Born Bad Read online

  Mr. Allen, he wasn't weak. He was an ex-con, a big guy with a hard face and heavy muscles. I want to look like him–it's a good way to look when you're inside. He did State time, years ago. Now he works for the State.

  Rodney lived in my room. Just the two of us–the room was real small. I didn't have much stuff, but I had a radio. One day, when I was out looking for a part-time job, three guys from upstairs came into the room after my radio. Rodney walked in while they were doing it. They told him to mind his own business, but he tried to stop them. They rat-packed him, stomped him good. But they left the radio, because they knew from how he fought that he would tell me.

  They took Rodney to the hospital. That night, Mr. Allen came into my room. He asked me how come I wasn't playing my radio. I told him I wanted to read. He went over to the radio, turned it on. Nothing happened.

  "Where are they?" he asked me.

  I gave him the Institution look, but Mr. Allen stared me right back.

  "Give it up," he said.

  I reached under my bed and gave him one of my thick white socks. Full of batteries from the radio.

  "Going for some payback, Marlon?"

  I didn't say anything.

  "That's not the way it works in here," he said. "I'll take care of it."

  The next morning, they shipped the three guys out. Back to the Institution.

  When Rodney came back, Mr. Allen told us in Group that the three guys couldn't live by the rules of the Community, so they were expelled.

  Everybody nodded, like that was righteous. I could feel Mr. Allen watching me, but I didn't look at him.

  One day, in Group, Rodney said he wanted a puppy. He even had a picture of the one he wanted. A black and white puppy. "I would call him Bandit," Rodney said.

  Mr. Allen said maybe someday he could have one, if he would take care of it. Rodney got all excited. One of the guys whispered "punk" real quiet, but I heard him. I said I wanted a puppy too, looking the guy in the face. He didn't say anything to me.

  Mr. Allen took me aside later. He told me it was good that I watched out for my partner, but not to be stupid.

  Rodney cried every night, but I never said anything.

  Nobody ever visited him.

  Nobody ever visited me either, but that was different. I knew nobody would come, but Rodney, he always thought his mother would come.

  The lock on the back door of the pet shop was nothing. I went in like I learned in the Institution.

  Rodney cried when I showed him the puppy. "Bandit!" he said. The puppy slept on his bed.

  They came for me the next morning. Mr. Allen took me in his office. The cops said it was okay, but they left the handcuffs on.

  "Will you let Rodney keep the puppy?" I asked him.

  He said he would. His face was sad. "I'll pay for the dog, Marion," he said. "You pay me back when you can."

  "I will," I told him. I always pay back.

  Those guys who did Rodney…I'll see them soon.

  Cripple

  I worked my way down the long corridor toward the spill of light, antenna out. Ready. The door to the room was standing open, a greenish glow from the computer terminal marking the path. I stepped inside, my rubber-soled shoes soundless on the thick carpet. He was in his wheelchair, facing the screen, huge head wobbling on the thin stalk of his neck, skeletal fingers splayed across the keyboard.

  On the screen, the image of a little boy dressed in a sailor suit.

  He touched some keys. Another figure entered the screen. Dark, looming in the shadows. The human in the wheelchair tapped more keys and the image crystallized. Into a man. A tall man, neatly dressed.

  Faint hum from the computer. The man's breathing changed, went from smooth to ragged.

  "How did you get past the dogs?" he asked, not turning around.

  "Tranquilizer gun," I told him. "Secobarbital. A grain and a half in each cartridge."

  He pushed a button on the wheelchair's console. The motor moved him back, away from the computer, rotating until he faced me across the room.

  "You must be very good at what you do," he said. His voice was as atrophied as his body, rusty from neglect.

  "Like you are," I replied, just above a whisper.

  "What do you want?"

  "I want what's in your computer."

  "It's not for sale."

  "That's why they sent me."

  "You don't understand. I'm not a pornographer. I don't hurt children. This is all a game. For entertainment. What I do is create interactive computer modules. Just images on a screen. You push the buttons, and the images do whatever you want them to. It doesn't hurt anybody."

