Blood Ties (9 page)

I plopped down next to a girl I didn’t know and grabbed a beer and a slice of pizza. I gave her a smile. Her look wasn’t friendly. It must have been her beer. Maybe it had been her pizza.

“Here’s to Sally!” I called out.

A murmur of disgust went up around us. “God rest her soul.”

“Here here.” And with that, we raised our glasses.

It was Tuesday night and still raining. You’d think a Tuesday night in St. Germaine would be quiet, very low key. Oh no, I’d been sadly mistaken. Every night was an excuse to party. The beers were half price. Too bad the pizza wasn’t. We were hanging out with the townies getting hammered. Our lifeboat in this drizzle was a small dive at the edge of town. And when I mean a dive, I mean a low rent bar that smelled like Sally’s office. It was so filthy your shoes stuck to the grimy carpet. Old license plates covered the holes in the walls.

The bartender, as ancient as the hills, with a beard halfway down his stained wife-beater-covered chest, stood behind the bar. His hair matched his beard, frizzy like a cluster of grey hairballs. He’d entertained me all evening with his spittoon. He caught my gaze and gave me a grin. His crooked and yellowed teeth shocked me in to chugging my beer.

Jen bumped into me and I almost dropped my pizza. “Hey come with me to the john.” She grabbed my free hand. We headed to a hallway at the back of the bar. I crinkled up my nose. The pizza hanging out of my face wasn’t enough to mask the smell. A man stepped out of the men’s bathroom in a
t-shirt with a yellow moose on it, pulling up his pants and zipping his fly. I saw what was behind him and the pizza came out of my mouth in a spew.

“God,
” I hissed. Before Jen had a chance to take a look, the filthy door had shut behind him. “You missed it.”

“I don’t need to see what I can picture in my head,” she
said. “Come’ere.” She plastered us up against the wall then slowly peeked around it. She pulled back with a quick movement. “There’s a table of creepy dudes. They followed us in. They’ve been watching you all night.”

“Le’me see.” I switched places with her. Two guys in their late twenties or early thirties sat at a table close to the door. They weren’t talking. They huddled around their beers, occasionally flicking their eyes to our group. One
looked towards the back of the bar. I flipped back around. “Yeah … creepy. Get that one’s t-shirt. It’s got ex-con written all over it.” It was a black and white print of Charlie Manson.

Jen’s eyes went wide and she broke out into laughter. “Oh
my God! It’s your parolee boyfriend. Here, le’me take a picture.” She grabbed my arm and yanked me back. She pulled out her cell phone and held it up to her face then slid her head around the corner. I heard a soft click.

We huddled around the digital picture. “
I like the one with the tattoos. You can take the other one,” she said, slurring her words.

I argued with her. “No, you know how much I’m into tats.” We did rock-paper-scissors. I won.

“Names, we need names, good scary names.” We settled for the classics, Eddie for mine and Mick for hers.

“
Okay, they’ve been out of the joint for what, three months. It makes them par-tic-u-lar-ily dangrus.”

“Yeah,” she replied. We hit our knuckles together in a salute. We went into the ladies bathroom. There was a toilet and a sink, no mirror. The toilet hadn’t been flushed in a
while. I dropped my pizza on the floor and we ran out gasping for air.

“I’m not using the boy’s. It look
s just as bad,” I said.

“Fuck this, I’m going outside.”

We grabbed our umbrellas and ran out into the rain, around the corner. I shielded Jen with her umbrella. A feeling as if I were being watched from the trees crept over me.

“Hurry up, I’m getting the creeps. God you pee a long time.”

She laughed, “Beer pee.”

Out of the corner of my eye
there was a movement at the edge of the building and I made a quick adjustment of her umbrella to hide her. I caught a flash of a familiar face. It was Eddie with the tats, hunched over in a hooded wind-breaker, walking slowly. He seemed to be confused as to where he’d put his car. He circled around, jingling his keys, glancing a couple times our way. If that and the treeline didn’t give me the creeps, nothing would.

