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TIM WOHLFORTH has had twenty-five short stories accepted for publication in the recent period. His stories have appeared in Futures, Detective Mystery Magazine, Orchard Press, Hand Held Crime, Plots With Guns, Mysterical-e, Without A Clue, Hardluck Stories, and StoryOne. His writings also appear in six anthologies, including Fedora (2001) and Hardbroiled (March 2003.) Another short story will be part of a CD-ROM issued by Mysterical-e. He co-authored the non-fiction book, On The Edge: Political Cults Right and Left, published by M. E. Sharpe (2000). Wohlforth participated in a panel on short mysteries, chaired by Ed Hoch, at Bouchercon. He moderated the short story panel at Left Coast Crime (LCC) in Portland and was on the flash fiction panel at LCC in Pasadena. He is the author of three novels. Dark Savior is a thriller that takes the reader into the underground world of environmental terrorism. Dynamite is based on the 1886 Haymarket Tragedy. No Time To Mourn is a contemporary California noir PI story set on Jack London Square at Oakland's waterfront.
1
"She's back there," Lori gestured with her head toward a shape bent over a drink at the end of the bar. Hardly human. More like a bundle of black clothes someone had left on the barstool.
As my eyes adjusted to the dim light of Big Emma's, the bundle morphed into the semblance of a woman. Around fifty with high cheekbones and a touch of wrinkle around eyes with dense pupils. Her black suit exuded quality, Nieman-Marcus or Saks. Full red lips that matched bright dyed hair provided the only color. It was as if an artist had begun to colorize her just before she walked out of a frame in a 40's noir movie.
A slight stiffening in her posture suggested she sensed she was being watched. She didn't look up. Just kept staring into her glass.
"See the way she clutches that drink?" I said. "You didn't tell me she's a lush."
Lori looked up from polishing the mahogany surface of the bar, "Didn't used to be. Her name's Susan Henry. Came in here like clockwork every Friday for lunch with her husband, Edward. He'd order a martini. All she ever drank was a Virgin Mary. Then, someone shot Edward. He died in her arms."
"The black clothes. She's still in mourning."
"I can't break her out of it."
Lori returned to her polishing, platinum blond ponytail bobbing up and down. She wore a white turtleneck sweater and a black skirt. A black velvet ribbon held her hair high up on her head. She was my former lover. Now my best friend. She runs Big Emma's, the Victorian bar on Jack London Square in Oakland. Serves as my office.
"So what can I do? I'm pretty good but I don't bring back the dead. And I'm lousy at consoling. Become tongue-tied. That's your department."
"Keep her alive. She says the same killer is after her now."
Just what I didn't need, Lori dropping a murder case in my lap.
"You know me," I stumbled ahead. "A bit of insurance fraud here. A skip trace there. Murder's for cops."
"She's already seen the cops. They won't help her. She needs you, Jim."
Lori looked up into my eyes, doing that fluttering thing with her eyelashes.
"I'll talk to her, but I'm not promising anything."
"Thanks, Wolf. You'll see."
What I could see was I was going to have a hell of a time talking my way out of this case. I grabbed my drink, Oban's single malt neat, and headed down the bar feeling like a killer on death row who knew the DNA would match. The place was half full. Largely regulars. Two Port of Oakland engineers nodded as I sauntered by. Soon the after-work crowd would pour in.
The interior of Big Emma's was dimly lit by ornate brass lighting fixtures with golden candle-shaped bulbs. A wide mirror in a carved oak frame covered the wall. Dice cups, some with players' names engraved on gold plaques, were stacked on a shelf in front of it. A large brass antique National cash register with monstrous keys stood in the middle. A tantalizing whiff of garlic and cheese floated through the air from the kitchen where cannelloni was being prepared.
I wasn't expecting to hear the truth from Susan. They never tell all. Human nature. Then you've got to use their money to find out the full truth. Part of the game all clients play. Worse. The deeper the trouble clients are in, the more they hold back. I get paid by the hour so I shouldn't complain. Their decision, their bucks. But, sometimes they pay for their reticence with their lives.
Susan didn't look up as I slid onto the stool next to her. Just kept staring into her glass.
