Gregg Hurwitz: Prodigal Son

He hung up. Sucked in a lungful of frigid night air.

The headlights eased toward the kiosk. Halted. A dinging announced an open door.

Duran edged out from a row of cars and peered up the makeshift aisle.

A Prius was parked by the wrecked Bronco. The driver’s door was open, the dome light throwing a globe of yellow. At first Duran didn’t see anyone.

Then a movement brought his attention to the Bronco. A broad-shouldered guy—Hargreave?—had ducked through the passenger door of the truck and was leaning over the dashboard.

“Hey!” Duran shouted. “Hey!”

The guy slid out of the Bronco, took a few steps in front of the Prius, and stood backlit by the headlights’ glow, a perfect black cutout. His hands were at his sides, his head cocked with either curiosity or concern.

Duran jogged a few steps toward him. “You should get out of here. These guys are after you. They fooled me—I’m sorry, but—”

The faintest hum reached his ears. About thirty yards away from Hargreave, safely back from the throw of light from the kiosk, Duran halted.

Hargreave turned, half his silhouette catching the headlights’ blaze, a vertical seam splitting his body.

The hum grew louder, rising in pitch.

Hargreave twitched once, violently.

There was the briefest moment of calm.

And then a jet spurted from his neck, two feet high.

It took Duran a moment to assemble what he was seeing, to make the pieces fit.

Blood.

Carotid.

As if Hargreave had been jabbed by a scalpel.

Except there was no scalpel. And no hand to hold it.

Hargreave clamped a palm to the side of his neck. His fingers trisecting the jet, three streams spraying through.

His knees buckled.

He sagged to the ground.

He curled up in a loose fetal position. His knees twitched on the asphalt once, twice, and then stilled. A wet circle dilated beneath his head, as mesmerizing as an oil slick. The headlights laid a blanket of light over his hunched form.

No one had been near him.

Nothing had touched him.

There’d been no gunshot, no projectile, no pop of a mini-explosion.

It was impossible, and yet Duran had seen it with his own eyes.

He was the only person in the lot. He was the only person on the security footage. Which meant he’d be the only person to blame.

From the darkness he stared at the limp form, his flesh prickling. It was incredible how quickly a life could be extinguished.

A jerking inhale shuddered through him. His senses had revved into overdrive. His skin on fire. The breeze chilling the wetness in his eyes. Even at thirty yards, he swore he could smell blood, taste the iron in the air. He pictured the two fake deputies with their well-dressed confidence, how the security monitors had fritzed out in perfect concert, a display of tech genius or dark magic.

And now Hargreave lay emptied out on the ground thirty yards away, felled by an invisible hand.

Duran could barely hear the humming over the white-noise rush in his ears, but he sensed it clearly, a vibration in his teeth. It was still present in the air, thrown like a ventriloquist’s voice, hovering over Hargreave’s body, then buzzing around the kiosk. And then, inside, a faint sound amplified between the tight walls.

Searching.

Searching for him.

He took a step forward. Crumpled the piece of paper in his fist, his palm slick with sweat. The next few steps came with excruciating slowness, his wobbling legs threatening to give way. Peering out from behind a dismembered minivan, he gasped in a few breaths. The faint disturbance in the air still seemed to be moving inside the kiosk.

He sprang forward, darted to the kiosk, and slammed the door closed. Fighting the key from his pocket, he jammed it halfway into the lock, then reared back and kicked the shiny metal head. It snapped off, pinging around in the darkness.

Already he was running for the perimeter.

He braced for the sound of the hum pursuing him but heard nothing aside from his breath thundering in his ears.

Sliding into the rear fence, he skinned his palms, tore the knee of his shitty security slacks. He shoved through the hole the possums used, stray spikes of chain-link gouging his spine.

Squirming free, he shot a look over his shoulder but could make out nothing more through the diamonds of chain-link than the dark expanse of the lot.

They’d seen his face.

They knew his name.

He was in some next-level deep shit.

He careened into the nearest alley, his shoulder scraping the rough brick. His mind whirled through options and outcomes. He was starting to grasp just how utterly screwed he was. Tied to a murder. On the run.

No one to turn to.

5A Killing Tool

Sweat cooling across his bare chest, Evan watched her doze off, running his fingers through her curly hair.

Lying naked, bathed in the pale blue glow, she looked like a painting. The moonlight spill through the window painted her skin a flawless gold. One leg was drawn to the side, putting her hips on a slight tilt, the tilde of her waist dipping beneath the strokes of her ribs. The sheets gathered around her swirled like cake frosting. Her shoulders bore streaks from where he’d clutched her.

From this particular angle in the uneven light, with her face turned away, she might have been someone else. For a moment Evan let his eyes feed him the lie.

Then she lifted her head and nuzzled into his touch, her features coming clear, wide-set eyes, caramel skin, broad ski-jump nose.

Not Mia Hall, the single-mother district attorney who lived in his building and occupied an outsize space in his thoughts.

But Jeanette-Marie, a woman he’d met earlier that night at the Beverly Hills Hotel’s Polo Lounge. She’d been sipping Cîroc, a perfectly acceptable choice of vodka, and when he’d sat next to her and ordered Jewel of Russia Ultra, he’d caught her attention. Like him she was nicely into her thirties, and she had the poise and grace to show for it.

A grin pulled her mouth to one side. “That was … gymnastic.” She blew a corkscrew sprig of hair out of her eye. “What’s your name again?”

Evan said, “David.”

“Are you gonna call me?”

He kept stroking her hair lazily, the back of her neck hot against his fingertips. “No,” he said, not unkindly.

“That’s fine.” She stretched, catlike, content. “I’m so sick of bullshit. Thanks for being honest.”

“Thank you for letting me spend time with you.”

She cocked her head. “You’re a funny one, David. Polite and … hmm, formal, I guess. I mean, don’t get me wrong, I dig it.” She slid up and pulled on a lace camisole, which had landed slung over her headboard. “Can I make you something to eat?”

“No thank you,” he said. “I can show myself out.”

“You sure? You want an espresso, something?” She caught herself. “I’m sorry. Ugh. It’s just—women, we’re used to making ourselves useful.”

“You don’t need to. You’re delightful doing nothing.”

He was on his feet now, hunting for his boxer briefs on the white Carrara marble floor. His RoamZone, discarded near an overturned high heel, showed a missed call.

Same number as the last three calls, starting with the country code of Argentina.

The one time he’d picked up, he hadn’t liked what he’d heard.

There was a time when a missed call to 1-855-2-NOWHERE would have been cause for concern. But he’d moved on to a normal life—or at least a simulacrum of what a normal life could be. A life that allowed for the Polo Lounge, women with broad ski-jump noses, and evenings that didn’t bring with them the promise of violence.

He exhaled deeply, cracked his neck, breathing in perfume and sweat. Stretching his shoulders, he took in the warmth of the decor.