The wake-up Read online

They all stared at him; then Missy laughed, her voice hurting Vlad's ears.

  "You talking about me and the stock market?" asked Arturo. "Trust me, it's too late to make it back. I'm into bonds now, strictly investment-grade corporates and T-bills. No risk for me. I got enough stress in my life."

  "Everybody makes mistakes." Vlad tried to stand, to hustle Arturo out of the store, but his legs weren't working. It was if they belonged to someone else, someone he didn't know, someone who wanted to stay sitting. "What's important is to admit it."

  "I admitted it." Arturo plucked a doughnut from the box. "That's why I'm in bonds. I'm no stock picker. You ask me, brokers are the biggest crooks there is. They ought to make dope legal and buying stocks a felony."

  "Don't say that," Clark joked. "You're going to put us all out of business."

  Cecil walked over from the refrigerator, his arms full of cans and bottles. He set an Evian in front of Missy, a Pepsi for Clark, Cherry Coke for Vlad, and a Diet Pepsi for Arturo.

  "I don't drink Diet Pepsi, you idiot." Arturo tossed the can back to him. "Diet Coke. It's been Diet Coke since the first time you asked me. What's that been-two years, and you still can't remember? Doesn't anything penetrate that brain of yours?"

  Missy laughed again, louder now, as Cecil sulked back to the refrigerator. She took a long drink from her bottled water, watching Vlad.

  Clark's eyes were too bright. Arturo was going to know something was wrong.

  "I hate that redheaded bastard," Arturo said to Missy. "I know he's your brother, but I can't stand him." He took a tiny bite of the doughnut, glanced at Vlad. "I'm only going to eat half of this, so don't give me that look."

  "Have you ever seen The Lion King?" Vlad said to Arturo.

  Arturo pushed the rest of the doughnut into his mouth.

  "The Lion King," said Vlad. "It's a cartoon movie. Haven't you ever watched it with your kids?"

  "Diet Coke." Cecil banged the can onto the table.

  "I guess so," Arturo said to Vlad. He licked powdered sugar off his fingers.

  "Remember how in The Lion King everybody blames Simba for killing his father in the stampede, even though it wasn't really his fault?" Vlad glanced at Clark. "See, it was really his bad uncle Scar who was responsible, but everyone blamed Simba…"

  "If you say so." Arturo picked up the can of Diet Coke, snapped it open. Diet Coke sprayed the table. "Son of a bitch." He jumped up, soda dripping off his chin, and backhanded Cecil, sent him flying. "You did that on purpose."

  Vlad tried to stand, but his legs still wouldn't work. "Even though everyone thought Simba was guilty, they didn't kill him." He braced his hands against the tabletop, pushed himself upright. "I mean… Scar wanted to kill him, but the pride rules called for Simba to be exiled…"

  Arturo wiped soda off his jacket with angry sweeps of his hands.

  "Simba was part of the pride," Vlad pleaded with Clark and Missy. "You don't kill a member of the pride just because they make a mistake, even if it's a big mistake…"

  Arturo shook out his handkerchief, dabbed at his face.

  "You exile him, and then after a while, he gets to come back, and everybody is happy again." Vlad looked around the table. "That's how it works."

  "This isn't The Lion King," said Clark.

  "Yeah, Vlad, what are you talking about?" asked Arturo.

  Cecil stepped behind Arturo, shoved a gun in his ear, a tiny gun, a lady's.22, and pulled the trigger.

  It made such a small sound that Vlad thought at first that the gun had misfired. Then Arturo twisted away, took a step toward Vlad, and fell. Vlad pushed off from the table, slid onto the floor beside Arturo.

  "Yes!" Cecil jabbed the gun at Arturo. "How's that feel, fucker? That penetrate your brain?"

  Clark winced at the blood dripping from Arturo's ear. "Whoa."

  Missy backed away from the table.

  "Didn't think I could do it, did you?" Cecil said to Clark, waving the gun in the air. "Give the job to Vlad, give the job to Frank, but never even think about giving it to Cecil. Shit, I'm just family, right, so what do I know?"

  Vlad cradled Arturo in his arms, singing to him, trying to revive him, but all the weight in Arturo's body was gone.

  "Lookee here at your big tough hombre," crowed Cecil. "He don't look so tough now, does he, Clark? Pow. One shot, just like you asked for. So much for his fucking bulletproof clothes. Hey, man, anytime you want, you feel free to thank me."