She stood, pulling up her pants. It was my turn. I concentrated on hurrying, happy that Jen was
performing admirably with her umbrella blocking skills and Eddie, and whatever was out in the trees, couldn’t catch a peek.

Logan turned the corner and stood there under an umbrella.
It was like Grand Central Station.

“Jeesus
Logan. Get the hell back inside,” Jen said.

“I was just wondering what you two were doing.”

“Well, now you know!”

He disappeared.

Jen bounced up and down in the mud impatiently. “Look who takes forever.” She turned to look towards the forest and visibly shivered. “I feel it too. Ya done yet?”

“Yep.” I stood up, zipped up, and took
my umbrella from her.

A
large black van, with its lights off, pulled up. It parked in front of the bar, partially blocking the view of where we were. Its windows were tinted so dark that not even the street light could penetrate. The body was like a black mirror. Blacker than black.

“A Darth van,” Jen said.

The back doors opened and Mick and Eddie got out. They stood there, huddled in the rain. We walked towards them and heard someone yelling.

“Dude … you can’t park here!
”

We heard a couple other voices.

Mick and Eddie glanced at us then to the front of the van. They shut the doors and headed towards the voices. Jen and I followed them, squeezing between the van and the front of the building. The bartender was yelling at the blacked-out window on the passenger side. A couple customers stood in the doorway, watching. He yelled louder and smacked the window a couple of times with the flat of his hand. He started to make his way around to the front when the van suddenly took off, spraying him with mud. It was missing a license plate.

The bartender flipped it off.
“Yeah, fuck you too buddy.”

We followed him in
side as he messed with the mud on his jeans, muttering, “… fucking Amerkins ...”

“Not
saying a word, nope not a word,” Jen said.

“Eh,” I replied, ducking into the
door, shaking off my umbrella. She broke out into laughter.

We sauntered
up to our table, mightily pleased with ourselves for our clever roughing it in the rain. Logan was a little flushed. I slid into the seat next to him. “Let me know when you need a lookout.”

“Sick … very sick,” he said.

I shrugged my shoulders and laughed when he blushed a little brighter. It was nice to see someone else doing it for a change.

I stood up and whooped with my fist in the air, chanting, “Logan … Logan …” Everybody yelled and our bong
in’ buddies dragged him out from behind the table and hung him by his ankles. While he was sucking on the tube, I glanced over at our ex-cons Mick and Eddie. They were back at the same table. They sat across from each other, staring into their beers. My guy, Eddie, watched me out of the corner of his eye. He was creeping on me. And the Darth van? What the hell was up with that?

Jen pulled out her phone and showed Parker the snapshot. “Our new boyfriends. Ex-cons.” She pointed out whose was whose. Parker pulled it away from her and looked over at the
ir table. “Ya, trying to make me jealous?”

Dylan
, Parker’s roommate, who had tagged along for the evening, pulled the phone out of his hands. “You’ll have some good lookin’ kids there.”

I grinned. “Yeah, little Clyde, little Bonnie.”

The two got up, pulled out a few notes from their pockets and threw them on the table. They left without a backwards glance.

“Wow … a whirlwind romance,” said Dylan. “That’s gotta be a record.”

I shrugged. “Yeah, I work fast.”

“So, now that you’re free, are you looking for another boyfriend?”

“I need at least one night with a gallon of ice cream and a bag of cookies, weeping and lamenting the loss of the father of my child.” It was an amazing act of dexterity that my words didn’t sound like inebriated mush.

“Yeah, well, when you’ve recovered, give me a call.”

“You volunteering?” I smirked.

He leaned towards me as if he was going to kiss me and I slid out of my seat.
Yeah, keep dreamin’.

I went to the door and pushed it open to
look outside. The rain had stopped. Thank God.

