Spare Change Read online

  “Please,” he asks, extending a tin cup my way and giving it a shake. “It’s getting colder, and I’m hungry.”

  Every alert system I possess is pinging at once. Alternating between wanting to run back to the car and ball my hand into a fist and drive it through the man’s nose, they are telling me that something is wrong.

  It’s not because the man is homeless. The city is almost teeming with them, a sad offshoot of the massive expansion and influx of people that has gripped the area recently. Of those I’ve encountered, they are nice enough, just dealing with their situation in the best way they can.

  This man doesn’t seem to fit the mold. His look, his smell, even his phrasing, all seem a bit contrived.

  Even if I can’t decipher what it is, I can tell things are off. My body remains poised, trying to determine the best course of action.

  “Honey,” Mira says, her fingers scratching twice at my arm before settling flat against it, “it’s okay. He’s just hungry.”

  I know hungry. I’ve seen hungry. I’ve been hungry. Nothing about this man says hungry.

  “Please,” he repeats, the words even more pitiable than the time before. “Anything helps.”

  Beside me, Mira remains quiet, her fingers pressing lightly against me the only indicator she gives, though it is enough. In no way will I make a scene, not here, in her special place. Nor will I go against her wishes, not on such a great evening, with so much promise lying just over the horizon.

  Some of the tension releases as I slide my hands into my pockets, grasping for the money clip I know is resting against my front thighs.

  There were two of them coming our way. Both females, one was long and gangly, with frizzy blonde hair pulled back into a ponytail. Strappy sandals that looked like something from the set of Troy or 300 were on her feet, puffs of dirt rising with each step around the dusty parking lot.

  All of it I saw and discarded in just a matter of moments, my focus squarely on her partner.

  Shorter – both than the girl she was with and myself – she stood somewhere between five-eight and five-ten. Glossy dark hair hung just past her chin, curved inward at the bottom to frame her face. In a sundress, the late day sun glinted off a necklace hanging around her neck.

  For the better part of a full minute, I simply stood and stared. Vaguely aware that my jaw was sagging, I was unable to do anything about it, my attention turned toward the pair as they came toward us.

  “Hey there,” Yates said beside me, mercifully snapping the trance-state I had been stuck in a moment before. “You made it.”

  “We did,” the tall blonde said. Pulling up short, she folded her arms over her chest, striated muscle visible in her shoulders.

  “Wasn’t too hard,” the dark-haired girl added. “This whole town is smaller than my neighborhood back home.”

  To that, I managed to laugh, Yates doing the same beside me, his louder by at least a factor of two.

  “Yeah, well, not exactly in the big city any longer,” he said.

  “That’s for sure,” the girl replied.

  “Nancy Raye,” the tall girl interjected, extending a hand my direction. “Apologies for my teammate here. He doesn’t have the common manners the good Lord gave a moose.”

  A corner of my mouth rose in amusement as I cast a glance to Yates, seeing his cheeks were again pink with embarrassment.

  “That’s okay,” I replied. “We actually just met ourselves a minute ago. He probably didn’t want to introduce me because he couldn’t remember my name.”

  All three managed a chuckle, the sort of polite faux mirth that seemed to always accompany such events, as I accepted the girl’s shake. Calluses lined her palms as she squeezed and pumped twice before releasing.

  “Kyle Clady, nice to meet you.” Shifting to the side, I held my hand to her friend.

  Thrusting her palm into mine, her shake was nothing more than a whisper, a quick brush of my hand against hers before it was gone.

  “Mira Martinez.”

  “Pleasure,” I replied. “You ladies both play racquetball as well, I’m guessing?”

  “We do,” Nancy replied, a bit of defensiveness creeping in, which wasn’t entirely unexpected. The closest I’d ever been to a racquetball game was the old guys that used to play at the local YMCA in my hometown on weekends.

  Never once had I ever thought of it as a college sport. Hell, before that moment, I didn’t even know we had a team.

  “Never actually been to a game,” I confessed.

