Crying Wolf (31 page)

The college kid got this pissed-off look in his eyes, more than pissed off, angry you could call it, and batted—yes, batted—Freedy's arm away. With some force, even, a surprising amount. Thing was, since Freedy'd been intent only on shushing, he'd used his right arm, the one that wasn't working so well on account of that tire iron business. Also, the one that would hurt if someone batted it. And now someone had.

“You know what I'm going to do to you for that?” Freedy said.

“You're going to take me to where she is,” the college kid said. “I'm going to give you the money. After that, you can try whatever you want.”

The answer confused Freedy. Truth was, he couldn't recall a moment of confusion like this, ever. Made him look away for a second, almost like he needed a break from staring the college kid down. Good thing, though—momentum was still on his side—because in that moment of looking away, he saw someone else in the alley.

“What the fuck?” said Freedy.

The college kid turned to see what he was talking about.

“Get back,” he called to whoever it was.

Making that turn, of course, the college kid took his eyes off Freedy. Mistake. Beginner's mistake, taking your eyes off old Freedy, especially at a moment like this, when things were a bit confusing, maybe even getting out of hand, and when there was so much bottled up inside him, due to all the composure he'd been keeping. Freedy let him have it. A left hand, yes, not like his right, not like another whole person, but still, he put everything into it, legs—those legs of his!—hips, back, chest, all those reps, all those sets, all those curls, dips, presses, raises, all those years in the gym, all those supplements, all that andro, he put that kind of everything into it, and hit the college kid a good one, bang on the side of the face, a crusher. Orgasm? Orgasm had nothing on the feeling that spurted through him at that moment.

College kid went down, no surprise there, and Freedy grabbed the backpack. Bit of a surprise there; he didn't grab it clean. The college kid kind of held on to it, kind of fought him for control of the thing, didn't let go—never let go, in fact—until Freedy booted him one in the gut, making his grip soften enough for Freedy to snatch the backpack away.

Turned out a million was easy to carry. Freedy slung it over his good shoulder, gave the college kid another boot, aiming for the head, but maybe not connecting square, what with all the snow on the ground. No time to do any better, with whoever it was in the alley, and the alley the only way out.

Freedy ran into the alley, a funny, heavy run in the deepening snow. Out on the street the storm was howling now, but between him and it stood this other person, at the edge of the orange light. Freedy switched the backpack to his other shoulder even though it smarted at bit, freeing his left arm.

This other person stepped right into the middle of the alley, blocking his way.

“Stop,” she said.

Turned out to be a she, and with a familiar voice. Then Freedy got a good look at her—snowflakes in her light brown hair—and it gave him a shock. She'd somehow gotten free! Undone all that tape, climbed out of the tunnels, come after him. Was it possible? No, not with her face like that. Not a mark on it, both eyes open, no sign of all they'd been through. Somehow, this had to be the other one.

“Stop right there,” she said, in a real commanding voice, like he was a dog.

He was no dog. Two more steps and he let her in on the secret of that left, caught her a nice one, marking her, making them more like twins again. But: something hurt. In his left forearm, something hurt awful, awful enough to make him cry out. He looked at that forearm, held it up in the orange light, that mighty mighty forearm: and what was this? A knife, a goddamn switchblade, angled deep into it, deep in the heart of the muscle. Freedy boiled over. He hit her again with his left, the knife still in it, but didn't connect the way he'd wanted, only staggering her. She was moving away, running now, down the alley, calling, “Nat, Nat.”

Freedy looked at that knife in his arm and felt like puking. Funny, to be puking again at the Glass Onion. He didn't let himself.
Get a grip,
he thought, or maybe said aloud. Getting a grip meant figuring out what to do. First, the knife. He got his right hand on it—right hand not at its best either, they were maddening him, maddening him like a bull—sucked in some air, yanked out the switchblade knife. That hurt too—even though there wasn't much blood—hurt enough to make him cry out again, although he kept it inside. Or maybe not. Meth: oh, how he wanted it, and lots of other drugs. He dropped the knife in the snow and stepped out into the street.

