Twin Cities Noir

“Let’s go,” Curtis says, and from behind him appears a heavyset guy I haven’t seen before. He doesn’t say anything but he moves with us in the direction of Curtis’s car, so I figure he’s with him.

I jump in the front seat, Heavy in the back, as Curtis starts the ignition. “I saw them go toward Jackson Street,” he says. “They’re probably heading up to the interstate. We can catch ’em.” He leaves the gravel driveway and squeals the tires onto 7th.

“Oh man, am I glad you came along when you did, Curtis. I’m dead meat if I don’t get that car back.”

“How much is in there today?” Curtis asks, jerking the wheel to pull around a slow-moving milk truck.

“Over seventy thousand,” I answer. “I gotta get that money or Benno will kill me.”

“I wouldn’t worry about Benno,” Curtis says. “We’ll take care of this.”

We reach the interchange at 35E and Curtis automatically takes the northbound onramp.

“Are you sure they headed north?” I ask. “Maybe they kept going east up to 94.”

“No,” Curtis shakes his head, “they went this way. I saw them take this right.”

Thank God he can see what’s going on. My head is still ringing from the thumping Tattoo gave me. We scream up 35E and nearly reach the 694 interchange when we spot my Continental cruising north, just like Curtis said.

“There,” I say. “Hang back a little. Let’s follow them to where they’re going. I’m gonna fuck these guys up when we get there.” I reach for my gun and remember I don’t have it anymore. “Shit, they got my gun.”

“Don’t worry about it,” Curtis says reassuringly, “I got one with your name on it.” Heavy doesn’t say anything from the backseat, so I assume he’s just enjoying the ride, but I hope he’s ready to rumble when we get where we’re going, because I’m not just gonna get that money back, I’m gonna take a surcharge out of their hides.

We follow these clowns—who don’t seem to be in any big hurry—clear up past Forest Lake, where they finally pull off the interstate and head east to Lindstrom. Once through that dinky town, they go north on a narrow highway.

“They gotta know by now that we’re following them,” I say to Curtis, who is driving casually along now, unconcerned about tipping them off.

“Yeah,” he says, “but they’re not worried.”

“You think they’re planning to shoot it out?” I ask.

“Don’t know,” Curtis replies, as he turns off the narrow highway onto an even narrower gravel road, “hard to say what people will do to get their hands on that much money.”

That much money. I suddenly realize how odd it was that he asked me in the parking lot how much was in the car today—in all the months I’ve been stopping at the Gopher, I never mentioned what my day job is—and how I didn’t see him inside the bar but he appeared as soon as those jerks took my car. Now here I sit in the passenger seat, with this guy driving who I really don’t know that well, and Heavy in the seat behind me who I’ve never seen before, and I start to wonder. And my wonder turns to worry. I look at Curtis as he pulls the car off the gravel road into a tree-obscured lane with two wheel ruts, and I say, “No, no way.”

Suddenly, from behind, Heavy clasps my shoulder with his meaty hand and presses the cold barrel of his pistol against the base of my skull. I get the message—don’t move—and I don’t. I just sit there and say the Lord’s Prayer in my mind.

We come to a stop in a leaf-canopied clearing where a broken-down old cabin stands, roof covered with moss, and there next to my beautiful baby-blue Lincoln Continental stand Dude #1 and Tattoo. Son of a bitch, am I a schmuck! Tattoo steps up to the passenger side and opens the door, covering me with my own gun, and I hear the key alarm bong as Curtis and Heavy get out of the car. I stand up and shake my head.

“You ain’t gonna get away with this,” I say, as Heavy pushes me toward the back side of the cabin.

Curtis sneers at me. “You’re such a blowhard, Davy. I’ve been sitting in that bar listening to your bullshit for so long I can’t wait to hit the off button. But you’re gonna talk right up to the end, aren’t you?”

“You can make this personal if you want, Curtis. But I ain’t gonna tell you the combination to the box. It’ll take you a year to get it open, and when Benno finds out he’s gonna skin you motherfuckers alive.”

“I already have the combination,” he says with a velvety satisfaction in his voice. “And what makes you think Benno doesn’t already know what we’re up to?”

“Shit,” I whisper.

“That’s right,” Curtis says. “Benno didn’t give you no lunch break.” He steps away and tells Heavy, “Pop this jerk so I can get to work. I got deliveries to make.”

It’s all clear to me now. “Go ahead and take the fucking job, Curtis. I’m sick of it anyway. And by the way, the fringe benefits suck.”

Heavy pushes the gun against the back of my head and squeezes the trigger. Ah, what the hell, it was worth it—that’s one hell of a chili dog.

Acknowledgments

Thanks go out to all our bookselling friends, especially Pat Frovarp and Gary Shulze, Jeff Hatfield, Lyle Starkloff, Hans Weyandt, and Tom Bielenberg. Thanks also to Johnny Temple for giving us the opportunity, and to Johanna Ingalls for being Johanna Ingalls. And thanks to the Twin Cities writing community for their generosity and trust. If it weren’t for you, there would only be an introduction.

ABOUT THE CONTRIBUTORS:

GARY BUSH recently finished a novel featuring private detective Max Coppersmith. He is currently working on a second Coppersmith novel and researching a historical mystery. His short fiction has appeared in Flesh and Blood Volume 3, Fedora 2, Small Crimes, and MXB Magazine. Bush lives in Minneapolis with his wife Stacey.

K.J. ERICKSON writes the Marshall Bahr mystery series, set in the Twin Cities. The fourth title in the series, Alone at Night, won a 2005 Minnesota Book Award.

CHRIS EVERHEART , a Minnesota native, is a fiction and screen writer. He has worked in film and advertising in Minneapolis, where he lives with his wife and stepson.

JUDITH GUEST has lived since 1976 in Edina, Minnesota, where she has been gathering lots of material, which could take another thirty years to be disseminated. She is the author of five books, including Killing Time in St. Cloud and The Tarnished Eye. She has one husband, three sons, and three daughters-in-law, plus seven of the best grandchildren known to man (or woman).

PETE HAUTMAN has written novels for both adults and teens. His poker-themed crime novels Drawing Dead and The Mortal Nuts were selected as New York Times Book Review Notable Books. His latest novel, Invisible, is about model railroads, pyromania, friendship, and window-peeping. Hautman lives with novelist and poet Mary Logue in Golden Valley, Minnesota, and Stockholm, Wisconsin.

ELLEN HART, five-time winner of the Lambda Literary Award for Best Lesbian Mystery and two-time winner of the Minnesota Book Award for Best Crime Fiction, has written twenty-one mystery novels in two long-running series, all set in the Twin Cities. She teaches crime writing at the Loft Literary Center, the largest independent writing community in the nation, and lives in Minneapolis with her partner of twenty-eight years.