“There you go, spoiling me again.”
“You’re worth it. This place doesn’t function without you.”
“Am I blushing? I feel kinda hot.”
“Stop it,” said Alex. “Go on, get ready for lunch.”
He watched her walk down the rubber mats, twirling a spatula to the music in her head.
Raymond Monroe parked the Pontiac in the middle of Delafield Place and studied the block. The majority of the houses here were detached four-square colonials with large front porches showing lacquered white columns, shaded by huge oaks and situated on a gentle grade. It was a lovely street, and Monroe could not see that it would be a viable location for a house of offenders. But as his eyes continued along the block, he noticed the odd houses that were not so fine. Fronted by Formstone rather than wood or vinyl siding, and with weedy, overgrown yards and hoopties parked out front, there were two or three candidates that bore the run-down mark of group homes.
A knock on any door would have told him what he needed to know. Longtime residents who took pride in their homes were always eager to point out the homes of those less inclined to take care of their properties. But he didn’t want anyone to remember him later on. Squinting his eyes, he noticed the mailboxes stuffed with flyers and letters. The mailman had an early route here, and that was good.
Monroe got out of the Pontiac and adjusted his loose nylon jacket. The screwdriver, now tipped with cork, lay in the inner jacket pocket, handle up, point down.
He walked to the first run-down house nearest his car and stepped up onto its porch, looking around at the streetscape as he moved along. He went directly to the mailbox and quickly checked its contents. A dog rushed to the closed door, barking. Monroe saw that all of the letters were addressed to a couple of individuals with the same last name, and he moved off the porch and back down to the sidewalk. The dog was still barking as Monroe crossed the street and headed for a house sided by pink and green Formstone. Its yard needed to be mowed, and there were old chairs set up on its porch. Monroe checked the mailbox. It held letters and advertising material addressed to several different male names. Raymond felt his heart race as he knocked on the door.
A man with a comically long nose stood before him as the door swung open.
“Yeah.”
“Baker here?” said Monroe.
The man blinked hard. “He’s here.”
Monroe stepped into the foyer of the house. His eyes told the man to step aside and let him. Before Monroe was a long staircase. Beside him, through open French doors, was a living room that had once been nicely furnished but was now trashed. A big man sat in a shredded armchair with the sports section open in his lap.
“Where’s he at?” said Monroe, looking at the man who had opened the door.
“Who are you?” said the big man.
“Where is he?” said Monroe to the man with the trombone nose.
“He sleepin, most likely.”
“You ain’t his PO,” said the big man.
“What room is he sleeping in?”
“You ain’t his PO and you got no right to be in here,” said the big man.
“If I was talkin to you, you’d know it,” said Monroe.
“I’ll call the police.”
“No, you won’t.” The big man looked down at his newspaper. Monroe turned his attention to the man with the long nose. “What room does he stay in?”
The man jerked his head up. “First door to the right of the bathroom.”
Monroe took the stairs. The flame grew inside him as he hit the landing and went to the closed door and kicked it at the jamb. It did not crack, and he kicked it a second time. The door swung open, and he blocked it on the backswing as he stepped inside. Charles Baker, bare to his boxers, was throwing off the sheet, swinging his legs over the side of his bed. Monroe drew the sharpened screwdriver in one motion, tore off its corked tip, and leaped onto the bed. He punched Baker with a sharp left to the jawline that sent him back to the mattress. Monroe straddled Baker and pressed his left forearm to Baker’s upper chest. It pinned him there, and Monroe put the sharp end of the screwdriver to the top of his neck. He pushed it until it punctured the skin and Baker moaned. Blood trickled down over his Adam’s apple.
“Quiet now,” said Monroe softly. “Don’t speak. I’ll push this pick straight up into your brain.”
Baker’s hazel eyes were still.
“Stay away from Pappas and his family. Stay away from my brother forever. I will kill you. Do you understand this?”
Baker did not respond. Monroe pushed the weapon farther and saw the tip of the screwdriver go deeper into Baker’s skin. Blood flowed freely down his neck. Baker made a small high sound against the pain, but still his eyes were steady. It was Monroe who blinked.
He felt sick and a sudden chill. The flame died inside him. He pulled the screwdriver out of Baker’s neck, got off him, and stood away from the bed.
Baker wiped at the blood. He sat upright, his back against the wall. He rubbed at his jawline where Monroe had struck him and he stared at Monroe and smiled.
“You can’t,” said Baker. “You could have once. But you can’t today.”
“That’s right,” said Monroe. “It’s not in me and I’m not you.”
“James and Raymond Monroe,” said Baker with contempt. “The good boys in the neighborhood. Sons of Ernest and Almeda. Lived in the clean house had the fresh coat of paint on it each year. Everything so clean and nice. Only thing missing was the apple pie gettin cool on the windowsill and the bluebirds flyin around it. Weren’t you the lucky ones.”
“You got wronged when you were young,” said Monroe. “But that don’t excuse you now.”
“I deserve things.”
“Leave us alone, Charles.”
“I’ll think on it,” said Baker.
Monroe replaced the screwdriver in his jacket, exited the room, and went down the stairs. The men in the living room did not look at him as he left the house.
In his room, Baker pressed fingers to his neck and walked to the landing at the top of the stairs.
“Trombone,” Baker called down to the living room. “I need you up here, man. Bring some of that medical shit you got, too.”
Trombone, the house mother, slowed the blood from Baker’s puncture wound as best he could, cleaned it and dressed it with Neosporin, and sprayed it with Mastisol, a liquid adhesive. Over that he taped a gauze bandage. Almost immediately the bandage became dotted with blood.
“You better have someone look at that,” said Trombone.
“Yeah, all right.”
Baker dressed in black slacks, a lavender shirt, and the tooled leather shoes that looked like gators. He wore his deep purple sport jacket with the white stitching on the lapels. He was not shook up. Instead, he felt almost jovial as he prepared to leave the house. The visit from Ray Monroe had only confirmed what he knew. He was like one of those strong animals, walking proud in plain sight, a hunter who had no need to hide his intent. Because who was going to stop him? No one, it seemed, had the will.
Charles Baker took Delafield east on foot. He’d catch the 70 on Georgia Avenue, go on over to Cody’s apartment. The boy was out delivering his weed, but he’d be back. There Baker would compose another letter, this one to Pappas, with none of the niceties that his letter to Whitten had contained. Cody could help him with the spelling and grammar. He wasn’t as smart as James Monroe, but he would have to do.
Baker hummed a tune as he walked down the block, confidence in his step, his knobby wrists protruding from the too-short sleeves of his sport jacket, his hands swinging free.
Twenty-Four
Alex Pappas had his head down, counting out ones below the counter, not with any real purpose but because he liked the feel of paper money moving between his fingers and thumb. As he worked, he turned the bills around so that all the heads of George Washington were facing the same way. For his father, it had been a meaningless fetish and it had become his as well.