"You are?" she asked, as she finally focused on me. At least her glass didn't have to bear the full weight of her intense glare anymore.
"Wolf. Jim Wolf."
"Oh, Lori sent you. It is a pleasure to meet you."
She held out her quivering hand. I grabbed it and received a limp shake. She withdrew her hand from mine immediately. She smelled of lavender and whiskey.
"Lori tells me that someone is trying to kill you."
Susan looked up at me, eyes wide open, as fear broke through her alcoholic fog. "I call him Red."
"Why?"
"He has a red face and drives a red car."
"He's the one who killed your husband?"
"Now he's following me." She shivered. "Bet he's outside right now."
"Just a minute."
I was not about to take Susan at her word. Too much booze leads so often to paranoia. So I figured I better check out her story. I swung off of my stool, and made my way out the door.
I heard the dolorous braying of the foghorn off the estuary. The only light was the shimmering orange glow of Big Emma's behind me. A thick fog had swallowed up Jack London Square. I felt a cloud of white pressing in on my face like a feather pillow. Beads of moisture dripped down my forehead. My damp flannel shirt and jeans clung to my body. I turned up the collar on my sports jacket.
I stopped and looked around. I saw no one. Once again the bleating of the distant foghorn. I trudged on. Big Emma's orange glow dimmed. Then disappeared entirely. I started to check out parked cars. I didn't notice the red Saab until I was almost on top of it. I stopped, backed up a few steps, and strained to make out the license number in the fog. Then I walked casually past the car.
A man sat in the driver's seat, reading the Chronicle under a dome light. What I could see of his face had a ruddy appearance. He glanced up, eyes glowering through layers of fat, like he was trying to kill me with his glare. Then his lips turned slightly upward at the corners. I looked away but too late. He damned well saw me checking him out.
Nothing I could do about it. I hurried down the street and tried to lose myself in the fog.
I went to the end of the block, crossed over, and headed back to Big Emma's. I couldn't see the cars on the opposite side. A car's engine started. The roar of its motor grew louder. Red must have made a U-turn in the middle of the street.
I tried to penetrate the fog. Nothing. Then the glare of headlights pierced the haze. The car bore down upon me. I reached the door of Big Emma's and pulled it open. I hesitated and turned to see which direction Red would go.
Straight at me was his answer. He gunned his engine. The car bashed its way onto the sidewalk. Damn it. The bastard wasn't going to stop. So close that when a puff of fog cleared I could see his face through the windshield. A smirk. The guy was drooling.
2
I stood frozen in the Saab's headlights for a moment, like a raccoon caught in a tree by a powerful flashlight beam. He couldn't miss me. But I didn't move. Couldn't move. What a stupid way to die. Run over by a fat man who didn't like to be stared at.
I threw myself back into the bar. The car swerved, tires screeched, and the Saab banged back down into the street. Red barreled off toward the warehouse district just past the bar.
I lay on the floor of Big Emma's. A startled crowd of regulars gathered around me. Red tried to kill me. Just didn't want to smash into the front of Big Emma's. I'd be dead if I had been standing just a few feet further out from the door. I remembered that smile on Red's face when he spotted me - he was entertaining himself. Nothing like running into somebody who liked his work.
Shit. Just what I didn't need, a killer with a hard-on about me. Funny how Lori roped me into things. I'll just talk with Susan, I had told her. Now I was already in over my head. I could identify Red. He knew that. This guy was no amateur. He'd have no difficulty finding out my name and where I lived. I could do it in five minutes if I were in his shoes. I couldn't let this bastard stalk and kill Susan. Then stalk and kill me. I was stuck. A case I couldn't avoid.
"Jim. You okay?"
It was Lori. She broke through the crowd. Cold fog swirled into the open door.
"Just shook up."
"What happened?"
"Your friend Susan's shadow just tried to run me down."
"Sorry for getting you involved."
"Sorry doesn't cover it."
I got up off the floor, brushed myself off. Lori closed the front door. I resumed my perch at the bar. Susan hadn't noticed the commotion by the door. She didn't even look up at me. I took out the small notepad I always carry with me and wrote down the Saab's license number.
