Lucky Bastard (29 page)

It doesn’t make any sense.

Or maybe I’m missing something.

“I see from the bottles you left in the safe-deposit box that you managed to get halfway through the list I gave you,” says Tommy from in front of me while his goon plays caboose. “Though I noticed the deposit didn’t include the luck you poached from Donna Baker.”

At least he bought that I actually poached from the other marks on the list. Alex must have told him about Donna, the douche bag. I hope he chokes on a tofu dog.

“I decided to hold on to that for a while,” I say, leaving out that Donna Baker’s luck is currently flowing through me. “In case of an emergency.”

“I respect a man who hedges his bets,” says Tommy. “Though if you’re betting against me, you should know that the house always wins.”

The three of us walk down the hallway past doors to other rooms and more paintings of images meant to attract good luck. Tommy has done his best to surround himself with as many symbols of good fortune as he can find. But it’s not enough. Tommy wants more. As much as he can get his hands on and at whatever cost.

“I have another job for you,” says Tommy.

“What kind of a job?”

“The kind that will wipe your debt clean.”

“Funny. I didn’t realize I owed you anything.”

“You owe me whatever I say you owe me,” he says. “And you should know by now that I don’t find you all that amusing.”

“I guess I’ll have to come up with some new material.”

Tommy leads me to a door at the end of the hallway, which has yet another goon standing guard outside. That this is a dead end isn’t lost on me.

“One last poaching job for you,” says Tommy, stepping past the goon and swiping a card in the magnetic key lock.

The way he says it makes me wonder if I’ll be leaving here in the back of a Mercedes or in the back of a garbage truck.

Tommy and his goon and I walk into the room, which is another suite decorated with lucky symbols, most of them of the Asian variety. One of them in particular, a large ceramic lucky cat with its left paw raised, sits in the center of the room on a glass coffee table next to another bamboo plant. If I didn’t know any better, I’d swear the cat was winking at me.

Tommy walks to the closed door at the back of the suite and produces a key, which he inserts into the lock. I don’t know what I expect to find in the room when he opens that door.

Tuesday Knight. Barry Manilow. A couple of Playboy Playmates, a jar of baby oil, and a giant Twister mat.

I’m hoping for option number three.

But when Tommy opens the door, I see a small boy in a windowless bedroom sitting on the floor at the foot of the bed wearing headphones and watching one of the Harry Potter films on a flat-screen television. A couple of empty cans of root beer and a bag of potato chips sit on the floor next to him. When he turns to look at us, his eyes go wide and the moment hits me like a car accident.

It’s Jimmy Saltzman Jr.

“W
hat’s he doing here?” I ask, after we’ve stepped back out of the room and closed the door.

“I think the answer to that is fairly obvious,” says Tommy.

“I mean, how did he get here? How did you know about him?”

“Let’s just say your so-called
douche bag
driver was very helpful in recounting your exploits.”

It didn’t even occur to me to think that Alex would rat me out to Tommy. And I’m suddenly thinking about my visit to Mandy and hoping she’s not in one of the other rooms on this floor.

“It was nice of his mother and father to go out to dinner and leave him home without a babysitter,” says Tommy. “Today’s parents are so responsible.”

I don’t even want to know how these guys lured Jimmy out of his house. You’d think a neighbor would have noticed something, but people don’t pay attention to things
like that. Especially when the person doing the kidnapping has accumulated a surplus of good luck.

“Any other surprises?” I ask.

“I don’t really think of this as a surprise. You were obviously thinking about poaching his luck before. Now you get your chance.”

I hadn’t made up my mind what I was going to do about Jimmy. But even if I did decide to poach his luck, I definitely didn’t want it to happen like this. It just doesn’t seem sporting.

“Does that mean I get the reward?” I ask.

Tommy laughs. A big, throaty, head-thrown-back laugh that makes me feel like the kid in high school who gets his gym clothes stolen by the campus bully.

Once Tommy stops laughing, which comes to an abrupt end as if severed with a knife, he looks at me without any humor and says, “Your reward, Mr. Monday, is that you’re still alive.”

Yeah, and I’m wondering how much longer I have to spend my bounty.

“I like this better,” says Tommy. “This way, I get what I want and I don’t have to pay the five hundred thousand dollars.”

“What if I refuse?”

“Then I’ll just get someone else to do it. You. Her. Him. It’s all the same to me.”

“So it’s that easy?” I say. “You’ll let me leave? I can just walk out of here?”

“Not exactly.”

He sits down on one of the couches and, from somewhere inside his smoking jacket, pulls out a gun. He doesn’t aim it at me but just holds it on his lap to make his point. His goon lurks about while the other one presumably stands guard outside the front door.

I don’t really need Tommy to elaborate on his intentions to know that my choices are limited, but I’m hoping I can stall until I come up with another option.

“I don’t have my transference equipment,” I say. “It’s at my apartment.”

“We have the proper equipment here. I’ll have it delivered to your room.”

“I need a cappuccino and an apple fritter in order to process the luck.”

“There’s a Starbucks downstairs on the corner,” says Tommy. “But you’ll have to make do with a cinnamon roll.”

I could make a case for the apple fritter, but that wouldn’t buy me much time. Besides, I have a feeling Tommy isn’t in much of a giving mood.

“Any more excuses?” asks Tommy. “Or are you ready to settle your debt?”

