Tim Green - Exact Revenge

“In a way,” I say, thinking of Lester.

The car dips down into a tunnel and we lose sight of the city around us. Bert drinks the next beer on his own, and neither of us says anything until we get out in front of the mansion and we say good night.

When I get to my bedroom, I feel something. A dark figure is tucked into the curtains by the balcony. My heart races and I ease my way over toward the night table. There is a gun in the drawer.

I think of Andre, Russo, Villay, Rangle, and Frank all at once.

“Seth?”

“Helena?” I say, exhaling. I step into the broad strip of light that falls into the bedroom from between the curtains.

She moves into the same light and throws her arms around my shoulders.

“Don’t do that.”

“I saw you and Bert come in,” she says. “Standing in the curtains is lucky for me.”

“I thought you were in Toronto.”

“I was.”

“I thought tomorrow was Boston.”

“It is,” she says, putting her nose in my chest. “Did you miss me?”

“I always miss you.”

“So, you’re glad I’m here?” she asks.

“Always.”

“Is there someone else?” She pulls away and looks up at me.

“Is that why you were watching?” I ask quietly.

“You’re different since we came here,” she says. “There’s something.”

“Work,” I say. “Just work.”

I kiss her and we move toward the bed.

In the middle of the night, my eyes shoot open. I am breathing hard. Helena is wrapped around me and I twist free and sit up, dabbing at the dampness on my upper lip. I saw Villay, twisting in his sheets. I heard him moan. And scream.

It is 3:37. I look at the computer on the desk across the room and I get up and get dressed. I resist the urge to turn on the computer. Instead, I sit out on the balcony, watching the sky above the park change from black to purple to blue while I wait for the day to come.

At 6 a.m., I am in the second-floor dining room, having breakfast with Bert, when my cell phone rings.

“He did it,” says Chuck Lawrence. “It’ll be on the news if you want to see. I waited until now to call. Didn’t want to wake you.”

“What did he do?” I ask. Bert is looking at me.

“Killed the wife,” Lawrence says. “Strangled her. Then went running through the neighborhood in his boxers crying like a baby. I went in as soon as he left and got our stuff out of there. I’ve seen some bad stuff, but… Jesus.”

“Where is he now?”

“They took him straight to Winthrop Hospital,” he says, “that’s where I am. They got him locked up in a rubber room.”

By the time the psychiatrists are finished with their initial assessments and I am able to buy my way into Dean Villay’s rubber room it’s nearly noon. He is lying in the corner wrapped in a straitjacket, sedated. His breathing is shallow and he stares vacantly at the empty wall. His face is sunken and gray and his forehead gleams with a thin sheen of sweat.

His blood-red eyes widen when I kneel and put my face in front of his. The torn pupils are fully dilated, like black stars. I speak in a whisper.

“Do you know who I am?” I say.

His eyes grow wider yet. He nods that he does.

“Cole,” he says in a mutter.

“No,” I say, keeping my voice very low. I put my lips next to his ear. “Look close. Look at my eyes. It’s me… Raymond White. I’m back.”

I look at him again, staring until his face crumples in agony, his eyes locked on mine.

“You can’t be,” he says. “You’re dead.”

His arms begin to squirm inside the canvas straitjacket, making the buckles clink like small spoons. A choking noise bubbles up from his throat. His head starts to shake and jerk from side to side before he explodes into an unending wail.

I put my fingers in my ears and stand up, looking down on him while he twists and shrieks until his throat is torn and an attendant comes in, nervously taking me by the arm and leading me away.

THE WINDSHIELD WIPERS slapped erratically across the cracked glass, making the dark road ahead barely discernible through the rainbow smudge. Andre rubbed the back of his neck, tired from holding it at an angle so he could see out of the one strip that the blade wiped clear. The play in the wheel of the ’72 International Harvester made steering the wet, windy back roads a constant battle.

“Piece of shit ,” he said, stubbing out his Marlboro in the ashtray and slapping the dashboard. In the back was most of the heroin, along with three hundred and sixty thousand dollars in cash. They had dumped some of their smack in Syracuse and gotten rid of a little more outside Utica.

Andre wasn’t going to do anything stupid, though. He knew the best places for him to unload it were up at the border where it would go to Montreal. He wasn’t going to get caught up with another Haitian deal. He was selling only to people he knew. Then, when he had his money, he could go back to New York and check out Seth Cole again to see what else he might have.

“Should have taken that fancy car of yours,” Russo said from the backseat, offering up a nearly empty bottle of Jack Daniel’s.

“Shut the fuck up,” Andre said, swiping the bottle from him and taking a pull. Dani was asleep, curled up on the seat next to him. Like him, she wore jeans and a white tank top T-shirt. He nudged her.

“Whaaat,” she said in a long groan.

“Want some?” he said, nudging her still.

“Fuck off,” she said and pulled her jean jacket up off the floor and over her head.

“Bitch,” Andre said, nudging her with his elbow hard enough in the head to make her sit up and blink. “Have some.”

She took the bottle and tipped it up. Amber liquid dribbled down her chin and she swallowed until it was gone.

“I love a girl that swallows,” Andre said, and she cuffed him playfully on the back of the head.

“Where’d you find this piece of shit, anyway?” Andre asked Russo, looking at his ugly mug in the rearview mirror. “The junkyard?”

“Got it for four hundred dollars,” Russo said, frowning. “So I don’t know what you expect. You better believe I’ll be buying myself a Mercedes as soon as we get back to civilization. Hey, what are we gonna drink now? There’s no liquor stores open.”

Instead of answering, Andre focused on an all-night gas station up ahead. He pulled in and handed Russo a hundred-dollar bill.

“Go get a case of something good. Michelob or something. And ask them if there’s a decent place to get some rest around here.”

“There ain’t no Ritz-Carltons,” Russo said, hopping out. “I can tell you that.”

“He’s an asshole,” Dani said in a slurred voice when he was gone. She was staring straight ahead.

Andre looked up through the smeared windshield at the bright green and yellow of the BP sign and in a detached voice said, “I know.”

“Why’d we even bring that ugly bastard?” she asked. “He gives me the creeps. Why are we riding in this piece of shit?”

“This is America, honey,” he said. “I want to see how the real people live.”

“You’re talking funny.”

“I been talking funny for a month,” he said. “Now, why don’t you give me a kiss.”

“He’s coming.”

“So what,” Andre said, grabbing the soft part of her thigh and squeezing. “Maybe we’ll let him watch tonight.”

“You’re sick,” she said, and licked his neck.

“I think you’d like that,” he said, and swirled his own tongue in her ear.

The rear door opened. Russo slipped in, brushing the rain off his shoulders, and said, “Hey, hey, cut it out. There’s a motel about two miles up Route 12 with HBO, can you save it?”