Nickel Plated Page 8

  We rode side by side. She’d gotten out what she’d needed to, and now we could get back to this thing. What I told her was true: dead or alive, we were going to find Shelby.

  Chapter 18

  We stopped at the bridge and parked our bikes. Unlike the last time, we didn’t hop down the hill. Instead, we looked up. Telephone lines, just like we knew there’d be; we’d followed them here. I climbed down the little hill to the creek and looked up. There was a pole right in my line of sight, and I wasn’t five feet from where I’d found the hair band. If someone had been up there, they would have known how secluded this spot was. Everything was coming together in my head. Not the why yet—the only why I knew would point to a sexual predator, and I didn’t want to think that way unless there was no other solution. The how, though, I was getting all of that.

  Arrow was just staring at me from the road, and I called her down. She came down the hill with a sure-footedness I hadn’t seen the last time when she’d offered me a hand. I sure hope when I’m older I understand women better than I do now. When she was next to me we did the creek walk again, hurried this time. What we were looking for wasn’t in the woods; it was on the other side of them.

  We walked past where the shoe had been found and where both of us were convinced Shelby had been dragged against her will. Little sounds came before sights, just small hints of noise as the modern world conquered the sanctity of the woods. We left the trees together and saw what I knew we’d find: telephone poles and wires going in all directions, as far as the eye could see.

  “You think someone who works on those lines did it.”

  “I’m convinced of it.”

  “Why? Couldn’t someone have just seen her and decided to grab her?”

  I shook my head.

  “Anyone that impulsive is going to have gotten caught before, probably more than once. This guy is used to people seeing through him. He does his work where people live, and he’s not a distraction—he’s barely an afterthought. He would have time to get ready, to see what people were doing, find the best spot, time, and candidate. He got all of his ducks in a row while the people that live here went about their lives. He was invisible; he always is when he’s in uniform. I bet he never even considered that part of that uniform could lead us to him.”

  “Can we look on the sex offender database for him?”

  “He won’t be there. Telephone repair work would be like a government job—if you have a record, you aren’t getting hired. I imagine if we could look at youth records we’d find him, but those aren’t for our eyes.”

  “So what are we going to do?”

  “I don’t know yet. I need to think. It’s close, just like seeing the telephone lines. I just need to put the rest of the pieces together.”

  “Do it soon.”

  “I need to go home.”

  “So do I.”

  She gave me a sad smile—home was the last place she wanted to be. A part of me wished I could have her over to the house and order a pizza. It was impossible, the survivor side of me screamed, no one can know where you live. Trust can get you killed. Survivor always won.

  “I’ll ride with you home.”

  We pedaled slowly, dawdling as we made our way back to Arrow’s shattered home. I had nothing to say on the subject, and she never challenged me to talk. I could feel the skin around my eye puffing up. I’d ice it when I got home. When we turned onto her street, I saw the cops. My blood was ice.

  “Arrow, you have to go the rest of the way on your own.”

  “Why?”

  “The cops are at your house. I can’t talk to them; questions will get asked that I can’t answer.”

  “They’re here because they found Shelby and she’s dead.” She said it coldly, no malice, just fact.

  “Or maybe they found her alive. Either way, you need to face it. Call me when you know what’s going on. We can meet tonight if you need to.”

  “Thank you, Nickel. For everything.”

  “I’ll talk to you soon.”

  She barely looked human as she rode to her house. I’m sure it felt like she was dying, the life she knew was dying. That was the only easy part about being me. Everything bad had already happened. Something could happen to mirror it, but nothing worse was going to happen to me again. My job was to make the really bad things not happen to other people, and so far I was failing Arrow. It was enough to make a boy chew on a matchstick, so that’s what I did.

  Chapter 19

  When men hunt ducks, they yell, “Quit!” into a little nozzle, and it sounds like quacking. I needed my own quit—I needed to call in my game. If I was going to find Shelby, I had to call my prey by its name. Yell with a voice it understood, a voice it wanted to choke in person.

  I started with three of the more popular pedo bulletin boards. Trying was a stretch; I’d thought about these before, but the idea of her being a passable commodity just never occurred to me. I went fishing with a decent-sized lure, man looking to swap lunch in the Midwest. The stuff I didn’t say in writing was that I was in possession of a girl older than ten and younger than fifteen. Lunch. Still better than breakfast, but not by much; pedos have bad appetites. I got nothing—found guys looking to swap, but squat in Michigan. I knew it was a long shot. Nothing named Shelby, or matching her description. Logged off, made dinner. Heard the pager go. Called her on line one.

  “Nickel.”

  “Shhh.”

  “I need you now.”

  Just tell me where, baby.

  She did. I left, on my bike, into the black.

  Chapter 20

  We met at Knapp—dark, no fights tonight. She was wearing the same kind of sweat suit I was; this was a long trip on a bike. Arrow cut to business quickly.

  “They arrested my dad. He beat up his…girlfriend, and she called the cops. Nickel. They found a magazine under his spare tire, a magazine about girls. Young girls. They found Shelby’s other shoe too. They think my dad killed her.”

