Women of the Mean Streets Page 3

  Her watch alarm went off, and she silenced it. She returned the keys to the rack and headed for the back exit, noting an open door she’d missed before. She saw it led to the downstairs level and to the tuck-under garage.

  She had barely slipped into the hedge when Gordon rounded the corner of the house. Oh, shit, she thought. That was a lot closer than I intended. As he filled the gas tank, she tried to calm down. Once he had cranked up the mower, she moved through the hedge and away from Gordon Chasney’s den of iniquity.

  That was the start of it.

  *

  Over the next weeks, Ava came to believe Gordon was the most obvious man she’d ever known, so why didn’t anyone else see it? All you had to do was watch him closely, and it was clear there was something off about him. Had he been this obvious during her childhood when he’d stalked her, gained her trust, and then molested her? She wished she could remember the details better, but she couldn’t. Whenever she thought of that day—being grabbed, held down, the relentless probing—her stomach clenched and sometimes she very nearly passed out. All she knew for sure was that he’d initially been very smooth. He’d had to be, or even at age ten she would have seen his true intent.

  She watched him now as he walked briskly around the neighborhood park, his eyes glinting with interest as he surreptitiously glanced toward little girls on the swings, on the slide, twirling on the merry-go-round. Ava wanted to scream at the parents in the park. People, she wanted to say, can’t you see him? He’s a sexual predator!

  But she had no proof, and he looked completely innocent as he kept to the sidewalk, hands in his Windbreaker pockets, smiling and nodding pleasantly. Couldn’t anyone else see how his eyes followed the children like a voracious grizzly seeking flesh to devour?

  She couldn’t waste another moment worrying about perfecting a plan. He was on the prowl again, and she needed to act. If she couldn’t kill him and get away with it, there had to be another way to stop him. Luckily, her self-employment as a website designer gave her time and flexibility. Tuesday nights Gordon bowled in an eight p.m. league at the Leapfrog Lanes. No more dithering. She needed to get back in his house and take care of business.

  *

  The program Ava had installed during her first foray into Gordon’s domain yielded all sorts of good information. Every time he typed something, the spyware monitored where he surfed and what he searched for, and every keystroke he made was transmitted over the Internet to her. She knew his home and work computer passwords, banking information, credit card details, and what he’d bought online. If she wanted to, she could install a program that would allow her to update his computer remotely…but she didn’t dare use that for what she had in mind.

  Tuesday night she dressed in a long-sleeved gray shirt, black slacks, tennis shoes, and a baseball cap. When it was sufficiently dark, she drove to the side street near Gordon’s house and waited until she saw his truck turn the corner and pass her car. Show time. She gathered her courage, picked up a clipboard, and got out. She strode into his backyard as though she had every right to be there. Had anyone seen? She stood on his back porch stoop, hardly breathing, expecting someone to call out. A dog barked in the distance. Over the hedge she could see the second-story windows lit up in the house behind Gordon’s, but no one seemed to have noticed her.

  She pressed the back doorbell and heard the muffled ringing inside. The house stayed dark, and no one came to the door. After waiting one sweat-filled, oxygen-deprived moment, she put on her gloves, inserted the stolen key, and was surprised to find that Gordon hadn’t locked up when he left. She giggled nervously. All that work to get his keys, and he doesn’t even bother with security. What an arrogant man.

  Ava slipped into the house and turned on a penlight to find her way through the kitchen. He’d left a light on by the front door, and for a moment that worried her. What if he came home unexpectedly? When he parked in the garage underneath the house, she thought she’d hear the door go up and know to get out. But what if he parked on the street and came in the front door?

  In all the time she’d watched him, he’d never parked on the street, so she had to assume he’d do exactly what he always did.

  The computer was on. Did he ever turn it off? Didn’t he know that hijackers could put all kinds of spyware on his computer much more easily when he left it on? Since he went to porn sites, his computer would likely be stuffed full of bots and malware. She checked his cookie file. Sure enough, he had all sorts of problems festering. This pleased her.

