Kim Oh 3: Real Dangerous People (The Kim Oh Thrillers) (15 page)

“Maybe,” said Donnie, “I could make some money. So things wouldn’t be so tough on you.”

“Yeah? Doing what?”

“Online gambling. I’ve been looking into it. I think I’d be pretty good at it.”

“Forget that. Right now.” I dropped the hammer on him, swelling up to as big and threatening as my hundred-whatever pounds could go. “You even think about logging into one of those sites, I will take that laptop and Frisbee it out the window. I mean it. That stuff’s
illegal
.”

“You should talk.”

“Do not get on my case, pal. Just –
don’t
.” I shoved my chair back, got up from the table, and started slamming around the empty saucepans on top of the stove, not accomplishing anything except making a racket. “You’re not exactly telling me stuff I don’t know.”

“So if it’s okay for you,” said Donnie, “why not me?”

With my hands leaning hard against the edge of the stove, I lowered my head. It was pounding, with little red flashes up by my temples. I should’ve just gone straight to the hotel. That’s where my job was.

“I’m sorry, Kimmie.” Donnie had rolled himself behind me, close enough that he could lean forward in the wheelchair and wrap his arms around my waist, pressing the side of his head against my back. “Really.”

I could see my tears on the stove’s white enamel. Now I really felt like an idiot. I had always felt that way when I cried, even before I’d started killing people for a living. In my head, I could see Cole looking at me and shaking his head. If he were still alive, he would’ve told me that I need to toughen up. A lot.

Then again, maybe I had already.

When we had been gearing up to go out and take care of our old boss McIntyre, Cole had asked me something. That back then, I’d had a little trouble answering. He’d asked me if it mattered to me or not, whether I came back from that job. If I was going to get killed while I was in the process of killing McIntyre, would it have made a difference to me? It hadn’t, to him. That’d been one of the differences between the two of us.

Since then, I think I’d made a little progress on that issue. At least inside my own head. It probably didn’t matter to me anymore, whether or not I made it. Survived, I mean. Just more of what came with the territory, I supposed.

The only problem I still had was with my brother Donnie. It’s pretty chickenshit of me, I know, but if I just got killed while I was doing my job, then I wouldn’t have to worry about him anymore. I wouldn’t be around to do any worrying. But what if I got caught? The whole police thing, then going to prison. For a long time. Then what? I might never see Donnie again. I didn’t know if I could take that.

I could see a little reflection of my face in one of the tear drops on the stove’s white enamel. I should quit this job – I knew that. There had to be some other way.

But there was another problem. Which I didn’t want to think about right now. I just wanted to put it in a little box and think about it some time later. Or maybe never.

But I couldn’t stop thinking about it, right now.

When I’d been running around today, in that mall parking lot with a gun all up in my hand and ready to go – dodging the other guy’s bullets and jumping from the top of one car to another –

I’d been digging on it.

My heart hadn’t been racing from the exertion, the running and jumping and all that. It’d been kicked into overdrive from the sheer adrenaline rush.

I didn’t hate my job. I loved my job.

Crap
, I thought. I really was screwed up.

Maybe that was why I’d started crying. Because I knew that there wasn’t that much difference between Cole and me. I’d changed.

Which wasn’t a problem. Unless I changed some more. There were still some things that I cared about now. What if I got to some place where I didn’t care about them? Then what was going to happen to Donnie and me?

I didn’t know. I just didn’t know.

I pushed myself back from the stove. I took Donnie’s wrists in my hands and peeled his hug away from me, then went over to the fridge.

“I’m sorry.” There wasn’t much in there. I should have gone over to the corner store when Earl had dropped me off. “Would scrambled eggs be okay?”

“That’d be fine,” he said. “That’s just what I want.”

“Okay.” I took out the half-empty carton of eggs and carried them over to the counter. This much at least, I could do on autopilot.

* * *

While I’d been getting my heart rebroken and then Scotch-taped back together again, Foley and Elton had been having their own little conference. Not at that White Hawk dump, but over at the marginally more pleasant Diamondhead Lounge.

“So what’re we going to do?” Foley leaned over his beer. “About Curt?”

“Beats me.” Elton leaned back in the booth. There weren’t a lot of other people around. There never were, in that place. “Suppose we could just put a bullet through his head. Put the poor ol’ bastard out of his misery.”

Foley nodded. “That’s an idea.”

“You’d do as much for some dog.”

“What?”

“Well, I don’t know what you do here in the big city. But where I come from, we’d put down some old hound that was sick and couldn’t take care of itself anymore. It’s a kindness when you do that.”

“I’m not talking about Curt’s hands,” said Foley. “That tremor he’s got going on. I’m talking about what’s happened between him and Falcon.”

“Oh. Well, in that case, just shooting him wouldn’t solve the problem.”

“No. It wouldn’t.” Foley took a long pull from his beer, then set it back down. “Because there’s a lot more going on than you’re aware of.”

“That’s what you keep hinting around about. You’ve sang that song so many times, I pretty much know all the words from back to front.”

“All right.” Foley kept his words mild and emotionless. “So – you want to know what’s really going on?”

“Do tell. If you want.”

“Here’s the deal.” Foley reached into his shirt pocket and took out a folded piece of paper. He spread it out flat on the booth’s table and slid it toward Elton. “What do we got here?”

Elton looked down at it. “Looks like a menu.” He turned his head to one side, reading the words. “From an Italian restaurant, by the looks of it. What’s
scungilli
?”

“Don’t worry about that for now. Know where I got this?”

“Haven’t a clue.”

“I took it off Johnny Dodd. After he got killed.”

