The First Cut (11 page)

"I'll be OK," he shouted into the wind, then moved to the center of the canoe and lowered himself as much as possible to give the boat a solid center of gravity like he'd done before. It followed the rapids, bouncing along in what seemed like slow motion as the front bobbed up and down in the water. The boat then caught the current as it swept around rock and sand in the center of the waterway and shot toward the bank. Paul leaned left, trying to draw the boat parallel with the bank to lessen the impact. The boat turned, but not enough, and hit hard against the dark mud, dislodging a large hunk that fell into the front of the canoe. Paul leaned quickly back and forth, catching his balance before the current caught the tail end of the boat and whipped it around, sending him backwards into the downed tree. The boat slid under the first few large branches, but Paul did not duck in time and a large branch caught him while the boat kept moving. He banged against the side of the canoe, upsetting it as he fell into the water.

He was about 40 yards from the sandbar where the group stood. Eric and Charlie dropped their poles and ran to the edge of the water to watch their father. Paul bobbed to the surface and saw Carl and Mike climb in a canoe to get him.

The water was deep here, and he paddled his arms, trying to pull himself over to the upturned canoe. He turned, looking for the boys. He saw them, and he saw Joyce, who also was at the water’s edge now, her gaze shifting from him to the men in the boat and back. He pictured himself on the bar, shivering against the chill with a blanket wrapped around his shoulders. Joyce would be her old self for a while, a moment, perhaps, worrying over him until her mothering instincts were overruled by something else at work inside her. He blocked her out, focusing on his boys, seeing them alone on the bank, fishing, the bluffs towering above them like sentinels. He closed his eyes and slid below the surface for a moment. He knew he'd always need to fight like hell to make sure he could still see the boys. He would. He'd fight like hell.

Sinking in the Sea of Love

The two hulking men—boys, really—had declined Janet's offer of tea, so she sat down in the chair across from them, smoothing her skirt with her hands.

"So, you said you're friends of my husband's?" she asked. The men were on the loveseat, trying to avoid touching each other as their weight and gravity combined to make them slide ever so slightly toward the middle of the cushion. They were in the rarely used living room of her modest brownstone. This was of course where you entertained guests, and she was embarrassed that she hadn't had the chance to take the plastic covers off the furniture. That's to be expected with unannounced visitors, she supposed.

"Not exactly. We're just looking for Benny," said the one who had introduced himself as Nico. The other, Vince, sat quietly, cracking his knuckles. "We, uh, need to talk to him."

"With him, dear," she said.

"Huh?"

"You need to talk with him, not to him. I assume you're going to let him speak?" After 35 years in the classroom, Janet found herself unable to control correcting young people when they misspoke.

"Right. With him."

"Well, Benny isn't home at the moment. Works awfully hard, you know. If you knew him, I'm sure he would have told you that many times. He probably just stopped off for a drink on his way home. Needs to unwind, he says," she said. "Now, if you don't mind my asking, what do you need to discuss
with
Benny?"

"It's just business, ma'am," Nico said. There's an, um, debt we need to discuss."

Janet grabbed a coaster and set her teacup down—just because they didn't want any didn't mean she was going to deny herself—and leaned forward.

"Oh, my. Did Benny buy something from you young men? He's always talking about wanting a motorcycle, the old fool. As you can tell from the fact that I didn't offer you cookies, we can't even afford a new oven. How are we going to afford that silly contraption?"

"No, nothin' like that, ma'am. It's ... well, it's a gambling debt."

"Well, in that case, let me see what I can do." She climbed out of her chair, limped to the buffet table by the door, and grabbed her purse. She came back and slowly lowered herself into the chair, then opened the clasp and pulled out her pocketbook.

"So, what was it? A wager on a ball game or something? What does he owe?"

"Twelve large," Nico said.

Janet pulled a ten and two ones from her pocketbook and stretched out her hand toward Nico.

"Thousand, lady. Twelve
thousand
dollars," he said, looking at the money in her hand.

"Hey, what's that?" he said, pointing to a large, deep bruise on her forearm, exposed by her sleeve as she stretched her arm out.

