The Sexiest Man Alive (12 page)

“Mind if I leave you for a minute?” Johnny asked. “I want to talk to Brandi.”

Mazie gave him a playful shove. “Go!”

She watched Johnny move across the room. He had no trouble striking up a conversation with the barmaid. Mazie doubted he ever had trouble getting women to talk to him. There was something about Johnny that made people trust him. Brandi, on the other hand, did not strike her as trustworthy in the least. She had shifty eyes and she was nervous as a cat in a roomful of Dobermans. Twitchy, rubbing her arms, playing with her hair—an addict in need of a fix?

Maybe while Johnny was occupied, she ought to do some investigating of her own, Mazie thought. She found the ladies’ loo, a closet-sized room whose walls were painted a sickly shade of green evidently bought at a paint closeout sale. Peering into the dimly lit mirror, Mazie freshened her lipstick and reapplied her eyeliner, telling herself it had nothing to do with wanting to look good for Johnny.

Emerging from the toilet, Mazie looked around. She was in a narrow service corridor that ran behind the bar room. To her right, a screen door opened to a delivery dock piled with empty beer kegs and liquor cases. To her left a roped-off stairway, hung with a smudged sign reading
PRIVATE
, led to an upper floor. Operating on the theory that respecting signs never gained you anything, she tiptoed up the stairs, which creaked alarmingly and opened at the top to a hallway with rooms on both sides. On tenterhooks, Mazie turned the handle of the first door. It opened to a dark, musty-smelling room used to store old bar equipment. The room across from it held a bare bedstead and a dresser missing its drawers.

Not hoping for much, she opened the last door on the left. It contained twin beds with floral spreads, two cheap particleboard dressers, a goosenecked floor lamp with a tasseled shade, and a rolling rack jammed with women’s clothes on wire hangers. Picking her way across a floor strewn with wadded underwear and scattered shoes, Mazie moved to the dresser. The top was invisible beneath a layer of makeup, perfume bottles, nail polish, jewelry, fast-food wrappers, and CDs. It looked so much like her own dresser when she’d been a teenager that she got a déjà vu sensation. Snapshots were crammed into the edges of the mirror frame. Scrutinizing them in the dim light, Mazie recognized the skinny blond woman who appeared in most of the photos as the barmaid Brandi. This must be Brandi’s room—maybe the bar owner threw in free rent as a perk. Judging from the shoes carpeting the floor, Brandi spent her entire salary on footwear, most of it dressy heels, the type you could buy for thirty bucks at discount stores. Mazie picked up a slingback in synthetic black leather and searched for the size. Eight and a half. Ditto for a sequined sandal. But a Puma trainer, worn at the heel and ripping at the seams, turned out to be a six, a size for a small foot. Shayla Connelly was small, according to Johnny. With growing excitement, Mazie began rummaging through the clothes jumbled across the beds, looking for evidence that Shayla Connelly was here.

A thump came from the room across the hall, the noise a toilet lid made when it was dropped back into place. Mazie moved swiftly to the door of a room she assumed was a bathroom. It was locked. But a light was on inside and she could hear someone moving around.

“Shayla?” Mazie whispered.

Silence.

“Shayla, if that’s you in there, my name is Mazie,” she whispered. “Mazie Maguire. Maybe you’ve heard of me? I’m from Quail Hollow, too. I know what it’s like to be on the run.
Could you open the door, please?”

Nothing. Mazie had the sense of someone standing just on the other side of the door.

“Shayla—I can help you if you let me.”

No response. Mazie racked her brain, trying to come up with the right thing to say to a frightened eighteen-year-old. “I’m with Johnny Hoolihan. You must know him—everyone knows Johnny. He’s a good guy—he’ll see to it that you’re taken care of—”

A rumbling noise came from the street outside. It sounded like an eighteen-wheeler shifting into low gear on an uphill grade. Darting back to the bedroom, Mazie peered out the window that overlooked the street. Four huge Harley motorcycles roared down the street, veered toward the Hog Wild, and slowed to a stop on the sidewalk, parking so they blocked the bar’s door. The engines cut out and the riders leaped off. They wore helmets emblazoned with glow-in-the-dark, grinning skulls and bandannas that hid their faces. This had to be the Skulls! Moving with military precision, they whipped out semiautomatic weapons, glanced at one another, nodded, and then stormed into the bar.

