(The rest of the chapter is now included!)
“We got the
email. He’ll meet you at the Texaco station that just went out of business past
the Southgate Mall. I suggested the tavern, but that was too crowded for
him. I have the money he asked for, so
we have an hour before you’re supposed to be there. Like your ride?” he said
patting the top of the Toyota Corolla.
“Non-descript
gray. Guess that’s the point.”
“I rented it for
a couple of days. We can’t use our own cars.”
Jessie’s pulse ramped up to double-time as she
thought about all that could go wrong. “Marc, we need to talk about what I’m
supposed to say and do.”
Marc grabbed the
sack with the wig out of his car and tossed it to her. “Change your clothes
first. Do you have anything black you could wear?”
“Yeah, and I
have a black raincoat with a hood. It looks like it’ll still be raining.”
She hurried
upstairs and when she got to her room she sank on the bed, her knees weak and
her hands shaking. Her first test. She repeated, “You can do this, you can do
this,” over and over as she dressed. She unsheathed the Leatherman knife she
took from her mom’s desk and put it in her coat pocket. It took her two tries
to get the copper wig on correctly. She added blue eye shadow, lots of mascara, and
red lipstick to complete her disguise.
“I’m ready,” she
said coming down the stairs. “What do I tell them and how long do I try to talk
with them? “
“Wow—you’re a
knockout, Jess.” Marc stepped around her and looked at all angles. “No one
would take you for Jessie Jensen in that get-up.” He eyed the black leather
pants and the high heeled boots. “Can you run in those?”
“I guess… if I
had to.”
He handed her a
packet of money. “Put this in your inside pocket. Its $400 for 50 pills. Oh,
and your name is Melanie Long. That’s the email I set up.”
“Melanie, nice;
so these pills go for eight dollars on the street?”
“Anywhere from
four to eight dollars. These must be special. I’ll drive until we get a couple
of blocks away, then you’ll need to take the wheel and I’ll get in the back
seat. You’ll park a block away from the gas station and walk. It’ll be dark, so
I brought us both pocket flashlights,” he said tossing one at her.
“So I don’t have
any way to contact you if there’s trouble?”
“No, I don’t
have a wire for you so you’ll be on your own.”
“Do you have a
gun?” she asked.
“Yes, do you
know how to shoot one?”
“No, I was never
interested in learning.”
“I’ll hang on to
it then. This should be an easy deal, Jessie. You give him the money and he
gives you the pills. You try to remember any and everything he says or does.
Get a good description of him, too. Tell him you may need more. Remember, we’re
after his boss, not him. Hopefully he’ll lead us to him.”
“Right,” she
said rolling her eyes. The more she thought about their scheme, the worse it
sounded to her. But they were committed now. She had to go through with it.
They drove in
silence for the rest of the trip. Jessie made the switch and drove slowly until
they spotted the gas station.
“It looks like
the field behind it slopes down to the high school track. I can see the lights
and the road beside it.” Marc was scoping their position crouched down in the
back seat and giving her directions. “Drive by the gas station and go down
another block to the State Farm building. See it? It’s on the same side of the
road. Park behind it. And Jessie, if you have to leave in a hurry, run down the
hill and hide in the bushes by the road. I’ll come get you.”
She parked and
got out of the car, looking around. “There’s no one here,” she said quietly.
“Good. There
were a few other cars parked on the road, but they all looked empty.”
“Here I go,” she
said willing herself strength and extra courage. Her hands shook and her
heartbeat echoed in her ears. She was glad she wore a turtleneck because she
was sure the pounding pulse at her throat would be noticeable. As she walked
she tamped down a nervous giggle that wanted to escape from her mouth.
Jessie
approached the gas station main door. A dim bulb was mounted to the side of the
door casting a meager shadow of her on the asphalt. She tried the handle but it
was locked. She cautiously picked her way around piles of litter and random
pieces of two-by-fours to the back of the station. She glanced down the
hillside behind it towards the track. The dark sky and the mist in the air gave
it the look of an eerie obstacle course. Half way down the back wall of the building,
a door stood ajar to a lighted room.
Jessie took a
calming breath and knocked on the door, “Hello.”
A rustle of
paper muted his reply. “Come in.”
She pushed at
the door and hesitantly stepped into the room.
A nice looking blonde
young man sat on a plastic crate reading the Wall Street Journal. He couldn’t
have been older than 20. The creases down the legs of his Dockers were pressed
and he wore a long sleeved green sweatshirt with U of O Ducks emblazed on the
front. She hoped her mouth hadn’t fallen open.
“You’re the person
I’m buying my drugs from?” she said, her eyes wide.
“Yeah, well, I’m
just breaking into the business. I need the money for college.”
Jessie was
stunned. “Can’t you just get a job or something?”
“I’m looking for
easy money and it’s been pretty easy so far. I’ve just branched out from Eugene
into the Portland area.” He folded his newspaper. “So, you brought the money?”
“Of course,” she
said fumbling for it in her pocket.
“Stop,” he said.
“Keep your hands where I can see them. I’ll get the money out of your coat.”
Suddenly a gun appeared in his hand. “Can’t be too sure, you know.”
“It’s here,” she
said, pointing to the inside of her coat.
