The Blade Itself (9 page)

She nodded, her eyes narrowing a little bit.

‘In fact, there’s only one thing I’d rather see him do.’ He paused. ‘You know what?’

Karen shook her head.

‘Not come back.’ He watched his words sink in. ‘He’s happy, Karen. Happier than I’ve ever seen him. Maybe he misses the life now and then, for a second. But he belongs in the one you guys have. And he knows it.’

She’d smiled then, not the kind you flash on request, but the kind that boils up from somewhere deep inside. The kind you can’t turn off. ‘Thanks.’ She’d given him a hug, and he’d taken it.

The whole time knowing what Danny was actually keeping from her. Knowing how much worse the truth was than her fears. And right then, he’d made up his mind.

He finished with the other side of the blade and tested the edge against his thumbnail. It took the barest pressure to cut a mark. He folded it, and slid it into his boot, then
grabbed his sunglasses and walked out of what used to be the manager’s office, where he’d set up his bedroom.

The service station had sat abandoned for three years before Danny gave him the idea. After all, what better place to park a tow truck? He could even store merchandise here if he had to. Not that he kept anything very long – you had to be pretty dumb to park the evidence in your front yard – but it never hurt to have cover available.

Besides, against all logic, women loved it. After he’d hosed the oil stains away, painted up the rooms and scrubbed out the shower, even your upscale types saw it as artistic. God bless the yuppies and their lofts.

His babies sat parked in the garage. He briefly considered the truck, then dismissed it. Good cover, but not enough style. Better to roar up on a bike. He traced one palm along the Triumph he’d rebuilt with his own hands, 750 cubic centimeters of gleaming engine and custom chrome fixed to the same body Marlon Brando rode in
The Wild One
. No point being bad if you didn’t look good. He unlocked the roll door that fronted the garage and hauled it clattering upward.

He paused to kiss his fingers and tap the medallion hanging on his workbench. Danny’s mother had given it to him, a zillion years earlier. Saint Christopher, half hunched, with a lumpy-looking baby Christ on his back. Patron saint of travelers, and a dude who helped his friends.

On one level, it bothered him to break his promise, but he didn’t see much choice. Things were all messed up. Danny should have remembered that the only way to back down a guy like Evan was to take a stand yourself. That’s the way it worked. Strength respected only strength. But Patrick could understand his position, see how he’d forgotten such a basic rule. The guy was a civilian now, and he had Karen to think about.

But that’s what friends were for. The way he figured it, his oldest friend would be happier if Patrick took care of business.

So he would. Just like Saint Chris.

He straddled the bike, the leather soft between his thighs. The engine roared with power at the first turn of the key. He cracked his knuckles, put on his shades, and rocked off the stand. Leaving the helmet behind, he rolled out of the shop and turned south.

Evan was out there. Somewhere.

Working on his car, the radio tuned to classic rock, a rag in his back pocket. Straining and sweating at his old weight bench. Or maybe sitting across the street with a pistol in his lap.

It meant that getting up and going to work was out of the question. Danny needed time to think. Besides, he didn’t want to look Richard in the eye, not yet. So he’d called in, said he needed a day to take care of some personal business.

Then he sat and had a cup of coffee with his dead father.

It happened as he counted his options. The way he saw it, he had only four. He could refuse to help and risk Evan coming at him, tearing his life apart. He could bolt, leave his home and his job and the city he’d spent his whole life in. He could give Evan up to the cops, a violation of everything he’d grown up believing. Or he could help Evan and risk his relationship, his self-respect, even his freedom.

Dad appeared as he counted the last option, square jaw set in a disapproving grimace.

‘I know,’ Danny said. ‘I know. I’m just thinking, okay?’

After the accident, Dad had started coming pretty regularly. Danny would wake up in Cook County Prison to find him perched on the edge of the bunk. Or riding shotgun as he went to meet Evan for a job. He’d stopped coming about the time Danny went straight, seven years back. But now, poof, there he was again, one arm propped on the back of the chair, his left hand tapping the table, the white ridge of the old circular-saw scar flexing. Danny rarely
imagined him talking, but just like in life, his eyes spoke volumes.

‘You know what I need, Pops?’ Danny said. ‘A joker.’

