Dead Bang (32 page)

“Three minutes,” said Manny. “You are back in three minutes, or you are a widow.”

“We're parked down the block,” said Wendy.

“Leave now and hurry,” said Manny, making arches of his eyebrows.

Wendy gathered her purse and hustled for the door. When it shut behind her, I looked at Manny and said, “You're going to shoot me and use a generic oil filter as a silencer.”

Manny shrugged. “Yes.”

“A dollar?” I said. “I saw the Buck Shop tag on there—seventy cents, American!”

Manny laughed. “Only the best for you.”

“You don't mind if I pray?” I asked.

“If you must,” said Mr. Unibrow.

“What will you pray?” asked Manny.

“That the devil feeds your soul to the fire cheap-ass first.”

They chuckled. Manny said, “Why should you pray? I have said that you may go when the copies arrive.”

“I have a million-dollar life insurance policy,” I said. “If you kill me, my wife retires.”

They smiled. Manny looked at his watch.

“Teach me a prayer in Arabic,” I said.

“You are not a Muslim,” said Manny.

“If God is watching you, maybe he'll hear me.”

“Two minutes,” said Manny. “Say what I say.”

It took a couple of attempts and prompting—the prayer was mercifully short—and Manny said, “Your wife is now a very rich woman.”

I held up a halting hand and said, “Wait!” Wagging a finger I said, “You're going to shoot me right here?”

“During the next applause,” said Manny. “No one will hear. And as a favor to you, we will say your wife did it before she left.”

“One last thing,” I said. “What did that prayer say?”

“Why?” asked Manny.

“If God's an Episcopal, I may have to translate.”

They smiled. Mr. Unibrow said, “It is the first prayer taught to a small boy. It means, ‘Praise Allah I am not a woman.'”

We laughed. I bolted to my feet, turning up the table. Manny hit the floor. The light fixture above us exploded in a shower of glass—Manny was right, I didn't hear a bang. I bolted directly into the outstretched hands of the bouncer.

“What's this, eh?”

“I spilled my tea in my lap,” I said.

“You don't look wet,” said the bouncer, making the statement an accusation.

“I'm fast,” I said.

The bouncer grabbed the shoulder of my jacket and jerked me toward the door. “Let's see how fast you can get out of here, eh?”

I got to the door first, but still coupled to the bouncer. Wendy had the Camaro idling at the curb with the passenger door open. On the sidewalk,
I wiped the bouncer's hand off my shoulder. As he loaded up his right hand, the glass in the door exploded.

I said, “Oh shit, eh?”

The bouncer ran, his elbows and the soles of his shoes flashing in the light from the overhead sign. Without looking back he yelled, “Fuck you, eh!”

Wendy had the tires screeching before I could yank the door shut.

“T
HE TUNNEL'S CLOSER
than the bridge,” said Wendy.

“You're driving, doll,” I told her and pecked out the number for Special Agent Matty Svenson on my cell phone. The good news was that she picked up the line despite the lateness of the hour. The bad news was that I had her on the line long enough to say hello and lost the signal.

Marked Windsor police cars screamed into the area like random artillery shells, bursting onto the scene and scattering the traffic to the curbs. Wendy circled the block and in front of a 7-Eleven convenience store, I had Matty on the line again. I told Wendy to turn in and park.

A cruiser pulled to the curb across the street and loitered with its motor running and its rollers trolling. I stepped out of the Camaro and walked into the store. At the coffee bar, I poured a coffee large enough to require a ladder and a lifeguard while I told Matty where to find Karen.

“The information is less than five minutes old,” I said. “No telling how long it will keep.”

“How good is the information?” asked Matty.

“Right from the camel's mouth.”

“You found Manny?”

“Yes, ma'am, we did.”

“Call me when you're back on this side of the river,” said Matty. “And make it fast.” She hung up.

I looked out the window and saw that the patrol car had crossed the
street and now sat parked behind the Camaro. A hatless Windsor policeman stood at the driver's window with what I believed to be Wendy's driver's license in his hand.

