Harmless (18 page)

Am I slightly OCD or
just anal?  Hard to say, but I detest cleaning up hair.  Just when you think
you’ve gotten it all, it shows up in thirty-seven more places.

Could I have messed
things up in a drunken state the night before?

No.  I’d brushed my
teeth that morning.  I’d also thrown away an empty bottle of liquid soap,
careful not to disturb the hair.  Some trendy brand with a flashy label that
promised to make women swoon over me. 
Rock Star
scent—which amused me,
because it smelled nothing like skinny jeans or horny groupies.

The faint smell of
pizza.  The misplaced toothbrush.  The disturbed hair package.

Someone had been
inside my house.

My first thought?

Strout.

Had he come back? 
And if so, why?  Weren’t we on close enough terms that he could’ve knocked? 
Waited on me to get back from my failed stakeout?  He had the money already, he
knew we could identify him—shouldn’t he be halfway to Mexico, or sitting at
some craps table down in Vegas trying to double his stolen two million?

It didn’t make sense.

I wondered if it’d
been Thomas, and then realized what a stupid idea it was.  He didn’t want
anything to do with me, didn’t even want to see my face—what reason would he
have to break into my house and rearrange a couple of items and go through my
trash?

Had I been robbed? 
All signs pointed to no, but just in case, I did a quick recon tally of
everything in the house, everything I could recall from memory, and nothing was
missing, not even a single bill of the hundred thousand dollars sitting on a
basement shelf.

Another
B and E, damn it, and
Jesus
, yes, yes, yes, I
had
to get better about locking my back door, especially with a brick of money
lying around.

Everything was how
I’d left it, minus the toothbrush and my discarded hair.

I stopped in the
living room to catch my breath, hands on my hips, thankful for the small rush
of adrenaline that temporarily abated the lingering hangover.

Who, what, why?

As if I didn’t have
enough crazy shit swimming around in my head—fear, the feeling of being
violated, anger at the bold intruder—increasing paranoia rattled and wheezed
and sputtered and coughed to life.  I began to think that maybe I’d put too
much out into the universe, that the man I’d attempted to spy on, Kerry’s
stalker, had somehow picked up on my thoughts like a distant radio
transmission, and he, in turn, had broken into my house in an attempt to spy on
me
.  What if he’d left microphones behind, or, God forbid, miniscule
video cameras that could be hidden in a houseplant or inside a light fixture?

Before I could rip
the house apart, before I had a chance to spend hours looking for these
nonexistent devices, my doorbell rang.

I don’t spook
easily.  Never have.  “Boo” has no effect on me whatsoever, but in that moment,
in my hyper-focused state, the doorbell was completely and thoroughly
unexpected.  Given the proper usage of the word, I
literally
jumped two
inches off the ground.  And yes, I
figuratively
shit a brick.

Opening the door, I
saw the bent, shaky, gremlin form of the old crone from across the street, Mrs.
Epstein.  To my knowledge, she’d never made it any farther than her front yard
when she wanted to curse me for something she was unhappy with, making her
presence yet another baffling shock.

I forced a smile,
faked enthusiasm.  “Hi, Mrs. Epstein.  What brings you over?”

“You’re a weasel, ”
she said, pointing at me with a wobbly finger. 

(How do you respond
to that?)  I said, “Steve. 
Steeeve
,” pretending she’d mispronounced my
name—and possibly in a slight attempt to deride her.

“You’re a weasel, and
you disgust me, but I thought you should know…somebody went in your house
earlier.  He sneaked around back, then I saw him in your upstairs window.”

“How?”

“Using my
bird-watching binoculars.”

Dear Lord.  My first
real break, offered from the bony claws of Death herself.

“Really?  Did you see
who it was?”

“Can’t say.  Only saw
him from the back.”

“I
thought
somebody had been in here.”

“I’m not normally
nosy, but I figured you should know since you weren’t home.  You don’t have any
friends.  Not that I’ve seen, anyway.”

“I have friends.”

“Uh-huh.  You should
lock your doors.”

“I know, I know.  Did
you call the police?”

“Why would I do
that?”

“Because you said
somebody broke into my house?”  It made sense to me.

“I didn’t call the
cops because he looked like a cop.  It didn’t make sense to call them if he was
here on purpose.  He acted like he was here on purpose.”

“He
looked
like a cop?”

“You in some kind of
trouble, weasel?  This got anything to do with that Parker girl?  Because if it
does, you can bet your scrawny little behind I’m not too old to whip it for
you.”