I try to come up with something to keep stalling. Anything at all. But my reserve of excuses is as empty as a bulimic’s stomach.

“What’s going to happen to Jimmy after I poach his luck?”

“That’s none of your concern. Besides, what does it matter to you what happens to him? He’s just another mark.”

“Call me curious.”

Tommy looks at me and smiles. “The same thing that’s going to happen to him whether you poach his luck or someone else does.”

Knowing that Tommy’s thought this out makes me feel like I’m two steps behind. I’m still trying to figure out my next move and he already has an exit strategy.

“So what’s it going to be, Mr. Monday?” he asks, picking up the gun for emphasis. “Poach his luck and get on with your life? Or play the conflicted hero and get on with your death?”

I never was good with ultimatums.

“Make it a grande cappuccino,” I say. “And if you can find a bear claw or something with raisins or fruit, that would be great.”

“Good decision.” Tommy stands up and puts the gun away and hands the key to Jimmy’s room to his goon. “I’ll have your coffee and pastry sent up. As soon as you’ve finished with your snack, you’ll have five minutes to get me my luck. Any questions?”

“Yeah, are you a vegan?”

Tommy just laughs and heads toward the front door.

I’m thinking maybe I can somehow avoid poaching Jimmy’s luck while finding a way to infect Tommy with the bad luck. Or let the police know that Tommy is holding a
kidnapped kid hostage. Or discover a way to travel back in time so I can start this day all over.

“And in case you get any ideas about trying something clever,” says Tommy, standing in the doorway, “I have your sister locked up in another room on this floor.”

Then the door closes and he’s gone, leaving one goon with a pickle up his ass and one poacher still looking for his self-respect.

I
sit and wait for my coffee and doughnut like a cop who’s been on the wagon for three months and can’t wait to fall off. Except my anxiety has nothing to do with my addiction to Starbucks and deep-fried pastries and everything to do with how this day has, to use the words of Barry Manilow, turned into a complete clusterfuck.

I suppose Tommy could be lying about Mandy, but considering Alex told Tommy about Jimmy Saltzman, I don’t really have any reason to doubt that he gave up my sister, too. And if Tommy could get a ten-year-old kid up to the twentieth floor of the Sir Francis Drake without raising any questions, I don’t have any doubts that my sister is somewhere on this floor with me. And probably pissed off. Most likely at me.

So to take my mind off of my sister and Jimmy and the general mess this day has become, I strike up a conversation with Tommy’s goon.

“So what’s your name?” I ask.

He just stares at me and stands with his hands folded in front of him like a constipated statue.

“How long you been working for Tommy?”

More of the same.

“Has anyone ever mentioned that you have excellent social skills?”

Nothing. Not even a yawn or a dirty look.

So much for making small talk.

A few minutes later, my cappuccino and bear claw arrive from Starbucks. The goon from outside brings them in and sets them down on the coffee table next to the ceramic lucky cat, then he nods at the other goon in a show of goon solidarity before he resumes his post outside the door.

I break out the bear claw and start eating it, washing down each bite with some cappuccino, taking my time, trying to think of a way out of this.

If I can get the bad luck out of my backpack and into the cappuccino, I can douse the goon and get out of here, saving my ass and hopefully Jimmy’s and Mandy’s, too. But the goon is watching me like an obsessed stalker, making it difficult for me to scratch my ass without making him suspicious.

Had I thought about it earlier, I would have gone into the restroom and removed the vial of bad luck and palmed it or put it in my pocket so I’d be prepared to use it. But since I’m channeling my inner Indiana Jones, planning
ahead didn’t occur to me. Plus the idea of having a fragile vial of bad luck cupped in my hand or stashed in my pocket isn’t exactly appealing. It’s creepy enough carrying it around in a bag of Starbucks House Blend.

That gets me to thinking again about using the coffee grounds. Which gives me an idea. I don’t know if it’s any good, but at least it’s a plan, and right now it’s the only thing I have going for me.

I just hope I can pull this off in less than five minutes.

I pretend to finish my cappuccino, leaving the cup a little less than half-full, then I stand up and grab my backpack off the table, accidentally knocking over the ceramic lucky cat and causing the raised left paw to break off.

Good thing I’m not superstitious, otherwise I’m guessing I’d be pretty much screwed right about now.

I look up at the goon with a smile and shrug. “Oops.”

He just shakes his head. But at least it was some kind of a reaction.

“Ready when you are, Gabby,” I say.

Gabby opens the front door and tells the other goon what we’re doing, then he leads me to the room where Jimmy’s being held.

“I’ve got five minutes, right?” I say.

He nods once, then unlocks the door.

“I like a man of few words,” I say, stepping inside. “Makes it easier to win an argument.”

Then the door closes and locks behind me, leaving me standing there holding my backpack and my half-empty
Starbucks cup. Some might look at the situation and think of the cup as half-full, but I’m not exactly brimming with optimism.

Jimmy is no longer watching
Harry Potter
but is standing in the middle of the bedroom, watching me with suspicion as the movie plays silently on the flat-screen behind him.

“What are you doing here?” he asks.

The attitude and sense of bravado are gone. Now he just looks like a scared little kid. I guess getting kidnapped and locked inside a hotel bedroom will do that to you.

Aware that Gabby might be listening outside the door, I unplug the headphones from the flat-screen so the sound of the movie helps to drown out any conversation.