Money Shot

6.

So once I figured out I was in the trunk of a car, I remembered the blue Civic and from there it was a swift re-connect the dots back to Jesse and Sam and the girl with the briefcase.

I also remembered that I had been shot, or thought I had. It obviously hadn’t been by a very good shot, since I was still around to worry about it, but it did seem fairly pressing that I get some sort of medical attention. I felt like someone was digging a fork around in my right side just below the armpit and it hurt like hell if I took a deep breath. I thought maybe my right arm was also hit, as there was a hot nasty pain on the soft underside of my triceps. Moving my right hand made the pain in my arm crank up from ugly to excruciating so I yanked and twisted my left again and again until I was able to work the knots loose around my wrists. It was fairly easy. Jesse was a lousy rigger.

Once I had my hands loose, I was able to rip the tape off my mouth. I spat out the crumpled rag and the meager contents of my stomach immediately followed. It was mostly sour old blood. I managed not to get too much on myself, which was pretty impressive in such a small space.

When I was able, I used my awkward left hand to free my ankles. My feet were icy numb and howled with sharp needling pain as the blood started to flow back in. You’d think there’d be a point where so much of your body hurt so badly that it would hang a sign on the door saying NO VACANCY and refuse to accept any new pain. Apparently not.

Free now but still stuck in the puke-stinking trunk, I needed to figure a way out. The Civic had been built before anyone thought to put safety latches on the insides of trunks. The only way out would be by kicking down the folding back seats. I had a long discussion with my legs about the idea of kicking anything. At first they were having none of it, but once I explained how difficult it would be for them if my heart stopped beating or severe blood loss eventually caused the cessation of all brain function, they reluctantly agreed to do their part, though not without a lot of surly grumbling.

For a piece of shit, the latches on the Civic’s back seats were annoyingly well made and solid. I had to brace my back against the rear of the trunk and push with all the strength left in my legs. The strain of it made my head fill with dizzy red spangles, but eventually the seat on the passenger side flopped down, letting a weak wash of yellow light into my dark little world. It hurt my eyes and made me feel like a Morlock as I wiggled out through the gap.

Now that I could see where I was, I still had no idea where I was. Rundown industrial wasteland like this was all over Southern California. All over the country, even, but the drive had felt like less than thirty minutes so I figured I must still be in or near the L.A. area.

The Civic turned out to be parked at the far end of a lot behind a large empty warehouse with mostly broken windows. I thought I heard a train somewhere close, but couldn’t see any tracks. The sodium lights illuminating the scene sat atop graffitied poles around the warehouse next door, which was apparently still in use. On the other side was a weedy vacant lot.

I had been so focused on the series of tasks required to get myself out of the trunk that I had almost lost track of the bigger picture. Now that I was loose and alive, the cold fury that had taken second place to basic survival suddenly moved up to center stage. I was so angry, it felt almost like love. Angry for being made to feel helpless and scared. Angry for having my nice comfortable life torn open and savaged and left bleeding. Angry for getting the shit kicked out of me and Sam too, all for something I didn’t even understand. I knew what I wanted to do. I wanted to find Jesse and the rhino and their boss, that fucker with the bland everyman face. Find them and kill them.

I slowly pushed open the Civic’s passenger-side door and put my bare feet on the grimy concrete, high on beautiful, full-color action movie fantasies of dishing out. 44-caliber vigilante justice. That’s when I realized I was naked.

I’m about as far from shy as you can get, but walking around a neighborhood like this in the altogether was the dictionary definition of a bad idea. I figured I needed to table the whole vendetta thing until I could find something to cover my girly bits.

There was nothing in the car at all, not even a map or an old burger wrapper. I thought about trying to tear the vinyl off the seats but it was too tough and my right arm was throbbing and I just wanted to get the hell out of there. I scanned the narrow lot, searching for anything that I could use to cover myself. Nothing but a single torn black trash bag, more than half full of stuff I didn’t even want to think about. I shook out the contents onto the cement and turned the bag inside out so that the wet side would not touch my skin. The smell was appalling. I tore open the bottom all the way until I had a sort of skirt-shaped thing and stepped squeamishly into it. Instead of tying it at my waist, I pulled it up to just above my breasts, like a towel. The bottom of the bag covered the cheeks of my ass but only if I stood completely straight. It was bad, barely better than naked and much, much stinkier. Breathing shallowly though my mouth, I limped around to the front of the warehouse.

The faded sign on the building’s rough brick hide gave away nothing. HW Equipment Ltd. I saw an address spray painted above a heavily barred door. 23202. No street name.

The warehouse was near the dead end of a desolate block of ugly industrial buildings. It felt like a marathon just to make it to a cross street. When I finally found one, my eyes had trouble focusing on the signs. East 37th and Saco Street. I didn’t recognize either one. I could have been anywhere.

I found a rusty shopping cart at the intersection. It was full of swollen, moldy phonebooks and an eclectic collection of glass jars containing, apparently, urine. There didn’t seem to be an owner nearby. In fact, there were no humans anywhere that I could see. No homeless, no hookers, no junkies, not even cars. Nothing, like I was the last girl on earth and had somehow missed out on the apocalypse while I was in the trunk. There was, however, a shirt in the shopping cart. It was plaid, stiff, and only slightly less repugnant than the garbage bag, but I was thrilled to have it. I slipped my arms into the ragged sleeves and pulled the trash bag down to form a longer skirt. Now if only I could find some shoes, I’d be set.

