Bloodthirst in Babylon Read online

  “Rough, being out of work,” the cop said.

  Todd gripped the wheel, said nothing.

  “So you got a lead or something in Detroit, eh?” the cop asked him encouragingly. Just two old friends bullshitting.

  “Yeah, we—”

  “Not really,” Joy broke in. “But it’s a big city with lots of factories and warehouses, and we’ll do just about anything, so—”

  “Uh oh.” The cop’s tone of alarm and his troubled look as he propped his arms on the window silenced Joy. “I don’t want to jinx you folks or anything, but you’re doing it the hard way. You can’t imagine the number of people trekking out of Detroit while you-all head in. You know about the auto industry, right? Not so healthy. Used to be, folks in the city headed for Vegas or down South for work. Sun Belt, so they say. But nowadays, hell.” The cop shrugged. “Where they should be going, I guess, is India or China. You’ll make five dollars a day, but at least you got a job.”

  The cop finished with a hard chuckle at the cruel irony.

  Todd could hear his wife sucking in air and knew he’d later have to justify his desperate decision to try the so-called Motor City. A decision he’d made without a whole lot of confidence in the first place, but what else was there?

  A van rumbled past, braking so hard at the sight of the blue and red dome lights that it shimmied slightly.

  They all seemed to be waiting for Todd to say something. To somehow justify his employment-seeking strategy.

  “We’re not broke or anything,” he replied carefully, parsing the word in his mind. “We’re fine till we find something.”

  Todd knew the stereotype: the small town cop who’d bust you for vagrancy if you didn’t have cash to flash. Hell, probably no less accurate than the one about the West Virginia migrant family in desperate need of work.

  Thirty-seven dollars, most of it borrowed from his folks: that’s how fine they were.

  “What’s it you do?”

  Todd took longer than Joy to figure a response.

  “My husband drives a front-end coal loader for contour strip mining,” Joy answered for him. She sounded so proud, puffing up his grimy job description like he ran Caterpillar itself.

  “Mmm,” the cop said. “Not much call for strip mining in Detroit.”

  Asshole, Todd said, but wisely only to himself.

  “Todd can do anything,” Joy said, pushing the claim too hard. “So can I.”

  The car got quiet. Even the kids stopped fidgeting in back, though Todd could have used the distraction.

  At least three generations of Dunbar men had worked a shaft in the mountains before it got played out and closed by the EPA. Todd, who’d been the first of his family to graduate from high school, now remembered in embarrassment the family celebration that had followed that feeble accomplishment. A high school diploma and two bucks got you a cup of coffee. Long as you weren’t looking for espresso.

  “Nice car,” said the cop as though sensing Todd’s humiliation and working his fingers into the open wound.

  It sure felt like sarcasm, but the uniformed officer peering in at him looked way too earnest. He was the Pillsbury Doughboy, but with a nine millimeter on his padded hip.

  He took a step back, straightened and arched his back, spread his small pink hands to take in the Olds. “You take care of them, you’ll be driving these Detroit beasts long after your Japanese SUV’s been towed to the junkyard. How many miles?”

  Todd stared up at him.

  “On the odometer.”

  He glanced down. His hand found the discarded cigarette in his lap and he palmed it like a magician. “Uh, one-eighty-six, five…almost,” he answered after scanning the frightfully long string of numbers. Numbers he’d trained his eye not to see.

  The cop let out a burst of high laughter. “Wow. That’s a lot even for one of these road warriors.”

  Not to Todd. Generations of Dunbar men had held their rides together for decades with duct tape and prayer.

  “That kind of mileage, the problems start adding up quickly.” The young cop’s twinkly eyes seemed to take in every inch of the vehicle’s ragged interior, including its five ragged occupants. “You don’t put any money into a car like this, the brake shoes burn up, tires go bald, muffler droops, bulbs and lights blink out. Wiring troubles. Lots of things. And I’d say—” he added extra wattage to his grin—“you’re riding on all of the above.”

  Todd felt a lump of panic growing deep and malignant in his belly. It wasn’t just the toll-road savings that had put him on the back roads. He hadn’t told Joy, but he’d also wanted to avoid just this kind of attention.

