Hard Play Read online

  ONE SHADE OF BLACK

  Vol.1

  by Kurt Douglas

  Cover Artwork by J.D. Lee

  Images Courtesy of:

  Vlado

  Simon Howden

  David Castillo Dominici

  www.freedigitalphotos.net

  [email protected]

  www.trueleefiction.com

  Hard Play

  First Edition

  Copyright © 2014 Truelee Fiction

  All rights reserved.

  ISBN-10: 149744487X

  ISBN-13: 978-1497444874

  ASIN: B00QECOZ4U

  ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. This book contains material protected under International and Federal Copyright Laws and Treaties. Any unauthorized reprint or use of this material is prohibited. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system without express written permission from the author / publisher.

  This book is for

  Eve

  Table of Contents

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Acknowledgments

  ONE SHADE OF BLACK

  Vol.1

  Chapter 1

  The room was dark but for a desk lamp in the corner. Beneath the small circle of light, an eight-year-old girl slept hunched in a straight-backed chair. Her tear-stained cheek pressed against her crossed arms as she dreamt of better times. It was the first bit of sleep she’d had in days.

  Her blonde pigtails were fanned out over her face and across the desk in a tangled mess. Her body was wrapped tight in a beige blanket that bunched up around the waist, showing her pale green sweats and the bottom of a gray T-shirt. The last time her mother spoke, if you can call it that, was just before the orderly had given her the blanket, no more than three hours ago. A kind gesture by an empathetic old man. But to her, it was at best a consolation prize for the lack of her mother’s words, her mother’s touch.

  Her mother lay in the bed behind her, covered by sheets and surrounded by medical devices. Only her closed eyes were visible amongst the hospital’s mechanical adornments. There was no motion on the bed but that of her chest as the respirator pumped air in and out of her lungs, inflating and deflating the poor woman like a balloon. The room was silent but for the occasional beep of the heart monitor cutting through the low rasp of the ventilator device—a constant reminder that she was still alive, even if just barely.

  A rising commotion outside the door shook the little girl from her sleep.

  “What do you mean pull the plug?” she heard her father shout.

  Another man—the doctor, she assumed— responded, saying, “I’m sorry sir, but the insurance company won’t cover any further treatments.”

  “Please don’t. You know she’ll die,” her dad pleaded with the doctor.

  The little girl sat upright, listening to her father’s pleas. She moved her knees to her chest, balancing in the chair as she rocked back and forth, hugging herself. She stared into the hospital bed, looking through her mother’s body, wishing it were her arms holding her, hugging her, loving her.

  “We’ve reached the end, sir,” admitted the doctor. “Even if there was coverage there’s nothing more we can do.”

  “You know that’s a lie!” her father shouted.

  She heard the loud sobs as her father broke down, crying outside the door.

  “It’s all about the money,” he said between shallow breaths. “You’re all the same. You’re no hero. You don’t want to save people. There’s no money in that.”

  The door swung open. Her father stood in the doorway, his silhouette blurred by the hall light as he wiped the tears from his chin. The little girl leapt to her feet, crying, snot dripping from her nose as she ran to him. He fell to his knees and reached out for her. She wrapped her arms around her father and sobbed into his shoulder.

  As father and daughter attempted to comfort each other, the doctor stepped past them with a nurse in tow. Moving to the hospital bed, the doctor directed the nurse to remove the respirator. He did so, sliding it from her gaunt face and placing it on the table beside them. The doctor nodded to the nurse and pointed to one of the panels of buttons. With a click, the bay of dim lights went off. The beeping of the heart monitor raced, accelerating into a rapid succession of blips. As the woman’s body began to seize, the beeps blended into a dreary dial tone—the signal it was over.

  The nurse removed the IV from her forearm and the doctor declared, “Time of death, 2:34 am.”

  It was over. The little girl’s mother was gone. Her father’s wife, dead. They sank into each other’s arms as the doctor and nurse left the room, walking into the hall.

