Death Watch Page 4

  He flopped back on the pillows and lay, quite dead.

  The assassin backed to the wall and waited a few seconds, counting under his breath, one-Mississippi, two-Mississippi, making sure that the life hissed out of his target. He did not like this part of his job, but it had to be done. He had to report back. The corner of his mouth twitched, partially obscured by his equipment and the sweatshirt hood. She who must be obeyed in all things, he thought. She would want to know the target was really dead.

  When he heard no more gurgling, mere seconds down the Mississippi as he counted, he went back out the hotel room door.

  Face still partially hooded, the gunman returned his pistol to his jacket pocket. He made his way down the corridors and halls the way he’d come in, changing direction only once, breaking into a jog as he exited onto the pool deck and trotting on by into the parking lot as if he were one of the guests going for a run.

  He did not stop until he reached the environs of a cardboard city, several miles away. He paused by a dumpster, stripped off the hooded sweatshirt and pants, revealing an unremarkable pair of blue jeans and a denim shirt underneath. He glanced around before removing the headgear and gloves, stuffing them into his shirt. The gun went down a storm drain, where it clattered to a halt somewhere out of sight. Then he broke into a loping stride, an easy, ground-covering walk which took him away swiftly.

  Another mile and he found the parked car where he’d left it. He used the plastic key in his pocket—no rattle, no telltale bulge, compliments of the Auto Club for use in emergencies. He pulled away from the curb, already planning ahead, for he had another job to do that evening.

  Fuzzy rolled out from behind the dumpster when he was certain the stranger’s footsteps had faded away. Beard growing in tattered scraps shadowed his face. His hands and arms were the color of graphite, grime permanently tattooed into the pigment of his skin. He rubbed his palms together and nervously licked his lips, uncertain what he wanted to do. He’d seen the clothing go in the dumpster—and worse—he’d seen the horrific face of the being who’d left it. Nothing human, he’d thought, before skittering behind the trash bin for safety, like a bug frightened of being squashed. Somethin’ godawful, but nothing human. It had been long minutes before his pounding heart had quieted enough to allow him to stick his head out and look again.

  By then the being had retreated down the street. Fuzzy had squatted and waited until the thud of his footsteps were long departed. Now he rocked, back and forth, back and forth, hugging himself, in desperate indecision.

  Would it be radioactive or somehow contaminated if he took it? He needed the clothing, he craved it, but his fear of the former owner paralyzed him. Could there be anything left inside it to transmit to him? He’d seen the thing, for godsakes, three eyes, metal helmet, and all.

  He’d seen it!

  Finally, when his stomach clenched and grumbled, reminding him that the day’s scavenging had been lean thus far, Fuzzy scrambled out from behind the dumpster, hiked himself over the rim of the bin, and grabbed out the clothing. Clutching the sweat suit to his chest, he ran away from the area, crablike, sideways and hitched, as crippled by old injuries as by a disintegrating mind.

  Chapter 4

  The gas tank was ticking inexorably down to empty again when she pulled off the freeway. Late afternoon haze edged the valley, smog so thick she could taste it, even inside the car. She’d forgotten about the look of it, like a curtain of brushfire smoke that hung in the air. The afternoon of uninterrupted music pouring out of the radio paused for the news. McKenzie only half-listened as the newsman delivered the news in the same bop-and-rock voice as the deejay presented the music. They might have been clones, except for the different levels of maturity apparent in their tones.

  “The exchange for guns program has wrapped up a successful six-month plan here in L.A., and sponsors say they’ll be back in the fall with new incentives. The popularity of this approach among the teens particularly made city council members talk with renewed enthusiasm about the future. The Los Angeles Kings and the Mighty Ducks of Anaheim have also reported continued success with their Tickets for Guns program....” The newsman paused and another voice cut in, saying, “Would you really want to sit in a hockey stadium with that kind of crowd? Now, c’mon.”

  The newsman responded smoothly, “I don’t see the difference from the regular crowd.”

  A tape of phony-sounding yucks followed this exchange. It wrapped up with raucous duck calls. McKenzie wrinkled her nose.

  She watched the green signs hanging over the freeway. Two miles to her exit. She moved over a lane. The news break continued.

  “Law enforcement officials report that the body of young businesswoman Denise Faberge was found in her condo this morning after being reported missing from work for the last two days. Authorities have released little information about her death, but one source who helped locate the body reports ‘the apartment looked as if a butcher had been there.’ Autopsy findings are not expected for several days. Faberge’s estranged boyfriend, who was questioned by police as a possible suspect, said only that they had been separated for some time and that she had just completed a self-help program.”

  She had forgotten the death count in Los Angeles. McKenzie shrugged back her uneasiness. One step forward, two back. She found her off-ramp and eased onto it, suddenly out of the tunnel of multilaned freeway and sound walls, and into tract housing. The radio had surged into the latest by Aerosmith, when it suddenly halted.