Behind Mazie, a door banged open. She whirled around in time to glimpse a small figure, ponytail wildly swinging, pelting down the hall. Mazie dashed out in pursuit but stumbled over a shoe on the floor, losing precious seconds. Scrambling back to her feet, she hurtled down the hall, took the stairs at a gallop, jumped the last three steps, and hit the ground floor running. The girl had gone out the back; the delivery dock door was just swinging shut as Mazie reached it.

Suddenly an earsplitting noise blew out of the bar room—a barrage of gunfire, as though war had abruptly broken out in the quiet streets of Piggsville. It sounded as though an enormous machine was spitting nails at supersonic speed, a stuttering, rhythmic noise Mazie had only ever heard in violent action movies. Glass shattered; bottles exploded; people yelled and shrieked. Expecting to feel bullets ripping into her any second, Mazie crashed through the screen door, rolled across the platform, and dropped to the concrete below, surprised to find that she was still in one piece. Inside the bar, the firing stopped, leaving in its wake an ear-ringing silence even more terrifying than the weapons chatter. Johnny was in there, maybe hurt or dying.

But looking for him now would be insane, Mazie realized; the most helpful thing she could do was to phone the police. Keeping low, she nipped across the back parking lot and into an alley. A mat of slick leaves sent her skidding out of control and she fell, banging against a row of trash cans. A figure carrying a gun—a Skull—appeared silhouetted at the loading dock
door, peering out into the alley. Mazie wriggled farther into the shadows, willing herself to disappear. Was he going to come after her?

No. The Skull hesitated, then turned and pounded up the building’s stairs. Probably looking for Shayla. Frantically Mazie rooted through her purse for her phone, but her hands were shaking so badly that she couldn’t locate it. Hauling herself to her feet, she began to move down the alley, surrounded by the clamor of barking dogs. A German shepherd behind a chain-link fence suddenly lunged at her, his teeth clicking on the steel links, sending her heart and her bladder into spasms.

A figure moved in the darkness just a few yards ahead. Bare white shoulders gleamed in the dark. It had to be Shayla! Mazie tried to call out to her, but her voice was lost in the wail of the sirens that suddenly seemed to be coming from all directions at once. The police were on their way! She hesitated. Should she go back to find Johnny or try to catch up with Shayla?

Johnny would want her to find the girl, she was sure of it.

She jogged toward the figure running down the alley. Was it a trick of the shadows, or was Shayla limping? The alley was tilting downhill, and the brackish smell warned Mazie that the drainage canal must be close by. Suddenly there was a roar of engines behind her. Motorcycle engines. Looking back over her shoulder, she could see their headlights. Two … three … four motorcycles, rocketing toward her. Shayla looked back and Mazie caught the gleam of her terrified eyes before the girl leaped up onto a fence, vaulted over it, and landed in a backyard.

The choppers were mere seconds away and Mazie’s eardrums felt like they were about to blow out. Abruptly she dived into a narrow space between a garage and a fence. Had the Skulls seen her? Would they stop and come after her? And why were they driving down this way? Didn’t they realize they’d be trapped where the alley ended at the drainage ditch?

The engines’ noise grew to an unbearable snarl, and then they were roaring past, sounding like the pack at Indy 500. Cautiously peeking out, Mazie saw the choppers approach the drainage canal. They’d have to stop. But no—they were veering around the railing at the edge of the canal and driving straight down into the channel, motorboating through the foot-high water, then up the concrete slope on the opposite bank.

Police cars hurtled down the alley, lights flashing, sirens going full bore. But it was too late; even as the police cars screeched to a halt at the lip of the canal, the Skulls were escaping on
the opposite side, using the access road that ran beneath the viaduct.

Mazie hurried back up the alley, trying to find where Shayla had jumped the fence. Here it was, next to a dog kennel whose black Labrador was barking itself hoarse. There was a backyard garden with crushed tomato plants, as though someone had hurriedly blundered through. Something wet gleamed on the concrete garage apron, illuminated by the house’s rear porch light. Mazie bent to study it. Blood. Part of a small bloody footprint. There were more on the driveway. Shayla, bolting out of the bar so fast she hadn’t put on shoes, must have cut her foot. The prints headed back in the direction of the Hog Wild; evidently Shayla was doubling back. The prints disappeared as Shayla ran across a lawn. She couldn’t spare any more time tracking the girl, Mazie decided; right now she needed to find Johnny.

