Linwood Barclay - Bad Guys

“Let’s get on the road first, then I’ll call.”

“No,” I said, with more forcefulness than I knew I had. “Now.”

“Fine,” he said, and got out his phone. “This is a huge pain. Now that Barbie’s got to prove himself, he’s got all these little plans and procedures. Fucking intercoms and phone-ins and-”

Someone picked up. “Yeah, it’s me, checking in, talk to you in thirty.”

As we walked back to the car he said, “Mayhew must have already made his deal. He’s got his money, and he’s getting out of the country.”

“Am I still driving?” I asked, sounding positive, like I was happy to help, but mostly wanting to make sure Trimble didn’t see the gun down by the accelerator pedal.

“Yeah, sure,” he said, waving his hand.

Once we were both in the car and back on the road, Trimble shook his head. “Man oh man, things are not unfolding the way they should.”

“What?”

He kept shaking his head, made a fist and pounded it repeatedly on the top of the dashboard. I hoped he wouldn’t set off the passenger-side airbag. “We made a big mistake back there. I should have killed her.”

“No, you shouldn’t have killed her.”

“Oh man,” he said, putting his fist back to his mouth. “I’ve really fucked up this time.”

“You couldn’t kill her. There was no way you could kill her.”

“Don’t you see how this is going to play out? Eddie, he’s on borrowed time, it’s all over once Bullock’s had a chance to talk to him. And then when the cops come to interview her, you think she’s not going to talk? That she’s not going to be able to provide a description of me?”

I swallowed. “And me.”

Trimble waved his hand dismissively. At first, I thought that simply meant he cared more about his own skin than mine. But then I realized it was more likely that my being picked out of a lineup by Mrs. Mayhew was never going to happen. I was as unlikely to see the sun come up as Eddie.

“Fuck,” he whispered under his breath. “Fuck.”

“You’ve never had to kill anyone for Bullock, have you?” I asked. “You’ve done lots for him, but never that.”

His silence was as good as a yes.

“So there’s at least one line you have trouble crossing,” I said. “But if you’re not willing to kill for him, how can you stand by and let him kill others? Because that’s what he’s going to do. To Eddie. To me. And to Angie.”

“That’s not for sure.”

I almost laughed. “Well, that’s comforting.”

“I shouldn’t have left her alive back there.”

“I’m not turning around,” I said. “If you tell me to turn around and take you back there so you can kill that woman, I’ll run us off a bridge. I’ll floor it and run us into a tree. But I won’t go back.”

“What about your daughter?” Trimble asked. Not in a threatening way, more like he was just interested.

“I don’t know. Maybe I’ll try to smash your side of the car, so you’re dead, and I survive, long enough to call the cops, the good ones, see if they can save Angie.”

“Oh, that’s a good plan,” Trimble said. “A carefully engineered car wreck.”

He shook his head a couple more times, stared straight ahead out the window. “God,” he said under his breath. “This is one very deep hole to crawl out of.”

We got back onto the expressway, but instead of driving all the way back into the city, took the highway that skirted the city’s north side and went past the airport.

“Let me ask you this,” I said. “All that shit about his dead sister and weird mother aside, what kind of guy has a Barbie collection like that?”

Trimble must have waited a good ten seconds before he responded. “Fucking nutjob, that’s what,” he said.

We drove awhile longer, neither of us saying anything. Then Trimble said, “Have you been to see Lawrence, in the hospital?”

“Yeah.”

Trimble paused. “How is he?”

“He’s bad.”

And then the car went quiet again.

Nearly half an hour after we left the Mayhew house, we pulled into the parking lot of the airport Ramada. I pointed out the time to Trimble, and he put in a call to Bullock as required to protect Angie. The hotel was dead, no cars going in or out, no one in the lobby. We parked around the side, but it was after midnight, and every access was locked except the main doors out front.

“Just walk in like you own the place, like you’re a guest here,” Trimble said. “Head straight for the elevators.”

We walked through the lobby, the two employees behind the desk paying no attention to us. Once we were at the bank of elevators, we were out of their sight, and Trimble said, “He’s in room 1023. At least he better be.”

The doors opened and we stepped inside. Trimble found the button marked “ 10” and tapped it with his index finger. The doors parted, and Trimble scanned the markers indicating where the rooms were. Suites 1020 to 1034 were down the left hall, so we bore left.

We stood in front of 1023 and Trimble rapped on the door. “Mr. Mayhew?” he called out, friendly like. He rapped a bit harder. “Mr. Mayhew?” He stood right up close to the door, so if Eddie looked through the peephole, he’d wouldn’t see much more than a couple of nostrils.

We heard some stirring inside, then a muffled voice at the door. “Hello?”

“Mr. Mayhew?”

“Yes? Yes? Who is it? Yes?”

“I’m from the front desk. We thought we should tell you, there were some suspicious-looking men asking for you, and we thought you should know.”

“Oh God, oh my God, oh, oh, oh my God,” he said.

“We don’t like to see our guests have any trouble, so we told them you’d already checked out.”

“Oh God, really? You really did that? Oh, thank you so much. Thank you. Oh God, thank you so much.”

“No problem, sir.”

“What did they look like? Did you see them? Did you see what they looked like? I mean, I guess you did, if they were here. You saw them?”

Trimble looked me up and down, glanced at himself. “Two men, white, one in a suit, the other more casually dressed.”

“And they left? They’re gone? They’ve gone away?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Oh my God, that’s good. That’s good. Listen, stay there a moment, I’d like to give you something. Just stay there a sec, I’m getting you a tip.”

“Oh, really, that’s not necessary,” Trimble said.

“No no, just give me a minute, I’ll get you something for your trouble, you did a wonderful thing, a terrific thing,” he said, his voice fading back into the room. Trimble got ready. He took a step back from the door, so he’d be able to take a run at it. Then we heard the deadbolt slip back, the chain slide off its track, and then the door began to open.

“And if they come back, there’s more where this came from-”

Trimble hit the door like a freight train, propelling Eddie back into the room and onto the floor. The door must have caught his toes, at least on one foot, because he was already holding them in both hands, screaming, as we came in.

Trimble had his gun out and pressed up against Eddie’s forehead. “Stop your whimpering.”

“My toes, man! Oh my God, my toes! They’re all broken! You’ve broken my toes!”

“We’ll call a toe truck,” Trimble said, glancing at me and grinning. “I haven’t used that joke since I was six.”

Eddie eyes were squeezed shut, and he was rocking back and forth on his butt, still holding on to his foot. He was wearing nothing but a pair of green boxers with a tear in the crotch, and I looked away, not really interested in a peek at his luggage. He was thin and kind of bony, his back was splattered with pimples and blotches, and his short, curly hair was wet, like he’d been in the shower recently.