John Locke - Lethal Experiment

“I said you should be safe for now. You want to take a chance?”

Chapter 34

For five hundred dollars and the promise of more to come, the guard was glad to smuggle Alison’s photo into Wolf Williams’ cell. I gave him the picture and cash in the parking lot behind the titty bar, and Alison and I were finally flying back down the highway to Dallas.

“I didn’t pose for any nude photo,” Alison said.

“It’s only important that Wolf thinks you did,” I said.

“I still don’t understand. He’s going to get the picture, he’s going to rub it with his finger, then what?”

“The reason the picture is in the plastic baggie, there’s a coating on it, made out of snake venom. There are hundreds of microscopic glass shards imbedded in the coating. When Wolf starts rubbing the photo, he’ll cut his finger and create an entry for the venom.”

“You’re insane,” she said.

“Probably.”

She gave me a look of exasperation. “I’m supposed to hang my life on that ridiculous plan?”

“Trust me, he’ll be dead fifteen minutes after getting the picture.”

“You’ve done this before?”

“I have.”

“What kind of person imbeds broken glass and snake venom onto a photograph in two hours’ time?”

“Say it.”

“What.”

“You’re glad you’re on my side.”

She shook her head. “You are seriously fucked up, Creed.”

“And you’re noisy in bed.”

She looked at me. “Are you talking about last night? For your information, that was an act.”

I didn’t say anything.

“What, you think I actually wanted you?”

I didn’t respond.

“Someone sure has a high opinion of himself,” she said.

I sighed.

“Touching you last night gave me the creeps,” she said, and she was just getting started.

It was a long ride back to Dallas.

Chapter 35

I’ve lived my entire adult life by what I call the phone call theory.

The way my theory goes, you can be good, bad, or somewhere in between. You can be rich, poor, or middle class. A winner or loser, a builder or breaker, a giver or taker, makes no difference: we’re all just a phone call away from a life-changing event.

I’ve seen it a thousand times: you can abuse your body or nurture it. You can be the most honest, loving, generous person on earth—or the worst. You can live your life by strategy or pure chance, run with gangs or walk with kings, doesn’t matter. We’re all hostage to the phone call. And if there’s one thing in life you can count on, it’s that at some point in your life, you’re going to get one of these calls.

Like Ronald Goldman, a waiter, Mezzaluna Restaurant, LA: June 13, 1994, he got a call that Nicole Simpson’s mother, Juditha, left her glasses at the restaurant. It was a call that changed his life.

Not all calls are bad.

Herbert Plant, former homeless guy, Worcester, England: got a call he’d won five million dollars playing the Lucky Dip Lottery.

Happens to someone every day. A guy with a perfect life gets a call. His white blood cell count is off the charts. A woman with a perfect life gets a call. Her husband is cheating on her. Or he just died in a car wreck.

Want to live like me? Every time the phone rings I wonder if this is the call that shatters my life or saves it. Not saying my life needs saving. I’m just saying.

So I’m in the Dallas-Fort Worth airport, waiting to catch a flight to Nashville, when my cell phone rang. I looked at the caller ID and saw Kathleen was trying to reach me.

“What time does your plane get in?” she said.

“My plane?”

“Don’t tell me you’re still in Dallas.”

“Sorry.” I wondered what she was expecting me to do that day.

She sighed heavily. “You’ll at least be here by dinner, right?”

“In New York City? By dinner?”

“Oh. My. God, Donovan. Please tell me you didn’t forget.” She sounded heartbroken.

Of course I forgot. My life was running at warp speed. Until that very moment I was planning to hit Nashville running, kill Trish and Rob to satisfy the requirements of Victor’s creepy social experiment, then rush to Boston to start hunting Tara Siegel, to talk her out of using Callie’s girlfriend for her body double.

“Of course I haven’t forgotten. How could you possibly think that?” I said, stalling while forcing my brain to rewind.

“Thank God. You had me scared there for a minute.”

Something big was happening today with Kathleen and I needed to figure out what it was. “Just a sec,” I said, “I’ve got to give my credit card to the counter lady.”

I covered the mouthpiece and started a brain backtrack. The day before, Alison and I had driven to Lofton, where I’d met Wolf at the prison. Later that night I’d bribed his guard to deliver the death picture. Then we drove back to Dallas, where I helped Alison get settled into her new hotel room. I spent the next four hours giving her a crash course in how to help Darwin set up the terrorists. Afaya should be contacting Alison soon. Until then, she’d continue her Dallas audit of the local Park ‘N Fly as though nothing unusual happened the past two days. Wolf Williams’ body had been discovered, and Augustus Quinn was guarding Alison until I could work a deal with whoever wound up replacing Wolf as head of the Texas Syndicate. Darwin would let me know when that happened, and agreed to set up a meeting between me and the new boss.

“Any clue who’s first in line for the job?” I had asked Darwin.

“Could be any of a half-dozen guys,” he’d said. “It’ll probably be a guy on the outside this time.”