  He licked his lips to wet the humid silence.

  “Truth is,” he said, seething at the need to plead his case before this plump badge, “it’s been a little hard lately scraping together the cash for repairs.”

  “No shit,” said the baby-faced cop. “Pardon the language, kids,” he added dipping his head toward the backseat where the three sat in awestruck silence. It wasn’t even close to being the first time they’d heard that word, but never before uttered to their dad by a man with a gun on his hip. “But that’s exactly the point. Without a good job…well, I’ve got a steady paycheck and there’s still stuff I need done on my car. Money’s tight for everyone, even folks with regular work, so I don’t blame you folks for the condition of this car.”

  For some reason, that lump in Dunbar’s belly just kept growing.

  “What if you did have a job? You, Mr. Dunbar. Or the both of you. However you’d want to work it.”

  The cop twitched his head like a sparrow as he tried deciding whether to settle his gaze on driver or front seat passenger.

  “You saying you know who’s hiring?” Todd hoped his doubt wasn’t as apparent to the police officer as it was to his own ears.

  The cop chuckled. “Stranger things, my friend. Stranger things. You got the whole family in here?” He dipped his head again to the backseat.

  When Joy assured him that he was indeed looking at one entire branch of the Dunbar clan, he said, “Weird thing about Babylon, Michigan, it’s probably the nation’s best-kept secret. Almost a boomtown, but I’ll deny it if word gets out. Last thing we want is to end up like Detroit…congested and dirty and crime-ridden. Know what I’m saying?”

  No, Todd hadn’t the slightest idea. He had a hard time imagining anywhere around here to be so bustling it had to be kept under wraps.

  The air shuddered as an 18-wheeler slammed past. Crissie gasped, which made Melanie giggle, and Little Todd felt suddenly free to broadcast his bathroom needs.

  Todd looked up to find the young cop with his face positioned in the driver’s window frame as though patiently awaiting a response, but Todd didn’t remember the question or even if one had been asked. He didn’t need any of this. He was twenty-eight freaking years old, with three good kids who could seriously get on his nerves at times, and a wife who was four years older and hadn’t lost the water weight from her last pregnancy. Or the two before it, for that matter. He had thirty-seven borrowed dollars and a dying car.

  There were men his age still in school, their biggest decisions being which bar to head off to when exams were taken. These other men, they could look forward to wearing suits and working in air-conditioned offices for fat paychecks and different women every night. Women who spoke good and worked out and had nice teeth and didn’t—

  “Of course, we don’t have any front-end coal-loading jobs in Babylon, but if you’re not quite so picky…”

  Todd blinked out of his frat-boy thoughts. He could feel Joy’s glaze clinging to him. A car cruised by, honked, and three or four teen boys pumped their arms out open windows in testosterone glee at the fact that, for once, it wasn’t them being pulled over.

  The elms and oaks bordering the pastures and scrubland falling off to one side of the road drooped their changing leaves to block the sun and turn mid-afternoon to premature evening. He saw a tree with a faded orange ‘X’ s
prayed on it, pointing out the presence or threat of Dutch elm disease. Someone had forgotten, decades ago, to cut it down, but it looked healthy enough to Todd.

  “Thanks, but we’re moving on,” he said, avoiding eye contact with his wife.

  At some point she’d lit another cigarette and now the smoke was drifting under his nose and making him itch for one of his own. He wished he hadn’t tossed it aside, the one in his lap.

  “To Detroit,” the cop said, sounding like he still found it hard to believe.

  Todd nodded. To Detroit, simply because it was a one-tank distance from their last wasted stop. No hot rumors this time, no inkpen-circled help-wanted ads, no nothing except pure desperation and a stubborn determination to not return to West Virginia without at least a glimmer of hope.

  “Yeah, Detroit,” Todd muttered.

  “Well that’s alright,” the cop said graciously, as though forgiving a personal affront. “Thought you folks could have used a sure thing, but I was wrong. And for all I know the Ford plant’s hiring or you find yourself some construction work. What do I know except what I read? Nothing. I keep hearing bad news, but I haven’t actually been there. And it’s only a couple hours away. You might be able to get someone from town to run you up there for not much more than gas money.”