He moved towards
her and pulled her coat away from her, reaching into the inside pocket for the
cash. He pulled a vial from the front pocket of his sweatshirt and placed it in
her coat where the money had been. He felt the heaviness in her outside pocket
and pulled out the knife and flashlight. He studied the knife. “It’s good to be
prepared, but you don’t need this with me.” He put it and the flashlight back
in her pocket. This couldn’t be the person her mom was dealing with.
“Have you been
in Fernhill very long?” she asked.
“I hacked into
another companies program last week and got the email addresses of most of
their clients. You were the first one to contact me after I sent out the new
email.”
She couldn’t
believe how young he was. It had sidetracked her from the mission of the night
momentarily, so she brought herself back to it. “I may need more. Can you take
care of that for me?”
“Certainly. But
I’ll tell you a different place to meet. If the other company catches wind of
my enterprise and I need to be pretty mobile.”
Jessie’s
maternal instincts kicked in. “Are you sure you’re capable of dealing with the
other company? You seem so young. I’m betting they’ll be majorly pissed and
will go all out to stop you.”
"Hey, thanks gorgeous. I
appreciate the concern, but it’s a cake-walk.”
They heard
footsteps just before a man dressed in black sweats and a black-hooded
sweatshirt pushed open the door and stepped into the room, pointing a gun at
them. “Death-walk you mean. You’ve made some people unhappy. I’ve been told to
take care of it.”
Jessie’s breath
caught in her throat and she flattened herself against the wall, inching
towards the door.
“Sorry, man. Thought
there’d be enough business to go around.”
Jessie’s
movement caught the other man’s attention and as he turned towards her, she put
all the force she could into the motion she practiced in her kickboxing class
catching him square in the groin with her high heeled boot. He folded over
grabbing his crotch and her contact easily wrestled the gun from his hand. He
pushed her out the door. The man leapt after them, knocking all of them into
the barbed-wire fence.
Jessie was the first to react. She struggled her way out
of the fray of arms and legs but found her pant leg caught in the barbed wire.
She grabbed the knife from her pocket, flipped it open and cut the material free.
The two men
rolled on the ground, wrestling for the gun. Jessie kicked at their hands
entwined around the weapon with the toe of her boot and the gun went flying into the
field on the other side of the fence. Her contact jumped up shaking his hand.
“Nice moves.” He grabbed his gun and pointed it at the man while she held her
knife toward him.
“Two against
one. You lose,” he said.
The sound of
fast approaching sirens split the night air. Jessie’s free hand flew to her
mouth and she groaned, “Oh no.”
“We’re outa’
here,” her contact said pushing her towards the fence.
He leaped over,
grabbed the other gun on the ground and disappeared down the hill.
She heard doors
slamming and static from the police radios. The attacker scrambled up and
sprinted towards the next building. “Not done with you,” he snarled
disappearing into the night.
She climbed over
the fence scraping her hand and leg on the barbed wire. She ran for all she was
worth down the hill, falling once, but getting back up and running again. Half
way down she flipped up the hood of her jacket to cover her red hair and picked
up her pace. She’d worn the wrong shoes for running, but they’d certainly come
in handy for other reasons.
By the time the
police lights swept the hillside, she was at the bottom dripping wet, dirty, and
gulping for air, but hidden in the bushes. And mad as hell. She frantically
felt her pocket. The vial of pills, her knife, and the flashlight were still
there. Thank God.
“You so better
be here, Marc” she said grinding her teeth. She crept further down the road
along the bushes away from the lights of the police above while watching for
the Toyota.
She heard Ryan’s
voice on the bull horn telling them to come out with their hands up, but they’d
been gone moments before—over the fence and down the hill—nothing left behind.
Except perhaps a small piece of her leather pants. She wouldn’t know until she
could see them in the light.
She breathed
easier when she saw the Toyota coming down the road with its lights off. Marc
had his head out the window calling softly, “Jessie? Jess?”
She flashed her
light at him and stepped out onto the road well in front of the car and out of
sight of the police above. When he slowed, she leaped into the car and shouted,
“Go, GO.”
Marc sped up and
moments later turned onto a main street. “You okay?” he asked looking at her
closely, reaching over to grab her arm. “Whoa, you’re a mess.”
The adrenalin
rush had her whole body shaking uncontrollably. “Where were.. were you? I
thought you sa..said you’d be there if you saw..saw I was in trouble. Didn’t
you see..see that guy with the gu..gun?”
“I was coming,
but I heard the sirens and figured it would be best if I got the car and made
it and down to the street below to pick you up.”
She leaned forward
and hugged her knees, tears starting to fall. “Marc, that ..that was Ryan. We
could have been caught. We probably screwed up his drug bust.” Anger replaced
her tears. “Did you hear me, we could have been arrested!”
“I’m sorry,
Jess. It shouldn’t have attracted their attention. It was a simple deal.”
“Why can’t you just go to Ryan and tell him
who you are and why you’re here? We could work together with him. We’re after
the same guys for the same reason.”
He was quiet for
a moment. “The same guys, but not necessarily for the same reason.”
She stared at him
incredulously and shook her head. “Take me home. I need a shower and a drink. Then
I’ll tell you about the guy who sold me the drugs and the one with the gun. And
you need to explain what you mean by not necessarily,” she said using air
quotes.
