Justice for All (The Outcast Book #1) Page 8

  “Yeah, so?”

  “I’m not judging you, Robin. That’s not my job.”

  “Then what are you doing?”

  “I want to help you through this. Losing one parent is difficult, but you’ve lost both of yours. For a girl your age—”

  “You think it’d be easier if I were a boy?”

  “No, of course not. I’m only saying for a young person it’s very traumatic to lose a parent.”

  “Especially when that parent is executed on live TV.”

  “Is that how you think of it, as an execution?”

  “Assassination if you think that’s better. Madame Crimson wanted to kill Louie Heine and Daddy happened to be in the way.”

  “The police never found any evidence of Madame Crimson’s involvement, did they?”

  I snort again. Carol had told me the same thing after months they were supposedly investigating the explosion at the courthouse. “Of course not. The whole world saw what she does to witnesses who try to snitch on her. You really think anyone would come forward after that?”

  “I see. You hate Madame Crimson, don’t you?”

  “Yes.”

  “Do you want to kill her?”

  “Yes,” I say without hesitation.

  “This man on the subway, did you imagine he was Madame Crimson?”

  “No. He was just a warm-up.”

  Dr. Tyrell shifts uncomfortably in his chair. He has gotten a lot more than he bargained for with this. “Are you planning to do something, Robin?”

  “Not yet.” Shrink appointments are supposed to be confidential, but I don’t want to risk him blabbing to Carol or anyone else.

  “That’s good. Madame Crimson is a very dangerous person. You know that better than a lot of people.”

  “She’s not invincible.”

  “I hope you’re not going to do anything foolish, Robin. You might not think it matters, but I’m sure your sister loves you very much.”

  “Maybe.”

  “Don’t you think your sister loves you?”

  “Right now I’m more a nuisance to her than anything. I mean, she had to postpone her graduation to take care of me. She has to work at Starbucks so she can pay the bills.”

  “You think she resents you for that?”

  “I don’t know. You’d have to ask her. She could use a shrink with all the stress she’s under.”

  “I may get a chance to talk to her. For now let’s focus on you. Don’t you think your sister would miss you if something happened to you?”

  “I’m not going to kill myself.”

  He gestures to the newspaper again. “Risky behavior like this suggests otherwise.”

  “It wasn’t much of a risk.”

  “We’re almost out of time for today, but I hope I can see you again on Monday.”

  “We going to do all the tests then?”

  “Yes. I think that would be a good idea. In the meantime, I hope you don’t do anything too rash.”

  “I’m not planning on it,” I lie. We make small talk—Dr. Tyrell doing most of the talking—until Carol shows up again. I go out to the car so she can talk to the doctor in private.

  When Carol comes back out to the car, I wonder how much Dr. Tyrell told her about our session. As we start down the road, she says, “Dr. Tyrell likes you. He thinks under all this angst there’s a good kid.”

  “It’s not ‘angst.’ And it’s not a phase.”

  “If you say so. Did I ever tell you what I was like when I was sixteen? I used to wear the long hippie skirts and had hair down to my ass. I went vegan for a while too.”

  “What made you join the fascist establishment?”

  “I thought I could change things from the inside. What a joke, right?”

  “Yeah,” I say but neither of us laughs. I look straight ahead and think about tonight. With this morning’s developments I’m sure Jessica is going to watch me like a hawk. It’ll be almost impossible to sneak out. “If I tell you something, will you promise not to tell Jessica?”

  She studies me for a moment and then nods. “It’ll be our secret.”

  “I overheard something…on the train. The Star of Panama is coming into the docks at eleven o’clock. I think there’s something illegal on board.”

  “You overheard this on the train?”

  “Yeah. Some big fat Italian guy talking too loud on his phone.”

  “Uh-huh. This wouldn’t have anything to do with someone shaking down Frankie Lutz and Tiny Dashner, would it?”

  “Who?”

