Fair Game, page 1
FAIR GAME
By B. W. Battin
(writing as S. W. Bradford)
A Gordian Knot Thriller
Gordian Knot is an imprint of Crossroad Press
Digital Edition published by Crossroad Press
Digital Edition Copyright © 2016 B. W. Battin
LICENSE NOTES
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Meet the Author
B. W. Battin grew up in Santa Fe, New Mexico. After serving four years in the U.S. Coast Guard, he graduated from the University of New Mexico in Albuquerque. He became a reporter at KOAT-TV in Albuquerque, then moved on to TV stations in Shreveport, Louisiana; Rapid City, South Dakota; and Duluth, Minnesota, where he wrote his first published novel, Angel of the Night. After it was published, he became a full-time writer. One of his novels, Smithereens, was made into a TV movie for NBC. His novels and short stories have been translated into various languages, and he has ghost-written novels for other authors. He lives in Belen, New Mexico, with his wife Sandy, whom he describes as the love of his life. They met in Albuquerque while they were both in the news business.
Book List
Thrillers
Angel of the Night
Catch Me If You Can
Demented
Fair Game
Programmed for Terror
Serial Blood
Smithereens
Tender Prey
The Attraction
The Boogeyman
The Creep
Horror
Into the Pit
It’s Loose
Mary, Mary
Night Sounds
Satan’s Servant
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FAIR GAME
PROLOGUE
The alligator approached him slowly, purposefully. It opened its jaws, revealing a mouthful of pointed teeth. It was hungry. It wanted him. He tried to move away, but his back was against a wall. There was no escape.
His body twitched, and Edgar Waterfield suddenly found himself sitting in a dirty alley. Trembling, he tried to blink his surroundings into focus. It was dark, but beyond that he had no idea what time it was. It could be eight in the evening, four in the morning, something in between. He could see a dumpster across the alley, a doorway with a light above it, the bulb enclosed in a wire cage. The light either hadn’t been turned on or was burned out. To the left of the door was a stack of forklift pallets.
There was no alligator.
It was just a dream, he thought, an alcohol-induced nightmare. He hoped that was true, for if it wasn’t he’d been having the DTs again. The DTs frightened him, because they were proof of just how far he’d sunk. The DTs meant you were near the bottom, not far from becoming a permanent ward of the state, a half-human thing with burned-out brain cells and a ruined liver. Either that or you’d end up dead in a filthy alley like this one.
Maybe dead was better.
He surveyed the alley again, making sure there were no alligators.
Waterfield’s hand explored the asphalt beside him until it bumped into something. The bottle. The wine bottle. The cheapest stuff the liquor store sold. Bought with money acquired panhandling. His hands were shaking so badly he had trouble unscrewing the cap. When he finally got it off, he lifted the bottle to his lips and tipped it up. A single drop of liquid ran into his mouth. He threw the bottle across the alley. It hit something unseen and shattered.
Something in the back of his brain informed him that breaking the bottle was a stupid thing to do, because he might come back here sometime and cut himself on shards of his own making. He dismissed the thought as pointless. He didn’t even know where he was.
An alley. Somewhere in Los Angeles.
No, not just somewhere in Los Angeles. He wasn’t in Beverly Hills. This alley did not run behind the shops of Rodeo Drive. Nor was he in Brentwood. Nor Bel Air. Nor Pacific Palisades. And this was definitely not the San Fernando Valley. For one thing, the alley had no swimming pool. He chuckled at his joke, and the act of laughing triggered a series of deep, jarring coughs that went on for about a minute.
Damn, he needed a drink.
Digging into his pockets, he found two small coins. Pennies or dimes; in the dark he couldn’t tell which. Not that it mattered. Neither would buy him what he needed.
When he’d been president of Waterfield Enterprises, he hadn’t had this problem. He’d had an office on the top floor of a skyscraper, a chauffeur-driven limo, a big house with a view of the Pacific. And all the booze he could drink. Expensive booze, not the shit he consumed now. That was how he got here, he supposed. Too much available booze.
At least that was the story he told everyone. He was uncertain whether it was true or whether he’d simply told it so many times he’d started to believe it. The truth was he had no idea how he’d become what he was now. And many bums told grand stories of what had been. It was all they had, what had been.
He wasn’t even absolutely sure his name was Waterfield. He had no identification, couldn’t remember ever having any. Bums made up names sometimes, fancy-sounding names. Like Waterfield. The only things in his pockets were the two coins. His clothes, such as they were, had come from the rescue mission. He hated the rescue mission. They made you listen to a sermon and pray before you could eat or have any clothing. The preacher was pompous and arrogant, and he acted as though he were God’s chosen servant.
