Mr. Lucky

50

Huck Dubb sat in a pizza delivery car and stared at Gerry Valentine’s house in Palm Harbor a block away. It was noon, the street deserted. He’d commandeered the car a half hour ago from a shopping center where the pizza maker was located. The driver had been sitting in the car, counting his money, when Huck had stuck a gun through his open window. The driver had given Huck the keys and even thrown in his stupid hat for good measure.

Huck had stolen cars every hundred miles during his trip down from the Florida Panhandle. It had made the trip longer, but also safer. Changing cars every couple of hours made it impossible for the law to get a bead on him.

He stared at the address on the card he’d stolen from the registration desk at the Holiday Inn in Gulfport. The address on the card and the one on the mailbox were the same, but something didn’t feel right about the place. It was a quaint New England–style clapboard house and not what he’d expect an Eye-talian to be living in. Taking the driver’s cell phone off the seat, he called information and got the operator to verify the address for him.

A Palm Harbor sheriff’s car materialized in his mirror. Huck felt his heartbeat kick into high gear. It had taken him nine hours to get here after leaving Arlen behind. For every minute of that nine hours, he’d thought about how he was going to punish Gerry Valentine’s family. Cut and strangle and shoot was how he’d decided to kill them. Thinking about it had put a fire in his belly as powerful as any he’d ever felt.

Digging into his pocket, Huck removed his cash and pretended to be counting it while the sheriff trolled past. On the backseat of the car were boxes of pizzas in insulated bags. The food made the interior of the car smell real good. Huck lifted his eyes and saw the sheriff idling beside him. He smiled at the man behind the wheel.

“Hey, Officer, how’s it going?”

“Can’t complain,” the sheriff replied.

“Nobody listens. Want a free slice? I got a pie that went undelivered.”

The sheriff smiled and said no and drove to the next block. Huck watched him park in front of Gerry Valentine’s house and climb out of his vehicle. The sheriff walked around the house and then got back in his car and drove away.

Huck smiled to himself as he started up his engine. The police up in the Panhandle must have figured out that Arlen wasn’t him and alerted the police down here. In a way, he was happy he’d run into the sheriff. Now he knew to be on his toes—and that Gerry Valentine didn’t keep a dog running around his property.

He parked in the spot the sheriff had vacated. As he killed the engine, his stomach growled. He hadn’t put anything in his mouth since leaving Gulfport, and the pizza on the backseat was calling him. First things first, he told himself.

Getting out, he removed one of the insulated boxes from the backseat, then opened the trunk and removed the short-barreled shotgun he’d brought from his grandmother’s house. He stuck the shotgun beneath the box. It was just small enough to stay hidden.

He walked up the front path, wondering how foolish he looked in his coveralls and the pizza driver’s hat tilted rakishly on his head. At the front door he stopped and peered through a wire mesh screen door onto a porch. Baby toys were scattered across the floor. His breath caught in his throat. What did the Old Testament say? An eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth. With his free hand, he rapped on the screen door.

When no one came out, he tested the knob and got it to turn. He pulled the door open and stepped inside the porch. It was small and cozy, with newspapers scattered on the furniture. He glanced behind him on the street. Still quiet as a church.

“Anyone home? Pizza delivery.”

He could hear music inside the house. It had a Latin rhythm that made Huck instinctively tap his foot. He tested the front door and found it unlocked. He opened it and slipped inside the house of the man who’d killed his three sons.

Huck had been a criminal since he was eight. He’d learned from his daddy, who’d made ruckus juice out of a still in the back of his house and sold it for a buck a gallon to the blacks and farmhands. If he’d learned one lesson from his daddy, it was that you had to move fast. Whatever the crime, speed was key. Everything else was secondary.

He put the pizza box on the floor. The music was coming from a room off to his right. Gloria Estefan and Miami Sound Machine. He drew a hunting knife from the sheath hanging beneath his shirt, then walked down a short hallway and entered the room. More baby toys scattered on the floor, a crib in the corner. Gerry Valentine was a proud new daddy. It made Huck that much more enraged. Then it hit him what he’d do. He’d kill the wife and take the kid. That would put a knot in Gerry’s colon for the rest of his life.

He walked into the center of the room and looked for a picture. He didn’t want to end up killing the goddamn cleaning lady. In the corner of the room was a small desk with a computer in its center. On its ledge was a family photo. He got close enough to make out Gerry and the woman in his arms. She was a real beauty.

