Siegel, James - Derailed

But he didn’t know something. They say money is the great equalizer, but it’s really, truly, desperation. It had leveled the playing field.

I pulled the trigger.

Nothing happened.

In the millisecond it took for Vasquez to realize his good fortune, to begin raising his gun hand, I understood why nothing had happened.

I’d forgotten to click off the safety.

I launched myself at Vasquez, using the only advantage I had going for me. Surprise.

My initial charge knocked the gun right out of Vasquez’s hand, and it skittered somewhere under the bed. So now we were more or less even.

Maybe I even had the edge. Because there was a chance my desperation was even more terrible than Vasquez’s. I had nothing much to lose. Detective Palumbo would be calling back any day now, and even if he didn’t, Barry Lenge would. So I did have desperation on my side. And something was not quite right with Vasquez. He was drunk, or stoned, or something.

Vasquez had gasped from the initial shock of body contact, then immediately tried to separate himself from my grasp. But he seemed like a punched-out heavyweight in round twelve, sluggish and wobbly kneed. It gave me courage.

I could see Sam out of the corner of my eye — up on his knees and looking down at his hand, which was bright red because he’d just touched his mouth with it. He looked dazed and confused.

“Mother . . . fucker . . . ,” Vasquez said, grunting now from the exertion of trying to get me off him but not having much success. I had my arms firmly around him, and I wasn’t letting go.

Vasquez staggered into the wall. I had him in a bear hug, so he was doing what bears do when they want to get something off their backs. They rub themselves against the nearest tree trunk. Vasquez was using the nearest wall.

I held fast as I crashed into the plaster wall and dislodged a yellowed reproduction, my sunglasses spinning off onto the floor.

Then we fell to the floor with a loud crash; I could smell Vasquez now — the stink of garlic and cigarette smoke and fried eggs. The carpet was so thin that it was like rolling around on playground cement. And for the first time, I was absolutely convinced I was going to win. I’d moved my right arm around Vasquez’s neck and was squeezing for all I was worth — and right at this minute I was worth a lot. One hundred and ten thousand dollars, at least.

Vasquez was sputtering, and I wondered if I was going to kill him. And I thought: If I have to, I will.

Vasquez gave one last effort at getting me off his back, but one of his arms was pinned between me and the floor, and I had the other one wrapped up tightly, so even though Vasquez gave an awkward lunge forward, he couldn’t dislodge me.

He collapsed; I felt all the strength go out of him — whatever strength booze or drugs hadn’t sapped from him already.

I hadn’t killed him, but I’d won.

I’d won.

There were a pair of shoes standing just at eye level. At first I thought they belonged to Sam, but Sam was over there on the other side of the room, bleeding into his hands.

So I peered up.

“Lookit here,” said Dexter, “it’s Chuck.”

FORTY-ONE

Dexter had slipped in during the heat of the battle.

We’d been rolling around on the floor, and neither one of us had heard the door open. That allowed Dexter to enter the room, pick up my gun, click off the safety, and point the barrel at my head.

I was leashed and muzzled. My hands were tied behind my back with my own belt. They took off my shoes and socks and stuffed one clammy sock into my mouth.

They did the same thing to Sam. Sam resisted momentarily, and Vasquez kicked him in the head.

I could smell Sam’s blood.

It smelled almost sweet, but since I knew where it was coming from, it was a nauseating sweetness. That was a problem. Because it made me want to throw up, and the thought of throwing up with a sock already stuffed into my mouth made me want to panic.

Not panicking was easier said than done. I was wondering, for instance, what they were planning to do with us, with Sam and me. I had the strong feeling they didn’t know yet.

They seemed at loose ends. They kept muttering and whispering to each other — sometimes in Spanish, sometimes not.

“Nosotros tenemos que hacer algo,” Lucinda was saying now.

I’d taken just one year of high school Spanish, and the only word I actually remembered was gracias — but I could intuit their confusion anyway.

I overheard Vasquez whispering something in English to Lucinda.

“Afterwards . . . we can go . . . Miami and . . .” They were taking off.

It made sense. After all, Sam was useless to them now, a would-be cash cow that had been irrevocably damaged. All that time and effort put into leading him here and nothing to show for it.

They were legitimately upset. They were unhappy I’d shown up. I was the reason it hadn’t worked out the way they’d planned. Me. I’d gummed up the works and left them with a problem they hadn’t counted on. Their weapons, after all, were fear and deception, but now I’d made those weapons useless.

Which left what?

“You stupid fuck . . . ” Vasquez was sitting on the bed with his hands on his knees. He was talking to me. “I told you not to pull this kind of shit again. I told you to go back to Long Island and stay there, right? You lost money before, motherfucker. Money. You should’ve thanked God. Now what you gonna do, huh?”

Perhaps pray.

It wasn’t merely the words that were frightening, that made me think praying was in order—it was the fact that Vasquez himself seemed frightened saying them. Now what you gonna do, huh? As if it were a question they’d asked themselves, then come up with an answer they hadn’t liked. When scary people start sounding scared, that’s when it’s okay to be scared yourself.

The three of them went into the bathroom together. Someone — I thought it was Dexter — was arguing against doing something. I could hear his raised voice.

When they came out of the bathroom, Dexter didn’t look very happy. It appeared he’d lost.

But Vasquez and Dexter were going somewhere now.

“Ten minutes,” I heard Vasquez whisper to Lucinda, “and then we’ll go down to . . . Little Havana . . . my cousin . . .”

Vasquez and Dexter left the room.

Which left the three of us. Sam, Lucinda, and me.

“What are you going to do with us?” Sam said through the sock in his mouth. The words muffled, but understandable.

But Lucinda didn’t answer him.

“I won’t tell,” Sam said. “If you let me go, I won’t say a thing, I promise. Please . . .”

Still no answer from Lucinda. Maybe she’d been told not to say anything — no fraternizing with the enemy. Maybe after having had to talk to Sam Griffen for months, it was nice not having to say anything to him now. Or maybe she knew exactly what they were going to do with us and thought it better not to tell.

“The sock . . . it’s choking me,” Sam said. "Please . . .”

Lucinda finally responded, but not with words. She got up and walked over to Sam — a short walk of five feet, maybe.

“Please,” Sam said, “take it out of my mouth . . . please . . . I’m choking . . . ”

So Lucinda reached down to pull out the sock.

As soon as her hand reached into his mouth, he bit down on it, and Lucinda screamed.

Maybe he’d been asking himself the same questions I had and come up with the same answers. So maybe he’d decided he had nothing to lose.

She kicked out at him — “Motherfucker!” —trying to get her hand out of his mouth, but Sam was holding on like an attack dog, the kind trained to take down robbers and not let go, even if you shoot them dead. Lucinda, screaming and punching at Sam’s head with her free hand, but Sam still not letting go, holding on for dear life.