Cherry Bomb (2010) Read online

  "I'll call you later. We can eat in the Winnebago. It's got a kitchenette. You can cook stuff."

  I started to walk away, back to the casket.

  "When you come over, bring food!" he called after me. "I haven't bought any food yet! Pick up some steaks! Or a ham!"

  "Shut up!" someone yelled. "It's a funeral! Show a little respect for the dead!"

  "Who the hell are you, Big Nose?"

  "I'm Latham's cousin Ray!"

  "Well, I was with Latham the night he died, and his last words were: 'My big-nosed cousin Ray is a dick!'"

  Swearing ensued, and probably a scuffle. I didn't look back to find out.

  Mom stood at the edge of Latham's grave, peering down. We'd spent six hours shopping for her dress, Mom dismissing one after another, convinced that Latham wouldn't have liked them. They'd been close.

  I reached out, held her hand, feeling swollen knuckles beneath thin, cool skin. I tried to recall the exact moment when Mom had become an old lady, and wondered when I'd reach that point myself. I stared at my hand, looking for signs of arthritis, and instead focused on my engagement ring.

  The pain threatened to erupt. I shook with the effort to keep it buried.

  "You have to mourn sometime, Jacqueline."

  Mom's voice left no doubt she was following her own advice.

  "I need to find her, Mom."

  My mom turned away from the grave, her red-rimmed eyes finding mine. The softness of her tone didn't undermine its strength.

  "I could tell you that revenge won't bring him back. Or I could tell you that letting go is the only way you'll be able to get on with your life. Or I could even plead with you to not chase Alex, because I can't bear to lose you. But instead of all that I'm just going to say that when you need me, I'll be there."

  I managed to choke out, "Thanks."

  We were silent for a moment, focusing on Latham's final resting place.

  Mom broke the silence.

  "Revenge won't bring him back."

  "I know."

  "You need to grieve and accept. It's the only way you'll get through this."

  "I know."

  "And if anything...happens...to you..."

  I hugged my mother, her tears warm on my neck.

  "I know, Mom. I know."

  After a few deep sobs, Mom stiffened. She held me at arm's length, her face hard and set. The face she wore as a cop, de cades ago.

  "Don't try to arrest her this time, Jacqueline. When you have the chance, send her to hell where she belongs."

  I nodded, but I didn't really want to think about that right now. What I had to say next didn't come easy.

  "Mom...I need you to go away for a while."

  Instead of showing anger, Mom smiled.

  "I've already booked a cruise. Two weeks in Alaska. I'm leaving tomorrow."

  Color me surprised.

  "Really? I thought I'd have to threaten you."

  "It doesn't make sense for both of us to be worried about each other. Alex won't be able to get me while I'm on a boat. And seeing glaciers and polar bears will help me forget that my daughter is hunting a maniac."

  "It will?"

  Mom shook her head sadly.

  "No. You'd better come back to me, young lady. Don't make me strap on my gun and put her in the ground myself."

  Again I faced an internal battle to hold back the tears.

  "I'll be fine," I managed.

  "I assume Harry's going with you."

  "Probably not."

  "You need help, Jacqueline. Someone to watch your back."

  "Harry is a..." My mind searched for a softer word than shithead. "...he's difficult to work with."

  "He's an obnoxious pig, and I say that knowing he might be my son. But he cares about you in his way, and you can use him."

  "Going on the road with Harry McGlade...I think I'd rather dance at a strip club for sex offenders."

  "You need someone. Herb won't be any good to you with his bad leg. How about that other fellow who helped us? Phineas Troutt?"

  "This isn't his fight, Mom."

  "Alex seemed just as eager to kill him as she did us. Call him."

  "If you want me to."

  "Pinky swear."

  "Jesus, Mom. I'm forty-seven years old."

  She held up a gnarled pinky. I hooked mine around it.

  "Fine. I pinky swear."

  Mom stared at the grave for another minute, said goodbye to Latham under her breath, then turned to leave.

  "I'm going to Shirley's. Your partner said he'd give me a ride. You sure you don't want to come?"