  The rich-voiced anchor boomed, “This just in. A man identified tentatively as Congressman John Nelson of Illinois has been found dead in a Marina del Rey hotel. Authorities have not confirmed the exact cause of death or the identity, but reliable sources say the congressman was evidently alone in his hotel room when he was shot, assassin-style, while resting after flying in from Washington, D.C. this morning.” The newsman took a breath. “Stay tuned and we’ll bring you further details as we receive them.”

  The second deejay said breezily, “Or not. Hey, what’s another politician or two, right? Anybody going to miss this guy? Send us a fax if you do. We’re out of toilet paper, right,

  Bobb-o?”

  She found herself frowning even more deeply.

  The jacaranda had begun blooming, purple smoky haze among towering trees, the blossoms erupting on bare, sable branches before the fernlike green leaves. She hadn’t thought about the jacarandas in years. They lined her father’s street, an archway of spring green and mauve. They would be dropping their nectar-filled blossoms in a deep indigo rain, their season brief but intense. Their showy heads could be seen among the gray and brown asphalt shingled roofs.

  She moved slowly into the left lane for a turn. A California car buzzed past her, horn sounding in angry impatience. McKenzie went on through the intersection, feeling as if she were herself caught in a smoky cloud. The adrenaline had gone. Sweat dampened her sports bra uncomfortably. She could smell herself, the faint tinge of perfume, the edgy odor of fear, the sharper scent of onion from that last drive through.

  The first thing she would do would be to take a hot shower. Then sleep for two days. Then figure out how to put her life back together.

  The old ballpark, when she saw it, surprised her. Mac slowed down, eyes caught by the backstop, chain-link fencing tarnished black with age. It had been graffitied, sprayed white and garish orange on the dark background. She could not read either the names or symbols painted there. The grass in the infield looked threadbare and yellowing. A weathered billboard proclaimed: Little Blue Field. Then, underneath, in letters disintegrating off the wood, it said: We Bleed Dodger Blue.

  She could almost feel the wood under her fingertips. They’d jumped to see if they could touch the bottom edge of the board, she and her friends. Then, all of a sudden, she was grown, and when she stood tall, the top of her shoulder hit the rim. How many years had she played here? T-ball with the Bobby Soxers, then softball with the Pony League, regular hardball baseball wit
h her dad.

  McKenzie eased her car into a crawl at the curb. She could almost see herself running across the field, spikes sending up little clouds of dust if it was late in the season and the grass battered from the pounding it had taken.

  These were the only good times she remembered as a family, the only times when he’d stayed sober on an evening or a Saturday. The only memories worth keeping, and she’d buried them herself, because it was she who’d ruined her softball career in college, who’d failed herself, who’d lost it all—and why?

  Because I couldn’t stand being a winner, she thought bitterly. Because I had to go and find someone else to ruin my life.

  A car buzzed angrily past. McKenzie blinked several times, then pulled her eyes away from the old field and edged back onto the road.

  The low wall of the housing tract loomed ahead. She saw the graffiti tracks, and patches where oddly colored paint had wiped out previous intrusions. She turned in, houses of stucco, all fenced, all 1950’s built, jacarandas in the boulevard, front porches shaded by pepper trees, every yard fenced. She remembered how uneasy she’d first been in Washington, where few yards in the suburbs were fenced at all. Here redwood fences, blockwall, an occasional chain-link, surrounded every home, and an orange tree stood in every backyard, or had at one time. Theirs had been Valencia, juice oranges, turning color in January, but not really sweet for juicing until after Easter. Fallen purple buds popped under car tires as she drove over them. Celery-green lawns were blanketed under the blooming trees with their fern-feathery branches.

  Everything had begun to slow. McKenzie felt as if she were driving through heavy water. Finally the mailbox marked SMITH appeared, and she turned into the cement driveway, with its cracks from various earthquakes giving it wrinkles of age.

  Both she and the car came to a halt simultaneously and she sat, too weary to move. Her vision blurred sharply, the images sliding sideways and she froze, waiting for the violent wash of red across her sight, but nothing happened this time. Mac took a deep breath and forced it downward. She wasn’t crazy yet. Not entirely.

  The chain-link gate across the driveway to the garage began to move. She straightened, surprised, then saw her father. He strode purposely toward the car, not much different than the last time she’d seen him, except that he’d gone silvery-gray, and his hair had receded sharply. He beckoned to her to bring the car on in.

  The house shared driveways, side by side, with a ground strip running between them. Mrs. Ethelridge had always kept that strip blossoming with border plants. Run over a leaf with bicycle or car wheel, and she would be out her kitchen door in a second, sharp tongue ready to deliver a lashing. She’d always seemed old to Mac. She was both surprised and comforted seeing the flowers still there, still omnipresent. Mac sat, looking down the strip. Blue lobelia, followed by white alyssum and yellow marigolds. An unending territory line that ran from the sidewalk to the alley behind their garages.

  She started up again. The car protested, then caught, and she edged it forward, careful not to cross the flowers. The driveway had been extended in the back, and she pulled over and under a carport. Her father opened the door as she turned the ignition off and took the keys out.

  She got out, legs suddenly feeling leaden. Out of habit, she looked at Mrs. Ethelridge’s kitchen door, and saw faded ivory curtains wavering at the window as if someone had been observing.