The scene outside the tavern was chaotic. Police lights painted the scene in lurid red and blue, patrol cars were parked helter-skelter along the street, ambulances were pulling up with screaming sirens, huge satellite news trucks were arriving, and shocked neighborhood residents stood around in frightened clusters. Police radio static filled the air.

Mazie felt as though a giant fist was squeezing her heart. The scene looked like the site of a terrorist bombing. Every window had been shot out and broken glass littered the pavement. The Hog Wild Bar sign hung crookedly from a single bolt above the bullet-pocked door. Paramedics were easing someone out of the bar on a wheeled stretcher. There was an oxygen mask clamped over the person’s face. Oh, God, oh please—don’t let it be Johnny!

Then she saw him, wearing a neon green vest stenciled with
POLICE
and helping set up crowd-control sawhorses.

“Johnny!”

He saw her, trotted over, grabbed her, and gave her quick, hard hug. “I’ve been worried sick about you. Are you all right?”

“Yes. The gang was after Shayla. I saw her, Johnny—at least, I think it was her—a girl with dark hair in a ponytail? She bugged out just before they shot up the place.”

“You saw her—you’re sure?”

“Almost positive.” Mazie swallowed, dreading the answer but needing to know. “Were a lot of people—”

Johnny gripped her hand. “Nobody killed. The bartender went for his shotgun—dumb move—they shot him before he could get off a round. He’s badly hurt, but I don’t think he’s
critical. A lot of people were cut by flying glass, but far as we know they’re mostly minor injuries—”

“You’re hurt, too.” She saw that Johnny’s left earlobe was bleeding, blood dribbling down the side of his face and neck.

“Flying glass. Looks worse than it is. I don’t think the gang was interested in killing people—it was more a big macho display of power. And they wanted Shayla.”

“They knew she was here?”

“I think Brandi ratted out Shayla to the gang. Brandi slipped out a side door half a minute before the gang stormed in.”

“So she knew what was going to happen?”

“That’s my guess. I was just going to go look for you—a woman said she’d seen you heading for the ladies’ room—when the gang burst in and opened fire. It seemed to go on for hours, but I checked my watch and the whole thing happened in about fifteen seconds. One of the Skulls—he was the smallest guy but he seemed to be the leader—ran upstairs while the others covered the people in the bar—”

“Shayla was staying up there. She ran the second she heard the motorcycles.”

“That girl has good instincts.” Johnny touched his slashed ear and winced. “Did you see where she went?”

“I’ll tell you if you let me take care of that cut.”

“Women. Always fussin’.” Johnny pretended to be grumpy, but Mazie was pretty sure he was enjoying the attention.

Mazie retrieved her purse from Johnny’s car and dug out tissues and a bottle of water. Johnny perched on a sawhorse while she cleaned his cut and told him everything that had happened, from her non-conversation with Shayla through the bathroom door to the Skulls’ amazing escape through the canal. “I didn’t know motorcycles could do that,” Mazie said.

“They can if the water’s shallow enough and the bottom has decent traction. Still, it was pretty risky.”

“You should get this cut checked by a doctor,” Mazie said. “It might get infected.”

“Later.” Johnny removed the bloody tissue from his ear and absently stared at it. “The gang must have known they could get away by running that canal. The more I think about it, the more planned-out the whole thing seems.”

Mazie nodded in agreement.

“The Skulls knew their bikes could get through the canal but police cars couldn’t. Once they were on the other side, they probably split up so they’d be less conspicuous. Milwaukee PD will have every cop in the city hunting them right now—”

“Mazie?”

Mazie looked up and was startled to see Ben Labeck striding across the parking lot, a large video camera mounted on his shoulder. He must be here on assignment, covering the story for his station.

“Mazie, why are you—” He stopped abruptly, noticing Johnny for the first time. His face darkened. “Hoolihan,” he snarled. “What are
you
doing here?”

Johnny Hoolihan stared back at Ben. “Labeck,” he said, nodding cooly.

Mazie had been first-aiding Hoolihan, Ben saw, and the thought of her touching him, tsk-tsking over the big chump’s boo-boo, made him furious. He hadn’t minded when the saps at the dating event had come on to her because they were such a sorry bunch of losers, but Johnny Goddamn Hoolihan was a different matter.