The trick to problem solving, he’d found, was to look at it like a deck of cards. At a glance, an implacable rectangle. But fan them out, start looking at the options, and you could usually find a way. Best of all was the wild card, the one that didn’t figure into normal play. The joker was the solution people didn’t think of, the one that gave you an edge.

Only problem was, no matter how much he shuffled and redealt, he kept coming up with nothing but minor variations of the same four tired options. He couldn’t see a way that didn’t risk everything he cared about. A way that didn’t let his past poison his future.

His father stopped tapping, tilted his hand back to check his fingernails, his silence judgmental.

Danny glared. ‘Ahh, what do you know? You’re dead.’

He put his father out of his head and went back to shuffling. He was still at the table two hours later, when Karen wandered in. She wore a white baby-doll tee and panties, rubbed sleep from her eyes with one hand. ‘You feeling okay?’ she asked.

He nodded, told her he wanted to get a few things done around the house. She poured coffee and slid into a chair, her fingers cupped around the mug for warmth. ‘Nice,’ she yawned, ‘seeing Patrick the other night.’

‘Huh? Oh, yeah.’

She sipped her coffee, gave a loud sigh of pleasure. ‘Hey, what were you guys laughing about?’

‘Just that – well, Patrick thinks it’s funny the way you try to set him up. He thinks you’re trying to save him.’

She smiled. ‘I guess I am.’

‘He’s okay, Kar. He’s happy.’

‘I know. I realize I can be kind of a bitch about him.
Stupid of me, but I sometimes hold it against him that he’s still – you know. I don’t care how he makes his money, it’s just…’

‘I know, babe.’

‘Anyway, I was thinking about it last night, and I decided that was dumb. He’s your friend, and that’s that. I mean, I know you aren’t going back.’

He kept his gaze level while heart and head warred. He wanted to tell her about Evan, about everything, just spill it. Take comfort in her arms, and talk it over together. Maybe she’d help him find his joker.

Or maybe she’d decide it was time to fold the hand. She’d made only one ultimatum in their whole relationship – if he took up the life again, she was gone for good.

‘So,’ she continued, ‘I’m going to try to be adult, and not hold it against Patrick.’

He felt dirty but kept his tone light. ‘I think he’d be happy if you’d just stop trying to set him up.’

‘Okay. Though he really should meet Jenny.’

Despite everything – despite himself – he laughed.

She stood, walked to his side of the table, and slid onto his lap, one arm around his shoulders. Her face still bore faint red marks from the pillow, and the coffee barely covered her morning breath, but even so, she glowed. ‘I love you, babe.’

His heart swelled in a way that made it hard to speak, and he kissed her instead, held her to him, soft and warm. When she climbed off his lap and padded away, he watched her go, her bare feet dirty, a faint sway to her hips.

He waited until he heard the shower, then went to the phone on the counter and dialed. Some decks didn’t have a joker.

‘Could I please speak to Sean Nolan?’

*

The diner was a storefront on West Belmont, tucked in among auto repair shops and warehouses. Across the street three flats bore upscale real estate logos in anticipation of the day when Wicker Park and Lakeview were finally and irrefutably full, though now there were more signs than tenants. Inside, fluorescent lights shone brightly off the fake wood paneling and cash register. A bald cook, not fat but Chicago-big, worked the grill.

Nolan sat halfway down the chipped counter, peering suspiciously at a laminated menu and twisting his wedding ring. He wore his brown suit too well to have a bulletproof vest beneath.

‘Hello, Sean.’

‘Danny.’ The greeting was neutral, offering no clues. His eyes were watery and marked with crow’s feet, but he looked good.

‘Long time.’

‘Ten years? Since you picked Marty Frisk up outta holding for that D-and-D.’

Danny shook his head. ‘I saw you a couple of years ago, when you were still a regular cop.’

‘Yeah?’

‘You didn’t see me. You were coming out of a 7-Eleven in the Loop.’

‘Why didn’t you say hello?’

Because he was too freshly clean. Because his new life hadn’t taken hold. Because he was afraid Sean’s gaze would cut him to ribbons, would confirm he was just a thief with an upscale address.

‘I hollered. You must not’ve heard.’

The cop grunted. Danny slid onto the Naugahyde stool, turned his coffee cup upward to signal the cook. The smell of bacon sizzling on the grill tightened his stomach.

