The Unlucky Man (12 page)

Corg watched them follow into the open smaller door side of the building which shut behind them, then sank back into the driver’s seat to wait and count the minutes as they ticked by. He’d counted off about five when something happened.

From the corner of his eye, Corg saw another side door on the east of the building sneak slowly, suspiciously, open and a figure emerge furtively out onto the lot, moving with care until he was hidden by a pile of purple shale. Watching in the side mirror, he observed the figure reappear further down the pile and begin making his way in a wide loop towards the back of the car.

Corg considered his options. It was possible, he supposed, that this was some kind of elaborate hoax being played on him by his new colleagues, but the likelihood of that seemed pretty remote.

The figure was closing in on him, trying his best to keep low and out of the reflective line of the mirrors. They must think I’m an idiot Corg thought to himself as he eased himself across into the passenger seat and brought up one booted foot, leg bent at the knee, level with the driver’s door. He’d left it open earlier to let in the cool air and now he thanked his lucky stars for this stroke of good fortune.

Corg’s hope was that, on seeing that the car looked empty, the approaching figure would be forced to risk a glance through the open driver’s side door, and this proved to be the case. After a few tense moments, in which Corg tried to listen for the sound of approaching stealthy footfalls, a face appeared tentatively around the door frame, still crouched low, silhouetted against the backdrop of the lot. It made an irresistible target.

Corg’s foot lashed out with power and accuracy, crunching nose and chin beneath its heel. Quickly, Corg delivered a second hammering kick and spilled the unconscious interloper onto the ground. A small knife fell from his stunned fingers.

Satisfied that something was now definitely amiss, Corg slipped from the car and crept across the lot towards the ramshackle building. There was an empty window frame at eye level, to the left of the door, where some Perspex sheeting had torn away and he risked a quick glance.

 Ray was on the ground, blood matted into his dark hair of his head. The
back
of his head, Corg noticed with distaste. Loess was still standing but was under the bead of Kolic’s Glock and he seemed to be getting fidgety. Apart from the sweating turncoat, Corg couldn’t see that there was anyone else hanging about to worry about.

Ducking back from the window, Corg thought about his options, then, mind made up, he set off at a shuffling run back across the concrete to the prone figure by the car. Rifling his pockets failed to turn up the keys to the Winnebago as he had hoped, and so he was forced to improvise. He slipped an arm under each of the man’s armpits and started to drag him in a sitting position across the dusty ground, moving in a shuffling half run across the yard.

Corg dragged his load, sweating with exertion and the close humidity of the evening, until he was directly outside the rickety double loading doors where he left the prone figure leant against the hood of the Winnebago whilst he wiped his brow with the back of his hand. It came away wet.

There was a broken piece of wooden pole just under the front wheel and he plucked it up then, with difficulty, he took up his unconscious friend by the shoulders once more and launched him into the doors.

They smashed open, buckling easily under the weight of the projectile body, crashing against the inner walls. With a cry of surprise, Kolic spun towards the noise and loosed a single shot that went high, blowing out one of the few remaining panes of glass on the building’s crumbling front.

Then Corg was through the door, swinging downwards with the broken pole, smashing it into Kolic’s hand holding the gun. His armbands jangled. With another cry he dropped the weapon and turned just as Loess’ knee came up into his stomach, knocking the air out of him and her elbow crashed into his temple, spinning him to the ground. She aimed a kick at him for good measure and seemed satisfied he was out cold when he failed to react.

“Nice work,” she said, crossing over to Ray. “Of course, when he wakes up I’m going to tell him I took care of everything.” Corg grinned. “Seriously, though,” she continued, “Thanks.”

He reddened and the grin spread a little wider. “It was nothing,” he said bashfully. “Sometime you can do the same for me.”

“I might just,” she said. Ray was coming round and she helped him to his feet. ’You OK?” she asked. He nodded, then winced.

“You all right loading up and taking care of the run by yourself?” Loess asked Corg.

“Sure,” he said, “But what about these two?” he indicated the fallen would-be stick-up boys.

“Oh, don’t you worry about them, we’ll find somewhere for them. Probably at the bottom on the Links.” She smiled, “Don’t feel bad for them though, Kolic was planning on blaming this whole thing on you, say you took out me and Ray and stole the guns for yourself. Stick it on the new guy.”

“Shit,” Corg said, matter of factly. “What a dick.”

She smiled brightly. “Sure is,” she said. “Listen, when you get back from the drop, come find me at the garage, I’ll buy you a drink to say thanks.”

“I’ll do that,” he said.

By the time he drove back into the city, the night was drawing in and a chill had entered the air so he drove with the windows up and nothing on the radio, preferring the silence of the night. But he still felt pretty badass.

As we neared the looming bulk of Old Links, we made a plan. Both Corg and I were known elements so Loess would set up on the apartment whilst we made enough noise somewhere else that, hopefully, she would have enough time to get in and make the call without being disturbed. Not a great plan by any reckoning but it was the best we could do under the circumstances. Desperate times, as they say.

At the bridge we went our separate ways as the water lapped at the supports embedded beneath the current, undiminished it its power from when we had crossed. It sulked and roared in a grey tumult and lent its voice to our parting.

Loess drove herself whilst Corg was happily ensconced back behind the wheel of his beloved hearse, sullenly deposited at Loess' command by one of the crumbling flock. With me as passenger once more, we made our way out of the Wildlands and back into the City proper and whatever lay ahead.

I watched Loess’ taillights in my side mirror until they disappeared from sight. The rain still held off and the sky had brightened even as a strange, creeping mist began to insinuate its way into the surroundings, clinging at doors and windows and circling cold, wet fingertip tendrils in the air.

