The Barbed-Wire Kiss (37 page)

“I know. I saw what you did to him.”

“Then you know where we stand. Fallon and I had a long talk before we parted company.”

“What do you want?”

“What do
I
want? What do you think I want? I can’t even go back to the place I live, get a few things, because there’s always some cop parked outside. I’ve been living in a crackhead motel for almost a week now. You think I’m enjoying it?”

“I’ll ask you again.”

“I want a lot of things. I want to be able to go back to leading a life. I want your head on a fucking stick. Starting to get the picture?”

“Go on.”

“Fallon told me the girl left with something that belonged to him.”

“I wouldn’t know.”

Dunleavy sighed.

“We’ve gone through this before, haven’t we?” he said. “And look what happened then. Well, if you don’t know, then maybe I’ll ask her again. She wasn’t too forthcoming the first time.”

“Leave her alone.”

“You’ve got it?”

“I’ve got it. It isn’t much.”

“Well, it’s more than I have access to right now, sport. The way I look at it, it’s the least of what you owe me. By the way, I’ve got to hand it to you, that was a slick number at the airport. That was Wiley’s shit, wasn’t it? You managed to hold on to it all this time and then used it to pull that off. I have to admire that, Harry, I really do. It was smart. So don’t get stupid now.”

“You expect me to believe that if I give you the twenty-five grand you’ll walk away and leave us alone?”

“I didn’t say that. You give me the twenty-five grand and we’ll talk about it. By the way, Fallon said it was thirty.”

“He was wrong.”

“Maybe so. Three things didn’t come out of that bastard’s mouth that two weren’t lies. But the secret is to know who you can lie to and who you can’t. And you’re smart enough to know that.”

“Am I?”

“I think so. And I also think you’re smart enough to do what you’re told if you think things will work out for you. So get that twenty-five together—if that’s all there is—and in just about”—there was a pause—“one hour, I’m going to call a pay phone in Manasquan. You should be there to answer it.”

“I’ll need time.”

“No time left. Be there or we might not talk again.”

“What phone? Where?”

“Outside the Sand Castle. The one facing the parking lot. I’m sure you’ll make it in time.”

“Then what?”

“Then you listen to what I say and you find out what. We’ll take it one step at a time. You just worry about being there.”

“One hour is tight.”

“Conversation’s over, sport. You know the game, you know the stakes, you know the way we play. You’re not an amateur. One hour.”

He parked a few feet from the pay phone, his window open. The Sand Castle was dark. Beneath his sweatshirt, the Kevlar vest itched against his chest. He gripped the wheel, tried to slow his breathing, the dread coalescing like stone in his stomach.

At two minutes after midnight, the phone rang, loud in the empty lot. He got to it on the third ring.

“Yeah?”

Silence at first. Then Dunleavy’s voice. “That you, sport?”

“It’s me.”

“Good. I knew you’d make it in time. You sound like you’re out of breath. Ready to wrap this thing up, get me out of your life?”

“Talk.”

“There’s a building in Asbury Park near the beach, a high-rise they never finished. You know it?”

“Yeah.”

“Meet me there in an hour. I’ll bring the girl. Sixth floor. I’ll be in a position where I can see everything going on for blocks around. If you show up with anyone else, or if anyone even decides to follow you without your knowing it, I’ll see him. Do you understand that?”

“Yes.”

“And if that happens, everything’s off. You find the missus at a later date, very much the worse for wear, I promise you.”

“I understand.”

“Have the money on you. No trips back to the car, no ‘It’s near but I have to go get it’ bullshit.”

“How do I know you won’t just kill me and take the money?”

“You don’t. That’s the chance you’re taking, isn’t it? Have the money on you.”

“I’ll have it.”

“Because if anything doesn’t look right, or if everything doesn’t go exactly as I say it should, then I cut my losses and walk. And you find yourself another girlfriend.”

“I’ll be there.”

“One a.m.,” Dunleavy said and hung up.

He drove to Asbury, spotted the building from blocks away. Twelve stories high, it had been intended as a beachfront condo complex until the developer went bankrupt two months into construction. Now the concrete shell loomed over a neighborhood of boarded-up stores and empty lots.

