Traci Tyne Hilton - Mitzi Neuhaus 02 - Eminent Domain Page 21

  Ben was breathing fast and shallow. His mind spun as he lifted the lid of the box. There was a computer inside. It had a familiar Dead Kennedys’ sticker on the front. It was his. Each movement was an effort, like he was fighting gravity for motion. He pulled his computer out of the box and put it in the big pocket of his cargo pants.

  The myrtle wood box was still in his hand. He ran his fingers over the smooth surface. It was just an empty box. They had tied him up for an empty box. Ben turned it over on its side and pressed the dovetailed joints one at a time like a puzzle box. Nothing moved. He pushed his thumbs along the edge of the box. Nothing happened. He gripped the box in one hand and pulled at the inner wall of the box with his fingertips.

  A thin strip of laminate slid forward with the pressure of his fingers. Ben stared at the cavity beneath it. It was thin and narrow. Exactly the size of the memory card that was sitting inside it. An SD card like the one in Ben’s camera. Ben pinched the card between his thumb and his finger. The box fell from his hand, clattering on the floor. Ben pulled his head up, but no one was responding to the noise. Ben steadied his hand on the nearest scooter’s handlebar. He took a deep breath. He slipped his hand into his pocket and blindly shoved the memory card into the drive on his Mac Book

  Ben shoved the myrtle wood box into an open gear bag on the back wall. The scooters had been cool. The guys seemed cool. But that small flat box changed everything. The Scooter Mafia would kill him over that box. But they might not if he just gave it to them. If they believed his story. But that would be selling out Mitzy. He had to choose right now. The Mafia or Mitzy. Then his phone began to vibrate. He reached his hand in his pocket to pull it out.

  Sergei popped his head around the corner from the back room, “Coffee?” he said with a smile.

  Ben shook his head. Sergei returned to the back room. Ben pulled his phone out as fast as he could. It was Jenny but it was too late. With the phone only half out of his pocket he sent her a text. M OK SKTR 5. Did she know the scooter shop on fifth street? He hoped she did. He really hoped she did. He wanted to get back to Jenny. He stepped away from the gear bag and tried to look like he was paying attention to the Aprilia Scarabeo in front of him but all he could think about was cake. He had missed the cake testing. The only wedding planning event he had even remotely cared about was the one where he got to eat plate after plate of cake and he had missed it. He turned his back to the scooter. He pinched his mouth shut tight and crossed his arms over his chest. He had been blaming Mitzy for the kidnapping. It seemed like her fault but looking at where he was now he realized it had been the scooters keeping him here, not Mitzy. Mitzy could have her box back and he was going to get to Jenny. Something in the back room crashed,

  “Hey Ben,” Sergei called, “Could you give me a hand? I dropped something.”

  Ben turned to help Sergei. The computer in his baggy pants pocket was banging against his knee. He had the memory card. He couldn’t stay here. He turned again and ran out the door of the shop.

  He ran as fast as he could, puffing for breath. His face was beet red. He ignored the burning in his side and kept running for more than two blocks. He slid into the first doorway he could hide in. When he left the shop the little bell on the door had rung. Any second he would be followed. He slipped his phone out of his pocket again and sent a text to Mitzy. BX SKTR 5. It was all he had time for. He left the safe shadow of the door way and ran again. He ran what felt like forever until fate handed him a bus with the door open. He took the steps two and a time and flashed the driver his monthly bus pass. He took the first empty seat, pulled his hoody over his head and hunkered down. Ben took one last desperate look behind him but saw nothing on the street. He was safe.

  Taking to heart the message from the Spoons book, Alonzo had Mitzy at a nice restaurant that didn’t serve Italian food and wasn’t near work. He was trying to think of something to talk about over lunch that was unrelated to the Tram, the community center, the inn, environmental issues, local history, Ben, immigration law, and the sale of the Smythes’ house. He wished Mitzy’s work wasn’t so far-reaching.

  Mitzy’s phone rang and she picked it up. No one was there. She pulled it away from her ear and shook it.

  “Text,” Alonzo said.

  “Oh, yeah.” She looked at her phone. Ben. “It’s from Ben. Alonzo, it’s a message from Ben.”