"He was out there but now he's gone," I said to Susan. No sense frightening her more than she already was by telling her about almost getting run down.
"He'll be back."
She seemed startled by her own voice. Her body became rigid. I reached for her hand. She jerked away. I grabbed her icy delicate fingers and got off the barstool. I helped her stand and led her across the room to a quiet booth.
An oil painting of Big Emma hung over us. An enormous, corpulent nude, waves of breast and belly undulating down her body, stretched out on a red velvet settee. Delicate gold leaf legs somehow supported Big Emma's weight. Curly black hair flowed down the nude's back. I loved the expression on her face, defiantly proud of the massive mound of her body. Big Emma was a monument to the joy of human excess from a period when life was short and knowledge of what made it so beneficently absent. So full of vitality. Susan, on the other hand, was preoccupied with death.
"Why are you so certain he's trying to kill you?" I asked.
God knows the bastard was certainly capable of killing.
"Because he tried to kill me before. Edward saved my life by placing his body between me and the bullet."
"You sure Edward was not the intended victim of that shooting?"
"Absolutely sure. But the cops think the gunman was after Edward. They think I hired him. Why would I want to kill him? I had both Edward and money. Now I just have money. Look at me."
She had a point.
"Why didn't Red shoot you after killing your husband?"
"The police asked me that. This car stopped in the street just then. Red shot at it. I ran away. Then the cops showed up."
"Let's just say for the moment Edward was the target. Who would have benefited from his death?"
"Me."
"Suppose Red was to succeed in killing you both. Who would benefit?"
"The children."
"What children?"
"Edward's. Edith and Edward, Junior."
We were getting some place. Real suspects.
"So both Edith and Edward, Junior might have reason to hire Red."
"Never thought of that."
The bar was filling up. I wasn't sure where they all came from on such a night. Comfort in numbers. I could hear rattling, followed by a loud banging against the bar-top, and then shouts, from an exuberant group playing liars' dice. I leaned toward Susan to hear her better. Startled, she moved back in her seat.
"This man, Red, how long has he been following you?"
"A couple of nights ago, when I got home - I admit I was kind of drunk - there was this red car parked across from the house. Big man sitting in it, reading a paper."
"Red?"
"Think so," she said. Her face became rigid and her eyes opened wide. She was reliving the scene in her mind. "I didn't see him that clearly when he shot Edward. I... I was in shock. Like a dream. I started thinking back. On other nights along my street, I'd seen that car several times before with the same guy sitting in it. That's when I went to police headquarters."
"And they did nothing?" Oakland's Finest were pretty busy and could be negligent, but this sounded a bit strange.
"They asked me if I was willing to testify in court that this guy was the one who shot Edward. I couldn't. The main cop, a guy called Ollie...."
"I know him."
That's Richard Oliphant and a real bastard he was. He's got it in for me. Hated private eyes, especially the few like me who have never been cops. He was the guy who almost got my license yanked over a homicide investigation. Just my luck that he'd be involved in the Edward Henry case. His partner, Nina Peterson, was different. A doll. One of my best friends.
"He just shrugged his shoulders and said they couldn't do anything for me. I thought they could watch the place and prevent him from killing me."
"You thought wrong."
Cops are reactive not proactive. They saved stakeouts for high-profile drug stings. They claimed it was a matter of manpower. I believed it flowed from an attitude. You're not a homicide case until you're dead. Hell of a way to get their attention.
Might as well get paid for my trouble. And trouble I knew it would be.
"It'll cost you a $1,000 retainer. I'll bill you $90 an hour plus expenses. I account for all time and give receipts on all expenses."
She opened her black Gucci purse and pulled out a roll of bills. All hundreds. She peeled off the top ten and handed them to me. She had more money in that purse than I earn in a good month.
"Always carry that kind of cash?"
"I don't like to feel that I have nothing. I have spent too many years with only change in my pocket."
I said nothing for a few minutes, mulling over what she had told me. All kinds of people committed murder. Still, I couldn't agree with the cops. Didn't picture this sad, screwed-up widow as a killer.
"Don't think Red," she said, "has anything to do with Junior or Edith."
