Moist (23 page)

“Do you think this is a safe neighborhood?”

Don put his chopsticks down and considered her question.

“No more or less than any other. At the end of the day it's a big city.”

She nodded.

“I don't feel safe living by myself. That's why I bought the gun.”

Don smiled at her.

“You're amazing.”

“Why do you say that?”

“I don't know. I guess when I think of someone who's a vegetarian I don't think of a gun owner.”

“I just don't want to be a victim.”

Don looked at her, curious.

“Did something happen to you?”

“Women get victimized. Society is set up that way.”

“I don't think a gun will solve society's problems.”

“It's not just a gun. It's, I don't know, it's empowerment.”

“Empowerment? Just because you can shoot someone?”

Maura nodded.

“But it's more than just shooting someone. It's something else.”

“What?”

“I don't know, but it's very sexy.”

Maura began to unbutton her blouse. She wanted to show Don how empowered she felt. Then maybe he'd understand. She took her shirt off, exposing her chest to him.

“Give me your gun.”

Don hesitated. He knew he shouldn't be doing this, but he couldn't help himself, he couldn't stop. Don slowly reached around and took his gun out of its holster. He checked to make sure the safety was on.

“Be careful.”

Maura took the gun.

“It's not about being careful.”

She pointed the gun at him.

“It's about being intimate.”

. . .

Esteban parked in front of Norberto's apartment. He checked his gun, making sure it was fully loaded and ready to go. He also checked his spare clip. No use jamming a new clip in only to find out that it was empty as well. He'd learned that the hard way when a couple of Mexican police had tried to jump him in a cantina in Juárez. Fortunately, the bartender had been a friend of his and had a twelve-gauge shotgun behind the bar.

Esteban knocked on the door and Amado let him in.

Esteban looked around the room. He wasn't shocked to see Norberto lying dead in a pool of blood. He figured it was something like that.

“Who killed him?”

“Yo.”

That was surprising.

“¿Por qué?”

“He and Martin stole my arm.”

It didn't take long for Esteban to piece together what might be occurring. He was used to power plays. He'd seen people plot against him and his crew for years.

“Where is it?”

“I don't know.”

Amado pointed to Norberto.

“He said that Martin was going to give it to
las placas
.”

So that was the plan. Let the police do Martin's dirty work. Still, Esteban was surprised. He didn't think Norberto would do something like this. The guy just wasn't a rat. Esteban walked over, carefully so as not to step in the blood, and looked at Norberto.

“I can't bury him with one arm.”

Esteban looked at Amado and chuckled.

“I think your days as a matador are over, my friend.”

“Lástima.”

“What will become of you? You need two hands to drive a cab or bus dirty dishes off of tables.”

“I've been thinking about a new job.”

Esteban looked at him and discreetly began to reach for his gun. Amado raised his arm in the air to reassure him.

“No, amigo. I don't want your job. I want to be a writer of
telenovelas.
”

B
OB WOKE UP
. The sun glinted in through a gap in the bright orange curtains and splashed across his face. He felt good. Warm, snuggled, and safe. The only thing slightly alarming was the fact that his cock was as hard as a lead pipe. He looked over and saw Felicia snoring peacefully next to him. Miss Scarlet, in the bedroom, with the lead pipe.

He shifted carefully, he didn't want Felicia to see it, because she'd make him fuck her again and, frankly, he was exhausted. He'd had sex so many times since he met her, fifteen, sixteen, maybe more, that he felt deeply tired, drained. His left eye had picked up a strange twitch.

The first thing he noticed as he climbed out of bed were the scabs on his knees. They were large, red, and painful. As he slid out of bed and stood up, his back squeaked in pain.
Christ, I feel sixty.
Bob hobbled off to the bathroom. He had to go to work.

. . .