At least he had the money. At least? What was he thinking? That was the whole point. No pain, no gain: how true. A millionaire! A millionaire at last! And right away, his life started changing, because parked by the curb, just a few feet away and motor running, was a Mercedes convertible. An old one, but immaculate, and very cool. Not only that, but the top was down, like it was all ready for Florida. Did he need an invitation? He did not. Freedy slipped behind the wheel. No CD player, but he could always add one later. Which way to Miami?

The girl? What about her? The girl maybe wasn't so perfect after all. That part was confusing too. These girls, coming at him with jagged glass, with switchblades, could he ever really trust one of them? Could he ever really be sure she was broken like a horse? He made a decision, an executive decision: forget her. There were girls in Florida, girls who'd be hopping into this new car of his every time he stopped to take a piss, for Christ's sake. No, he would start his golden future alone, like a man.

Miami:
what a word, a perfect match for
millionaire
. Which way to Miami? He knew: south. South meant the turnpike; the turnpike meant Route 7, Route 7 meant driving his cool new car down the Hill and taking a right on Main. Freedy was doing that, had switched on the headlights and released the clutch, was actually rolling, when he realized he'd forgotten something important, maybe even basic. He hadn't checked the money. He pulled to a stop beneath the nearest street-light and picked up the backpack. What if they'd cheated him? Was it possible? He tore it open: no, it wasn't possible, because there, inside the backpack, was money, beautiful, beautiful money. Hundred-dollar bills, in thick wads held together with rubber bands, wads and wads and wads of them. He pawed through. This wasn't orgasm time, but a pretty good feeling just the same. He was rich! It was that easy. Real life begins.

But hey, what was this? Another little wad down in there, a little deeper, held together by a rubber band like the others, but didn't feel like the others. In fact, it felt like—he held it up in the orange light—it was: just a stack of goddamn note cards. And here was another. And another, and another, and another. He was hurling them around now, out of the convertible, into the snow, maybe hurling around some of the money too. A million dollars? Wasn't anything like that here, not even close. He wasn't a millionaire. He wasn't rich.

They were maddening him, maddening him like a bull, inciting violence. Wasn't that a crime? He wheeled the car around, tires spinning crazily in the snow, skidded to a stop outside the Glass Onion, jumped out, slamming the door shut hard, but nothing like the way he was going to slam them around. Slam. The street-lights went out.

The whole town went dark. Everything disappeared: the street, the buildings, the ground, the sky. Even the blowing snow was now invisible, but Freedy could feel it stinging his face, maddening him more. He entered the alley, felt his way along to the space behind the Glass Onion.

Couldn't see a goddamn thing, no people, no footprints, only darker shadows and lighter shadows. He slogged his way through the snow, bumped into what had to be the overhang of the loading dock. A good hiding place, as he knew well. He lashed out with his boot a few times, hit nothing.

“I want the money,” he said, not hysterically, just making an announcement. He found the Dumpster, one of the darker shadows, kicked out at any small dark shadows he saw around it, connected with nothing human.

He made another announcement: “I'm going to murder you.” Then he had a disturbing thought. What if they'd slipped by him, were already out of the alley? What about the car? Freedy hurried back to the street, slipping once and falling in deep snow. So cold. He hated the cold.

The car was still there, filling up with snow. He got in, turned it on, fiddled with switches. This and that happened, but the top didn't go up. He sat there, hundred-dollar bills and note cards all around him, blood seeping from his forearm, snow filling the car. An important business term was eluding him. What was it? Something about . . . taking stock. That was it. Time to take stock. What did he have? He had this car, of course, but it wasn't his main asset. His main asset, his only important asset—yes, face facts—was the girl. He had to do something about that asset. There were two choices: protect the asset or destroy it. He tried to think of other options and could not. Protect or destroy, but it would be his choice, no one else's. He was in charge.

Freedy switched on the headlights, the only lights in town, and gunned the car up College Hill.

 

N
at and Izzie, lying on top of the Dumpster lid, heard the sound of the fading engine through the storm.

“Where's he going?” Izzie said.

“To get her,” said Nat. His jaw was bad. He felt the side of his face: caved in.

