Reunion (10 page)

Allie’s eyes meet mine. She doesn’t know where to point the gun. Why isn’t she shooting
someone
? Anyone? Chase told her not to shoot Galt.
 

W
hy?

“You give a shit about her, Galt,” Frenchie says in a triumphant voice, “’cause she’s your son’s piece of ass.”

“Chase? She’s fucking
Chase
?” Galt grunts. “You and I know Chase is fucking
her
.” He points to Allie. “The one with the gun.”
 

Allie waves the gun. “Hello? Yes. I have a gun. You all seem to be ignoring me.” She looks over at Loogie and her eyes go really wide.

H
e shakes his head so imperceptibly I wouldn’t notice it, except I’m noticing everything now. I can see the tiny hairs on Galt’s ears. Smell the garlic in the lunchmeat Loogie ate for breakfast.
Detect the scent of Chase’s deodorant on Allie.
 

I can see, smell, taste, feel and intuit everything.

All the men continue to ignore Allie.

“No,” Frenchie says. He’s gloating. He pulls me to him, his arm like a cinch string on a sack, and then adds:

“Your
other
son.”

Galt’s response is just a half-second too late. But a half-second is all it takes.

“
What other son?” he scoffs. Loogie’s face goes slack.
 

Oh,
no
.

I feel more danger right now than I did while El Brujo was alive.

“
The DEA agent. Don’t jack with me like that, Galt. I’m no sucker. I kept that little secret in my back pocket.” He kicks El Brujo’s dead body. The tip of Frenchie’s boot catches El Brujo’s shoulder and he rolls slightly. A piece of greyish-peach tissue falls out of the back of his head.
 

I retch. Allie makes a curdled sound in her throat and her hand holding the gun begins to shake.

“What the fuck you talking about, Frenchie? You been taking some of that meth El Brujo’s got you moving?” Loogie is dismissive and taunting at the same time. His hand tightens around the gun he’s holding.

Frenchie presses the gun so hard into my jaw I feel my joint pop.

Loogie and Galt don’t budge.

Allie points the gun right at Frenchie’s head, though, and takes a step forward.

“I’ll pop your little friend here just like you took care of El Brujo, Girlie Girl,” he warns. But he takes a step back, pulling me with him. The grip on the gun lessens slightly. My hip pushes into the metal rim of the open pipe behind us.

And then Frenchie’s entire body tightens like he’s inhaling sharply and holding his breath.

Something grabs my bad arm and yanks down, hard.
I
t doesn’t take much for me to lose my balance and fall like a sack of potatoes.

I fall to the floor on my back and look up to find Mark’s face poking out from the open pipe, his hand holding the hilt of a knife he’s twisting into Frenchie’s kidney.
Mark’s face is shockingly devoid of emotion. He is an automaton on a mission.
 

A mission to gut Frenchie alive.

Frenchie’s fingers thread through the cloth of my shirt and rip it with a sickening pull, the sound and the feel of the weave biting into whatever skin I have that isn’t hurt. A piece threads between my ribs and it’s like a rope burn, one that slides through my neck, shoulder, ribs and hip, until the rope just lets go.

I’
m attached to a twitching Frenchie, though, whose wild eyes meet mine as he gurgles and gags, hands flailing, reaching for the gun he dropped.

And then Galt takes one step forward and puts a bullet in Frenchie’s head.

The storage room door opens and a man wearing a flak jacket and carrying what looks like machine guns runs in,
barrel
pointed at us all. Mark, Galt and Loogie all put their hands up in the air.

Allie points the gun at the guy and screams, “You can’t ignore me!”
Her hair looks like Medusa snakes and she’s caked with filth.
 

They all ignore her, though.

“Drew,” Mark says with a sigh. “
About time.”
 

“Hey, man,” Drew snaps. He looks like the epitome of a soldier from the movies, all short hair, heavy brow, and complete concentration. “We did our job.”

“That you did,” Mark snaps back as he looks at me. H
e drops his hands and crouches down to me.

I can’t stop staring at the lightbulb. The long, fluorescent lightbulb.
I
t’s soothing, even as my body throbs and pulses. Pain isn’t pain any longer. It’s just existence. It’s who I am.

