The Devil's Right Hand - J. D. Rhoades [58]
“Where’s the stairway?” Raymond shouted.
“Back this way,” Billy Ray said, backing up. He fired a quick burst into the ceiling above the crowd, increasing their panic before the two men turned and bolted around the corner. They located the stairway marked “authorized personnel only” and plunged down it, four steps at a time, past three floors and the lobby floor to the basement level. They burst out into a dimly lit hallway.
“Which way?” Raymond panted. The sutures across his side blazed like flames.
“I dunno,” Billy Ray said. “This wasn’t how I planned to get out.”
“Fuck,” Raymond said. He jogged down the hallway past a line of battered vending machines. He had to stop and catch his breath. It was then that he noticed the sticky wetness along his side. He looked down to see a slow seepage of blood coming through his shirt. Billy Ray pulled up alongside of him. He noticed the blood and grimaced.
“Man,” he said, “We get out of here, we better find you a doctor. I know a guy…”
“Later,” Raymond grunted. He saw a heavy pair of metal doors at the end of the hallway. He walked over and pushed them open. The doors led to a small grass courtyard with a rusty metal picnic table. The lights of the parking lots glimmered beyond. “C’mon,” Raymond said. “We gotta get out of here.”
CHAPTER NINE
Keller sat on the couch, drinking a beer as Marie cleaned up in the kitchen. She had asked him to stay for dinner. The meal had been a hectic affair, with Marie spending half her time trying to talk to Keller and the other half trying to ensure that more food got into her son than ended up on him. Now, with dinner over, Marie had banished them both to the living room. Keller took a sip of his beer and stared at a baseball game on TV without actually watching it as he listened to Marie clattering around in the kitchen. Ben seemed absorbed with a set of brightly colored wooden blocks a few feet away on the living room floor. It was such a normal scene that Keller felt out of place, like a visitor from another planet.
Keller looked up to see the boy standing in front of him, a thin book in his chubby hands. “Read,” the boy said simply. Feeling a little foolish, Keller took the book. It was a dog-eared and jelly-stained retelling of the story of the Little Engine That Could. The boy clambered up on the couch beside him and pointed to the book. “Read,” he said again, a little impatiently. Keller sighed, opened the book and began to read. He had gotten to the point where the Little Engine was puffing up the hill and was reading the Engine’s mantra of “I think I can, I think I can,” trying to pitch his voice with a suitably strained inflection, when he looked up and saw Marie. She was standing in the kitchen door. She had covered her mouth with her hand to stifle her laughter but her eyes were dancing.
“You’re enjoying this,” he said.
“You better believe it,” she said. “Tough guy.”
“READ,” the boy ordered, then added, “tough guy.”
Keller sighed and went on. When the book was finished, Marie applauded. “C’mon, little man,” she said, sweeping Ben off the couch. She gave Keller a quick peck on the cheek. “It’s time for a bath and then to bed.”
“I wannanother book,” the boy complained, but allowed himself to be led towards the bathroom. Keller got up and stretched. “Stick around,” Marie said, waving him back towards the couch. “After that, you probably could use a little grownup conversation.”
Keller got another beer and sat down. He tried to sort out what he was feeling. What was going on between him and Marie seemed like a betrayal of Angela. But he knew there was no commitment with Angela, no relationship to betray. He thought again of Angela’s word that he was always looking for a damsel in distress. If so, he seemed to have no luck whatsoever in finding them.
After the boy was bathed and safely tucked in bed, Marie came back in and sat on the couch. Keller put his arm around her and she snuggled into the hollow of his shoulder. “It was sweet of you to read to Ben,” she whispered, and kissed him lightly on the cheek.