The Thousand - Kevin Guilfoile [151]
She tried to stand but felt a tugging under the skin of her forearm. She clumsily removed the bandage and yanked on the needle, which burned and tore on its way out. She rested the side of her head against the cool floor. From below came the sound of musicians setting up, plucking strings, chairs being dragged across the floor, coughing, laughter, fast conversation in short syllables she didn’t understand, maybe Chinese.
She pulled up onto the side of the bed and gagged into the sheet. Mucus and bile formed a bubbly yellow mass against the white, but it was a shock of color introduced to the room, and it gave her a jolt that prompted more gagging. Acid burned in her throat.
She tried to stand up quickly and felt so light as she did it, so light that she could fly, and she gave into the sensation immediately, arms extended at her shoulders, the air lifting her up as easily as a dozen hands taking her away, and then her chin hit the cold floor, rattling the thoughts and teeth in her head hard against her skull.
58
THEY WERE PARKED behind a Jewel supermarket near an empty loading dock. The neighborhood was empty and silent. It looked like there had been power as they pulled off the highway, but there wasn’t any juice here. Crouched in the sleeping compartment, under the dome light, Wayne traced routes with his finger in a thick blue atlas of detailed Chicago street maps. Denny was reconnecting his CB and Wayne was letting him. They were like that now.
“This is us.” Wayne was working through the maps out loud. Denny was being awfully helpful, considering what Wayne had done to his face, and also considering that he still thought Wayne was a murderer.
“This is your guy’s address,” Denny said, glancing up only briefly from his repairs. “The city’s on a grid, so it should be easy to find your way.”
Wayne turned to the index and then flipped to a page showing a big park by the lake. Denny had maneuvered them as close to Jameson’s house as he could, but many of the main streets were closed, some with roadblocks manned by cops. By Wayne’s estimate, he was probably fifty blocks west and north.
As Denny tinkered under the dash, the CB came to life with sudden static and mumbles and Wayne jumped. He ripped a page out of the book, then another, then another and another—all the pages that connected this parking lot to Jameson’s address. Denny started to object but didn’t. “Why don’t you just take it?” he said, but Wayne tossed the rest aside.
“Burn that,” Wayne said, thinking like Peter now. “Get a new one. I’ll burn these pages when I’m done. Nothing to link us, right? Keep your mouth shut.”
“You know where I live,” Denny said quietly, as if the implications of that were just occurring to him.
“Move out, Denny,” he said. “Get a divorce.”
Wayne tucked the gun in his rear waistband, saluted casually, and reached for the door handle. Denny started to say something, but the CB squawked under him as he did and Wayne only halfway heard what either was saying.
“Shush!” Wayne said, and Denny did, quickly.
Wayne shut his eyes and listened to the chatter on the CB.
“—ed back to Canada.”
“Chicago is out of control. I’d take the Tri-State if I were you. Go around. Go around.”
“It’s like Escape from New York in there. You ever seen that movie? With what’s his name, Kurt Russell? I was afraid to get out of the cab.”
“What about the Edgewater neighborhood? Anybody got a feel for what’s going on up there?”
“It’s ugly everywhere. I saw this shot on the news of Lincoln Park. Ritziest neighborhood in the city and there’re tents all over the place. Looks like something out of the Civil War.”
Over the reports, Wayne said, “For a minute, I thought they were talking about someone I knew.”
“Not likely,” Denny said.
“Which way’s east?”
Denny pointed. Wayne felt the urge to thank him, but he didn’t. Murderer Wayne wouldn’t have.
He hopped down from the cab and limped as best he could across the parking lot. After a hundred yards, he turned. The glow from the truck cab was the only illumination in any direction. He pictured Denny