Summer sizzles, p.9
Summer Sizzles, page 9
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Callum
For most of his life, Callum McCauley relied on one person to unfuck his life: Joanie Miller. When his loser dad beat the shit out of him, Joanie wiped away tears and blood, staining her own shirts in the process.
In grade school, when the principal expelled Callum for destruction of property, nine-year-old Joanie proudly took the rap, a gleam in her angel-devil green eyes.
At seventeen, when drugs and alcohol grabbed him by the throat, Joanie’s Jesus-now-what? attitude pulled him out of the gutter, cleaned him up, and pointed him in the right direction—which was a shove toward the high school so he could get his dipshit act together long enough to earn a diploma.
And at nineteen, when he was busted with heroin, eleven thousand dollars in cash, and three semi-automatic military-grade weapons, while speeding in a stolen vehicle, Joanie’s adult-like mannerisms and a strongly-worded letter convinced the judge to go lenient.
Callum’s sorry ass to transferred from the Texas State Penitentiary system to the United States Army.
It wasn’t so bad. They shaved his unruly reddish-blond hair, gave him a gun, a paycheck, and called him a grunt.
Either way he was going to get a uniform and three squares a day, and it turned out he was good at pointing weapons at other people. The Army put this skill to a lot of use.
He used to keep a list, but Callum stopped counting when the confirmed kills surpassed the misses.
He and Joanie were as different as they were inseparable. Trailer park trash has a way of doing that to hungry gutter kids. Runt-size Joanie’s ambition was as large as her imagination could conjure within in the pages of a book; Callum’s was doing whatever he could to stay out of juvie while simultaneously reaching for what was most likely to put him there in the first place. Fighting. Drugs. Weapons. Whichever was easiest at any given time.
On days where Joanie wasn’t pissed at him, she’d read at her window, her words loud enough for him to hear from the trailer next door. Didn’t matter that the dumpster sitting in the back made it nearly unbearable, the smell of rotten eggs biting the back of his throat, with roaches by the thousands milling about, Joanie’s earthy, laughing voice was his salvation.
His only salvation.
He’d know her voice anywhere.
He might have been the older of the two, but she was the strong one; the one who owned a compass that pointed true north. Even if Joanie’s true north led to a pile of dog turd, it was good enough for him.
Of course Callum loved her.
Always had, and always would, but when she got a college scholarship and moved away, his moral compass evaporated when Joanie left him. She kissed him on the cheek after he walked her to the bus stop, so that helped, and she promised to write even though he couldn’t read worth a damn.
At boot camp, and the years following, he’d find a letter waiting for him. As he read her words, he’d fantasize about being her hero. He’d be the man of her dreams.
Of course that never happened.
Clever and beautiful, Joanie Miller was her own heroine, saving herself from abuse and neglect. One of her last letters, which came when he was stationed in Germany, mentioned she was getting married, and could he get his dumb ass back to the States to attend the wedding.
Did he? Of course not. Instead he volunteered to redeploy, and found himself in the jungles of South America, hunting FARC criminals while Joanie hunted for the perfect wedding dress to wear down the aisle and marry a man not named Callum McCauley.
That was thirty years ago.
Sometimes he wondered about her, which did him no favors. He’d chase away memories with a bottle of whiskey or a dozen lines of coke, or both. Women helped, but not usually. They tried to fix him but gave up when it was like trying to repair shattered glass. Not that it was their fault. He was amazed anyone wanted to try.
A man can change in thirty years, and men like Callum who owned mercenary instincts honed by years living on the edge usually turned to gristle and bone, lean with hard experiences, surviving on a heart that was more mechanical than sentimental. He worked for whoever paid him the most: the good, the bad, and the in-between, which was most folks.
It was best this way. Maybe one day he’d get a dog, take it easy for a while. Maybe after the current job.
He was in Miami to talk about an immunity deal, earn a few bones, and meet up with the DA to rat out a slew of dirty cops when he figured he’d all but forgotten about Joanie Miller, and Callum was okay with this.
But when his burner cell phone rang at 1:32 on a Saturday morning and he heard her voice on the other end of the line asking him to unfuck her life, he knew it couldn’t be good. He didn’t have another thirty years to get over her again.
* * *
Joanie
Joanie Miller Bretton put down the knife and picked up the phone. Manicured fingers tapped the numbers and she wondered how many rings would it take before the call was answered.
She wasn’t alone in the kitchen, but she was the only one standing, and it was quiet. Very quiet. It wasn’t unnerving just yet. Give it a minute or two, and Joanie knew she might freak out. Especially if it went to voicemail.
It was a Friday night, the air was stiflingly hot. She’d focus on the heat, instead. Her eyes swung to the wide-open French doors, revealing an amazing view of the Golden Gate Bridge. It was the property’s main selling point. She and Teddy bought it back in January and were looking forward to the upcoming fireworks show.
The sun had just set, but the bridge was lit and it captured her attention while the phone made its outbound call. Her other hand drummed the countertop. Inches away, a handmade pottery bowl held two apples, an orange, and a browning banana.