"Why?"
"The way he looked at me when he tried to shoot me and killed Edward instead."
"Why?"
"Why what?"
"If he isn't after you on behalf of Edith and Junior, what is his motivation? Do you come from money?"
"I come from a modest home in Chicago. My maiden name is Kranowsky. The people in my old neighborhood spoke Polish, ate kielbasi and perogis, and belonged to the same local parish. I attended parochial school on a scholarship. I went to the University of Illinois the same way and had to work for my room and board. I taught school in Chicago, then came out here fifteen years ago. I met Henry when I took my students on a tour of his printing plant."
"Red's a professional. He kills for big bucks. Whoever is footing his bill has a damned good reason to have you killed. If it's not the kids, it certainly has nothing to do with perogis. There must be something else."
"I got this photo. My mother, Sara, recently passed away. It was among her things. It shows her standing in front of an adobe building. Somewhere out West. There's a man next to her. It's not my father."
"Could be some old boyfriend, from before she met your father."
"Maybe, but, I feel I knew him. Yet, I don't remember anything about him. Not even his name. He frightens me."
"How about the place? Had you ever been in the West prior to coming to live here in the Bay Area?"
"I'm not sure. There's some world at the edge of my memory. Dust. Heat. Palm trees. Like it's trying to break through. Tell me something. Something important." She shuddered, looked down at her empty glass, and then turned back to me. "Perhaps it's nothing."
"Perhaps it's something. I need to see that picture. I'll be coming up to your place tonight to watch for Red. I'll pick it up then."
She reached for her empty glass. I waved to Lori.
"What do you want?"
"Old Fashioned."
Figured.
3
The drink came and Susan took a gulp, like she'd been without water in the Mohave for a month. I wrote her address and phone number in my notepad and told her I'd be in touch. She fell silent. I sat taking in her bent black image, like a sketch artist preparing to draw. Double mourning. For her recently departed husband. For her impending death. There was nothing I could do about the first death. But maybe I could prevent the second one. I knew I had to try.
I rose from the booth with the remnants of my whiskey, pushed my way through the crowd, and found an empty stool at the bar. A group of longshoremen, all wearing matching jackets with "ILWU" on the back, plowed by carrying on a loud discussion about union politics. A tall black lawyer with city hall connections, who I vaguely knew, slapped me on the back as he moved to his accustomed stool in the rear to join his liar's dice buddies.
Normally at this hour the place began to thin out as customers made their way home for supper and telly with the spouse and kiddies. They seemed to have made a collective decision to hang out as long as possible in the hopes that the dense fog would clear.
Lori's brother Joe turned up to handle second shift. She would now have some time for me. Lori's family, the Mazzettis, have owned the joint for three generations. She, Joe and her mother, Angela, ran the place. Her father, Tony, passed away a few years back.
Lori and I considered ourselves lucky to have saved our friendship after the breakup of our relationship. We have remained closer than most married couples. What did we have in common? Nothing really and that's what made our non-relationship work. She was my connection with other humans. What did I offer in return? I was her private crusade. She was determined to transform me into a social being.
I spent my spare time reading, fiction, non-fiction, newspapers, magazines. I listened to classical music. Mostly baroque and early music. Lori? She talked. When she wasn't in Big Emma's gabbing with customers, she was at home on the phone. Music? Country. Books? Are you kidding?
Lori collected people while I investigated them. I was a voyeur. I listened in on private conversations in restaurants. I was the guy in the corner of a packed living room, back to the wall, sipping my single malt with a sardonic smile on my face, taking in the scene. I didn't run with the pack.
My attitude came in part from being adopted. I felt like I was parachuted into my family. Part of the gang though somehow always apart. Surrounded by people yet alone. Not that I'm complaining. I didn't just pop out. I got picked out. Kind of like shopping at Wal-Mart. The chosen one.
Lori spotted me and made her way toward me. As she approached, she worked the crowd at the bar like a politician, patting a hand here and bussing a cheek there.
"You're really in trouble now, Wolf," Lori said. "Damn it. Be careful. I feel responsible for all this."
"You didn't kill Susan's husband. And you were right. Somebody has to protect that lady."
