David Putnam - The Replacements

Their images crept in. Images of them all trussed up, twine biting into their soft flesh, their eyes and mouth taped with duct tape. Anxiety rose in me, my hands and feet fidgeted, and it quickly shifted to anger.

I sat in the flickering candlelight waiting for Marie and wondered: How could Jonas Mabry have devolved into such an animal? Maybe it wasn’t true. Maybe Barbara Wicks had it wrong. That option didn’t make sense. Barbara, the consummate professional, wouldn’t make a mistake of that magnitude.

Outside, the wrought-iron gate clanged. Marie was home. The quiet and the calm, soon to be broken when she found out.

The usual sounds reached out to the dining room. Her sandals slipped off, her purse hung up. She padded on small feet down the hall. She was a fiery Puerto Rican woman with green eyes. I held my breath. Every time I saw her, I felt the same all over again. Her beauty, her smile, and simply her presence made any problem dissolve away. I wanted to hug and kiss her.

This time, the problem would not go away.

She entered the dining room. The soft glow from the candles caressed her smile as she took in the scene. Her gaze fell upon mine. She read my expression, the emotion plain on my face. Her smile disappeared. She pulled out a chair and eased down.

“Oh, Bruno, no. Please, no.”

Marie watched me pour her a tall glass of the purple-red sangria. She took a sip. “It’s Wally, isn’t it?”

“What?”

I had not told her about my negotiations with the South Korean deputy ambassador, the conduit to Wally’s father, Mr. Kim. With this other problem, I’d forgotten all about that issue. I nodded.

Tears filled her eyes. She came over and sat in my lap, buried her face, warm and wet, against my neck. I held on, relishing her touch, knowing the risk that in a few minutes she might pull away and never again would I have this same wonderful feeling. Her accelerated heartbeat transmitted through to my hands on her back. She kept her face hidden.

She ignored my question, asking one of her own. “When?”

“Tomorrow morning.”

She jerked away enough to look into my eyes. “So soon? Why so soon? That’s not fair.”

“We’ve talked about this. It’s the right thing to do.”

“I know that. I know, but so soon? Come on, Bruno, can’t we wait a month?”

“It’s better this way.”

She nodded and laid her cheek down on my shoulder. I rocked her gently back and forth as she stroked my hair. After a moment she said, “I smell perfume on you.”

I nodded.

“Did Angelina Jolie come to The Margarite and mistake you for Denzel Washington and give you a big wet kiss?”

I’d made that story up one night not long ago when she’d asked me what had happened at work. Nothing ever happened and I made up stories.

I shook my head ‘no’ and croaked out the words in a half-whisper. Words I did not want to share. “It’s from Barbara Wicks.”

She leaped off my lap, her eyes wide, her mouth agape.

I couldn’t get words to come out, trapped in a roadblock at the top of my throat. I hated more than anything in the world to hurt Marie.

She grabbed a linen napkin from the table and wiped her eyes to see me better. Not good enough, she skipped-hopped over to the wall and turned on the light. I squinted.

She said, “No, you aren’t going back.” She’d put it together just that fast from the name. Why else would Barbara be down here? Marie had always been the sharper of the two of us.

Her expression wrinkled up. “I know what she wants. I saw the news-” More tears. It hurt worse, ripped my guts out.

“I…I saw those poor little girls taken from their homes and I thought…I mean, I know this is selfish, and…and piggish of me, but I thought, ‘I hope Bruno doesn’t see this. He’ll jump on his horse and go galloping off, and no way will I be able to stop him.’”

Her face smoothed out as she shifted to anger. She quick-stepped over, balled a little fist, and socked me as hard as she could in the chest. I sat still.

“You promised me, Bruno. You promised me that after we got down here-” She broke down and brought her hands up to cover her face. She was torn, I could see it. She couldn’t live with herself if she talked me out of going and something worse happened to Sandy Williams and Elena Cortez, something that could have been avoided had I intervened. The truly sad part, we both knew, was that whether I went or not, something bad was likely to happen to those little girls. Historical statistics were not on their side. Now all that mattered was how much I could tip the balance in their favor.

“It’s not what you think. I’m the only one who can help these little girls.”

She pointed her finger at me and opened her mouth to speak.

I raised my hand. “Wait, please wait and let me explain.” I swallowed hard. I didn’t like reliving the story of the Mabry family and the house that bled. In all the years after the event, I’d never told anyone the story except Marie. One hot summer night while lying with Marie on damp sheets, my need to share overwhelmed my need to keep the images, pain, and emotions buried. Her hot body up against mine, her head resting on my shoulder, I told her the entire story. Her breath increased, her body tensed. When I finished, she said, “I am so very sorry, Bruno.” She, too, had been outraged by the brutality, the cold insensitivity. The evil. We never spoke of the event again.

“I have to go, because it’s Jonas Mabry who has the children. He took them in order to get me to come back to the States.”

Her hand flew to her mouth. Her eyes went wide as tears filled them again.

I pulled her into me. After a time, still in the embrace, I asked, “You hungry? I am.” I really wasn’t, but wanted her to eat something.

“You’re wanted,” she said in a quieter tone. “The odds are not in your favor. They catch you, I’ll never see you again.”

“Baby, I have to go. I’ll be all right. I promise you, it’ll be all right. No one’s going to catch me. I’ll get in, find out what this is all about, find the two little girls, and get right out. One day, two at the most.”

She wouldn’t look at me and pulled away. She plopped down on the chair, tears streaming down her cheeks, her eyes aflame with anger. A reaction to be expected under the circumstances.

“What about the next time? Huh? What about the next time, Bruno ‘the Bad Boy’ Johnson?” For emphasis, she’d used an old street moniker the guys on the Violent Crimes Team had labeled me.

I spoke in a lowered voice, words I wanted to be true more than anything else. “There won’t be a next time, because there is only one Jonas Mabry.”

She searched my eyes for truth and nodded.

I went over and turned the light off. In the dim light from the candles, I went back and picked her up the same as I would a child, blew out the candles, and carried her to the bedroom. I was hungry for her, all of her. The ache I would have being away from her was already there. I wanted to savor every second of our time together.

I laid her gently on the bed and kissed her long and deep. I unbuttoned the top button to her blouse and she grabbed my hand. She got up on her knees and pulled my shirt off over my head, kissing my neck and chest. I slipped her blouse over her head and unhooked her bra so her breasts fell loose. We lay down, went slow, stretched time, tried to pretend we could make it last forever.

The next morning, Marie put on a fake smile as she loaded a bag of Wally’s clothes and toys and books. Dad and Marie turned away to wipe tears as they said good-bye. The kids were confused, but most of all, four-year-old Wally. Kids are so intuitive .