  As they passed, the doctor interrupted their quiet whimpers and languished sobs to say, “I know this is difficult, but you can’t stay here. We need to prep this room for the next patient. There’s a couch in the waiting area if you need some time.”

  The little girl glanced up with her blue eyes, tears welling beneath the bottom lids, and found the nurse looking down at her from beside the cold doctor, pitying her. He mouthed the words, I’m sorry, and his eyes echoed the sentiment, but it made her feel no better. If anything, it offended her. She was only eight and she had lost her mother, the only mother she had in the world, and nothing could replace her. Not words. Not pity. She felt the anger fester in her stomach. The resentment burrowed into her soul. She knew she would never forget this moment. She would never forget them. She would never forgive them.

  Chapter 2

  It was 6 a.m. and the sun had just begun to peek out from behind the cityscape. The clamor of traffic on the 170 was already roaring overhead. Orange lines and black shadows traced the ground around the “Early Gang”—a self-bestowed mantle—as they stood outside the front doors of Fitness Finesse. The building stood alone in a black parking lot, framed only by the overpass above and the concrete belly of the L.A. River behind. The air was heavy, cold and brisk. The morning sun had only been out long enough to heat up the full garbage bin left open overnight in the back of the building. The stinging smell clung to the exhaust filled air. With each rising breeze the gang cringed, raising their sweaters and T-shirts to their noses and waiting for it to pass.

  Every morning they came to the gym to get that early workout in before their days begun, and most mornings, Bill was late. This morning was no different. Bill was late. The gang waited.

  Sitting on the concrete bench and fiddling with his phone, the oldest of the four asked, “Have any of you seen Mary-Beth this week?”

  “You know, Ed, come to think of it, I haven’t. Have you?” One of the women said as she moved to sit beside him.

  Ed was well into his sixties, which made him the oldest in the group by ten years, the next one down the list being Mary-Beth. He was a short, thin man with wiry chest hair that poked out of his shirt, reaching up his thin neck like tiny furry fingers. He always stank of arthritis balm and damp New England forest, though the man had never been there, complete with pine and red spruce riding on the scent of the eucalyptus and menthol of the ointment rubbed into his joints. Ed’s attire was age-appropriate; this morning, he was wearing black ankle socks with his white tennis shoes, salmon Bermuda shorts and a white tank. His gray hair wa
s thinning, but not entirely gone. A bristly crew cut covered most of his head, except for a patch of scalp toward the front, which was for the better. The bare skin up there gave a bit more length to the old man’s too-short forehead and took some attention from his thick, black brow. Below his bushy eyebrows and nested above his knobby cheekbones, Ed’s blue eyes bulged, growing even wider when he spoke.

  Ed looked up from his phone and replied, his eyes bulging, “No. I have not. Unusual if you ask me.”

  Ed shifted a bit on his bench, scooting closer to Cheryl and making room for Pedro to sit.

  “She’s not been here in a few weeks, man,” Pedro said in his best American accent.

  Then the other woman, the larger of the two, pulled out a small planner and thumbed through the pages, declaring, “This is the fifth week she’s missed, guys.”

  “Unusual indeed,” Ed whispered.

  Pedro looked at Ed just in time to catch the old man looking him up and down.

  “Don’t look at me,” Ed said, “I don’t talk to her other than here.”

  Then Pedro looked to the large woman with the day-planner, “You, Rhonda?”

  “Not me. I only talk to Cheryl,” she said, glancing toward the woman beside Ed.

  “We all have each other’s numbers but no one has Mary-Beth’s?” Ed grimaced.

  Then there was the telltale sound of Bill’s arrival—screaming saxophones and screeching tires as he and his Pontiac tore into the parking lot.

  “Sorry I’m late, guys. Traffic.” Bill said, pointing to the overpass overhead as he threw open his car door and huffed and puffed toward the gym.

