Out of the Dark

47 Roused Beast

Driving home, Evan watched the sun bury itself in the horizon. Its dying glow washed the hills in gold, the sepia-toned filter of another era. The sky, too, was hyper-real, the kind of soft lavender reserved for children’s sketches of sunsets. Soon enough darkness prevailed, headlights and freeway overheads spot-bleaching the endless black strip of the 10.

As Evan neared downtown, the vehicles proliferated like prairie mammals. In short order the freeway grew constipated even by L.A. traffic standards, so he looped south on the 710 and cut west across Slauson Avenue. Given the streetlights, it would probably take him just as long to get home, but there was a pleasure in keeping the Ford pickup on the move, a sense of hard-won progress.

Huntington Park was three square miles of densely packed Hispanic working-class folks living mostly above the poverty line. It felt dreary and vibrant at the same time, nightclubs and health centers, shops and run-down apartments. When Mexico beat Croatia in the World Cup a few years back, the whole neighborhood had taken to the streets, prompting LAPD to dispatch mounted officers in riot gear to ensure that the celebration didn’t tip into lawlessness.

Evan almost didn’t notice the sign as he drove past.

In hindsight he wished he hadn’t.

Waiting for the light to change, he read the reversed words in the reflection off his windshield, a neon-pink glare: NNI ROTOM REGAYOV.

Then he turned and stared at the seedy motel.

Mia’s words came back to him: Like he’s an international mogul instead of a strung-out reprobate renting a by-the-day room at the Voyager Motor Inn in Huntington Park.

“Goddamn it,” Evan said.

The light changed. The car behind him honked, the window cranking down, an upturned hand helping convey a stream of profane Spanish in his direction.

He coasted through the light and then pulled to the curb. His eyes gazed back at him from the rearview, issuing a clear warning.

This was stupid.

Mia had told him not to get involved.

It was none of his business.

It wasn’t like he didn’t have enough to worry about.

But he thought about the taste of the sun-kissed skin at her shoulder. Her bottom lip between his teeth. The light freckles across her nose, visible only at close quarters. Then he remembered how her expression had changed when she’d answered the phone. I won’t let that piece of shit scare me. What had the man told her? That he was going to rape her. Kidnap her and keep her in a cellar. That when he was done, she’d beg to be put out of her misery.

Mia was right. It wasn’t Evan’s business. He wasn’t going to get involved.

Already he was out of the truck, walking up the sidewalk, head lowered.

The door of the lobby clanged against a mounted bell, the cheery ring adding a discordant note to the decidedly uncheery interior. Stuffing protruded from a gut-slashed love seat. The floorboards had rotted away in an amoeba by the front desk, releasing the sweet smell of mold. An obese receptionist rested her head on a propped fist, her jowls dimpled into concentric folds above her knuckles. She was watching The Silence of the Lambs on a television no bigger than a toaster. Hannibal Lecter bragged about eating the census taker’s liver with some fava beans and a nice Chianti, then rabbit-sucked his teeth with epicurean relish.

As Evan approached, the woman slid her eyes over to him but didn’t otherwise move.

“Is Oscar Esposito staying here?” Evan asked.

“Why?”

“He’s a friend.”

“Then I don’t much want to help you.”

“Why?”

“Because he’s a culo.”

Evan supposed that a man whose four-year-old daughter answered to “Idiot” generally didn’t make a winning impression on women.

He said, “Then I’m an enemy.”

At this she moved, shifting her considerable weight on her chair. “What do you want to do to him?”

“Just have a talk.”

“A talk.”

“Yes.”

“That might not be the worst thing.” She fanned her fingers, considered. “Too bad, though. You just missed him. He flew out of here.”

“Drunk?”

“No. Like, with a purpose, you know?”

A ripple of heat moved across Evan’s shoulders. “Do you know where he was heading?”

The woman shrugged. “Course not.”

“Does he have a car?”

“Not that I know of. Cara de mierda takes the bus.”