“Any guess how long we’ve got?”

“No, but shit eventually floats to the top.”

The mind backtrack wasn’t working. Maybe I should try current events featuring Kathleen.

Let’s see , I thought. Kathleen was planning to move to Virginia so she and Addie could be closer to me. Something about the move? Something about…Aw, shit. How could I have forgotten ?

“Today’s the day you get Addie,” I said. “Of course I’m planning to be there.”

“In time to go with me to pick her up, or in time for dinner?”

I looked at my watch. “In between those. With any luck, I’ll be at your house before you get her home.”

“I wish you were here already. I could sure use the emotional support.”

“I know, baby. I’m sorry.”

She sighed. “I know it’s all part of the job. Maybe we ought to re-think that job. It sure keeps us apart a lot.”

I didn’t respond to that. But I was beginning to see why a bright, beautiful girl like Kathleen was still on the market. In the few months we’d been dating, she’d added a child to our romantic dynamic, had plans to move closer to my work, disapproved of my traveling lifestyle, and wanted me to change professions.

“I know about the big dinner at Serendipity tonight,” I said. “But do you want me to arrange something special for afterward?”

“It’s already taken care of. After dinner we’re going back home. We’re going to get on the computer and go video house-hunting until it’s time to put her to bed.”

“Sounds great!” I said, putting what I hoped was the precise amount of enthusiasm into the response.

She paused. “You’re still all for this, aren’t you?”

“Of course.”

“I don’t want to push you,” she said. “I want you to want this as much as me and Addie.”

“I do,” I said, wondering if I was being honest.

“You sure?”

“Of course.” Still wondering.

“You promise?”

Jesus , I thought. Is this how normal people talk? No wonder there’s so much drug use in the suburbs !

“Donovan?”

“Huh? Oh. Yes, of course I promise I’m sure!” At least that’s what I think she was asking me to say.

She kissed the air on her end of the line and giggled when I didn’t kiss her back.

“What,” I said.

“You always try to act so tough. It’s adorable.”

I couldn’t wait to tell Quinn how adorable I was.

After we hung up I sat in my chair by the gate that would have taken me to Nashville. Now I’d have to go all the way back to the main terminal, cancel the Nashville flight, and book the twelve-fifteen to New York City—which boards from the gate directly opposite the Nashville gate. On the bright side, I didn’t have to get any suitcases off the plane. The phony jewelry suitcase I’d booked on the trip down had long since been discarded.

I took a deep, cleansing breath and closed my eyes. When I opened them I saw a well-dressed guy, late-forties, checking into first class astride a stunning, long-legged beauty, roughly half his age. She was toned and tanned and ponytailed, with shiny pink lipstick and perfect white teeth, and that effusive, self-confident-yet-naïve, perky quality that reminds every guy of the cheerleader from high school he loved from afar but could never approach.

In other words, she looked like half the hookers I’d taken on similar trips.

All of us in the waiting area stared at her like a kid trying to find Waldo in a picture book. Speaking only for myself, if Waldo had been hidden anywhere near her denim miniskirt or the pale pink panties we’d gotten a glimpse of, I’d have found him twenty times. I felt a tug of desire and realized I’d just gotten the phone call—the one that would either save my life, or destroy it. I might have been sitting at a gate in an airport at the time, but I was literally at a crossroads. Nashville loomed to the left, representing the status quo, my comfort zone, and the known.

The door to Nashville offered a future filled with hookers and free time, travel, excitement, bullets and danger.

The door to my right led to New York and Kathleen, who seemed to be moving me at breakneck speed toward monogamy, fatherhood, and the wedding altar. If I took that door, in three years the sex faucet will have slowed to a drip and the arguments will take longer to quell. Routine things would start annoying us about each other, and resentments would build. Addie would steadily crowbar her way into our hearts and lives and it was only a matter of time before we’d lose the “us” that brought us together in the first place. There would be endless hours of babysitting, homework, tears, adolescent issues, sleepovers. There would be obligations to church, school, friends and sports, and all spontaneity would vanish from our lives.

I glanced at the gate to New York City and saw a future unfolding before me that made me question my commitment to Kathleen and Addie. Would I have to give up my job and don a suit and tie and work for some corporate schmuck? Would Kathleen expect me to get involved in her charity work? Could I ever see myself playing tennis or golf at some tight-assed country club or hosting mind-numbing cookouts for the neighbors, having to deal in a civilized way with the guy that drools over my wife’s ass and comes on to her every time I’m looking the other way?

I looked at the babe, cooing in the middle-aged guy’s ear. He said something and she giggled and gave his earlobe a gentle bite with those perfect, porcelain teeth. Both of them seemed completely oblivious to the glares and stares of the disgusted women and envious men watching their public show of affection. As they headed through the jet way, he cupped her ass in his hand. Did she scold him or call him a pervert? No. She rewarded him with a squeal of delight.

It’s not too late , I thought. I can still be that guy .