  "Whatever you say."

  "This isn't even illegal, you know. I've got my rights. The First Amendment, you ever hear of it?"

  "Sure."

  "No, you wouldn't understand. You're just a mercenary. A man for hire. A common criminal. Well, you tell the people who sent you that they'll never be competition for me. You can steal my computer, but I always have my brain. My intelligence. Whatever you take, I can just make more of it."

  "I know."

  "Then take whatever you came for and get out. I have work to do."

  He spun the wheelchair again, faced the screen. Tapped the keys. I took out the pistol, screwed in the silencer, and shot him in the back of his head. His brains splattered the screen, obscuring the images.

  A mind isn't always a terrible thing to waste.

  Mad Dog

  How come you want to give him up? He turn on you or something?"

  I shifted my weight in the battered vinyl office chair, scratching the big Doberman behind his ears the way he liked. The fat man sat facing me across an old wooden desk under a painted metal sign. CENTURION GUARD DOGS–Sales and Rentals. He held a pencil in one hand, a clipboard in front of him. The sleeves of his graying T-shirt were rolled up, a tattoo of a hula dancer on his right biceps. When the flab had been muscle, the dancer would shake her butt when he flexed.

  I snapped a match into flame with my thumbnail, lit my cigarette. The Doberman's ears were flat, corded neck muscles gentle against the choke collar.

  "That's a lot of crap," I told the fat man. "Dobermans don't turn on you. They got a bad rep for it, but they don't deserve it. See, what happens, a guy hears all the stories, okay? He gets a Dobie as a puppy, he figures he's going to make sure the dog never turns on him when he grows up. So he beats the hell out of the dog every day. Takes control. Dominates. It's easy to make a puppy afraid of you. Makes some people feel tough, you understand? But Dobermans, one way they're different from other dogs, they got good memories. Real good. So, one day, the guy goes to beat up his dog and the dog says, 'Un huh, not today, pal.' And the dog nails him. Like he deserves. Then this guy, this guy who beat his own puppy, he says, "The son of a bitch turned on me.' You understand what I'm telling you?"

  The fat man's eyes flicked a challenge at me. Dropped it when I tossed it back. His voice was soft, sly-cored. "If he didn't turn on you, how come you're giving him up?"

  My expression didn't change. "He's brain-damaged. I had to leave him at a kennel when I went away. He got hold of some virus from the other dogs. Almost died."

  "He looks okay to me."

  "Oh yeah. He's in great physical shape. But his mind's not right. He'll be just sitting around and all of a sudden he'll go off. He's not safe. You couldn't put him in a home or anything."

  "You sure? I mean, he looks so good and all. He should be worth…"

  I gave the Doberman's chain an imperceptible tug. His ears shot up. A blood-chilling snarl slipped between his Hashing teeth. "Stop it!" I yelled at him, tugging again. He lunged at the fat man. I jerked the chain hard. The dog's ears went fiat again like nothing had happened.

  "What d'I do?" the fat man asked, rubbing his hands together.

  "Nothing. You don't have to do anything. He's just nuts. It's not his fault."

  "Yeah. Yeah, maybe I could use him for a warehouse job. Or something. But I
can't pay much…I mean he's not trained or nothing.

  "You got a mobile cage?"

  "Back of the station wagon."

  I walked the Doberman around the back of the joint to the cage. The fat man opened the door. I jerked the chain and the Doberman jumped inside, quiet as oil in water. The fat man slammed the cage shut. The Doberman looked at me. I reached my hand inside the cage, rubbed the side of his head. Turned my back on him.

  The fat man handed me the money. "What's his name?" he asked, pencil poised.

  "Devil," I told him.

