Walk Away, page 24
He kicked her in the side, and pain shot through her ribs. He kicked her a second time as she rolled, clipping her as she made it to her feet. She raised her guard too slowly, and Lukas punched her squarely in the jaw. Her head snapped around, and she saw lights again.
Camaro staggered and drove out a leg. Her heel glanced off his thigh, and then he was on her, swinging her around by arm and neck to crash headfirst into the wall. Blood was in her mouth. She pivoted and ducked, but a rising left snapped her teeth together and sent her reeling.
They exchanged a rapid flurry of blows. Camaro managed to get inside and bloody Lukas’s nose. He hit her with an elbow in the temple that nearly took her off her feet.
She drove into him with her shoulder, but he outweighed her by thirty pounds and flung her back. She barely deflected a swinging right that would have closed her eye, but caught a sudden left in the stomach.
They clashed together. She hooked his ankle and sent him down to one knee. He charged back to his feet and rocked her. Camaro had something hot and sticky in her hair, and the only thing she could smell was more blood. A sharp strike directly to the point of her chin sparked stars. The ground came up, and she fell completely.
“Federal marshals! Don’t move!”
Way’s voice boomed out behind her. Camaro saw Lukas take up his gun and run. She scrambled for her own, a persistent spinning in her skull tilting her balance askew.
“I said stop!”
Her hand closed on the Glock. Camaro raised the gun to fire. Lukas was nearly at the far end of the building.
“Stop where you are, Collier!”
Lukas turned at the moment Way stumbled over Camaro. Camaro was flattened again, the Glock skittering out of her grasp as she and Way became entangled. A burst of exhalation exploded in her ear, almost as loud as the ringing pair of shots from Lukas’s gun. Camaro heard a woman cry out.
Way flailed on top of her, cursing as they unraveled the knot of their limbs. He fired his weapon twice, the report profoundly deafening at such close range. Then he was up on his feet, running after Lukas.
Camaro tried to make it upright. She saw Hannon on the ground, clutching her chest. Her gun was loose beside her. Camaro ignored it and went to Hannon instead. There were two distinct entry marks in the front of her dark jacket, but no blood.
“I…” Hannon said breathlessly. She grabbed Camaro by the arm.
“Don’t move,” Camaro told her. Her brain struggled to put together the next steps, the right words. She kept seeing spots. “Just lie still. Breathe.”
Camaro opened Hannon’s jacket and saw where the bullets had passed through the material of the marshal’s blouse as well. There was still no blood. Her searching fingers felt the stiffness of a layer of Kevlar underneath.
“Way,” Hannon said.
Camaro sagged to the ground beside Hannon. She could only place a hand on Hannon’s vest. She sucked air, and little by little it cleared her head. “I said lie still,” she managed to say. “You could have…cracked ribs.”
Multiple gunshots sounded nearby, the reports of at least two different weapons. Camaro distantly heard Way shouting, and Yates, too. She forced herself back onto her knees and leaned over Hannon. She tore open her blouse to expose the body armor the marshal wore underneath her clothes. Two slugs were embedded in the white material.
Hannon shuddered. Camaro felt her hands, and they were cold. “You’re going into shock.”
“You’re hurt,” Hannon said. “You’re bleeding.”
Camaro shook her head. “I’m fine. Breathe like I told you. You’re going to be all right.”
Camaro didn’t hear the footsteps falling behind her, but the sudden blow behind her ear sent fresh sparks into her vision. She wobbled, one hand still on Hannon, the other on the unyielding concrete walk.
She turned enough to see Way standing over her, his gun in his hand. Blood stained his left arm. He hit her with the butt of his weapon again, and something hot dripped into Camaro’s vision. She fell on her back and put a hand up. Way hit her again. He panted, knelt over her, and stuck the barrel of his pistol in her face. “Don’t you move. Not one muscle.”
