“I think we’re getting off on the wrong foot here,” Cap finally said. “Everything happened so fast last night. I think we were all a little in shock or something.”
“Yeah. Or something.”
He started tapping his fingertips on the beer bottle. “Okay,” he said, drawing out the word. There was a little smile on his face.
“Before you guys got in the boat,” I said, “did you happen to run into a little trouble at the casino?”
“What do you mean?”
“At the Bay Mills Casino. Did you happen to have a little altercation with someone who works there?”
“There may have been a little misunderstanding. Some Indian trying to act like a tough guy.”
“The pit boss, you mean.”
“Yeah, whatever. Without the casino he’d probably be selling little totem poles to tourists.”
“I kinda doubt that. Anyway, he’s a friend of mine. You guys gave him some nice bruises.”
“This is a small town,” Cap said. “Didn’t I tell you, Brucie?”
I didn’t see the big man’s reaction. I was still looking at Cap.
“Why are you really here?” I said.
“I told you.”
“Okay, then. You bought me a drink.”
“Maybe there is one more thing.”
“Surprise.”
I saw it in his eyes just then. The little flash of anger. It came quick, like it wasn’t that far away to begin with. Not far away at all.
“There was a box in the boat,” he said. “About this big.” He held up his hands about four feet apart.
“What about it?”
“It was yellow and black. Airtight. You know, designed to float.”
“What was in it?”
“Some valuables. Wallets, cash, that kind of thing. It’s just a box to keep things safe. Like a lockbox.”
“I never heard of a lockbox that floats.”
“It was in a boat,” he said. He seemed to be measuring his voice carefully now. “Everything in a boat should float, don’t you think?”
“You may have a point. But why are you telling me all this?”
“I was just wondering if you happened to see it.”
“No, I didn’t.”
“It was in the front of the boat,” he said. “At one point, I remember seeing it. I was going to grab it, but that was when the other guy jumped in to turn off the motor. And then after that I think we were all pretty occupied with Harry. You know, making sure he was still alive and everything. I never saw the box after that.”
“I never saw it at all. It probably just floated away.”
“I’m not sure about that.”
“Or else it sank. It might have gotten damaged and filled up with water.”
“You’re answering pretty quick. Are you sure you don’t want to think about it?”
I counted to three in my head. “I didn’t see it. I didn’t touch it. I don’t know anything about it. I can’t help you.”
He finally blinked. He looked down at his bottle. I could see the veins in his forearms standing out as he worked his hands. If something was going to happen here, it was me and Jackie against the two of them. And the biggest man in the room was right behind me.
“Do you…,” he started to say, slowly, “have any idea…”
“Cap,” Bruce said.
“Shut up, Brucie. I’m talking to the man. I think he needs to understand some things.”
“Or not,” I said. “I think I’ll just stay in the dark, if you don’t mind. I’d like you both to leave now.”
“He needs to understand, Brucie. The man needs some enlightenment.”
There was an old baseball bat under the counter. Jackie had had it there for years, and never had to use it. Not once. At that moment, I couldn’t help wondering if it was still there.
“He really, really needs to understand.” He was working his hands harder and harder. Opening them and closing them. The only question now was how fast I could hit him with my bottle, and then what the big guy would do to the back of my head.
That’s when the door opened and Vinnie walked in.
Chapter Four
Five hundred miles. Paradise, Michigan, to Toronto, Ontario. Across the International Bridge, then up around the North Channel, right through Blind River in fact, past the house where Natalie grew up. Turning south finally around Sudbury, down the eastern edge of Lake Huron, through Big Chute, through Barrie. Finally coming to the city itself, on the northern shore of Lake Ontario.
Or if you’re a bird, you fly right over all that water. Like many other things in this life, how much quicker it is if you don’t have to go around something so unimaginably big.
Or in my case…It’s almost immediate. I’m already there, in my mind, a thousand times every day. When I open my eyes in the morning, cold sunlight in my cabin window, I’m thinking about her doing the same in her own bed. Somehow I can feel that she is awake at the same moment I am. I can hear the shower as she steps into it. I know how long it takes her to be ready to face the day. Her hair dried, a few brush strokes across her cheeks. That’s all she needs. How much she hates to waste time.
I know when she’s driving her Jeep. The music she is listening to. The sounds of a city all around her. It’s a miracle that I know this, moment to moment. A miracle both wonderful and terrible at the same time. After so many years, to feel this way.
I don’t know how long it can last. Even now, I can feel it start to fade sometimes. A faraway station on the radio, lost in the air. In the mornings especially, when she goes to the operations room instead of to the precinct. Her whole routine different now. I have to ask her about it after the fact to fill in the blanks. That she has to take more time in the morning to put herself together. That she’s already wearing her undercover clothes when she drives into the city. That she’s still meeting with the task force before she heads out to the coffee shop.
It’s become a regular thing now. Seeing Rhapsody there, spending a few minutes at one of the tables. It’s hard for me to imagine how that would feel, to be on stage every day. To be somebody completely different from yourself. I don’t know how long it will take for Natalie to win Rhapsody’s trust, assuming she ever does. How long it will take, with just a few words every morning, to steer things around to a certain type of merchandise that might find its way from the States to Toronto for the right price.
Five hundred miles away from me, it’s all coming together, day by day. Natalie is inching her way closer to the man they call Antoine Laraque.
It took about five seconds for the men to remember where they’d seen Vinnie before. That was just enough time for Jackie to grab his bat from under the bar, and for me to slide out from between Cap and his pal Brucie. Now it was two against three plus a baseball bat, on our home field.
Cap played it cool. He took another long pull off his beer, like he had never had any other intentions. Vinnie kept standing in the doorway, looking like something out of an old western. Brucie just looked at Jackie and his bat, like the sight was vaguely amusing.
“I get the impression,” Cap said finally, “that we’re not welcome here anymore.”
“Leave this bar,” Jackie said. “Leave it now.”
“How much for the beers?”
“Just. Leave.”
Cap put the bottle down. He gave his friend a little tilt of his head and then aimed for the door. When he got to Vinnie, he looked him up and down for a moment. “We have to stop meeting like this,” Cap said.
