Flamethrower - Maggie Estep [29]
“Emilio,” Ruby said, looking down at him.
Emilio was apparently sound asleep. Ruby’s voice startled him, and he nearly fell off his chair.
“Huh?” He looked at Ruby. His short black hair was sticking up, and his light brown skin had a red, sunburned hue.
“I’m the girl with the 1974 Mustang,” Ruby said. Emilio looked as if he had no idea what she was talking about.
“Ruby? Blue Mustang?” She scanned the lot and saw her car parked in a far corner, wedged behind some nondescript vehicles. “There,” Ruby said, pointing to her car.
“Oh!” Emilio got to his feet. “Sorry, lady, I was sleeping. What happened to your head?” He motioned at Ruby’s bandage.
“Fell off my bike,” Ruby said. “That’s why I’m driving today.”
Emilio shook his head as though bike riding was some thoroughly insane pursuit. When he suddenly realized how much work it would take to get the Mustang out, he lectured Ruby about giving him a few hours’ notice before coming to get her car.
Ruby tried to look apologetic.
She nosed the Mustang out of the lot and saw that Emilio was back on his chaise longue, eyes closed.
She got onto the Belt Parkway and considered praying even though her only sense of religion was a vague paganism investing all things with small gods. By the time she reached Tobias’s dead-end street, Ruby was almost calm from focusing so hard on the road. She pulled the Mustang up onto the patch of dirt in front of Tobias’s house.
The sky was slate gray, and half a dozen gulls circled overhead. Ruby got out and knocked on Tobias’s door. She wouldn’t have been shocked if Tobias had suddenly rematerialized there in his house. There was no answer though. She tried the door, and it opened, unlocked as she’d left it.
“Hello?” Ruby called out, not expecting an answer.
“Who the hell are you?” a voice asked.
Ruby jumped halfway out of her skin then flipped around and saw a man sitting on a chair beside the door. He was holding a gun.
“Who are you?” Ruby asked, heart pumping.
“I asked first,” the man said. He grinned a little. His teeth were large and crooked. He had sandy hair, a few days’ beard, and dark eyes. He pointed the gun at Ruby.
“I’m Ruby Murphy.” Ruby tried to sound calm.
“And what business do you have here?”
“My bike is here.” Ruby motioned at her bike leaning against the wall near where the guy was sitting.
“Where’s Tobias, Ruby Murphy?”
“Last time I saw him he was right there.” Ruby motioned toward the kitchen. “I have no idea where he is now. I just came to get my bike.”
“And the wife?”
“What wife?”
“Tobias’s wife. Where is she?”
“She’s missing too,” Ruby said.
“You think they reconciled and rode off into the sunset?”
“No idea.”
“You’re not much help, are you?”
“I’m sorry.” Ruby silently vowed that if she lived through this, she would lead a safe and dull life ever after.
“So what the hell are you doing here?” Gun Guy wanted to know. He wouldn’t have looked threatening if it weren’t for the gun. He was probably in his early forties. A decent-looking guy if you went in for the scruffy, crazy type. “And what happened to your head?” he asked.
“Fell off my bike.”
“Oh. That one?” The guy motioned at Ruby’s brown bike.
“No. My racing bike.” Ruby was starting to almost enjoy her ongoing fib about a bike accident. She was ready to embellish. it further. Maybe say she’d actually been racing her bike when she’d crashed.
He wasn’t that interested though. “You’re friends with Tobias?” he asked.
“More with his wife. Jody. She asked me to stop by and say hello to him.”
“I thought you just told me she was missing too.”
“She is. But she wasn’t yesterday.”
“Ah.” The guy paused. “Tobias owes me money,” he said then, as if Ruby could do anything about it.
“Well I don’t know where he is. Please stop pointing the gun at me.”
“This bothers you?” He looked down at his gun.
“Yes.”
“Okay.” He shrugged and tucked the gun into the back of his pants. “Tobias and I had a business arrangement, but it went a little sour,” he said