Big Red Tequila (Tres Navarre #1)(97)

I turned. Kellin was just reaching the far side of the catwalk. My body was telling me to stay doubled over, to curl up in the rainwater and take a nap. Instead, I forced myself to get up and follow.

I didn’t have Ralph’s phobia—not until I stepped onto the catwalk and it started bouncing up and down, creaking under my weight. Below there was nothing but five stories of blackness. The smokestack loomed out of the void, white and huge; its diameter was big enough to house a tennis court. Above me it rose another five stories like some massive antiaircraft gun. Kellin was only a few feet up the ladder now. He seemed to be having trouble with his right ankle.

I made it across. The concrete sides of the smokestack were surprisingly smooth and cold. The ladder rungs were wet. Kellin was breathing hard above me, still cursing. His hand was about two rungs below the bottom of the door.

I didn’t know why he wanted back in that room. I just knew if it was more important to him than lighting over Lillian, I couldn’t let him get there.

I got his ankle, the right one, as he was pulling himself into the doorway. He kicked back, reflexively, and I twisted, using his own kick to bend the joint. He screamed. It would’ve been perfect if I hadn’t lost my balance.

For an instant I was hanging on only by my left hand, my feet dangling freely over nothing at all. My other hand let go of Kellin, then grabbed for a rung. I scraped against concrete instead. I felt my fingernails rip. I was watching the Tower of the Americas tilting sideways in the distance, wondering why it was like that. I wondered if that revolving restaurant at the top of the Tower was still open, the place my dad used to go for his birthdays. I was also thinking what an inane final thought that would be. Then my foot found a rung. Kellin could’ve kept me out of the doorway easily if he had been there. He wasn’t. When I pulled myself into the tiny cement chamber he was limping off to the left, toward a milk crate full of hanging files that was sitting on the floor next to another metal door. On top of the files was a revolver.

The maintenance area wasn’t much more than a hallway. It was only about six feet deep, but lengthwise it curved around with the circumference of the smokestack, ending in a metal door ten feet down on either end. The fuse boxes and metal cables along the inner wall were probably once used to light up the “ALAMO CEMENT” signs on the sides of the stacks. There was also some bedding on the floor, an open wicker picnic basket, some clothes scattered about.

Kellin heard me behind him and turned. His uniform was covered with sludge and white dust from the side of the smokestack. His short-cropped hair looked like a Brillo pad that had just been used. And his face, for once, was anything but impassive. I suddenly realized that he was much older than I’d first thought—closer to fifty than thirty. He was pointing the gun at me now. You can never be faster than a squeeze of the trigger, no matter how fast you can hit or kick. I knew it, he knew it. I wasn’t stupid. I smiled and spread my hands, admitting defeat. He smiled back at me.

Then I kicked the .38 out of his hand.

The shot went past my left ear and tore a chuck of concrete out of the wall. The gun landed in the corner. For a second Kellin looked amazed at how stupid I had been, right before I pulled him forward and flipped him onto the concrete on his back, hard.

I’ll give Kellin credit. He got up.

My right hand was starting to get sticky from the blood. The ruined fingertips throbbed so bad I was afraid to look.

“Is the lady of the house in?" I asked Kellin, who was now backing up to the exit.

He wiped the grime off his forehead with the back of his hand, then glanced over at the gun. He smiled at me.

"No offense, man," he said. "But you don’t know shit about what’s going on here."

"Fill me in."

He shook his head. "I was there," he said, still smiling almost pleasantly. "With that stupid shit Halcomb we set up for the fall. I was driving. Pretty damn funny watching Randall plow that fat f**k into his front lawn. Your face, man--"

He started laughing. Then he went for me, figuring I was disoriented.

I was. Tai chi would’ve demanded that I use his own force to send him into the wall behind. I didn’t. I pushed back—force against force, a totally incorrect approach. Kellin was obviously appalled. At least he looked that way when he went out the door. His hands kept reaching for something, but there wasn’t anything there. There was no sound at all until he reached the bottom and even then nothing much—a faint metallic clap like the echo of a snare drum, nothing nearly as loud as my heartbeats.

I sat down on the blankets. I wrapped my bloody hand inside one of Lillian’s old T-shirts. I needed to get out of there. Instead I sat and stared out the door. I must’ve gotten up and looked around after a while. I remember looking through a few of the files in the milk crate, learning all about the real owners of Sheff Construction.

All I really needed to do was look in the picnic basket. There were a few slices left, wrapped in a linen napkin and smelling wonderful. Obviously fresh baked today. The lady of the house had not been in. But she’d sent some banana bread.

60

It was a long ride to the West Side in Jess’s pickup truck. The engine was bucking resentfully, my hand was bleeding, Ralph was still shaking from acrophobia too badly to drive, and Lillian was sandwiched between us mumbling lines from Dr. Seuss. So far she had not recognized either of us, but she seemed perfectly happy to go for a ride.