I gave Lori a run down on what Susan had told me.
"So what're you going to do?" she asked.
"Chase down the license plate number on the Saab. I'll also stake Susan out. Even if the license plate doesn't lead anywhere, the red Saab will return. Then I'll follow the guy."
"After that?"
"That's the problem. I've got to work the case from two angles."
"What do you mean?"
"I need to go after Red and hope he will lead me to his boss. But I can't assume that, even if I find him, I will be able to connect him to his employer. Professionals know how to keep secrets. The real killer is the person who has hired him. We jail Red and his boss hires a substitute. Therefore, I need to follow a second track of investigation. Find the employer. I'll investigate the son and daughter. Get that photo from Susan. Check it out."
"If you need late night help, let me know."
Lori sometimes covered a surveillance for me in the middle of the night. I was a day person and began to fade after 1 A.M.
That's when Lori clicked in. Probably one more reason why we never worked out a pattern of living together.
"I'll need your help tonight. No way am I going to leave her unwatched."
"Awesome."
A plate of cannelloni I had ordered arrived along with fried zucchini, and fresh Italian bread. I started nibbling on the food. Lori smiled warmly and looked over the crowd at the bar. She waved to the black lawyer in the rear and winked at one of the longshoremen. Then she turned to me.
"Tonight reminds me of the night after that firestorm in the hills a few years back. Everybody poured in here then as well. And wouldn't leave. Even people whose homes weren't touched. Like we needed to be with each other. It's a jungle out there."
Lori waved a long red nail at the door of the bar. As if on cue, it opened to admit two customers, neighborhood cops, and buckets of swirling fog. Jungle? More like the Okefenokee swamp. She wore her serious look, slight frown, corners of her mouth almost forming a pout.
"You above all know that world outside my door," she continued. "My customers are the walking wounded. They've been out there foraging. Predators hunt them down. A few get eaten up. The rest stagger in here to regroup. We help each other out, listen to stories, and drink a bit. Then, they venture back out into the jungle. Me, I stay here and wait for the hunters and gatherers to return."
Lori was onto something. Somewhere outside that door, hidden in the fog, lurked a predator far more dangerous than the lions and tigers that used to chew on our ancestors. This predator knew how to use a gun.
"Mind if I have a bite?" Lori asked.
I had eaten only half my cannelloni and hadn't touched the zucchini or bread. I smiled and pushed the plate toward her. Without waiting for my reply she started shoving down the cannelloni as if she hadn't eaten in a week.
"Thanks, I'm ravenous," she said when she came up for air. "I can't get enough of Mama's cooking."
She gave me a slightly guilty glance, like a child that had just gobbled down her family's last piece of pecan pie. Then she took the bread and started soaking up the last remnants of the rich cream sauce.
I raised myself from the barstool and leaned toward her. I could see her mini-skirt and shapely long legs that ended up in black shoes with spiked heels. She lifted her head from the plate, turned a cheek, and received her obligatory peck.
"Gotta' head home," I said. "Keep an eye on Susan and phone me right after you call her a cab. I want her watched from now on until I find the guy in the red Saab. I'll need you up there later."
"Fabulous."
Susan raised her head from the table as I swung off my stool and walked toward the door. She looked at me, a sad, doomed expression in her eyes. Then she tried to raise one hand. Was she gesturing for me to stop? She muttered something that sounded like "holster." She was really out of it.
I turned up the collar of my sports coat, secured the top button, and involuntarily shivered in anticipation of what I faced on the other side of the door. I stepped out of the bar and into Jack London Square. I felt like I had walked right into the middle of a cotton candy machine, damp fog sticking to me, blinding me, binding me.
4
The street was deserted. I crept past Yoshi's restaurant and jazz club. Plate glass windows took up most of a block, exposing customers to perusal by passersby. Couples sat on the floor next to low tables, nibbling on sushi. Slim Asian women with short black hair and red and black kimonos scurried around serving them. McCoy Tyner was playing. A small line of devotees had defied the weather and waited to enter for the eight o'clock set.