  “You and everybody else,” Nancy replied.

  “I’ll have to come check it out sometime,” sensing her growing hostility. Already this was an event I was not overly excited about being forced into. Having to deal with freshman attitude was about the only thing that could make it even less bearable. “Now that we’re all friends here.”

  “Believe it when I see it,” Nancy muttered, just barely loud enough to be heard. Craning her head at the neck, she looked past us to the tent, the conglomerated sound of the crowd growing louder by the moment.

  “And you?” Mira asked. “What sport do you play?”

  “Baseball,” Yates said, supplying the answer before I had a chance to respond. Shifting to Mira, he added, “Which is a big deal in these parts.”

  “Yeah, so much so, they don’t even have to dress up for things like this,” Nancy interjected, casting a look my way before shifting her attention back to the tent.

  My choice of attire had nothing to do with the sport I played. It was a result of having just gotten off the road, of not wanting to attend the mixer to begin with, of knowing it would be a thousand degrees inside.

  Just as surely, I knew that her open animosity probably didn’t have anything to do with me personally. Whether it was a sports-related inferiority complex or something larger, I couldn’t be certain.

  Nor did I really care to delve into finding out.

  “A big deal?” Mira asked, doing her best to save the conversation. “So you guys are good?”

  It was a question I’d been hoping she’d ask since first approaching, the same one that always seemed to work in Montana over the summer.

  “Back-to-back national champions.”

  A faint smile settled over my face as I looked between the girls, expecting it to bring the same reaction it usually did when working the streets of Missoula. Surprise, followed by curiosity, with a healthy dollop of impressed thrown in.

  These two seemed to be wearing nothing of the sort.

  “Oh,” Mira replied, offering nothing more.

  “Yeah, well, call us after about six more,” Nancy added. “Come on, Mira, let’s go see if the others are here.”

  Reaching out, she grabbed her friend by the arm, jerking her toward the central entrance to the tent. The move was so abrupt, and with such force, that it pulled the smaller girl to the side. She staggered twice before catching her balance, falling in beside her teammate, her attention still turned back toward us.

  “Nice meeting you,” she managed.

  “Likewise,” I offered, it the best I could do before they were swallowed by the mass of people crowding toward the front entrance.

  In the wake of their departure, Yates and I both stood a moment in silence, both processing what had just happened.

  “You’ll have to excuse Nance,” Yates offered, his voice pulling my attention to the side. “She and I both grew up here.”

  Not sure where he was going with the explanation, I prompted, “Meaning?”

  “Meaning, there’s already a pretty big locals-vs-outsiders vibe here. It’s a small town and it pretty much gets taken over whenever school is in session.”

  That alone didn’t explain her hostility. Maybe to me as a person, but not for the fact that she seemed to flip the moment I mentioned baseball.

  “And you also have to realize, racquetball has won the last eight national championships in a row, but all anybody around here talks about is you guys, or the football team, or the b
asketball team. The rest of us are just fighting for scraps.”

  Rocking my head back slightly, I watched until the girls were inside the tent before shifting my attention over to Yates. A handful of different thoughts went through my head, most beginning and ending with wanting to point out that the three sports he’d just mentioned funded every other activity on campus, but I managed to keep them inside.

  It wasn’t his fault his friend was actually the one lacking in common manners.

  Besides, it wasn’t like she was the one I had even the slightest interest in anyway.

  “What about Mira?” I asked. “You said something about not being in the big city any longer?”

  “Oh, yeah,” he said, his eyebrows rising slightly as we began to drift in the same direction the girls had just gone. “One of the Southern California spots. San Diego, I think?”

  Chapter Six

  With my hands shoved into the front of my pants and my attention aimed down, I am completely helpless. Even as I see it coming - the blanket peeling back off the man’s shoulders, the glint of the front end of the gun he’s holding – it is impossible to stop it. My eyes go wide and a carnal yell of some sort passes through my lips as the first orange blossom erupts from the tip of the weapon, a four-leaf clover pattern of bright light and the smell of gunpowder both emitted in unison.

