61
Patrick Cahill and his partner, Dwyer, squatted down in the small walkway between Jason Kolarich’s townhouse and the townhouse next door. It was past one A.M. now, and they were tired and cold, having sat in this spot for the better part of seven hours now. But the later it got, the more likely he was to show up any minute.
They were lucky, too. This was a uniquely advantageous hiding place. It was right next to the garage, it was poorly lit, and it was such a tiny space-no more than five feet wide-that Kolarich almost assuredly wouldn’t even think to look for them.
And the neighbor, whoever he or she or they were, didn’t have a window on the ground or even the second floor that overlooked this walkway. There was a window directly above them on the third floor, but the occupant would have to go out of his way to stick his head out the window and look all the way down at the walkway, and even then the visibility would be relatively poor.
They’d purchased thermal underwear and black hooded sweatshirts and extra pairs of socks, and they wore all of them now. It was cold regardless. The temperature was probably in the teens. But they were doing okay. Their biggest problem was that their legs were getting cramped. Every half-hour, one of them walked up and down the walkway between the houses to keep himself limber.
Above them, for the first time, they heard the voices of the neighbors. Muted sounds, presumably coming from the third floor and traveling through the window to their ears. Dwyer nudged Cahill and they listened.
“Disgusting. That’s disgusting!”
It was a woman’s voice, shouting.
“You’re overreacting!” a man called out.
They heard the scraping and shifting of wood, the unmistakable sound of the window opening directly above them on the third floor. Cahill and Dwyer braced themselves and tucked in their chins, froze in their crouch, doing their best to conceal themselves. But they were probably okay, Cahill thought. These people were just arguing. Someone would have to look straight down, three stories, into the dark, to see them crouched down.
“It’s not that big a deal,” the man called out. “Calm down.”
“You want me to be calm? I’ll be calm when it’s out of my house.”
“Honey, listen!”
“No!”
Another sound, something close, right by the window. Cahill looked up just in time to see something at the window, maybe a-a bucket? It hit them in one sudden, heavy splash, so hard it knocked them into each other and to the asphalt.
“What the fuck-” Dwyer began, but Cahill squeezed his arm.
“Shut up!” Cahill ordered in a harsh whisper. “If you can hear her, she can hear you.”
“You don’t think this was on purpose?” he whispered back.
Cahill had no idea. But it sounded like a domestic dispute.
“There!” came the woman’s voice from the window. “It’s gone now!”
“You threw it out?”
“I sure did. And that better be the last time I see that in my house!”
Was this-oil? He could hardly see his hand in front of his face so he couldn’t tell-he didn’t dare taste it-but that smell.
“It’s fucking motor oil!” Dwyer hissed.
“Keep your voice down, God damn it.”
It was oil. That lady had just dumped a bucket of motor oil on them.
“What the hell is going on?” Dwyer whispered. “Why the fuck did she dump motor-”
“Shh. I don’t fucking know. Keep your mouth shut.”
Above them, they heard the man and woman continue to argue.
“Why are you always getting on my case?”
“Why are you such a slob?”
Then they heard the familiar grinding and whining of gears as Kolarich’s garage door began to lift. Cahill grabbed Dwyer and motioned to him. They both heard it. They moved back against the brick wall of Kolarich’s garage and saw the headlights of a truck bounce as the truck came off the street and onto Kolarich’s driveway.
Cahill was still stunned, and now everything was happening at once. He didn’t have time to worry about the oil covering his head and shoulders. Jason Kolarich had arrived home.
“Game time.”
But the truck didn’t move farther up the driveway. It stayed back near the sidewalk, the headlights trained toward the garage.
Why?
Cahill and Dwyer didn’t move, didn’t breathe, for a long time.
“You think he spotted us?” Dwyer whispered.
“Don’t know.” Cahill was still in a daze from the oil dumping on him. He wasn’t entirely sure what the hell was going on right now. Did that lady deliberately dump oil on them?
At the base of Kolarich’s driveway, where the truck remained idled, the driver’s side door opened, and the driver exited and sprinted west along the sidewalk, quickly out of their view.
“What the-”
And then Cahill heard another sound from above. He looked up and was hit smack in the face with a heavy powder that invaded his nose and mouth and caused him to gag.
He fell back against the wall, Dwyer on top of him.
Sand, he thought, as he coughed.
She had just dumped a bucket of sand on them.
“Fuck!” Dwyer shouted. “What the fuck!” He jumped to his feet. “Let’s go get this asshole!” he shouted. He first pointed the gun up at the window, but hesitated, unsure of where to direct his fury. Then he turned around and ran toward Kolarich’s driveway.
Cahill didn’t know what the hell was happening. More than half his body was covered with motor oil and now sand particles were embedded in it.
Dwyer had already begun to run down the driveway after Kolarich. He should have known better. They’d both seen Kolarich run before. There was no way they were going to catch him, wherever it was he’d run. Cahill coughed again, spat, and got to his feet.
What the hell had just happened? Were those neighbors working with Kolarich The truck, he thought. They could use Kolarich’s truck, which was idling in the driveway, and give chase.
When Cahill stumbled to the driveway, he found Dwyer standing still, staring at the truck, his gun at his side.
Dwyer looked totally ridiculous, doused in thick black oil and then with a healthy coat of sand on top of it. Cahill assumed he looked equally preposterous. Were they-where was Kolarich?
Dwyer pointed at the truck. Only then did Cahill realize that this wasn’t a vehicle that Jason Kolarich owned.
This was their Ford Explorer.
“Fuck me,” he mumbled, as he approached the truck.
Every window had been busted out completely. The paint was scratched badly. It looked as if words had been scratched into the paint, but the lighting wasn’t that good, so it was hard to make out.
“What in the motherfuck is going on?” Dwyer said.
Neither of them knew where to start with all of this. Cahill looked back at the neighbor’s townhome. Hard to believe that it was just a coincidence that they dumped all that shit on them but if not, it meant they were on to them, and Dwyer started marching toward the neighbor’s townhouse. Cahill grabbed his arm. “We need to get the fuck out of here, Dwyer.”
“They’re in there. I fucking know it, and I’m going-”
“Then they’ve called the cops, you moron. We have to get out of here.”
Dwyer couldn’t bring himself to disagree. Things hadn’t gone so well up to now, and there was no reason to expect their luck would improve by sticking around.
Cahill got behind the wheel, Dwyer the passenger seat. Dwyer was unhappy to discover that he had sat in a pile of broken glass. So had Cahill, but he wasn’t going to delay their exit over that.
“All right, Kolarich, score one for you,” he mumbled. “But I’m going to find you, and when I do, I’m going to cut your fucking head off.”
He put the car in reverse, backed out of the driveway, and headed west. Who knows, maybe their luck would change and they’d see Kolarich running Headlights popped on a car behind them, and then flashing lights on the dome overhead.