crack, but open.
“Ross?” he called.
“Come on in, Frank,” he heard Ross call. “It ain’t locked. I seen you comin’.”
He thought of every other time he had met with the junkie: the nervousness, the triple-locked doors.
He pulled out his gun.
“Come out here, Ross,” he called.
Silence.
“Come out here, or I’m going back to Las Piernas. We’ll talk another time.”
He heard the porch creak behind him and whirled.
A man in a gold lame cape and a full set of purple-sequined tails stood on the other end of the porch. He took off his glimmering top hat and bowed.
“Want to see me pull a rabbit out of my hat?” he asked.
“No. Drop the hat and hold your hands—” He sensed a movement behind him but did not quite turn in time to ward off the blow to the back of his head.
He blacked out for a moment, not feeling the fall to the porch until he hit it with his face. His gun clattered away from him, but he could smell powder. Had he fired it? Hit the magician? No, one of the men pinning him to the porch was wearing purple and gold. Dizzy, half-stunned, he struggled beneath them, but they held him down. Soon his hands were tied behind his back.
“You didn’t hit him hard enough!” the magician said.
“It won’t matter.”
He felt fear, cold and real, clearing his head.
“He almost shot me!” the magician complained. “What if someone heard it?”
“Get his gun, goddammit,” the other said. The cape lifted.
He struggled again, felt the jab of a needle in his neck.
“Keep wiggling around,” the voice said, “and it will only work faster.”
He was hauled roughly to his feet and shoved into the house.
Ross was inside, cowering in a corner.
“Oh, God!” he wailed when he saw Frank. “You two are fuckin’ nuts! He’s a cop!”
“Shut up,” the magician said.
Ross started crying but said nothing more.
The pain from his head was not so bad now, but he could feel his own blood, warm and wet on his neck and back, could taste it in his mouth. He was dizzy, but it wasn’t so bad to be dizzy, he thought.
“How much time?” the voice behind him asked.
The magician pulled out a pocket watch. “Any minute now,” he said, and looked toward the tracks.
A train. Even through the fog that was settling on his mind, he thought of the train. He started to move toward the door. He was yanked back, hard.
He heard the train. These sons of bitches were going to kill him, he thought hazily. Well, screw them. They weren’t going to put him down without a fight.
He stumbled forward, pulling his captor off balance, then rolled the young man over his back. A surprised young man, he noted, grinning at him as he lay on the floor.
“Stop it!” the magician yelled, waving the gun.
Frank kicked at the man on the floor but missed him completely. He tried again and lost his own balance, crashing into a lamp and coffee table and God knew what else before the man who had been on the floor was grabbing him again. Frank struggled, but he was growing clumsier now.
“Follow the plan!” the captor yelled. “Kill him!”
Frank fell to his knees, too dizzy, too sleepy, to stand. The magician looked lost.
The captor let him fall to the floor. He marched over to the magician and took the gun.
Frank heard the shot — loud, louder than the train.
Just like falling asleep, he thought. He felt cold. He allowed himself to wish she were holding him. He imagined her arms around him and wondered if she would ever forgive him for getting himself killed.
7
MARK BAKER DIDN’T SEE ME at my desk when he came into the newsroom. He made a beeline into John’s office. I’m not sure if it was my chickeny side or my rebellious nature at work, but in either case I wasn’t willing to contribute to the story on my husband’s disappearance — so I staged one of my own. I slipped out of the newsroom and made my way downstairs.
Cassidy wasn’t in the lobby, and I didn’t see him among the cops who were still huddled around Frank’s car. I looked across the lot and saw him leaning against my Karmann Ghia.
“I’m going home,” I told him when I reached the car.
“See you there,” he said, an announcement I was less than happy about, but I was in no mood to argue. I got into my car as he watched. I rolled down the window.
