurs. Political lawn signs, roadside mailboxes with engraved family names, the houses themselves—Michael took none of it in.
A beat or two more and Merriman would be right up on him, bumper kissing bumper. Or, bumper punching bumper probably more accurate. Michael pictured himself buried deep in the woods somewhere, his steadily decaying flesh making the soil all the more rich.
Spurred by that dark vision, he eased off of the gas, pulled his wheel hard to the right. If he wasn’t mistaken this road cut through the last bit of residential area and fed into another commercial strip. Six or seven streets crisscrossed it, and the speed limit fell to twenty-five. But it was a chance he had to take. If he could make it through and out to the main road, there’d be hope.
He glanced in his rearview again. Merriman was still on his trail, traveling slow as well to adhere to the neighborhood.