"That?" she said, quickly withdrawing her arm. "Nothing. Ran into a door. Just leaped out at me," she added with a giggle. "I seem to do that all the time."

"Look, ma'am," Nico said. "I'm sure you don't have that kind of cash around. That's why we need to talk with Benny. Do you know where he stops for his after-work drink?"

"I just don't understand," she said. "Twelve thousand dollars? Are you sure it's him?"

"Doesn't matter," Nico said. There's a name and a number on a slip. That name doesn't cough up that amount, someone calls us."

What did he bet on?" Janet asked. "This is so unlike him."

"Horses," Vince said, leaning forward. "Look lady, we've done enough yammerin'. Where's your husband?"

Nico put a hand on Vince's chest. "Take it easy. You heard what they said. For right now we only deal with Benny." He turned to Janet. "Vince is right, though, ma'am. If we can just find your husband, I'm sure we can straighten this out."

"If you'll indulge an old lady's questions, how was he able to work up such a debt? I would think you would try to collect before things get to this stage."

"He put down five grand on Sea of Love at Arlington a couple of days ago. Apparently, he thought it'd make him square and then some. It was a strange bet, real long shot. Horse came in sixth. Bet like that, you gotta cover it right away. He didn't."

"Oh ho," Janet said, wagging her finger. "That Benny. 'Sea of Love' was the theme of our senior prom."

"Makes sense," Nico said. "Lotta guys bet stuff like that. Use their kids' birthdays for lottery numbers, you know. For luck."

"Well, he wasn't thinking this time. He stepped out on me that night. Almost lost me. Can't imagine he thinks of that song as being lucky," she said. "Of course, I suppose he did get lucky with that tramp Bernadette."

Vince stood up. "Listen," he said. "We're done with the chit chat here. Where's your husband?"

"He's been on that Facebook thing. Can you believe it? A man his age, gossiping about the old days on a computer," she said. "I hear old Bernadette is on there somewhere, too."

Nico ran a hand through his hair. "Ma'am. Please just tell us where we can find your husband, okay? We can only be nice about this for so long."

"I suppose so," she said. "I guess that's why they sent such strong men to handle this. Twelve thousand dollars is a lot of money, isn't it? I'd expect your boss is very interested in getting that back, and I would imagine you two can be quite persuasive."

Just then, the front door swung open. Benny, stepped in. He wore a new leather jacket and his face had the orange glow of a spray-on tan.

"Why don't I smell dinner?" he said as he hung the coat on a rack by the door. "What have you been—"

He turned and saw Nico and Vince, who were now standing.

"Who the hell are you?" Benny said.

"We're with Marty. Here to talk about the twelve grand you owe him," Nico said.

Benny looked at Janet, confused. "What are they talking about?"

"They say you've been betting on the horses, Ben," she said. "What, you take Bernadette? You know I'd like to go to the track sometime. Sounds like fun."

"Horses? What?" Benny said. He turned to Nico. "Look, guys. I don't know what's going on here, but there must be some mistake. The only betting I do is the NCAA tourney pool once a year down at the office."

Vince walked up to Benny, grabbed his arm and pulled it up behind Benny's back, twisting the old man into a painful knot. "Don't make this any harder than it needs to be, Benny," he said.

He pulled open the front door and pushed Benny through the storm door screen and down the steps to the sidewalk. Janet heard Benny grunt and moan as he hit the pavement.

Nico turned to Janet. "I'm sorry you had to see this, ma'am. You got any jewelry or anything you could sell, you might want to do that. Make it easier on your husband."

Or not, Janet thought, as she shut the door behind him. She went into the kitchen and pulled a racing form out of the breadbox. Marty wasn't the only bookie in town, and she thought Lady Luck looked good in the fifth today. I'll start winning yet, she thought. Then again, this doesn't feel like losing at all.

Circumstantial

So, Juanita, let’s go over this, OK?”

Briggs was leaning back in the metal chair, the crack in the worn vinyl seat cushion pinching his ass. West was leaning against the wall by the door, eyes closed -- probably asleep on his feet. Briggs marveled at the skill.

“What you wanna know?” said Juanita. She was a woman for whom the term “spunky” was invented. She was short — maybe four-eleven — and compact, the kind of chick who would have a handful of someone’s hair within the first three seconds of a catfight.