“But where is she?”

Where was she?
A milion sounds nice.
It was somewhere in there, right in the open. Later would be no good. He had to figure it out now. He was supposed to be smart, supposed to be good at solving problems. Solve this one. A simple sentence.
A milion sounds nice.
What was the most important part of any sentence? The verb.
Sounds.
Nat said it aloud. “Sounds, sounds, sounds. For something to sound nice . . .” There had to be a listener to hear it. For something to sound nice, you had to hear it. To hear it, you had to be in a place to hear it. Freedy had a place. He'd been listening.

A convincing idea, especially since he had no others. “Let's go,” Nat said.

They went, but it was slow. He was slow, not Izzie. He was slow lowering himself off the Dumpster, slow finding his way to the street. Izzie tugged him along, stooping once to pick something up, somehow sharp-eyed and surefooted in the darkness.

“If he does anything to her, my life is over,” she said.

“That's not true.”

“How can you be so stupid?”

His jaw hurt too much to argue.

They ran, or tried to run, up College Hill.

“What's that in your hand?”

“For killing him,” Izzie said.

 

C
razy amount of duct tape. Took forever to get it all off, free her from the pipe. She fell to the dirt floor with a thump. The candle burned near her face. The other twin was a lot prettier now.

“Bad news,” Freedy said. “They fucked me.”

The gold eye, the one that would open, opened. “I need a doctor.” So quiet he could hardly hear her, even with his super hearing.

“Say that again and you won't.” He wasn't in the mood. What was he going to do with her? The simple solution was asset destruction, moving on. But moving on to what, exactly? And he'd invested a lot in her. Plus there was still the potential for a big payoff. He just needed a time-out, that was all, to rethink.

“Feel like a little spin?” he said to her.

She just lay there.

“Get up,” he said, louder and not so friendly.

 

T
hey heard him. On the other side of the wall, Izzie turned sideways, raised one foot high like a trained Thai kick boxer, precisely as Grace had done the night they found the tunnels, and kicked in the wooden paneling in the big room of the old social club. Nat shone his flash through the opening, and there they were in a little square room lit by a single tall candle balanced on the dirt floor, Grace on her back, hair matted with blood, Freedy crouched over her.

Izzie saw her sister's face and made a horrible sound. The next instant she was diving through the hole in the wall, switchblade glinting in the candlelight, so quick. But Freedy was quicker. Somehow he was already up, already slapping at her arm as though he'd known what was coming. The next moment, she was down. By that time, Nat was in the little room too, flashlight raised high, striking with all his strength at the back of Freedy's head.

He never connected. Without even looking, Freedy jabbed with his elbow, a pistonlike blow that caught Nat just under the rib cage, knocking the wind out of him, knocking him down. The candle fell, started rolling, rolled through the hole in the wall, dropped down into the big room on the other side. Then Freedy's fist started landing, although Nat couldn't see a thing, flashlight smashed, candle gone. He took a punch in the back, scrambled away, felt Grace. He found her hand, not warm, not cold, the same temperature as his.

Nat held on to her, would hold on to her at any cost; but then came that fist, and again, and he felt her slipping, slipping away, and gone.

 

T
otal darkness. Didn't bother Freedy. This was his territory. Freedy slung the girl over his shoulder and carried her out of the little square room and into F. Had he ever felt stronger? No. This kind of challenge or whatever it was brought out the best in him. He headed down F, the girl on his shoulder, at a fast walking pace, almost trotting in total darkness. Didn't bother him. He turned into Z, invisible Z, without breaking stride. Z, on the way to building 13: now came the beauty part.

 

T
otal darkness: until flames shot up on the other side of the wall. Nat felt heat flowing in through the hole. He rose. Izzie was already up, the knife, half the blade snapped off, in her hand. They stepped out into a tunnel they didn't know, heard a grunt in the distance, hurried after the sound. Flickering light followed them for a few yards, dwindled to nothing. They kept going, almost running in the darkness. Nat kept one hand on the wall; he didn't know how Izzie was doing it. She was a little ahead, then more so.