I crossed the street. A tantalizing whiff of popcorn drifted over me. I had smelled the Multiplex before I saw it. I heard the hum of voices and began to make out a scraggly line of restless bodies. The glow of the marquee lights fought back against the fog illuminating eager faces. A ticket line of young people - baggy pants, backward turned caps, Nikes, Gortex sweats - went halfway around the block. Next came Scott's seafood restaurant. A valet parking attendant held open the door of a Mercedes for a stout woman with blue-white hair, wearing a pink, sequined gown. She held up an umbrella. A lot of good it would do her.
Pockets of light, noise, and crowds disappeared. I stopped by a railing for a moment, engulfed in darkness and fog. I could hear the lapping of the water against the hulls of a hundred private yachts, while halyards slapped the aluminum masts. The more I stared into the fog the less I could see. A strange hue, almost yellow, unnatural.
I sensed Red out there. Watching. Waiting. Damn it, I was more pissed than frightened. To the extent that there was a place for me in this crazy world - and I had some big doubts on that subject - it was here in Oakland, at the bottom of Broadway, on the edge of the estuary across from the island of Alameda. I was not about to be hounded out of my turf.
* * *
I stepped onto the deck of Sea Wolf, the thirty-seven foot sloop I called home. I unlocked the hatch, slid it back, removed the two boards that sealed the opening, and descended the stairs through the companionway. A bell rang. I grabbed the phone, tucked away in my nav. That's a small built-in table with drawers where the captain - me - works on his charts and tide tables when sailing. I heard breathing and then a click. Wrong number. Or was it?
I thought again about Red. He could be stalking me now. He knew where I lived and probably what I looked like. He tried to kill me once with his car. Next time it would be with a bullet.
I climbed back up the companionway stairs, pushed open the hatch cover, and looked around. In the distance I could hear the relentless bleating of the foghorn off the estuary. Every ninety seconds. My head pounded in synchronization. It was as if the estuary mourned for Susan. The fog contributed a damp shroud to cover her almost cold body. But she was not dead. It was my job to stop Red, to save Susan. Maybe even encourage her to get rid of that hideous black outfit. Swear off the juice. Come alive again. Too soon to mourn. I saw nothing, but I could only see a few feetin any direction.
I climbed back down into the cabin and checked on Monty, my pet python. I kept her in a glass reptile tank that took up about half of the quarterberth - that's the bed in the aft of the boat. Two beady eyes greeted me. Her tongue flicked out. About as warm a greeting as Monty can offer.
I was not really the pet type. Don't like something furry rubbing against my leg and purring. Or slobbering all over me, licking my face and covering me with smelly saliva. Monty, to her credit, did neither. We respected each other's space.
I didn't actually choose Monty as a pet. I got stuck with her. It was all Sheila's fault, one of Lori's volunteers to be my perfect mate. She left her with me. Told me Monty was a male. It's kind of hard to tell about gender with snakes. When Monty got sick one day - visualize a very limp rope - I found out from the vet that she was actually a female Burmese python.
Sheila worked as a belly dancer at the Greek place, Never On Sunday, down on Broadway. Also gave lessons. I must say she had a most remarkable belly. Fabulous muscles. I had moved into her loft in a warehouse area a couple of blocks up the street from Big Emma's.
One day I went to the Greek joint to watch Sheila. This nerdy guy with thick glasses and a gray flannel suit kept stuffing hundred dollar bills into Sheila's crotch. Got to admit it, I was jealous. Sheila explained between sets that this was an old Egyptian custom. I didn't feel any better. Sheila was Jewish and from Brooklyn. The guy wasn't Egyptian either, not even Greek. He was a WASP from Seattle. Worked for Microsoft.
The combination of Microsoft and hundred dollar bills in the crotch was too much for Sheila to resist. She took off for Seattle with him. Said she'd come back for Monty as soon as they got settled. That was three years ago. I recently heard she's pregnant with her second kid.
The vet had told me Monty would eventually grow to twenty or thirty feet and could be as thick as a telephone pole. A seven foot constrictor was dangerous enough. Could kill a man. I was not about to wait until Monty reached twenty feet for Sheila to return.
