Upon A Pale Horse (8 page)

Four hours later Jeffrey awoke, groggy and hungry. He donned his casual clothes and hefted his coat, and after a cursory glance in the mirror and a token running of a brush through his hair, he went down to the hotel restaurant and ordered a late lunch, opting for caffeinated soda rather than more booze. His head pounded like drills were boring their way through his visual cortex and into his frontal lobes, and he silently rued his decision to down the two double Scotches – a move that was unlike him, as was all his drinking in the last twenty-four hours.

But perfectly understandable, he thought, gulping a glass of water with a twist of lemon floating in it. It’s not every day your only brother vaporizes in a front-page disaster. Part of him was still tugged towards getting obliterated so he wouldn’t have to confront the grim errands awaiting him, but he wrestled that impulse back into the dark recesses of his mind from whence it had come. There was no point delaying the inevitable.

Jeffrey chewed his twenty-five dollar steak sandwich slowly, determined to wring every ounce of pleasure out of it as he mulled over his next move. As unappealing as it was, he’d need to go to his brother’s place and deal with things there. Even as he reconciled himself to doing so, he realized that he wasn’t entirely sure where it was – Keith had bought it since the last time he’d been there, taking advantage of the abrupt drop in values as the economy had nosedived.

He fished his cell out of his pocket, navigated to his address book, and punched in Becky’s number. She had the key and knew the location. Maybe she’d even have a change of heart and want to give him a hand – a long shot, and way above the call of duty, he knew. The phone rang four times before she answered, sounding out of breath.

“Becky?”

“Who is this?” she snapped.

“It’s me. Jeffrey. Keith’s brother?” he responded, wondering if he hadn’t been the only one to hit the bottle after the service.

“Oh…Jeffrey. I’m sorry. I didn’t recognize your voice…”

“Is everything all right? You sound–”

“No, Jeff, it’s not. I…somebody broke in while I was at the funeral home this morning. I’ve been burglarized. The police are here right now, taking a report…”

“Jesus. Are you okay?”

“Yeah, sure. I’m fine. It looks like they only got a few things. My laptop, the stereo…it’s not like I stored diamonds here. Still…it’s an invasion.”

“I’m sure. Good Lord, I don’t even know what to say…”

“I don’t think there is anything. Don’t take this the wrong way, but I’m kind of tied up right now…what did you need?”

“I wanted to see if I could stop by and get the key to my brother’s place, and then I realized that I have no idea where you live, or where he did,” Jeffrey admitted sheepishly.

“Oh, the key. Of course. I’ll give you my address and you can come by. I think it’s safe to say I’ll be here for the duration.”

Becky lived nine blocks north of the hotel, and Jeffrey was able to pull up a map on his phone to see the best way to get there. He debated taking a taxi but decided to walk, hopefully burning off the last of the toxic residue from his brief flirtation with alcohol poisoning. He paid the bill and used the bathroom, then pulled his coat on and exited onto the main street, striding purposefully, the sun’s rays warming him in spite of the frigid air. When he reached the building he saw a squad car parked in the red zone to one side of the doors, and hurried up the four steps to the intercom panel with Becky’s name neatly handwritten in blue ink on a glass-protected tab to the right of a black button. Twenty seconds later the door buzzed in response to his call. He pushed it open and climbed the stairs to the third floor, as instructed.

Becky was standing in the hall by the first door on the left, speaking in a hushed voice to a uniformed officer taking notes, his radio squawking intermittently as he completed a form. His face was slack, his eyes revealing nothing as they shifted to give Jeffrey the once over before returning to his pad and checking off another box. Jeffrey waited until he was done and had handed Becky a pen and the clipboard to sign before he approached.

Becky’s eyes glistened as she looked up at him and smiled wistfully. “You found the place,” she said.

“Yes. Exactly where you said it would be.” Jeffrey returned the smile.

“I guess I should have said to look for the building with the cop cars in front. Nice neighborhood we have here…”

Jeffrey stepped closer and tipped his head in the direction of her door. “How bad is it?”

“See for yourself. They’re about done. But there’s not a lot they can do, according to Officer Klutsky here and his twin. Everyone’s just going through the motions. Best they can offer is that my computer or stereo might show up on a hot sheet if the thieves try to sell them.”

Jeffrey followed her a few yards to the door. She pushed it open and motioned with an open hand for him to take a look.

The room was in shambles, drawers dumped out on the floor, papers everywhere.

“Damn. Looks like it’s been hit by a tornado.”

“Now you know how I’ll be spending my evening. The cops think it was junkies. Apparently there’ve been a host of robberies in the last week. The only thing that’s weird to them is that it looks like the lock was picked. There’s no sign of a forced entry, so they’re not sure it’s the same gang. The others were obvious break-ins where they jammed the lock or broke a window to get inside.”

