Robert Crais - Indigo Slam

Teri looked around the room. This had been her mother's room, just as this house had been her mother's house, as it had been Teri's for as long as she could remember. There was one closet and two windows looking toward the alley at the back of the house and a queen-size bed and a dresser and a chest. Her mother had slept in this bed and kept her clothes in this chest and looked at herself in that dresser mirror. Her mother had breathed the air in this room, and her warmth had spread through the sheets and made them toasty and perfect for snuggling when Teri was little. Her mother would read to her. Her mother would sing 'Edelweiss.' Teri closed her eyes and tried to feel the warmth, but couldn't. Teri had a hard time remembering her mother as a living being; she remembered a face in pictures, and now they were leaving. Good-bye, Mama.

Teri hugged her father's raincoat tight; just as she turned to leave the room she heard the thump in the backyard. It was a dull, heavy sound against the back wall of the house, distinct against the rain. She looked through the rear window and saw a black shadow move through the rain, and that's when Mr. Peterson stepped silently into the door. 'Teri, I want you to go to the front door, now, please.' His voice was low and urgent.

Teri said, 'I saw something in the yard.'

Peterson pulled her past a third man in a still-dripping raincoat. The man who'd been loading the boxes. He held his right hand straight down along his leg and Teri saw that he had a gun.

Her father and Charles and Winona were standing with Mr. Jasper. Her father's eyes looked wild, as if at any moment they might pop out right onto the floor. Jasper said, 'C'mon, Dan, it's probably nothing.'

Her father clutched Jasper's arm. 'I thought you said they didn't know. You said we were safe.'

Jasper pried Clark Hewitt's hand away as Mr. Peterson said, 'I'll check it out while you get 'em in the van.' He looked worried. 'Jerry! Let's move!'

The third man, Jerry, reappeared and picked up Winona. 'C'mon, honey. You're with me.'

Jasper said, 'I'll check it with you.' Jasper was breathing fast.

Mr. Peterson pushed Jasper toward the door. 'Get 'em in the van. Now!'

Jasper said, 'It's probably nothing.'

Charles said, 'What's happening?'

A loud cracking came from the kitchen, as if the back door was being pried open, and then Peterson was pushing them hard through the door, yelling, 'Do it, Jasper! Take 'em!' and her father moaned, a kind of faraway wail that made Winona start crying. Jerry bolted toward the street, carrying Winona in one arm and pulling Teri's father with the other, shouting something that Teri could not understand. Jasper said, 'Oh, holy shit!' and tossed Charles across his shoulder like a laundry bag. He grabbed Teri hard by the arm, so hard that she had never felt such pain, and she thought her flesh and bone would surely be crushed into a meaty red pulp like you see in those Freddie Krueger movies, and then Jasper was pulling her out into the rain as, somewhere in the back of the house, she heard Mr. Peterson shout, very clearly, 'Federal Marshals!' and then there were three sharp BOOMS that didn't sound anything like thunder, not anything at all.

The rain fell like a heavy cloak across Teri's shoulders and splattered up from the sidewalk to wet her legs as they ran for the van. Charles was kicking his legs, screaming, 'I don't have my raincoat! I left it inside!'

The driver had the window down, oblivious to the rain, eyes darting as Jerry pushed first Winona and then Clark through the side door. The van's engine screamed to life.

Jasper ran to the rear of the van and shoved Teri inside. Clark was holding Winona, huddled together between the boxes and the driver's seat. Winona was still crying, her father bug-eyed and panting. Two more BOOMS came from the house, loud and distinct even with the rain hammering in through the open doors and windows. The driver twisted toward them, shouting, 'What the fuck's happening?!'

Jerry yanked a short black shotgun from behind the seat. 'I'm with Peterson! Get 'em outta here!'

Jasper clawed out his gun, trying to scramble back out into the rain, saying, 'I'm coming with you!'

Jerry pushed Jasper back into the van. 'You get these people outta here, goddamnit! You get 'em out now! ' Jerry slammed the door in Jasper's face and the driver was screaming, 'What happened?! Where's Peterson?'

Jasper seemed torn, but then he screamed back, 'Drive! Get the hell outta here!' He crushed past the cardboard boxes to the van's rear window, cursing over and over, 'Always some shit! Always goddamn bullshit!'

The van slid sideways from the curb as it crabbed for traction. The driver shouted into some kind of radio and Jasper cursed and Teri's father started crying like Winona, and Charles was crying, too. Teri thought that maybe even Federal Marshal Jasper was crying, but she couldn't be sure because he was watching out the van's square rear window.

Teri felt her eyes well with tears, but then, very clearly, she told herself: You will not cry. And she didn't. The tears went away, and Teri felt calm. She was soaked under her raincoat, and she realized that the floor was wet from rain that had blown in when the doors were open. The eight cardboard boxes that held the sum total of their lives were wet, too.

Her father said, 'What happened back there? You said we were safe! You said they wouldn't know!'

Jasper glanced back at her father. Jasper looked scared, too. 'I don't know. Somehow they found out.'

Teri's father shouted, 'Well, that's just great! That's wonderful!' His voice was very high. 'Now they're gonna kill us!'

Jasper went back to staring out the window. 'They're not going to kill you.'

" That's what you people said before !' Her father's voice was a shriek.

Jasper turned again and stared at Teri's father for the longest time before he said, 'Peterson is still back there, Mr. Hewitt.'

Teri watched her brother and sister and father, huddled together and crying, and then she knew what she had to do. She crawled across the wet, tumbled boxes and along the van's gritty bed and went to her family. She found a place for herself between Winona and her father, and looked up into her father's frightened eyes. His face was pale and drawn, and the thin wet hair matted across his forehead made him look lost. She said, 'Don't be scared, Daddy.'

Clark Hewitt whimpered, and Teri could feel him shivering. It was July, and the rain was warm, but he wasn't shivering because he was cold. Teri said, 'I won't let anyone hurt us, and I won't let anything happen to you. I promise.'

Clark Hewitt nodded without looking at her. She held him tightly, and felt his shaking ease.

The van careened through the night, hidden by the darkness and rain.

It was plant day in the City of Angels. On plant day I gather the plants that I keep in my office and take them out onto the little balcony I have overlooking West Los Angeles, where I clean and water and feed them, and then spend the remainder of the afternoon wondering why my plants are more yellow than green. A friend who knows plants once told me that I was giving them too much water, so I cut their rations in half. When the plants turned soft as well as yellow, another friend said that I was still drowning them, so I cut their water in half again. The plants died. I bought new plants and stopped asking other people's advice. Yellow plants are my curse.

I was sneering at all the yellow when Lucy Chenier said, 'I don't think I'll be able to get away until much later, Elvis. I'm afraid we've lost the afternoon.'

'Oh?' I was using a new cordless phone to talk to Lucille Chenier from the balcony as I worked on the plants. It was in the low eighties, the air quality was good, and a cool breeze rolled up Santa Monica Boulevard to swirl through the open French doors into my office. Cindy, the woman in the office next to mine, saw me on the balcony and made a little finger wave. Cindy was wearing a bright white dress shirt tied at the belly and a full-length sarong skirt. I was wearing Gap jeans, a silk Tommy Bahama shirt, and a Bianchi shoulder holster replete with Dan Wesson.38-caliber revolver. The shoulder holster was new, so I was wearing it around the office to break in the leather.