The preacher was a stupid shit.
So stupid he didn’t even realize there was no God.
Waterfield rubbed his eyes, then rested his head against the wall. Memories flitted lazily through his consciousness. Most of them were vague, like the group of shabbily dressed men sitting in a large, foul-smelling room with a cement floor. It was an institution of some sort. The drunk tank? He’d been in the drunk tank lots of times. Or was it that other place, the one where they’d taken him for treatment? Their word, treatment. What they’d done was dry him out, lecture him a little, and turn him loose. His first act had been to panhandle enough money for a bottle of wine.
Other memories—if they were memories—appeared and disappeared. A woman’s face, soft and pretty, surrounded by blond curls. A younger face that resembled the first, with straight shoulder-length hair. He thought he’d seen those faces before. A wife and daughter? He wasn’t sure, but a tear trickled down his cheek, triggered by those brain cells that knew what had been and protected the memory from what was.
He saw a house, not the Waterfield mansion of which he bragged, but a modest house with two big shade trees in the front yard. The name on the mailbox said Walter Field. Had that been his name? Had he created Waterfield from that? He didn’t know. Abruptly all these thoughts vanished, replaced by an overwhelming need.
A drink. He wanted a drink. He needed a drink.
He wished he knew what time it was. Was it early enough for him to get some money, find a liquor store? Or would he find the streets deserted? There was only one way to find out. Getting unsteadily to his feet, Waterfield started toward the mouth of the alley. The street ahead was deserted. Had he heard any traffic? He didn’t think so, but he wasn’t sure. He tried to focus on the street in hopes of figuring out where he was, and suddenly the world started to spin. He reached for something to hang onto, found nothing, and fell, scraping his left arm on the asphalt.
Shit, he thought. He needed a drink worse than he’d thought.
He sat up, waited for the world to stop whirling. His vision cleared just as a car passed the mouth of the alley, moving slowly. It was an expensive car, a Mercedes or BMW or one of those. Though uncertain where he was, Waterfield was pretty sure that an expensive car like that didn’t belong in a neighborhood like this. Some yuppies slumming maybe. Or just a guy taking a shortcut on his way to a meeting of the Orange County Republican Party.
Waterfield tried to stand up, but dizziness washed over him, and he had to abandon the effort. Need a drink real bad, he thought. Somewhere in the depths of his mind, something protested that he w as in this condition because he drank, but he refused to listen. He knew what he needed.
The expensive car passed again. It was shiny, black or maybe gray. The driver had to be lost. And then another explanation occurred to him. Maybe it was some rich guys looking to score some drugs. Guys too stupid to know where to go, so they were just driving around what seemed a likely part of town, looking.
Which gave him an idea. If they were that stupid, maybe he could take them for a few bucks. If he could make it to the end of the alley before the car came around again, he could flag it down, tell them he knew what they were after and that he could get it for them. If they’d give him the money, he’d meet them back at this same spot in forty-five minutes. Maybe they were stupid enough to fall for it. Maybe.
Waterfield started to get up, and again the alley tilted and swirled. His stomach lurched, then settled. If he could just stand up, get to the street…
A scraping, slithering noise. Something breathing.
It was the alligator. He was sure of it. But peering into the darkness, he saw nothing but shadows. There were no alligators. There never had been an alligator. The beasts lived in the southern swamps; they didn’t roam the streets of L.A. at night. Even drunken bums had enough functioning brain cells to reason that out.
Something in the shadows moved.
Waterfield blinked, tried to force his eyes to bring the shape out of the blackness.
And then he saw it, a man walking toward him. No, three men.
Moving toward him. Silently.
They’re the owners of one of the businesses here, he thought. But he knew that was wrong. He was starting to wonder whether they were other bums or maybe even burglars when they walked up to him and stopped. A flashlight beam hit his face; then it was switched off. Bright, circular afterimages danced in front of his eyes. He closed his lids, but they were still there.
“Well, well,” one of the men said, “what do we have here?”
“Something completely useless,” one of his companions replied.
Waterfield tried to see them through the bright circles. They didn’t sound like bums. They didn’t sound as if they belonged in this neighborhood. Waterfield could dimly make out the man standing closest to him, the one who’d spoken first. The guy was wearing a suit, white dress shirt, paisley tie. What was a guy dressed like that doing in a neighborhood like this, in an alley, at night?
And then it dawned on Waterfield that the man was wearing an overcoat, open in front. They were all wearing overcoats. The other two guys had theirs buttoned.
“Hey,” Waterfield said, “don’t you guys know this is southern California? Nobody wears overcoats out here in La La Land.”
