Body Movers (9 page)

pay her bil s, but then she fisted her hands at her sides.

“You’d be wasting your time. Besides, I figured you were

too busy giving McGruff the Crime Dog speeches to

salesclerks to be digging around in an old case that not

even the D.A. cares about anymore.”

“Wrong, Ms. Wren.”

She turned to see Kelvin Lucas standing there, slump-

shouldered, his hands in his pants pockets. “I do care.

Funny thing, your brother’s arrest got me all interested in

your fugitive daddy all over again. I’ve reassigned the case

to Detective Terry here because he always gets his man,

don’t you, Detective?”

A muscle worked in the detective’s jaw. “Yes, sir.”

Lucas smiled, but his eyes remained hard and cold. “So just

in case this trouble that your delinquent brother’s gotten

himself into happens to smoke out your runaway parents,

Detective Terry wil be watching. And if I hear that your

brother does anything to violate his probation, I’l nail his

scrawny ass to the wall.”

The D.A. walked away, his hard-sole shoes clicking against

the floor. Carlotta scowled at the detective and he scowled

back. “I know my rights,” she said with more confidence

than she felt, pul ing herself up to her ful height, which,

even in heels, brought her only up to the man’s chin. “Stay

away from me and my brother or I’l …I’l …”

“You’l what?” he asked dryly.

“I’ll sic your ex-lover Liz on you.” She smirked—ten points

for her.

But he barked out a laugh. “Lady, you’re way more scary

than Liz, and that’s saying a lot.”

She narrowed her eyes. “I don’t like the idea of you

watching me.”

“You’l get used to it.” He gave her a little salute and

walked away.

7

Wesley swung his legs over the edge of his bed, put on his

glasses and stared in the predawn light at the empty wall

unit where a dozen monitors, hard drives, routers,

keyboards, joysticks and printers had once sat, all

interconnected. Damn, the police had cleaned him out.

They’d even taken his software cabinet, games and

landline phones.

He smiled to himself. It was a good thing that he kept all

his good equipment at his buddy Chance’s apartment.

He stood and stretched the kinks out of his neck, a

bothersome side effect of spending so many hours bent

over a keyboard.

Whew. Thank goodness the business with the police had

been settled yesterday in court. Liz Fischer was a

godsend…and a hottie. Too bad a woman like her would

never take him seriously—movies like The Graduate and

PS gave guys like him false hope.

Walking to the bathroom connected to his room, he

rubbed his sore mouth, working his jaw. He wished he

knew who had sent the guy who’d jumped him in the

courthouse bathroom, but the thug seemed to prefer to

talk with his hands. In truth, the guy could have been

working for either one of the people that he owed—Father

Thom being his biggest creditor. Then again, the guy

robbing him could have been a coincidence.

But he doubted it.

The worst part was that he’d been carrying the fifteen

hundred that Chance had paid him for deleting the

speeding tickets—money he’d planned to take to Father

Thom this morning. Instead, he’d have to scrounge

together a few hundred from his various hiding places and

beg for more time.

He thought about showering, but decided that fresh

deodorant and mouthwash would suffice. If he got the ass-

kicking he expected from Father Thom’s thugs, a soak in a

hot tub of water was probably in his near future anyway.

He rooted around the floor for a cleanish pair of jeans and

pul ed a T-shirt from the laundry basket of clothes he

hadn’t gotten around to folding. He dressed and shoved

his feet into his old Merrell slip-ons, mourning his brown

suede Pumas, and kicked Hubert’s decaying shoes near his

trash can.

In the fifty-gallon glass aquarium on the other side of the

room, a mouse scurried around, terrified. A pang of

remorse hit him and he walked over, unlocked the pin and

slid the screen top aside. With a practiced hand, he

captured the mouse and held it up by its tail.