I developed a plan in my head. One way to recover my very frayed nerves. If Sheila didn't return before Monty grew too big for the boat, I'd put her in a crate and ship her by special courier to a certain address in Redmond, Washington. The world would never miss one less computer programmer.
I decided I might as well take some action related to the case while I waited for Lori to call. I would start with a call to Nina Peterson, Oakland's only African American female detective, and my good friend. She answered the phone.
"It's Wolf. I need a favor."
"What else is new?"
"Bring the kids by the boat and Monty and I'll baby sit while you and Duane take in a flick."
Duane's the husband. He also works for Oakland PD and readily admits she's smarter and tougher than he is. Now that's a nice guy!
"You'll feed 'em to that damned cobra of yours."
"Python. Her jaw won't stretch wide enough to get a kid's head in. A Chihuahua maybe."
"Great! Only a leg or foot! What can I do you for?"
"Information on a license number."
"I'm home."
"But you can make a call for me. Just a chance there's some warrants outstanding, or it's hot. Then it would be in that computer bank of yours. Wouldn't have to check DMV."
"I'll make one call."
I read off to her the license number from my notepad.
"Phone as soon as I can. But, it could take time, Jimmie."
She hung up. Jimmie. She's the only one who calls me that. Even my mother, after a lot of pleading on my part, went over to Jim when I became a teenager. Now most people just call me Wolf, which suited me fine. I suspected Nina wanted to place me on the same level as her children. She liked to be in charge.
I could do nothing but wait for Lori or Nina to call. I put on one of my favorite CDs, Yo Yo Ma playing Bach's "Suites for Unaccompanied Cello," and curled up on the berth. Usually sooths me. Not this night. I was still upset about the phone call. Then Monty's attack.
I was really getting into a funk. The slapping of the halyard against the mast, which usually lulls me to sleep, irritated me. Yo Yo Ma paused between suites. I thought I heard faint footsteps on the floating dock. I wouldn't have noticed if I hadn't been so keyed up. Yo Yo Ma started sawing away on a new suite. I pressed the pause button on the CD player and listened again. Yes. Footsteps.
I grabbed my .38, a Smith & Wesson Bodyguard Airweight, from the drawer under the nav table. The five-shot double action revolver was perfect for my line of work. With a two-inch barrel and weighing only fourteen and a half ounces, it was easy to conceal. I stuck the gun into my belt and threw on a black turtleneck sweater to cover it up. I crept up the companionway stairs and peeked out of the opening under the hatch cover. Nothing.
I shoved the hatch cover all the way back and hoisted myself onto the deck in one smooth motion. I heard a faint ping and a splintering sound. A gunshot, damn it. Red had a silencer. Close. The bullet had struck just inches from my head. I dropped flat on the deck. He could see me. Maybe a special sight on his gun or night vision goggles. But where the hell was he? No doubt waiting for me to move. Then he'd shoot again. Next time he wouldn't miss. Hired to hunt down Red, I had become the hunted.
Why was he so damned determined to pop me? I could think of only one reason. He planned to off Susan that night. With me dead, there would be no one to identify him. He would just take off and that would be the end of it. I couldn't just lie there waiting for him to finish me off. I had to get him before he got me and then Susan. I had no choice.
I heard steps heading down the floating dock toward the gangway to the shore. Must be Red. I lifted myself up from the deck, hopped onto the dock, and ran toward the sound. I tripped on some rope. Shit. I pulled myself up and plowed forward. The gangway lay ahead somewhere. There. I saw its outline, then the shore itself.
A dark phantasm, looking like a giant gargoyle, separated itself from the fog. Red was wearing a black suit. He stood on the dock ten feet away. The bastard had been waiting for me as I clumsily - noisily - ran down the dock. He stared right at me, his gun in hand. He grinned like a little boy let loose in a toy store with papa's credit card.
I grabbed my revolver out from under my
belt. Too late. Red had raised his gun - small, long, thin muzzle, a scope - as
if he had all the time in the world. He had me. No way could he miss.
Copyright© 2003 Tim Wohlforth
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Read Tim Wohlforth's review of Dennis Lehane's Mystic River
Read Tim Wohlforth's short story Presumed Guilty at Orchard Press Mysteries