Chapter Sixty-Six
LUKAS WAS GONE. Yates surrendered himself into custody, and Way kept them both under the gun until the local police and EMTs arrived. Hannon was taken away on a gurney, and Camaro didn’t see her anymore. Yates went, too. Way said nothing to any of them and spoke only to the LAPD officers who bundled Camaro into a unit. The car drove northwest to Van Nuys, where the LA County lockup was.
The processing was the easy part. A female officer was assigned to Camaro and took her photograph and her fingerprints. She was asked a series of questions about her drug and alcohol history. They wanted to know if she was suicidal. She told them she wasn’t.
“You’re banged up. We’ll have a medic check you over.”
“I saw one already.”
“We’ll have them check you again.”
She was escorted to a large area filled with rows of chairs locked together. It looked like a DMV, and there were televisions bolted to the ceiling in two corners so the men and women waiting in the chairs could occupy themselves. The deputy informed her that she had free access to the phones on the far wall so long as no one else was waiting to make a call. For the rest of the time she was obliged to sit in a seat and wait.
Camaro took a spot in an empty row. The television was tuned to a basic cable channel, and the show was Cops. She sat and willed stillness into herself. Her body ached profoundly, but it did not hurt in the place where she went. There was a constant murmur of noise from the bank of phones as detainees made calls for lawyers, for bail bondsmen, for loved ones. She didn’t hear them.
She looked at the holding area. A pair of deputies sat behind an island of counters to one side of the room, working at computers and only occasionally glancing up to scan the assembled men and women. Now and again another two or three officers would pass through the area, either to talk or to escort a new body to one of the holding cells that dotted one long wall. Some of the cells were small enough for a single occupant, but most were large, with broad windows impregnated with wire, through which Camaro saw idle men and women deemed too uncontrollable for the plastic chairs and the reruns of Cops.
On the far side of the counter island was the processing area. Through there a direct exit to the outside opened into the loading zone where Camaro had been brought in. There were other hallways leading out, but those were certain to be secured by locks Camaro had no means to bypass.
No one carried guns inside the jail, but the officers were armed with Tasers and collapsible batons. On the way in Camaro had watched her escort check her weapon into a locker outside the detention area, so even the police who passed from the outside into processing were unarmed. Traffic was slow. There were never more than two or three cops present at any given time.
She shook her head. There would be no jailbreak.
A nurse came as they promised, and Camaro was taken to a side room and asked to strip. She had her wounds cleaned for the second time, and the nurse clucked her tongue at the bruises on Camaro’s face. When she saw the gash on the back of her leg, she made a disgusted noise. “Who sewed this up? Is that fishing line?”
“It’s all I had.”
“Well, it’s torn now. I’m going to put a real suture in, but you need to get looked at by a doctor.”
“I’ll be all right.”
It was done, and she was returned to the chairs. After three hours a deputy came for her. “Up,” she said.
Camaro stood. “What’s going on?”
“Walk ahead of me along that row of doors.”
Camaro did as she was told, and the two of them walked past the cells to another hallway, also lined with cells. They went four doors down, and the deputy instructed her to stand with her nose against the wall and her hands behind her back. The deputy opened a cell then and took her arm to guide her in.
The door was closed. Camaro looked around the space. The cell was empty. There were no chairs, only benches molded from concrete. A short wall at the back sheltered a toilet. There was no sink.
She sat down, but it was only a minute before she heard the deputy’s key in the door again. The door swung wide, and Way entered. Camaro didn’t move.
They were shut in together. Way stood over her, watching her, and said nothing. Camaro glanced away from him and stared at the opposite wall instead. She heard him breathing. A tense vibration emanated from him, tangible in the still air of the cell.
A minute passed before Way broke the silence. “You look bad,” he said.
“Thanks.”
“I thought you should know that you’re going to go in front of a judge in a few hours. You’re being charged with unlawful possession of a firearm, assault with a deadly weapon, and a few other things you probably don’t give a shit about. But the fun part comes when the U.S. Attorney’s office gets involved, because we’re going to step in on the federal level and run your ass all the way to prison.”
