The Last Deep Breath Read online

  “If he likes me then why won’t he help?”

  “He’ll want to know why first. He’ll want to see what he can get out of you, what you can do for him.”

  “I can’t do anything for him.”

  “Maybe not, but he’ll still get you to try.”

  Like a major Hollywood agent didn’t already have everything anyway, the guy would have to try to squeeze whatever he could out of a guy like Grey.

  They decided on lunch in a seafood restaurant, sat by the window and ordered real drinks to go with the food. She got something that looked and sounded frou-frou but had five shots of different liquors in it. He just went with a double whiskey and beer back. She took a sip of hers and said, “Why’d you steal Monty’s .32?”

  “I’m going to ask Harvey some questions, and I need straight answers.”

  “So that means you expect Harvey to lie to you otherwise.”

  “Maybe.”

  “Does this have to do with drugs, money, or a woman?”

  “A woman.”

  “Ah. Was Harvey banging someone he shouldn’t have been?”

  “Probably.”

  She sighed and gave him a frown, finally showing some signs that she was getting a little fed up with him. “You don’t like talking about this but you’re not bothered that I keep asking you so many questions. You want to get it out but you feel that you can’t because you need it internalized and want to keep your emotions, your story, to yourself. It’s kind of like the way that actors discover the characters they’re about to play. You read the script and know what’s supposed to be there in the movie, but you have to ask yourself questions about this person and find answers that aren’t on the page. What kind of a childhood did she have? What would she do in this or that situation? Did someone break her heart when she was sixteen? Did she have an abortion? Is she jealous of her sister? All these other bits and pieces of history go into helping define the character you eventually play.” She got in close, kissed him lightly, then with more passion. He went with it, looked deep in her eyes. He liked the taste of her drink on her tongue. Her expression had a mean edge to it. “So, why don’t we jump ahead a bit. Let me ask you. When you do find your character, when you know who you are, then what exactly are you going to do?”

  “Some damage,” Grey said.

  8

  On West 4th, Ellie in his doorway with the blade in her side, Grey rushed to her and clamped his hands to the wound and was surprised at how little it was bleeding. She said, “Jesus, don’t pull it out.”

  “I won’t.”

  “How bad is it?”

  “Bad enough.”

  “You know anyone who can help?”

  “No hospital, huh?”

  “No.”

  “Let’s get you inside.”

  All of this after not seeing each other for more than a decade. It was a little surreal, but somehow still expected, perfectly natural.

  She put an arm around his neck and he half-carried her into the vestibule. His apartment was on the third floor. They got a rhythm going as they moved up the staircase, where she’d sort of take a tiny jump and he’d lift her up three steps at a time. On the second floor landing the manager was cleaning up old Chinese restaurant menus on the floor. The guy glanced at the knife handle in terror.

  Grey said, “Look away. You didn’t see anything, right?”

  He got the key into his lock and opened the door. It clunked against the surround-sound speaker.

  Ellie asked, “You know anyone who—”

  “A medic I was in the Army with. Let me call him. If your liver hasn’t been nicked he can probably help. If it has, we need to take you to the emergency room.”

  “Goddamn it.”

  Grey got her down onto his couch, propped pillows behind her head, threw a blanket over her to help with shock. She hadn’t been stabbed long ago, which meant it had happened fairly nearby. She’d been in the neighborhood and he hadn’t known.

  He grabbed his cell and called Tough-Shit Sherman. T.S. answered on the first half-ring, barked, “The fuck?”

  ”It’s Grey. I’ve got my sister here at my place. Knife wound, not much bleeding. Looks like a two, maybe three-inch puncture. The knife’s still in. Think it missed the stomach but not sure about the liver.”

  “First thing, don’t pull the blade out.”

  “I’m not going to pull the fucking blade out.”

  “Any black discharge?”

  “Not that I see.”

  “Good. If he was seeping liver bile you could cross her off your Christmas card list.”

  “Just get here,” Grey said and hung up.

  He looked down and Ellie was grinning at him, a welled drop of blood on her lower lip. He wasn’t sure if she was hemorrhaging internally or if she’d taken a smack in the mouth. She was radiant and lovely and looked exactly like the little girl he’d known and nothing like her at all. They’d only been in foster care together for about twelve months, but it was an important time, a year that would never merge with the rest of the years, never fade, never soften. He considered her to be his sister and always would. He’d looked for her several times over the last decade, but she’d hit the streets at fourteen and he’d never so much as caught a hint of her after that.

  She raised one hand, her fingertips speckled with dry blood, and brushed the hair from his eyes. “You look good,” she said. “I’ve missed you.”

  “Don’t talk, Ellie.”

  “I want to talk. It’s been long time since we’ve talked.”

  A thousand questions boiled up in his throat, but he had to go with, “Who did this to you?”

  “It wasn’t his fault.”

  “Whose fault?”

  “Johnny’s.”

  “Somebody named Johnny stabbed you in the guts and it wasn’t his fault?”

  Her gaze unfocused for an instant, then she centered on him again. She wet her lips. “Did you look for me?”

  “Yes.”

  “How hard?”

  “You dropped out of the system when you were fourteen.”

  “I thought maybe I could change,” she said, and for an instant her exquisite face fell and her bottom lip trembled, eyes suddenly wet. And then just as quickly the moment of weakness was gone and she was beautiful and hard again. “Do you know anything about what happened to Pax?”

  “He lives outside of Fort Bragg, but right now he’s back in Iraq.”

  “He’s a soldier?”

  “Career.”

  “And what are you?”

  Even though his eyes didn’t brighten with tears, his own moment of weakness hit him. “A fuckup.”

  “No you’re not. You just still need to find what you’re good at.”

