Silent Echo

Except I don’t turn in my seat. I stay where I am, breathing deeply. I feel weak. Too weak to do what I am about to do. “Fuck it,” I say, and open the glove box.

I verify that a black BMW X5 is in the parking lot. Then, with the gun swaying in the front pocket of my light jacket, I take the stairs slowly. Not because I am being cautious, but because my legs are shaky. Halfway up, I pause, take in my air. My heart is racing. From adrenaline, from lack of oxygen.

At the landing, I stop and silently wish there was a bench nearby. There is no bench. Just a few pots with plants and a short row of front doors.

I stop in front of the third one down, breathing harder than ever. I wait for at least two minutes, catching my breath, willing my lungs to at least give me enough to get through the next few minutes.

Finally, finally, my lungs cooperate and I suck in just enough oxygen to clear my head.

I knock on the door as loudly as I can with one hand, and grip the handle of the .44 with the other.

I hear slow footsteps from the other side of the door. A shadow passes behind the peephole. I’m being peeped at. I smile as brightly as I can.

The shadow disappears and there is a long pause. The floorboards creak a little on the other side of the door. I am not psychic and I don’t pretend to be. I know the visions and dreams and strange events that are happening to me are a product of a delusional mind, a sick mind.

But one thing I am sure of—beyond a shadow of a doubt—is that the man standing behind the door has just removed his own gun. Instinct perhaps. I’d been in this business nearly twenty years. I’ve faced nearly every dangerous situation a private investigator could face. Most investigators specialize in following cheating spouses. I have specialized in finding the missing. I’ve faced killers and kidnappers. Monsters and men. I’ve looked down the barrels of guns. I’ve seen fingers twitch nervously around triggers. I’ve thought I was going to die a dozen times over.

But I’m still here, still standing, and I have my instincts to thank. Or maybe an angel or two on my shoulder.

Either way, I pull out my own gun, hold it down by my side, and wait. I continue smiling pleasantly. Ever the affable detective and friend.

The doorknob turns slowly in front of me.

And when the door cracks open, I shove it as hard as I can and step quickly into the apartment, holding my gun before me.

CHAPTER THIRTY

Eddie doesn’t know what has hit him.

Good. As he’s puzzling out what is happening to him and holding his broken nose, I kick the door shut and deliver a punch that rocks my whole body.

I don’t have a lot behind it, but it’s enough to send Eddie sideways and down to one knee. I feel no pain. I am on an adrenaline high. I have no clue how long it will last, or how long my strength will last. I suspect I only have minutes.

Eddie says nothing. He is simply on one knee and dripping blood on his linoleum. Eddie is not an idiot. In fact, he’s a helluva smart guy.

“The great detective finally puzzles it out, huh?” He looks up and doesn’t bother to stop the flow of blood that pours from his now-crooked nose, blood that pours over his lips and spatters as he breathes.

I say nothing. I keep the gun pointed at the crown of his head. Any sudden movements and he is dead, and he knows it. He looks up at me slowly.

“You look well, Jimmy.” He grins. He looks like a ghoul. He is a ghoul. Truth is, I’m still trying to wrap my brain around what is happening.

I keep saying nothing. The gun is feeling heavier and heavier.

“You’re shaking, Jimmy,” he says. He begins standing slowly. I see his brain working every which way. There are many ways this encounter can go, and some of them end badly for me, although most will end badly for him. He knows it. He’s calculating and thinking this through. One of his options is to charge me. If so, I will kill him.

He doesn’t charge. At least, not at the moment.

“Why?” I ask. My voice is shaking. “Why!” The gun is shaking more now, too. I can see a couch in my peripheral vision. The couch is empty. I sense the rest of the house is empty, too, although I have been lucky on that end. It could have been full of people.

Eddie is calculating his odds of rushing me and grabbing the gun before I can fire. Eddie is athletic, but he’s also a good five feet from me. He will be dead before he covers two feet. He knows it.

“Are you here to kill me, Jimmy?”

I say nothing, mostly because I don’t have the energy to play whatever game he thinks will buy him more time.

“I don’t blame you,” he says. “I sure as hell would kill me, if I were you. Then again, I like killing, so you probably shouldn’t listen to me.”

He grins and the blood covers his upper front teeth. He looks like something from a nightmare. He is something from a nightmare. My head is spinning a little. I’m getting dizzy. The gun is getting heavier.

“But why my brother?” I ask, quietly now.

My friend of the last twenty-five years of my life watches me carefully. I raise my gun to him, keeping it aimed between his eyes.

“Your brother was my first. Well, my first person. I’d been killing frogs and cats and dogs up until that point. Hell, anything I could get away with.”

There was a buzzing in my head. My breathing was getting difficult. It was all I could do to keep it together.

“I was at the Dodgers game, too. Don’t you remember? I had asked if you wanted to come but you said you had tickets for just you and your brother. I’d gotten there early. Turns out none of my friends could make it. I went alone. I had gotten there early and had waited in Elysian Park. Like you. Like the two honeys I had been watching from the woods. Yes, I was in the woods, back behind the trees, watching them and imagining what it would be like to graduate from cats and dogs to girls.

“Imagine my surprise when I saw you and your brother show up. You were playing catch. Very big brotherish of you. And then I saw you do something curious. You purposely threw the ball over your brother’s head. I knew this because you first spied the girls coming your way, and then you chucked the ball easily five feet over your brother’s head. You told him to get the ball, then immediately went over to the two girls.

“Bought yourself a little time there, did we, Jimmy? Sending your brother off into the woods alone? Dick move, bro.”

He was right, of course. I had, in fact, purposely overthrown the ball to my brother. Jesus, he’d really been there. Seen it all.

“So, instead of the two girls, you could say I focused my attention on your little brother. After all, you practically hand-delivered him to me. And, the closer he got, the more I realized I didn’t really want to go to the stupid ball game after all. My plans, you could say, changed.”