Макс Коллинз - Spree

Fisher was a good man — clueing him in would be a risk, but a minimal one; Nolan knew from past experience that Fisher shared Winch’s distaste for violence, and Comfort’s kidnaping of Sherry to coerce Nolan’s participation would not likely sit well with the slightly stuffy electronics whiz.

And some light, however faint, was showing up down at the end of the tunnel. Jon had gotten a piece of something. In more ways than one.

Jon had showed up at the restaurant just after midnight and Nolan took him into the cement-walled back room where Nolan’s desk and file cabinet kept company with boxes of liquor and food. The kid seemed dazed, confused.

“What the hell happened to you?” Nolan had demanded. The kid hadn’t checked in with Nolan in hours.

“I couldn’t use the phone in the van,” Jon explained, breathlessly, “because I had company in there, till just a few minutes ago.”

And Jon had told him about Cindy Lou Comfort, who turned out, of all things, to be a groupie of sorts for bands like Jon’s; she’d even gone to see Jon’s band on occasion, and knew him from it.

“I was in the van with her for two hours,” Jon said. “I didn’t find out where Sherry is exactly, but some of what I did learn is going to be helpful.”

Jon filled him in, including the news that Sherry wasn’t at the nearby Holiday Inn: she was somewhere on the Illinois side, being watched by Lyle.

“You’ve narrowed the state down, anyway,” Nolan said, darkly.

“She’s kind of an innocent kid,” Jon said, “for a little slut. I get the idea she’s only vaguely aware of what her father does. She’s also having some problems with him — she made some vague references that I think may mean he’s hitting on her.”

“Hitting on her?”

“Sexually,” Jon said, shrugging, embarrassed.

“He’s a class act, our Cole. She doesn’t know who you are?”

“She knows my name is Jon and I used to play keyboards for the Nodes. That’s it. She’s a troubled kid — she’s thinking about hopping a bus to California, to go live with some friend of hers out there.”

“So is every other teenage girl in the Midwest.”

“I suppose. But how many of ’em have a homelife with Cole and Lyle Comfort in it?”

“We could snatch her.”

“What?”

“We could snatch her and swap her for Sherry.”

“Jeez, Nolan—”

“If you’re thinking that would make us no better than Comfort himself, kid, you’re dead bang full of shit. On our worst day we’re better than that evil worthless cocksucker, who started this, remember. He grabbed Sherry, so all bets are off!”

Jon did something unusual: he touched Nolan’s arm.

“I’m with you,” Jon said. “Whatever it takes.”

Nolan’s hands were shaking; he looked at them shaking and shook his head disgustedly. “Goddamn coffee,” he said.

Now it was just after two-thirty and everybody was here, most of them sitting at that long table — including Nolan, who had taken Comfort’s position at its head; Comfort sat to Nolan’s left, on the corner of the table, as if almost sitting at the head reminded everybody he was really in charge — just deferring to Nolan for this one planning session. Jon again sat off to the side at a small table.

But the big change was the presence of Lyle Comfort, who sat next to his father; Lyle was a handsome, well-groomed kid in expensive clothes — he wore a rust-colored leather jacket and a shirt with a faint yellow and gray puzzle pattern, had curly brown hair and brown eyes and a tan and a blank fashion-model expression. He looked like a city kid, on first glance, but if you looked hard, Lyle was a dumb-as-a-post country kid, who learned how to dress from TV and magazines.

The Leeches were again lined up on one side of the table, but Fisher was sitting on their side, tonight, down at the far end, still with a shirt pocket full of pens and gizmos, still with a notepad in front of him — open to a page of notes he’d already taken. Neither the slight, easygoing Winch nor the dour, basset-faced Dooley, sitting next to Lyle Comfort, gave anything away; they seemed completely at ease — what they knew about Nolan’s situation, they kept close to the vest. Nolan’s favorite kind of people: pros.

Tonight the Leeches had taken their stocking caps off, and spoiled their uniformity: one was sandy-haired, one was brown-haired, the other was brown-haired balding. They were sitting there putting the beer away pretty good. Nolan had relented and put two pitchers of beer on the table — this meet would take a while, and a nod to sociality wouldn’t hurt.

Lyle Comfort’s presence here, however, was disturbing.

If Lyle was here, who was watching Sherry?

Before the meet began, Nolan cornered Cole Comfort and put a hand on his shoulder and said, “Nice to have your son with us tonight, Cole.”

Comfort nodded, not knowing what Nolan was getting at.

“Who’s minding the store?” Nolan asked Comfort.

Now Comfort got it. “Never you mind,” he said.

Nolan whispered in Comfort’s ear. “If she’s dead, so are you.”

Comfort pulled away, shaken, nervous. “She’s fine. Don’t talk about that here.”

Nolan laughed harshly. “Here? Meeting here at all is moronic, meeting at the place we plan to hit in twenty-four hours. Less than twenty-four hours.”

“We’re here,” Comfort said. “Let’s have our meet.”

“You know, if the cops prowl the parking lot, this will make two nights in a row that pickup of yours and that pimpmobile of the Leeches’ll be out in front of my restaurant in the wee hours.”

The Leeches drove a yellow Camaro with gaudy racing stripes. Very inconspicuous — if this were Tijuana.

“You said the cops don’t prowl the mall,” Comfort said, irritably.

“My information is that they haven’t been lately, yes. But that information was casually obtained. We didn’t stake out the lot like we should have, seeing if they are prowling, and if so, what the pattern is, if any.”

“Aw shut up,” Comfort said. He prodded Nolan with a pointing finger. “And leave this negative horseshit behind, when you’re running through your plans, front of the others.”

“Don’t poke me, Cole,” Nolan said.

“I’ll do what I fuckin’ well please.”

“I’m sure you will. But I’d ask you to keep in mind, I’ve been upholding my end of the bargain. I’m helping you heist your mall — my mall — and I’m giving it my best shot.”

“Yeah, yeah, I know you are. I appreciate that.”

“I expect Sherry back — unharmed — and my full share. Jon’s, too.”

“We been through all that...”

“Just so we understand each other.”

Now Nolan was talking while the seated group studied photocopies of a map he’d made of the mall.

“The stores with the X’s,” Nolan said, looking down toward Dooley, “are the ones we’ll need opened, Phil.”

“No problem,” the locksmith said.

Comfort said, “Were you out to Brady Eighty today, Phil?”

“Yeah. I walked the mall. They use those sliding glass doors that lock together; a few have metal cage doors. In either case, picking the locks is no big deal.”

Nolan asked, “How long will it take you to open each shop?”

“Five to fifteen minutes.”

A Leech said, “Fifty stores, that’s a lot of time.”

Nolan said, “We won’t be opening fifty stores.”

Comfort scowled at Nolan and slammed a fist on the table and the beer pitchers sloshed. He said, “How many times do I have to say it? We’re looting the whole motherfucker! We’re taking it all!”

“Cole,” Nolan said, smiling tightly, “as much as you may wish to take every spool of thread and Snickers bar and Slinky, we got a finite amount of time, and finite manpower. We got to pick and choose.”