As we drove, the dereliction and industrial grey melted away as we got further and further from the bridge and the raging waters to be replaced with fresh steel and sweeping clean glass. Smooth lines and sharp aesthetics were now the order of the day as we pressed on into the richer, business district at the heart of the city. We now found ourselves trapped in a strip of galleries and office complexes, artfully arranged around one another, interlacing, to entice interest from only the richest and most select of clientele. If you get lost in the maze then you better have a fat wallet.

It didn’t take long to find something promising: a new gallery was opening, a monstrous building cut from steel girders and recycled red brick and, of course, the mandatory sweeping ocean of glass. A news crew was setting up as Corg drifted the hearse to a halt around a growing gaggle of spectators and killed the engine.

I watched as the crowd’s numbers swelled and quickly coalesced into the gravitational pull of the camera. They were, in the main, a mix of journalists and curious business types who’d clearly let themselves out of the surrounding buildings to take a look at the commotion. Here and there I noticed others too, day-trippers and stranger figures of the type that are inexorably drawn to a spectacle. We sat there for a while, watching the crowd mill expectantly, waiting for the go ahead from Loess.

Behind the news people, in a protective ring that stood sentry around the various expansive entryways to the offices and workspaces around the plaza, lurked the brooding shapes of on-site security: big, heavy, serious looking shadows. Perfect.

The phone rang. I picked up and listened for a moment. "Yeah, OK." I hung up.

"She’s in place," I said. "Says we’re good to go whenever."

"Great," Corg said without feeling, then, "She say anything else?"

"Yeah. Good luck," I said, opening the door into the frigid air. Corg snorted.

"Right," he said before following me out.

We crossed the square quickly, forcing our way into the press of bodies and insinuating through the spaces between them, in the same way I’d done hundreds of times through a pack of drinkers at a crowded bar, until I was sure we must be on Camera. The anchor was a serious looking guy, hair coiffured and held in place with more product than I’d ever seen on one head before, lending him a plastic, doll like quality. Up close, the pan couldn’t hide the rings under his eyes or the faint stink of Scotch leaking from his pores. He wore a striped sports coat, a big heavy watch hanging at his wrist.

As he spoke to camera, I wondered how to go about drawing attention to myself, how best to make a commotion to get noticed. Maybe throw a punch or start smashing windows?

It turned out I needn’t have worried. As soon as the crowd clocked our faces the reaction was unmistakable. I looked at Corg, wondering just how infamous we had become in our short stop across the bridge and realised that we would have drawn unwelcome attention here regardless.

Corg’s suit, once black, was coated in a thick grey dust and little more than rags in places. His face too, thick with a couple of days beard growth, was still vivid with the gash he sustained in the fall, now healing but crusted with dry blood. On the other side of the bridge none of this had seemed incongruous, but back in the land of the living he made an alarming sight.

I knew, too, that I must look pretty much the same. Suddenly I felt acutely aware of the grime encrusted on my skin, under my nails, that my hair was swept back from my face with a mixture of grease and old sweat and felt lank and dirty. My skin itched for a shave and some warm water. I must stink, I thought, shocked at the realisation.

"I think this might work a bit too well," I hissed at Corg, feeling the swell of the crowd at my back as a whisper spread like a novelty wave through their ranks. People in the throng were pulling back. At first it was just one or two of them but a trickle swiftly became a flood and suddenly everyone was trying to push away from us in every direction, pressing in on neighbors who hadn’t caught up with what was happening yet. The impassive, slow eye of the news camera swallowed it all hungrily.

One of the security guards had made us too. I saw a hand go to a belt and then my view was obscured by a bearded journalist babbling excitedly into his phone. Best case scenario, nightstick, I thought. Would they be carrying guns?

I hadn’t envisioned this, had never dreamed that we might have become so infamous in so short a space of time. It struck me how strange it was to be cut off from all media, even for so brief a period.

"Come on," I grunted trying to force my way back into the crowd. We’d done what we set out to do. For a moment the press resisted then broke in all directions as the communal impulse of the crowd dissolved in on itself. I saw a woman in impractical stilettos fall, her high-heel twisted off in the commotion, and scream and, as if that were the catalyst, all hell broke loose.

Lost in a sudden sea of pressing bodies I slipped, went down and felt the distinct crunch as someone’s boot found my splayed fingers before, somehow-battered and knocked about, I managed to regain my footing. A shot fired into the air combined with, irrationally, a call to remain calm. Gun then, I thought.

Someone screamed again as the sound of the shot whipped panic into frenzy. Lost in the crush of bodies, I doubted anyone was even seeing me now, made blind as they were by proximity and frenetic movement. I had no idea where Corg was but I hoped he was still close by and keeping pace.

Someone’s hand smacked limply into my face, pressing against my cheek before being withdrawn. A dead weight cannoned into my shoulder, spinning me, and I had to concentrate hard to keep going in what I hoped was the right direction, the way back to the waiting hearse. It would be easy to get lost in this press, to get crushed, sucked down and trampled unseen underfoot. The faceless mash of bodies pressed senselessly in on all sides with dead, unfeeling weight.

And then I was out the other side, pulling Corg with me as a black SUV hurtled onto the concourse. Although I could see nothing through the hulking machine’s tinted front window, I felt sure that its occupants would be only too familiar in their practical unadorned Kevlar. The door flung back on silent runners but we were already running and it slammed shut again as the engine roared and it set off in pursuit.

We hammered back to the hearse, feet pounding on the plaza’s moulded stone, and threw ourselves inside. Corg lit it up, hitting the road full throttle. In the rearview the SUV spun onto the tarmac barely a few yards behind.

"Well, we got someone’s attention!" I screamed as we fishtailed into a tight bend, metal and brick zipping by in a nauseous blur. I was gripping the dash so hard that my fingertips were white