Walk Away, page 22
“Could he lose himself in a big enough city?”
“Sure, for a while. People have been known to stay lost for years. But here’s the thing: sooner or later they slip up. And you have to remember it’s the Feds and the Marshals Service after him. Doesn’t matter if it’s one year or ten years, they won’t forget about him. They even got Whitey Bulger.”
“Who?”
“Never mind.”
“My point is that everything says Lukas will run to LA,” Camaro said. “He sent money ahead, and he’s got some kind of plan. So maybe he’s only going to run a little way before he turns and fights.”
“It would be foolish of him.”
“We have an address where he sent the money. We have a name: Konnor Spencer. Those have to be good for something. And there’s something else, too.”
Yates’s order came, and Camaro sat back while he ate his soup with a piece of crusty bread to sop up the last drops. He slurped his coffee when he drank it, and the corners of his mustache got wet. Camaro said nothing.
After a while Yates colored slightly and wiped his mouth. “Quit staring, will you? I’m a little bashful when I eat.”
“I wouldn’t waste your time if all I had were a couple of clues and nothing else to go on. What I have can put us right on top of him, and he won’t even know it’s happening.”
“Well, don’t keep me in suspense. What do you got?”
“We need to get to LA. Like right now. If we get there fast enough, we have a real chance.”
Chapter Sixty
THEY GOT ON the road. Camaro gave Yates an address in Los Angeles. They would be on the road for hours, and for a while they simply listened to the satellite radio and drove on US-101, skirting Los Padres National Forest and skipping through farmland carved out of the space between high-riding hills and low mountains. They were two hours out when Camaro’s phone rang. She checked the number and answered.
“I understand you left today,” Special Agent Brock said.
“That’s right.”
“It’s good you took my advice. There’s nothing left for you here.”
“I won’t be back,” Camaro said. “Not for a long time.”
“I didn’t think you would be. Thank you for that. It makes my life a lot less complicated.”
“I had to kill Jake, you know. I didn’t have a choice.”
“I know. I never questioned it. And it turns out he was putting the screws to his other woman as well. She gave him six thousand dollars over the last twelve months, all in cash. Don’t know where it went or what it was for, but he wasn’t exactly living the high life. Who knows? Maybe he was going to get into his brother’s business.”
“What is his brother’s business?”
“Whatever he can buy, sell, or trade. If it’s illegal, Lukas Collier wants a piece of it. Before he set out for California he was neck deep in a trafficking scheme, bringing guns up from places like Virginia and selling them in New York and New Jersey. That got him on ATF’s radar and eventually the Marshals Service’s. We have a hand in that, too.”
“So who goes after him? All of you people want him.”
“We’re working on that. I’m finding Deputy Marshal Hannon very easy to work with.”
“The other one’s a prick,” Camaro said.
“He is. But you don’t have to worry about it. Good-bye, Camaro. Enjoy Miami.”
Camaro ended the call without saying anything else. Her heartbeat was up, and it made her stitches throb. The fishing line was holding. She toyed with the phone for a few moments before stuffing it back into her pocket. Yates glanced over at her, but she directed her attention away from him, out into the winter fields that dragged by beyond her window.
“So which one was it?” Yates asked.
“Who?”
“On the phone.”
“The FBI.”
“He doesn’t seem like a bad kind.”
“I wouldn’t know.”
“Why don’t I believe you?”
Camaro shot Yates a look. “Believe what you want. I’m here for my sister.”
Yates made an affirmative sound. “You’re the one she always came to? Big sister? Always there?”
“Something like that.”
“That’s a good thing. I had a younger sister who died when she was about your age. Stomach cancer. Ate her up from the inside. I was there every step of the way, and before that I was the one who ran off the bad boys who’d come sniffing around her skirt. I made sure she got together with a good man. I always wished she’d had sons and daughters of her own so we could see how things turned out for them.”
Camaro didn’t speak for a while. She watched the lane line slip by on the highway ahead. “When my sister was fourteen she was seeing this guy in secret. He was nineteen. One day she tells me she thinks she’s pregnant and she doesn’t know what to do. The guy won’t talk to her anymore. She can’t tell our dad or he’ll go crazy.”
Yates listened.
“So I went to the guy’s apartment and I knocked on the door. When he opened up, I kicked his ass. I kicked it hard. He had a girl with him, and she was so scared she locked herself in a closet and called the police.”
“What happened then?”
“I left. The cops came, and he wouldn’t identify me. A few days later he drops an envelope full of cash in our mailbox with Bel’s name on it. So she could take care of things. Then he moved, and neither one of us ever saw him again.
“My sister doesn’t make good choices,” Camaro said. “Whatever helps a person steer clear of trouble, she doesn’t have it. And that’s definitely true when it comes to men.”
Yates spared a look in her direction. “How about you? What are your men like?”
Camaro’s mouth turned down. “I don’t have that problem.”
“Don’t like men, or don’t pick the wrong ones?”
“I don’t keep them around at all,” she said. “That’s the easiest way to do it.”
“Loneliest, too.”
