Dues of Mortality (48 page)

“
He
couldn’t take a piss without clearing it with you first, Ian,”
Gabriel shouted. “And I, for one, find it incredible that he
still trusts you! You would think he’d have a rather low
opinion of your skills, after everything he’s been through!”
Gabriel paused, calming down. “Now, tell me where he is.”

Shaw
just shrugged. “Or what? You’ll turn me in? I don’t
think so; not with what I know.”

“
So
he did tell you everything. Probably after the fact though, right?
Just to make sure he could pull the strings from a safe distance. Of
course, who better to trust than the person who already knew most of
his dirty little secrets and who he could rely on to help sort out
the details.”

“
And
it still does you no good,” Shaw said, feeling his position.
“You tell your story, and I tell mine; it’s that simple.”

“
Oh,
it certainly does simplify things, Ian. On that, we agree.”

Gabriel
snapped his fingers and the man who’d been cooling his heels
behind the door to the study eased it closed. He then slid its
bolt-action lock into place. The man was huge. His faded denim jeans
and mock turtleneck shirt each looked about a size too small. His
suede jacket, which had to be a fifty, extra-long, made him look like
a bear on its hind legs. From across the office, the door leading to
a walk-in closet opened and another, smaller man entered the room.
What he lacked in size compared to Suede Jacket, he made up for in
sinisterly aura.

“
You’re
not serious,” Shaw said.

Gabriel
shrugged.

“
This
isn’t a mob movie, you asshole!” Shaw had no luck
disguising his panic as he watched Yogi and Boo Boo close in. “What
do you think this is going to get you?”

“
You
made it clear, Ian; we’re at a stalemate,” Gabriel said
plainly.

Shaw
swallowed hard. “
I have
people who...”

“
...you
will tell nothing! Just like you said, Ian, you tell your story, and
I tell mine. As far as the doctors will be concerned, it was a bad
in-home accident.”

“
What
are you going to do, pull my fingernails out one at a time?”

Gabriel
guffawed. “Ian, you have a peptic ulcer and a borderline
addiction to painkillers. I sincerely doubt it will come to that.”

****

“
Have
you completely taken leave of your senses?” Xavier asked for
the third time, as he checked, yet again, the charges for his .3 mm
MAG gun. He was glad to have it back after he had sealed it in a
heavy document envelope and stashed it in an airport locker before
leaving for Seattle. Technically, just having it in the terminal was
illegal, but he'd wanted to carry it as far as he could short of the
metal detectors. If Glenda was going to proceed with this pea-brained
blind date, he thought, it wouldn’t be unarmed.

“
I
have to do this, Xavier,” Glenda said, exiting their rental
car. She gazed up at the stories-high Halite sign that stretched
across the building's facade.

The
Halite branch of the salt mines, on the edge of Lake Erie was
perpetually half-closed. A sign of the times. There wasn't much use
for road salt in the increasing spring-like winters and that
dolomitic epoxy road sealant that trapped de-icing chemicals, lasted
for years. Many of the mine’s warehousing and office facilities
had long since been shut down and would be due for demolition unless
otherwise leased or bought up.

“
You
have to?” Xavier asked. “No, you
have
to eat, you
have
to sleep, you
have
to go to the bathroom, but you
do
not have
to
walk into the jaws of death, because some little birdie told you to!”

“
Xavier,
I told you, this could be the key to solving this whole thing,”
Glenda insisted.

“
You
said that, but what you haven’t told me is how!”

“
Because,
I’m not sure how, yet! Just trust me for now...please?”

Xavier
finally relented, but was still beset.

Glenda
led him up to and through a warehouse entrance facing east along the
lake. She then walked them onto an elevator and she pressed the
button for the third floor.

She
knew where she was going, Xavier noticed. This moon man hadn't sent a
navigation point or GPS marker or anything, but she knew exactly what
and where salt air meant.
What
the hell?

When
the elevator opened, they stepped off—Xavier first, with
gun-barrel pointed outward—and proceeded down a poorly lit
hallway. Glenda brought them quickly to an office door with remnants
of lettering on it—the posting now completely illegible. She
reached for the knob and he looked annoyed when he had to physically
intercede. She should know better by now. Whoever or whatever this
moon man was had completely thrown her off her game. Xavier pulled
her behind him and then opened the door, again, gun-barrel outward
and from under the chin. Inside was a former supervisor’s
office with the remains of a desk and a number of armless wooden
chairs. Another door, adjacent to a warehouse area, was off to the
left.

“
What
now?” Xavier asked.

Glenda
held still, looking thoughtful. “There,” she said,
nodding at the warehouse entrance.

Xavier
ordered Glenda to stay back and entered the warehouse on his own. He
was shocked that they hadn't been ambushed up until now and he wanted
his record to stay unchallenged.

The
warehouse was a one and a half level area with stacks of empty,
bright yellow
polyethylene
salt
bins pyramided halfway to the ceiling and over most of the floor
space. Flecks of dust and salt residue swirled along powerful shafts
of moonlight beaming through the dozen or so windows. A trio of
ceiling lamps above the lower level was the only
internal
light source.

Should
the power even be on in here?
Xavier almost asked out
loud. He discovered he couldn’t open his mouth without tasting
salt.
Salt air takes control.
How original
. Lord Byron, this guy was not.

“
Anything?”
Glenda asked. She had taken position next to the office door. Her
head-and-shoulders silhouette projected onto its single pane of
tempered glass.

“
Yes,”
Xavier answered. “A hard headed woman who won't be happy until
she gets herself killed. Get back inside.”

Glenda
completely ignored him and wandered further into the warehouse.
Xavier reached out to grab her, but relented when he realized the
ensuing argument would do just as much to give them away.