Beside this was a black briefcase, which she glanced at, but her eyes zipped back to the banana.
She should throw it out. Only Teddy ate them.
Four rings in, the line answered.
“Go.” The voice was cigarette-gruff and hollow. Even thirty years later, she physically responded to that voice.
“Callum?” Joanie asked, shaking.
She pressed her hand flat against the countertop, waiting to see how he reacted. They hadn’t spoken since she married Teddy Bretton, an up-and-coming lawyer right out of college. But by doing so, she burned the unstable bridge that led back to Callum McCauley. Not her finest move, but a necessary one.
As a child, the desire to survive fueled Joanie’s unquenchable hunger. That hadn’t changed in the years since. Even after all their financial success, it never seemed to be enough because every time she closed her eyes she was back in that roach-infested trailer.
Back then she was a journalism major itching to travel the globe and Teddy was the best solution to satisfy that itch. It wasn’t a loving partnership, but it worked for them. They were a handsome couple and she thought they had a decent marriage.
Of course she was wrong.
Tonight, their secrets collided, which was why she found herself needing Callum.
“No names.” A heartbeat later she heard a sizzle-click. He must have lit a cigarette. Then he asked, “Where are you?”
She knew he’d recognize her voice. If anyone could help her, it would be her childhood friend, the gangly, slouching boy with the inquisitively sad, bruise-filled face who lived on the other side of the dumpster.
Of course, he was none of those things now.
As a journalist, her contacts had contacts, and she kept tabs on Callum. He could make people and things disappear. Their history would serve her well, but this wasn’t just any situation, and Joanie had no choice but to trust him with this one. In truth, there was no one else she could go to.
“San Francisco.”
“I’ll be there in seven hours.”
Joanie expelled a breath and wiped the sweat dotting her upper lip. The banana was beginning to bother her, so she tossed it in the trash.
“Okay,” she answered automatically even though the shaking got worse. Seven hours meant he was on the East Coast. Would he get here before things got worse? She eyed the bloody knife, then the briefcase. “You don’t want to know why I’m calling?”
“No.”
There was no hesitation in his voice. It terrified and soothed her.
Callum gave her additional instructions on where to meet him and ended the call after that. Wrist flicking, she placed the phone on the counter, and the click sounded like a gunshot, jolting her out of a fog. The urge to move, to run, hit her hard then.
God, it was hot, but she was freezing.
Perhaps she should close the French doors, but that’d mean stepping over Teddy.
Head angled as if he were enjoying the view, his distinguished, prone profile seemed larger than life. Any second now he was going to get up and accuse Joanie of embezzlement, blackmail, and a host of other infractions, not to mention murder.
Considering it might be one of the last times she looked at the bridge from this vantage point, it struck her as ironic that she found the view rather dazzling. It would have been better if Teddy were on the other side of the kitchen, but some things couldn’t be helped.
She needed to get going. She needed to follow Callum’s orders.
Some things change, and some things don’t. If anyone knew what to do, it would be Callum, the boy she’d been in love with since she was a brassy seven-year-old girl.
* * *
Marta
It was unlike Teddy to avoid Marta Epstein’s phone calls, even late into the evening. He was her top attorney and a damn good one. The best, in fact, though she admitted she wouldn’t want to be on his bad side.
As she picked up Teddy’s case files and reviewed the evidence for the tenth time, Marta began to doubt that their office needed anything further to convict the mayor of tax fraud and embezzlement. It was all right there, in black and white.
Whatever this new lead was, it prevented him from taking her phone call, which meant it was bad. She flipped through the file again, page by page. Nothing.
She’d go to his house, instead. They were not losing this case.
Marta jumped in her SUV and drove to Belvedere.
* * *
Callum
Bag already at the ready, he called in a few favors while leaving a note for the Miami District Attorney. A Family Emergency didn’t mean a damn thing to a man like Callum, and the DA would see through the lie, but an extra day or two wouldn’t kill the cop case, and if the immunity deal fell off the table, Callum would slip away.
It was summertime and people go shit crazy when it’s hot. Humans were the stupidest species on the planet. Callum had met his fair share of them. The DA would be busy.
Besides, Callum needed a few minutes to process what just happened.
He wasn’t often caught off guard, but his forty-seven-second phone call with Joanie torpedoed his usual even keel. Under thirty seconds would’ve been better, but he chalked it up to needing a cigarette before he could continue the conversation. He’d ditch the phone, but that was easy.
Joanie needed his help and he’d fucking scoop out his insides to get to her on time. Didn’t matter what the problem was; his feelings wouldn’t change. She could have slaughtered an entire family and he’d be there to pick up the pieces. He’d seen a lot worse. Fuck, he’d done a lot worse.
His fifty-three-year-old heart thumped like a junkyard engine that hadn’t been kicked in decades. It made him nervous, and a man who killed others for a living rarely got nervous. It was always, One more job and I’m done. He’d been saying that for a decade. Each job promised more money—money to retire.
