The Killing Hour

CHAPTER THIRTY-NINE

The sun sinks and my anguish rises.

I stop at a supermarket and ignore the looks. A person dressed in fatigues is a common enough sight. People who have been beaten up are also common enough. It’s not often the two are combined. Normally the guy in the fatigues has given the beating. Stopping at the supermarket has never been so weird. It’s as if I’ve evolved beyond walking up and down aisles looking for pastas and cereals and bread. This kind of mundane day-to-day living is behind me. This isn’t where people go when death is all around them. I grab chips, doughnuts, a packet of cheese slices, and two drinks. I roll out a hundred-dollar note and the looks on the faces around me change. The girl working the checkout takes a small step back. She’s thinking I just mugged somebody. Or killed them.

I pull past Kathy’s house at six fifty in my shiny, rented Holden and park six houses further down. There are no police cars. No police tape. Life has moved on. Death hasn’t, though. I can feel it waiting in the street watching me. The Mercedes I saw parked outside one of the neighboring houses is still parked in the same place. Maybe it’s broken down. The street is pretty quiet. I start waiting.

I flick through the newspaper I bought with my snacks. The murders are still front-page news. No mention of Landry. I figure it’s too soon. The cops will be concerned. I’m sure Landry kept any information about me to himself. Had to, so he could execute me without fear of being caught. At least that’s something in my favor, I guess. I try to think if anything connects me to Landry’s death. My fingerprints are all over the cabin, which will match those at Kathy’s and Luciana’s houses. What else is there? Oh shit. There’s the piece of paper he showed me with my name and phone number surrounded by rubbed pencil. If Landry’s body is found the note will be discovered. But maybe it’s gotten so battered by the river it’s now useless. Or maybe it wasn’t in those clothes, but in the pocket of his jacket or pants, which Jo is now wearing. If she’s even wearing anything.

My stomach tightens at that thought. The harder I try not to imagine her naked and pinned beneath Cyris, the more visual it becomes. I start sweating. I look for a distraction. I read the rest of the newspaper. I start on the crossword puzzle and can only manage to solve a third of it. The day goes from being light to dim to dark. The streetlights come on. An hour into my wait a dark Mercedes pulls into a driveway six houses ahead of me. Into Kathy’s house. I put the binoculars to my eyes and manage only a glimpse of the car before it rolls out of sight. I start the car and move up to pull in behind the silver Mercedes. Does everybody on this street own one? I kill the engine. Wait patiently.

I can see the right front of the house and the back of the Mercedes. I can’t see any movement inside the house or the car. There’s not much more I can do. I came prepared to wait for hours and now it seems I may just be doing that. I have to remain focused. Remain sharp. I have to trust everything is okay. If I believed otherwise I’d be believing there’s no point in carrying on.

I start to grow restless, fidgety. The minutes slip by like lost nights. This is the first evening Landry has ever missed since being born. A few people are out and about. Some are walking dogs. Others are power walking, thrusting their arms in front of them in self-defense movements to stay fit. Nobody pays any attention to me. I probably look like a reporter. Or a cop. Both would have perfect justification to be sitting here. Both wouldn’t look out of place with cuts and bruises on their faces. I consider reading the newspaper again, but it’s too dark now. I want to get out and stretch a few of my aching muscles. I adjust my position in the seat. I look into the rearview mirror. My jaw where Landry hit me is getting darker. The swelling has gone down and the bruising has darkened. I run my finger along the line of the bruise. It feels soft, like a small balloon of water is trapped underneath.

I look up at the sky and wonder if it will rain tonight. When my cell phone rings I can’t find it. I fumble through my vest pockets, forgetting which one I put it in, swearing every time my fingers come up empty. When I get to it I check the display. The number is blocked. I flip it open and answer it.

“Why aren’t you at home, partner?” Cyris’s voice crackles through the earpiece.

“Didn’t want you changing your mind and deciding to kill me instead.”

Cyris says nothing as he thinks about it. So I say nothing. A minute goes by in which it seems we’re setting a trend.

“You got the money?” he asks.

“I got it.”

“Fifty grand.”

“What?”

“You’re pissing me off, buddy. It’s fifty grand now. It’s not free to dial a cell phone.”

No, but it doesn’t cost ten thousand dollars either. “I only have forty.”

“Forty will only get you eighty percent of her, and I decide which eighty.”

At least he’s sharpening up. “Fine,” I finally say. “Fifty grand.” This isn’t going to come down to money. It’s going to come down to me killing him.

“Meet me back out at the cabin.”

“No way.”

“What?”

“We three go out there and only you come back. Tell me if I’m wrong. It has to be somewhere more public.” I’ve been giving it some thought. “The pier. New Brighton.”

It seems like a good location. Not too many people, but enough so Cyris won’t try anything. He says nothing as he thinks this through. Jo could already be dead and he just wants the money. Or she could be alive and he’s thinking about the location, about how he has to change his plans. He’s thinking that maybe he won’t be getting the chance to kill us tomorrow night after all. So he’s still saying nothing. But now he’s realizing he knows my address, my details. He’s figuring he can kill me later on. In his own time. At his own leisure. He can afford to drive on over one night after mowing his lawn, rip me apart, and pick up dinner on the way back. So the idea of a public place isn’t looking too bad. In a public place I can’t try anything against him. In a public place we all walk away alive.

“Midnight,” he says.

Only he’s wrong. I’m happy to try something in a public place. I have more to lose than him. Everything to gain.

“Ten o’clock,” I counter. “More people.”

I wince as I wait for a reply or for the phone to hang up.

“Don’t forget the money, asshole. I’ll cut her pretty little head off no matter how many people are around.”

“Let me talk to Jo.”

“She’s busy.”

“I need to know she’s okay.”

“She’s okay, asshole.”

“I need proof of life,” I say, which is something I’ve heard people say in movies and documentaries.

“I’m going to give you proof of death instead, partner,” he says, and with that he hangs up.