Was he crazy, sitting down with Nolan –
Detective
Nolan –
to solve a problem? All his street responses told him yes.

On the other hand, look where his street responses had gotten him.

The cook came over, coffeepot in one hand, spatula in the other. Danny asked for a BLT. Nolan ordered egg whites, skim milk, and wheat toast.

‘I heard you got married.’

‘Yeah,’ Nolan said. ‘Two kids, a boy and a girl.’

‘Still in the neighborhood?’

‘My folks moved to Beverly ten years ago, and Mary-Louise and I followed when we had Tracy. It’s nice. No gangs, everybody shows up to cheer the St Patty’s parade. Sundays I smoke a cigar and water my lawn. You want to see pictures, or you going to tell me why I’m sitting here?’

Danny sipped his coffee. It tasted sharp. ‘You know I left the neighborhood, too.’

‘So I hear.’

‘I work in construction, as a project manager. I’ve got a place in Lakeview, second floor in a graystone. Nothing fancy, but it’s mine, you know?’

Nolan nodded slightly, betraying nothing.

‘It’s nice to have made a place for myself. Something…’ He hesitated, old habits making him nervous admitting anything. ‘Legitimate.’

The cook set their order in front of them on white plastic plates, then snapped the grease off the spatula, set it down, and walked to the end of the counter. Nolan forked egg onto his toast, took a bite. His cool refusal to get involved irked Danny.

‘I thought cops liked doughnuts.’ Trying to engage the guy, not piss him off, his tone playful.

‘I thought criminals stayed criminals.’

Danny laughed. ‘I guess we’re both wrong.’

Nolan gave him a slow, appraising look. ‘Maybe.’

The coffee may not have been much to brag about, but the BLT was delicious. Danny took another bite before he spoke. ‘Funny thing. When I started working construction, you know what I realized? Being a thief actually helped me out.’

‘How’s that?’

‘Little ways. Knowing how to bargain, negotiate. Being able to plan. Mostly, though, to be good at either, you had to know when to take risks.’

‘That’s what you’re doing here? Taking a risk?’

Danny nodded.

‘Because I’m the police.’ Pronouncing it ‘
poh
-lease.’

‘Yeah.’

‘So you’re not clean.’

‘Oh, I’m hundred-proof. Go to work, pay my taxes. I’m a civilian.’

Nolan shrugged. ‘So why buy me breakfast? Just to tell me that?’

Danny’s stomach felt sour. ‘I’ve got a problem.’

The other man took another forkful of eggs, content to wait him out.

You came to dance, kid
. ‘Someone is harassing me. Following me around. My girlfriend, Karen, I think he’s watching her, too. Friday, he broke into our apartment.’

That got the detective’s attention. ‘He steal anything?’

‘No. He was waiting for me.’

Nolan’s eyes narrowed. ‘Waiting to do what?’

‘To talk. To threaten us.’

‘So this is somebody you know.’

Danny nodded.

‘You file a report?’

‘It’s not that simple.’

‘Why?’

‘Because…’ Danny took another swallow of bitter coffee. ‘You know how much response an ex-felon gets when he yells for help?’

‘Why do you think you’ll get more here?’

It was a question Danny had been afraid to consider too closely. Nolan was three, four years older, and while they’d had mutual friends – no way to avoid it, growing up Irish in a South Side neighborhood that belonged to them less every day – they’d never been close. But even when Nolan had gone off to the academy, and the rest of his friends had started to speak of him with contempt, Danny had remained respectful. No point pissing the guy off, he’d thought then. No point attracting his attention.

It was a thin rationale to pin his hopes on, and he knew it. But it was Nolan or nobody. What was he going to do, call 911? He didn’t have anything to tell them, not really, and he knew police procedure well enough to know he didn’t want the attention. Karen knew about his past, sure, and Patrick, but as far as the rest of the world was concerned, Danny had always been in construction. He’d lied to get his first shot as a yard hand – plenty of people did, mostly Latins without papers – but he’d risen to a point where that kind of attention could hurt. How would Richard react to find he’d trusted the management of his business to a man with two felony counts?

And that was assuming things went
well
. He could suffer much worse than damage to his reputation. If Evan dimed him out on the pawnshop, he’d face charges. Lose his job, his freedom, maybe even Karen. Set himself back seven years – more, when you counted however long he spent in jail.