Camaro remained silent.
Way waved his hand in front of her face. “This registering with you? Because now is the time to help yourself. Felony interference with a federal agent isn’t a joke. Your friend Yates, he might make out okay with the right lawyer, but you have no leg to stand on. You’re a straight-up criminal, and you got my partner shot.”
She looked at him for the first time. “How is she?”
“She’ll be fine.”
“And Yates?”
“He’s a lucky old man. The bullet hit him at an angle and glanced off his shoulder blade. He’s going to be stiff, but he’s gonna live.”
“That’s good.”
“You’re damned right it’s good,” Way said. “If either one of them had died, I’d look to put you away forever. And I mean forever.”
Camaro looked away again. “It doesn’t matter.”
“Why not?”
“Because Lukas is gone. You screwed up the whole thing. You’ll never catch him.”
“I screwed up? I am the only one with the authority to pursue Lukas Collier. I don’t give two shits about whatever bond he skipped out on. I’m pursuing the wanted felon who killed a federal marshal and a cop. And that’s before we even bring kidnapping and every other person he’s killed into it. I am the big dog. I told you that back in Carmel, but you wouldn’t listen. And now what do you have? Nothing.”
“I’m tired of talking to you,” Camaro said.
Way stalked the small cell. “I don’t think you realize the barrel I have you over. We are talking about prison time. Hard time in a federal penitentiary where you get one hour outside your cell every day. I have the power to put you there and keep you there until your tits fall and your hair turns gray. You get me?”
She saw him grinding his teeth and smiled inside.
“You know, I’ve been thinking about it,” he said. “Identity fraud is a federal crime. You want your sister to be in the same pen with you? Of course, your niece would have to go into the system, seeing as how her father is dead and you have no immediate relatives. Rebecca’s coming up on five years old, right? The maximum sentence for identity fraud is fifteen years. So she’ll be almost old enough to take her mommy out for a drink when she gets out. What do you think about that?”
Camaro didn’t speak.
“So I guess that’s what we’re going to do. Innocent people are going to be hurt because you won’t come clean. I’m glad I’m not in your family.”
“What do you want from me?”
“I want you to tell me everything you know about where Lukas is going and what he’s going to do when he gets there.”
“How the hell would I know that?”
“You knew he was headed south. How?”
Camaro pressed her lips together and didn’t answer. Out of the corner of her eye she saw Way smile.
“You had Lukas’s personal cell phone number and used it to track him to that motel. Yeah, yeah, we talked to that stupid bastard who traced the signal for you. We know all about it. I want to know when you talked to Lukas, what you talked about, and everything you learned. And if you do that, I’ll see about getting you a spot in minimum security instead. That’s not so bad.”
“I can’t help you,” Camaro said.
“Don’t screw around with me,” Way said.
“I want a lawyer, and I don’t want to see your face again.”
Way said nothing. He stood staring at her, and she felt his eyes boring into her flesh. She didn’t look his way and didn’t move. She sat and waited and took each breath as it came until finally he moved to the door. He rapped on the thick glass. “Open up.”
The deputy unlocked the door.
“Hey, Deputy Way,” Camaro said.
Way paused in the doorway. “What?”
“There’s one more thing I want to say.”
“Spit it out.”
“Better luck next time.”
Way stepped out. The door was closed again, and the lock engaged automatically.
Camaro rested the back of her head against the wall and let the corners of her mouth turn up just a little as she heard him walk away.
Chapter Sixty-Seven
FOR THE SECOND time in a day, Lukas fled the sound of sirens. He saw a bus stopping for passengers up ahead in the failing light of sunset, its interior brightly lit. The doors were already closed when he got there, but he thumped his fist on the glass and the driver let him on. “Hey, man,” Lukas said, “is there a Greyhound station on this line?”
“Not on this line, but you can transfer at Long Beach and Hill.”
