Playtime (18 page)

Then Blaine hears a crash and more noises coming
from downstairs. He races for the stairway, and when he is halfway down, he
takes in the back door hanging open and Sketch on top of somebody on the
ground, butt of the Desert Eagle raised and pummeling the person below him. It
is Todd below him! 

 He takes three steps down the stairway and
launches himself at the big man like a diver going into a pool. His aim is
good, contact clean, and he strikes him like a missile right at the
shoulder-line. Big man rolls with the blow, but Blaine is on top of him and
slaps the Desert Eagle flying. Then he punches at him with all his might, but only
grazes his chin, and Sketch nails him with a wild elbow, knocks him off. Todd
is finally standing over them both, Desert Eagle in his hand, cocked, and motions
the big man away. Blaine is groggy but still conscious. Todd leans back and
kicks Sketch with his boot. Blaine looks up at his brother, who has the Eagle
pointed directly at Sketch's head. 

 "Where is Renee?" Todd asks. Big man
shakes his head. 

 "Upstairs, I hope," Blaine says. He is
breathing hard and shaky. "Sick bastard has some type of hidden room up
there, I think." He spies a couple of those plastic ties hanging from
Sketch's pocket, takes one, says "Put your hands together, Sketch." 

 Sketch acts groggy, himself, but he holds them up,
and Blaine tightens the plastic till it is taut and firm. "Get up,"
he says. "Open up that room for us right now." 

 "Latch in the trim, right at the
bottom," Sketch says, and Blaine can see the hope in his eyes that he will
have better odds if the brothers separate. 

 "You've got him, Todd," he says,
backing off towards the stairs. "Shoot his ass if he gives you any
trouble." Then he remembers his .22 and walks over and slides it out of
Sketch's front pocket, watching him all the while. He is hoping Sketch will
give him an excuse to whack him one more time, but the big man sees it in his
eyes and does nothing, though his eyes dart from side to side, considering.
"How'd you find me?" he asks, as he moves toward the stairs. 

 "Tracked your phone," his brother says.
  

 Then he is racing up the staircase again, heart
in his mouth, heading to that closet and the suspected door. When he gets there,
he quickly runs his hand down the side, and this time, near the bottom, he
feels the latch and pulls. 

 It is a small, dim room that is barren and it is
empty. Against the far wall is a grandfather clock: one of those that chimes all
the time. But the chimes are wrapped in burlap or some other rough material and
as Blaine watches, instead of chiming they move and make that thumping noise he
had heard. 

 He can't believe it. He had been so sure that she
was here. The room is only about 8 by 12 and he quickly covers all corners,
looking for another door, a hidden compartment, anything. But it is empty. He
can tell be the way the house is laid out that there is not space for another
room. This one must butt up against the two adjacent rooms on either side. He
checks one more time to be sure, rapping on walls with his knuckles, but the
room is empty and has no more secret entrances. Nothing in the ceiling either.
He backs out and goes to search the rest of the house again – she must be here
someplace, when he hears someone on a police bullhorn shouting for everyone
inside to come out, hands in the air. 

 Sidling to the window, he looks out, and there
are cop cars everywhere. It looks like the Galveston Police Department has
relocated to this street. Swat team members are behind different cars. Must be at
least ten cops outside. Maybe more. Nielson is on the bullhorn. He flips open
his phone and hits Nielson's number. He has it saved under favorites. Out in
the street he sees Nielson go for his pocket then his voice is on the line. 

 "We've got him," he says to Nielson.
"You can tell those guys to stand down." 

 "You've got Renee?" 

 "No," Blaine says. "We found a
secret room up here, but she's not in it." 

 "You poor, dumb son of a bitch,"
Nielson says. "You have screwed the pooch, my friend." 

 Then the line goes dead, and he hears him back on
the bullhorn: "Everybody in that house come out now or we are sending tear
gas in. I repeat, come out with your hands in the air." Blaine takes his
little pick, wraps it in the gloves, knots them into a small ball and heads
into the bathroom and flushes them away.   

Downstairs, Todd and Sketch move toward the front
door with him when he tells Todd what the situation is. When he sees the look
of triumph on Sketch's face he realizes how deep in the doo they are. They have
found nothing incriminating in Sketch's house. Blaine had broken in with a
weapon. Sketch is going to be just an upright homeowner defending his castle.
He shoots a glance at Todd. Where does all that leave him? Maybe a gray area
for Todd, but incarceration of some kind for Blaine. He glances at Sketch again
as they head for the front door, but the big man has put his acting shoes on again,
and is projecting grim and honest outrage, as befits a homeowner in a home
invasion. "You guys are going to jail for a while," he says, and
grimaces at Blaine. Then they walk out into the sunshine, cops everywhere
screaming hands up at them, and Sketch lifts his in the plastic manacles and
looks back at Blaine one last time and says, "Fuck you, sport." 