“I’m not lonely.”
The miles passed with no more conversation between them. Yates fiddled with the dial and found a station playing classic country from Willie Nelson, Waylon Jennings, and others who fit the mold. Camaro listened with her face pressed into a frown. When the radio played “Okie from Muskogee,” she reached over and turned it off completely.
“Not a Merle Haggard fan?” Yates asked.
“I’d rather listen to nothing.”
“That’s classic music from my youth. Ol’ Merle wrote that to support the troops over in Vietnam. I was back by then, but I appreciated the sentiment. Only got a few folks these days who’d write a song like that.”
“I still don’t want to hear it.”
“Fair enough. What’s your song?”
“My song?” Camaro asked.
“Sure. Everybody’s got a song. My wife and I, we like ‘Unforgettable.’ They sang that at our wedding reception for the first dance. I have an old record I bought back in 1961 with all of Nat King Cole’s hits on it. We play it on our anniversaries and dance right there in the living room. I won’t say it makes me feel young again, but it does make me feel a little less old.”
“I don’t have anything like that,” Camaro said.
“That’s too bad. It’s hard going through life without a song.”
“I’ll take your word for it.”
Yates eased back in his seat and was quiet for a while. Finally he said, “I know it’s none of my business, but the old man in me makes me want to impart some wisdom.”
“Like what?”
“I looked at you, and first thing I knew you were tough. You went ahead and proved it, too. But the thing is, it’s not enough to be hard. You have to let the softer side show through now and again, or you lose it, sometimes for good.”
“I don’t have time for that right now.”
“Do you ever?”
“Hey, you don’t even know me,” Camaro said.
“Not in particular, but I know your type in general. Got a fight in you the whole world is welcome to. Some deserve it, most don’t. All I’m saying is, don’t let somebody like Lukas Collier turn off the lights in there.”
Camaro turned away from Yates and looked at the hint of her reflection in the window. “Lukas isn’t taking anything from me. Not anymore.”
“That’s good to hear, because you seem like someone worth knowing, Camaro Espinoza. I’d hate for you to turn away from that.”
She looked back toward Yates. “You going to tell me to save my soul?”
“Souls are God’s lookout, not mine.”
“I just want to see him die.”
“I hope your wish comes true. I surely do.”
They said nothing else. After a while Camaro heard him humming the Merle Haggard song to himself. She did not stop him.
Chapter Sixty-One
IT WAS IN the upper sixties under clear, bright skies when Lukas passed Santa Clarita and drove into the sprawl of LA. He put the windows down and let his left hand play in the air streaming past the car. He angled down into the Hollywood Hills on the way downtown. Almost at random he took the Alvarado Street exit and ended up on Sunset Boulevard.
He saw no stars, but there were out-of-season tourists on the sidewalks and filthy vagrants who hadn’t yet been driven off by LA’s finest. He spotted a Super 8 motel, painted canary yellow and wedged into a corner lot. For a moment he considered passing by, but instead he slowed and turned into the parking lot, taking the spot farthest from the street.
The manager behind the counter was a short, round Filipino man in a crisp white shirt. Lukas filled out the registration form with a lot of nonsense and passed it over.
“May I see your ID, please?” the man asked.
“I’m paying cash.”
“We still need to see an ID.”
Lukas scowled. He put a hundred dollars on the counter, then laid another hundred next to it. “One’s for the room, and the other one’s for you. I just want a place to lay my head until tomorrow, and I like my privacy. You got your form.”
The manager examined the form doubtfully, then swept the bills off the counter. He made a card key for Lukas and handed it over. “It’s on the second floor. I’ll mark a map for you.”
“Thanks, friend,” Lukas said.
He had nothing to take with him except the clothes on his back, and he ascended the outdoor staircase to the second floor. The ice machine and a couple of vending machines were at the far end of the building, well away from his door, which meant peace and quiet for the time he’d be a resident.
Inside, the room was small and plain, without even a piece of generic art to adorn the off-white walls. Lukas locked the door and set the bar guard before heading to the sink. He washed his face with cold water, then scratched his scalp vigorously. He made a decision and took a towel from the wall rack, letting himself into the small room with the tub and toilet. He locked this door, too, before stripping out of his clothes.
The Colt went on top of the toilet tank. Lukas washed himself all over, twice, aware of tiny stinging cuts on his arms and neck that he hadn’t noticed before. After he dried off, he examined his clothes for glass fragments and found a few in his shirt and clinging to his jeans. He dressed and went out into the room.
For a while he allowed himself to vegetate in front of the television, surfing channels, but eventually he realized he was only delaying the inevitable. He drew his phone out of his pocket and dialed.
It didn’t take long for Konnor to answer. “My brother! I was starting to worry about you. No calls, and I got your package.”
“Everything in there like it should be?”
“Close to ten thousand. Your brother came through.”
“Is that going to be enough to make the buy?” Lukas asked.
“Plenty. We won’t be able to tip, but who cares? I have people coming to make delivery at the toy store tomorrow, so all we need now is for you to make the connection.”
“It’ll be done. I got to make a call.”