  Now it was time to do the one distasteful thing she’d been avoiding. She entered keywords that she hoped would bring up kiddie porn chat lists. She knew they’d be difficult to find, that they were well hidden. But with some persistence, she expected to at least come across some Internet groups where she could advertise her plan.

  She should have set her watch alarm. So deep was she in her searching and inquiring that when she felt a strange rumble beneath her, she didn’t pay attention at first. Then far away, below, a car door slammed, and she came to her senses. She leapt from the chair, grabbed her clipboard, and tiptoed toward the kitchen.

  She heard him coming up the back stairs. Quick course correction. She ran to the front door, opened it, and pushed at the screen door. A light came on behind her. She stepped out to the porch as she peeled off her gloves. Over her shoulder, she saw Gordon’s foot as he came up into the kitchen.

  She whipped around, between the front door and the open screen, the gloves balled up in one hand. His eyes met hers, a surprised look on his face. She froze.

  “Can I help you?” he asked.

  “Cable company, sir.” She looked down at her clipboard. “I got the call that you’re having trouble with your TV reception and Internet.” She pulled down the brim of her cap and hoped it shrouded her face.

  He moved to stand in the hallway only a few feet away, wearing a puzzled look. “Isn’t nine thirty kind of late for repair work?”

  She glanced at her watch. “Dispatch said this was an emergency, and that no matter what, I was to get in and fix the problem. We work till ten, so here I am.”

  He rested a big, meaty hand against the edge of the door. His eyes looked glassy, his face relaxed. “I didn’t call.”

  She smelled beer on his breath. Maybe he wasn’t so with it after all. Heart beating fast, she lifted a page on her clipboard. “Twelve eighty-nine Birch, cable and Internet out.”

  He made a snorting sound. “Look, lady, this is twelve eighty-nine Franklin. Birch is a couple blocks thataway.” He gestured behind him with a big thumb. “Better get your ass moving if you want to fix ’em up before ten.”

  Ava stepped back and let the screen door flutter closed. “Thanks, mister.” She stumbled off the porch feeling giddy and amazed. Oh, my God. Had that really happened? She’d almost been caught. Unbelievable.

  She was hunting for a parking place in front of her apartment when she realized she’d left her penlight behind.

  *

  Ava spent the next week alternating between feeling triumphant and trying not to melt into a puddle of stress. She made herself focus on her work with her Internet accounts, but she couldn’t help thinking that her entire plan was in danger due to a damned penlight. How could she have been so stupid?

  The next Tuesday night she repeated her preparations, though every time she realized what she was contemplating, she shook, and just before she left her house, she threw up. Still, she forged on. When Gordon departed for the bowling alley, she entered the house quickly. This time he had locked the back door. Maybe he was educable after all.

  She didn’t have the penlight to guide her, but she crept through the house to the den of iniquity. A touch of her gloved hand brought up the computer screen, and it shed enough light for her to search by. She moved piles carefully and looked under the new detritus.

  The penlight wasn’t on the desk.

  On a hunch, she knelt and felt around the carpet, wincing at how dusty and crud-fl
ecked the shag was. She had almost given up when she saw a glint of silver along the front of the desk pedestal and found the penlight half-hidden in the long fibers.

  Ava pocketed the light and checked her watch. She had a lot to do, but in order to complete the transactions, she had to wait until Gordon would be on his way home. The timing would be maddeningly close, but she wouldn’t be taken unawares again.

  Over the next hour she prepared to set up a merchant account using Gordon’s credit card, built a bare-bones Internet storefront and got it ready to post, then created his very own e-mail address—gordyluvsgrrls—at a popular free service.

  The worst part was finding and downloading online photos of degraded women and girls and writing disgusting comments to advertise what was for sale in each of the packets she created to sell at the storefront. She felt guilty about using the pictures, even though justice would ultimately be done. If she had any way of knowing who the women were, she would apologize, but of course each was as anonymous as the abusers who raped and hurt them.