Mark’s filthy, anxious face hovers over me. His hands touch me gingerly.

“Medic!”
he screams, like he’s in a war zone.
 

I
guess we are.

“
Right here, sir,” Drew barks as a groups of uniformed paramedics fill the storage room carrying what looks like a surfboard with straps.
 

“Jesus, that was close,” Galt says, clapping Mark on the back.
No one is smiling.
He turns and gives Loogie a resigned look. His eyes skitter over to Frenchie, whose head is sunken in, like a rotten pumpkin.

“We’re gonna have to file a metric fuckton of paperwork on
that
one,” Loogie mutters to Galt, motioning toward Frenchie’s dead body.
 

“WHAT IS GOING ON?” Allie shrieks. Her gun floats between Drew, Galt and Loogie. Suddenly, they aren’t ignoring her. Drew’s hand goes to the trigger of his gun, but he doesn’t point it at her.

I’
m watching al
l
of this with eyes that are looking anywhere but at Mark.

“Put the gun down, honey,” Chase says from the top steps of the storage door. “Please. Allie, it’s over.
I
t’s over.” His voice is steady, like he’s gentling a crazy horse.

“But what’s Galt doing here?” she asks in a trembling voice. “He’s trying to kill you! He wants you dead! And why did he kill Frenchie? And—” Her eyes roll in the back of her head. Loogie grabs her before she falls.

H
er fainting unravels Chase, who rushes to her side.
H
e slips on a small patch of congealed blood.

“
What the fucking
fuck
?” he screams. He cradles her head in his lap as he looks around the room with frantic eyes. Then our eyes meet.
 

“Carrie. Carrie, what did he
do
to you in here?” Chase’s horror looks misplaced on his tough-guy face. “Your face. Your shoulder. The scratches, the...” He moves his hands in a shaky way over Allie’s sleeping body, then looks at El Brujo’s dead body. “What
happened
in here?”
 

Between his reaction and Mark’s warm hands on me, I realize it’s okay.

I can let go.

And so I do.

The world fades out.

I am done.

When I come to, I’m in a hospital bed.
M
ark’s worried face fills my sight the second I open one eye.

One eye is all I can open.

“Carrie?” His voice is so rich with relief I want to cry. But if I cry, I won’t be able to see.

I open my mouth to say something, but my lips stick together.

“Water?” he asks.

I try to nod and pain shoots through my neck. I just grunt.

He doesn’t make a joke, or comment at all. A straw appears at my lips.
H
e cups the back of my head gingerly and helps me sip.

The water is so welcome I want to cheer.

“Hospital?” I whisper.

“Yes.”

“How long?”

“About a day.”

My shoulder blade screams. I try to move it and it’s like moving a boulder. I look down. A weird contraption holds my upper body immobile.

“What happened?” I ask.

He strokes my hand. His eyes are sad and searching. “You tell me. We only know what Allie could tell us, once she woke up. Amy isn’t really in any condition to talk yet.
T
he only person who really knows what happened in that storage space is you, sweetie.”

“
Sweetie,” I murmur.
 

H
e kisses my forehead. His lips are so gentle. Mark sits back down. “My sweet warrior princess. Jesus, Carrie, what it took for you to survive that....” Tears fill his eyes. I see him fight them, his jaw muscles rolling. He blinks over and over.

I’ve never seen Mark
cry
.

I take a good look at him. He’s clean. His hair is wet, like he just got out of the shower. No uniform, just a polo shirt and jeans. He’s also wearing a look of utter interest in hearing what happened.

I’ll get there. Eventually.

Right now I’m just marveling that I’m alive.

How did
that
happen?

“Allie killed El Brujo,” I mutter. “You know that, right? Shot him.”

“Yes.”

“And your dad killed Frenchie.”

H
e shifts, suddenly uncomfortable. Maybe this isn’t the time for this conversation after all.

“Technically,” he corrects me, “
I
killed Frenchie. No one can survive that kind of kidney wound.”
A long sigh comes out of him. “I should know. I train people to use that technique.”
 