“Maybe you, me, and Jake can go out and grab some drinks tonight. See about picking up some ladies. Make a party out of it. What do you think?”
Lukas didn’t speak for a long moment. “Jake’s dead.”
“What? When the hell did this happen?”
“A couple days ago. He got himself shot dead in his old lady’s place.”
“The same old lady you were talking about before?”
“It doesn’t matter. We still have a connection in Salinas. One of Jake’s asshole friends. Guy doesn’t know much about anything, but that doesn’t mean he can’t learn. But I can’t head up there while he figures it out. I’ve got more heat coming down on me. I might have to keep my head down for a little while.”
“Whatever you need, man. Semper fi.”
“Semper fi,” Lukas said without enthusiasm. “We make this first deal, I can afford to take a vacation for a while. Catch some waves. Maybe I’ll shack up with one of those beach bunnies down by the boardwalk. Work out my grief.”
“Well, you know I’m here for you. Anytime, anywhere.”
“I’m gonna hold you to that. Talk to you later.”
Lukas ended the call. He muted the TV and sat up in bed, then dialed a second number. This one took longer to go through. In the background he heard the thump and rhythm of hip-hop playing. “Yo, who’s this?” asked the man on the other end.
“Otilio, it’s Lukas.”
“Lukas? Hey, Lukas! I was starting to wonder if I was gonna hear from you again, cuz. You keep me waiting too long, I make deals with someone else, you feel me?”
“Yeah, I feel you. I had some things to take care of, but it’s all better now. My people tell me we can have the goods ready for you in forty-eight hours. We meet, we settle up, and everybody goes away happy until the next time.”
“Are we still talking about the same amount of merchandise?”
“No change. You get everything you ask for, so long as I get everything I’m asking for.”
“Have I ever cheated you before?”
“Never. That’s why I like you.”
Otilio laughed. “White-boy love! Okay, listen, I can get you exactly what we agreed on and deliver it anywhere at any time.”
“You’ll deliver when we deliver. Even exchange.”
“You don’t trust me?”
“Just doing business. I’ll give you an address twelve hours in advance,” Lukas said. “I don’t want to see a huge crew.”
“No problema. Talk to you soon, Lukas.”
When the phone beeped and the call was over, Lukas took a deep breath and held it for a count of three before letting it ease out of his lungs. He wanted a cigarette, and he wanted something to drink with it. There had to be a liquor store nearby. But first he had to talk to Derrick. The deal was incomplete without someone to haul the load.
He called and called again. He left two messages. Derrick didn’t answer. Lukas’s mood grew dark. He left the room and lit a cigarette down in the parking lot, and then he went in search of beer.
Chapter Sixty-Two
THEY WERE IN Los Angeles with some time to spare before sundown. Traffic was dense and unforgiving. Camaro projected herself past all the slow-moving cars, trying to ignore the spring that coiled up steadily inside her, waiting for release.
“Take the exit onto the 10,” Camaro said after a while.
“What next?” Yates asked.
“Watch for the 710 exit. Go south toward Long Beach.”
“Will do. You think this is going to pay off?”
“As long as he still has the same phone.”
“He might have ditched it. He might be over the border already.”
Camaro glared at him. “You got any better ideas?”
Yates shook his head. “No, ma’am. I’m just being the voice of reason.”
“You said crooks are stupid. They do dumb things and slip up.”
“I did say that.”
“So this is my play.”
“I’m pulling for you. I really am.”
“Watch for that exit. It comes up fast.”
They were east of downtown, and if they kept on they would end up in Monterey Park, but the exit would carry them farther south. When the signs for I-710 south appeared, Yates followed them, and from there Camaro directed him off the freeway and onto the surface streets. They hadn’t gone far when she called for a stop.
The street was narrow and ran along the length of the Long Beach Freeway, closed off on that side by a concrete wall. Houses had barred windows and sturdy fences built into low ramparts. Camaro pointed out a stretch of empty curb, and Yates parked. He killed the engine. “Where are we?” he asked.
“This is the house where I grew up,” Camaro said.
She saw his eyes drift past her to the little white house with flowering vines overgrowing the fence in spots and a single tree on the lawn. When Camaro looked at it she saw through time, and in the driveway was parked a ’74 Plymouth Barracuda with the cover pulled off and the hood up. A shiny V-Max motorcycle stood just inside the mouth of the open garage door, sharing space with a well-loved FXST Softail bought off the line in 1984.
“This is where it happens?” Yates asked.
“No, but it gets us there. Wait here.”
She climbed out of the SUV without waiting for an answer and stepped off onto the dead grass adjoining the sidewalk. Two more steps brought her to the fence. A gust of wind caught her as she put her hands on the white-painted metal. She stood for a long while looking at the house. She had not seen it for a lifetime.
A glance back showed her Yates was still in the SUV. She nodded to him and set off along the street, heading two doors down to a house sided in red brick. The gate was unlocked, and there was an old Ram 1500 with scratched and dull black paint in the driveway. Camaro let herself into the yard and went to the front door. She rang the bell.