  Alonzo leaned over to read it. “Box skaters at 5? Is he on drugs?”

  “I doubt it,” Mitzy said. She twirled a curl on her finger as she considered the text.

  “He knows you can’t read texting, right?”

  “He must be in a hurry then. BX means my box. I know it does. What is SKTR 5? It needs a vowel. Skater? Skeeter? Skiter? Skoter? Skuter?”

  “Scooter?” Alonzo said.

  “That makes sense. Does he want me to bring him his scooter? But where would I bring it? Where is 5?”

  “Fifth Avenue? Fifth street? The five hundred block? The five hundred club? Fifth grade?”

  “Don’t be absurd,” Mitzy said, as she googled Scooter Fifth street PDX.

  “I’m not the one who sent you a text.”

  “There’s a scooter shop on fifth!” Mitzy said. She jumped from her seat and grabbed her jacket. “We’ve got to go. He has my box at the scooter shop on Fifth Street.”

  “But why?” Alonzo asked, shrugging his coat on. He stepped out of the booth and stood with a heavy sigh.

  “We can ask him later, come on.”

  The bell on the front door jingled.

  “Ben? Is that a customer? Tell him I will be just a moment. Ben? I’ll just grab a towel and wipe this up. The coffee is done. I will leave it for you. Ben?” Sergei attempted to sound like he was cleaning as he poured popcorn oil over boxes filled with paper invoices. The coffee pot was not guaranteed to ignite this mess. If he had to use a match, he would. He went out to the showroom wiping his hands on a paper towel.

  Ben was gone.

  The traffic on Fifth Street in downtown Portland was dizzying. It was lunch hour and the street was swarming with people. They were getting on and off of busses, pulling away from the curb and entering traffic, pulling to the curb and parking their cars. They were lined up at the hot dog cart. But Mitzy and Alonzo trained their eyes to the building. One of the shops had to be Ben’s SKTR 5. Mitzy saw the sign.

  “There it is.” She grabbed Alonzo by the sleeve.

  He picked up her hand with his and gave it a gentle squeeze. “Slow down babe. Let’s just walk in the shop and see what happens.”

  They walked into the shop and looked around, stopping at the vintage scooter in the middle of the room. They heard something fall with a thud in the back.

  Mitzy looked at Alonzo and raised her eyebrow. Alonzo shrugged.

  “Great ride,” he said.

  “Yeah,” Mitzy said, raising her voice. “I’d love to try it out. Think it’s for sale?”

  Alonzo nudged her with his elbow. “Try to talk normal,” he whispered.

  “Whispers travel better than normal voices,” Mitzy said.

  “Yeah. I know.”

  A tall thin man with a broken nose stepped out of the back room wiping his hands on a towel. “Sorry to keep you waiting,” he said. “Please have some popcorn and make my terrific mess worth it.” The man was glancing around the room as he spoke, his eyes not settling on anything.

  “It is just you here then?” he asked.

  Mitzy smiled, “Just us,” she said. “But no thanks for the snack.” She waved her hand in the direction of the popcorn maker.

  “Too bad,” the broken-nosed man said. “I have just made a terrific mess spilling that oil all over the back. I’d like to say it was worth it since the customers love the popcorn so much.”

  Mitzy chuckled.

  A man with a deep scowl and ash blonde hair threw the front door open and banged his way in. “Sergei,” he said, nodding to his friend and heading to the Vyatka.

  Sergei lifted his eyebrows into h
is hairline and nodded his head in the direction of Mitzy and Alonzo.

  “Ahhhh!” Vasiliy said, with an artificially high voice. “It is our dear friend Mitzy! Come to find Ben, no doubt. Welcome to Scooter-Niks, Mitzy. Do not touch the Vyatka, please.”

  Mitzy yanked her hand back from the leather seat of the scooter.

  “Make yourself comfortable, friend. And tell me, where is this box that I need?” Vasiliy said, his voice smooth and confident.

  Alonzo stood between Mitzy and Vasiliy, with his hand clutching his phone.

  “What box?” he asked.

  Vasiliy looked in Alonzo’s direction, and then turned back to Mitzy.

  Mitzy turned around and looked at Sergei, “Where is Ben?” she asked.

