Seldom Seen in August

CHAPTER TWO

The interior of the house offered no surprises.

Wade gently slid the door shut behind him and locked it, then pulled the curtains.

He turned to inspect his surroundings, but it was hard to make anything out in the gloom. What he could tell was that beneath his feet was a carpet that had seen better days and the air smelled faintly of furniture polish and pine air freshener. He did not need to know what the room looked like, only that he was the only one currently occupying it.

He felt a little better now that he was off the street and hidden, though he remained intrinsically aware that this did not constitute freedom. He was far from out of the woods. Anything could still go wrong, and in cases like this, usually did. Until he knew that he was alone in the house, he wouldn’t let his guard down. Even then, he would remain on edge until a viable long-term escape plan presented itself, if one presented itself and he wasn’t just dawdling here while a juggernaut of doom bore steadily down upon him.

Goddamn you anyway, Cartwright, he thought, clenching his teeth in frustration. He remained where he was, standing in the darkness by the drawn curtains, listening.

The house was quiet as the grave.

Not fool enough to take that as proof that he was alone, Wade cocked the gun as quietly as he could, which was not quiet at all, and slowly crossed the room, bound for the door in the wall opposite. Twice he barked his shin against furniture that had been lurking in the dark and had to restrain a gasp of pain. At length, ankle throbbing, he found the door and beside it a light switch he yearned to turn on, but resisted just in case it gave him away should someone be waiting for him in the hall.

Quietly, he opened the door.

A naked bulb cast sickly yellow light down on the narrow hallway.

There were coats, children’s by the look of them, hooked over the newel post at the bottom of a short flight of carpeted stairs. A punctured football sat on one step beside the naked head and torso of a baby doll. Its eyes were closed as if sleeping. Wade gave it only the most cursory glance. He hated dolls, and had ever since that movie he’d seen as a kid in which one of them had opened its eyes in a darkened bedroom and grinned at a terrified child. The stupid movie hadn’t even been about dolls, he recalled, and shook his head as he edged into the hall.

Ahead of him was a doorway, the light from the hall unable to reach very far over the threshold. There’s no one here, Wade told himself. He was alone. He could feel it, but he knew better than to rely solely on instinct. Last time he’d trusted his gut, he’d enlisted Cartwright to help him with a heist and now six people were dead and the police were hunting them both. Unless of course they had already caught Cartwright, and Wade might not have been bothered to learn that was the case had his idiot partner not been lugging around with him the fifty grand or so they’d cleared from the bank job.

He moved on, back pressed to the wall, until he was inside the kitchen. It smelled like disinfectant in here, and he imagined the chaos of a busy family in the morning: kids yelling and shoveling cereal into their maws while their parents got dressed and tried not to let show the hatred and regret they felt for their own lives and each other. He pictured a woman, just this side of good-looking, her teeth grit as she vigorously scrubbed down the kitchen surfaces while pretending the sponge was a lathe and the counter her husband’s face. They would exchange pleasant farewells for the sake of the kids, all the while secretly wishing fatal misfortune on one another.

Misery.

Wade had lived it and so found it easy to envision. Indeed, though he recalled little of his childhood, so generic was this house that it summoned what unpleasant memories he had retained of it.

Pain.

Anger.

Annoyed, he shook off the reverie before it could properly take hold of him and moved further into the kitchen, sure now that he was alone in the house. The kitchen was empty. The dirty cups, bowls, and glasses piled in the sink in the center of the L-shaped counter confirmed his suspicion that what he had walked into was the aftermath of an ordinary morning in a hectic household. It was Monday; if he was lucky, the family would be gone until early evening when school and work relinquished its hold on them. If not, and someone came home for lunch, things could get ugly. He hoped it wouldn’t come to that.

There was a small calendar tacked to a corkboard beside the refrigerator. He noted that today’s date had been circled in red marker. August 16^th. The picture above it was of a lush green meadow, speckled with dandelions beneath a sprawling blue sky. It might have been a pretty scene if not for the monstrous black satellite dish dominating the right side of the picture, the red tip of its phallic probe turned heavenward.

After uncocking the gun and tucking it back into his waistband, Wade opened the refrigerator and helped himself to some milk, straight from the carton. He belched and, still thirsty, exchanged the milk for a cold bottle of water, which did a better job of soothing his parched throat. His stomach growled, but he decided that could be dealt with after he’d inspected the upper rooms. He finished the bottle of water and tossed it in the trashcan, then moved to the large window, which looked out on the street. Cautiously, he fingered open the Venetian blinds.