“OK, here’s what I know,” Briggs said. He leaned forward and the chair’s front legs hit the floor. Still nothing from West. “You were Paco’s girlfriend, and –”

“Taco,” she said.

“What?”

“It’s Taco. You know, like Bell? Not Paco. You’re saying it wrong.”

“Seriously? Nickname, right?”

“Nah, his Papi liked tacos, so…”

“All right. So, you and Taco were boyfriend and girlfriend, right?”

“Yes,” she said as she twirled her long black hair around a finger, clearly bored.

“Then, what, he left you? Slept with your sister? I mean, this is a lot of anger we’re dealing with here,” Briggs said. He looked over at West, still stock still against the wall. They had money riding on this. He said sister, West went kinky and said mother.

“No, not angry.”

“Come on, Juanita. His head was hacked off and placed on the nightstand next to the bed. Whoever did that wasn’t exactly happy with Taco.”

“OK, I get that,” she said.

Briggs felt relieved.

“You do?” An actual breakthrough! When was the last time a suspect actually agreed with anything a cop had to say in the box? He was going to ask West, but didn’t want to wake him. “I mean, of course you do. So my question is this: why did you do it?”

“Me? I didn’t kill Taco. Look at me.” She stood and twirled. “How could I do something like that?”

Briggs actually had no trouble imagining it, but tried a different tack.

“Can we talk about your ink?” he asked.

“You like?” she said, smiling. She held out her arms, which made Amy Winehouse, God rest her soul, seem demure.

“Let’s talk about the one on your left shoulder. That’s a pretty nice tat of Taco, right?”

He pulled a mug shot from the folder in front of him and slid it across the table. It was clearly the source material for the tattoo.

“Yeah,” she said, hesitating now. “So? I got that when we started going out.”

“A fine expression of love,” Briggs said. “But I can’t help but notice that it has been altered. It’s nice, work, actually. Seems like the arm holding his head up by the hair seems new. Like, really new. That and the bloody neck stump.”

“What? Just because Taco’s head was cut off and I have a tattoo of his cut-off head on my shoulder, that somehow means I did it?” she said, her voice rising to a screech.

Briggs shrugged, impressed that she was going to play hardball.

“I’ll admit, it’s circumstantial,” he said, leaning back again. “The timing, however, makes me wonder. We talked with Tank down at Tattoo You, and he said you had that done yesterday. The coroner is pretty sure poor old Taco lost his head the day before that. Just seems, well, too convenient, you know?”

Juanita sat motionless for a moment, something that seemed to require effort.

“It’s a metaphor for our–”

“Juanita…” Briggs said.

“No good?”

“No, it’s not bad, actually,” Briggs said. “First time I’ve heard that word in this place. But it’s over.”

“The tattoo was a bad idea, wasn’t it?” she said.

“Didn’t help,” Briggs said. “You confess, it might be, well, who am I kidding? You cut off your boyfriend’s head. Emotional distress is the best you’ve got. Did he hit you?”

“No. He fucked my sister, that whore.”

“Damn.” This was West, who pushed himself away from the wall, pulled out his wallet and tossed a twenty on the table. He then grabbed Juanita by the arm. “All right, off you go to lockup.”

Bleed American

Foley stomped across the apartment, slammed open the sliding glass door to the deck that was just wide enough to accommodate two lawn chairs, and pulled a tattered American flag from the railing. He came back inside, stepped onto a scarred end table, reached up and unhooked another flag hung sideways with thumbtacks in the wall.

He folded each flag in turn, then set them on the kitchen table. He walked across the room to the disheveled college student still sitting stunned in a threadbare recliner, grabbed him by the front of the shirt and dragged him across the room to the table.

“This is not a Cubs banner,” he said, pointing to the tattered flag from outside. He pointed to the other. “And this is not a Bob Marley poster. This not art. It’s a symbol of your freedom.

“Take this one to the Legion post and dispose of it properly, and keep this one folded up until you can think of a more proper way to display it,” he said. “I know you kids think this is some big joke, but boys your age fought and died to keep this flag flying. Show some respect.”