Page 135 of Nash
Tuesday afternoon. There's a kid on a bicycle at the far intersection, pedaling away. An old man sits in a plastic chair outside the hardware store, reading a newspaper. Phoenix's man sits at the diner counter, visible through the window, coffee cup in hand, his eyes tracking the street.
Whitmore hasn't moved. Ball cap low. His phone is in his lap now. His eyes are on the Amaranth storefront, and even from fifty feet away I can see the particular focus of a man cataloging details. The tilt of his head when someone moves past the shop window. The way his thumb hovers over the phone screen.
I cross the street. My hands are empty. My cut is on. The Outsiders patch visible and so is the Sergeant-at-Arms tab beneath it.
He doesn't see me until I'm fifteen feet away. His head turns, then his body locks. His eyes drop to my cut, the patch, the Sergeant-at-Arms tab. Then back to my face. He knows who I am.
"Dale Whitmore," I say.
He's off the bench before I finish his name. But he doesn't run toward the alley, he runs at me.
The first punch comes wide, a looping right aimed at my jaw. He's two-twenty, but slow. The swing telegraphs from his shoulder three feet before his fist arrives. I step inside the arc, catch his wrist, and redirect his momentum into the brick wall of the laundromat. His shoulder hits first. The air leaves his lungs in a grunt.
He pushes off the wall and swings again. Left this time. Tighter. The knuckles graze my cheekbone, and the sting registers without slowing me down. I drive my fist into his solar plexus. The punch folds him. His mouth opens. No sound comes out. His knees buckle, but he doesn't go down.
Dale grabs my cut with both hands. Tries to pull me into a headbutt. I break his grip by driving my forearms through the gap between his wrists, snapping them apart, and hit him with a short right to the jaw that drops his head sideways. Blood from his lip sprays the sidewalk.
"Stay down," I say.
He doesn't.
He comes at me again. Lower this time. Shoulder aimed at my midsection. A tackle from a man who has nothing left except forward motion and the animal refusal to stop. I sidestep, grab the back of his jacket, and use his own momentum to drive him face-first into the brick. His forehead hits the wall. The sound is dull, heavy. He staggers back. Blood from a cut above his eyebrow runs into his right eye.
I grab his jacket collar and pin him against the wall. My forearm across his chest. His feet barely touch the sidewalk. His breath comes in ragged pulls, blood dripping from his brow and his split lip, his eyes unfocused.
"The woman in that shop," I say. My voice is even. My pulse is elevated but my voice is even. "You've been watching her for months. Broke into her apartment. Left a note for her father. You took photographs of her at work, at the clubhouse, in her own neighborhood."
His jaw works. Blood on his teeth. "I was following orders."
"Whose orders?"
"The network. Donovan's people. Alice's operation."
"Donovan's dead. Alice is dead. The network doesn't exist." I press my forearm harder against his chest. "You've been running on instructions from dead people. The chain of command you served is ash. The handlers who gave you orders are gone. You've been stalking a woman for months on behalf of a ghost."
His face changes. The fight drains out of him. His shoulders slacken against the brick. It's the realization of a soldier whodidn't notice the war was over arrives behind his eyes in slow, heavy waves.
"What happens now?" he murmurs. Blood drips from his chin.
Kyle and Rider close from both ends of the block. My phone is already in my hand. Phoenix's van pulls to the curb. The side door slides open. The transfer takes eleven seconds. Kyle grips Whitmore's jacket. Rider takes his legs. Whitmore goes into the van without resistance. The door slides shut, then van pulls away.
Phoenix will handle the rest. His network has infrastructure for people who disappear. Whitmore won't be seen in Willowridge again.
I stand on the sidewalk. Blood on my knuckles. The graze on my cheekbone starts to throb. The bench is empty, the laundromat sign blinks above it.
I tap my earpiece. "Clear."
Knox: "Copy. All positions stand down."
I walk back across the street. Through the door. Into Amaranth.
Frankie is at her station, her eyes finding mine for one second. They drop to my knuckles. To the mark on my cheekbone. She returns to her work without a word.
Ruby is standing behind her station. Earpiece still in. A pencil still in her hand. Her sketchbook is open to the compass rose. She sees me, and the pencil hits the floor.
Her eyes track my face. My cheekbone. My hands. The blood on my knuckles. Her face drops. The color leaves her cheeks and her hand reaches for me before she pulls it back.
"Back room. Now," Ruby says, grabbing my wrist and pulling me off the shop floor, past the counter, through the hallway, into the supply room. She pushes me onto the stool by the sink and turns the faucet on.