Gloria Estefan’s singing was getting to him. He liked Latin music, especially to dance to. What people back home called cutting the rug. He found the stereo and turned the music up. He was about to ruin another man’s life. It made him feel incredibly powerful. He went into the hallway and walked to the foot of the stairway. He listened hard for a few moments, thought he heard a noise. He put a foot on the stairs, then halted. He needed to be sure she wasn’t downstairs, or risk letting her get away.

He went to the end of the hallway. It cut to his right, and he stuck his head around the corner. The hallway led to the kitchen in the rear of the house, and he squinted at Gerry Valentine’s wife standing at a sink in the kitchen with her back to him. She wore jeans and a T-shirt and stood motionless at the sink. He guessed she was cleaning dishes.

He pulled his head back around the corner. Knife or gun? He decided on the gun. It was quicker. He’d rush into the room, shoot her, and be done with it.

Payback time.

Mabel Struck was serving homemade eggplant lasagna to Brownie and Little Pete when the telephone in the kitchen rang. She’d invited them to lunch after they’d agreed to help her, then learned from Brownie that neither man ate meat. So she’d found a vegetarian recipe online that looked easy to make.

“Will you excuse me?” she asked.

“Of course,” the two retired carnival men said.

“Please start without me. I don’t want your food to get cold.” She went into the kitchen and picked up the phone. After all the work they’d done—and so quickly!—having them for lunch was the least she could do. “Hello?”

Her caller was the chief of the Palm Harbor police department. He told her the news, and Mabel leaned against the wall and brought her hand to her mouth.

“Oh my God,” she said. “I’ll be right over.”

The chief didn’t think that was a good idea. There was a lot of blood in the house.

“I’m coming anyway,” Mabel said.

She put the phone in its cradle before the chief could reply. Her head felt light, and she stared out the window at the gloriously sunny afternoon. It seemed unfathomable that something so horrible could happen on such a beautiful day. She found herself wishing Tony was here, so they could go across the street together. Only, she couldn’t lean on Tony for the rest of her life. Sucking in her breath, she went to the back door and pulled it open.

Yolanda sat on the back stoop, rocking the sleeping baby in her arms. Lois had started wailing a few minutes ago, and Yolanda had brought her outside so Brownie and Little Pete wouldn’t have their eardrums ruined. The younger woman looked up at her.

“Is everything all right?”

“Our trap worked,” Mabel said.

Yolanda rose from the stoop. “Are the police there now?”

Mabel nodded. “Your neighbor heard a shotgun blast and dialed 911.”

“Did they catch him?”

“Yes. He shot himself in the foot. The police think…”

“What?”

“They think he might die.”

Yolanda grabbed Mabel by the wrist and looked her in the eye with a steely gaze. “Don’t feel sorry for him. He was going to hurt me and my baby.”

“I know. It’s just—”

“He got what was coming to him.”

It was exactly what Tony would say, and Mabel found herself nodding. Cradling the baby in her arms, Yolanda hurried inside with Mabel right behind her.

Three Palm Harbor sheriff’s cars and an ambulance were parked in front of Yolanda’s house. Yolanda identified herself to the uniform in charge and asked to be let inside. The sheriff stared at the baby in her arms, then at Mabel.

“She’s with me,” Yolanda said.

“It ain’t pretty,” the sheriff warned her.

“Please let us in,” Yolanda said.

The sheriff led them inside the house. Everything looked normal until they reached the rear hallway that led to the kitchen. The floor was sheeted with blood, the sight of it so unsettling that Mabel felt her breath go away. If it bothered Yolanda, she didn’t show it.

Mabel stared at the door at the end of the hallway. That morning, Brownie and Little Pete had painted a trompe l’oeil on it that showed Yolanda standing at the sink with her back to the door. The painting was poor compared to those at the Showtown, but the bad light in the hallway hid the imperfections. Huck Dubb must have been looking at it when he fell.

“Where is he?” Yolanda asked the sheriff.

“Out in the ambulance,” the sheriff replied. “He hit the trip wire your friends ran across the floor, and blew his foot clean off. We’re trying to find a hospital that will take him.”

“Why bother?” Yolanda said.

Mabel could no longer stomach the blood and left the house. There was a massive oak tree on the front lawn, and she stood beneath its cool shade and tried to regain her composure. The ambulance’s back doors were open, and she watched the EMS team work on Huck Dubb. He was a big man and looked like a beached whale lying on his back. No matter how horrible a person he was, she didn’t want to see him die.

Then she looked at the gang of sheriffs standing by the curb. They were talking and laughing and enjoying the beautiful day. And they were eating something. Her vision was poor, and she had to stare before she realized what it was. Pizza.

Staring up into the clouds, Mabel thanked God for looking out for them.