  She dove into my chest, sobbing. She bounced off of me, and I handled her as best I was able. She was a kite, and I held on to the string. I thought she was wrong, but it wasn’t the time to tell her yet. She looked at me with these huge eyes, and I wondered, not for the first time, why everything can come down so hard on a kid.

  “Arrow…”

  “What?”

  “Do you think your dad did it?”

  “No.”

  “Do you think it would even be possible for your dad to have done it?”

  “Anything is possible.”

  “I don’t believe this is possible, and I don’t even know your dad. If anything, this is just more proof of what we were already thinking.”

  “How?”

  “Somebody had to plant that stuff, right? Someone who would know the perfect time, who would know that they wouldn’t be seen.”

  “You still think some repair guy did this?”

  I nodded. She grabbed me around the waist and held me close, a lone anchor in a bad storm. I needed to find our boy, and soon. I needed to find Shelby, and I had no idea how to find my target. So close but so far. I held Arrow as the night overtook us. Don’t worry, I know she was only holding me because I was the only one there. That doesn’t mean that I couldn’t enjoy the company.

  When she let me go, we walked back to our bikes. It was late, and she had school in the morning. I saw two cars pass and wondered if the cops had followed her out here. It wasn’t likely, but who knew? I pushed the thought aside and got on my bike.

  “Call me tomorrow.”

  “I will.”

  “Arrow?”

  “Yeah?”

  “Don’t watch TV.”

  She nodded and left, disappeared right in front of my eyes. I took the long way home, trying to think. I got a page when I was halfway home, same number that I missed a couple days ago. On a whim I stopped at the post office. One envelope. I tucked it in my back pocket, tucked my chin against my chest, and ducked out of there. No creep
s. I went home. I was still thinking about how to find the repairman when I fell asleep. I called the number the next morning.

  Chapter 21

  A woman answered on the second ring.

  “Hello?”

  She had a raspy voice, whiskey and cigarettes would be my guess.

  “You paged me.”

  “This is Nickel?”

  “We can’t talk like that on the phone.”

  “I need to talk to you.”

  I thought about Arrow, her father in chains, mother a mess, sister still missing. “I don’t have time for anything right now.”

  “This would be worth your time. I need someone with your skill set.”

  The survivor in me spoke. “How long will it take?”

  “A couple of days, tops.”

  “When can you meet?”

  “Tonight.”

  “Downtown library. Seven o’clock. Come alone. Wear a baseball cap; go stand by the Stephen King books in fiction.”

  She hung up on me. The hair on my neck stood on end. I set the phone back on the receiver and went to my computer.

  You’d think it’d be hard to find employee records on the phone company Web site, but within ten minutes I found buried in there a handy alphabetical listing of all our fair city’s line maintenance personnel. Just names, unfortunately. Names were no good, or at least not enough. I was going to need to take a risk, see who showed up and then use this database to find them. If I got lucky, I’d get our guy. If there were a way to know that the same repairman would be back, I’d head over there right now and cut down a telephone pole. That wouldn’t work more than once. People would be wise the next time they heard a saw. I needed creativity. Moved my mouse, clicked a few buttons. Started looking for answers.

  A couple of years ago I read an old comic that made a joke about how there was a magazine for everything. With the digital world at our fingertips, the joke is over—there really is content for everything. What I was looking for didn’t take long. These days even lumberjacks take time to get out of the woods and onto a laptop.

  I found what I was looking for after just a few minutes: stump removal. Not fire, that wouldn’t work, but explosives, that was fine with me.

  There were no diagrams for exactly what I needed to do, but there were plenty of descriptions on how a similar task had been accomplished. I just needed to figure out angles to maximize impact on a small area. If I was going to take down a telephone pole, I didn’t want it falling on someone’s house. It came to me; I went to the garage to work.

  Dug into my workshop that I’ve cobbled together over the years and closed the garage. Looked at my pipe lengths and decided on a six-inch piece of galvanized steel, inch and a half in diameter. I made a hole using an eighth-inch drill bit in the length of it. Took red Loctite and screwed on one end cap, also galvanized steel. I plugged in my hot glue gun, let it warm.

  When the glue was running, I took my cannon fuse and cut a six-inch section of wick. I slid it into the hole I’d drilled. It fit well. Took the wick out, filled the hole with the glue gun. Pushed the wick in, more glue around the base. I set it to cool and got out some gunpowder.

  The first few pipe bombs I made more to amuse myself than for any real gain. I was experimenting, and I’d already realized that knowing how to make an explosion could prove useful, especially if what I wanted to happen with my life really did come through. I was closer now than I had been then, but the same rules applied now. Do this wrong, wind up dead.

  I filled the pipe with pistol gunpowder. I use the strongest they make; I always keep a couple of cans in the garage, plus one in the house. You never know when something might need to go bang. I poured the gunpowder in, hands shaking as the little black granules filled the tube. When it was done, I put more red Loctite on the pipe and threaded on the other cap. I brought it inside the house with me, let it sit on the kitchen table. Went out back, watered the plants. I came in and was going to go to the basement but changed my mind. I walked into the kitchen and checked my pager three times. No Arrow.