“Huh. How about that. From all this song-and-dance you’re going through about it, would’ve thought it was some kind of treasure map.”

“Oh, it’s better than that,” said Foley. “A lot better. Did you notice this?”

He pointed to one corner of the paper. Or what would have been its corner if it hadn’t been torn off.

“Yes, I
did
, Sherlock. What’s it all mean?”

“What would’ve been here, on this corner?”

“I don’t know.”

“Think about it.”

Elton heaved a sigh, then looked down more intently at the unfolded paper. “I suppose,” he said after a few seconds, “that’s where this place’s address and phone number was. Since I don’t see it anywhere else on here.” He looked again at the paper. “Hey, is this place really open twenty-four hours? ’Cause I could go for a pizza or something, right about now.”

“Hold that thought.” Foley turned over the piece of paper. “Now what do you see?”

The other man studied the markings and lines that had been hand-drawn on the paper’s blank side. “Well, I’ll be damned,” said Elton. “Actually
is
a map. I gotta hand it to you. ’Cept it looks like the inside of some building. That doesn’t sound too promising.”

“You’ve been to this place.” Foley tapped his finger on the paper. “Here’s where you come in from the street . . . and this is where the tables are . . . kitchen’s back here.” An
X
was scrawled where the kitchen’s doorway was indicated. “And this is where Johnny Dodd had stationed himself, so he’d have a clear shot at us when we came in.”

“Wait a minute.” Elton peered closer at the map. “This is the Lido? Where we took Mr. Falcon for that meeting he was supposed to have?”

“Yeah – and where Heinz got killed instead. Remember it?”

“Okay.” Elton shrugged. “So Dodd went over there and cased the place before we got there. Hell, I would’ve done the same if I’d been setting up a hit.”

Foley pointed to the handwritten note at the side of the map. It read
2:30 p.m
.
“And that’s when we were scheduled to show up.”

“So somebody tipped the guy off about Mr. Falcon’s plans. Big deal.”

“Right,” said Foley. “Big deal. Now take a look at this.” He turned the paper back over to show the menu side. Then he took a smaller scrap from his pocket and placed it where the missing corner of the paper would have been. The edges of the two pieces of paper, the big one and the little one, lined up perfectly. He tapped the little piece. “Remember where I got this?”

“Yeah . . .” Elton’s brow creased as he looked down at the arrangement on the booth’s table. “You picked it up from the dresser. Up in Falcon’s bedroom.”

“Exactly.” Foley lowered his voice even more. “So why would Falcon have wanted this other place’s phone number?”

“Wait a minute . . .”

“One way to find out.” Foley took his cell phone from his jacket pocket and flipped it open. He punched in the phone number that was printed on the corner scrap of paper, then held the phone to his ear.

Somebody answered.

“Hey, who’s this?” Foley talked into the cell phone. “Doesn’t matter – I just wanna leave a message for Johnny Dodd. That okay? Just a second.” Foley handed the phone over to Elton. “Go ahead.”

Elton took the phone and held it to his ear. He hesitated a moment before speaking. “Tell Johnny . . . tell him –” He suddenly shook his head. “Never mind.”

He closed the phone and set it down on the table. He looked up at Foley, across from him.

Who was smiling all smugly. “So what do you think?”

“You really believe I’m gonna fall for this?” Elton’s gaze narrowed in anger. “You believe that?”

“Fall?” That caught Foley by surprise. “Fall for what?”

Elton didn’t care whether anyone in the lounge saw what happened. He reached inside his jacket and pulled out his gun. Holding it by the barrel, he reached over and clubbed Foley across the head with it. Foley landed sprawling on the floor. He pushed himself up on his elbows and found himself looking straight into the gun.

“You dopey sonuvabitch . . .”

“Pretty smart, aren’t you?” Elton jabbed the gun down toward him. “I don’t know how you cooked all this up, but I’m not buying into it.”

“What the hell are you talking about?”

“You want me to think that this is all something that Mr. Falcon arranged. Don’t you? You want me to think that Falcon’s the one who hired that Johnny Dodd guy. And he took the phone number of where he could reach the guy, then drew him a map of the restaurant where he was going to be. Are you crazy?” Elton poked the gun into Foley’s face. “Why the hell would Falcon arrange for somebody to come out and kill him?”

“You dumb hick.” Foley glared back at him. “The guy didn’t come out there to kill Falcon. He came out there to kill
us
.”

“You expect me to believe this shit? Why would Falcon pay a guy to do that?”

“I don’t know –” Foley pushed himself back on the floor, then got to his feet. “But that’s what happened.”

“Yeah, well, this is what
I
know.” Elton raised the gun so it remained pointed at Foley. “You’re trying to set me up. Feed me this line of crap, I fall for it – then what were you expecting me to do?”

“You’re getting this all wrong, pal –”

“Pretty smart,” said Elton. “You thought I’d go stomping off and whack Falcon, didn’t you? Only maybe you’d just happen to already be there with him. So you could take me out instead. What a hero, huh? And then Falcon would make you the next boss of the crew. Because that’s what you want, isn’t it?”

“Yeah, that’s what I want, all right.” Foley shook his head. “But not like that.”

“All right.” Elton studied him for a few seconds. “Why should I believe you?”

“If you don’t,” said Foley quietly, “maybe somebody else will.”

“Like who?”

Foley reached over to the table and picked up his cell phone. “Let’s make another call.”

* * *

There was only person left over at Falcon’s mansion. And that was Curt.

He was sitting on the couch in the living room. His gun was lying on the coffee table in front of him. Leaning forward, his elbows laid across his knees, he sat looking at the gun. For a long time.