He circled the block twice, the second time with his lights off. A chain-link fence surrounded the site, but a half dozen gaping holes had been cut into it. Anything in the building worth stealing would be long gone.

He parked a block away, facing the ocean, and turned off the engine, waited for his heartbeat to slow. Out over the water, he could see the moist poundings of heat lightning on the horizon. Above him the sky was cloudless, the moon bright.

A police car sped by, its lights flashing, heading for some other part of town. As the siren faded, the silence returned. He looked back at the building. The interior was unbroken blackness. If Dunleavy waited there, he waited in darkness.

At twenty minutes to one, he got out of the car. The money pack was tucked into his sling, the Glock in his belt at the small of his back. Inside his cast was a thin-bladed filleting knife he’d taken from Bobby’s boat. The wooden handle chafed against the inside of his wrist, but he’d found he could draw the seven-inch blade easily without cutting himself.

In the glow of the street lamps, he walked the perimeter of the fence until he found an opening, then pushed through ragged lips of chain. Glass crunched under his feet. Parked alongside the building was an aluminum trailer that had once been a construction office, its windows now broken, sides covered with graffiti.

He walked toward the dark, doorless tunnel of the front entrance, took out the Glock. Beyond was what would have been the lobby, an expanse of concrete stretching toward a dark stairwell at the far end.

He went slowly up the front steps. Inside, every surface was covered with graffiti, the walls like bone in the moonlight. The floor glittered with broken glass.

He moved silently through the lobby. When he got to the wide concrete stairwell, he stopped, drew four long, slow breaths, trying to calm himself.

He stepped into the stairwell, staying close to the wall, and looked up into darkness. He listened for footsteps, the sound of breathing, heard nothing. He started up the stairs, his sneakers silent on the concrete.

At the second-floor landing, he stopped. Like the lobby, this floor was just a length of concrete with high ceilings and gaps in the walls where the windows would have gone. A salt breeze blew through the room.

The third floor was the same, and the fourth. As he neared the fifth, he heard a rustle on the stairs in front of him. He held his breath, raised the gun.

The seagull broke from its hiding place with a flutter of wings, flew straight at him. He dodged and then it was over his head and past. He watched it fly, wings dirty white in the moonlight. It glided the length of the floor and soared out into open air.

He started up the stairs again.

On the sixth floor, the wind was stronger. He stopped in the doorway. Through the far windows came a flash of heat lightning and the distant rumble of thunder. He waited.

Twenty feet in front of him, a flashlight went on. It blinded him briefly, winked out. Afterimages pulsed in his eyes.

“You’re early,” Dunleavy said.

Harry turned to his right, the gun along his leg. He heard footsteps on concrete. A silhouette moved past one of the windows.

“Where is she?” he said.

The flashlight clicked on again, its beam illuminating a wide circle of concrete floor. He could see nothing but blackness behind it.

“She’s here, don’t worry.”

The circle of light moved toward him, stopped.

“Turn around, Harry. Face the doorway.”

He waited, not moving. At the edge of the light a hand came up. In it was a dark automatic, a silver noise suppressor screwed into the muzzle.

“I could shoot you now, Harry. I could have shot you on the stairs if I’d wanted to. Turn around. I won’t ask you again.”

“I left the money downstairs. If you kill me now, you’ll never find it.”

“Relax, Harry. You think I’d do you like that? Pop you from behind? Face the doorway.”

In that instant, he considered bringing up the Glock, firing at the light. He could wing him at least, maybe bring him down. But he had no clear target. And Cristina might be in the room beyond.

He turned slowly, looked into the darkness of the stairwell.

“Right there,” Dunleavy said.

The flashlight came up and Harry’s shadow fell huge against the wall. He felt the cold touch of the suppressor against the back of his neck.

“Take a deep breath,” Dunleavy said. “Relax.”

The flashlight clicked off. Dunleavy’s hand moved on him, slid down his arm and found the Glock, pulled it free from his fingers. Harry let him take it. The hand came back, felt along his chest, reached into the sling and took out the leather pack. He heard it hit the floor.

“Move toward the stairs. Not all the way. Stop there.”

He stepped forward, felt the suppressor drop away from his neck.