“Great.” Lukas fed some bills into the fare taker and went to sit down. The marshal had clipped him with a shot. His leg was bleeding, and he had no way to stop it. Droplets fell on the floor of the bus. No one seemed to notice or care.
He watched the stops light up on an LED sign just above the driver, and fifteen minutes later he was off waiting for his transfer, a slip of paper in his hand. He threw his phone away in a trash can mounted on the side of a lamppost.
The Number 60 bus picked him up and drove east until it reached his stop. The driver instructed him to keep walking another half a mile to reach the Greyhound bus station. He did as he was told and made it to the station without spotting a single police cruiser along the way. He stopped once to pull up the leg of his jeans and examine his wound. It was only oozing now, though it hurt to put his full weight on that leg.
There was a bank of disused public phones tucked away in a neglected corner of the station. Lukas scrounged in his pocket for change and fed one of the phones. He called Konnor and waited through an interminable series of rings until Konnor picked up. “I’ve got trouble,” Lukas told him.
“What’s happening?”
“I got jumped at the motel. Couple of bounty hunters and some U.S. marshals. I got away okay, but I’m hit in the leg and I’m bleeding. I need you to pick me up and get me somewhere I can get patched up.”
“How bad’s the leg?”
“It doesn’t have to come off, but it needs stitching.”
“I can handle that, so long as there’s no bullet in there. Where are you?”
“Greyhound station off Seventh.”
“I know it. Give me half an hour.”
“Don’t be late.”
“Just sit tight.”
Lukas left the phones and found a spot on a scratched wooden bench. It wasn’t busy in the station, but there were eyes enough that he felt uncomfortable being out in the open. Without thinking he tried to cross his legs, and pain shot through his bullet wound. Lukas gasped and saw an old woman glance his way. He forced a smile and nodded, and she looked in the other direction.
The time on his watch ticked away until thirty minutes had passed. Lukas didn’t see Konnor, and another ten minutes went by without the man appearing. He started to count out change again when he heard his name spoken across the room. “Hey,” Konnor said. “I’m here.”
Lukas got up. His leg throbbed. “About time.”
“Traffic. What are you gonna do?”
“Let’s get out of here.”
They went out to the parking lot, and Konnor directed Lukas to a white Chevy pickup with a Harley-Davidson decal spread across the entire rear window. Lukas managed to climb in and stuck his wounded leg out from his body as far as he could.
He saw Konnor look at his bloodied pant leg. “Hurting?”
“What do you think?”
“We’ll get it taken care of. I’ve got a stash of Vicodin that’ll take the edge off.”
“Still living with the beaners?”
“Yeah, the neighborhood’s got plenty. But you know how it is.”
“Sure.”
Konnor drove. For a while they didn’t talk. It was Konnor who broke the silence. “How close are these people to you? The bounty hunters and the marshals?”
“Too close. I have a pretty good idea how they found me before. I dumped my phone, so I need a new one. I thought that shit was illegal, but I guess not. They homed right in on me.”
“Is it gonna be a problem? You know, for the deal?”
“We can still make the swap. I talked to Otilio, and he’s ready to make delivery so long as we hold up our end.”
“It’s all arranged. We’re on for tomorrow. Pay the cash, get the goods. Then we make the exchange on Sunday. The candy store is closed that day, so we’ll have it all to ourselves. How’s your pickup man doing?”
Lukas cursed. “I can’t get ahold of him. If he’s running scared, we might be stuck holding the load for a while until we can arrange for someone else to take it. If Jake hadn’t gone and gotten himself killed, this wouldn’t be a problem, but Jake’s still causing me trouble. Him and his goddamned friends.”
“Amateurs.”
“That’s the size of it.”
Konnor let the silence grow between them. “You want to talk about it?”
“Talk about what?”
“Jake.”
“What’s there to talk about? He was stupid. He was always stupid. As soon as he told me he could sell weed all around the bay, I should have known it was gonna be trouble. He couldn’t be counted on to wipe his own ass.”