  Latham's cousin was having a reception at his house following the funeral. Mom was invited. I wasn't. I considered going anyway, weighing the pros and cons of being spat on by his family and friends. Much as I deserved it, I'd be a disruptive presence.

  "I need to be alone for a little bit. If I don't see you, have fun on your cruise."

  "I intend to. I'm hoping I'll meet a nice man. Those tiny little cabins are much cozier when you're sharing a bed."

  Mom winked, and touched my cheek. Then she headed back into the throng of mourners, which had now dwindled to only a few. I silently wished for someone, anyone, to come up to me and blame me for Latham's death. Call me names. Even throw a punch. I was prepared not to defend myself.

  Except for a few sour looks cast in my direction, I was ignored. I faced Latham again.

  "I'm sorry," I mumbled for the thousandth time.

  I tried to get my lips to say goodbye, as my mother had done. They refused. I wasn't ready to let go just yet. So I simply stood there and stared.

  After a while, the grave digger came by with a backhoe and began filling in the dirt. Methodical. Disinterested. The elaborate ceremony of death, meant to offer comfort to loved ones, reduced to menial labor. I watched, staying put as the drizzle became heavy rain, cold, relentless, and unforgiving.

  Chapter 4

  THE MAN'S WRINKLES are caked with filth, and the layers of soiled clothing wrapped around his thin body smell of BO, urine, and worse. Alex takes no joy in slitting his throat. She mixes business with plea sure when possible, but for this old crazy bum it's a mercy killing. Alex derives no plea sure from mercy.

  She holds his shoulder, keeps him turned away so the spray of the carotid doesn't splash her Dolce & Gabbana. He moans a little, but resigns himself to his fate quickly, collapsing into a clump of bloody, dirty rags. The alley, like most in the area, is narrow and deserted.

  Alex lights a cigarette and waits for him to stop breathing. She doesn't inhale, because she doesn't smoke. If someone happens to walk by, a nicotine break is a good excuse for standing around in an alley.

  Two minutes pass. No one walks by. For a population of six hundred thousand, there aren't many people on the street. Maybe it's the crummy weather.

  "D...deh...deh..."

  The bum is trying to talk, but he's having some problems; most of his breath is bubbling out through the hole in his neck. She nudges a patch of unbloodied clothing with her toe.

  "Last words are important. Try to finish."

  "D...deh...devil," he manages, somewhere between a whisper and a gurgle.

  Alex smiles, but only the right side of her face moves.

  "The dev il isn't real, buddy. I am."

  The bum expires, rheumy eyes going dull, and the blood finally stops pumping. Breaking his neck would have been quicker, but that would have meant getting behind him, finding a good grip. Changing her hair color is annoying enough. Alex doesn't want to fuss with lice shampoo as well.

  Alex peels back his sweatshirt, and the smell gets so bad it activates her gag reflex. She removed the bandage from her nose a few days ago, not because the break was fully healed, but because it drew more attention than her scars, even under a veil. Now she wishes she'd waited; a nose brace and plugs would have prevented this awful odor from assaulting her.

  The money roll is in his pants pocket, almost the diameter of a soda can. Durin
g her stint in the marines, she knew of an MP who would roll drug dealers and pimps when he needed fast cash, the logic being they always had a wad. The downside was they also carried weapons, and had unsavory friends.

  When Alex needed money, her solution was less complicated. Homeless people carry their entire fortunes on them. Though some were drunks and druggies, spending their last nickels to score, the schizos and psychotics tended to hoard cash. It took her less than an hour to find one on the street, muttering to himself. When she shoved him into the alley, he was more interested in protecting his plastic bags full of precious cans than his own throat.

  She flips through the bills, which are surprisingly clean and crisp, and concludes she's just made around six hundred bucks. Alex tucks the roll into her laptop bag, checks the sidewalk for pedestrians, then steps out of the alley and heads for her car. It's parked on the street next to a small bookstore. A recent model Honda Accord, so popular it's anonymous. In her younger years, she preferred to steal sports cars. But those are conspicuous.

  Or perhaps, Alex thinks, I'm simply mellowing with age.

