Mission Road (Tres Navarre #6)(58)

We talked about the future.

I was going to Texas A&M to major in English.

Ralph and Frankie had a good laugh over that.

Ralph was disdainful of college. He was going to go into business and make millions. In truth, he’d already been in business for years, “finding merchandise” for Alamo Heights students. If we wanted a new Walkman, or a watch, or a James Avery charm bracelet, we knew to talk to Ralph first. His locker had better prices than the mall.

“What about you, Frankie?” Ralph asked. “Dad get you into Harvard?”

Immediately, Frankie’s mood turned sour.

I doubt Ralph paid any attention to GPAs or college admissions, but I’d heard the rumors. I knew that despite Guy White’s sizable bank account and lofty expectations for his son, Frankie had gotten in nowhere. With his grades and his terrible discipline record, he’d graduated only by the slimmest of margins.

“SAC,” Frankie grumbled.

We both stared at him. San Antonio College, derisively known as San Pedro High, had an unfair reputation as the bottom rung on the local education ladder. It was, in our teenage minds, only one step up from a career at McDonald’s.

Ralph burst out laughing. “SAC? What the hell for? You don’t need to work.”

Frankie took another swig of tequila. He shifted his weight and the Skycar bobbed back and forth precariously. “Punishment.”

His face was scary in the dark—pale and brutal, his hair deathly white.

“Man,” Ralph sympathized, “if I had your dad—”

“You’d dump him in a trash can,” Frankie growled. “Yeah, that’d be nice. And you’d still have your mom, too.”

Ralph didn’t say anything.

The night wind smelled of fish spawn and lantana from the Sunken Gardens somewhere below us in the dark. Headlights glowed on McAllister Freeway. A line of traffic was still snaking its way down Hildebrand from Trinity University, where we’d had our graduation ceremony—all the good students who’d stayed for the reception with their families, unlike us.

Guy White had been at that party, no doubt, giving the other parents strained smiles, looking around for his errant son, probably contemplating what punishment he would have to inflict on Frankie when he came home.

“I want to kill him,” Frankie mumbled. “I wish to hell—”

“Hey, man.” Ralph punched him in the shoulder. “Don’t worry about it. Tres and me will always be around for you, right?”

Ralph looked at me. He knew damn well I was out of the picture. I couldn’t wait to leave town. Even if I’d been staying, Frankie White was the last person I’d want to help.

But the way Ralph talked, you could almost buy into his optimism. He made everything sound so reasonable. He described his business plans, said Frankie could help him out.

Ralph would open some pawnshops. He loved talking to people. He loved hearing their problems and pricing their most precious possessions. How much for a wedding ring? How much for the guitar that was supposed to take a kid to L.A.?

“Pawning is life, vatos,” he said with a grin. “You want to understand somebody, look at what he’s willing to give up.”

Sometimes he would even save his customers’ lives. Front them a little cash, keep the loan sharks away. Even if it was only for a few days, Ralph could do some good while he made a profit. What could be better than that?

I’m pretty sure Frankie heard very little of what Ralph said, but the tone of Ralph’s voice seemed to calm him down. We sat drinking in our rusty Skycar, Ralph and I contemplating the future, Frankie contemplating murder, until the cable lurched and the Skyride started moving again, carrying us down through a hundred feet of darkness toward the end of the ride.

THE CLOCK ON FRANKIE’S BED STAND blinked midnight.

From the wall behind my head, I heard tapping. I wasn’t sure at first, but then recognized the beat. “La Bamba.”

Ralph.

I got out of bed. The knocking was coming from behind a Guatemalan tapestry. I draped it over the bedpost to get it out of my way, then ran my hand over the wall. Plaster and sheetrock. I tapped until I found a spot without a stud.

I went back to Frankie’s closet and got his baseball bat.

What the hell.

I gave the wall a good battering-ram strike, dented it pretty nicely.

The guard didn’t open the door. Maybe he was used to prisoners throwing tantrums. Maybe he was just scared I’d ask him for water again.

The second hit, the aluminum head of the bat went into the wall and ripped through insulation.

The third whack, I felt something give on the other side.

I put my face down at the hole.

From the other side, Ralph’s voice said, “Al Capone’s vault. May I help you?”

I couldn’t see him very well—just a shadow against more shadows. Still, it was reassuring to hear his voice.

“Maia get away all right?” I asked.

“Yeah. I’m pretty sure.”

“So what do you think?”

“Besides the fact that we’re totally screwed?”

“We still got tomorrow,” I said. “Let White get some sleep. I bet the old bastard will be chipper at breakfast.”

Silence. The hole smelled of chalk and dust and mildew.