  “Oh that does not matter,” Vasiliy said, his voice much deeper now, each word pronounced with care. “Because really, we do not care at all about Ben. We were looking for you and your box. Her bag,” Vasiliy said.

  “Ben’s gone,” Sergei said as he reached for Mitzy’s bag and slid it off of her arm.

  As the box was no longer in her bag, Mitzy didn’t protest. “Where is Ben?” she said, her voice like the whisper of an angry librarian.

  “He was here and now he is gone. Who knows? I suppose he just ran off,” Sergei said. He tipped the large, purple alligator Birken bag over and spilled its contents on the white linoleum floor

  He kicked her compact and phone and day planner around with the pointy toe of his black leather shoe.

  Vasiliy sucked in his breath. “It was necessary, Sergei, that Ben stay here.”

  “But he was a nice guy,” Sergei said.

  “Yes. But do we want this nice guy to go and talk about us right now?” Vasiliy said his face turning a deep red.

  Sergei kicked the day planner. It skidded across the room and hit the wall. “I wasn’t going to leave him in here. I’m no—”

  Vasiliy cut him off. “No. You aren’t. You’re soft. But taking him with you and letting him get away are not the same thing! Where’s the box!” Vasiliy was screaming now, his face livid with anger.

  Alonzo still stood between Mitzy and Vasiliy. The two were technically surrounded, with Sergei and Vasiliy each blocking an exit. Mitzy sneezed. Sergei sniffed dramatically.

  “The coffee maker is very hot right now,” Sergei said under his breath. He looked at Vasiliy and said it again, “The coffee maker.” He shook his head, his hint dropping like a dud on the room. Vasiliy should have been crossing the interstate bridge right now. Sergei shuffled toward the back room, keeping an eye on Mitzy as he left. Obviously Vasiliy had come for the Vyatka, which was supposed to have been Sergei’s own ride out of town.

  Alonzo took one step forward and pounded his fist into Vasiliy’s face.

  Vasiliy threw a hand over his face and punched blindly, hitting Alonzo in the shoulder.

  “Run!” Alonzo yelled.

  Mitzy stood frozen. Vasiliy wiped blood from his face and hit Alonzo again. Alonzo dropped him with a second fist to the face. A thin grey smoke with the poisonous smell of burning nylon trickled into the room.

  “Hey Vasiliy!” Sergei hollered from the back, “Would you call 911? I, um, I can’t get the fire out.” Sergei swore loudly and banged around. “It was the oil on the coffee pot and now, Ouch! Now it has the wall and the…” Sergei made his feeble cry for help and then left through the back door. There was more than one way out of Portland.

  The sound of the back door slamming shut filled the scooter shop. Vasiliy struggled to his feet but Alonzo nudged the kickstand of the Vyatka out with his toe and the scooter fell over knocking Vasiliy to the floor again.

  Vasiliy whimpered as smoke filled the room, “Get this off of me! We’ve got to get out.”

  Alonzo reached back for Mitzy’s hand as he shoved the 200 pound Scooter off of Vasiliy with his knee. But Mitzy wasn’t there.

  In the back room the smoke was black and thick. Thinking only of her box Mitzy flapped her $10,000 purse at the fire, trying to smother it. But the flames licked the wall, eating the particle board shelving system and the boxes of invoices. She dropped to her knees and pulled open the cupboards. Ben said the box was here. If the mafia needed it then so did the Feds. She didn’t intend to leave without it.

  Vasiliy pushed the bike the rest of the way off of himself and got on it. He started it and the high-pitched whine filled the room. Shards of splintered glass flew everywhere as he pushed himself and his slow little Soviet scooter through the plate glass door. A rush of oxygen blew through and the flames broke through the wall, eating up the display of scooter accessories and gear bags.

  “Mitzy!” Alonzo was screaming.

  Mitzy heard him, but didn’t give up. She had crawled into a storage closet. It was full of smoke but hadn’t caught fire yet. She pulled box after box of toilet paper, popcorn sacks, cash register tape, pens and catalogues to the floor searching for her Myrtle wood box. Where had Ben put it?

  Alonzo spread himself on the floor, breathing the fresh air that was pouring in from the broken glass store front. He pulled his phone out of his jacket pocked and called 911. “Fire at scooter shop. 5th and Alder.” The emergency rescue assured him they were on their way and tried to keep him on the phone.

