Apaches - Lorenzo Carcaterra [52]
He managed to get the first box to the door, straining for breath, the muscles in his back tight against his coat. Dead-Eye went for physical therapy three times a week, fighting to keep his body in one piece. He still worked out, ignoring the pain it caused, and he ate what little he could hold in what was left of his stomach. He was a cripple, but a damn stubborn one.
It took him a full hour to get the boxes up to the front door of 17B. He was sweating and his breath came out in a wheeze as he pressed the buzzer. The man opened the door holding a glass of white wine.
“I thought you forgot about me,” he said. He pointed to the den. “Put them in there. Gently, please.”
Dead-Eye did as he was told, refusing to let the man see his struggle, closing his eyes to the pain. He put the last box in the den and walked out the door, tipping the lip of his cap to the man.
“Wait,” the man said.
Dead-Eye turned and watched the man reach a hand into his pocket. He pulled out a thick roll of bills, peeled off a dollar, and handed it to Dead-Eye. “This is for your troubles.”
The man closed the door. Dead-Eye stood there, sweat running down his face, his right arm trembling, his stomach cramped with pain, holding a dollar bill in a gloved hand.
He crumpled the bill, tossed it on the mat in front of the door, and walked into the elevator for the ride back down. To finish off his shift.
• • •
BOOMER SLID HIS Cadillac into an open spot next to a fire hydrant, shifted the gear to park, and let the engine idle. The windshield wipers were still on low, slowly clearing away heavy streaks of rain. He put five slices of Wrigley’s spearmint gum into his mouth and watched the man walk toward him, his head down against the rain, collar of a brown leather jacket turned up to brace the wind. The sounds of Ry Cooder’s rendition of “Little Sister” filled the car’s interior.
The man was less than ten feet from the car when Boomer leaned across the front and flipped open the passenger side door. He smiled when the man drew a .44 semiautomatic from his leather jacket and aimed it at the steering wheel.
“Thought you’d lost your touch,” Boomer said, watching the man shove the gun back up his sleeve and slide into the car, slamming the door shut.
“Lucky for you I’m in a good mood,” Dead-Eye said, lowering his collar with one hand, rainwater dripping on the brown interior. “Spotted you at the corner. Could have taken you out before the light turned green.”
Boomer looked over at his ex-partner and smiled. The two had remained friendly in the years since their retirement, each helping the other through the dark days of therapy and inactivity.
Dead-Eye’s father had lost his battle with cancer less than six months after his son was shot in the elevator. They spent those months together, the father dying, the son often wishing he were dying too. The two men talked, cried, sometimes laughed, tightening their already strong bond. It was during those precious months that Dead-Eye’s father learned how much being a cop meant to his son and how a crippled future opening doors for blank faces could bury him faster than a bullet.
It was difficult for the other cops to understand. For many of them, getting out was the goal. Pocketing the pension and working an easy second job the ideal way to leave the department. But to Boomer and Dead-Eye, a life void of action was a death sentence. Unwillingly dragged from a front-row seat to what they considered the greatest show on earth, the red gauge on their adrenaline tanks