Eye of the Burning Man: A Mick Callahan Novel (The Mick Callahan Series) (22 page)

"I beg your pardon?"

"I done rung up the sale, and you ain't got no change coming, neither." She turned on her heel and walked away. As she reached the corner she looked back over her shoulder and winked at Jerry. "Boy, you get some money together, you come and see me. I don't mind scars at all." And then she was gone.

"Smooth as ice cream," Jerry said. "What a team. I think we really had her going there."

I sighed. "Do me a favor, and keep your metaphorical erection zippered next time."

"It wasn't metaphorical at all, a second ago."

"That's more information than I needed, Jerry."

"Mick," Jerry said. "Check it out."

The girl was a knockout. She wore a long blonde wig, big sunglasses despite the darkness, a tight red blouse and some sprayed-on jeans with sparklers glued on the thighs. She walked in spiked heels that made her hips sway dangerously and cast long shadows along the sidewalk. The girl was chewing gum and swinging a large, pink purse with an autographed photo of a well-known boy band on the side. At first glance, I took her for a teenager with a heroin habit, out to make a buck.

"Jesus," Jerry said. He whistled.

"Shut up and use the camera." I glanced over at the alley across from the Carlton Arms and saw a man standing there in the darkness. He stepped forward. Average height, muscular arms, dark skinned. I didn't recognize him. We continued to pace the sidewalk as if shooting film.

"Damn it, this is business," I barked. Jerry jumped. "Keep your mind on your work."

Jerry caught on to the charade. "Yes, sir. Sorry."

The new girl appeared to see us for the first time. She stopped and looked me over. She turned her head and stared at Jerry and his camera. Finally she walked by without stopping.

"Excuse me."

The girl ignored me. Under her breath she said: "Pretty wimpy, Mick. Be a little more forceful."

"Miss," I said again. No response. "Hey, over here, bitch."

Darlene whispered again. "That's better." Louder, she said, "What's your fucking problem, buddy?"

Jerry nearly dropped the camera in surprise. I'd recognized her from the outset, but just barely. I spoke with teeth clenched. "Not bad, babe. All those years walking the streets paid off."

"Screw you, Callahan," she muttered. And then louder: "What do you want? I'm busy, here."

"I can see that. Can I ask you a few questions?"

"About what?"

I caught movement from the corner of my eye. There were two men standing in the alley, now. One was carrying a baseball bat. A tingle jogged rapidly up my spine.

"We're shooting some footage for a documentary, lady. We will take your face and any objectionable words out of it later, but we would like to talk to you about your work."

"My work," she said, projecting her voice for effect. "I'm an actress."

"I see. What kind of acting do you do?"

Darlene blew a gum bubble. It popped. "First I act like you turn me on," she said. "Then I act like I give a shit about who you are and what you have to say. Then I act like I came. Oh, and I'm expensive."

A long, dark red Lincoln Town Car slid around the corner, four plump tires sizzling on the hot pavement. A distinguished businessman with perfectly coifed hair sat behind the wheel. He wore an open-necked silk shirt and was smoking a thick cigar. Jerry saw him, lowered the camera and slipped it behind his back. He needn't have bothered. The man only had eyes for Darlene. She smiled. "Check this out."

"Baby?"

Darlene walked over, swinging her hips. "Good evening, sugar. Are you looking for a good time?"

"Absolutely," the man said. He blew two smoke rings, stuck out his tongue and licked the air. "How much for a blow job?"

For a long moment I half expected Darlene to whip out a pair of handcuffs and arrest the guy out of habit, but she stayed in character. "I was just telling this red-necked country boy over here that I don't come cheap, baby."

The man stared at me. "Like I said, how much?"

Darlene held up three fingers. "Three hundred."

The man roared with laughter. "You've got to be fucking kidding me, a three yard piece of ass in a neighborhood like this? This isn't Vegas, girl."

"Take it or leave it," Darlene said.

"Hey." I walked over and tapped Darlene on the shoulder. "I'll take it."

The driver blinked. "You're not serious."