  Clark looked at Missy. "Who knew?"

  "That's my gun," Missy said to Cecil. "You didn't ask if you could take it."

  "You always underestimated me," Cecil said to Missy. "Vlad's standing around jabbering about cartoons, and I'm the go-to guy." He pretended to fan the little semiauto. "Fucking stone killer, right under your noses, but you never even noticed."

  Vlad rocked Arturo. In movies, men always talked before they died. They told their true feelings, and gave messages for their families. In movies, men said it didn't hurt, or sometimes that they felt cold, but Arturo had died without saying a word. Vlad hung his head, feeling the life drain out of him, too.

  "Things are going to be different now," Cecil said, out of breath, pointing the gun from one to the other. "I want… I want my own damn car, and my own credit card, too. I want… I want a plasma-screen TV in my room, and… and… I want a big fucking gun."

  "Bag Arturo up before he bleeds all over the place," Missy said. "We're going to have to scrub the floor down. There's ammonia in the bathroom for the floor and-"

  "Don't look at me," said Cecil. "Vlad gets the shit job for a change."

  Missy rubbed her temples as if she had a headache. "Vlad, bag Arturo up. Please?"

  Vlad shook his head.

  Clark took another sip of Pepsi. "Here we go. Nothing is ever simple."

  Cecil sauntered over to Vlad, looked down at him. "My sister told you to do something, bitch." He poked Vlad in the forehead with the.22. It looked like a toy gun, but it left a red ring on Vlad's white skin. "You hear me?"

  "Back off, Cecil," said Clark.

  Vlad looked past Cecil. "What am I going to tell Arturo's wife and children?"

  "Don't tell them anything," said Missy. "The plan stays the same. We pack Arturo in with the clothes, and then take him to the incinerator tomorrow morning. His wife knows better than to check up on him for a few days. By then… he's just smoke."

  "You said we were going to talk to him," said Vlad.

  "You talked to him," said Cecil, moving on the balls of his feet, as if he were onstage. "You talked to him your way, and I talked to him mine." He aimed the gun at Vlad. "Now do what my sister told you, before I fucking talk to you, too."

  "You're not going to turn Arturo into smoke," Vlad said to Missy.

  "Put the gun down, Cecil," said Clark. "We're all friends here."

  "Bullshit," said Cecil.

  "Cecil, you do what Clark says," said Missy. "Go on, give me my gun back."

  "No fucking way," said Cecil. "I told you before. Everything is different now. Cecil don't fetch and carry no more. Get used to it."

  "I'll take care of Arturo," said Vlad. "I'll give him a proper funeral."

  "Vlad… dude, it's got to be done like we planned," said Clark.

  "Get your ass up. I don't want to tell you again." Cecil posed with the gun, pointing it out vertically and horizontally at Vlad, making gunshot sounds. "You want me to pop him, too, Clark? I'll fucking do it. This killing thing is no big deal. You get used to it real fast, that's the God's honest truth. I think I got me a natural aptitude."

  "Give me my gun, Cecil," ordered Missy.

  Cecil whirled on her. "I told you. Everything is-" The gun went off, and Missy gave a little cry, sat down in the chair.

  "Missy?" said Clark. "Missy!"

  "I didn't do anything," said Cecil.

  Pink liquid ran out of Missy's right eye and down her cheek.

  "Look what you done," Cecil said to Vlad. "You distracted me."

  Cla
rk clutched at Missy, but she flopped onto the floor. He stood over her, calling her name, howling like he had been the one shot, but she didn't move. Just like Arturo: One minute they were alive, and then next minute they were gone, and all the shouting didn't make a bit of difference.

  "This is your fault," Cecil said to Vlad, so angry that he was sweating. "You did it." He shot Vlad. Shot him again. And again.

  Vlad barely felt it. He brushed powdered sugar from the doughnut off Arturo's lips.

  40

  Thorpe watched from an outside table at the Los Flores Taqueteria as Paulo Rodriguez made a loop through the park across the street. Every minute or so, Paulo would pass into view, bent low over the handlebars like a fighter pilot, his teeth bared in delight. He had customized the bike Thorpe had left for him, adding streamers from the handlebars and about a dozen reflectors interspersed among the front and back spokes. A tiny Mexican flag hung from the seat, flapping as he sped away.