“I’m not. 
I’m not
. 
Seriously.  Can you tell me anything about him?  I mean, what made you think he
was a cop?”

“My husband, Arnold,
God rest his soul, he put weasels like you behind bars for forty years.  I’ve
been around ‘em enough.  You know a cop when you see one.  I just figured he’d
come back to do more investigating over at her place, at least until I saw him
walking through
your
yard.”

“That’s it?”

“Trust an old
lady—I’m too old for hogwash.”  She turned to leave, and I could almost hear
her claws scrabbling across the wooden porch slats.  “I got my eye on you,
weasel,” she said over her shoulder.  “You’d be wise to keep your nose clean.”

I watched her go,
wanting desperately to grab her, turn her upside down, and shake her like a
pair of jeans, in hopes of some more information falling out of the pockets.

I realized that she’d
already told me all she had to tell, so I backed inside, slowly, keeping an eye
on her, half expecting her to put a hex on my house or sprout black crow wings
and fly across the street.

My cell rang.  Again,
I took a chance and answered an unrecognized number.

“Who is this?”

“Planck.”

His call was as
unexpected as Mrs. Epstein’s visit.

“Thomas?  Holy shit,
you’re lucky I answered.  Whose number is that?”

“I’m at a gas
station.”

“I didn’t think I’d
ever hear—”

“Where are you?”

“Home, why?”

“You gotta leave,
bro.  Right now.”

“What?  Why?”

“Boathouse.  Twenty
minutes.  Leave your cell at home so they can’t track you, just in case.  Oh,
and definitely,
definitely
get that diary out of your house.”

He hung up.

I listened to the
dial tone, and then the sounds of distant, approaching sirens.

CHAPTER
20

I paced around inside
the boathouse, shivering, even though it was still eighty-five degrees at six
o’clock.  I was all sorts of messed up.  Panicky, anxious…afraid.  I hadn’t
bothered to grab anything other than my wallet and keys.  And Kerry’s diary, of
course.  The sirens had been coming closer too fast—almost too quickly for me
to make my escape—and I’d seen the cops turn onto my street in the rearview
mirror.

The intruder in my
home, Thomas’s secretive call, and the in-a-goddamn-hurry gaggle of police cars
whipping around the corner on two wheels added up to only one thing.

They were coming for
me
.

But why?  What had I
done?  Had someone noticed me scoping out the police station?  I couldn’t think
of any crime I’d committed, aside from loitering, maybe, but that didn’t
warrant an army of police barreling toward my home.

I moved back and
forth across the creaking floor, bouncing from one side of the building to the
other, and if I’d been in any other situation, I might’ve chuckled because I
couldn’t help comparing myself to a game of Pong.  Back and forth, back and
forth.

Thomas popped through
the open doorway, agitated, sweating.  “Shit, you made it.  When did you shave
your head?”

“What’s going on?”  I
moved over to hug him.  I was freaked out—the reassurance would’ve been nice,
but he recoiled…and then surrendered when he saw the disappointment on my face.

“Okay, okay, that’s
enough, bro,” he said, patting my back.  “Steve.  Steve?”

“Yeah?”

“Let go of me.”

“Right, sorry.”  I
released my grip and stepped back.

“Anybody follow you?”

“I don’t think so.”

“You sure?  And you
got the diary out, right?”

“It’s in my car.  I
think I got out in time—a bunch of cops turned onto my street but they didn’t
see me.  So what’s going on?”

“They turned onto
your street?”

“Yeah.”

“Son of a bitch.  I
knew it.”

“Knew what?”

“Are you sure they
didn’t see you, didn’t follow you?”

“Maybe—how the hell
should I know?”

“Focus, bro.  Think! 
Did you have a tail on your way here?  Because if you did, I’m gone, I
shouldn’t be here.”

“I didn’t know I
needed to be looking for somebody, but no, I’m pretty sure.”

He swiped at the
sweat on his forehead.  “All right, damn it.  You got anywhere to go? 
Somewhere you can hide out for a day or two?”

“Hide?  What for?” 

I didn’t, really. 
I’d moved out here ages ago, and all my family was back east—my folks in
Virginia, my brother in Louisiana.  Shayna’s family wouldn’t let me within
miles.  Not that I’d want to stay with them—horrible, rude, invasive people
that had threatened me with violence more than once.  My complaints to the
local police had gone ignored. 

And, sadly, Mrs.
Epstein was right, to a degree; I have friends—Darlene, Michelle, Mailman
Jeffrey, Thomas—but none of them are close enough for me to call on, none of
them willing to hide a potential fugitive. 