Her voice cracked as she finished and her shoulders sagged, and a small part of Jeffrey’s heart broke. After all she’d been through, the timing couldn’t have been worse. Before either knew what was happening, she was in his arms, sobbing against his chest as he held her tentatively, unsure what to do next. The moment only lasted a few heartbeats and then she pulled away, wiping her tears from her face with the back of her hand. He looked at the two officers conferring by the bedroom door, giving her a chance to compose herself.

“I’m…I’m sorry, Jeff. Some days really suck, you know?”

“Yeah. I do.”

The two uniforms walked towards them, as unenthusiastic as any humans Jeffrey had ever seen, and offered a few insincere platitudes before excusing themselves and leaving, their work done. Becky’s eyes swept around the room. She sighed, went into the kitchen, and returned holding a shiny brass ring with two keys dangling from it.

“The keys to Keith’s kingdom. You’re lucky – at least they didn’t steal them. Oh, and here, I wrote down his address. It’s about fifteen to twenty minutes away, over by Logan Circle.” She checked her watch. “Unless you try it during rush hour, in which case you can double or triple that.”

“Are you going to be okay here?” he asked, eyeing the mess on the floor.

“Sure. It looks worse than it is. It’ll actually give me something to do besides sit here and cry, so maybe they did me a favor…”

“You’re taking it way better than I would.”

“What’s the alternative? If I stop to consider how much bad has happened in just the last few days, I’d probably wind up in a padded room.”

He nodded. “Then I’m going to get going. Let me know if you need anything.”

“Do you want to take your brother’s stuff? I have it in a box over there…Had. Had it in a box. Now it’s that pile over by the window.”

“Can I ask you to hold onto it for now? I don’t know what I’m walking into at his place, and I don’t want to bite off more than I can chew. Unless you want it out of here…”

“No, that’s not it at all. I’ll keep it until you get things under control. Don’t worry about it. It’s all just odds and ends, anyway. Nothing super important,” she said.

They walked back to the door and he stepped across the threshold into the hallway, then gave her another hug, realizing as he did so just how little he knew her or about his brother’s life. Time had a way of racing by, especially if you were busy, but that seemed like a facile, inadequate excuse now that Keith was gone forever. He made his way back down the stairs and set out for the larger street two blocks away, where with any luck he could find a taxi.

The man tailing him moved from between two buildings on the far corner and settled in a comfortable distance behind Jeffrey, who was oblivious to his shadow, his head spinning from the events of the day as he hurried to get a cab before traffic came to a standstill.

EIGHT

Legacy

“What do you mean, you lost him?” Thorn growled, his voice slightly distorted by the cell phone signal.

“He rounded the corner, and by the time I caught up he was gone. The car was paralleling him up a block, but couldn’t swing around in time.”

“Do you think he spotted you?”

“No. The guy’s a boy scout. I think it was just unlucky timing. Besides, based on what we heard at the girl’s apartment, he’s headed for his brother’s condo, so we can pick up the surveillance there. We’ve got it wired; we’ll know if he so much as farts. I just wish we could get the tracking going on his cell – this is doing it the hard way.”

Three seconds of silence went by, the emptiness on the line hanging heavily in the air.

“I’m working on it. Should be any minute. In the meantime, get over to the condo. And no more screw-ups. Do I make myself clear?”

“Perfectly. And if I can make a suggestion, until we have his phone live, let’s get a three-man team on him. Obviously two aren’t enough.”

“Whatever you need. I’ll make the call.”

The field operative switched the line off, slipped the cell back into his pocket, and glared at his partner, sitting to his left behind the wheel of the sedan they’d been assigned, stopped at a red light.

“Get over to the condo. We know he’s going there.”

“Crap. Traffic’s going to be a bitch headed that direction.”

“Tell me something I don’t already know. The big guy wasn’t happy, by the way.”

“No, I don’t expect he was. But as you pointed out, it’s not a catastrophe. We’ll pick him up on that end.”

“Besides which, we’re probably wasting our time. You heard him. He doesn’t sound like he knows anything.”

“Agreed. But that’s why we get paid the big bucks.”

“Remind me again when that starts?”

“Soon. Really soon.”

“Tell me the one about the three bears next.”

The light turned green and the car in front of them surged forward, the German import’s powerful engine catapulting it down the street like a heat-seeking missile. The driver stepped on the gas and their Dodge sedan lunged after it before the driver eased up with a grin.

“Wish they’d give us one of those high-roller-mobiles every now and then. Big Benz. Zero to sixty in, what, five something? This thing’s lucky to get out of its own way with a tailwind.”

The passenger murmured assent and reached over to stab the radio on, then settled back into his seat for another shift of waiting for the brother to do something besides go for walks and sleep.

“That’s it, over there. Pull into that space. I’ll only be a couple of minutes,” Jeffrey said, pointing to the glowing red sign over the display window, nothing but Chinese characters advertising the shop on a blue fabric awning that provided shade from the afternoon glare.

“It’s your money. But I gotta run the meter. You sure about this?” the taxi driver grumbled.