“What’s going to happen?”
“Beats me.”
I sat up, irritated with his attitude. “Don’t play dumb, Raymond. What’s Chopper going to do to her?”
“How do I know? I’m not a fuckin’ psychic. Don’t worry about it. It’s got nothing to do with you.”
“What about her mother?”
“What do you care? Quit acting like this is my fault.”
I looked at him with astonishment. “Who’s fault is it, men?”
“Bibianna’s,” he replied, as if it were self-evident.
“Why is it her fault? You’re the one who cut the woman.”
“Who, Gina? She’s alive, isn’t she? Which is more man you can say for Chago. I got a brother dead, and who do you think did that?”
“Not her,” I shot back.
“That’s my point,” he replied patiently. “She didn’t do nothing. She’s innocent, right? Just like him. Tit for tat. It says so right in the Bible – an eye for an eye – and that’s all this is about. Lookit, I could have killed the bitch, but I didn’t, did I. And you know why? Because I’m a good guy. Nobody gives me credit. Bibianna has to learn not to fuck with me, I told you that. You think I like this? She’d done what I said to begin with, we wouldn’t be here.”
“Which is what?”
“Quit horsing around and get serious. She shoulda married me when I asked her. I’m not stupid, you know. I don’t know what’s going on, but I’ve been as patient as I’m gonna be. And that goes for you, too. You got that?”
I stared at him, at a loss for words. His view of the world was so skewed there was no reasoning with him. He really seemed to see himself as innocent, the victim of a circumstance in which everyone was responsible for his behavior except him. Like every other “victim” I’ve known, he clung to his “one-down” position as justification for his abuse of other people.
Raymond picked up the car phone and punched in a number. ” ‘Ey, Luis. Raymond. Put some clothes on, we’re swinging by to pick you up.” He glanced at his watch. “Ten minutes. And bring the mutt.”
He started the car then and pulled out, hanging a left onto a main artery as we headed south again. I glanced out the window. Raymond was driving at a sedate forty miles an hour. We were now on Sepulveda, not far from the airport. Not a wonderful neighborhood, but I thought I’d be safe until I could get a call through to the cops. I opened the car door. Raymond speeded up.
“Please stop the car. I’m getting out,” I said.
He picked up the gun again and pointed it at me. “Close the door.”
I did as I was told. He turned his attention to the road again. In the glow from the streetlights, I studied his profile, hair still damp from the shower, the tousle of curls, dark eyes, long lashes, the dimple in his chin. He was bare-chested, barefoot, his skin very pale. I could see the faint scarring in the crooks of his arms. My guess was that after the intensity of the chase and the rush of adrenaline, the euphoric effects of his shooting up were beginning to wane. His ticcing had returned. The mysterious connections in his neurological circuitry were touching off a series of reactions, as if he were enduring tiny jolts of electricity. His mouth came open and he jerked his neck to the right. His body jumped with the same irrepressible response I’ve felt when a doctor pops with his rubber hammer on my patellar reflex. In that quick tap, there isn’t any way to prevent my foot from flying out. Raymond seemed to live with the constant assault of invisible rubber hammers, which rapped him randomly at all hours of the day, testing every reflex … little elves and fairies tapping on him like a boot. If his gun hand jerked the wrong way, he was going to plug me full of holes. My own adrenaline had seeped away, leaving me depleted.
“Oh, God, Raymond. Please. I just want to go home,” I said wearily.
“I’m not going to let you out here. It’s too dangerous. You wouldn’t last a block.”
I wanted to laugh at the absurdity of his concern. There he was, holding me at gunpoint, probably willing to kill me if it came to that, but he didn’t want me out on the streets in a questionable neighborhood. Raymond punched in another number. He really reminded me of some high-powered business exec.
Someone answered on the other end.
“Hey, yeah,” he said. “I got a problem. Somebody just stole my car. …”
I slouched down on my spine, knees propped against the dashboard, listening with wonder as Raymond availed himself of city police services in the matter of his missing Cadillac. From his end of the conversation, I gathered he was going to have to go over to the 77th Division and file a stolen vehicle report, but he was the soul of cooperation, Mr. Righteous Citizen rallying the forces of law and order to his cause. He hung up and we drove in silence as far as Luis’s place.
We pulled over at the curb and Raymond gave a quick beep. A moment later, Luis appeared with Perro at his side.
Raymond pulled on the emergency brake and got out on the driver’s side. “You drive,” he said to Luis.
Luis put the dog in the front seat between us and got behind the wheel. “Where we going?”
“Police station.”
Luis took off. Perro leaned against me, panting bad breath. I could tell he would have preferred the window seat himself so he could hang his head out and let his ears flap in the passing breeze.
Luis watched Raymond in the rearview mirror with guarded interest. “So what’s happening?”
“Bibianna stole the Caddy. We gotta file a report.”
“Bibianna stole the Caddy?”
“Yeah, can you believe that? After all I’ve done for her? I called Chopper and sent him after her. I don’t have time for that shit, you know what I’m talking about?”
Luis made no comment. I saw him slide a look in my direction, but what was I going to say?
We reached the 77th Division police station. Luis parked on the street and got out of the car, peering into the backseat while Raymond gave him instructions about the stolen Caddy. “What about the registration?” he asked.
“It’s in the car,” Raymond said irritably.
“You want me to give ‘em your telephone number?”
“How else are they going to notify me when they find the car?”
“Oh.”
“Yeah, ‘oh,’ ” Raymond said.
Luis disappeared.
“Guy’s a fuckin’ pinhead,” Raymond said to himself. He kicked the back of my seat. “I still got a gun on you,” he said. “I ain’t forgettin’ it was you helped Bibianna get away.”
I waited in the car with Raymond, pinned in place by Perro’s weight, wishing a cop would saunter by so that I could scream for help. Several patrol cars gunned past us, but no one seemed to realize that this tacky-looking Anglo was Nancy Drew in disguise. I stared out at the police station not fifty feet away.
Luis came back to the car and got in without a word. He took a quick look in the rearview mirror. I turned around and looked myself, realizing belatedly that Raymond had nodded off.
Once we reached the apartment complex, Luis had to help him up the stairs. I went up first, with the dog bringing up the rear. Raymond was awake but seemed groggy and out of it. When we reached the apartment, Luis unlocked the door. For a moment, the exterior lights fell on Raymond’s bare back and I saw that his skin was crisscrossed with scars, like a webbing of white diamonds. The old cuts had healed but had never entirely gone away. The even spacing suggested quite methodical work.
Inside the apartment, I scanned the living room, searching for the handbag I’d left behind earlier. I spotted it on the floor, shoved halfway under the upholstered chair. It had apparently been kicked to one side during the struggle with Raymond and the top was now yawning open. Luis held Raymond’s gun and he motioned me toward the couch. I took a seat. From that angle, the butt of the SIG-Sauer was clearly visible in the handbag. I willed myself to look away. I didn’t dare make a move for it for fear Luis would catch sight of it. Raymond staggered off to bed.
I was forced to sleep on the couch that night. Perro guarded the front door while Luis dozed in the chair, keeping watch over me, Raymond’s gun in hand. The kitchen bulb glowed like a nightlight. Now and then, Luis and I would stare at each other across the dimly lighted room, his dark eyes devoid of any feeling whatsoever. It’s the same look you get from a lover when he’s moved on to someone new. Whatever moments you might have shared get buried under layers of hostility and indifference.