Something about Dena’s delivery wasn’t convincing, a singsong bounce in her voice, her eyes skimming from Bailey to Cap and back. Cap glanced at his gun, thought about how long it would take to grab it, just in case she was having second thoughts about where this was going.
Bailey took a couple of steps and then stopped, arms still pinned to her sides. Cap kept his hands raised slightly above his head but watched Dena move from side to side, like a catcher settling in his spot.
“Come on,” Cap said to Bailey, just above a whisper.
Bailey started moving forward again and was almost to him. Sweat streamed down his temples. He could hear nothing—no birds, no breeze, just the sound of Bailey’s small feet shuffling through the dirt.
And then the front door slammed open and there was Vega, half her face covered in blood, aiming her pistol at Dena.
Dena fired at Vega, missing, hitting the door and shattering the frame, splinters falling on the porch in a cloud.
Bailey froze and screamed, a foot away from Cap, and Cap yelled, “Vega, don’t!”
But Vega wasn’t hearing him.
Cap threw his body over Bailey, nesting-doll style, as Vega started to shoot. Shot one was at Dena’s hands before she could fire again; the gun flew to the ground and Dena let out a piercing scream that sounded like a birdcall, blood spraying. She fell back against the car, hands curled into her chest, and howled, started to slide down but didn’t get far.
Vega came down the stairs of the porch, loose-limbed and wobbling like Dorothy’s Scarecrow, and shot again, hitting Dena’s right shoulder. Then one knee, then the other. Four shots. Dena was on the ground now, convulsing, vomit bubbling from her mouth.
Cap pushed Bailey’s face into his shoulder so she wouldn’t see. Vega staggered toward Dena.
“Vega!” Cap called, trying to wake her up.
She turned to him and lowered the gun. He got a better look at her face now, the blood coming from someplace on her forehead that was distended and starting to swell. She regarded him with her non-bloodied eye, but Cap knew she couldn’t see him—the eye was rolling and squinting, her head starting to droop and then snap back up, like someone falling asleep on a plane.
“Where’s Kylie?” she said.
She fell to her knees, then forward, and passed out, dirt swirling around the outline of her body.
Cap wanted to go to her but didn’t want to let go of Bailey, who was gripping his sleeves. She pulled her head away from him gently and looked up at him, whispered with her puppy breath, “Kylie’s not here. Evan took her.”
15
Vega was fully clothed on the beach, and it was hot and bright. She tried standing, but it was a lot of work, first to get to her knees, then upright. Was it the Pacific, that little beach near Monterey, darker as it got deeper, whirlpools spinning in the distance? But the sand was different here than she remembered, muddy, her feet in her boots sinking and sticking every time she took a step.
That’s because you’re dreaming, asshole. She tried to take off her dream clothes, but they were heavy, draped around her like towels, each second that passed making her hotter and hotter, blood roiling and bones rattling in her torso as she made her way to the water.
Then she was in, her head under, but still she was breathing, taking water into her nose and mouth and throat and lungs, and then she heard the voice of the boy in the tank.
“Can you hear me?”
That brought her back to Hyacinth Avenue, in the neighborhood where all the streets were named for flowers. It was a cute little town, except for all the meth. Trees and fences and pinwheels in the breeze.
Was it that day again? This is death, then, she thought. Reliving all the big days.
It had been three months since Perry had died, and Vega was working freelance for a couple of different bail bondsmen, guys you wouldn’t necessarily cross the street to avoid but not people she would call friends or even business partners.
She’d stopped drinking for the most part, had started and quit yoga, ran five miles every morning and did pull-ups on a bar in her closet. She’d mostly stopped talking. Ordered what she could online so she wouldn’t have to speak to people: protein bars, toilet paper, mags for her firearms. She’d started carrying a Springfield in a shoulder holster instead of the Browning rifle on jobs, kept the out-the-front knife strapped to her calf.
The neighborhood was quiet, people at school or work or locked inside watching talk shows, lifting shaking spoons of cereal to their mouths. She found the block, then the house. Not the nicest of either. She opened the gate, went up the path, and not up the porch steps but around the side. Looked in the windows but couldn’t see anything—blinds shut, frames locked.
Then a back door. She opened the screen door, doorknob jammed. Push-button lock. Took a minute or two with a paper clip. Click, then open. She drew the Springfield, held it with both hands.
She stepped into a moderately messy kitchen and smelled cigarette smoke, bacon, sweat. She could hear the television coming from another room and stepped around the table, got close to the doorway and took a little look.
There was her skip, Quincy-Ray Day, lying on the couch smoking a pipe with a girl asleep on his lap. She did not have to look at her phone to make sure it was him. Tiny brass-snap eyes, cheeks red with acne and scars, oily ginger hair. She didn’t see a gun anywhere near him, which meant a little. Could be one between the couch cushions, under the girl, stuck in the back of his pants. But if it was not immediately visible, then it was also not immediately accessible. Add that to both his hands being occupied, one with the pipe, one with the lighter, and that gave Vega a nice fat set of seconds.
She moved quickly into the living room toward Quincy-Ray, pointing the Springfield right at him. She watched his fuzzy eyes focus on her, making sure she wasn’t a hallucination, and then when he realized it, he dropped the pipe and jumped off the couch, the girl falling hard to the floor, screaming. And Quincy-Ray scrambled to his feet and raced for the door.
Oh, Jesus, thought Vega. You dumbass saltine motherfucker.
“What the fuck, what the fuck?!” yelled the girl.
Vega glanced at her, saw no features except brown teeth and a white tongue lolling around like a piece of fish.
Vega took one more step and pressed the Springfield into the back of Quincy-Ray’s neck.
“Stop,” she said. “Stay on your knees.”
He stopped and stayed. The girl kept chattering but Vega ignored her.
“Reggie Guff’s looking for you, Quincy-Ray,” she said. “Put your hands behind your back.”
Vega took one hand off the gun and reached for her belt where her cuffs were hanging. She knew a second before it happened—he was taking too long to bring his left arm back.