Robert Crais - Free Fall

Eric Dees took the tape from Pete Garcia, then grinned at me. “Sonofabitch if you didn’t cause some trouble.”

I said, “How’d you figure it, Dees?”

“You put in eighteen years on the job, you make a few friends.” As he spoke he put the tape on the floor, then stepped on it. He took a can of Ronson lighter fluid out of his pocket, squirted the fluid on the cassette, then lit it. Once it was going, he used more of the fluid. “They heard the talk, and they let me know there’s an investigation going down. They said there’s something about a tape, so I check and find out the tape is gone.” The fire was going pretty good, so he put away the fluid and came over and stood close to Mark Thurman. “You fucked up bad, Mark. You should’ve just let it sit.”

Mark Thurman said, “Jesus Christ, Eric, we were wrong.” The smell of the burning plastic was strong.

Riggens said, “Hey, we went through that. We agreed. You agreed. You gave your word.”

Thurman shook his head. “It was wrong. We did the bad thing together, and then we covered it up together. We should’ve stood up together, Floyd. Doesn’t that bother you?”

“Going to fuckin’ jail bothers me more!” Riggens was yelling. “Losing the job and the pension and getting raked through the papers bothers me a helluva lot more!”

Garcia was pacing near the doors, glancing out like he expected something.

Dees said, “You think I like this? You think I want it?” He looked at the fire. It was already dying away. “You should’ve trusted me, Mark. I was going to work it out. I’m still going to work it out.”

Riggens said, “Fuckin’ A.”

I said, “How, Dees? You going to bring Charles Lewis Washington back to life?”

Riggens screamed, “Fuck you. With no tape, no one can prove anything. So maybe you showed it. Big fuckin’ deal. Without the tape it’s just hearsay, and we can ride that out.”

I nodded. “Unless there’s a copy.”

Garcia stopped the pacing and looked at me. Pinkworth shifted behind Eric Dees and Riggens sort of let his mouth open. Dees said, “I’m willing to bet that you haven’t made a copy. I figure you take the tape, you’re thinking about cutting a deal, why do you need a dupe? You got a dupe, why make a big deal out of holding out? You’d just say, okay, here’s the tape. You see?” Garcia was looking from Dees to me, Dees to me.

I spread my hands. “But it’s still a bet. You bet, sometimes you lose.”

Dees nodded. “Yeah, but probably not this time.”

Guess you didn’t earn command of a REACT team if you weren’t smart. Of course, if you were smart, you didn’t get yourself into a fix like this, either.

Mark Thurman said, “Okay, the tape is gone and you’re going to work things out. Let us out of here.”

Dees shook his head. “Not yet.”

Jennifer said, “You said if you got the tape back, you’d let us go. You said that.”

“I know.”

The crunching sound of tires over gravel came from outside, and Akeem D’Muere’s jet black Monte Carlo eased between the fences and came toward the concession stand. Garcia said, “He’s here.” Pinkworth and Riggens went to the doors.

Eric Dees took out his 9 mm Beretta service gun and Mark Thurman said, “What the hell is D’Muere doing here, Eric?”

Floyd Riggens turned back from the doors. “Akeem’s pissed off about all the trouble. He wants to make sure it don’t happen again.”

Jennifer said, “What does that mean?”

I met Eric Dees’s eyes. “It means that Akeem wants to kill us, and Eric said okay.”

Eric Dees said, “Floyd. Pink. Get on them.”

Riggens drew his gun and Pinkworth worked the slide on his pump gun. Pete Garcia looked like he was about to pee in his pants. Jennifer Sheridan said, “Oh, shit.”

Thurman shouted, “Are you nuts? Have you lost your fuckin’ mind?”

I took two steps forward, putting myself closer to Riggens and Pinkworth. “You can’t live it out, Dees. We come up dead, they’re going to know. They’ll backtrack the case and put it in bed with you.”

Dees nodded, but he nodded the way you nod when you’re not really thinking about it. “We’ll see.”

Thurman said, “Dees.”

Eric Dees went outside and walked toward the Monte Carlo. The front passenger door opened and two black guys slid out with sawed-off Mossberg shotguns. They said something to Dees and the three of them came toward the concession stand.

Thurman yelled, “Jesus Christ, Riggens. Pete.”

Pete Garcia said, “Shut up. Just shut up.”

Pike moved across the cloudy glass at the back side of the concession stand. Everyone was looking toward the front, at Eric Dees with the hitters, so nobody saw him but me.

Eric Dees and the two Eight-Deuce hitters came in through the double doors, Dees squinting from the bright desert sun and the hitters stone-faced behind heavy-framed Wayfarer sunglasses. The hitters held their shotguns loosely, right hands on the pistol grips, left hands cradling the slides. Nothing like being comfortable with your work.

I said, “Think it through, Dees. It’s falling apart around you.”

Dees made a little gesture at Pinkworth and Riggens. “Pink, you and Riggens take off.” He glanced at Garcia. “Come on, Pete. We’re outta here.”

Thurman shook his head, giving incredulous, still not believing that this could be happening. “You’re just giving us to these guys?”

Riggens said, “Yeah.”

Riggens and Pinkworth holstered their guns and went to the door. Garcia wiped his hands on his thighs and hopped around some more, but he didn’t move to leave. “I can’t believe we’re doing this, Eric. We can’t go along with this.”

Riggens stopped. Pinkworth was already outside, but he stopped, too, when he realized that Riggens wasn’t with him.

Garcia looked at Dees, then Riggens. “We can’t do this. This is fuckin’ nuts.”

Riggens went red in the face. “What’d you say?”

Pinkworth came back and stood in the door.

Riggens screamed, “You losing your fuckin’ nut? We got a lot at stake here.”

Garcia screamed back at him. “We know these people. This is fuckin’ conspiracy. Fuckin’ cold-blooded murder.”

The taller of the two hitters said, “Shit.” He racked the slide on his shotgun.

Dees said, “It’s too late to back out, Pete. This is the only chance we have. You know that. Come on. All you have to do is let it happen.”

Pete Garcia said, “No, Eric,” and reached under his shirt for his gun. When he did, the tall hitter lifted his shotgun and the shotgun went off with a sound that was as sharp and loud as a seismic shock. Pete Garcia was kicked back into the counter and then Joe Pike stepped into the glass doors at the back of the shack and fired his shotgun twice. The milky glass erupted inward and the tall hitter flipped backwards. Dees and Riggens came out with their pieces and fired at Pike, but Pike wasn’t there anymore. The short hitter ran under their fire toward the broken doors, boomed his shotgun into the remaining glass, then looked out. “Muthuhfuckuh gone.”

Something scuffed on the roof, and the short hitter let off another volley through the ceiling.

Warren Pinkworth ran for the blue sedan. Beyond him, the Monte Carlo kicked up a cloud of rocks and sand and fishtailed across the berms. Eric Dees dove out through the double doors and shot at something on the roof, but whatever he shot at he didn’t hit. He said, “Shit.”

I pushed Jennifer Sheridan down, and when I did, Mark Thurman went for Floyd Riggens. I yelled, “No,” and Floyd Riggens shot him. Thurman spun to the left and sat down and Jennifer Sheridan screamed. She clawed past me, baring her teeth as if she’d like to tear out Riggens’s throat.