Cloaked
in the shadows of the rear upper level, a pair of black leather
hiking shoes crept tacitly across the dust-covered floor. The
midnight darkness along with stacks of old wooden pallets kept the
stranger well hidden. Like a nocturnal animal, he deftly circled the
newcomers to his lair before crouching down to scope them through the
separations in the pallet stacks. When he was sure he could get a
clean shot, he maneuvered closer to the edge, just short of the
railing. He aimed the old service pistol through the pallets and down
at his target. He’d remembered reading Mafioso stories
mentioning that just behind the ear was always a good spot. His hands
shook as he tried to better his aim. He could have used some form of
MAG that would make targeting a trifle easier, but honestly, they
scared him. Even if he shot someone by mistake, it was an error far
more likely to be fatal. He trusted the Colt because he’d
practiced with it on the firing range. Most days he actually hit the
target. He would have to rely heavily on the laser sight upgrade.

Xavier’s
hand was slipping from the sweat around the gun’s handle. The
quiet of the room was deafening. Part of him just wanted to shout for
the bastard to come out so they could end this torture. When he heard
the granules of salt cascade from the upper level, just behind him,
he was grateful he’d kept his mouth shut. Xavier spun halfway
before his eyes locked on the swirling green dot endeavoring to find
him. A shot rang out and chipped the floor by his foot. Xavier then
pivoted, scooped Glenda by the waist and dove as far into the corner
shadows as possible. The two came to huddle behind a wall of salt
bins.

The
stranger squatted behind his cover of pallets, cursing himself for
being too impatient and prematurely activating the sight on his
pistol.
Shit.
His inexperience in this sort of thing was going
to get him killed. “Let her go!” he shouted.

Xavier
had a “fuck you” on the tip of his tongue, but he had no
intention of giving away their position. He only hoped the idiot
would say something else so he could get a bead on him.

“
Let
the woman go and I’ll let you live,” the stranger said.
His threat sounded pathetic even to him.

Xavier
craned his neck. He'd placed the shooter by his voice, but wouldn’t
be able to hit him from their position.

“
It’s
your only chance,” the shooter yelled. “If you hurt her,
you’re dead; I swear it!”

Xavier
wagged his head.
What did he
say?

Glenda
looked askance at the darkened corners of the warehouse. She was
overwhelmed with the possibility of having answers. But could she
trust what she was hearing? That was the real question. She gazed up
into the pitch black shadows from where the shot had come.
He was
aiming for Xavier
, she thought. She'd gone ahead of him. She was
first out of the office door. Either the shooter was a complete klutz
or...

Glenda
sprang out of her spot next to Xavier and ran for the flaccid
convergence of light between the stacks of bins and the upper level.

As
Xavier watched her, the visions of old headlines swept over him:
COLONEL’S DAUGHTER SLAUGHTERED IN LOVER’S QUARREL.
DAUGHTER OF WAR HERO VICIOUSLY MURDERED.

Xavier
jumped to his feet. He circled around the bins until he was in direct
line behind Glenda. He was thankful she hadn't been shot and assumed
a jammed gun or some other divine intervention. He aimed up into the
pallets on the balcony and held his breath.

Glenda
edged into the illuminated area of the warehouse like a
stage-frightened actress entering the spotlight. She gazed up
expectantly in the direction from which the familiar voice had
spoken.

Yes
,
the stranger thought. Glenda's eyes shone like limpid studs of copper
to him even under the anemic light if the room. Slowly but anxiously,
he stepped from the shadows as if beckoned by their blaze.

No!
Xavier said to himself and fired two shots at what had to be a head
moving through the slots of pallet stacks. Fragments of wooden
shrapnel pattered the stranger’s face and he reeled backward.
His gun hand hit the corner of the stack and fell over the balcony's
railing to the floor of the lower level. The stranger was left
clutching one side of his face and squealing on the floor like a
certain farm animal.

“
No!
Wait!” Glenda shouted.

Xavier
ran to her side. “Are you all right?”

“
Yes,
but...” She pointed to the balcony.

“
Stay
here.”

Xavier
collected the stranger's gun and ran for the staircase that led to
the upper level. When he reached the top of the stairs, he aimed his
MAG at the center mass of a man in a flannel shirt and jeans hunched
over in agony.

“Don't
move
!” Xavier commanded.

“
Please
don’t hurt her,” the man pleaded. “I’ll pay
you more. Just don’t hurt her.”

Xavier
moved closer, keeping a tight grip and steady aim. Upon reaching the
man, he stuck his foot into the stranger's ribcage and pushed. The
stranger rolled onto his back and his hands fell away, allowing the
moonlight to illuminate his face. It was the same face that was
crashing the news-webs the day before Glenda’s. It
was
Peter Simonton.

Xavier
straddled the old wooden office chair, grinding his hands to blisters
on the back support. They burned almost as hot as the glare he aimed
at Simonton, who was laid across two chairs with his head nestled in
Glenda’s lap like a wounded cub. She dabbed blood from his face
with a monogrammed handkerchief that Simonton apparently never left
home without. Xavier knew it was silly of him to be annoyed, but he
couldn’t help it. This guy had to be the reason she was in this
mess; why the hell was she babying his ass?
And look at him, in
his flannel lumberjack shirt, trying to pass for someone who actually
worked for a living.
Please.
Simonton sported the manicure
of a hand model and his pampered skin positively glowed with a fresh
tropical tan. Wherever he'd been hiding all this time was likely big
on nude beaches and small on extradition treaties.

“
I’m
so sorry, Glen,” Simonton said. He gazed up at her longingly.
He hadn’t shut up since he sat down. Xavier was sure he’d
shoot the asshole if he apologized one more time. But who or what
would he be shooting? Xavier asked himself.