  The concrete processing plant stood alone in the middle of a prairie on a six-acre lot in Brooklyn. Surrounded by a six-foot chain-link fence topped with loops of razor wire. Nothing nearby but abandoned factories. No streetlights. The front gate was wide enough for the sand and gravel trucks to make their daily deliveries. The two sides of the gate were held together by a heavy padlocked chain. A white metal sign was posted on the front. Big red letters: PATROLLED BY ATTACK DOGS. It was 5:50 A.M. early in June. I watched the dogs through the binoculars. A pair of Shepherds, their coats thick and matted with the concrete dust. A barrel-bodied Rottweiler. And a sleek Doberman.

  Okay.

  It's gotta be an accident. This guy, he's not reasonable. We got no problems with the other partners. They understand the way things are. The way they gotta be. This guy, he's a hardnose. He gets shot or something, maybe the other partners get the message, maybe they spook and run to the federales. You know how it works."

  "I know."

  "You pull this one off, there's a place for you with us. I told you this before."

  I kept my face neutral. The way they taught me. In the place where I was raised. The man in the white silk shirt watched me, waiting. I waited too. Another thing they taught me. He shrugged his shoulders. "Half now, half when it's done?" he asked.

  "Yeah." I held my hand out for the cash.

  • • •

  Two days later, I pulled the rented car up to the gate. The sun was just making its move, dawn coming fast. I slipped the leather gloves on my hands. They were lined with a fine chain mesh. I knelt, pointed the Polaroid camera at the plant. Waited.

  I heard his car coming. Didn't look up. A squeal of rubber as his white Caddy pulled across the front of my car, blocking any escape. He charged out, waving the tire iron.

  "What the hell you think you're doings'

  I tried to hide the camera under my jacket, sneak back toward my car. He cut me off. His face was twisted into frightened hate, white foam on his lips.

  "You son of a bitch! You're not taking what's mine. I worked for this! You tell those bastards I'm never paying!"

  "Hey! I don't know what you're talking about. I just wanted to take a picture of the dogs."

  He was past talking. Charged at me, whipping the tire iron at my head. I dropped the camera, caught the first shot with my left hand, spun to face him, my back to the gate. The dogs went mad. The switchblade popped open in my hand. I dropped into a crouch, working my way to him, one hand in front to take his next blow with the tire iron.

  He was a big man, block-shouldered. He'd seen knives before. He backed away from me, parallel to the gate. Raised his right hand, bluffed a swing with the tire iron, and rammed his shoulder against the gate, forcing a narrow slot open. "Get him!" he screamed. And the Doberman flowed through the opening past him in one bound, heading for me.

  "Devil!" I yelled. "Hit! Hit him, boy!"

  The Doberman whirled and turned on the big man like a tornado swooping up a farmhouse. Buried his teeth deep into the man's upper thigh. The man's scream hit a past-human octave as he raised the tire iron to smash down on the dog's head. I hooked him hard in the belly and he went to his knees. The Doberman ripped at his throat. A chunk of red-and-white flew into the air.

  It was over fast. "Devil! Out!" I shouted. The big dog backed away, his muzzle bathed in blood. I opened the back door of my car, gave the dog the signal and he jumped inside. I slammed my shoulder against the gate, shoving the man's body inside, face first. The other dogs tore at the body. I left it where it was.

  It's all in the way you raise them.

  Statute of Limitations

  1

  I watched her coming down the stairs to the basement pool–room. Watched her in the bank–security mirror the old man keeps just inside the door. All in black, she was–but dressed for mourning, not for style.

  She threaded her way through the maze of tables, a dark, slender wraith, not even drawing a glance from the men playing their various games. I was where I said I'd be—back corner, away from the windows. She was wearing a black pillbox hat with a black half–veil. Her face was anemia–pale under the mesh.

  "Mister…Cross?"

  "Sit down," I told her, pointing toward a small round table with the tip of my cue stick.

  She took one of the two wooden chairs, took off her gloves, fumbled in her purse for a cigarette. I pocketed the last ball on the table, left my cue on the felt and sat down. Two men detached themselves from the wall and moved into my spot, racking the balls and starting a game. The woman and I were invisible behind their shield.

  I took a seat, lit a smoke of my own. Waited.