  Just a split second later, a matching projectile is spat out, the light just as blinding as the first, leaving twin amoebas of neon flashing across from my field of vision.

  Amoebas that are dismissed as fast as they arrive by the searing pain of a bullet ripping through my right arm.

  Slicing through the long-sleeve shirt I’m wearing, it strafes across my skin. Leaning into the momentum of it, I place my back broadside to the man, twisting Mira to the ground in one smooth motion, pressing her against the cold concrete.

  With my weight flush against her, I can feel the sting of the wound on my arm, smell my own blood. My knees are pressed tight against the hard walkway as I jerk my attention upward, a hand extended toward the gunman, silently imploring him to do no more.

  It is a warning that is unneeded, the man dashing back into the darkness he’s come from. In his wake, the blanket lies in a heap, the sole sign of his passing, a dark misshapen bundle on the soft grass.

  My heart pounds in my chest as I watch him become nothing more than a shadow, my first inclination to give chase. To reach for the pistol that most days is strapped to my hip or raise my assault rifle and put him firmly in my crosshairs.

  Just as fast, the urge passes, my surroundings and the limitations they provide rushing back to me. The trance of the moment fades, taking with it some tiny bit of the adrenaline I feel, my first breath since reaching into my pocket coming to me.

  “It’s okay, honey. He’s gone.”

  Remaining poised for another instant, my attention is raised, making sure the man is truly away. And it is in this position that I feel something that will change my life forever.

  The warm, sticky feeling of blood.

  Jerking my attention down to the ground, I raise my body a few inches from Mira’s, providing separation between us. Shifting my gaze to my arm, I can see the small slick of blood standing out against the darkened shirt I’m wearing, much too small and too high up to account for what I’m feeling.

  “Mira?” I snap, my eyes widening, a tremor passing through my voice.

  The blood is flowing out in a steady circle, dark and thick. With a focal point behind her left arm, it pushes outward, the smooth concrete providing no resistance as it settles into the cracks and divots of the brushed surface.

  Lifting my hand free of it, I can see my entire right thumb painted bright red, the spot where it was the only indentation in the growing pattern as it continues to spread.

  “Oh, Jesus. Mira, Mira.”

  Snapping myself upright at the waist, I run my palms down the front of her, feeling against the dark sweater and jacket she’s wearing.

  “Mira! Mira!”

  Two entry wounds, equally spaced in the center of her chest. Stripping my shirt up over my head, I wad the material into a medium-sized ball and shove it against her. Placing one palm down atop either wound, I press as much of my weight down on her as I can muster from the position, my right triceps burning, a smear of fresh blood painted across the skin.

  In this position, I can see into my wife’s eyes for the first time since stepping out of the car. I can look straight down into the dark pools that I first met so long ago, when I was nothing more than an arrogant undergrad and she was a vision that had been sent to teach me everything that a college education alone could never impart.

  And I can see that already the light from them is fading. Just as surely as I can see the twin spots of blood on her cheek, and the way her mouth is parted, breath rushing out beneath my weight with nothing coming back in to replace it.

  Hot moisture comes to my eyes as I stare down at her, snot arriving in my nostrils, saliva reaching my lips as well. Torqueing my neck upward, I bawl for help, bellowing with everything I have. Extending the word as long and as loud as I can, I draw in a second breath of air before pushing out another entreaty for aid, my voice strafed raw as it echoes across the park.

  This cannot be happening. Not now. Not on this night.

  Not ever.

  “Help, dammit! Somebody, please, help!”

  Chapter Seven

  “Sir, you have to let us in. Sir!”

  The voice is female. It’s low-pitched and urgent, practically a scream just inches from my ear, one I am fairly certain I’ve never heard before. The face it belongs to I can only guess at, my gaze having not left my wife since the moment I realized she was injured.

