Chapter 41

On Sunday night, Conley watched Samay through a coffee shop window. Samay sat on a stool at the counter, studying a young waitress as if she were prey. She balanced a tray on her delicate left hand and plucked donuts from the silver platter with her right. She placed the pastries in neat rows on slanted, well-lit shelves, careful to join them with others of their own kind. The upper part of her tanned arm slid in and out of her short sleeve like a gold piston. The white uniform caressed slender hips, stretched across a slim back and under a spill of hair so light their colors almost matched.

Samay’s legs encircled the metal shaft under him—there seemed to be more joints than just ankle and knee. Elbows rested on the countertop with wrists bent and hands pecking at a cruller on the dish in front of him. He dissected the food slowly and popped torn pieces into his mouth. Steam rose from the paper cup in front of him, curled, and dissipated.

He said something to her, cheeks full, mouth still chewing. She ignored him. He spoke again, several times, until she finally turned, unsmiling, and spoke back.

He laughed and spun on the stool.

The girl walked into the back room, show over. Samay unwrapped his legs and drained his cup before he left.

Conley followed.

****

Minutes later, Samay took a quick look over his shoulder, saw darkness, and decided to light up. He brought a fat joint out of his pocket, ends twisted like taffy. He admired its heft and the tightness of the roll, and ran his tongue along the gummed seam. He lit up.

Lori liked him, he was sure. Girls always played a part, acting angry and irritated. He ran his tongue again, this time across his upper lip. He tasted sugar from the donut she’d given him, the one she’d touched.

I wonder if Lori tastes as sweet?

Another pull on the joint. He inhaled and felt his lungs warm. The familiar hum began in his head. A new world was coming.

The dark sidewalk stretched in front of him, a beautiful lane with lush hedges and trees that formed a green canopy under a hazy half moon. Music drifted from a house, from windows with rippling curtains and mysterious silhouettes behind them. He smiled and held the joint sideways, appreciating the beauty of the glowing tip.

Vithu’s ganja—Good stuff.

A car’s engine surged from behind, growling like an animal. Suddenly a dark metal behemoth jumped the curb, tires carving tracks in the thin strip of sidewalk grass.

Samay stared, frightened, as the car stopped in front of him. Dark tinted windows hid the inside, and he wondered if a driver was behind the wheel or if the angry vehicle was acting on its own. A click sounded, the wide trunk yawned, and the lid quivered.

A tiny bulb reflected on something inside. He approached, more curious than afraid. Was this another of Vithuʼs games? A shovel lay on the floor, rocking back and forth. The wood handle was pocked with light-colored scars, the pointed gray blade mottled with dirt.

Strong hands clasped his arms from behind, powerful fingers clamped his triceps. Samay punched and kicked, and stiffened his body as he was forcefully fed into the trunk. The lid slammed shut and the car growled again and accelerated. A breath of greasy exhaust seeped into the closed space.

He felt overhead and ran his hand across the roof of his prison. The car banked and he was pressed against cold metal. Another turn and he slid, shoulder biting into the rear quarter on the other side.

Stop. Accelerate. The darkness got darker. Was the trunk really closing in on him? He reached out, tentatively, and touched the lid to determine if it was closer than before.

The car slid to a stop on rough surface and the trunk lid opened again, quiet and slow. Hands grabbed at his clothes, found belt and collar, and dragged him out. He fell on hard ground.

Another kind of smoke filled his lungs. Light shone from a high, crackling fire. Conley and Stefanos—the cops who had found Channary—stood between him and a blazing campfire. They wore heavy clothes—boots, jeans, pullover tops whose long sleeves ended in black gloves, and their faces were marbled red from the flames. Conley reached into the trunk and retrieved the shovel. It passed over Samay slowly, as if levitating.

Conley turned and marched away, shovel resting on his shoulder like a rifle.

Samay stood and sprinted around the perimeter, but couldn’t find the road they’d come from, or even a path in the black woods. Trees surrounded the clearing, undulating shapes that turned sea green as light flickered on leaves. A howl came from nearby, an anguished sob that cut through the crackling fire. A black woman stood next to a tree, arms held above her head by a rope slung over a branch.

He recognized her dark, tight hair and handsome face. She’d been at the house in Nahant the night they took Channary. So Vithu hadn’t killed her after all. But why was she here?

Samay stood unsteadily. A beat began behind him, a metallic sound.

Chock. Chock.

He turned. Conley was thrusting the shovel into the ground on the other side of the fire. Stefanos stood behind, next to smoke ghosts rising from the blaze.

Samay shuffled to the writhing girl, his legs still aching from the ride. He slowed as he neared. She saw him and stopped.

“Help me,” she pleaded.

Chock. Chock. Chock.