My stomach flip-flops. There’s so much about him I don’t know.
“But your dad finished him off.”

“Yes. Galt did.” I notice he’s not calling him
Dad
. I understand that.

“
And why did Chase tell us not to shoot Galt? I thought Galt was out for Chase? He wants him dead, right?” My thumb strokes the back of Mark’s hand. A tickle in the back of my throat threatens to make me cough. If I cough, I’ll hurt. I tighten my chest to stop the spasm.
 

And then all my pain comes roaring through my body at once. I seize, my muscles turning to stone.

I begin to pant, short bursts of breath that fight the wall of torture.

“Carrie?”

“Pain.”
It’s the only word I can think to say. It’s the only word I know right now.
 

“Here.” He pushes a button on a remote control thing attached to a wire.

A nurse rushes in.
She doesn’t even introduce herself, focusing first on the IV.
 

Second later, sweet heat flows through me.

“There you go, Carrie. I’m Lucy.” She looks just enough like Amy
to make me blink a few times and focus better. I wonder if she lived in constant fear of being kidnapped.
 

I squeeze Mark’s hand. He reaches up and brushes my cheek.

“The kidnappings? The women?”

He shakes his head, topaz eyes warm and yet troubled. “No new ones, but it’s only been a day. We’ve recovered most of the recent ones, though.”

“Recovered?” My voice lifts up with a hopeful tone.

“Dead and alive. Mostly alive,” he grud
g
ingly says. “Look, Carrie, I don’t think this is the time to talk.
Y
ou need to heal. Your job is to rest and get better so I can take you home.”

Home.

Tears ruin my ability to see. I start to shake, even though the painkillers Lucy gave me are kicking in. I’m so swollen and hot. My skin will burst.

“Carrie, Carrie, don’t cry,” he soothes, wiping away the tears with his thumb. He’s caressing my hair.

Wait.

I reach up with my good hand and move without upsetting the IV lines.

I have no hair.

All I touch is gauze.

“What happened to my hair?” I whisper.

His eyebrows wrinkle with compassion. “Um, it was mostly gone when we found you. Allie said there was a candle accident.”

Candle accident.

My memory is so faulty. Candle accident? When were there candles?

Then I remember. Yes. When Allie appeared in the pipe.

“Is it gone? All of it?” Fat teardrops
drip drip drip
down the side of my face, stinging the long scrape from Frenchie’s ring.

“Not all of it. Er, it wasn’t. It is now, though.”

“Huh?” I’m feeling fuzzy all over. His hand is so warm. So nice.

So good.

“They had to shave your head, honey. The flame burned your hair and fused it into a big mess, and when we med-flighted you here, they weren’t sure how bad your head injuries were. So we told them to just shave it.”

“We?”

“Me and Allie. You had no next of kin, so...”

No next of kin.

A huge sob builds in me.

No one. I have no one.

“Mikey,” I hiss. “Mikey and Elaine and Brian. Were they in on it?” The thought of Elaine betraying me makes every part of me want to throw up.

“It’s so complicated—”

“That’s a
yes
.”

“No, it’s not,” he insists. “Here—drink more water. You need to hydrate. Between the burn on your neck, the dislocated shoulder, the broken arm, and the infected rat bite, you need to go slow. Start with water.”

“Infected rat bite?” I ask, then take a big sip of water.

The nurse comes back in then. “Did I hear you talking about the rat bite?” she asks, her voice soft but businesslike. “May I ask a question, Carrie?”

“Yes.” I sigh, the sound long and pressured.

“Was the rat in the mousetrap the same one that bit you?”

“
Yes.
That’s a weird question,” I mutter.

“
I
f it is, then we don’t need to worry about giving you a series of rabies shots.”

“Shots?” I am terrified of shots. Adrenaline pours into me like it’s been injected into my IV.

IV.

Needles.

I look at my arm.

And pass out.

“We just have a few questions to ask,” someone shouts outside my hospital room,
followed by a bunch of shouts of my name and so many flashes it’s like Fourth of July fireworks in the hallway
.

Ah, twenty-four hour cable news. They have to cover something. And El Brujo’s death and my role in it makes me a minor celebrity.