Isaiah raced down the hill from Cal’s place at twice the speed limit. He felt in charge when he was driving, slick as K-Y with the six-speed, eyes focused, not even blinking, seeing the turn-in and the line like they were painted on the road.
“Damn,” Dodson said as they slid around a hard left-hander, the tail end of the Audi drifting out wide. “Who taught you how to drive?”
Isaiah called Cal and put him on speaker. “Cal, it’s Isaiah.”
“Whassup, Mr. Q?” Cal said. “You got something on that evil bitch yet?”
“Where are you?”
“On my way to my appointment.”
“With who?”
“Why is that your business? I want to go see Dr. Freeman, that’s what I’ll do.”
Isaiah heard the wheeze of a bus. They were on the streets and Dr. Freeman’s office was in Beverly Hills. Bug would take the freeway to Beverly Hills. “Listen to me, Cal,” Isaiah said. “Don’t go to the appointment. It’s a setup.”
“A setup? Why would Dr. Freeman set me up? Bug, we got time to stop for a dozen? What? I do if I want to be late? How ’bout you gonna be late to keep your job? How ’bout that, Bug?”
“Where’s the appointment, Cal? Cal?”
“Damn, Bug, look what you did—yeah, it’s your fault. I wouldn’t have spilled it on you if you hadn’t been going so fast, you nondriving clumsy muthafucka.”
“Cal, pull over and wait for me.”
“Will you look at this muthafucka? Hey, hey! You see who’s riding in this car? I know I can roll my window up, Bug, you don’t think I can work a goddamn window? Which button is it? What? Look at the numbers? You look at the goddamn numbers.”
“Cal, can you hear me? Cal?”
“There it is, Bug. What’s all that bullshit? Look, Bug, a parking spot, go on and take it. What do you mean you can’t? Did you forget how to park?”
“Listen to your phone, Cal, can you hear me?”
“Damn, Bug, we passed it now. I swear to God, you ain’t good for shit. I should replace your ass with one of them butlers. Diddy had one held an umbrella over his head to keep the sun off.”
“Don’t go, Cal. Don’t go!”
“I should have drove here myself. Least I know a parking space when I see one. Well, go around the muthafuckin’ block and drop me off. You think you can do that, Bug? Go around the block and drop me off or is that too much for you? What? Did you just say shut the fuck up? You must not know who you talking to. What do you mean this is the day? What day? What are you doing, Bug? Why you stopping here?”
You could hear Bug get out of the car and a moment later Cal’s door opening. “What?” Cal said. “Get out of the car? Why should I get out of the car? Don’t put your hands on me, Bug, you fuckin’ up my—I don’t want to get out of the—okay, okay, I’m gettin’ out, you don’t have to—I’m choking on the seat belt, Bug.” The phone clattered to the pavement and the call went dead.
Isaiah downshifted, blasted off the hill, and swung into traffic.
“Where are we going? They could be anywhere,” Dodson said.
“Cal said he wanted a dozen,” Isaiah said. “He was talking about Krispy Kremes.”
Skip waited in the Corolla. The appointment was for eleven and it was eleven-fifteen. The rapper was late, big surprise. Skip slipped on the ski mask and racked the slide on the Glock. “Come on, asshole,” he said. “Where are you?”
Cal entered the lobby of the Amos Center. His throat hurt where the seat belt had cut into him and he was dripping wet. After Bug yanked him out of the car he’d thrown him in the fountain in front of the Fidelity building. Cal hesitated. Brian Sterling’s instructions were a little waterlogged now. Brian said something about a hallway but there were three of them branching off the lobby. Cal said: “Eenie meenie miney.”
The Audi was on Ventura Boulevard, weaving through traffic, slowing as it passed the Krispy Kreme. “So?” Dodson said. “There’s Krispy Kreme. Now what?”
“Cal spilled his drink on Bug,” Isaiah said. “If you make a right turn, the passenger leans left.” Isaiah made a right.
“How do you know he turned here?” Dodson said. “Maybe he turned into that alley we just passed.”
Isaiah didn’t answer, looking ahead, worried. “Cal was yelling at somebody and he wanted to close the window—why? Why did he—up there, they’re fixing the street. The guy’s got a jackhammer. Cal wanted to shut out the noise. This is the right street.”
Dodson was getting aggravated. It was as if his job was to lob softballs so Isaiah could knock them out of the park. “Okay,” Dodson said. “But we still don’t know where we going.”
The eenie hallway opened onto a courtyard. The meenie was like a maze, Cal turning corner after corner until he was back in the lobby. The miney went straight but there was supposed to be an exit sign. Was that it? The red blur way at the end or was that one of those floaty things he saw when he drank and took too much Ativan?