“Relax, buddy, you got a reprieve. Einstein must be fasting

again.” He stared down at the black-and-gray spotted

axanthic ball python, all six feet of his longtime pet coiled

disinterestedly in a corner. “Finicky reptile, are you sure

you aren’t female? Or vegetarian?”

Einstein didn’t move, and would likely stay in his stoic

position for the next several hours. The police search, with

al the activity and noise, must have traumatized him.

Wesley slid the cover closed, locked the pin, then returned

the lucky mouse to a smaller container. Sometimes he

thought that Einstein didn’t eat out of sympathy for his

prey. When he did feed, it was as if he would begrudgingly

relent, then coil around and squeeze his prey to death

before it had time to react, and swallow it promptly, as if

to get it over with. Carlotta thought the snake was a man-

eater, but Wesley could barely get him to eat enough to

sustain his monstrous size.

Wesley sometimes wondered, though, what his pet could

kil and consume if it were motivated.

Hearing a noise in the hallway, Wesley frowned. He’d

hoped to be out of the house before Carlotta got up, partly

because he didn’t want to worry her, and partly because

he didn’t want to face her. The fact that she wasn’t

normally an early riser told him that she probably hadn’t

slept wel , and no doubt he was the cause. Frustration

tightened his chest. He just needed some time and space

to get things worked out with his creditors and to

investigate his father’s case. Although he appreciated his

sister’s concern, her hovering was making things more

complicated.

He made his way around the room and checked various

hiding places—the hem of the curtain, the hol ow leg of his

metal bed, inside his worn copy of The Catcher in the

Rye—and counted up three hundred sixty dol ars.

He heard a muffled voice and realized that Carlotta was

calling his name. God, he hoped she hadn’t set the kitchen

on fire again.

He grabbed his backpack and stuffed his iPod, cel phone

and money inside. Then he stepped out into the hall and

closed his bedroom door. It was a house rule that his

bedroom door be closed at all times because Carlotta lived

in fear that Einstein would somehow escape his enclosure.

“Wesley!”

“I’m coming,” he yel ed. But when he reached the living

room, he stopped short. Sitting next to Carlotta on the

couch was Tick, the tub of lard who had forced his way in

the house last week and called Carlotta at work.

“Mornin’, Wesley,” the guy said, smiling and patting

Carlotta’s knee.

Carlotta, clutching the newspaper, looked terrified. Tick

must have been waiting for her when she stepped outside

to leave for work. Fury balled in Wesley’s stomach—he

wanted to kil the guy. He had always wished he was big

and beefy like Chance, but never more so than at this

moment.

“Leave her alone,” was all he could say.

“Where’s the money?” Tick asked.

Wesley pul ed himself up to his ful height. “Maybe you

can tel me.”

Tick laughed. “What are you talkin’ about?”

“I was jumped yesterday. Guy took all that I was carrying. I

figured it was for Father Thom.”

Tick wagged his fat head. “Nope. Must have been

someone else you owe.”

Wesley couldn’t tel if he was lying—but then, did it really

matter?

Then the man’s eyes grew mean. “So like I said, where’s

the money?”

Wesley reached into his backpack. “After yesterday, three-

sixty was all I could get together.”

Tick laughed. “You’re shittin’ me, right?”

Wesley extended the money and, as he hoped, Tick

lurched to his feet to count it. “This ain’t enough, Wesley.

Father Thom gave me strict orders not to leave here with

less than a grand. You don’t want to get me in trouble with

my boss, do you?”

Wesley swallowed. “No. But you can’t squeeze blood out

of a turnip.”

Tick grinned. “Sure I can.”

“Wait a minute,” Carlotta said, her voice trembling.

“Nobody’s going to squeeze blood out of anybody. I have

the money.”

Wesley and Tick both looked at her. “You do?” they asked

in unison.

Wesley frowned. “How?”

“Get it,” Tick said. “I’m beginning to lose patience with you

two.”

Carlotta pushed to her feet and dropped the newspaper

into a chair, then marched out of the room toward her

bedroom.