 The cops finally quit screaming, and separate and
search them and put them in different cars for the trip downtown.  

Blaine is in the back of the car, behind the
screen, with a uniformed cop and Nielson in front. They had put the cuffs on
him out on the lawn, right after searching him and taking the .22. Nielson suffers
in silence in the front seat for a bit before turning to Blaine. 

 "Didn't I tell you to leave it alone?"
he says. "I had just convinced the higher-ups to put surveillance on this
guy, which wasn't easy. He has friends in high places." Blaine feels
stupid, but what can he really say. He thought the guy had his girl. He
knows
he does. 

 "He's got her," he says. "I know
he does." 

 "Did he admit that?" asks Nielson.
"In front of somebody besides you?" 

 "He –" says Blaine, and then stops to
think, trying to remember the words. The son of a bitch had never actually
admitted to taking her. Just some rather vague pronouncements about really
liking women and it not being his first dance. "No, he never actually said
he had her," he finally says, looking out the window, "but he does. He
knows it, and he knows I know it. And this isn't his first time." 

 "None of that means anything in a court of
law," says Nielson. "We've got an evidence crew coming to check the
house, now, from top to bottom, since it is the scene of the crime of breaking
and entering which you have perpetrated." He is leaning over the seat at
Blaine, face almost in the screen that separates them, staring at him with
those muddy brown eyes. "But unless we get lucky, Blaine, and at this
point I've got to tell you, I don't feel particularly lucky, we've got nothing
on Mr. Irons."   

 "I'll find her," Blaine says. "I
know she's still out there." 

 "You don't understand, my friend," says
Nielson. "You are getting ready to spend some time in jail. I saved you
from that other deal, which is going to make me look stupid, and I will
probably take some heat. You will be cast as a stalker and irrational, bereaved
boyfriend who tried to take the law into his own hands." He turns and
stares out the window as they roll through the sunny Galveston day. The guy in
the uniform, a big, dark-haired man, has not said a word, and is staring
straight ahead, taking care of business.   

 "Plus," he says looking back at Blaine,
"We had the element of surprise, or at least the benefit of the doubt of
it. Now this whole thing will have to go public, and our friend Irons there, is
on full alert. If," he says, staring hard now, "he hasn't killed her by
now, he's going to know we're watching and not go near her." 

 "At least he won't be able to kill
her," Blaine says. 

 "How long do you think she'll last without
food or water, if he's got her holed away somewhere?" Nielson asks.
"And what if the higher-ups don't go along with watching him? I'm telling
you, the man has some friends. We're probably going to be screwed whichever way
it goes," he says gloomily. "Oh, yeah," he says, "By the
way, you have the right to remain silent. Anything you say can and will …" 

 He goes through the spiel as Blaine stares out
the window. He tells him he understands his rights, but what he is thinking is:
Fuck Nielson. Sure, it's all my fault. Of course, if the fucking cops were
doing their jobs, it would never have come to all this.   

 "You're not going to just let Irons go?"
he says. 

 Nielson swivels back to him. "We'll be able
to hold him for a while at least," he says. "Talk to him about this
whole mess. But if there's not any evidence at his house, and he doesn't break
down and confess …" He grimaces at Blaine, "Which I don't think is
likely, do you?" 

 Blaine says, "Fuck no." He glares at
Nielson. These guys are hard. They get jaded dealing with scum their whole
lives. It seems to him they try to make a game of it somehow, so that it
doesn't affect them as much. He can maybe see the necessity of that, to keep them
going, but he doesn't like it. "Where the hell is Winslow, anyway?" 

 "She's working on the case," Nielson
says. "Which is what I would be doing if you hadn't screwed everything up.
Congratulations, though, you just went from citizen to inmate. You will be tied
up and out of our hair for a while, anyway." 

 It is beginning to sink in to Blaine that he may
spend some real time in jail. He doesn't know how he will handle that. On top
of everything else, he has always been uncomfortable in small, tight spaces. The
thought he would be out soon had sustained him last time. This time he is not
so sure.  

 When they get to the jail, he sees that they have
arranged to put them through booking separately. There is no sign of his
brother or Sketch. Blaine can see how they would want it that way. They put him
through the booking process: roll the fingerprints, get the necessary info,
take the picture. They collect his wallet and the miscellaneous items he has on
him. 

