'Still think we're all in this together?' Lloyd said, 'You really screwed up, you know it?'
Lloyd was a world-class blamer. Make a mistake and he'd be there to remind you. 'You can keep bringing it up, if it makes you feel better,' Bobby said. 'Or be a man, let it slide.' Lloyd gave him a hard look.
'Be a man? Is that what you just said to me?' He hit the brakes and pulled over in the emergency lane, cars were flying by so close it made Bobby nervous.
'I should pull you out of this car,' Lloyd said, 'kick your smartass Canadian butt.'
'Or you could put it in fucking gear and try to find her,' Bobby said. Lloyd was really getting on his nerves.
Chapter Sixteen
Johnny didn't tell her how much trouble he'd had trying to open the safe. He had the correct combination he was sure of that. He'd copied it right out of Samir's address book: 42 R, 5 L, 15 R. He'd followed that exact sequence and it wouldn't open. What was he doing wrong? He tried it again and again, getting more pissed off each time it wouldn't open. He was nervous, thinking it was taking too long and they were going to come back and catch him. But on the seventh try, it worked and the door opened.
He was thinking about Karen. She'd come out of nowhere, knocked him on his ass. He was in love, really in love for the first time in his life. He hadn't banged another chick since him and her had run into each other that day at the Capital Grill. If that didn't prove he'd fallen for her nothing did. He sat in the BMW, thinking about their new life together. No more collecting money, no more putting up with Samir. He figured he could take the money they had and double it easy on the gaming tables of the world. He pictured himself in a white tux, playing roulette at a casino in Monte Carlo, and in a Hawaiian shirt, playing blackjack on Paradise Island in the Bahamas. It was going to be fun. They could go anywhere, do anything they wanted.
Leaving Ann-Marie wouldn't be a problem. After fifteen years of misery he'd never think of her again. He could hear her voice in his head, a nonstop monologue: you're never here; you know that's your third drink; do I have to do everything?; don't wear that tie; you're really getting heavy; your hair's falling out; we never have any money.
The bonus, he wouldn't have to see Nana, his mother-in-law, either, and have to listen to her advice about life, Nana, the expert on everything, who'd spent thirty years working in a party store. He'd miss the kids, for sure, Johnny Junior and little Ashley. That was the only thing he didn't like. But life was a trade-off, wasn't it?
Johnny heard sirens and saw something going on in the Mountain Jack's parking lot, and then he saw Karen come out of the room, rolling the suitcase along the balcony and he felt sick to his stomach. He got out of the car and waited behind the stairs. He could hear the suitcase coming down, bumping the edge of each step, taking forever. When Karen got to the bottom, he stepped out and surprised her.
'Jesus,' she said. 'Where've you been? We've got to get out of here.'
'You weren't going to leave without me,' Johnny said, 'were you?'
'I heard sirens and got nervous,' Karen said.
He studied her face to see if she was lying, but couldn't tell. 'You think they're coming for you?' Johnny gripped the handle of the suitcase. He glanced at all the action in the Mountain Jack's parking lot and said, 'Everything's cool, baby. Somebody probably had a heart attack, or got a chicken bone stuck in their throat, that's all.'
Johnny lifted the suitcase and started up the stairs, so much for their new life together.
Karen didn't know if she should say something else or just let it go. She assumed Johnny believed her because he wanted to. Now she had to come up with another excuse to get away from him. Maybe she'd just wait till he drank more champagne and fell asleep. He stood the bag up on its wheels and closed the door. She was going to ask him where the vodka was when he turned and hit her and then she flew over the bed and landed on the floor, dazed, the shoulder bag twisted around her neck, choking her.
After that, it was like waking up out of a deep sleep. Karen was woozy, not fully conscious. She watched him come around the bed, towering over her. He stepped toward her and kicked her as she was trying to sit up and the pain exploded in her ribs, knocking the wind out of her. Her first instinct was to get air in her lungs. Then she put her hands up, trying to protect herself as he came at her and kicked her again. Her shoulder stung where he made contact. She fell back on the floor, the thin carpeting not giving her much of a cushion.
When she looked up he had a gun in his hand, a small semiautomatic. He racked it and aimed it at her, hesitated, moved to the bed and picked up a pillow. He was going to kill her there was no doubt in her mind. Karen panicked, reached her hand in her purse, trying to find the Mag. She felt the barrel and moved her hand down and wrapped her fingers around the grip as Johnny moved toward her again. The gun was stuck. She couldn't get it out and held up the purse, a Kate Spade knockoff, and pulled the trigger and the gun roared.
The round hit him in the stomach and went through him, punching a hole in the wall. He dropped the pillow and stepped back and sat on the bed, a look of surprise on his face, glancing down at the little red spot on his white designer polo. He still had the gun in his hand. He tried to raise his arm up and aim it at her, but didn't have the strength, and he fell back on the bed and didn't move.
Karen's ears were ringing from the gunshot. She sat up on her knees, her legs bent underneath her. She was still dizzy and leaned on the bed and pulled herself up and sat on the edge. Her vision was clearing, taking in the scene. Johnny was flat on his back- dead, eyes open staring at the ceiling.
Karen felt sick and got up and went in the bathroom and threw up in the toilet. She went to the sink and rinsed out her mouth and checked herself in the bathroom mirror. Her face hurt. Her left cheekbone was red and puffy. She went back in the bedroom and wrapped a washcloth around a handful of ice cubes from the bucket and pressed it to her face. She went to the window, hoping she wasn't going to see police cars pulling up, and cracked open the curtains. There was a red Mustang creeping though the parking lot below. Karen felt her heart race.
She opened the motel room door and watched Bobby and Lloyd cruise to the end of the building and turn right. She picked up her bag and left the room and went down the stairs, walked past the first floor rooms to the breezeway where the vending machines were, and crossed through to the opposite side of the building. The red Mustang was stopped behind her Audi. Bobby was out of the car looking through the driver's side window. She'd parked the Audi there yesterday because there were no spaces in front. Inconvenient at the time-now it was a stroke of luck.
Karen ran back upstairs, heart racing, nerves jangled, and fished the keys out of Johnny's pocket. She covered him with the bedspread and wheeled the suitcase out of the room.
Lloyd pulled into the Mountain Jack's parking lot and Bobby saw the flashing lights. Saw the minivan surrounded by cop cars, an EMS van, a fire truck, and a reporter from the Channel 7 Action News team, a good- looking black girl with a solemn expression, talking on camera. It reminded Bobby of a movie scene, people standing behind yellow police tape, gawking, trying to find out what was happening. Two paramedics lifted Wade out of the mini- van onto a gurney.
'We better check the restaurant,' Lloyd said.
Bobby said, 'You think she stopped to have a piece of prime rib, do you?'
'You're the fucking know-it-all. Why're you asking me?'
Lloyd was developing a real attitude problem. Bobby said, 'I think we've got a better chance of finding her at the motel if she's still around.'
'Don't let me stop you,' Lloyd said.
There was a Red Roof Inn next door. Maybe she went over and made a phone call, or got a room, and if they were real lucky, she'd checked in with her own name. They weren't. There was no guest by the name of Karen Delaney or Karen anything. The hick behind the reception desk, whose name was Gregg with three g's, couldn't remember seeing an attractive woman with red hair around the property. Property? Referring to it like it was a resort. Bobby got a kick out of that.
'You'd remember her,' Bobby said.
They cruised through the parking lot hoping to spot Karen, but what they saw behind building number three was almost as good, a silver Audi A4 with black interior, the Audi looking out of place among all the trucks and