"Serious as a heart attack," I said, loudly enough to be heard by the men in the alley. "And it's three hundred just to have a conversation."

The driver blew another three smoke rings, deliberately aimed at me this time. He gunned his engine. "Fuck the both of you, then."

I reached in through the window and used two fingers to flick the tip off the long cigar. Hot sparks fell down onto the driver's silk pants and those expensive leather seats. He took his foot off the brake and the car jerked forward. Swearing feverishly, he tried to pick up the hot coals. That meant taking his hands off the steering wheel. The Lincoln rolled up onto the curb, and the left rear door scraped itself raw on a metal post. The driver shrieked and jerked the wheel too far right, so the vehicle dropped back down into the street with a crunch that bent the left front fender.

"Prick!"

Red faced, the driver sped away, still slapping at the seat between his legs. Darlene's mouth was twitching when I risked a sidelong glance.

There were now three young men standing in the alley, just watching.

Darlene held out her hand. I peeled off three hundred dollars in twenties from a substantial roll and she tucked them between her breasts. Under her breath, she said: "You're not getting this back, you know."

I ignored her. "Jerry?"

Jerry brought the camera up, adjusted the lens a bit. A red light winked on near the monitor, and he nodded. "Rolling."

"How did you get into this line of work?" I asked.

"I do what I want to do," Darlene answered.

"Do you have anybody who represents you? Some of the girls say it's too dangerous to work the street without a pimp."

Darlene snorted derisively. "I don't need no fucking man taking my money, I can take care of myself."

"Have you worked this area long?" The men in the alley were conferring among themselves. I tried to pay attention to Darlene as she answered the questions, but I was taking measure of the situation and barely aware of her voice. I only caught a part of her response. My gut tightened and several moments passed.

". . . so I thought I would come down here for a while and check it out," she said. "This is my first night."

"What is your name?"

"Rose," Darlene said. She blew another bubble.

The charade had gone on long enough. I nodded. "Well, Rose, good luck to you."

"Thanks sweetie," she said. She walked away. The men in the alley continued to watch. It was impossible to act as if they weren't there. Jerry raised his eyebrows, asking if we were done with the game. I wasn't sure. I watched Darlene walk back up the block. She neared a smaller alley on the other side of the avenue. I glanced back at the three men who were following her with their eyes. They were still there.

I looked back up the street. Darlene was gone.

I took off running, tracing her steps, arms pumping. When I got to the smaller alley I turned, cautiously. The alley was well lit; a porch lamp from a nearby bar spread a wide, yellowing pool of light and shadow. Darlene was on her knees in a pile of flattened garbage. A tall, skinny Caucasian male with carrot red hair held a long straight razor to her throat. He was whispering in her ear. I edged closer, mouth dry, pulse racing.
Well, he's Fancy's boy and he's definitely white, so that's one, anyway
.

"Come on somebody else's turf with a big mouth, bitch, and you don't live very long."

"Easy," Darlene said, breathing rapidly. "Let's talk about this for a minute."

The man looked up. His face was pitted with acne scars and he had the yellowing teeth of a heroin addict. He spotted me and growled low, like a junkyard dog. "Back off."

Darlene moved the second his attention wavered. She slipped her open palms between his forearm and her chest, gripped and pulled. As the man fell forward slightly, off balance, she simultaneously rose slightly and squatted, lifting him with her strong legs. She turned her shoulder and rolled him over her and down onto the pavement with an audible thump. Somehow she ended up with the razor, too. Darlene eyed it with distaste and threw it in the garbage.

The man was up in a flash. He tried to get by me to escape. I tripped him, grabbed his shirt and slammed him into the brick wall. Then I did it a second time, just for scaring the crap out of me.

"What's his name?"

"Huh?"

I slammed him again and this time I thought I heard a rib pop. The thin man cried out. "Who sent you?"

"Let go, dude."

I grabbed one of the man's hands and bent the little finger back. He squealed like a pig, bared those bad teeth.

"Okay, you're gonna know soon enough anyway. The top dude around here is a black guy, name of Fancy."

"Fancy sent you?"