  Ava had just enough time to send out an advertisement to a few pervert lists before her watch alarm sounded. She went to the front window and peeked out the edge of the closed curtains. When she saw Gordon’s truck come to a halt at the stop sign down the block, she ran back to the den, sent all her creations, and waited during maddening seconds for them to be approved. The sound of the garage door cranking open set her heart into overdrive, and she mashed her lips together to stop their trembling. When the approvals to flashed on the screen, she quickly closed each program and ran to the front door before Gordon even got out of the truck. She was in her car driving away, penlight in pocket, before another minute passed.

  *

  The next week Ava went back to Gordon’s house to field orders off his merchant account. She was disgusted to see 412 orders from all over the world, totaling in excess of four thousand dollars.

  She selected U.S. customers only and used Gordon’s equipment to print out smutty photos and type up envelopes from his desk in which she enclosed photos of children, girls, and women. Before he arrived home, she had prepared thirty orders. She drove directly to a mailbox in a neighborhood far from her own and dropped in the first makeshift packets, knowing that the recipients would be furious upon receipt. They’d paid $9.95 for poor quality photos on regular laser paper. It was only a matter of time before her carefully contrived plan would blow up in Gordon’s face.

  *

  The next Tuesday night in Gordon Chasney’s house, Ava managed to mock up fifty-one packets and transfer $11,074.35 to his savings account. His gordyluvsgrrls e-mail account also had eighteen messages from outraged customers. The noose was tightening.

  She deleted her original key-logger program and other traces that she’d been on his computer. When she heard the garage door, she got away, headed to the mailbox, then went home and had her best night of sleep in years.

  *

  The following Monday, Ava opened the newspaper to see the headline she’d longed for: Local Man Arrested for Running Kiddie Porn Racket. She scanned the article. Multiple counts of mail fraud…illegal possession of child pornography…possibility of decades of imprisonment if convicted…more charges to come.

  “Aha! Gotcha, Gordy-O. You’re toast. Woo hoo!” She danced around the house, laughing with unbridled glee. Her level of elation was so great that she skipped breakfast, put on a sweat suit, and went outside to jog.

  The sun shone down upon her, and the chilly breeze wasn’t cool enough to penetrate. She quickly worked up a light sweat in a two-mile loop, and by the time she came back past the neighborhood park, her muscles were pleasantly fatigued. She stopped at a bench to stretch, and that’s when she saw him.

  Square-shouldered and beefy, the man had a hard face and predatory eyes. He strolled along the sidewalk, glancing periodically at the children frolicking on the playground equipment. He seemed particularly interested in one tiny girl who lay on her stomach over a swing, legs dangling, arms wrapped around the swing’s wood slat. Her long, golden hair nearly touched the ground as she sang a little song and periodically stuck a foot down to keep the swing moving. Ava watched the man with growing alarm.

  She wondered how long it would take to find out where he lived.

  Boomerang

  Carsen Taite

  If I hadn’t been so hungry, I might’ve asked the right questions. It wasn’t the first time my appetite clouded my common sense.

  The grainy photo only hinted at her beauty. Full blond waves tumbled down her shoulders. Bare shoulders. The sleeveless red blouse dipped low at the neck, and the row of numbers marching across her chest only partially obscured what I imagined was pure perfection. I traced a finger over the numbers as if I could erase them with my touch, and pinch the luscious breasts beneath. I felt a rush of heat between my legs and my own nipples tightened. First time a jumper turned me on. Hunger of a different kind made my mouth water. I would have this one. Without a doubt.

  “Luca, are you listening?”

  I mouthed the name on the photo before replying to the man waving a hand in my face. Diamond Collier. I rolled the name over my tongue, tasting the salty edge of anticipation.

  I tore my eyes away from Diamond and faced my potential employer. In his flannel shirt, hunting vest, and John Deere cap, Hardin Jones looked more like a cross-country trucker than one of the most successful businessmen in Dallas. I didn’t care what he looked like. He had a job for me when no one else was calling.

  “How much?” I asked.

  “Bounty’s fifty grand.”