Mounted on the wall behind her, a plywood board housed columns of hooks, some of which held room keys.

Evan said, “You can’t tell me what room he’s staying in, right?”

“That’s right.”

Evan stared at her.

She stared back.

And then she stretched, a great expansive gesture, her sweater swooping beneath her capacious arms like a set of wings. She finished with a finger landing on an empty gold hook, her pretty dark eyes peering pointedly at Evan from beneath elaborate fake lashes.

The keys on either side dangled from cheap plastic key chains labeled with blue Magic Marker—13 and 15.

Evan said, “If you’ll excuse me, I need to use the restroom.”

She gave a Vanna White flip of her hand. “Right down that hall, sir.”

He hustled up the corridor. Room 14 was conveniently unlocked, saving the half minute it would have taken him to pick the crappy dead bolt.

Given the prison-small space, it took Evan all of fifteen seconds to rifle through Oscar Esposito’s few belongings. He paused, scanning the room, his gaze coming to rest on a beige telephone propped on an old-fashioned radiator.

He picked up the handset, hit REDIAL.

A woman answered, her voice hoarse. “Look, O, I give up, okay? I give up. I told you where we at. Just come get us. I’ll come home with you. Just don’t hurt Aurora no more.” Her sobs came over the line. “I give up. I give up.”

Reseating the handset, Evan eyed the number on the cracked caller-display screen. On his RoamZone he accessed a classified reverse telephone directory and thumbed in the number.

An address 2.4 miles away.

That was a short bus ride.

Oscar Esposito was on tilt, all lean muscle and bone flying up the sidewalk, face thrust forward, leading the charge with his scowl. He wore black 501s tugged low enough to reveal a good six inches of Tommy Hilfiger boxer briefs and the grip of a nickel-plated .22. His leather jacket fluttered behind him as he cut between two parking meters and charged for the front door of the shelter.

Nearing the steps, he reached behind him and tugged the gun free.

That was when his momentum stopped.

It was puzzling at first, his foot raised before him, frozen above the sidewalk, ready to set down. The tightening pressure around his chest. His arms pinned at his sides.

He squinted down at the band of paracord lassoed around his torso.

It tightened some more.

And then he was whisked off his feet, flying backward into the alley next to the shelter.

He hit the ground hard, the wind knocked out of him, his gun skittering off. His mouth gaped, but nothing came out. And no air came in.

The alley walls were feathered with torn-off corners of flyers. A breeze rushed across his sweat-washed face, making the triangles of paper flap on their tabs of tape like the wings of injured butterflies. Through the gap between rooftops, a few stars shone through a bleary sky.

And then they were blotted out by a man-shaped form.

A boot lowered to Oscar’s chest, compressing his ribs, and at last his lungs released with a shudder. He gasped and then gasped again.

The voice came down at him as if from the heavens.

“Listen to me closely. When you regain consciousness, the cops will find you hog-tied on the doorstep of the shelter, in violation of your restraining order. Resting beside your cheek will be that gun, which I assume is unlicensed. It will be unloaded, not that you’ll be able to reach for it.”

The wind picked up even more, the torn bits of flyers fluttering with wounded fury, transforming the alley into something living, the hide of a roused beast.

“After you’ve served your time, if you try to hurt your wife or daughter again or ever contact the woman who prosecuted you, I will come back for you. Blink twice if you understand me.”

Oscar could hear his own breath screeching in and out of his lungs, but it didn’t sound like it was coming from him; it sounded like a growl issued from the chest of the alley.

He blinked twice.

All at once Oscar was flipped over onto his stomach, the rope coiled around his wrists and ankles, creaking with tension. The paracord zippered into a knot, cranking his shoulders and hips back in their sockets. His spinal cord bent in a painful reverse arc, strung like a bow.

The voice was lower now, calm and sharp, a dagger in his ear. “If I have to come back for you, I will make you hurt. Understand?”

Oscar blinked again.

This time everything stayed dark.