Don shaved quickly, cutting himself twice on the chin. He didn't normally chop his face up this way, but he couldn't
keep his hand from shaking. He looked in the mirror. He realized that he didn't know the man who looked back at him. What was happening to him? Was it the job? The pressure finally getting to him? He'd heard that sometimes officers take unnecessary risks in their personal lives. They become adrenaline junkies. Danger addicts. Maybe that was it. Maybe he should go see the shrink. Then again, maybe it was some unexplored part of him that Maura was able to reach. Or maybe he was just being completely stupid.

At first he'd thought it was love. He'd thought he was the luckiest man in the world. Here was a beautiful, intelligent, and charming woman, and she just couldn't get enough of him. Who wouldn't love her? God, just look at her body. Just talk to her. But after last night, he wasn't so sure it was love. He didn't know what it was. Something pathological, maybe.

He could've stopped her. He realized that. At any time he could've broken out of it and said that it was too dangerous or he wasn't comfortable or it was crazy or whatever he needed to say to stop it. He could've. Hell, he should've.

And what if the gun had gone off? He'd be dead, but what would his colleagues say? He'd become a laughingstock in every police department in every city in the world for the rest of history. They'd name a special rule after him. They'd teach it at the police academy. Don's rule: “A gun is not a sex toy.”

. . .

Martin rolled out of bed feeling energized. Nothing like a couple of bong hits and a Valium to give you a solid night's rest. Martin skipped the coffee and went right back to the
bong, packing it full of some awesome bud, the little golden hairs catching the light and gleaming like strips of neon. Martin needed to remain calm. He had to get some things accomplished today. He'd made a checklist before he went to bed.

One, call Esteban and tell him that he'd taken Amado's arm and incinerated it. It was just no good to leave evidence lying around. He'd get Esteban to stand up for him. Tell Amado that it was the smart thing to do. That way when the feds came swooping down on them, they'd think it was each other who ratted. Divide and conquer.

Two, swing by Norberto's and borrow a gun.

Three, find Bob and kill him.

Four, well, actually there wasn't a four. Martin figured that by the time he got Bob out to the woods and shot him, that would take up most of the day.

The water bubbled in the bong as he sucked in a solid hit. Yeah. He felt good. Proactive. He released the smoke in a great gray geyser. Yeah. He was taking control of his life. It was about time.

. . .

Maura lit some incense and got the chair ready for her first client. She hoped Larga wouldn't blow off this appointment. It wasn't unusual for people to miss an appointment; in fact, it happened all the time. It was unusual for them not to call, not to apologize and reschedule.

But today she would let it slide. She was in a fantastic mood. Awash with an inner joy, a deep glow, a sense of sexual satisfaction that, well, she'd never felt before. Sure, sex with
Bob had been fun, exhausting sometimes, but fun. Sex with Don was a whole other beast. They had a level of intimacy that you just didn't normally find between two people. He had taken her to a place, a deep, almost sacred place, that she had never known existed. Sex with Don touched an inner part of her and filled her with, well, filled her with fulfillment.

It moved her.

Perhaps it was because she felt empowered. Maybe that's what brought her to this sacred sex spot. She was glad that Don had let her keep his gun, just until she got her own. She opened her purse and looked at it. She felt a hot sensation shoot up through her body. She closed the purse. Later. She had work to do.

. . .

Bob walked into United Pathology.

Morris was there, already on the computer, looking at a Web site about cannibalism.

“Good morning.”

Morris looked up.

“Hey, Romeo, how's it going?”

“I'm tired.”

Morris grinned at him.

“Oh, boo hoo. You're having too much fun in bed. I feel so bad for you, man.”

“Maybe I need to eat more protein.”

“Oysters, dude.”

Bob nodded. Oysters were fine, but right now he needed a coffee.

“Would you mind if I sat at my desk?”

Morris moused out of the site.

“
No problema,
dude.”

Bob sat down behind his desk. He was hoping that it would feel secure, normal. He didn't know why, but he had a strange desire for everything to be back to normal. This morning in bed with Felicia he had felt so good. But somehow, on the way to work, he'd gotten cold feet. Maybe he wasn't cut out to be an underworld figure or a Latin lover. Maybe he wasn't strong enough to be a Roberto, and that's why his parents had named him Bob.