At the cash register, I learned I didn't have enough Canadian money to make the purchase, and the clerk didn't have enough American money to make the change. The clerk directed me to a bank machine in the corner. I took my time and watched the officer.

Wendy waved to me from the car. I waved back. She made a fist and pulled it toward her shoulder. I waved again, nodded, and didn't have the foggiest notion what she meant.

The cash machine provided me with a couple of pale-green twenty-dollar bills, each with a small gold seal. The cashier finished the rainbow with brightly colored five- and ten-dollar bills and a couple of brass two-dollar coins with the Queen of England on the front and a little ducky on the back. The police officer met me at the door.

I stepped aside as if to let him go by, but he asked, “What's your name?”

“Art Hardin.”

He pointed to the Camaro. “Do you know that woman?”

“That's my wife, Wendy.”

“May I see your identification, please?”

He held my coffee—left hand, smart lad—and I produced my driver's license from my wallet. He held it up so that he could look at me and the license at the same time.

“Passport?”

“Yeah,” I said. “They told us that was a problem at the bridge. Wendy and I haven't been to Canada for years.”

“What was the purpose of your visit?”

I made the motion that Wendy had showed me from the car and the light came on. “Came over to play the slots at the casino.”

“Win?”

“In a word, no!” I said.

“How bad?”

“Couple hundred bucks.”

“That's not what your wife said.”

I showed the officer my best grimace. “I, ah, didn't know she knew. I got more money while she was in the restroom.”

He smiled and arched his eyebrows. “She knows.”

“Great! I had a couple of beers so she had to drive.”

“So you stopped for coffee?”

“Yeah,” I said, and looked down at the cup. “Maybe, it should have been rat poison—less cruel than my wife.”

He handed back the coffee. “Good idea not to drive,” he said. “Don't forget your seat belt.” He laughed as he walked back to his cruiser. “Come and visit again.”

At the customs booth on the American side, things skittered downhill. The blue-uniformed agent asked, “Nationality?”

“U.S.,” said Wendy.

He held out his hand, and Wendy delivered our driver's licenses. He consulted some notes, pointed, and said, “Pull up over there, and open your trunk.”

While we waited for our turn for the drug dog to sniff out the Camaro, a customs officer walked up and said, “Art Hardin?”

“That's me.”

“Follow me,” he said.

We walked to an office, but I was led behind the counter and down a short hall to a room completely bare except for a short wooden bench and a chrome coatrack. Just as I was sweating through the concept of “cavity search,” a woman in blue coveralls walked in. She looked at me as if I were a space alien. Then I thought, if I have to get naked, better it's a woman. She reached into a pocket. I caught my breath.

The object turned out to be a cell phone. She punched a button, handed me the telephone, and walked out of the room.

“Hardin,” I said.

“Matty Svenson,” she said. “What name is Manny using?”

“Mahmud Salim,” I said. “We caught up with him at a comedy club on Wyandotte. The GPS address turned out to be a shop called the Buck Shop on Ouellette.”

“Why did he give up the location where Karen was being held?”

“He hoped the information would take him off your short list of things to do,” I said.

“Where are you staying?”

“At the Crest Park Motel on Jefferson,” I said. “Room two-eleven.”

“Go there, and wait for a call. Do not go back to Canada.”

“I don't have my passport,” I said. “Seems to be a problem. Never used to be.”

“They have a bulletin for you at Canadian customs. Something about a shooting at a comedy club.”

“Wasn't me doing the shooting.”

“Next time, pay your tab in cash,” said Matty.

“Didn't have time to wait for a receipt,” I said.

Matty hung up.

I stepped into the hall, and the lady customs agent stuck out her hand for the telephone. “Canadian Customs and the Windsor Police are on the way,” she said. “You have three minutes. If you're here when they get here, you're going back to Canada.”

I found Wendy waiting and the Camaro running. We left.

“How much money did I drop at the casino?”

“Maxed out your Gold Card, sweetie,” said Wendy.

“Damn, I guess I'm in trouble.”

“You're a dog,” said Wendy.