  At the side of the path, his mother sat on a bench, chatting with two other women, string bags of fruit and snacks in their laps. It was early evening, still light, and they moved unhurriedly, nodding their heads in agreement, occasionally waving away the hovering insects. As Paulo sped toward her, his mother chided him to slow down, and he slammed on the brakes, locked the back wheel, and skidded to a stop in front of her. She wagged a finger, and he hung his head, more to hide his grin than from shame. She slipped a section of orange into his mouth and sent him on his way.

  Thorpe crunched into his second pork taco, adding more hot sauce in between bites, juice dribbling at the corner of his mouth. The lemonade was fresh and ultrasweet. He watched Paulo and his mother and tried not to think. His wake-up had gotten Betty B and Ray Bishop killed… He had to take small pleasures where he found them.

  A trio of languid homeboys sat at an adjoining table, slender teenagers with lupine faces, their skinny arms wrapped with tattoos. They glanced at him from time to time, not hostile, but not friendly, either, just keeping track of him. He listened to them discuss him in Spanish, their voices high and musical. One thought he was a narc. One thought he was la Migra. The third, the smallest, an overgrown child with a sunken chest and-from the way he regularly touched his pocket, reassuring himself-the only one strapped, thought they should take him down and find out.

  Good time to be driving an armored car. Thorpe called Danny Hathaway. He answered on the second ring. It was noisy, wherever he was. "It's me," said Thorpe.

  "Frankie!"

  "Where are you?"

  "Vegas, land of milk and honey. I'm at the Bellagio, jackpots going off around me like the Fourth of July. I drove straight out here after I left you. The Town Car gets lousy mileage, but it's one sweet ride."

  "I wanted to give you my new cell phone number."

  "I haven't got any paper." The clanging of slot machines interrupted Hathaway. "My first night in town, I hit the blackjack tables, hit them hard, man. I ended up with a stack of thousand-dollar chips bigger than Ron Jeremy's dick. You got to visit, Frank. They comped me a suite."

  Thorpe smiled. "I'll call you soon."

  "Everything work out with Clark and Missy? You got them tearing at each other's throats?"

  That was a hard one to answer. He must have convinced Missy that Arturo had sold them out, because this morning she had transferred the hundred thousand dollars to his offshore account. Thorpe had already wired the money to Ray Bishop's wife in Pennsylvania. Right after he had called the Laguna PD and told them there was a body in the kitchen of the house on Pearl Street. Thorpe might have convinced Missy, but that was no guarantee.

  Thorpe watched Paulo's mother eat fish crackers from a Ziploc bag, eat them one at a time, daintily. Her head was covered with a yellow scarf dotted with red roses. She kept turning slightly, following Paulo's progress through the park, keeping up her end of the conversation with her companions the whole time.

  "Frank? Did it work out?"

  "I'm going to call and make sure. I've got a date with the Engineer in a few days, and I want to have my mind clear."

  "Kill him for me, will you?"

  "Roger that." Thorpe hung up, then called Missy. The phone rang for a long time, and when it was finally answered, it wasn't Missy. "Cecil?"

  "Just the man I was hoping to talk to," said Cecil, oddly chipper.

  "Let me talk to Missy."

  "Lose the attitude, Frank. I'm a professional myself now."

  Thorpe rolled his eyes. "Can I speak to her?"

  Cecil sniffed. "Missy's dead."

  Thorpe stared at the phone.

  "It was an accident. Vlad distracted me."

  Distracted? Thorpe watched Paulo taking another lap. "You killed your sister?"

  "I told you already. It wasn't my fault."

  "Is Arturo there?"

  Cecil cackled. "DOA. That was one uppity Mexican, but I put him down like a bag of warm shit. You got to get over here and see what I done, Frank. It's pretty impressive, if I do say so myself."

  Thorpe couldn't speak. He had expected Vlad to get the assignment, but never Cecil.

  "Practice makes perfect, Frank. It's true. You wouldn't believe the trouble I had running down that old bitch, but tonight, facing off against Arturo and Vlad, I was in the zone. Come over and see for yourself. I'm the real deal now. We got a lot to talk about, you and me. I'm at the Huntington Beach store."