  The hard lump in Todd’s stomach moved just slightly.

  “What?” Joy asked before he could.

  The cop smiled, but said nothing. His eyes found Todd’s, and Todd knew he was waiting to be asked the obvious. If he could have avoiding giving the son-of-a-bitch the satisfaction, he would have.

  But he dry-swallowed his resentment and said, “Why would we need a ride?”

  The cop raised both hands as though in supplication. “Well, because of the condition of this Olds, of course. What is it, a ninety-one? Ninety-two? Jesus, let’s face it, Mr. Dunbar, you’re driving a road menace and a rattletrap threat to your entire family. I wouldn’t be doing my job if I didn’t insist on you first completing a shopping list of repairs before you hot-tail it out of here. But something tells me you can’t exactly whip out that battered wallet of yours and slap the proper change on the counter. Am I wrong?”

  Thirty-seven dollars, Todd repeated to himself. That wouldn’t quite cover the cost of opening the hood.

  “Todd,” Joy said softly, like she was just sitting there waiting for him to solve everything.

  “Don’t you worry, ma’am,” said the cop. “I’m just trying to help, here.”

  Todd felt his fingers tightening on the steering wheel. He stared at the faded sign outside the windshield. It made him hungry for an ice cream stand that must have disappeared years ago, and which he couldn’t afford even if it still existed. But it sure would have been nice to be able to take the kids there and watch their eyes light up at the biggest fucking whipped cream-covered banana floats they’d ever seen.

  He listened to insects screeching in the weeds outside Joy’s rolled-down window, and felt the sweat trickling down his face, tickling his neck, crawling into his shirt. There was something wrong here. Something badly wrong, but he couldn’t put his finger on it.

  “Tell me again about those jobs in town,” his said, voice devoid of emotion.

  “What I could do, I could send for a tow truck from Zeebe’s. Jim’ll take good care of you. Then I’ll drop you folks off at a motel with real cheap rates and she won’t collect till you cash your first paycheck. In the meanwhile, I’ll make a call to a guy owns a small, corrugated packaging shop on Sennett Street, which is where the factories are. What I heard, he’s looking to pay maybe twelve, fifteen an hour to start. Not a fortune, but you don’t need any experience and he’s eager to hire.”

  The cop leaned further in the window, if that was possible. “There might even be a town job for you, ma’am. Seems I recall one of the city’s departments needing someone to answer phones, but I’m not promising. You can answer phones, can’t you?”

  Joy nodded with such zest that Todd felt the car wobble.

  Staring straight ahead, he said, “Maybe we’ll stay for a few days.” Like he had a choice in the matter. “Only till we get the car fixed and the repairs paid for.”

  It was important to maintain the illusion of being able to accept or reject the terms placed before him.

  “Absolutely,” the cop agreed.

  They beckoned the kids from the back of the car, Todd shushing each puzzled query. They grabbed suitcases from the trunk, Todd trying his best to block the worst dings and scuffs from view.

  The cop opened his own trunk and carefully tucked the pitiful load inside it.

  “I’m going to get right on the radio to Jim Zeebe and have him come out here and hook you up so you don’t have to worry none about your car just sitting here.”

  The cop held open the passenger door with the legend, ‘Babylon, Michigan Police Department,’ in white against the black panel, and they all piled in, Joy and Little Todd in front, Todd with the girls chattering excitedly in back. A ride in a police car: the thrill of their young lives.

  “Marty McConlon,” said the uniformed driver.

  “Huh?”

  “My name.”

  The radio crackled ominously in the space between the cop and Joy. Todd noticed that Little Todd wasn’t buckled in, but, due to the absence of the third belt, sitting on Joy’s lap. He was surprised that a police officer would allow that.

  The squad car did a sharp U-turn that made the kids squeal, then turned down an asphalt road off of the highway, a road that Todd hadn’t noticed before. Darrow Road, the sign read. The hard lump in his stomach made itself known once again when he saw the rusted sign just on the side of this new road: Babylon, 5 miles.