  I would’ve been happy with a couple of thousand and Diamond as a bonus. Hot broad like her? Figured she ran up some poor soul’s credit card, maybe a few too many cosmos behind the wheel, but fifty grand meant she was in deep. One more way she wasn’t your typical jumper. I hadn’t cared before, but now I needed to know. “What’s the charge?”

  “Murder. Bond set at half a mil. She missed her first court date, and I’m not in the mood to be charitable. Surety’s not either. Find her in a week and the fee’s yours.”

  His unspoken words rang loud. After a week, I’d lose my shot and Hardin would pass the case along to another agent. I wondered why I had a shot in the first place. No one had reached out to me in weeks. Luca Bennett was persona non grata, surrounded by a cloud of suspicion, and bondsmen hated being in the spotlight. I’m a big fan of the direct approach, so I asked. “Why me?”

  “You doing anything else?”

  No need for me to answer. Hardin, along with everyone else, knew I was hurting. And too hungry to be particular. I reached for the file in his hand, and he gave it up. “All the info’s here.”

  I nodded, but kept the file closed. I’d seen all I needed to know I could do this job. Diamond Collier would be mine within the week.

  *

  I slid into a booth and waited for Maggie to notice. Seconds passed before her loud voice rang out.

  “Hey, Luca, that’s a four top. I got real customers that can fill those seats. Get your ass up here to the bar where you belong.”

  I made a show of looking around the mostly empty bar, and blew her a kiss. “Love you, too, Maggie.” I ignored her hands-on-hips, evil-eye expression and arranged the half dozen sheets from the file on the table in front of me. Maggie’s scrawny frame, stage show makeup, and blazing bottle-red hair caused some folks not to take her seriously. I always took her seriously, but I also knew I could take her. At six foot and a hundred and eighty pounds, I was Amazon to her pixie. I smiled to soften her mood. “How ’bout a beer?”

  “You paying tonight?”

  I pointed at the spread in front of me. “Put it on my tab. I got a good hand here.”

  “Sure you do, Luca. Sure you do.” Maggie shook her head and pulled a glass of her cheapest pilsner. I focused on the papers in front of me. Once I brought Diamond in, I could buy a round of the best brew for the house.

  “She looks like trouble.”

  I glan
ced up and accepted the glass Maggie offered. “You got that right.”

  “So, you got some real work? That’s good.” Maggie fingered the photo, squinting into Diamond’s eyes. I resisted a possessive urge to grab it from her. I hadn’t even begun my week with Diamond, and I wasn’t ready to give her up.

  “She looks familiar.”

  “Seen her around?”

  “Not here, but I’ve seen a picture of her.” Maggie tapped Diamond’s mug shot against the edge of the table in time with her thoughts. “Can’t place her right now, but I’ll let you know if I remember. Hungry?”

  I shifted easily with her non sequitur, and nodded. I was hungry, but mostly I just wanted her to let go of my photo. She released the picture and headed to the kitchen, barking out an order along the way. She didn’t ask me what I wanted, but I’d eat whatever she brought. I always did.

  I set the photo on the far inside corner of the table and focused on the rest of the paperwork. I passed over the standard court notice and the warrant for failure to appear. I’d need them when I turned her in, but they wouldn’t tell me anything about where to find her. The only other paper in the file was the multipage form Diamond and the surety had signed to spring her in the first place. Hardin’s big bold handwriting in the middle of the typewritten form jumped off the page. The bond amount: five hundred thousand dollars. Next to Diamond’s flowing signature at the bottom, someone had scrawled her last known address. I flicked a glance at the name of the surety, curious about who had a half a million in collateral to spare. I sucked in a breath. Yuri Pretov.

  A plate clattered onto the table. “Now I remember where I’ve seen that woman,” Maggie declared. I already knew what she was going to say. I didn’t remember seeing Diamond’s picture or hearing her name, but like everyone else in Dallas, I’d read about the infamous murder of Pretov’s rival, Leo Kaminsky, and the arrest of Pretov’s woman while she was still standing over his body with a freshly fired gun in her hand. Maggie reached for the photo again, and I smacked her away. She slid into the booth across from me and shoved the plate toward me. “Eat.”