The Second Girl(44)

I notice a car pulling in to the parking lot. It’s a light blue four-door.

When it gets closer, I see that it’s a Honda Accord, not a Camry. It parks a few spaces over from me, the passenger’s side facing me. I lean down beneath my window.

The passenger steps out first. He’s a white kid with wavy brown hair and can’t be more then seventeen. The driver steps out, but I can only make out the back of his head ’cause the car obstructs my view. He moves toward the rear of the vehicle.

Damn if I didn’t get lucky. He sure as hell looks like Edgar Soto to me.

They walk across the lot to a gravel road and the opening to the path. They disappear into the wooded area.

I slip on my leather tactical gloves and move my car to a better position a couple of rows behind his—a spot that gives me a better vantage point to see the entrance to the path.

About an hour and a half later I notice Edgar come walking from the path and heading back to his car. The distance from the path to his car is far enough that whoever he was with would’ve appeared by the time Edgar hit the gravel road.

I shoulder my pack, exit my car, and act like I’m fiddling with my car door while he makes his way to his vehicle.

He doesn’t notice me.

I begin to move toward him while he’s unlocking the driver’s side door.

He bends in like he’s trying to find something. That gives me the time I need to get behind him.

I set my pack on the pavement.

“Edgar,” I say.

It startles him, and he hits his head on the metal portion of the doorframe. He grunts something and quickly turns to face me.

He takes me for a cop right away and tries to push out and run, but I’m bigger than him by at least six inches and a hundred pounds. I grab him tight by his right hand and squeeze his fingers until he cries out. I twist his arm up and around so he can do nothin’ but turn with it. That’s when I shove him face-first against the glass of the rear passenger door.

“What the f*ck…” he huffs.

I push my weight against him, look around me to see if anyone is watching.

Not a mom or a friend in sight.

I pull out my cuffs secured between my belt and the small of my back and click them tight onto the wrist of the arm I’m twisting behind his back.

“What are you—”

“Shut the f*ck up,” I tell him, and then I cuff his other wrist so his hands are secured behind his back.

I grab him by the hoodie of his zipped-up jacket to hold him up against the car while I lean over to the driver’s side so I can unlock all the doors. I do a quick pat-down, starting with his ankles and working up.

“What’s this?” I ask, after squeezing his left front pants pocket.

“Just my cell phone. What the f*ck are you doing this for?”

I check to make sure it’s a cell phone and put it back in his pocket. I squeeze his other pocket and feel what appear to be small zips with weed. After doing pat-downs for so many years, you learn what is what. I’m rarely wrong. When I’m done I force him around the car to the front passenger door.

“What are you doing? What do you think you’re doing? Let me the f*ck go!”

“I said shut up.” And I gut-punch him so he curls down and has to gulp for air.

I quickly open the passenger door of his car and muscle him into the seat.

“Wait, wait…”

I grab him by the chin with my left hand, push his head back against the headrest, and say, “One more word, Edgar. I swear, just give me another f*cking word.”

I take the seat belt and buckle him in. There’s nothing he can do with his hands cuffed behind him, so I step back and shut the door. I hurry around to the driver’s side, grab my backpack, and notice the keys to his car on the pavement under the open door. I pick them up and get in the driver’s side, set my pack on the floor behind the front seat.

I start the car and back the f*ck out.

I scan the parking lot as I drive out, but don’t see anyone around.

“Please, sir, please tell me what you want.”

I know I warned him, but I allow it just one more time. I start to think maybe I shoulda thought this through a bit more, but I’m impulsive like that. Now I gotta deal with it.

He’s moaning something I can’t understand, and I just wanna knock him into some white light so I can have time to mull everything over in my head.

“What’s your last name, Edgar?”

I look over, see tears streaming down his face. He knows I’m not a cop now. It’s gotta be terrifying, especially if you know what I know about me.

“Here’s the deal. I ask only one time from now on, and if you don’t answer, I’m gonna hurt you. I’ll hurt you bad. What’s your last name?”

“Soto,” he struggles out.

“You just sit there and shut the f*ck up, and I mean no crying, too, and maybe you’ll come outta this okay. You say one more word without me asking and you’ll get hurt. Clear?”

“Yes, sir.”

I turn the radio on.

He’s got it tuned to some shit I can’t stand. I find the classics station.

“Everything I Own,” by Bread. Haven’t heard them in a bit. My mother used to play this band. It makes me smile, but not for that reason, mostly ’cause having to listen to this song would drive Leslie nuts. I’m pretty sure she wasn’t even born when this song came out. I remember hearing it as a little kid, through my mom’s closed bedroom door. I sort of figured it was her alone-time music.