  The gang crowded in line behind Bill as he came to the door. The odor of salted pork wafted from his underarms as he fiddled with the lock and keys.

  Looking up, he asked, “Hey, where’s Mary-Beth? She owes me for this month’s membership. Haven’t seen her in a couple of weeks. I’ve tried to reach her. Called her. Emailed her. Even sent her a bill, but haven’t heard back. She’s not gonna be able to work out no more. You all talk to her, right? One of you let her know, yeah?”

  The gang all looked to Ed.

  “I don’t even know where she lives,” Ed blurted. A failed attempt to take the attention off him.

  “How about you, Bill?” Rhonda asked, a little too loudly. “You have her address?”

  “Actually, yeah,” Bill said. He dipped into his gym bag and fished out a wrinkled invoice. “Here you go.”

  Rhonda snatched it from his hands and forced it into Ed’s.

  “Here, Ed,” Rhonda said, “You know a cop or something. You can take him with you to check on her.”

  As he shoved the paper in his pocket, Ed replied, “Frank Black isn’t a cop.”

  “What’s he do then, man?” Pedro interjected, leaning over Ed’s shoulder.

  “A little bit of this. A little bit of that,” Ed said. “I know he’s done some investigative work but—”

  Cheryl interrupted, “Didn’t you say he owns a strip club? That’s gross. And what about Google? Can’t anyone with Google be a detective?”

  “Yeah, but I bet that guy already has access to some of that stuff, right?” Rhonda looked to Ed.

  “I guess so; I’ll ask. Cheryl, see what you can find online. I’m sure I can persuade Frank to lend a hand.” Ed got to his feet, holding up his phone in one hand and his gray and pink gym bag in the other. He checked the time. “I suppose I can miss one workout to check in on a friend. “

  The group flooded through the doors with Bill, and Ed made his way back into the parking lot. Packing his gym bag into the back of his blue Dodge, he headed home.

  Less than a mile away, Ed turned onto Moorpark Avenue and pulled into the driveway of The Pinemoor Apartments. Ugly palm trees tiredly dotted the lawn, surrounded by yellowing grass. The exterior was mainly natural wood paneling and cracked, blue-gray paint, except for the front facade that held the apartment’s marquee. That wall was a mosaic of jagged rocks in varied shades of brown. The building itself looked like an old, converted two-story motel; all of the units ran along one side of the courtyard, overlooking a pool that hadn’t been cleaned in some time, and a Jacuzzi that had long ago been turned into a marked but empty vegetable garden.

  The lot was in back as with most apartments in North Hollywood. A patch of uneven cobblestones bounced Ed's old Dodge up and down until the tires finally met smooth pavement. Weeds grew up between the cobblestones and the cracks in the pavement. Heavy oranges hung from a tree in the corner of the back lot. The warm citrusy resin crossed with the tangy smoke of flatiron steak and allspice floating up from the kabob restaurant on the other side of the back wall.

  Ed parked his truck and moved across the lot and into the courtyard. He dropped his gym bag at the base of the stairs. He could already smell the cigarette smoke billowing from Frank’s apartment, replacing the pungent smell of Middle Eastern food and orange blossoms. As he headed up, the faint sound of jazz flute and bongos echoed down the stairwell.

  Ed knocked. The door swung open and there he was: Frank Black.

  Beneath the layers of smoke was a strong fragrance of wet suede. Jazz flutes cascaded from a nearby record player as Frank sat hunched over a conga drum, a black silk kimono draped over his shoulders. The swamp cooler in the corner rattled as it pumped musty cold air into the small studio apartment. A smoldering cigarette was perched on his lower lip. He balanced the drum between his knees while banging it with one hand and holding a glass of scotch in his other—or, considering the hour, maybe it was apple juice, but knowing Frank, it was probably scotch. His sunglasses slid to the end of his nose as he pounded the skin.

  “You know it’s barely six in the morning, Frank?” Ed shouted.