  I fiddled around online when I got back into the office—nothing, nobody was biting. I took a shower and went to the library. Looked at the pipe bomb on the table. Pure evil.

  Chapter 22

  I saw her immediately, waiting for me just like I’d told her to. She had black hair, thick—made you want to run your hands through it. Pale, milk-white skin. Eyes as black as her hair. Dressed in all black, sweater that came halfway down her arms, leather skirt cut mid-thigh. She looked like she had died but was still warm. She followed me outside without saying a word. When we were off of the steps to the library, she said, “So you’re Nickel?”

  “Yep.”

  “I’ve heard good things.”

  “I hope not. What things?”

  “Nothing specific, just that you’re reliable.”

  “So what do you need help with?”

  She took a cigarette out of a pack in her purse. I had a match out to light it before she could react. She pulled long off of it and blew the smoke; I watched it dissipate under the glow of the streetlight. I tossed the match into the gutter. She took something else out of her purse and handed it over. I held it to the light. A hundred-dollar bill.

  “Fake?”

  “Yes.”

  “It’s a good fake.”

  “Yes.”

  “So what do you want me to do with it?”

  “I need to get it cleaned.”

  “How much?”

  “A hundred and fifty thousand to start. If I can get thirty-five cents on the dollar, I’d be a happy girl.”

  “Twenty-five.”

  “Thirty.”

  “End up at about forty-five thou?”

  “That’s right. Thing is though, if we can build a good enough network, this can happen all the time.”

  “Can you get anything smaller?”

  “Why?”

  “Smaller is easier. If you had that money in tens, maybe even twenties, it’d be a cinch.”

  “These are already printed.”

  “Won’t do you much good if you get caught.”

  “You’ll be doing the work. Everything I’ve heard about you seemed to indicate that you don’t get caught.”

  The lady made a good point.

  “Alright, I’ll work on it. I don’t want any weight until I can figure out what I’m going to do with it.”

  “Fair enough. How long?”

  “Give me a week; things are crazy right now.”

  “Do you get a hold of me, or…”

  “Is the number you paged me at good?”

  “Yes.”

  “Then I’ll call you once I get this thing figured out.”

  “I hope that you’re going to take this as seriously as it needs to be taken.”

  “That’s the only way I take anything. I understand the apprehension, but this is just another job for me, miss, and when it’s done, there’ll be another job after it.”

  She extended her hand, and we shook. She took her arm back, flashed me a grin, and spun to leave. Still had plenty of shake from what I could tell as she walked away. I checked the pager. No Arrow. I went home; I had work to do. It was going to be a long night.

  Chapter 23

  I was happy to see the pipe bomb still sitting on the table. I suppose the lack of police cruisers around the house should have tipped me off first. I checked the clock, went back outside to the garage. Started putting my kit together.

  Cordless drill, full charge, Sawzall, full battery there, too. A length of rope, maybe twenty feet. Gorilla glue. Air horn. One-inch drill bit. A pair of night vision goggles with a 1×3 magnification reticule set in the lenses. A little LED flashlight. A rubber mallet and a wooden dowel sawn off to work as a punch. Matches already in my pocket. A wish that Arrow would call. Went back in the house, lay down on the couch. Thought better of it and went to bed. Set the alarm for two.

  I woke confused, the alarm screaming at me. I remembered Ar
row and Shelby and shut off the alarm. Went to the bathroom, painted my face with makeup, shades of black, gray, and brown. I looked at myself. I was a demon. Got dressed in all black, non-reflective clothing. Grabbed the bag with all of my stuff and threw it over my shoulders. Got the pipe bomb last and strapped it to my thigh with tape. If it went off, I wanted it to kill me, not leave me a cripple. I took a deep breath and rode my bike to Four Oaks; the only light was the moon. I rode past the gas station. It was closed, so no worries about being seen. I rolled into Arrow’s neighborhood and tucked the bike behind the first truly dark tree that I saw. When I left it, I made sure to stay close to houses so I could bolt if I needed to. Nice night, if you weren’t a runaway with ten ounces of gunpowder strapped to your leg.

  What I needed, besides a telephone pole, was a nearby sewer grate and a good spot to sit and hide. I needed to watch, see who showed up besides police and fire trucks. I had a vibe that tonight I might get to see the man who took Shelby. I checked my pager, more out of habit than anything else. Still nothing from Arrow. I veered off of my path, stopped looking for what I needed, and went to her house. Her light was on, but I still felt silly throwing pebbles at her window, like I was some hapless kid in an eighties sitcom. After a couple of stones, her window opened. She popped out.

  “Nickel?”

  “Who else?”

  “I can’t see you.”

  I flicked the flashlight on and off twice.

  “You’re all black.”

  “I’m working.”

  “Shelby?”

  “Yeah. Want to come?”

  “What are you doing?”

  “Nothing I need help with.”

  Just blowing up your neighborhood.

  “No thanks then—I need to study and get some sleep. I was at the jail trying to see Dad pretty much all day. I got like fifteen minutes after he was done talking to Mom and his lawyer. He’s a wreck, but I believe that he didn’t hurt Shelby.”