  “Don’t worry, I haven’t told your sister. She’d have a conniption if she found out. My sources on the street mentioned a girl in black took those guys down. No one got a look at your face, but when I saw the newspaper this morning I put the pieces together.”

  “Good detective work.”

  She stops at a red light and then glares at me. “This isn’t a game, Robin. Those guys are bad news. Even worse are the guys they’re connected to.”

  “Like Madame Crimson.”

  “That’s right. I know what she did to your father was terrible, but all this is going to do is get you killed.”

  “Maybe if you did your job, I wouldn’t have to.”

  “I’m doing my job the way your father would want—within the law. That’s what you should do.”

  “Fine. I gave you a tip. You going to do anything?”

  “I’ll look into that boat and see what I can find, but you have to promise you’re going to stay home tonight. No sneaking out.”

  “I doubt Jessica will let me.”

  “Promise me, Robin.”

  “Fine, I promise,” I say, but I make sure to cross my fingers behind my back like when I was a kid. Someone has to do something about Madame Crimson’s shipment and if Carol won’t, I will.

  Chapter 11

  The rest of the day I have to clean the house from top to bottom while Jessica supervises. As if I haven’t spent enough of this week already sweeping floors and scrubbing toilets. “Don’t you have any other ideas for punishment?” I ask as I scrub the grout in the shower.

  “I can’t beat you and your room is full of electronics, so this is the best I can think of,” Jessica says. She flips the page of a magazine to rub it in that she’s not doing any work. “The house needs some cleaning anyway.”

  I want to tell her the house would be fine if she got off her butt once in a while to clean, but that would make things worse. I keep working until my warden decides to let me have a break for dinner at six o’clock. Jessica warms up a couple of French bread pizzas in the oven. She dumps one on a plate for me and then sets a glass of water in front of me; no soda for the naughty girl.

  “So what did Carol tell you about the shrink?” I ask.

  “She said you were being ornery as usual.”

  “Did she actually use the word ‘ornery?’”

  “This isn’t a joke, Robin. We’re trying to help you.”

  “Maybe I don’t need help.”

  “Sure. I should let you get into more fights on the train.”

  “What’s the big deal? Nothing happened to me.”

  Jessica shakes her head. “Whatever. Just eat your pizza. Then you can get started on the basement.”

  I’m a little worried Jessica will notice something odd about the basement, especially when she runs her hand over the punching bag. She gives it a whack that doesn’t even make a dent. “Should drag this old thing up to the road.”

  “It can wait a few days, can’t it?” I ask as I pretend to sort through a box of old records. “Garbage day is Wednesday. No sense leaving it out there for days.”

  “Uh-huh.” She hits the bag again. “Maybe I should keep it. Take out my frustrations created by some little brat.”

  “Who, me?”

  Jessica doesn’t say anything; she just punches the bag hard enough to make a dent. She sighs and then brushes some dust off of Daddy’s old police radio. She flips the switch that turns it on. The radio co
mes to life, announcing a robbery at a liquor store in Koreatown. That’s not anything connected to Madame Crimson; she doesn’t bother with small-time stuff like that.

  Jessica keeps the radio on as we go through the old junk in the basement. A lot of it we moved down here after Daddy died so we wouldn’t have those little reminders of him all over. She reaches into a box to pull out the case for one of Daddy’s medals. She flips the case open to stare at the medal inside.

  I’m not prepared for her to scream and then throw the case across the basement. She collapses to her knees and then starts to sob. I rush over to put an arm around her shoulders. “Hey, come on, what’s wrong?”

  “It’s not fair!” she bawls. “Daddy was so good. Why did he have to die?”

  “Because he was good,” I say. “A lot of people in this town don’t like good cops.”

  “And that bitch is still running around free. It’s not fair!”

  “I know it’s not.” I can’t remember the last time Jessica broke down like this. Even when Daddy died she didn’t let herself cry like this; she tried to be strong for me. “Life isn’t fair.”