  She approaches it from behind and inspects the trunk, satisfied that the car's previous owner hasn't begun to leak any bodily fluids. Since killing Jack's fiance three weeks ago, Alex has switched vehicles three times. Perhaps a bit overly cautious, but she doesn't want to leave Jack such obvious bread crumbs. She prefers to keep the lieutenant guessing.

  Exactly twenty days have passed since Alex was a guest of the Heathrow Facility, a maximum security prison for the criminally insane. She'd been put there by Jack, who had torn off half of her face in the process. The skin grafts, done by unskilled surgeons on the public dime, left Alex pink and mottled from her eye to her chin. She looked like a crazy quilt made out of Spam.

  While in Heathrow, Alex had a lot of time to think. About revenge. And about the future. She planned two elaborate schemes. The first was to exact some payback. The second was larger in scope, but would be even more satisfying than killing Jack and company.

  After a dramatic escape, Alex paid the lieutenant a visit, intending to kill her and everyone she cared about, including Jack's mother; her partner, Herb; her fiance; and two old friends, Harry McGlade and Phineas Troutt. But there were...complications, and everything went to hell.

  Alex had been thinking about that night a lot. About how it could have gone differently. Jack and her friends got very lucky, no doubt. But Jack had also stood toe-to-toe with Alex, and broken her nose.

  Alex had been in scores of fights, with both men and women. But no one had ever broken her nose before.

  So, scheme number one got flushed down the toilet. But scheme number two is still viable. Scheme number two will make everything right. And there's room for Jack to take a big role in it.

  A very big role.

  Alex takes out her keys and presses the button to open the car door. After she climbs in and buckles up, she considers her next move. It's a little past two p.m. There's time to buy some dye, do her hair, before her four o'clock date. Alex uses the onboard GPS system and searches for drugstore, finding one less than a mile away.

  She chooses red for her new hair color. The dead bum would have approved.

  Then Alex heads toward the Old Stone Inn near the airport, picked because the name is absolutely perfect, and muses about all of the people who are going to die in the next few days.

  There will be quite a few.

  Chapter 5

  I WANTED TO GET GOOD AND DRUNK, but I'd been pretty much good and drunk for the last few weeks. Mourning. Hating myself. Wallowing in a pool of alcohol, antidepressants, and self-pity, biding time until I was able get my shit together.

  The time had finally come.

  I walked past acres of tombstones through freezing rain, exited the Graceland Cemetery on Clark and Irving, and hailed a taxi.

  "UIC on Roosevelt."

  The cabbie glanced up at me in the rearview. I was soaked and shivering, my clothes sticking to me like they'd been painted on, my nipples jutting out like gun barrels.

  "Wet out there," he said.

  I didn't answer. He turned up the heat without being asked. I didn't deserve warming up, but I had no will to argue.

  Forty blocks later and thirty bucks lighter, I was spit out by the cab at the University of Illinois Chicago. The rain had changed its style of attack, cold fat drops replaced by wind-driven drizzle, which stung like needle pricks. The campus, normally gorgeous in the autumn, looked barren and dead. The trees were skeletons, their leafy skins shed in clumps all over the ground, brown and wet as mud.

  The Illinois Forensic Science Center was on the south side of the street. Before it merged with the state police more than a decade ago, it was just known as the Crime Lab. One of the most advanced in the country, containing over fifty thousand square feet of crime-busting technology.

  I showed my badge at the front desk, declined the offer of paper towels, and took the stairs to the second floor and Officer Scott Hajek, whom I'd phoned earlier.

  Hajek had a roundish face and large blue eyes magnified to cartoon-ish extreme by his thick glasses. The top of his head came up to my nose. He had a crush on me, and had asked me out several times over the years. I always deferred, saying I already had a boyfriend. Hopefully he'd have the tact not to ask me again.

  Per our call, I met Hajek in one of the many labs, this one crammed with computer equipment, expensive-looking electronic devices, and an impressive collection of empty pizza boxes stacked neatly in the corner.

  Hajek, sitting in a swivel chair and peering at a computer, glanced over his shoulder at me when I entered.

  "Still raining?"