Tick watched her leave and sucked his teeth. “Your sister’s

got a smokin’ bod.”

“Watch your mouth,” Wesley said, clenching his fists.

The big man looked at him and laughed. “I guess if my

sister looked like that, I’d be stupid about it, too.” Then

the man sobered. “But you are stupid if you think that

Father Thom won’t go after her if you’re late again.

Remember that real hard, little man.”

Wesley opened his mouth to say something foul but

stopped himself when he heard Carlotta’s footsteps.

“Here’s the other six hundred forty,” she said, extending a

stack of cash to Tick, her expression tight. “Now, please

leave.”

The big man took his time counting the money, then

shoved it into his pocket and smiled. “See how easy that

was? Do this every week and pretty soon, you’l be debt

free, just like all those commercials on TV promise.”

“Get out,” Carlotta said through clenched teeth. “Or I’l call

the police.”

Tick laughed. “Yeah…right.” Then he looked at Wesley.

“Remember what I said, little man.”

Wesley’s throat burned with bile as he watched the man

walk heavily toward the door. At the last second, Tick

turned his head and glanced at the aluminum Christmas

tree in the corner of the room.

“Merry fucking Christmas,” he said sarcastically before

banging the door shut behind him.

They were both quiet for a few seconds. He almost

couldn’t bear to look at his sister. When he did, her eyes

were stormy, her arms crossed, her back rigid.

He gave her his best little-brother smile. “Where did you

get the money?”

“A cash advance on my credit card,” she said quietly. “My

last credit card.”

“Wel …thanks,” he said. “I’m sorry that had to happen

here. I was going to take care of it—”

“Shut up, Wesley!”

He blinked.

“You. Have. To. Get. A. Job.”

“I’m supposed to upgrade two of the Sheltons’ computers

this week.”

“I mean a real job,” she said, walking toward him slowly,

stabbing her finger in the air, “with a paycheck and maybe

even something as radical as health benefits. And you’re

not al owed to work on computers, remember? You’re on

probation for computer tampering! And that toad Lucas

told me that if you violate your probation, he’d nail your

ass to the wall. Is that what you want, Wesley? To go to

jail?”

“Relax, sis,” he said, raising his hands and backing toward

the door.

“Relax?” Her dark eyebrows drew together and her finger

started to shake. “Listen to me, Wesley, and listen good.

The free ride is over. Get a job and start taking

responsibility for your debt, or—” Her throat constricted.

“Or get out.”

Wesley reeled as if she’d slapped him. He blinked rapidly

as she picked up her purse and walked past him and out

the front door. He heard the dul hum of the garage door

going up, and the growl of her car starting. When the

garage door came back down, he exhaled.

Maybe it would be better if he slept on Chance’s couch for

a while. Maybe Carlotta would be better off without him.

And maybe it would give him the space he needed to look

into his dad’s case.

He returned to his room and tossed a few things into a

duffel bag. Chance wouldn’t mind him crashing there for a

while—his friend was stoned most of the time anyway.

Einstein would be fine for a few days. Outside on the

stoop, he locked the door and was heading down the

sidewalk toward the Marta train station when a black

Cadil ac pul ed up to the curb and the passenger-side

window zoomed down. A man’s face came into view, and

Wesley’s knees weakened.

“Hey, Wesley, where you going?”

Wesley shouldered his duffel bag higher. “Nowhere,

Mouse.”

“Really? Looks to me like you’re trying to skip town.”

“Nah, Mouse, I was just going to visit a friend.”

“You missed your last payment,” the man said pleasantly.

“I know. I ran into some trouble with the police.”

“I read the papers,” Mouse said. “Thought I’d give you a

chance to get square with The Carver before you go to

jail.”

It occurred to Wesley that it was probably The Carver’s guy

who’d jumped him in the courthouse john. “I got

probation,” he said, trying to sound upbeat.