  His hazel eyes appraised both her and the automobile. He followed her line of sight. Then he sighed. “She’ll be over later, tonight or tomorrow, asking questions. I don’t know how your mother put up with it.”

  McKenzie looked at Walton Smith. “She used to hide,” Mac answered frankly. Her father put a hand out. She took it, feeling the hard warmth of his workmanlike hand. It still enveloped hers though he did not seem as tall as she remembered. McKenzie felt herself being peeled away in layers, by events and memories she could not control, as she looked at the house. This was the life she’d fled when she was young. She didn’t feel young any longer. She felt old, and used.

  There was no mother to come home to. She’d died almost two years ago, yet McKenzie looked past him, almost thinking that she could see her, too. He flinched, as if sharing that same thought, and let go of her hand.

  He broke the contact, but not before she felt a pinch of pain thrusting through her temples, slashing bloody streaks across her father’s face.

  McKenzie went cold. She blinked twice, rapidly, and the double vision faded as the warmth of her father’s touch left her palm. She fought to keep an even keel, to get a grip on reality.

  It was in her head. All in her head. Everything she thought and felt and saw .

  Walton Smith stood, head cocked slightly to one side, as if waiting for her to say something. His ears had gotten longer, and there were sharp creases through the lobes. She’d forgotten what that meant. Something to do with his health. His jaw moved, pulsing impatiently, a familiar tic that she knew well.

  “I’m back,” she said. Her voice sounded thin and watery.

  “So I see,” Walt responded gruffly. He dipped to look into the backseat. “This all you have?”

  “All I could bring with me.” McKenzie swallowed. Her throat knotted, again. Not much for ten years gone.

  “Where’s the dog?”

  Her jaw dropped. “What dog?”

  “You’ve always had a dog.” Walt cleared his throat. “Figured you’d bring one with you.”

  Her hand shook as she ran it through her hair, trying to clear it from her eyes. She hoped her voice was more solid. “No. No dog.”

  “Well, then. Come on.” He started down the driveway. “Leave the keys, I’ll unload.”

  To look at them now, to hear them, there was no common ground between them. How could she stay, and where could she go? “I’m here,” she said, not knowing what else to say or think.

  He grumbled, “Some sense in you yet.” The color had begun coming back into his face, highlighting his cheekbones. “I’ll fix some dinner. We need to eat early if I’m going to catch the Dodger game. It’s a doubleheader.”

  He hesitated, then put out his arm and took her in. The moment was stiff and awkward, and she let go, feeling astonished that he had even assayed it to begin with. Her body flinched under the pressure, joints stiff, old bruises still tender, and she could feel the hesitation in him as well. She let go.

  She leaned back in and took one of the suitcases, then entered the house she’d left so long ago.

  It did not smell the way she remembered. McKenzie could not readily identify what it was that was missing other than her mother. She could smell furniture polish and fresh coffee. Hardwood floors, clean but scuffed and scarred with age, bent under her step and talked back to her as she went down the hallway, softly, creaking. McKenzie decided to stop thinking until she’d at least had a long shower and a hot cup of coffee. The shower would come first.

  “You’ve learned to cook,” she noted, as she sat down to dinner. Hot water and fresh clothes had revived her somewhat. He had spaghetti and a green salad on the dinette table. The spaghetti stayed in the pot, a serving spoon plunged into its steaming marinara sauce, but the salad was in the cut crystal salad bowl she remembered from most of her life.

  “The sauce is out of a jar,” he responded. “But a good jar.” He helped himself, then nudged the pot her way. “Eat what you want. I’ll freeze the leftovers.”

  Was that how he got along now? Cooking and then eating the frozen leftovers until time to cook again? She could not imagine him self-sufficient without her mother, yet here he was, alive and well. She felt a faint resentment that he should be. Maybe they should have woken the old sleeping dog. He’d learned new tricks. She made a dry, ironic sound deep in her throat, one that almost, but not quite, washed away the lump of dread which never seemed to dissolve.

  He cocked his head, listened to the radio, and said, “Double play. That cools the inning down.”

  Her throat tightened. This was the onl
y connection she’d ever had with him. The only time she’d never been afraid to go out in public with him, that she knew he’d be sober, was at one of her softball games. Now, at Chavez Ravine, or Anaheim Stadium, that was another matter. He’d always found a way to get around the two beer limit. Professional games to her always stank of spilled beer and crushed peanut shells. She picked at her salad. The greens were fresh, crisp. “How are they doing this year?”

  He shrugged. “Who knows? Maybe the Dodgers are getting tired of the game. But the Angels—” he waved a fork. “That’s a roller coaster. Up, down. Young talent wasted, traded away. The strike hurt them a lot. They say the old Cowboy has ’em up for sale. But they’re playing .500 ball. Maybe they’ve got a chance. It could come true, a Freeway World Series.” That was what the sportswriters would always speculate about, if both the Dodgers and the Angels had winning seasons. A world series connected by southland freeways.

  Mac wrinkled her nose, considering, then both of them simultaneously, said, “Nah!”