  Now why would a Babylon cop have flagged them down that far out of his jurisdiction?

  Chapter Two

  Paul Highsmith tried to avoid gawking like a tourist as he stood in front of the four-story arched entrance to the Penobscot Building on Fort and Griswold in downtown Detroit. Its immense bronze, limestone, granite and glass face twinkled in the cloud-covered sunlight, its straight-edge styling an ode to Art Deco and the Roaring Twenties. Paul could smell the silty Detroit River blocks away. He’d had an office within walking distance for years and used to love making excuses to visit what had at one time been America’s eighth tallest building—all forty-seven stories of it.

  When someone bumped him and scurried past, Paul brushed his hand against his wallet, reassuring himself it was still there. Old habits. It broke his reverie and he pushed his way in.

  Again, he had to downplay his appreciation for the familiar marble-lined corridors, the rich mahogany woodwork and soaring ceilings, all of which seemed to impress no one else in the workday crowd jostling him left and right in their race for the elevators.

  It had only been eight months since his final commute to downtown Detroit’s commercial district and barely two since the move to Babylon, but he already missed this. It felt good to be in a linen suit in a big city again. A city that was, hopefully, still big enough for him to go unobserved by former co-workers and associates.

  No, he didn’t miss everything back here, but certainly the architecture. The city flair.

  The elevator took him to the thirty-sixth floor and the offices of Knoll Sullivan/Weldman Group LLP. Floor-to-ceiling glass, polished concrete floors, exposed brick walls and pounded copper and tin highlights. When he’d started coming here, everything had been rainforest hardwoods, plush Oriental carpets, rich Corinthian leather. But the finest comfort had given way to iron foundry edge at a point whose beginnings had escaped him. The battered red brick looked like it had been torn out of a road, only to be installed over the ivory grasscloth and smoothly plastered walls he’d known previously.

  He didn’t recognize the receptionist, though the smile and youthful appeal were familiar fixtures at such firms. It felt funny having to give up his name and tell this strange young woman that he had an appointment to see Freddie Brace.

  “
Thank you, Mr. Highsmith,” she said. “I’ll tell Mr. Brace you’re here.”

  Mr. Brace? As their surrounding had grown more proletarian in appearance, it seemed that the culture had formalized.

  He felt slightly distressed in the distressed leather chair he sank deeply into while waiting. People came and went, some vaguely familiar, but there was no sign of the one face he most needed—and dreaded—to see.

  “Hey, old man,” said Freddie, who came out to get him in only a few minutes. He sounded as heartily British as ever, that clipped, over-enunciated way of discarding his Alabama-by-way-of-Africa roots.

  He wore summer-weight wool slacks and a pullover cotton shirt, both in a shade of black that complemented his cocoa skin tones. The tight, short-sleeved shirt actually made him look buff despite his narrow shoulders, a feat suit and tie had never accomplished. Maybe there was something to the new fashion, after all.

  Paul walked down a meandering hallway and into an airy office where he was directed to a chair so deep he didn’t know how he’d ever extract himself from it. Lights streamed in through windows high enough up the face of the building that the sun was only nine or ten miles away. No bother; it was tinted glass.

  Freddie took a similarly overstuffed chair on the opposite side of a copper and glass coffee table that looked heavier than Paul’s car.

  “Nice suit,” said the lawyer after they settled in. It was hard to say whether the line was ironic or not. With him, it could go either way.

  After Paul declined the offer of coffee or tea or bottled water, Freddie took a longer look and said, “You look good.”

  Had it come to that? At just fifty-two, was he already to the point of being complimented for his apparent health and relatively slow rate of decay?

  “You do, too,” he told his lawyer.

  That was followed by more small talk, questions about the welfare of Darby and Tuck, baby pictures peeled from his wallet and shown to the no-doubt disinterested bachelor. Comments about common acquaintances. None of it could distract Paul from his purpose for being here. Today, he was the client, not the Detroit office of Boston-based Anchor/Tatum Financial Services, the deep-pocketed firm to which he’d devoted his defunct career.