“Where is she?” he said again.

“Waiting for you.”

“Where?”

“Close. Shut up and stand still.”

The flashlight went on again, played across the walls. He heard a soft grunt as Dunleavy bent over to pick up the pack. He moved his right hand to his cast, touched the handle of the knife.

He heard the pack being unzipped, tried to guess the distance between them. He began to slide out the knife.

“Looks like twenty-five,” Dunleavy said after a moment. “Just like you said. Didn’t keep any for yourself now, did you?”

“No.”

“Good man. Too honest for that, eh?”

The pack was zipped shut again. He tried to picture what was going on behind him: Dunleavy juggling the gun, the flashlight, and the pack. If he wanted to shoot, he would need one hand for the flashlight, the other for the gun. He’d have to drop the money.

He slipped the knife all the way out, held it in front of him.

“Look at it this way, Harry, you’re doing a favor for a brother trooper. You’re giving me a new lease on life with this money, believe it or not. Now I can start picking up the pieces, work this thing out. I appreciate that.”

Dunleavy was closer now. Shadows shifted on the wall. The flashlight changing hands.

“Sorry things went so wrong between us, sport,” Dunleavy said. “But I want you to know it was never personal.”

Harry bent his knees slightly, gripped the knife.

“So I’ll make it easy on you,” Dunleavy said. “Adios, partner.”

The pack hit the floor.

Harry spun to his right, crouching, and a petal of fire bloomed in front of him. Then he was lunging, the knife up, and Dunleavy was right there, closer than he had expected, and he thrust, felt the blade meet resistance and push past. A hammer blow to his chest knocked him backward, drove the breath from him. He hit the wall, slid down hard. Another flash of fire and a bullet whined off the wall above him, showered him with dust.

Pressure swelled in his chest, paralyzed his lungs. He rolled onto his stomach, scuttled away from the wall. The flashlight beam jittered back and forth, farther away now. The light swept the floor a final time, and then the flashlight fell and rolled and all was darkness.

Harry lay there for a moment, not moving, silently trying to draw air into his lungs. A bullet pranged off the ceiling, ricocheted across the room. In the distance, a pulse of heat lightning seemed to answer it.

He dragged himself along the floor, trying to put distance between himself and the place Dunleavy had seen him fall. He gulped air, felt it spread into his lungs, the tightness in his chest easing.

Dunleavy’s silhouette moved past a window, disappeared again.

Harry pulled up the right cuff of his jeans, clawed at the strip of duct tape above his ankle. He yanked the Grendel free and sat up, leaned against the wall. He thumbed off the safety and pointed the gun into darkness.

From a few feet away came a wet, gagging cough. He aimed at the sound, let his lungs fill with air, felt pain there.

“Throw away your gun, Mickey,” he said. “Nobody has to die here.”

Shuffling steps, then silence. Heat lightning flashed again.

“Toss the gun, Mickey. We can both walk out of here.”

Another wet noise, closer now, to his right. Dunleavy was circling toward the sound of his voice.

He inched to his left, faced a window that framed the moon. Dunleavy would have to pass in front of it to close on him.

The sound of shoes on concrete.

“Stop where you are,” Harry said.

He pointed the gun at the moon, heard the faintness of labored breathing not ten feet away. Then closer.

“Don’t do it, Mickey.”

Closer.

“Don’t …”

An outline filled the window, blotted out the moon.

Harry fired once, twice, saw the form buckle, straighten. He held the Grendel steady, squeezed the trigger again and again, shell casings flying around him. He didn’t count the shots and he didn’t take another breath until the slide locked back empty.

The silhouette loomed, wavered, vanished. He heard the heavy fall.

Except for the wind, there was silence.

After a while, when he could breathe without pain, he put the Grendel beside him, rolled slowly to his feet. Shell casings clattered from his lap to the floor. He listened for the sound of breathing, movement. There was only the wind.

He began to circle the room, using the wall for support. His foot hit something, sent it spinning away. He got down on his knees and crawled until his fingers closed on hard plastic. The flashlight. He pushed the thumb slide forward, shook the tube, slapped it against his thigh. The light blinked on, cut a tunnel in the darkness.