Marcus Sakey - The Blade Itself

Evan stepped away, breath coming hard, blood trickling from his nostrils. For a moment they eyed each other, glares hard, and then Evan gave a little laugh. “So the dumb cooze found you, huh?” He wiped the blood from his face with the back of his right hand in a childish gesture. “Thought she might. I figured that whole thing about a shower was bullshit.”

Danny took air in long gulps, willing the pain to die. It took more strength than he expected to stay propped up on one elbow. He kept an eye on Evan, watching his boots, trying to prepare for another attack. “She was scared.”

“Yeah, well, I’m not going back to Stateville over some fat-ass citizen.”

Danny reached deep, trying to picture a calm place, an underground lake, cavernous and cool and dark, where the pain was far away. When he had it, he pushed himself up to his knees, and then his feet. Evan backed away, on his guard.

“It was a stupid move.”

“Why?” Evan sneered. “Because it wasn’t part of your plan? I got news for you, Danny-boy. I don’t fit into your plans.”

Danny nodded, his vision grainy, his head sore. “I’m learning that.”

The remark seemed to please Evan, like it had been a compliment. Like he hadn’t understood the real message. “About time.” He lowered his fists, then reached into his jacket to fumble for his cigarettes.

“Evan. This changes things.” He straightened his back, feeling the vertebrae pop, each of them a sharp twinge. “We need to rethink.”

“Nothing,” Evan paused, lit a smoke, blew a thin stream of gray, “changes.”

“We’re talking murder. The police are going to be looking for you.”

Evan shrugged. “So what? Tomorrow we’ll have a million bucks.”

Could he really be so cold about it?

You know the answer to that one, kid. You learned it the hard way. Don’t ever forget it again.

Still. “I know you don’t like to think about it this way, but hear me out. The smart play is for you to leave tonight. You killed this guy in a parking lot, right? You know how much evidence you probably left? Fingerprints, footprints, tire tracks, his blood, your blood. This isn’t a pawnshop we’re knocking over, man. You stick around, they will find you. And if we’re sitting on the kid at the same time, we’ll both go down. Maybe for good.”

Evan stared at him, a sneer on his face. “Ahh, Danny.” He took a long draw on the cigarette, shook his head. “Come with me.” He turned and started to walk toward the trailer.

Danny didn’t move. “What for?”

Evan had a hand on the door. He stopped and turned around with exaggerated patience. “I want to show you something.”

Every nerve in Danny’s body tingled. Something in Evan’s easy manner scared the hell out of him. It could be a trap. Evan didn’t need his help any longer. He didn’t think the guy would just shoot him casually, but he could hardly be sure.

He pictured Karen. If something went wrong now, she’d never know the truth.

Evan held the door wider and smiled. “After you.”

On the other hand, it could be nothing. If he wanted to get out of this, to see Karen again, to try and find a happy solution, he didn’t have much choice. His bruised face throbbing with every beat of his heart, Danny stepped into the trailer, his ears straining for warnings.

The television lit the interior in flickering shades of blue and white. Cardboard packages from microwave dinners littered the counters. The air smelled dank. Tommy moved on the couch, struggling to sit up. His hands and feet had been duct taped to the arms of the couch. There was a strip of tape over his mouth, and another across his eyes. What skin was visible shone pale white and freckled.

“You taped him?” Danny couldn’t keep the disgust from his voice.

Evan just smiled as he walked over to the couch.

Then he pulled the gun from his belt and pressed the muzzle against Tommy’s forehead.

It happened so fast Danny couldn’t believe it. One minute no gun; the next, gun. The kid’s struggles ended immediately, replaced by a soft whimpering like a kicked puppy.

Horror and adrenaline coursed through Danny. His fists clenched, and he could hear the roar of his heart. He took a half step forward, and then caught himself as Evan cocked the hammer back.

“Now you see. Now you’re starting to get it. All that crap you were spinning out there? You were right about one thing.” Evan smiled at him, a mocking look. The cold light from the television carved his features from granite. “This isn’t a pawnshop.”

“Wait-”

“No. Enough talk.” Tommy whimpered as Evan pushed into him with the gun. “It’s time you understood something, amigo. You walked out on me once. It won’t happen again. Not without consequences.” Evan pushed the gun harder, the kid burrowing into the cushions to get away. Danny could see sweat marks on the fabric.

Then, holding a cocked pistol to a twelve-year-old’s forehead, Evan winked.

Everything had gone wrong.

And there was nothing Danny could do about it.

Everything hurt.

It had been a lot of years since his last fight, and he’d forgotten the layers of aches that followed a serious scrap, the symphonic balance of pain: a dull soreness across his body, a wobbly necked pounding in his head, a blood-warm throbbing at his swelling left eye, a sandpaper raggedness on his knuckles. None of it was overwhelming, but it all put him in mind of his age. When he’d been eighteen, man, you could hit him with a locomotive and he’d just bounce. But bodies in their thirties weren’t built for street fighting.

Worse than any of the physical pain, though, was the image seared in his mind. The gun appearing in Evan’s hand like magic, the slow-motion effect of him leaning forward to press it against Tommy’s forehead. The boy’s little whimper, a sound he knew would forever haunt his dark moments. The feeling of being utterly trapped, knowing the right thing, wanting the right thing, and doing the wrong.

After Evan had made his point, seen the horror, the capitulation on Danny’s face, he’d lowered the gun. Tommy had fallen back on the sofa, panic breaths whistling furiously through his nostrils. Danny had considered jumping Evan then, but the guy kept the gun out. Never explicitly threatening, more like it just happened to be in his hand.

“Don’t look so worried,” Evan had said, as he led the way outside. “Everything’s under control. I’ll get Debbie back here to babysit. Tomorrow we call Dick, tell him where to meet us. Before the kids are done trick-or-treating, we’ll have a million in cash, and this will all be over.”

Danny had nodded, not believing, knowing now that it would never be over, that he’d finally woken into his recurring nightmare. And even so, trying to control the damage. An engineer on the Hindenburg . “I’ve got the meet location picked.”

“Where?”

“Union Station.” He’d told Evan the logic, leaving out the hope that doing it in public would keep him calm.

Evan had shrugged, scratched his neck with the barrel of the gun. “Whatever. That’ll work.” Then he’d dismissed Danny with a wave of his cigarette.

Now, back on his own block, Danny stepped out of the truck and closed the door quietly. The air had grown chillier, with a breeze that blew through his shirt to cut at the skin beneath. His street radiated the easy calm of a place where monsters only came out on Halloween. He shouldered his bag and started down the sidewalk, trying not to see Tommy’s face in every shadow.

As he passed the weathered steps of his neighbor’s porch, a high-pitched shriek burst from the graystone. The scream gave way to an evil-genius laugh, and a strobe flashed on in the bay window, where a medical skeleton loomed amid drugstore cobwebs. After a moment the recorded sound track shut off, but harsh white light kept splashing up every few seconds. Danny stood in front of the window, watching as the beam flared, died, flared, died. In the periods of darkness, the streetlights were enough to turn the window into a dark mirror, and within it he could see himself reflected. A normal-looking guy with a few scrapes on his face and the beginnings of a shiner under one eye. Other than the bruises, not the kind of face that earned a second look.