We turned right into the Crest Park and pulled under the portico. Jamal sat snoring in a wooden chair leaning against the wall next to the door. I took the coffee out of the cup holder in the armrest.

“Jamal,” I said and gave him a gentle shake on the shoulder. He opened his eyes. “Don't you ever go home?”

Jamal settled the chair back onto all four legs. “My relief guy quit,” he said.

I gave him the coffee.

“Oh, you think you can come in here all hard-ass and give me a cup of coffee, and we're pals,” he said.

“No,” I said. “I'm thinking that if I'm paying you fifty dollars a day to protect my car, you should be awake.”

Wendy unlocked the front door with her key card and held it open. Jamal popped the cap off the coffee and sniffed. “Next time, think about two creams and three sugars,” said Jamal.

“All that cream and sugar makes your hands slow,” I said.

He took a sip and said, “Fast is fine, but—”

“But accurate is final,” I said.

Jamal pointed a finger at me and said, “Wyatt Earp!”

“The autobiography.”

“You read that?” asked Jamal.

“For my English class when I was taking law enforcement at Schoolcraft College.”

“Me too. Mrs. Skilling?” he asked.

“Get out!” I said. “Nobody's that old.”

“She is, or was. She be gone now.”

“Sorry to hear that,” I said.

I heard Wendy sigh.

“What happened to the Ebonics?”

“That's just how you talk loud,” said Jamal. “You know, like you're meeting a friend or trying to woof down someone you're angry with.”

“If you need to sleep,” I said, “sleep in the Camaro.”

“Nah,” said Jamal. “I'm up now. Thanks for the coffee.”

Jamal and I exchanged pointed fingers.

In the elevator, Wendy said, “You're worse than my father. He talked to everybody. It took him ten minutes to pay for gas.”

“Just being friendly,” I said.

“That's what my father said, but the pizza was always cold when he got it home.”

Back in the room, Wendy took her overnight bag into the restroom and ran water in the tub. I piled my clothes on a chair, stacked up the pillows on the bed, and crashed onto the bedspread in my boxer shorts.

All I could get on cable was CNN, so I clicked to the local news station. After the “if it bleeds, it leads” stories, I learned that the Hamtramck City Council had decided to allow mosques in Hamtramck to broadcast the call to prayer over loudspeakers five times a day. More interesting, Mark Behler of
The Mark Behler Show,
on this particular station's Grand Rapids affiliate, had gone missing. A couple of clips of Behler's “bomb” show followed, plus an announcement that until further notice, Chet Harkness would be filling in as guest host.

The bathroom door opened, and I hit the mute button. Wendy stepped around the corner in a très short, pleated, lime-green cotton nightie with a scandal of lace at the neck and hem. She made a saucy twirl. Her hair splashed across her shoulders. “You like?” she asked.

“Fantastic, but—”

“But?” she asked. “But, ‘When the roses are gone, only the thorns remain.'”

“Well, then, we need to plant more roses.”

“Well,” she said with a naughty smile and another pirouette. “I've removed the thicket.”

Indeed she had. My heart pounded so hard I could hear the blood rush in my ears.

Her nipples prominent in the thin material of her nightie, Wendy asked, “How ever will we get those shorts off now?”

• • •

Wendy and I, a blissful snag of tangled limbs, drifted in the shifting currents of sleep. The telephone intruded. We ignored it. It persisted. I scooped the handset from the bedside table. Matty.

“Turn on your TV,” she said. “Any news channel.”

I sifted through the bedclothes for the clicker. Wendy found it on the
floor. CNN showed a suburban bungalow with an attached garage bathed in searchlights. A white SUV sat parked in the drive. “Authorities have surrounded a home in Southfield, Michigan, a suburb of Detroit. Hostage negotiators are in contact with a kidnapper holding a Grand Rapids woman captive. The woman, whose name has not been released, is said to be wired with explosives.”

“Got it?” asked Matty.

“Yeah.”

“I want you down here ten minutes ago. You know generally where. Look for the lights. The local police will bring you through the tape.” Matty hung up.