“No. Do not.”
“Okay, Lucinda. Not a problem, Lucinda.”
She got out and slammed the door and climbed the stairs two at a time, bags in hand.
“Lucinda?”
“What?”
“You forgot to pay me.”
She looked down on him from the patio and he saw her shoulders sag and heard her sigh. Her bags clunked to the deck. She unslung her purse and came back down the stairs.
Ted finished off his shift at five o’clock, drove his truck to Open Sights in Oceanside and picked up his new Glock. Kerry sold him a clip-on holster, cleaning kit, a locking transport box, and a padded cloth pistol bag. The range was busy and the sharp reports of the guns came muffled but forcefully through the walls and safety glass. He thought of Lucinda coming down her stairs. She had asked for him.
“We’ve got some terrific classes coming up next month,” said Kerry. “Self-defense, safety, all the laws you need to know. Plenty of those to learn and more on the way.”
Before leaving the store Ted made sure the gun was empty, then locked it in the hard case. He locked all of his purchases in the toolbox bolted to the bed of his truck. Driving back toward Fallbrook he felt different. He felt calm, capable, and equal. He felt that he had a powerful secret. He felt that he could protect himself and his family and Lucinda against criminals and government. He thought how different it would have been — the day that Edgar held him up and took his money — if only the Glock had been there with him.
She had asked for him.
Chapter twenty-two
He stopped and bought a twelve-pack of budget beer and drove to Pride Auto Repair. Cade’s Bel Air and Trevor’s Magnum were there, along with a gleaming red-on-black Harley-Davidson he recognized. It was dark enough by now for the neon sign to show up beautifully, the blue Model T throwing out red flames. Standing between his truck and the building, keeping a weather eye for cruising cops — especially the one who had given him the nystagmus test in broad daylight after he’d been six months sober — Ted holstered the unloaded gun and clipped the rig to his belt. His XXL aloha shirttail — hula girls in grass skirts playing ukuleles — covered the gun nicely.
Inside there was no one at the front desk but behind it, through the open double doors to the repair bay, Cade Magnus fiddled with the engine of a van and Trevor rolled a new tire toward a white pickup truck. A biker couple Ted had met — Screw Loose and Psycha — sat on the old paisley sofa with their legs splayed and beers resting on their thighs, watching the men work. Ted walked into the bay and opened one of the refrigerators, set the twelve-pack inside then broke one off for himself. He lifted a white resin chair off the stack and set it down by the sofa. Cade and Trevor were watching. Ted lifted his shirttail. Cade nodded and Trevor gave Ted a thumbs-up.
“New iron?” asked Screw Loose. He was a short and stocky, with long orange hair and a short orange beard. Ted had noticed that, contrary to most bikers, Screw’s leather was always clean and his gear always shiny, right down to the buttons on his vest.
“What’s it look like to you?”
“Don’t shoot yourself in the foot.”
“I could shoot you.”
“Funny,” said Psycha. She was thin with lank brown hair parted down the middle and a face brined by wind and sun.
“True, too,” said Ted, enjoying the familiar tightening of breath and vision that presaged anger.
“What’s got into you, Ted?” asked Screw.
“It’s the gun,” said Psycha. “He’s got stones now. He’s not the shuffling moron he was yesterday and the day before.”
Screw Loose laughed loudly. Ted shook his head and cracked his beer. The beauty of having power was you didn’t have to use it. You could just glide. Cade cursed at the Chrysler engine and Trevor started locking on a new tire with the half-inch impact gun. Ted considered the paisley couch and again remembered seeing Jed Magnus sitting on it, reading, with one hand on Mrs. Magnus’s knee. Through the raised back door he saw the street where he’d sat on his bike all those years ago, looking in.
Cade and Trevor finished up the work and everyone filed past the refrigerator for beers, then went into the lobby. Joan and Amber showed up a few minutes later in tight jeans and snug tops and heady perfumes. They brought a friend named Icey who was slight and fair-skinned and had tattoos running up the backs of both legs — serpentine plaits like an old-fashioned silk stocking — disappearing under her shorts. Her hair was a bleached buzz cut and her face was studded and serious. The three women sauntered in and headed straight for beers, then the pool cues. Joan slung her purse onto the counter and dug in for some you-know-what. Trevor put on some hate rock, a new band called By the Neck Until Dead. To Ted they sounded even worse than Hate Matrix, although the lyrics were rousing.
Ted whiffed a.45 casing of powerful methamphetamine and chugged a beer. As the crank blistered his brain Ted danced awkwardly in place and clapped his hands to the music. I can do anything! He and Icey, the tattooed woman, won their game against Cade and Joan, though Ted wondered if Cade threw the game by missing an easy put away of the eight ball.
When Ted knocked it in Cade nodded approvingly and said something to Trevor, who checked his watch. The music was too loud for Ted to hear what was said but everyone else seemed to understand. The women gathered their purses and jackets and headed out to the parking lot. Cade and Screw Loose followed and a moment later Ted heard the Bel Air and the Harley roar to life. The headlight beams cut across the Pride Auto windows and the car and motorcycle rumbled away leaving Ted and Trevor in the wake of noise.
“Where’d everybody go?” asked Ted.
“It’s time to go see your friend.”
A visceral, muscle-rippling thrill shot through Ted, almost as strong as another whiff of crank. “The next level? Yeah, let’s do it.”
“Come here.”
Ted followed Trevor back into the repair bay. In one corner, leaning upright near the old-fashioned soft-drink machine, were a half-dozen baseball bats. Ted saw that some had been cut short. Trevor lifted one of these and gave it a discerning half-swing, more of a chop, then handed it to Ted. “Use this aluminum one.”
“What if he has his gun?”
“I’ve got it all figured.”
“I have the Glock just in case.”
“You won’t need it.”
“But just in case.”
Back in the lobby Trevor closed the front-door blinds, then the men stepped into the evening. Trevor locked up. Ted drove his truck down Old Stage. It was just after seven, and the street was quiet tonight. He swung into the shopping center and parked by Robertito’s Taco Shop where Trevor told him to. He cut the engine and looked out at the busy little restaurant. “Have you had their burrito fries?” Ted asked. “They’re so big I can’t even finish one.”
“I eat healthy, not Mexican.”
“You got all those muscles to take care of.”
Trevor looked at his watch again. “Edgar comes here most weeknights, about right now, according to a friend of a friend of his slut girlfriend, Jessica. He gets food for himself and her. She lives in that trailer slum in the middle of town and they eat at a picnic bench by the creek. They eat, then breed in his car, then Edgar drives home.”
“They’re gonna recognize me,” said Ted.
“That’s the whole point. You’re you and you’re white, and brown doesn’t mess with white. That’s your gospel. You’re going to beat this truth into his ignorant head.”