Andrew Vachss - Dead and Gone

But all I could see was Pansy snarling her last war cry as the bullets took her off this earth.

I breathed deep through my nose, expanding my stomach, taking the air down past my belly into my groin, holding it until it gathered the poison inside me into a little ball. Then I expelled it in a long, harsh stream, toxic yellow-green as it left. Lose the poison, keep the pain. I needed the pain the way a man who survives a bad car crash needs to feel his legs—to know they still work.

“They never killed you, sweetheart,” I promised Pansy. “You’re always with me.”

My eyes flooded. I bit my lip. But my last promise gave me the grip I needed. “And you’ll be there when we take them out, honeygirl.”

For us, from where we come from, that’s all the heaven we ever get.

You think it’s sentimental stupidity, that’s your business. But when we’re keeping our promises, don’t ever get in our way.

“What?” I answered the cellular.

“We’re breaking it off for now.” Byron’s voice. “No action last night. Can’t be in two places at once. Some of the stuff that has to be checked, it’s going to take the personal touch.”

“How’re you fixed for—?”

“Plenty left, don’t worry. My … partner doesn’t work domestic, but he thinks there may be some interest in the visitors by his people, you with me?”

“All the way. You want me to—?”

“Hang, bro. I checked with the studio. It’s a blank slate for the next week, easy.”

“All right.”

“Later.”

“May I have your clothes, please?” Gem asked me the next morning.

“What?”

“We have been here a while; it is time to do our laundry.”

“The hotel has—”

“Maids gossip,” she said, with the air of one who knew from personal experience.

“There’s no labels in my … All right, let’s go do it.”

“Do you know how to do it?”

“Laundry? Hell, yes. You think I don’t know how to take care of myself?”

“Do you cook?”

“Well … no.”

“And you ‘take care of’ your laundry by … what? Taking it somewhere, yes?”

“Yeah. Fine, I get your point. But—”

“Just put it all in the pillowcases,” she said. “I will return later.”

“Why are all your tops the same?” she asked me, later that afternoon. She was refolding all the freshly done laundry on the bed in my room.

“The same? They’re not—”

“They all have raglan sleeves. Is that a fashion preference?”

“Oh, now I see what you mean. No, miss, it’s not about fashion. If there’s no shoulder seam, your arms can move faster. Probably gets you an extra tenth of a second or so.”

“And that is important?”

“Almost never. But for when it is …”

“I understand,” she said, thoughtfully. “I must go out for a while. I will return when I can.”

Hours later, I heard the door handle click, and I stepped quickly outside to the terrace. I’d already checked—if it came down to it, I could go across the roof to one of the other suites, smash my way into the glass patio door if they’d left it locked. Tear through the suite and out its front door into the hallway. If the suite I picked was occupied, it wouldn’t slow me down much.

I stood with my back against the outer wall, twisting my neck to peer through the glass into my suite. When I saw it was Gem, alone, I pocketed my pistol and stepped back inside. She looked as fresh as when she’d left, regarding me solemnly with her hands on her hips.

“You prefer it outside?” she asked.

“Just cautious.”

“Why not put the chain on the door, then?”

“I didn’t want to slow you down. If you needed to get back inside in a hurry …”

“Oh.”

I didn’t say anything. I wanted to strip off her dress, check her for bruises. But I settled for watching her eyes.

“That was very considerate,” she finally said.

I didn’t like everything I could see in her eyes, but I didn’t want to ask about it. So I tried another question: “You want something to eat?”

“Yes!” she said, smile flashing. “I have to take a bath, first. Can you order …?”

“Sure,” I promised. And reached for the phone.

It took about half an hour for the food to arrive. Another few minutes for the sharply dressed room-service waiter to set everything up. I scrawled something on the bill for the signature, added 20 percent for the tip. Took the guy another couple of minutes to say thanks.

Soon as he was gone, I tapped lightly on the door to Gem’s room. Nothing. It was closed, but not shut, so my next taps opened it.

The door to her bathroom was ajar. “Gem?” I called out, softly. No answer. Something skipped in my chest. I stepped over to the bathroom door, pushed it all the way open. Gem was lying in the tub, her head on a couple of rolled-up towels, eyes closed. I touched the water. Still warm. Realized I was deliberately avoiding looking at her wrists. I put my hand behind her neck, pulled her toward me. Her eyes blinked open. “Burke.…”

“Yeah. You okay?”

“Yes. I am fine. I was just so … tired, I guess.”

She reached up, slipped both hands behind my neck. I stood up slowly, pulling her along with me.

“I got you all wet,” she said, her face buried.

“Ssshh,” I said, slapping her bottom lightly.

She made a noise I didn’t understand.

I walked her over to where the towels were racked. Found a big white fluffy one and wrapped it around her. Then I scooped her up and carried her over to the bed.

“You can eat when you wake up.”

“Little girl.”

“Huh?”

“ ‘You can eat when you wake up, little girl,’ that was the entire sentence, yes?”

“I—”

“I know what it means now. All right?”

“Yes,” I said, patting her dry.

She was asleep before I finished.

It was a little past nine when Gem came into the living room. And started in on the food like it had been served a minute ago.

She was still chewing away when the phone rang.

“What?” I answered.

“Cop come. Same one. Say, find bone hand.”

“Whose hand?”

“Not hand, bone of hand. Chop off at wrist. With ax, maybe.”

“The hand was chopped off with an ax?”

“Maybe. Look like, he say.”

“Whose hand, Mama?” I asked again.

“Cop say your hand. No flesh on hand. Just bones. But same place, find pistol, too. With thumbprint. Yours. Cop say, you leave hospital, people find you, kill you, cut off head, cut off hands, nobody trace. But cops find hand and pistol in big garbage can in Brooklyn. Way at bottom. Cop say, probably, they miss it when come to collect, stay there long time.”

“Big garbage can” was Mama’s term for a Dumpster. “Is it going to be official?” I asked her.

“Cop say you dead now. On record.”

“Thanks,” I said. Meaning: Tell him thanks. If she ever saw him again. Morales had owed me—big-time and long-time. And he’d just squared the debt.

I went to my bedroom a little after midnight. Gem said “Good night, Burke,” absently, absorbed in some footage of Russia’s pitiful invasion of Chechnya.

I took a long shower. Used some of the fancy shampoo the hotel supplied. Shaved slowly. Nothing worked. I stayed tired, but not sleepy. I had to let it come when it would.

The sound of a wooden match cracking into fire woke me. I was on my back—must have finally drifted off. The room was dark except for the candle Gem had just lit, a stubby thing in a little glass holder. It smelled like citrus and blood.

“You must own the images, or the images will own you,” she said softly, standing next to the bed, looking down at me.