Cars sat silently beside curbs.

Windows reflected the clear blue sky.

Sunlight through the sycamore trees painted leopard skin patterns on the sidewalks. Heat shimmered on the road.

But there was nobody on the street, no neighbors enjoying a day off, no retirees out mowing their lawns, no housewives gathering up the morning paper, no dogs barking despite the signs he’d seen that claimed the place was chock full of them. It was completely deserted, which was odd. If he’d chosen a dilapidated neighborhood as his hiding place, the absence of people would not have bothered him so much, but Seldom Seen Drive, while clearly not upper class, was no ghetto either. There should have been someone out there.

And you should be thankful that there isn’t, he told himself and a moment later nodded his agreement. There would be countless obstacles in his path before he made it home free, he knew. Better not to question the things that weren’t a problem.

He let the blinds snap back into place and returned to the hall. Averting his gaze, he stepped over the doll torso and quietly ascended the stairs. The further up he went, the darker it got until his progress slowed to a crawl and he was left fumbling for a light switch. Again he was reminded of the danger of switching on a light before he had explored the whole house, but concluded that it was equally dangerous to be trying to explore it blindly.

“Shit,” he hissed, almost tripping when his foot connected with something hard and unyielding. He steadied himself, dropped to his haunches and listened for signs that someone had been drawn to his presence on the landing, but heard nothing. Only his own steady breathing. He squinted down at the floor and reached out with his hands until they touched on something smooth and round. An attempt to form a picture with his hands of what the object might be proved fruitless, so he lifted it, surprised by the weight, and lugged it over to the head of the stairs where he set it down on the top step.

It was a large pink ceramic pig with a slot in its back.

Jesus, Wade thought. A friggin’ piggy bank.

It was loaded with coins, but why it had been left in the middle of the landing, like a lure for thieves pettier than he, was a mystery that immediately seemed less of one when he reminded himself that children lived here. Not without difficulty, he shoved it aside and thought that maybe he’d rob it after all, just because it had inconvenienced him. Besides, it would do the kid who owned it good to learn a hard lesson about life early on, so maybe the shit that lay ahead of them wouldn’t be nearly so surprising.

He stood, turned, and flipped the switch on the wall behind him. The landing flooded with stark white light from another unshaded bulb and he raised a hand to shield his eyes. Spastic shadows slipped under the three doors on the second floor and down the stairs as he blinked ghostly orbs from his eyes.

Nice house like this, he thought. No shades. Fucking weird.

He took a step and put a hand on the nearest door. It swung easily open revealing a cramped, unremarkable bathroom that seemed unsuitable for anything but a bachelor who didn’t mind getting piss in the sink. The shower curtain was spotted with mildew and pulled back to reveal a bathtub with a pink slip-proof mat, a drain clotted with long dark hairs, and a decidedly unhappy looking rubber duck. Time and multiple saturations had erased the pupil of one eye, leaving it with a cataract, while the other stared myopically upward as if questioning the injustice of it all. Wade grinned and turned away.

In the absence of any ambient sound, the sudden vibration against his right thigh made him jump and he scowled, embarrassed and glad as hell that no one had seen his reaction. From the pocket of his jeans he withdrew a slim silver cell phone. It hummed faintly as he checked the display.

“About goddamn time,” he muttered, and though he wouldn’t have admitted it under duress, he was relieved to see his partner’s name on the phone’s readout. It meant two things: Cartwright was alive, and he was loyal enough to keep in touch. The opposite in either case would have meant a whole lot of money lost to the wind.

Beneath Cartwright’s name was a flashing envelope icon. It was not a call but a text message. One of the last things Ward had barked at Cartwright had been “no calls, you hear me? I don’t want to be hiding up a goddamn tree and have the cops find me by following my Mission Impossible ring tone.” And he was glad he’d imparted that little caveat, for while there were no cops breathing down his neck at the moment, he still didn’t know for sure that there wasn’t someone hiding in one of the other two rooms. Turning the phone off hadn’t been an option either. He needed to regroup with Cartwright once the heat died down a little, and the sooner he knew the score, the better. If I don’t hear from you by sundown, he’d told his partner, I’m going to assume one of two scenarios: (a) you got caught, or (b) you got greedy and decided to split with the money. If the latter happens, I won’t come after you, because I probably wouldn’t know where to start looking. That’s just me being honest. So you’ll probably get away with it. I won’t dog you. Instead I’ll visit your family and you can see what I’ve done to them on the main evening news from whatever hole you’re hiding in, got it?