  My throat is raw, stripped bare by screaming for aid until no longer able to yell. My cheeks are wet, a combination of sweat and tears that has dripped down over my chin and streaked down my bare chest. Goose pimples line my arms, the cool air making them look pale, the smears of my blood and Mira’s standing out bright against my skin.

  Red-and-blue lights pass through my periphery, bright hues flashing on the edges of my vision, refracting from every vertical surface nearby. I assume they belong to medics and law enforcement personnel, though again, I haven’t bothered to look up.

  All I can bring myself to focus on is Mira, her skin growing cooler to the touch, the color draining from it with each passing second.

  This is not supposed to be how it goes. Today was my last day in a uniform. It is the first day for us to start making plans of our own accord, free from being told when and where we were off to next.

  It was the beginning of so many things, stuff we’d talked about for years.

  “Sir,” a second voice says. Deep and resonate, it is male, something like Vin Diesel, just inches from my ear. A moment later, a hand loops under my armpit, trying to pull me away.

  Feeling the pressure of it against my skin, I react on pure instinct, my arm a piston as I draw it back. Snapping my wrist back toward my cheek, my elbow becomes a wrecking pin, whistling straight away in a hard line.

  The force of the contact barely registers with me, the man’s cheek no match for the point of my ulnar bone. On contact, his face seems to crinkle beneath the force of the blow, my momentum pushing through him, sending us both toppling backward. I land on him in a heap, a loud gust of wind passing from the man’s lungs as he goes limp against the sidewalk, arms and legs twisted in an uneven tangle.

  Given my own uneven footing, his inert mass beneath me, there’s nothing I can do to right myself. The flashing colors of the light around me spin by as I rotate through, feeling his fleshy form beneath me. It seems to swallow me up as I scramble, trying to find firm footing, my hands and feet clawing for purchase.

  My feet are the first things to reach the concrete, the tips of my boots biting into the firm surface. Using my toes, I leverage my body forward a few inches, an improvised hop the best I can manage. Lifting my body just barely above the ma
n’s prone form, my hands reach out, feeling the hard sidewalk.

  With my hands and feet spread wide, the medic in blue prone beneath me, I must look like some sort of oversized spider crouched over my victim, about to do my worst, though I have no further interest in the man. No thought exists in my mind beyond getting back to Mira.

  Twisting back in her direction, I can see that already the female medic that was talking to me earlier has descended into my previous position. Crouched over Mira, she has a bag by her side, one hand feeling for a pulse.

  “Mira!” I call, my voice just more than a rasp. I must get back to her. I must do my job as her husband and protect her. I have to make this right, to reverse whatever that bastard just did. “Mira!”

  One step, a second, I try to stagger to my feet, scrambling for footing.

  There is no way for me to withstand the combined weights of the men that slam into me. My singular focus on Mira, I don’t even see them coming. One moment I am staring forward, my fingers sliding over brushed concrete. The next, I have more than four hundred pounds pinning me to the ground, the hard sidewalk biting into my exposed torso.

  I can feel various implements jabbing into me at random intervals, two-way radios, nightsticks, an assortment of other items. Sparks of pain erupt along my body as a forearm slams against the back of my head, pinning my cheek to the ground. One eye is forced closed under the awkward position, the other fixed on my wife as the medic continues to work on her.

  “Mira.”

  “Shut the hell up,” a voice hisses in my ear, saying nothing more as my wrists are jerked back toward my hips. The bodyweight continues to bear down on me as metal bites into my right hand, cuffs snapping into place.

  A moment later, the left is cinched closed, much tighter than necessary, chewing into my skin.

  Chapter Eight

  The backseat of the police cruiser smells like shit. I don’t mean that as a euphemism. It literally smells like feces, mixed with bad coffee and body odor and a dozen other things I don’t want to speculate on. Stuffed into it, I can feel the sticky vinyl seat pressed against my bare back. The awkward positioning of my cuffed hands is causing the metal to dig into my wrists, the trench in my right arm aching more with each bit of adrenaline that seeps out of my system.