Linwood Barclay - No Safe House

Vince’s place fell into the repairable category. I walked down here several times in the days after Sandy came through — cars weren’t allowed as crews worked to clear the streets of sand and debris. Part of the roof was missing from Vince’s two-story residence, windows had shattered, some of the siding had been ripped off. But compared with the houses on either side of him, he’d been lucky. Those two places looked as though they’d been dynamited.

Jane drove ahead of me, thinking maybe I couldn’t find the place without help. Her brake lights flashed and I could see her pointing to the house, Grace barely visible in the passenger seat. She brought the Mini to a stop and I parked behind her.

As I walked up to the passenger side, Grace put down her window. “If you have any kind of problem or you hear anything about Stuart,” I said to her, “you call me, okay?”

She nodded.

The lower level of Vince’s place was mostly garage. A place for two cars, or boat storage. A set of stairs went up the left side of the house to a small landing. Looking up, I could see lights on. I mounted the stairs. Not too slow, but not too fast, either. I figured Vince would be listening for me, and I didn’t want to go charging up there like I was some dog who came whenever you whistled for it. You try to preserve your pride in whatever small ways that are available to you.

I reached the landing and rapped on the screen door.

“’S’open,” he said.

It had been a long time since I’d heard that voice. Still recognizable, but more gravelly. Maybe even less forceful. But I knew better than to estimate this man based on his vocal abilities.

I pulled open the door and stepped in. The living area was on the beach side, the kitchen at the back. I glanced out at the sound, but there wasn’t much you could see this time of night beyond a few stars and the faint lights of some boats out on the water.

The room hadn’t changed any since I’d been brought here by Vince’s henchmen seven years ago. Kidnapped, really. I’d been asking around town for him, thinking he might be able to help me find Cynthia, who, along with Grace, was missing at the time, and when he got wind that someone was snooping around looking for him, he had his employees scoop me up and deliver me to him.

At least, this time I’d come under my own power.

He was sitting at the kitchen table, putting down a cell phone, making no effort to get up and greet me. He’d lost some weight and his hair was peppered with more gray. The word that came to mind was “gaunt.” I wondered whether he was sick.

He pointed to the chair opposite him.

“Siddown, Terry.”

I walked over, pulled out the chair, and sat. I kept my hands in my lap, off the tabletop. Didn’t want Vince to play any knife games with me this time.

“Vince,” I said, nodding.

“Long time,” he said.

“Yeah.”

“You don’t call, you don’t write.”

“Last time I saw you, you didn’t exactly encourage it.”

He waved a hand in the air. “I was feeling kind of cranky. Getting shot will do that to you.”

“I suppose,” I said. “We tried to tell you then, and I mean it when I tell you now, Cynthia and I remain grateful to you for your help and we regret the price you had to pay in offering it.”

Vince stared at me. “That’s nice. That’s lovely. The truth is, I think about you most every day.”

I swallowed. “Really.”

“That’s right. Every time I empty my bag.”

I blinked. “I’m sorry. What?”

Vince placed his meaty palms on the table and pushed himself back in his chair. He came around the end of the table, stood about two feet from me. I started to get up, but he raised a hand. “No no, just sit. You’ll get a better view from there.”

He undid his belt, lowered his zipper, pushed his pants down about six inches, and lifted up his shirt to reveal a plastic bag attached to his abdomen. The lower half contained dark yellow liquid.

“You know what that is?” he asked.

“Yes,” I said.

“That’s good. I’m impressed. Before I got shot, I’d never even heard about these ostomy bag things. But the bullet fucked up my interior plumbing so I can’t piss out my dick anymore. Had to get used to wearing one of these twenty-four/seven. So now, every time I go into the can to drain this bag, I think of you.”

“I’m sorry,” I said. “I didn’t know.”

“It’s not the sort of thing you put on Facebook.”

I hadn’t given up trying to be nice. “And I’m sorry about your wife, too. I ran into Jane a while back and she told me.”

Vince tucked his shirt back in, did up his zipper, and buckled his belt. He sat back down across from me.

“You didn’t ask Jane to get me here so you could update me on your health,” I said.

“No,” he said. “It’s about your kid.”

I felt a shiver run down the length of my spine.

“What about my kid?” I asked slowly.

“She’s stepped in the shit, that’s what.”

Bert Gooding was running the Buick’s headlights off the battery. He wasn’t too worried about anyone noticing the lights out here in the country on a farm, but thought leaving the engine running might attract some attention. It was a big V-8, sounded like a tractor, and pumped out exhaust like a coal plant.

But he needed to see what he was doing. So he positioned the car just right.

He’d brought an ax along, given the kind of job it was, and a change of clothes. It was hard to do something like this and not make a mess of yourself. When he was a kid, his dad used to take him twice a year to a cabin up in Maine, where they had a woodstove, and Bert always volunteered to split the already cut firewood into smaller pieces. He loved the feeling that came from making a perfect swing, blade meeting wood, forcing its way through cleanly without getting stuck. That satisfying sound of cracking wood. Using sufficient force so that you didn’t have to hold the wood down with your boot to pry the blade free. It was all physics.

Not quite the same as what he was doing now. But the principle remained the same. You wanted to take a good, strong swing, connect in just the right place, make as clean a cut as possible. But there wasn’t much chance of getting your blade stuck, and the sound wasn’t nearly as satisfying.

Sickening was more like it.

Didn’t feel good about this. Didn’t feel good about this at all. But sometimes you just had to do what you had to do, at least so long as you were still working for Vince Fleming.

He raised the ax over his head, swung down hard in a perfect arc.

Smoosh.

Moved over about a foot, swung again.

Smoosh.

It wasn’t quiet out here, not even with the car turned off. He was right up against the pen where the pigs were kept, and all the commotion had awakened them. They were grunting and snorting and bumping up against one another against the fence. They knew a treat was coming.

Bert tossed some morsels into the pen.

“Eat that, you fat fucks,” he said.

He had the ax up over his head, was getting ready to put some momentum into it, when his phone rang.

“Shit,” he said. Threw him off. He brought the ax down to his side, leaned the handle up against the front bumper of the Buick. He fetched the phone from his pocket, getting some blood on the screen, but not enough that he couldn’t see where the call was coming from: HOME.

Jabba.

He put the phone to his ear. “Yes, Janine?”

“Where are you?”

“Work.”

“Do you know what time it is?” she asked.

“I’ve got a pretty good idea.”

“You said you were going to be back by ten. You had a short thing with Vince and you’d be back.”