And apparently, Cartwright had.

Wade pressed the green phone symbol and the text message spread across the screen:

Wade bit down on his lower lip, his breath whistling through his nose. What the hell did that mean? Sorry, I fucked up. Was he referring to his little rampage at the bank despite Wade telling him only to shoot if someone got brave? Or was this some new turn of events? Had he lost the money?

Aggravated, he quickly hit REPLY and thumbed the buttons until he had typed:

He hit SEND and cursed a little too loudly. He ran his free hand through his hair and caught a whiff of himself. The odor was rank, unpleasant, like sour cream, an unnecessary reminder that he needed to take a shower. And he would, but not here. He was relatively fearless, but not enough to totally disregard common sense by taking a soak in the house he’d broken into.

Agitated and eyeing the phone in the hope that he wouldn’t have to wait long for the response, he pushed away from the wall. “C’mon, c’mon,” he whispered urgently, willing Cartwright to respond. If it turned out the money was gone, Wade figured he might as well come out with his hands up. His share of the takings wouldn’t be nearly enough to pay back the men who were out to break his legs, but it would keep them off his back for a while. Without it, he was as good as dead. And if they didn’t get to him first, the cops surely would. But if he settled some of his debt, he still ended up with nothing, which was why Wade planned to kill Cartwright and take his share. It would be just enough to finance his relocation somewhere south of the border. It was a cliché, sure, but one that held endless appeal. He liked the sun, he liked Mexican food, and he liked dark women. Where was the catch?

So intent was he on the phone’s display that it took him a moment longer than it should have to sense that there was someone standing behind him. Hair standing on end, body braced for the feel of slugs punching into his flesh, he turned, fumbled for the gun, but by the time he had it withdrawn, cocked and aimed at where the—what?—had been standing only a split-second before, it had vanished into the bathroom, slamming the door shut so hard behind it that for a moment Wade thought he’d pulled the trigger.

“Jesus H,” Wade murmured, his heart thundering. For a moment he stood there, vacillating, unsure what to do next. Only when he carefully walked himself through what he’d just seen did he realize how convinced he’d been that there had been nobody in the house with him. And perhaps he hadn’t been entirely wrong. After all, he couldn’t be certain that whoever had scurried into the bathroom hadn’t just come home. Wade hadn’t heard a car, or a door, but that didn’t mean squat.

No, he told himself. No… they were here all along.

His hackles rose, his senses on full alert now. He had let himself get complacent after the exhaustion of the chase, and that was an amateurish mistake to make, one that might have been his last.

Swallowing a lump the momentary shock had lodged in his throat, he pocketed his cell phone and took a step closer to the bathroom door.

It was a kid, he thought. A teenager maybe.

Not that it mattered a damn. He had no interest in taking hostages, only lives, especially those that intersected with his in ways in which he didn’t approve.

Slowly, he dropped to one knee and brought his face close to the latch panel, his eye to the keyhole. He squinted, caught a glimpse of a bare chest rapidly rising and falling, the acne-flushed cusp of a chin. It was a boy, probably no more than fifteen or sixteen, sitting on the toilet, terrified.

Wade exhaled explosively, his knees cracking as he stood up.

“Hey,” he said evenly. “Hey kid, come on out.”

There was no answer, but he fancied he could now hear the faint hush-whisper of the boy’s breathing as it quickened in panic.

“There’s nowhere you can go. You understand that, right?” Wade said into the door. “You’re stuck in there and I’m out here with a gun. What’re your options?”

He waited a few moments, but the kid didn’t answer.

“How about I give you three seconds to open the door, huh? One way or another, this hide-and-seek game’s gonna end, but it’d be easier on us both if you just came on out of there on your own. One…”

Despite what many people had said over the past twenty years, Wade would get no pleasure at all from what he was about to do.

“Two…”

But that didn’t alter the inescapable reality of the fact that it had to be done.

“Three.”