***

“Shhh … remember, stealth and silence,” I hissed, carefully enunciating each word since my lips had gone into numb mode. We snuck around the side of the Delta Sigs fraternity, our feet squishing in the wet grass. Jeff, our kidnapped safe driver, and Dylan kept watch at the front of the house, hidden in some bushes.

I
’d had the brilliant idea we should raid a fraternity house. According to campus lore, it was a big tradition between the houses to steal composites, class portraits of their members, and hold them for a hefty “college-style” ransom. I hadn’t seen it in action, maybe it was too early in the year, maybe it was just lore. In either case, my fingers had been itching for a theft.

We checked all the main windows at the back of the house. They were locked up tight except a small
one that looked down into the basement. My words slurred, “I’m gonna go in. Any arguments?” Jen shook her head. She was petite but her hips were wider than mine. “Okay then. I’ll get in, sneak upstairs and let …,” I waved my arms around in a drunken circle, “… everybody in through the back door.”

She grabbed my arm. “What if you get stuck?” I bent forward and spread my hands out
to measure the window then pulled back and almost toppled over. Parker took air measurements brushing against my thighs. Jen smacked him when he touched my butt.

“It’s going to be a tight fit Liz,” warned Parker.

I wobbled on my feet. “Well, hell, if I get stuck, somebody go get some Crisco.”

Jen nodded furiously. “Like a greased pig. I saw it at a county fair once.”

“Exactement, mes amis.”

I gave them a salute and began to inch my way in. I’d just pulled my shoulders past the window frame when I realized, quite stupidly, I should have gone in feet first. It was dark. I caught the faint smell of weed. I knew why the window was unlocked.

“Liz, you okay?”

“Yeah … thinking. Try
in’ to figure out how to land without breakin’ my neck.” I searched around with my hands. There was nothing I could grab on to.

“Okay
, lower me slooowly and for God’s sake, don’t drop me. I’ll let you know when I hit floor.” I pushed myself through, several hands holding my legs and ankles. I heard a slew of loud oaths as Parker partially pushed his shoulders through the window.

“Fu
ck. I can’t hold on much longer.”

“One more inch, I think I’ve got it.” I stretched and my fingertips finally felt floor. “Okay, okay, slow as you go.” I felt hands slide down my ankles. I balanced myself against the wall, first with my fingertips, then with the palms of my hands. I slid down the wall and a few seconds later, I was free. It was just like me to do this the hard way. I was smashed out of my mind and the odds were
only 50/50 I could do a handstand. A shot of pizza and beer bile trickled out of my throat.

I concentrated. Injury was not an option. I focused on the image of perfect balance and the movements I would
make. I walked my hands out away from the wall, keeping my legs against it. My eyes adjusted and boxes slowly emerged from the darkness. When my hands were about three feet out from the wall I arched my back and moved into a handstand. I rotated around, lowered my legs, then dropped my feet to the floor. Freakin’ amazin’.

“I made it. Meet me at the back door.”

I fumbled around in the darkness, looking for a way out, burping up pizza and beer. The door was unlocked. Thank God. It would have taken me a half hour to jimmy it in my state. I quietly opened the door and tiptoed in a squiggly line down the hall, seeing my way by red emergency lights. I wasn’t going to be walking any straight lines tonight.

To my right and left were framed composites.
I made my way up a set of stairs then to the back door and opened it. They slid in and followed me down to the basement. We split up and hunted for the most recent composite, the only one worth stealing. It wasn’t there. They must keep it somewhere up on the main level.

We went back up
stairs with Parker leading. We went from room to room hunting by moonlight and a small lamp that had been left on in the foyer.

“Hey Liz, we found it.”

“Can you yell any louder,” I hissed. I heard a door close and I plastered myself up against a door and the others went silent. We waited for a few minutes then I went to help them pull it off the wall. We carried it to the back door, banging it on walls a couple of times, giggling and speaking in loud whispers.