 Nielson disappears down a hallway, and the uniformed
officer leads him through a metal door where they are buzzed into the actual
cell area. Down a long, narrow hallway that smells like piss and vomit, with
pale green walls, past large cells where crowds of men are being held. Finally,
to a small cell that looks like about 5x10 to Blaine. It has the bars on the
outer part, and the same dingy green walls going back. At the rear is a
stainless steel toilet and sink. Two bunks hang down from the wall. Another
officer joins the guy transporting him, and he is uncuffed while they watch
him, then the cell door clangs behind him and he is alone. 

 Alone in the cell. But all around him are the
noises of the prisoners. It is a dull, muffled din that changes in pitch as
different voices chime in, but doesn't seem to ever die off completely. Metal
clanging on metal. The odors of sweat and other body fluids waft around him.
The musk of stale air and confined men. If desperation had an odor, this would
be it. He sits on the bunk, leans against the wall, jerks back off it when he
realizes how dirty it is. The faint odor of shit hangs around him. With all the
cells open to the halls, he bets that smell is always around. He stands and
puts his hands upon the bars, puts pressure on them and tries to move them.
They don't budge. The building is some 6 or 7 stories tall, he thinks, as he
walks along the front of the cell, checking the bars, which he knows is futile
and also useless. What would he do if he found one loose? Run for it? Become an
escapee felon? 

 He feels the weight of the big building pressing
in on him, feels a feeling that he has almost never really known before: that
he is confined, cannot leave. He had never liked being in the middle of crowds,
had felt a similar feeling when leaving a pro football game in the middle of
thousands of people. The feeling you couldn't get where you wanted even if you
had to. But this is different and much stronger. His breath comes faster, and
he has to will himself to calm. In the books he reads they always seemed to
gloss over this kind of feeling, or maybe he was just more sensitive than the
fictional heroes. Or the real ones either. 

 It hasn't been that long, maybe an hour, when the
uniformed officer comes back for him with another. "C'mon," he says,
motions Blaine back into the hallway. "Time for some pillow talk." 

 They proceed down the hall again, past the
crowded cells of men waiting for trial or transfer or just brought in on
misdemeanor charges and drunkenness. The smells are stronger here. Past all
that and finally into a small room that looks like all the interrogation rooms
in the movies. They leave him at a battered wooden table. He looks around. Same
green on the walls. Spots a sensor in the ceiling. Probably everything
recorded, filmed here. After a few minutes Nielson and Winslow come in. Nielson
has two cups of coffee in his hands, passes one to Blaine, and he takes a
grateful sip. Then they sit across from him in two more of the plain wooden
chairs. Finally, Nielson says "Okay, so the charges are going to be breaking
and entering, stalking, assault, and whatever else they can dream up. What's
your story?" 

 Blaine leans back, stares at him. "I saw him
come up the driveway, went over to talk to him. He had gone inside. The door
was open. I poked my head through and hollered for him. When he heard me he
freaked out, probably because of the deal at the beach. Swung on me. I didn't
have any choice but to swing back, subdue him." 

 Nielson is nodding. "That might work, but
you're going to spend a night or two in jail before you go up before a judge. That
story fits with what we know. I got you that cell, otherwise you'd be in a tank
with about 30 other pukes and God knows what would happen. Told them you were
helping me with this investigation. That is the only way I could get it
done." 

 "You can't just get me out? What about
Renee? Don't let that creep get to her while I'm trapped in here." 

 Nielson sighs, looks away. Winslow sips coffee
and looks at him. "Look, Blaine, odds are this guy has killed her by now. Don't
get your hopes up," she says. "That may sound brutal, but it is just
a fact of life, reality check." 

 "Really?" he says. "Where have you
been, anyway? I haven't seen you since the day at my house. You been on
vacation?" 

 She flushes, and Nielson leans forward, looks
intently at Blaine. "She's been working a different angle on this. I don't
even know why I'm explaining to you," he says, wiping his nose on his
sleeve. "How about a lie-detector on the break-in? You willing to take
one?" 

 Blaine leans back. Nielson
is
a devious
bastard. Hard to tell which side he is really on. Then he remembers the sensors,
and that all this is being recorded. That's the deal. "No," he says,
picking on a nail that's been bugging him, "I don't think so. Everything
I've read says that they're unreliable. I'll check with my attorney." 

 Nielson doesn't look like that is a big surprise.
"Okay," he says, shuffles a small pile of papers in front of him. 

 "What about my brother?" Blaine asks. 

 "Out already," Winslow says. "We
have a neighbor who confirms that he got there only a few minutes before we
did, and even Irons didn't claim he was there when he got home. His story that
he tracked you on the phone checks out. We won't charge him for you being
stupid." 

 Blaine ignores that last. Good news that Todd is
out. At least one of them is.