  “Get out of the building,” a lady with a confident voice said, “And stay on the phone.”

  He dropped the phone behind him as he crawled to the back room. “Come on Mitzy! We’ve got to get out of here.”

  The flames had turned the corner, covering the wall between Alonzo and Mitzy. The doorway was filled with flames.

  “Mitzy!” he yelled. “Go out the back door!”

  Mitzy pulled one more container down from the top shelf. Nothing. She dropped to her hands and knees and pushed the door open with her elbows. She could hear Alonzo yelling her name. She took a deep breath, “Get out!” she screamed. “I’m okay! I’ll use the back door.” Alonzo stood up and ran through the billowing black smoke and out the shattered door. He didn’t hesitate at all but continued running around the block to find the back door.

  A crowd of people on lunch break had gathered around the burning building, eating their food cart lunches and watching the show.

  Mitzy reached the back door of the scooter shop. She rose to a kneeling position and turned the handle. The Scooter shop was located in one portion of a converted warehouse and the back door led to the interior of the city-block-sized high rise. Mitzy shut the door and lay down again. If the fire didn’t get put out, she did not want to be lost in the middle of the building.

  The intense oil fire had consumed the wall quickly and was tearing into the ceiling and the side walls now. She pulled herself on her belly through the door from the back room to the shop. The rivets on her jeans were burning tiny spots on her hips but she was almost out. She was choking for breath but did not give up.

  Mitzy pulled herself through the broken window, slicing a deep gash in her thigh. She gasped for air on the other side, but the thick smoke was too much. She slid onto the concrete and lay, face down, on the sidewalk, the cold of the ground kissing her lips. With her mouth open over the sidewalk she tried to breathe in that cold. Then she dragged herself forward inch by inch to avoid rising into the black smoke that billowed out of scooter store. The acrid smell of burning plastic scooter bodies and tires covered every inch of her person. She reached the curb of the sidewalk and lay with her head off the edge, a cool air coming up from the storm drain. She closed her eyes for just a moment. The sharp pain her leg wound caught up with her; gasping once, she passed out.

  The blaring of the sirens didn’t rouse Mitzy from her daze; but by the time the fire fighters had cleared the crowd she had filled her lungs with the relatively fresh air of the storm drain and was sitting up again. A man in full turnout put his arm around her waist and heaved her to a stretcher. She lay down on it and took a deep breath. A paramedic put an oxygen mask over her face and she breathed. The team rolled her stretcher into the ambulance and it drov
e away. One paramedic cut the torn fabric of her Sevens away from her slashed leg and held a wad of gauze over it with the pressure of his whole body on the wound. She thought that was as bad as it would get but then the blood was stopped and they began to clean the wound. The solution he poured over her leg stung like a bite and tears filled Mitzy’s eyes. She tried to slow down her breathing, counting as she inhaled.

  She woke in the ER. Her leg was stitched shut but her eyes felt dry and sand-filled and all she could smell was the putrid scent of burning plastics that clung to her clothes and hair and skin.

  Alonzo had kept running. He ran the whole block searching for the door Mitzy would come out of. He reached the front again as the ambulance drove away. Breathless, he bent over, hands on his thighs and gasped for air. With one deep gasp, he stood up again. He grabbed the arm of the nearest person, “Did they get her out?”

  “They got some blonde lady out. They took her in the ambulance.”

  Alonzo took off again, this time running for his car.

  Ben rode the bus all the way to Hillsboro. He was on the bus for hours. At first he just thought about his life. Then he played Dungeon Hunter on his iPhone. Then he thought he ought to call Jenny. He looked out at the suburban landscape surrounding him. He was almost home. He wouldn’t try to explain in a text. He’d just go see her.

  Nearing her intersection he pulled the wire above the window. When the bus stopped he got off. He stretched and shook his hands out. He wasn’t sure what he’d say.

  Her apartment was in front of him before he knew it. He knocked on the door and waited. He listened for the sounds of her movement but it was a steel door. Her home was silent. He knocked again.

  The door creaked open and there she stood, mouth open slightly, hands on her hips.