  It took her two more cigarettes to realize I wasn't going to say anything.

  She had a chemotherapy voice, juiceless and resigned. "You have to make him stop," she said. "He's never going to stop."

  I'd expected a battered wife, from what the old man had told me. But this woman's soul was carrying the scars, not her body.

  "Just tell me," I said.

  "I can pay. Whatever it costs, I can get it."

  "This is part of what it costs."

  "I thought…"

  "I don't know you."

  "And you don't trust me."

  "That too."

  She lit another cigarette with the glowing butt of her last one.

  "I could lie to you," she said. Like she knew all about lying.

  "No. No, you can't."

  "You have a lie detector somewhere around here?"

  "I am one," I said, holding her eyes so she'd understand, get down to it.

  2

  My…stepfather," she finally said, the last word a mucus–coated maggot. A dangerous, deadly maggot.

  "What?"

  "He…had me. When I was a baby. When I was a girl. When I was a teenager. Now I'm away. But I'll never be free from him. I'll never have a boyfriend, never have a husband. I'll never have a baby–he burned me inside."

  "There's people who can fix that. Therapists…"

  Her eyes were corpses. "He burned me with a soldering iron. Right after I had my first period. He put it inside me and pushed the switch."

  "What do you want?"

  "I went to the police," she said, like she hadn't heard me. "They told me I came to them too late. Too much time had passed since the last time he had me. The statute of limitations, they said. He can't be prosecuted. So I went to a lawyer. He has money. I thought, if I could sue him, take his money, it would take his power. The lawyer told me I was too late too."

  "Okay, so…?"

  "The prosecutor, he was very kind. He told me I couldn't even get an Order of Protection. You can only get one if there's an ongoing criminal case. But he said if he…my stepfather…ever bothered me again, he'd lock him up. He said they know about him…from other things. He wouldn't tell me what."

  "Would that be enough?"

  "Nothing would ever be enough. For him to die, that wouldn't be enough. But if he could lose his power, if he could be in prison, that would…I don't know, give me a chance, maybe. To be free."

  "What did you think I could do?"

  "Hurt him," she whispered.

  "Felonious assault, that's a big–time rap in this state. If you've got a record, you could pull twenty years inside."

  "He has a record," she said.

  "For what?"

  "Rape. Before he married my mother. A long time ago. My mother didn't find out ab
out it until much later. He told me first. When I was just a little girl. He raped a girl and he went to prison. He told me he'd never rape a girl again. He hated prison. That's why he married my mother. So he could do what he does and not go to prison again. He was like some kind of…gangster, maybe. He'd talk real hard on the phone sometimes. And other times, he'd grovel. Crawl on his knees to whoever was on the other end of the line. I heard him doing it once and he…hurt me very ugly that night."

  I lit another smoke, watching her. "You want this bad?" "It's all I want," she said, holding my eyes.

  Then I told her what it would cost.

  3

  He lived alone. In a nice house in the suburbs. Neighbors on both sides, but he had a high fence all around the property. Solid cedar. It wouldn't keep out an amateur.

  A hard, slanting rain wasn't doing much to break the summer heat as I rang his bell just before midnight. No dog barked. We didn't expect any, not after a week of watching and waiting.

  I didn't hear footsteps before he threw the door open. A big man, paunchy, hair combed to one side exaggerating the baldness he was trying to conceal. Wearing a white T–shirt over baggy black pants, barefoot.

  I asked his name, holding my wallet open so he could see the police shield. He looked at it closely, eyes narrowing.

  "You don't mind waiting outside, Sergeants So I can just call the precinct, make sure you're who you say you are?"

  "No sir," I said, watching his expression change as he felt the pistol in his back.

  I stepped inside, pushing him back gently with the palm of my hand. I tilted my hat back on my head, quickly pulling the brim down again as I saw his eyes flash to the dragon tattoo across my forehead. I gestured for him to turn around. Buddha showed him the .307 magnum, close enough so he could see the rounds in the cylinder. Buddha's face was covered with a dark stocking mask.