I impulsively decided to take the shopping cart. It helped tremendously to lean my battered bones on the handle as I limped along the empty street. Plus, if I actually did encounter a fellow human, shopping carts are the world’s best urban camouflage. They have the power to make a person invisible in any big city in America. You hear a shopping cart coming down the street, you immediately look away from the person pushing it. Homeless, you tell yourself. Better not look, or they’ll ask for money.

I thought I might really die before I found a phone. More and more it seemed like the best course of action would be to just lie down on the pavement. The only thing that kept me going was picturing Jesse Black’s cocky smirk disintegrating under a point-blank lead facial.

I finally saw a sign for a tiny Mexican mercado at the far end of the street. The mercado was closed, but there was a payphone out front, plastered with stickers advertising taxis, escorts and phone cards with special rates to Central and South America. Amazingly, the phone worked.

I punched 9-1-1 on the grimy keypad. A woman came on the line, asking about the nature of my emergency. I told her I had been shot and gave the address of the mercado. She told me to hold on, that help was on the way.

Hearing this, my body wanted to pass back out. Mission accomplished, right? Time to lie down and wait for the cavalry. But my mind wouldn’t shut up about what had happened, fighting to make logic out of the madness. I thought of feisty little Didi giving those goons what for in my office and was suddenly very afraid for her. I had to make sure she was okay.

Even though I have a great memory for numbers and addresses, it took me a minute to pull my own calling card number out of the numb mush of my brain. As soon as I did, I phoned Didi’s home and her cell. Nothing. That scared me even worse, since I knew Didi to answer the phone any time, day or night. Even on the toilet or in the heat of her frequent intimate liaisons. And no, I didn’t want to leave a message. What I had to say was for her ears only. Paranoia coiled around my aching ribs, making it even harder to breathe. No sign of an ambulance. I couldn’t stand the thought of anything happening to Didi. I needed to call someone to go check up on her, to make sure she was okay. There was only one person I could think of who would be awake, willing and able. I called Malloy.

Lalo Malloy was the new guy, since Daring Angels’ faithful security escort Joe Saturnino got married and moved to Florida. I always employ a guy part-time to drive my girls to gigs with new production companies and hang out while they shoot. I like an older guy, reliable and mature enough not to go all gaga over the girls, but still intimidating enough to make sure no one thinks to try anything funny with my models. I pay a small hourly wage and the girls top it off with tips. Not bad for a part-time gig.

Malloy was an ex-cop like Joe, though he looked much more like a thug. Six-two, thick through the shoulders and the middle and pretty much everywhere else. Olive drab eyes that sized up the world through a taciturn tough-guy squint. Buzz-cut hair gone solid silver and under it a face like a police sketch based on the descriptions of terrorized victims. His left ear was slightly cauliflowered, just enough to let you know that he was no stranger to knuckles. His look was perfect for the job and he came highly recommended by Joe. They had been buddies back in the old LAPD days and had both left the force under less than sterling circumstances. I didn’t ask and they didn’t tell.

“Lalo’s okay,” Joe told me with a smirk the day he introduced us, faking a punch to Malloy’s meaty shoulder. “For a Hispamick.”

“A what?” I had asked.

“His daddy was Irish,” Joe explained. “And mama’s Mexican. A Hispamick.”

Malloy himself seemed neither amused nor annoyed by the joke. He just shrugged and put his big hands in his pockets.

He’d been driving my girls for almost two months and I still didn’t really know him all that well. He wasn’t an easy guy to get to know. Came in, did his job and left. Solid, but not much for casual conversation. I felt really strange calling him in the middle of the night like this, but there just wasn’t anyone else. It took me several wrong numbers to get him on the line. He picked up on the first ring.

“Malloy,” he said, like he was still answering the phone at the Homicide desk.

I had no idea what the hell I was going to say to him.

“Malloy,” I repeated, feeling like I had forgotten how to speak. “It’s... I...”

“I’ll call you back,” he said suddenly and hung up.

Baffled, I stared at the dirty blue receiver in my hand, then slowly put it back on the cradle. I leaned over the handle of the shopping cart and maybe grayed out for a little while, but then the phone rang, scaring me and making me jump. It hurt.

“Malloy?” I said into the phone.

“Angel,” he replied. I could hear traffic in the background. I figured he must have gotten the number off caller ID and then gone out to a payphone. “You wanna tell me what the hell is going on?”

I felt suddenly sure I really was going to black out. What the hell was going on? I didn’t even know where to begin.

“Angel,” Malloy was saying. “Angel, are you there?”

I tried to tell Malloy about the blonde and the briefcase full of money and Jesse and the blue Civic. I can’t imagine I made much sense, but eventually Malloy got the gist of it.

“Did you call an ambulance?” he asked.

It took me a minute to answer that. Did I call an ambulance? Things were getting woozy and confusing and I just wanted to lie down.

“Yeah,” I eventually said, or must have because then Malloy was telling me to get the hell away from the mercado, to hide from the ambulance.

“Hide from the ambulance?” I said. Nothing seemed to make any sense. “But why...”

“Angel,” Malloy said. “If you let them take you to the hospital, you’re going to be arrested for the murder of Sam Hammer.”