  I held my thumb and index finger an inch apart, indicating a wee bit.

  "There are some takeout napkins on the table there, next to that container of Parmesan cheese."

  "I'm fine." My teeth were only chattering a little.

  "You hungry? I still got some pizza left over from lunch. Double pepperoni."

  "No thanks."

  "You don't like pizza?"

  "I just came from a funeral. I'm not very hungry."

  Hajek stared at me, and for a moment I saw his eyes flicker to my boobs, which felt ready to fire two shots across his bow.

  "Maybe later to night? You have to eat, and if you want to talk, I'm a good listener."

  "Thanks for offering, Scott." I tried to sound genuine, even though I was tired and he was annoying me, squinting to see through my dress. "Tell me what you got on the cell phone I sent over."

  Hajek blinked, swallowed, and turned back to his desk.

  "It's a PP Tangsung 117EX. Quad-band, GSM 1900 network, MMS and EMS. Or, in non-geek terms, a pay-as-you-go model with enhanced video and messaging capabilities, and a good antenna. I lifted two prints, both belonging to Alexandra Kork, but you probably already knew that."

  I shivered. "Traceable?"

  Hajek swiveled to face me, except his eyes didn't meet mine.

  "She bought the phone at the mall in Gurnee, Illinois, six days ago. I called them, spoke to the employee who sold it to her. Said it was a tall woman, well built, with bandages on her face. Used a credit card in the name of Shanna Arnold. I ran a check; Mrs. Arnold was recently reported missing by her husband."

  "Were you able to trace the call? Where Alex called from? Her number?"

  Hajek didn't answer. His eyes were having a telepathic conversation with my breasts. I folded my arms over my chest.

  "Officer Hajek?"

  He blinked.

  "Captain Bains called me. Said you're on a leave of absence. You're not part of this investigation."

  My demeanor grew as cold as my skin.

  "So you're not going to tell me?"

  "I could get into trouble, Lieutenant."

  "She killed my fiance, Scott."

  "I'm sorry about that."

  I could have gone all superior officer on him, but instead I lowered my arms, knowing he'd look at my boobs again. Girl pow
er.

  "Please, Scott. Between you and me."

  He licked his lips, then slowly nodded.

  "There isn't a record of her activating the phone. That means she unlocked it, and used a different SIM card as a new number." He cleared his throat. "Then she spoofed the caller ID."

  "In non-geek, please."

  "Basically, she hacked the phone to make it usable with any network, then put in a stolen Subscriber Identity Module so the calls are being billed to someone else's account." He held up the cell. "This phone is using Shanna Arnold's SIM."

  "Can we find out the number Alex called from?"

  "No. Because of the spoof. Alex used this phone as a remote camera, switching it on by calling it. When I checked out the caller ID recorded on the SIM card, it showed that fake number Hollywood uses in movies, 555-5555."

  I'd seen the 555 number myself, on calls from Alex. She probably thought it was funny. "How is that possible?"

  "There are Internet ser vices you can sign up for that let you place a call and leave false caller ID numbers and names. You use a VoIP--a Voice-over Internet Protocol service--and punch in the ten-digit number you're calling, plus the ten-digit number and name you'd like the recipient to see."

  I frowned. I'd been hoping there was a way to trace it through the provider.

  "Can we get all the names of customers who had phones recently stolen, see if we can connect Alex with one of those?"

  "Do you know how many people lose their phones every day? And not everyone who does reports it. In Mrs. Arnold's case..."

  He let the words trail off. I knew what he meant. Shanna Arnold was probably dead. It wouldn't be beneath Alex to kill just to get a cell phone.

  "So there's no way to find out where she called from?"

  Hajek grinned shyly, like a schoolboy.

  "Tell me, Scott."

  "You sure you don't want to have a bite to eat later? I live real close."

  The little extortionist. If I hadn't been on a mandatory leave of absence and warned away from this case, I would have gotten seriously pissed.

  "Not to night, Scott. But I'll have some free time next week."

  "Tuesday?"

  I shrugged. "Sure."

  He grinned. Something was caught in his two front teeth. Probably double pepperoni.