“They’re gonna try to
pin it on you.  That’s why I wanted you to get rid of the diary.  It’s
evidence.”

“Evidence?  Pin
what?”

He lowered his voice,
leaned closer.  “Kerry’s murder.”

My legs went numb.  I
should’ve known.  I couldn’t get any words to come out of my mouth.  My lips
and jaws worked like I was speaking, but something had muted my vocal chords.

“That gun they found,
in her room?  Registered to her, but the ballistics came back negative.  Bullet
didn’t match.  Rumors went around that they were stuck.  No leads, nothing. 
Big time embarrassed.  So then this afternoon—I’m still on suspension, right? 
I was having lunch with one of the guys, trying to pick his brain, maybe see
where the suits were on that whole DeShazo thing.  Somehow we got around to
Schott and Berger and he mentions they caught a lucky break that morning,
something about fingerprints and hair samples.  I knew it was bullshit because
they hadn’t found anything like that in their sweeps, at least from what I’d
heard.  Then I thought maybe they had—you’d been in there, so it could’ve been
possible they were looking for somebody to lay it on.”

“Wait—you knew about
this
hours
ago?  And you’re
just now
telling me?”

“Look, yeah, that was
a dick move, okay?  Dick move, but bro, you gotta understand, this is my life
we’re talking about.  I got a wife and kids, man.  You, me, this thing we got
going on—I don’t know how else to say it, but this is some serious shit.  It’s
my
life
.”

When it comes to
friends—or even people I merely
consider
to be friends—I’m all about the
love.  Bro hugs, little sis hugs, high-fives, ‘atta boys’ and ‘atta girls.’ 

Physical contact with
friends is perfectly fine.  Physical contact with strangers?  Skin-crawling
repulsion. 

I understand that
friends get into arguments—it’s natural, like family—you stay in close
proximity long enough, some tussles are bound to arise, like two wolves in a
pack baring their fangs over the last piece of rabbit carcass.  Hackles are
raised, you growl at each other a little bit, and a couple hours later you’re
snuggled up next to each other for warmth and compassion.  I have never—
never
ever never
—raised a hand against a friend.  Arguments, sure.  (Scooter and
I strutted around each other once, like roosters in a cock-fighting ring, over
a girl we both had a crush on, but nothing ever came of it.  He backed down; she
rejected me anyway.) 

But threatening
violence?  Actually acting on it?

There’s a first time
for everything.

“Your life?” I said. 
You could say I growled if you wanted to get cutesy with describing my
emotions.  “
Your
life?  What about
mine
?”  I took one step
forward and shoved his chest.  He was stockier and sturdier than I’d expected,
but it still sent him reeling backward, swinging his arms, trying to catch his
balance.  “You could’ve warned me hours ago.”

He steadied himself,
planted his feet, and shoved me back.  “I’m here now.  You see me?  You see me
standing here?  I’m sorry, but that’s all you’re getting.”

“Whatever.  What am I
supposed to do with this information, huh?  What am I supposed to do now?  Why
me?  Why’re they blaming me?”

“I don’t know.  Easy
target, maybe.  I told you not to piss Berger off.”

It occurred to me
that in my haste to get details from him, I hadn’t mentioned the earlier
break-in.  “It makes so much more sense.”

“What does?”

“I wanted to find out
who the cop was that’d been stalking Kerry, so I went down to station earlier
today and did a little stakeout.”

“You did what?  Do
you
want
to go to jail?”

“Relax, nobody saw
me.  And besides, it was a total bust and I didn’t come up with anything, but
when I got home—someone had been in my house.”

“You mean, like,
robbed you?”

“No,” I said, but in
a way, I had.  If whoever had been inside my house had lifted my fingerprints
and taken some hair in order to frame me, then yes, I’d been robbed of my
innocence. 

“He moved some stuff
around in my bathroom, you know, like my toothbrush, and I had all my hair in
the trash and it was…disturbed, I guess.”  I didn’t think it was necessary to
describe how I knew that.  I prefer to keep some quirks hidden.

“You’re kidding me? 
That’s all?”

“I smelled pizza.”

“So what, he broke
into your house, ate a pizza and then brushed his teeth?” he said, following it
with a skeptical scoff.  “Which one of the three bears was it, Goldilocks?”

“Dead serious,
Thomas.  Totally sounds wacko, I get that, but the old lady across the street
saw him.  She came over to tell me right before you called.”

“No shit?  She didn’t
report it?”

“That’s the thing—she
said he looked like a cop.”

“Uniform?”

“Didn’t say, but I’m
guessing she would’ve mentioned that if he was.”