  “Why did he have to do it? Why did he have to take that guy into the courthouse? He was a captain; he had lots of other people who could do it.”

  “He couldn’t trust anyone else. Not with something like that.”

  Jessica shakes her head. “He had to be the hero. I tried to tell him to relax, to let Carol and the others do more of the work. I mean, he would have been sixty this year. It was time for him to slow down a little. Stop pushing himself, you know? But he couldn’t. And look what happened.”

  “Jessica—”

  “He should have put us first! Not his stupid job.”

  “Maybe he was doing it for us. So the city wouldn’t be run by bad people anymore.”

  “Yeah, right.”

  “Come on, let’s go upstairs. This stuff can wait a little longer.”

  “Fine.” Jessica sniffles as she gets to her feet. “Thanks, kid.”

  “What’s a little sister for?”

  “Mostly for giving me a headache,” she says, but with a smile.

  We go upstairs again. I make some coffee for us to drink as we watch TV. I keep an eye on the clock. The closer it gets to eleven, the antsier I get. Jessica doesn’t seem to notice; she’s still recovering from her little tantrum in the basement.

  At a couple of minutes to eleven I say, “I think I left my phone down in the basement.” It’s the only excuse I can come up with. Jessica just nods. I take that as tacit approval to go downstairs.

  The police radio is still on. As I pretend to rifle through the crap in the basement I listen for some indication that the cops are descending upon the docks to arrest Madame Crimson’s people. By five minutes after eleven there still isn’t anything. “Goddamn it, Carol,” I mutter. She probably didn’t take my warning seriously. That or she’s too scared of Madame Crimson to do anything about it.

  Since she won’t do anything, I’ll have to. I look around the basement until I find a wrench that should make a decent weapon. It’s the best I can find down here. I tuck the wrench into the waistband of my shorts and then crawl out the window. Jessica is going to be really pissed at me, but I don’t care. This is more important than her feelings.

  ***

  I have enough money on me for a cab to take me to near the docks. I don’t ask the driver to get me too close or else he might get suspicious if he reads the papers. I hand a twenty to him and then get out to start looking around for The Star of Panama. I wish I could have brought the police radio along with me to keep checking on the situation, but I’ll have to assume the deal is going down without any police interference.

  There are a number of big ships docked right now, but only one with armed guys on the deck. I duck behind a shipping container before anyone can see me. I’m not sure what I can do with just a wrench. The best idea I can come up with is to try to get some of the goons alone and pick them off one at a time.

  That’s a lot easier said than done. I peek around the corner of a shipping container to see a pair of guards loitering around. I take the wrench out of my shorts and then throw it a few feet. It makes enough noise that the guards look up. One nudges the other and says, “Go check it out.”

  I wait against the shipping container for the guard to get closer. Without the wrench all I have are my hands and feet. At this point I really wish I hadn’t been so stupid as to lose my gun last night. Though a gun would be way too noisy; I’d end up with a dozen goons coming after me.

  The guard starts to round the corner. I grab his left arm to swing him against the shipping container. I’m lucky that he isn’t wearing a helmet as his face smacks against the metal of the container. While he’s dazed, I take the machine gun from his right hand. I hit him in the back of the head with the butt of the rifle. He drops to the ground, knocked out cold.

  I check to see what other weapons he’s carrying. Madame Crimson must have something big going on as this guy is carrying a knife with a twelve-inch blade, a pistol, and a half-dozen grenades. I strip the guy’s padded vest off so I can carry his arsenal.

  By the time I’ve armed myself, the other guard is coming this way. “Dave? You taking a leak or something, man?”

  I wait for the guard to get around the corner and then press the barrel of the pistol to his head. I put a finger to my lips to indicate he should be quiet. He lets his machine gun drop and then puts up his hands. I motion for him to step around the corner. He sees Dave lying on the ground, but still doesn’t say anything.

  “How many of you are there?” I ask him.