  Frank dropped the drum and jumped to his feet; the kimono fell to the floor, exposing his bare arms and the Kevlar across his chest. He turned to Ed, splashing a bit of scotch out the sides of his glass. As he set it down, he lifted the needle from the record and the flutes screeched to a stop.

  Frank’s legs were clad in wrinkled, black slacks, and his boots were scuffed and worn from whatever it was he was doing the night before. His naked arms bulged from either side of the black bulletproof vest clinging to his barrel chest and his dark Wayfarers hid his steely, bloodshot eyes. His black hair, tousled and unkempt, was short at the sides and thick on top, falling backwards into a messy but smooth, natural wave; a classic cut that framed Frank’s square, stubbly jaw and strong brow—when it was neatly trimmed, but it had been a while since he’d bothered with that.

  Frank stared at Ed. His Pall Mall smoldered. Smoke danced across his sturdy face. He didn’t move. He didn’t invite Ed in.

  Taking a deep drag off his cigarette, Frank said, “I paid the rent.”

  “Jesus, Frank. You look like hell.”

  Frank picked up his drink, took a swig, then nodded at the older man.

  “Feel like hell,” Frank grumbled.

  Organization wasn’t one of Frank’s strong suits; boxes took up most of the standing room. Dusty morning light flowed in from the kitchen at the back. From the mini-blinds drawn across the windows, black bars stretched across the brown carpet, climbed the white file boxes and ascended up the dingy walls. Ed walked into the crowded room that doubled as an office and found an empty space on the couch and sat down.

  “You paid last month’s rent, Frank, but this isn’t about the rent,” Ed said.

  Frank looked at his watch.

  “You should be at the gym right now,” he decided.

  Then he swished the last of his liquid around in his mouth, extinguished his butt in the glass and sat down beside Ed, pulling another cigarette from the pack on the table.

  “It’s not about the music, either. I want to ask you a favor.”

  Ed’s voice trembled a bit. He’s not one to make a habit of asking favors, especially not of his tenants. Especially not this tenant.

  Frank pulled a Zippo from his pocket and flipped open the top. The flam
e burst into life as he lit a fresh cigarette.

  “Then ask,” he said, puffing away at the smoke.

  “You’re going to think I’m a crotchety old man. Paranoid in my old age.”

  “No such thing as paranoia, Ed,” breathed Frank. “Chances are it’s all true. It always is. You think you’re being cheated, you probably are. You think someone is after you, they’re usually right behind you. If something is lost, it’s probably stolen.”

  Frank flipped the Zippo shut, covering the flame with a clank.

  “Is that supposed to make us feel better or worse?” Ed asked into his lap. He looked up and added, “A friend of mine has gone missing.”

  “Report it,” Frank said without missing a beat.

  “You know I hate cops. The whole process in fact,” Ed confessed as he pulled the wrinkled invoice from his pocket.

  Frank grunted with a shrug and puffed on his cigarette.

  “You’re behind on rent, Frank,” Ed said. “You help me out and I’ll give you another week to play catch-up.”

  Ed whispered into the invoice in his hands, “Otherwise I’m going to have to kick you out.”

  “You’re kidding.” Frank forced the words through his teeth along with a cloud of smoke.

  He dragged hard on his Pall Mall, pulling at the red cherry.

  “Fine,” Frank said, “Who’s missing?”

  Ed handed Frank the invoice and said, “Her name is Mary-Beth Johnson.”

  Frank looked it over, tossed it on the coffee table and asked, “The judge?”

  “Ex. She’s retired,” Ed said. “We ride together.”

  Frank thought about it for a minute then reached for a stack of manila folders on the coffee table. He rummaged through the stack and then pulled from it a thin folder near the bottom.

  Opening the folder, Frank said, “Yeah. I remember Johnson. I worked with her a ways back regarding some insurance nonsense. How do you know she’s missing?”

  “Well, Bill says she’s missed her payment this month. She never misses any payments. And, she hasn’t shown up in a couple of weeks.”