  Cecil had killed Betty B. Thorpe looked past the homeboys at the nearby table, still trying to picture Cecil as the angel of death. Arturo was dead, and Missy, and maybe Clark and Vlad, for all he knew. That should be enough. Enough to make up for Ray Bishop getting his head hammered in. More than enough. Thorpe watched Paulo make another pass through the park, standing on the pedals, hollering.

  "Come on by, Frank. I don't know what I'm going to do if you don't."

  Thorpe clicked off the phone and started for his car.

  Paulo drove past, making his loop-de-loop, racing with another boy about his age, the two of them barking like dogs as they pedaled. Paulo glanced at Thorpe but didn't react, didn't recognize him. Thorpe smiled. That was as close to a happy ending as he could expect.

  41

  "Welcome to the scene of the crime." Cecil grinned as he waved Thorpe inside. "Check it out."

  Thorpe stepped into the back room of the surf shop, closed the alley door. A folding cot was set up in the far corner of the room, Vlad's clothes strewn on the floor. Missy sprawled beside a table, her elegant black dress hiked, one of her high heels snapped off. There was a hole through her eye. Vlad sat on the floor, his back against the sofa. Arturo lay on his back beside him, hands neatly folded across his suit jacket. Other than the fact that one ear was caked with dried blood, he looked as if he were resting. The room smelled like molten copper.

  "That's the only downside of the evening." Cecil pointed at Missy's body. He had two guns shoved into the front of his pants like Billy the Kid, Arturo's machine pistol and a small.22 semiauto. "Damn Vlad got me all upset and threw off my rhythm. Pissed me off, I'll tell you that much."

  Vlad's complexion was even whiter now, waxy and translucent, a road map of fine blue veins visible under the skin. Thorpe realized that the dark spots on Vlad's shirt weren't part of the tie-dyed pattern. "You've been shot."

  Vlad nodded.

  "I told you, Frank, he pissed me off," said Cecil. "I won't stand for that kind of thing. Not anymore. What we got here is a fucking new day for Cecil. You and me going to work together. You best understand that."

  Thorpe laughed.

  "What's so funny?" asked Cecil.

  Thorpe made eye contact with Vlad. "Do you remember the art dealer Missy used? The one who sold her-"

  "Douglas Meachum," said Vlad. "He was at the party. He saw me standing in the corner, shaking… but Meachum just walked past. You were the only one who stopped to help."

  "I asked you a question, Frank," said Cecil.

  Thorpe ignored him but kept track of him with his peripheral v
ision. Any sudden moves… "Arturo went to Meachum's house a few days ago," he said to Vlad. "He went there and killed a man. Were you with him?"

  Vlad's face was blank. "Arturo didn't kill anyone at Meachum's house."

  "The man's name was Ray Bishop," said Thorpe. "Arturo beat him to death with a claw hammer. Were you there when he did it?"

  Vlad scratched his head, and tufts of white-blond hair drifted down. "I wasn't there. Neither was Arturo. He would have told me if he had done that."

  Thorpe stared at him. Vlad was a lot of things, but he wasn't a liar. "You're sure?"

  Vlad nodded. "We were partners."

  Thorpe turned as Cecil reached for the machine pistol in his belt. "Don't do that."

  Cecil gripped the butt of the gun but didn't draw it. His face was incandescent. "I don't take orders anymore."

  "Okay," said Thorpe. Vlad coughed, and Thorpe glanced over, saw blood bubbling from his lips. Thorpe took his eyes off Cecil for only an instant, but it was long enough.

  "I'm willing to forgive you for putting my head through the wall that time at the house," said Cecil, the pistol steady on Thorpe's chest. His knuckles were raw. "I'm willing to forgive and forget, because I'm a little shorthanded now, and I'm going to need some help when I take over the operation."

  "Clark might have something to say about that."

  "I'm not worried," sneered Cecil. "You should have seen him, blubbering like a baby, talking to Missy like he expected her to answer. When he left, he told me he was going to grab his board and paddle out until it didn't hurt no more." He shook his head. "Hey, she was my sister, but you don't see me dying about it. You got to move on, right, Frank?"

  "Easier said than done."

  "Well, I said it and I done it." Cecil's finger curled around the trigger of the machine pistol. It was all he could do to hold himself back. "You going to work for me or not?"

  "I don't even want to be near you."

  Cecil grinned, pulled the trigger. Nothing happened, of course.

  Thorpe stepped closer, pulled the pistol away, and swatted him across the head with it. "You have to flip off the safety."