  “I don’t know.” I press the gun tighter against his temple. “I don’t know! Like twenty maybe.”

  “Is Madame Crimson here?”

  “The boss? Hell no. She wouldn’t come down here for something like this.”

  “Arleigh Carr is here, right?”

  “Of course he is. He always oversees the shipments.”

  “What’s on the boat?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “Don’t lie to me.”

  “Look, kid, I’m just hired muscle, all right? They don’t tell me what they’re doing.”

  “Fine. Get down on the ground.”

  “You ain’t gonna shoot me, are you?”

  “Not unless you give me reason to.”

  The guard wastes no time dropping to his knees. I take his weapons from him. He has a set of zip ties amongst his stuff that I use to tie his hands. For a gag I use the knife to slice off one of his sleeves. That should keep him from causing any more trouble.

  “See you around,” I say and then set out to find some more guards.

  The machine gun starts to get heavy after a few minutes. I think about ditching it, but it would probably be better than the pistol if there’s a firefight. Then I wouldn’t have to worry about being accurate.

  I peek around another shipping container to see two more guards. One is smoking a cigarette while the other blabs about the Renegades’s pitching rotation. “Psst,” I hiss.

  The guard stops talking. “You hear something?”

  “Just your mouth.”

  I hiss at them again. “There’s something out there.”

  “Probably a rat or something.”

  “I’m going to check it out.” I brace myself for him to come around the corner. I do like I did with the second guard, putting my pistol to his temple as he gets around the corner. Again I put my finger to my lips.

  Whatever Madame Crimson pays these guys, it’s not enough for them to be very bright or very loyal. I have the third guard tied up and gagged within two minutes. From what the other said, there’s only about seventeen more.

  The guard with the cigarette tosses it to the ground and then starts to come my way. I wait for him to come around the corner like the others. Just as he’s about to round the corner, though, he stops. I hold my breath as I wait for him. He’s not as dumb as the others. Instead of blindl
y rounding the corner, he bolts past the corner with his machine gun at the ready.

  I have to throw myself to the ground as he opens fire. From my belly I fire the pistol. I’ve never fired a gun before, so I’m not ready for the way it bucks in my hand. My shots go wide, but it’s enough to get the guard running for cover. As he does, he shouts into the radio, “There’s someone here! Get some backup here, ASAP!”

  I’m in trouble now. He’ll have a bunch more guards converging on his position. I look around for cover and then see rungs on the side of the shipping container. I tuck the pistol in my belt before I scramble up the rungs, to the top of the container. I flatten myself on my belly while reaching for one of the grenades I took off of the first guard.

  I try not to breathe as I hear more guards heading my way. The one who got away from me shouts, “I don’t know! It’s some kid. She’s got one of our guns at least.”

  As the guards consult with each other about what to do, I drag myself along the roof of the container until I’m at the edge. Then I pull the pin on the grenade and toss it. The grenade lands right in their midst. I close my eyes and put my fingers in my ears as it goes off. I hear screams that make me think of what happened at the courthouse.

  When the smoke clears, the guards are writhing on the ground. I’m not sure if any of them are dead. At the moment it doesn’t matter. The noise from the grenade is going to bring more of them running. I crawl along the top of the shipping container to wait to spring another ambush.

  Three of them are coming around a corner when I drop another grenade. It goes off, bringing another round of screams. Among these screams, one of the guards shouts, “She’s up there!”

  “Shit,” I mutter to myself. I scramble to my feet and then start to run along the surface of the container. I hear clanging to indicate someone is coming up to join me.

  The containers are close enough that I can jump from one to another. I briefly land on my feet, but then my knees buckle and I topple forward. As I’m getting back up, I hear a gunshot.

  If you’ve never been shot before, it hurts. A lot. The bullet tears through my right thigh to send me back onto my knees. I roll onto my back to fire my machine gun blindly. This buys me a few seconds in which I can get back to my feet and start limping.