But the desk wasn't comforting. It felt strange. It was somebody else's desk. You can never go home again.

Morris was looking at Bob in a strange way.

“So, Bob? How's the new chick?”

“She's different, man.”

Morris was confused.

“Like, how?”

“She's just different.”

“Like is it, you know, cultural? Does she do nasty shit that white chicks won't do? Does she taste spicy?”

“It's not because she's Mexican. It's her personality.”

“So, are you, like, still in love?”

“Yes.”

“Cool.”

Bob typed the name Frida Kahlo into the search engine and hit the go button.

“You're the only guy I know who's gone out with a Mexican, man.”

Bob turned away from the computer and looked at Morris.

“Would you mind going to Starbucks?”

. . .

Martin drove down Sunset toward downtown. He was on his way to Norberto's house to borrow a gun and tell him that the plan was unfolding, they needed to watch each other's backs now. But Martin had a queasy feeling in the pit of his stomach. The conversation he'd had with Esteban on the phone this morning kept rewinding in his brain. Esteban had seemed so . . . calm. Martin had listed the reasons, the logic, behind destroying Amado's arm. Esteban had agreed, promising he'd talk to Amado so that there'd be no hard feelings. He went so far as to congratulate Martin for a job well done, then telling him to come over for lunch, they had a lot of work to do.

Esteban told him that his new tunnel operation was working more efficiently than he'd ever imagined. He had dug a tunnel, three kilometers long, between a house in Zaragosa, a pueblo just outside of Juárez, and a deserted cattle ranch in Texas. Esteban had purchased the ranch by setting up a corporation in Delaware as his front. He now found himself with too much cash, and was seriously considering the Mazatlán investment.

Martin was surprised. He'd never been very enthusiastic about the tunnel. It just seemed too big. Too showy. Someone would rat them out. He had tried to dissuade Esteban from building it. But Esteban had, seemingly, forgiven the bad advice, and was ready to actually do something Martin wanted to do.

But it was uncharacteristic. Usually when Martin fucked up, Esteban was the first to point it out. The first to remind him that an MBA might get you a job on Wall Street but it doesn't amount to a pile of shit on the street.

Although Martin was tempted to make some excuse, phone in sick, whatever, he was intrigued by the idea of all that cash. Where was it? If he could find out where it was, then he could snatch it while the feds were taking Esteban into custody. Maybe he wouldn't even need to take over the crew. Maybe with enough money, say three or four million, he could just disappear. Vanish and let Norberto take the heat.

He pulled up in front of Norberto's apartment building and got out of the car. He'd have to figure out something to say to Norberto. Maybe tell him that he should be the leader of the crew. The family wouldn't accept a gringo, but they'd take him with open arms. Martin knew Norberto was gullible enough to fall for that.

He rang the doorbell. He knocked. A couple of punkedout Latino kids on skateboards cruised by. He knocked harder.

Norberto was probably out getting laid.

Martin walked around to the back; he knew where Norberto kept a key hidden. He found it, under the planter of a spiky barrel cactus, and let himself in.

“Norberto?”

Martin closed the door behind him. He was hit by the strong smell of cleaning fluids. Maybe the housekeeper, a sexy woman from Guatemala, had been there earlier. He walked through the living room to Norberto's bedroom.

Martin peeked in the bathroom and saw the glaringly white bathtub. Yeah. The housekeeper had been there.

Martin opened the door to the bedroom closet and pulled out a suitcase. He plopped the suitcase on the bed and took a quick inventory. Several handguns, all of them Glocks, boxes of ammunition, a couple ounces of weed, three vials of
various pills, a half kilo of coke, and a couple of small cellophane packets held together by a rubber band.

Martin picked up a Glock, checked to make sure it was loaded. He then took the cellophane packets. He'd put these in Bob's pockets. Make it look like he was a heroin dealer. Another red herring for the police.