"No. His people, though."

"What did his people tell you to do?"

"They said nobody wasn't in his stable should be working these streets. I was supposed to scare her off, man. Okay, maybe cut her a little, but not kill her or anything."

"That's it?"

"That's it."

I let go. His legs gave out and he fell forward, striking his chin on the pavement. He whimpered, checked his mouth for blood and then sat up on his knees.

"You tell Fancy something for me, okay?"

"Yeah, yeah."

I grabbed his hair and pulled. The man looked up. His lip was bleeding and his rheumy eyes went wide. "You tell him what used to be his isn't his anymore," I whispered.

"Shit, man. Are you fucking crazy?"

"You tell him we don't answer to him, or to anybody else. There's a new game in town. Any part of that you don't understand?"

"No."

I let him go. The man ran to the end of the alley. He turned back, shook his head in amazement and then disappeared into the night.

"Well," I said happily, "that ought to stir things up."

Jerry had taped the whole exchange. He looked at me as he lowered the camera, then let out a long rush of frightened air. He moved his baseball cap around again, pointing backwards, and stroked his scar. "Oh, man. I hate it when you say that."

The Carlton Arms Hotel was a funky, claptrap building with the nondescript, bland rooms that reeked of alcohol, marijuana, and sex. It had ancient iron fire escapes gone orange with rust and brick-rimmed windows with splintered frames and broken panes of glass. In any other neighborhood it would have been condemned, but here it served a purpose.

The bored clerk at the counter was studying the racing form. He didn't look up when we walked in. He held a room key in one hand and an open palm in the other. I gave him cash. Our trio stood frozen for a few moments, repeatedly pushing the elevator button. Jerry was sweating and his eyes were bugged with anxiety.

"Elevator ain't working," the clerk said, still looking down. He turned a page and wrote down some ideas. "Your room is on the second floor."

The stairs creaked like coffin lids. The burgundy carpet in the hallway stank of urine. I memorized the layout and noted the bulbs above all the doors were behind wire mesh to keep someone from breaking or unscrewing them. This hotel had seen its share of violence.

I glanced both ways. I opened the room, went in first, checked the closet and the bath then motioned to the others. Darlene immediately tore off the wig she had been wearing. She shifted her clothing around, pulled padding out of her bra, and took out a .38 special and two speed loaders. She checked the gun and tucked it into the waistband of her jeans.

"Man, I don't get it," Jerry said. "I hope you know what you're doing, Mick. A guy could get killed this way. Incidentally, what
are
you doing?"

"I'm making him mad."

"Oh, no shit? Well, we'll be lucky if he doesn't firebomb the whole fucking hotel after what you just said."

"Relax, Jerry," Darlene said.

"Oh, sure. Just relax." Jerry looked around the room. Gang graffiti festooned the peeling wallpaper and the lampshade and curtains were yellowed from smoke. The aging pieces of furniture—a well-worn double bed, end table, and one armchair—were pocked with cigarette burns.

"Another high class establishment," Jerry said. "I lived better than this in Dry Wells." He sat down on the edge of the bed and bounced. The springs squeaked. "What do we do now?"

I moved the chair over by the window and the fire escape; sat in the chair, leaned back and closed my eyes. The gallows humor had worn off and now I just felt sad, bitter, and overtired. "We wait."

"For what?"

"For Fancy to process what he hears and come to a decision. Then he'll make his move."

"And?"

"And then we'll make ours."

"Let me guess," Jerry said. "He kills us, and then we die?"

I shrugged. "Given time, I think he'll be more puzzled than angry."

"You
think
? Oh, great."

"I don't know if he will remember my face from the night I took Mary," I said. "But if he does, that will make him even more curious."

"So he'll want to talk to us instead of just take us out?"

"Exactly."

"Why?" Jerry asked.

"First I took one of his girls for what I told him were personal reasons, and now I show up again a few weeks later as if I am doing a documentary on hookers."

"Yeah, so?"

"So then I finally act like the truth is that I actually have a stable of my own girls. One of those three things has to be a lie, right?"