He was an old dog with a few barks left in him. Joanie, then the Miami job, and then he’d be done.
After a line of coke and a developing tick under his eye, he boarded a friend-of-a-friend’s jet and flew to San Francisco. He needed more than seven hours to prepare himself to see her, but that was all he had.
* * *
Joanie
When you’re fifty-one, it’s good to have friends who remember what you looked like at eighteen. Callum’s memory of her would place her back when she was a constantly tanned, freckle-faced teen with crooked teeth and aggressively furled eyebrows due to the sheer number of times she yanked him out of trouble.
In Texas, kids don’t do things halfway. Callum’s personal version of trouble would fill a high school football field and Joanie’s oversized persistence in worrying over him was loyalty touched with insanity.
Strangely, it worked.
Perhaps she was a worrier by nature, but she liked to think of it as hypervigilance mixed with planning. Early on, she and Teddy decided not to have children, but it was mostly at her insistence. Joanie never had a good mother figure and presumed she’d be a bad mother herself. Childhood treatment begets adulthood behavior. It was fine and she never regretted their decision, especially now as she stood in her closet and packed.
No need to conduct an emotional conversation with nonexistent children, and after stepping over Teddy’s body to lock the French doors, she didn’t have the mental capacity to talk to anyone.
The only person who might come around was Teddy’s boss, Marta Epstein, the state’s Attorney General, and that was because he discovered new evidence on a high profile case. If she could keep Marta away for another twenty-four hours, Joanie’d be long gone.
She showered, changed, and in the night’s folding darkness, she used Teddy’s car to pull cash at an ATM. She knew not to withdraw too much; it’d raise red flags over the next couple of days, so she removed a paltry eighty bucks. She’d miss the house for its view, but no doubt she’d envision Teddy’s body lying in the kitchen, forever ruining any other enjoyment from the property.
But old worries reveal fresh ones, and Joanie was prepared to leave the country for good, only Callum told her not to leave until he did damage control.
She left the windows down as she drove three hours north toward Timber Cove. At the boat landing, she took out the pre-paid phone she bought last week, which was what she used to call Callum, and threw it in the water. Her personal phone was on her nightstand.
Foamy white crests crashed rhythmically, the spray dampening her already sweaty skin.
She loved the sound of the ocean. Joanie was thirty when she first saw the Pacific Ocean. Teddy, a West Coast native, mentioned that you don’t see the Pacific Ocean as much as experience it, and he was right.
The waves’ cadence matched her beating heart, as if it were communicating with her, and there was a moment where she wanted to walk into the water and let the ocean keep her.
When they were young and broke, they spent a weekend in Timber Cove, sailing, and when you’re married to a sailor, you become a sailor, too. Otherwise you never see your spouse.
She smiled at the memory. Joanie wasn’t the sentimental type, but she’d forgotten about Timber Cove until tonight. She came here because Callum said to get rid of the phone at a location she’d been to before, and now she was glad she did.
Maybe that’s how this would all end: sail away and let the ocean keep her.
As she turned away, she felt crushing guilt. It didn’t last long, but it was enough for the furrowed eyebrows to return. Joanie spent the drive back to San Francisco questioning whether her actions were worth it, and by the time she picked up Callum, her conscience was in the clear.
* * *
Marta
When Marta was a block from Teddy’s house, his Lexus pulled out of the driveway, and she decided to follow. If she’d had known it would be a six-hour trip, Marta would have turned around and returned to the office.
But in Timber Cove, when Joanie emerged from car and Teddy was nowhere in sight, Marta’s interest was piqued.
So she waited to see what happened next.
* * *
Callum
From the airport, he walked to Chubby’s Fire Pit BBQ food truck, which was parked near the Coyote Point Marina. The weather favored their rendezvous location. The water was gray and choppy, and it’d probably rain in less than an hour. Only diehards would be out this morning.
Given the time of day, it was deserted. The fish-scented wind buzzed in his ears. To his left, docked boats creaked and moaned in a calm swell. Seagulls squawked their morning displeasures, and on Bluff Trail, which led deeper into the recreational park, a jogger wearing earbuds zipped by without looking up. Not even the jogger’s dog noticed Callum.
Dressed like a bum, Callum McCauley easily blended into every background, which was how he liked it. No one paid attention to the homeless, but they were his most valuable resource. They saw everything. The amount of money he paid them over the years to gather information for him was in the tens of thousands.
Knowledge was a commodity he frequently exploited.
A few minutes later, Joanie’s car pulled in.
From beneath a crappy baseball cap, Callum watched Joanie’s car idle for ten minutes, which were his instructions, before he limped over and slipped into the passenger seat of her sleek car.
Of course his breath caught.
Her hair was black with threads of gray, and her clever green eyes were not quite as bright as he remembered, but otherwise she hadn’t changed. Oh sure, Joanie Miller polished up like a million bucks, and she smelled so-goddamn-amazing, but deep down she was still that petite, tough as nails eighteen-year-old he walked to the bus stop.
