The Ten-Ounce Siesta

“But-”

A hard slap ended the conversation. Defeated, the younger woman moved away. Another figure replaced her, this one taller. . rangier. .

The stranger leaned over him. A male smell burned Jack’s nostrils-the minty stink of Ben-Gay laced with the sickly sweet odor of ginger ale and bourbon.

The old woman’s voice again: “Should I do him, Daddy?”

“Don’t waste a bullet, sugar pop. I got a better idea.” The man hovered over Jack, wheezing heavy bourbon breaths. Jack worked to see him clearly. He blinked several times and a gaunt face covered with jerky skin came into focus above him. Icy blue eyes wild with frostbitten fire were set beneath the man’s heavy brow as if pounded there with a sledge hammer. He wore a top hat and a frock coat and-

Jack’s eyelids fluttered. Focus was going. He was fading again.

Something was draped around the man’s neck.

Jack fought to remain conscious.

Something shiny encircled the man’s neck. Something slick, ends hanging free, like lengths of garden hose-

Like-

The man reached out, shedding wriggling shadows, his scarecrow arms laying midnight stripes across Jack’s body. And then the stranger’s bony fingers reached into the heavens and closed around a black cloud, and he pulled it down. . down. . and further still. . down. . until finally the cloud slammed closed over Jack Baddalach’s head.

THREE

The heat was the first thing Jack noticed when he regained consciousness, only the word heat seemed too timid a description. Get your ass trussed up in a mummy bag on the hottest day of the year in the middle of Death Valley, and you wouldn’t be one degree hotter than this.

Jack opened his eyes, but he couldn’t see a thing. Wherever he was, it was completely dark. Completely quiet, too. He lay on his back, knees twisted to one side, right shoulder pressed against something hard. He moved his hands and feet, just a little, and was relieved to find that the dognappers hadn’t tied him up.

Jack sucked a shallow breath and immediately wished he hadn’t. The air was foul. A single breath made his gut churn miserably. Add to that the mother of all headaches, blooming at the spot where the woman in black had struck him with her machine gun.

Jack reached for his forehead to see if he was bleeding, but his hand struck something hard before his arm could make the trip.

Suddenly he didn’t care about his head.

He reached out, palms pressing against smooth metal barely a foot from his face. His fingers traveled the metal-down to knee level, up above his head-and found no breaks in the wall.

There were walls above and below, too. He was trapped. That was why he couldn’t see anything. The women had locked him up.

Inside something.

Claustrophobia. Jack didn’t want to even think the word.

Instead, he took a deep breath. He knew he needed air and-

He tasted it this time. Actually tasted the stink. It was like drinking sewer sludge. He gagged.

He’d hardly moved at all, and already he was covered in sweat. Damn, but it was as hot as Satan’s backside. Jack’s heart started pounding, a live thing roasting on a barbecue grill. He could almost hear the searing hiss of red hot metal.

He had to get a grip on things. Because if he didn’t. . if he didn’t get a grip on himself-

But Jesus, how the hell was he supposed to feel? Maybe the crazy bitches had locked him in a metal box, dug a hole in the middle of the Mojave Desert-in the middle of fucking nowhere-and buried him alive.

Panic sank sharp hooks into Jack’s spine. He pushed against the metal wall above him, then hauled back and rammed it with his elbow. Once. Twice. Three times. Harder, then harder still. Again and again, but the wall did not give.

Jack sank back, sweating like a pig, the imaginary mummy bag tighter now. His breaths came hard and fast, but that didn’t bother him because suddenly he didn’t notice the stink so much. He was scared and he was hungry for oxygen. No matter how rank it smelled. Whatever he could get he’d take.

He rested a moment.

And nothing changed.

He knew he couldn’t rest at all. Not now. Rest, and the heat might drag him down to a place where he couldn’t fight it anymore. The mummy bag would get tighter. . and tighter. . until there was nothing left for him to do but suffocate in silence.

He wouldn’t do that. Wherever he was, he wanted out. Right now. He slammed his elbow against the metal wall again. Nothing. Pressed against it with his hands and knees until his spine ached. Still nothing.

Okay. He had to stop and think for a minute. Just a minute. He couldn’t panic. If he was going to get out of this, he had to figure things out.

His hands drifted over the metal above. It was hot to the touch, like an electric stove notched on low heat. He slammed his elbow against it one last time, and not very hard. The wall made a flexing sound, a deeper sound than metal would make if dirt were piled on top of it.

If he’d been buried in the desert, metal might very well hold heat like an electric range, but it certainly wouldn’t make a flexing sound. No. That fact meant something else.

But if he were locked in something black-say the trunk of a big black limousine-well, a black metal trunk would heat up real nice in the afternoon sun. Hell, if this were August instead of February, you’d probably be able to fry an egg on the sucker. And a trunk would make a flexing sound if you smashed at it like a wildman. Even the trunk of a Cadillac.

Yeah. It had to be. The women had locked him in the trunk of the limo.

Jack relaxed a little. Not much. Maybe a millimeter’s worth. Okay. The trunk wouldn’t give. And it was dark. He had to get the trunk open, because even if the air held out, he couldn’t take the heat forever. Let alone that stink-

There had to be something in the trunk that he could use. A jack maybe. Or a screwdriver. Yeah. With a screwdriver he could jimmy the lock from the inside-

Sure he could.

First things first. Things would go much faster if he didn’t have to work in complete darkness. If he could find an emergency kit, and if it held a flashlight-

Jack reached out, fingers groping blindly across heavy carpet, until he found something plastic, shaped like-

A water bottle. He tipped it back and forth, and the liquid slosh he heard was sweet. He twisted the top and drank greedily.

Jack couldn’t tell what he had, not in the dark. Evian or Calistoga or Perrier. And he certainly wasn’t up for any blindfolded designer water taste test. No way. Jack Baddalach was strictly a tap-water kind of guy.

Jack capped the bottle and set it aside. For the first time in his life he thanked God for yuppies. If he just kept his cool he’d be okay. He reached out again, searching for the emergency kit that had to be there.

Was there. He opened it and searched the small compartment-socket wrenches, a screwdriver, a flashlight. .

With dead batteries. Okay. That wouldn’t stop him. He held the screwdriver in one hand, reaching out toward the spot where the rear seal of the trunk should be with the other.