Andrew Vachss - Sacrifice

"That must be a pain in the neck."

"No, he gets in and out by himself. Dog door."

"If it's big enough for him, it's big enough for a person."

"No, it really isn't. We tried. Even Lola couldn't get through it."

The tall woman flashed a smile in the darkness.

"So this is a cat-free zone?"

"It sure is. One day I came out after this awful racket and there was this Siamese lying in the yard. In two pieces. The owner was my neighbor, claims he's a real animal lover. He came over screaming and yelling, said the cat was just following its natural instincts, hunting birds."

"What'd you tell him?"

"Bruiser was just following his natural instincts too. Protecting his territory. And my Bruiser doesn't invade other people's property like his cat."

"What'd he do?"

"Sued me in Small Claims Court." Wolfe chuckled. "The judge told him his cat was a trespasser and Bruiser had used self-help."

"Friend of yours?"

"No judge is a friend of mine," a chill lacing her speech, making sure I got it.

"Mine either."

"I know. We have a mated pair of cardinals living here. Blue jays, robins, doves. Even a stupid woodpecker who tries the cherry tree every now and then."

"Nice and peaceful."

"Yes."

She was going to wait. And I didn't know what she was waiting for. "I wanted to talk to you," I said.

"Talk."

"Alone."

"Not a chance, Mr. Burke. I'm not ungrateful for occasional help you've provided to City-Wide, but I'm not playing myself out of position."

"Neither am I. What if…just for the sake of argument…I wanted to discuss something with you…something that maybe I wouldn't want to admit I said if it ever went near a courthouse? I could say it to you, and then it's your word against mine. But if I said it to everyone, then I'm up against it."

"You don't trust me?" Hint of a smile.

"Sure, I trust you. It's how much that I'm wrestling with."

Wolfe lit another cigarette, patting her dog. At home, at peace. The redhead, Amanda, walked over, her hands full of papers like she was still in the office. Rocco and Floyd were doing something around the barbecue, arguing, it sounded like.

"Take your time," Wolfe said.

Fuck it. "I'm here to negotiate," I told her.

"Negotiate what?"

"Let's say…hypothetically…that you were looking for a missing kid. Maybe you thought you knew where the kid was, okay? Maybe you thought he was with friends. Your friends."

Wolfe's face was upturned, fingers absently stroking her cheek. A fire blazed to one side: Rocco finally got the barbecue going. The flames caught the white wings in Wolfe's dark hair. She didn't say anything, waiting.

"Your true friends," I told her. "Sometimes, even the closest of friends, even brothers and sisters, they can disagree. Before, you told me to take my time. That's easy to say, hard to do. Time. Hard to do. The State took my time from me. More than once. You know about that. It did me some good. Not the kind of good they meant. It scared me, but not so bad that I'd kiss ass to stay out. I had time— the time they made for me. I learned some things. Things about myself. Things about the way things work. You understand what I'm telling you?"

"No."

"Yes, you do. Some things need time. This…thing…between you and your sisters, it needs time."

"How much time?" Quick, no playing around, right to the center of it. Just Wolfe now— her people nearby but distanced.

"Couple of weeks."

"No way."

"The kid is safe."

"It's not him I care about. He's a killer. I should've dropped him the first time."

"He's nine years old."

"Everyone is, once."

"Everybody that gets to be ten. He's not a kid…that's what you're thinking. And you're right. Half right, anyway. He's not a kid, he's not a man either. Something else."

Wesley. "You're still a man," I told him, listening as he described a murder-mutilation. A message to his enemies. "I'm a bomb," the monster said.

And that's the way he went out.

"How do you know?" Wolfe asked, leaning toward me.

"I know. I paid the tuition, passed the course."

She flashed a quick grin at me, throaty, husky-soft voice. " Dónde está el dinero? "

The way I answered her question years ago. When she challenged me to say something in Spanish.

"There's no money in this. It would take me too long to tell you why. Even if you think I'm on a scam, you know your sisters aren't."

"Truth, justice, and the American way?"

"Truth, justice, and revenge."

"You said enough to get locked up already, pal." Rocco. Leaning forward, intruding.

Wolfe gave him a look. Patted her dog some more.

"You ever notice Bruiser's eyes?" I asked her. "They look straight ahead. The birds he guards, they look out each side. You know why?"

"Bruiser's a predator. The birds are prey."

"Not his prey, though."

She dragged deep on her cigarette. "Two weeks," she said. "Then he gets brought in."

I nodded.

"That's your word?" she asked.

I bowed confirmation.

55

I crossed over the Kosciuszko Bridge, heading south for Brooklyn. Slag yards underneath to my right, yawning black, spot-fires spurting. Suicides, they never jump off this bridge— water tells a better lie about what's waiting. Past them, way off in the distance, Manhattan neon told its own lies.

Two weeks.

Luke and Burke. Lurk.

I'd told Wolfe I knew. Didn't tell her how I'd learned.

1971. Lowell, Massachusetts, a struggling mill town. Sitting in a mostly empty downtown parking lot in the front seat of a dull brown Ford, stolen a couple of hours earlier. License plates looked good— they were two halves of two different plates, welded together with the seam at the back. Beer cans on the dashboard, radio turned down low. Two guys taking a break from their construction job. Me and Whitey, waiting. Watching.

Every Friday, a young woman walked past that parking lot. It was a joy to watch her. Pretty-proud, long brown hair bouncing on her shoulders, matching the swing in her hips. Not a traffic-stopper, but a juicy fine thing just the same.

We'd been watching her every Friday for a month. Watching her carry a leather bag over one shoulder. Her outfit changed each time, but the leather bag stayed the same.

She'd walk back the same way. Past us. With the leather bag heavier then. Her boss made the payroll in cash every Friday afternoon. The brunette made the bank run. Flouncing along, walking the way girls walk, one hand swinging with her rhythm, the other patting the bag at her hip. Taking her time, enjoying the sunshine and the stares.

We'd checked the traffic patterns, the escape routes. Had a garage all rented about a half mile away. One quick swoop and we'd make our own withdrawal. Hole up, listening to the sirens. Nighttime, we'd go down the back stairs, separate at the bus station.

Saturday, Whitey would be in Boston. I'd be in Chicago.

The brunette had on an egg-yolk-yellow dress that stopped at mid-thigh.

"Beautiful, huh?" Whitey whispered. He didn't mean the girl.

The radio said something about Attica. I turned it up. Riot at the prison, guards taken hostage, the whole joint out of control. State troopers had the place surrounded.

Whitey had done time before I was born. He cupped a cigarette, hiding the flame out of habit. Spoke softly out of the side of his mouth.

"They gonna kill all those niggers."

"How d'you know it's blacks?" I asked him.

"When the Man comes down on them, they'll all be niggers," Whitey said. "Dead niggers."

Blood-bought wisdom from an old man I'd never see again. We took the omen, aborted the snatch.

You stay in the sun long enough, you get a tan. I know why Ted Bundy went pro se, represented himself at his murder trial in Florida. You go pro se, you get whatever a lawyer would get. Like discovery motions. The prosecution wanted to introduce the crime-scene photos, show the jury the savage slasher's wake. Bundy got his copies too. So he could go back to his quiet, private cell and jerk off to his own personal splatter films. He told the TV cameras that pornography made him kill all those women, lying as smoothly as the lawyer he never got to be. Dancing until they stopped the music.