They just stood there, looking at him. An icy glob of fear slithered down Waterfield’s spine, settled in the pit of his stomach. “What… whadaya want?” he asked.
Waterfield squinted, trying to see them better. Although he couldn’t be sure, he thought they were in their twenties or early thirties. He sensed they were educated, well-off.
“I … I ain’t got nothin’ ya want,” Waterfield said. He didn’t know why he said it; these men were not here to rob him. He wished they were. Robbery was something he could understand. What was happening here was bizarre and scary.
“I ain’t got nothin’ you want,” he repeated. It was all he could think of to say.
“Yes, you do,” the man in the suit said.
“What?”
“The only thing you have.”
“I ain’t got nothin’. I swear it. You can search me.”
“I don’t have to. I can tell from here that you’ve got what we came for.” Another of them chuckled softly.
Waterfield just stared at them, wishing he could see their faces. “Are you of any value?” one of them asked.
“Any value? What’re you talkin’ about?”
“What good are you?” the third man asked. “What would society lose if it didn’t have you?”
It was a question Waterfield had asked himself when he was feeling particularly low, but he didn’t like hearing it from these guys. Anger began to well up, the kind that comes from having your pride stepped on, but it died almost instantly. He had no pride left. And he was in no position to irritate these men.
“Tell me what good you are,” the man in the suit said. When Waterfield didn’t respond, the man prodded him with his foot. He wore shiny, expensive-looking shoes. “Answer me.”
“I’m not bothering you,” Waterfield said.
“Your existence bothers me,” the man said. “Why do you exist, old man?”
Old man? He was only … He didn’t know how old he was. And the last time he’d looked at himself in a mirror, a pale and haggard face covered with gray stubble had stared back at him. Bloodshot eyes. Stringy gray hair. He was old. If not in years, then in the toll the years had taken.
The man kicked him. “Tell me what you are worth. Tell me why you should be on this planet.”
“I … I don’t hurt anyone,” Waterfield said.
“That’s it? That’s all you have to justify your existence?”
“I’m … I’m nice to animals.”
“Well, that’s good, old man. That’s a point for you. Now, what else? What other reasons can you give me for your being here?”
“I … I … I can’t help being a bum,” Waterfield said. “I used to own my own company. I used to have a big house overlooking the ocean. I … I … I …” His words trailed off.
“Then how did you end up like this?” one of the men asked.
“Couldn’t help it,” Waterfield said. “I’m sick.”
“Sick with what?” the man in the suit asked.
“Alcoholism. It’s a … a disease. I’m sick.”
“You ever hear of willpower, old man?”
“Yes. I tried. I tried.”
“Not very hard.”
“No, hard. Real hard. I swear.”
The man shook his head. “What’s your name?”
“Edgar.”
“Edgar what?”
“Waterfield.”
“Tell you what, Edgar Waterfield. I can’t see much reason for your being on earth. I can’t see where your presence does one useful thing.”
Waterfield said nothing. His testicles had shriveled up as if they’d withdrawn into his body. A drop of glacially cold sweat trickled down his neck.
“Can you justify your existence?” the man asked.
Waterfield just stared at him.
Turning to his companions, the man in the suit said, “What do you think?”
“He serves no purpose,” one said, sighing as if this bored him.
The other said, “He’s worse than useless. He’s a drain on society, a parasite.”
“It’s unanimous,” the man in the suit said. He turned to face Waterfield. “We’ll have to take what we came here for.”
“What?” Waterfield asked. His throat was as dry as sunbaked Mojave sand. He was barely able to speak.
“The one thing you have.”
“What?” he asked again. His lower lip was quivering. A tear spilled down his cheek.
“Your life, old man.”
The men brought out objects that had been concealed beneath their coats. Suddenly Waterfield realized that the men weren’t wearing overcoats at all. They were raincoats.
And the objects were baseball bats.
“What… what are you going to do?” Waterfield asked. The men began rebuttoning their coats.
Waterfield scooted backward on the asphalt. He’d only gone about five feet when his back hit the stuccoed wall of a building. “Please,” he said, his voice barely above a whisper.
The men came toward him. He tried to get up, but his legs seemed solid, without any joints. He screamed, but the sound that came from his dry throat was only a meaningless rattle.
Still, it was enough to keep him from hearing the swish of the baseball bats.
As they drove away from the city, the three men were silent, each absorbed in his own thoughts. The traffic on the freeway was light this time of night. The headlights of the oncoming cars made wavery halos in the smog. At West Covina, they left the freeway and drove to a supermarket, pulling into the alley that ran behind it. The man in the backseat quickly got out and put a plastic-wrapped bundle into the dumpster. It contained the baseball bats and raincoats.