The fire’s light made a long shadow behind her, a giant marionette, all legs and arms, a tall, black cobweb against the thick forest. Samay watched his own slow shadow join hers as he approached—until a third shadow grew. Stefanos. Samay turned to him.

“Why have you done this?”

Stefanos stepped past him toward the girl. She lifted herself on the rope like a gymnast, muscles straining before her arms went limp and she fell back. He swung a backhand, high and hard, that knocked her face to the side. Stefanos put his face in front of hers and spoke evenly.

“Who killed Lloyd Kendricks?”

Samay stepped back.

Vithu. This was about Vithu.

Her head lolled and she cried.

“I don’t know. You have to believe me. I don’t know.”

And she doesn’t.

Slap. “You were part of it. Last chance.”

Chock. Chock. Chock.

Stefanos repeated the question over and over, his voice smooth and deep.

“Who killed Lloyd Kendricks? Who killed Lloyd Kendricks? Who killed Lloyd Kendricks?”

Did he say it three times—or three hundred? The question became a string of sounds, words that made no sense. Samay stumbled away, the gibberish ringing in his head. He crossed the clearing, closer to the chocks. Conley was working, chest-deep, in a long, narrow hole. Sweat poured from the young cop’s brow and his face was dark crimson now. Samay slowed and stepped back when he realized the devil was toiling in a grave.

A shot rang from behind. Samay turned, saw the black girl go limp, arms drawing the ropes taut, legs bending and swaying. Stefanos cut her ropes and her lifeless body fell to the ground. Samay collapsed to his knees, placed one palm in the loose dirt, and pointed back to the still girl.

“Why have you done this?”

Conley turned and looked back at the dead girl with mild interest.

“Because she might have known.”

Might have known?

Stefanos was behind him again. The man moved magically around this hellish knoll. He just kept appearing, still as stone. He held the gun loose by his side, and when Samay looked at it, the automatic rose to greet him.

He watched the gun lift, one with the glove and dark sleeve, and stared at the hole in its end, wondering if he’d be able to see the bullet when it left the barrel.

Stefanos said, “Who killed Lloyd Kendricks?”

Samay laughed.

Was this their plan? Kidnap every person who breathed the same air as the murdered cop—then question—then kill?

“Who killed Lloyd Kendricks?”

Did they think he’d betray the gang? Never again. They wouldn’t just kill him for betrayal, they’d make Samay an example for new Asian Boyz. Hell only knew what they had in store—boil him alive maybe, skin him, crucify him. Those were the torments Vithu liked to talk about now that Pon was gone—back to Cambodia, some said.

Samay would rather the bullet. At least death would be quick.

A third time.

“Who killed Lloyd Kendricks?”

“I don’t know.”

Conley was neck deep now, but he managed to reach out and snare Samay’s ankle.

“Don’t waste the bullet,” Conley said.

Stefanos nodded and lowered the gun.

Conley pulled Samay’s leg toward the hole. He bent, hands bracing the ground, and tried to kick free. Stefanos clamped his biceps with steel fingers and helped him toward the grave. One leg cleared the edge and Conley pulled it hard toward the bottom. Stefanos denied any purchase, lifting Samay’s hand every time he clawed at ground.

Both legs were in the hole now. Conley swept Samay’s legs out from under him and pushed his shoulders into the bottom. Samay tried to rise, but a foot pinned the small of his back.

A clump of soil punched him between the shoulder blades and rained silently over his torso. Another, pounding his legs this time. The third fell on his head and when it disintegrated, the particles of dirt felt like crawling insects invading eyes and ears.

He shut his mouth tight, but then his nose breathed the musty soil. He moved his face to the side, searching for a pocket of clean air.

Soil came faster. The heavy foot anchored him, pressing him into the bottom of the grave.

“Mercy,” he screamed through a spray, and was answered with another shovelful.

The earth seemed to be crawling over him quicker, a swarm of cold mites. He spat mud and yelled, “Vithu. Vithu killed your friend. Have mercy!”

Another shovelful came, and for a frozen second he thought he heard the scrape of the blade again. He waited. And waited.

A minute or an hour?

Samay stirred and found he could turn. He raised his head and shook it clean. His legs moved as he twisted and rolled like a worm. He stood and climbed from the hole.

The car was gone, and the girl. The fire was dying. The shovel lay on the edge of the hole.

He sank back on his knees.

Vithu—the new, powerful Vithu—would wreak revenge on him. He’d sworn allegiance, vowed not to snitch, and was aware of the consequences. What form would his vengeance take? Samay shuddered, not from the cold, or from the wind that whistled through the sleeping trees. He hugged himself, rubbed arms pocked with goose bumps, and wondered what kind of nightmare he’d bargained for.