“Could she I.D. him
if we needed her to?”

“Doubt it.  She
didn’t get a good look.”

“Then how’d she know
he was a cop?”

“She said that her
husband used to be one, so she knows one when she sees one.”

“Fuck, man.”  He
paced back and forth, ping-ponging from one side of the little dock to the
other. 

“Hey…
hey
, what
am I supposed to do now?”  I don’t sweat much, even when I’ve been on a ridiculously
productive run—one of the ones where you hit that runner’s high halfway down
the block and every stride feels like you’re gliding across clouds, like you
could outlast the Tarahumara in a long-distance race—but standing there in the
boathouse, my pores rained, drenching my underarms and back.  It could’ve been
the suffocating heat inside the building, it could’ve been fear, it could’ve
been nerves; regardless, you could’ve wrung out my t-shirt like a washcloth.

“I’m thinking,” he
said.  Pacing.  Pacing.

“I’m going to
prison.  Jesus, I’m going to prison.”  I backed up a step, felt my knees
finally give way, and plopped down onto the dock.  “I’m toast.”

“It’s not right,”
Thomas said.  “They shouldn’t—I mean, I’d expect it from Berger, but I can’t believe
Schott is going along with it.  He’s gotta…  That doesn’t make any sense. 
Schott’s clean.  He’s always been clean.”

“Clean?”  I laid down
on my back, not caring about the germs or what might’ve been spilled, shed, or
squirted there and covered my eyes with a sweaty forearm.

“Berger must have
something on him, you know, like blackmail.”

“Thomas, what in the
hell are you talking about?”

“I don’t know... I
don’t know, but something’s off, bro.  Schott—you met him, you saw how he is. 
He’s like,
regal
or some shit.  Intellectual, laid back.  So laid back. 
They call him ‘Cool Breeze’ because he’s so chill.”

Do I have to tell you
that this reminded me of a particular deodorant scent?

“Like a real ‘Dudley
Do Right’ kind of cop—there’s no way he’d let Berger plant something on you
unless...”

“Unless what?”

“Unless Berger has
him by the balls.”

I sat up, tried to
swipe the dirt and gunk off my back.  “And what’s this got to do with me?”

“Maybe everything. 
Maybe nothing.  I’m just thinking out loud, trying to piece shit together.”

I got up, dusted off
my jeans, and said, “Okay, so…what?  Berger gets embarrassed that he ran with
the suicide thing, it’s wrong—
like I told him
it was
—so he
decides to come after me because I’m an easy target, but to do that, he needs
Schott to go along with it, so he blackmails Schott into agreeing—all this just
so he can save some face?  That’s what you’re thinking?”

“It’s a stretch but,
yeah, could be.”

A group of kids went
squealing by outside the boathouse, chasing a flotilla of bubbles, followed by
a young, blonde mother in a pink t-shirt, wearing a baby strapped to her
chest.  She stopped, giggled like she’d never been happier, brought the
dipstick up to her lips and blew another round.  More squealing, more laughing,
and she moved along, following the kids, following the bubble-filled breeze.  I
envied her joy, her freedom.

“And how does this
help me?” I whispered, hoping the bubble-blower was out of hearing distance.

“It doesn’t.  Or,
well, maybe it does.”

“Could you be any more
vague?  For God’s sake, Thomas, what am I gonna do?  Where am I gonna go?  I
won’t make it in prison.  Look at me, I’ve got ‘shank’ and ‘bitch boy’ written
all over me.”

“And I could go for
obstruction, just for telling you, for being here.”

“Then why’d you do
it?”

“Because it’s not
right, what they’re trying to do.”

“Then help me, tell
me what to do next.  Can we maybe go talk to Schott?  If Berger’s forcing him
into it, then—”

“Maybe—no, or…I don’t
know.  No, too risky.  Or possibly.  If we can get him alone.”

“Yes, no, maybe—which
is it?  How much time do I have?”

“Could be a couple of
hours, could be a couple of days.  They’ll check around, ask the neighbors.  If
your old lady across the street is as nosy as you say, she’ll probably tell
them which way you went, and they’ll put out an APB.  If that comes up empty,
if they put your face on the news, it’s only a matter of time.  Shit’s too
connected these days, bro.  Look how fast they found that dude that blew up the
courthouse in Chicago—”

“Yeah, that bastard—they
sent him to Guantanamo, didn’t they?”

“Hey, focus, forget
about what happened to
him
.  Your picture goes up on TV, next thing you
know it’s all over the internet.  You got Facebook, you got Twitter.”