  He’d lost his family, been abused by foster parents, kicked out of school, booted out of the Army, had nothing of value except the car, couldn’t hold a steady job and worked temp manual labor wasting his days waiting for something to happen. He wondered if this was it.

  “Where’ve you been?” he asked.

  “For the last few years, L.A. mostly.”

  “Doing what?”

  “Being very stupid.”

  It made her laugh, which led into a coughing fit that went on so long she nearly convulsed.

  “How long have you been in New York?” he asked.

  “Eight months.”

  He swallowed thickly. A knot in his chest tightened even further. “And you knew where I was that whole time. Why did you wait so long to come by? Why did it have to be like this?”

  “I’ve watched you,” she said. “I didn’t...I didn’t want to make things worse.”

  “There is nothing worse.”

  T.S. rushed in through the door with his medical kit, moved to Ellie’s side, looked her in the face and said, “Goddamn, woman, you’re gorgeous.”

  “Thank you,” she said and started vomiting bile.

  9

  It was rough going for a while, and there was a lot of b
lood. Grey went for the phone twice but Ellie, who should’ve been unconscious through it all, was still awake and kept telling him not to call an ambulance. Finally, T.S. got the situation under control. After he was done he gave her a couple of shots that put her out at last.

  As T.S. washed his red hands in the kitchen sink he said, “She’ll make it if peritonitis doesn’t set in. I think she’ll be all right. I’m leaving bandages and antibiotics. Change the dressing twice a day and follow the directions on the bottles.”

  Grey checked the meds and saw they belonged to an Esther Freeman on the Upper East Side. “Esther make out okay?”

  “Esther’s long dead. Don’t ask any questions.”

  “Right.”

  Grey started scrubbing at the blood that had splashed onto the wall.

  “She really your sister?” T.S. asked.

  No need to get into it. “Yes.”

  “I know this girl.”

  “What?”

  “I know her.”

  “You know her?” Grey turned, tossed his rag down. “How the hell would you know her?”

  “Yeah, from the movies.”

  Grey knew then exactly what kind of movies Ellie had been making, what had probably brought her low, and what had brought her to New York. If you bottom out in porn your next step is pro. She’d probably burned a lot of bridges out in L.A. and wanted to try fresh in New York.

  “Sorry, man,” T.S. said.

  “Don’t be.”

  “Maybe I shouldn’t have told you.”

  “It doesn’t matter.” The wall had dried but the paint was still marked with her blood. “She didn’t get knifed by being a soccer mom in Westchester.”

  “Still, if it was my sister, I’d be a little steamed thinking my best buddy had watched her on DVD and, you know, well...”

  “Shut the fuck up, Sherman.”

  “Right.” T.S. picked up his bag, started for the door. “You know she’s an addict, right?”

  Grey’s chin dropped to his chest. He shut his eyes and welcomed the darkness, felt it cool him, befriend him, then he opened his eyes again. “I do now.”

  “Heroin. I don’t know how bad a habit, but if it’s bad enough you’ll know it soon.”

  “Jesus.”

  “Call me if you need anything else.”

  “Thanks.”

  Once the echoes of footsteps receded down the stairs, Grey went through her purse and found a knotted condom full of heroin, a hypodermic needle, and a business card that sounded upper class unless you knew what you were looking for: “Premium Friends - For All Your Attendant Needs.” He thought it was cute how they interchanged the word “attendant” for “escort.”

  Listening to Ellie’s labored breathing, he dabbed her sweaty forehead with a wet towel. He remembered being a kid and doing this same thing after old man Wagner had been at her. Washing her wounds, cleaning up blood.

  She was naked under a blanket, snoring softly. He drew the blanket away and inspected her body. Some scars he recognized. Many others had been collected along the way. A nicely done armband tattoo of thorns around her left bicep. Another around her right thigh. The signs of addiction could still be seen. A few bad bruises and blemishes that hadn’t fully healed. She’d shot mostly in her feet and a couple of veins had collapsed, proving she’d been hardcore for years but had still been smart enough not to ruin the rest of her body, the moneymaker.

  He took her hand and put her palm to his mouth and spoke against her flesh. He wasn’t aware of his own words and he couldn’t stop himself. He didn’t recognize his own voice and was almost lulled by the rhythmic murmur of it, like a hymn or a prayer. It went on like that until it was dark and then he kissed her hand and laid it back across her belly.

  Ellie was sleeping soundly when Grey called the number and set up an appointment for later on that night. He said he was a businessman visiting town and would like some company. They went through the whole spiel that they were a “friendship club” and that their ladies were not prostitutes and there was no intent to sell sexual favors. He said sure, he understood. He showered, shaved, got dressed in his one black suit, and pulled a wedge of cash from his stash at the bottom of the closet. He needed to find out if anyone at Premium Friends knew this Johnny.

  10

  Turned out Premium Friends was a ritzy place down in the East Village. Grey met the madam and two bouncers out in the vestibule, who checked him out and put a little quiz to him that was supposed to force him to admit to being a cop if he was one. The madam was an Asian woman who was on the wrong side of fifty but still hanging in there. Her glossy black hair wagged and waved whenever she turned her head the slightest bit. He imagined her starting out as a pro playing the geisha girl, wearing teakwood sandals and telling guys in broken English how huge their cranks were.

  The bouncers were the usual muscle-bound no-neck types with faces blurred from past battles. The only difference was these two were well-dressed in double-breasted suits.

  Once Grey had passed muster he was charged a “membership fee” and they let him into the bar. This was the meeting area where you checked out the ladies who promenaded around in evening ware or lingerie. They slinked up beside you to ask your name and touch your arm and laugh at your lame jokes to make you feel comfortable.

  If you wanted to take them out to a club or a social function, the date was one price. You wanted to stay in and maybe go visit one of the rooms in back, you paid something else. All major credit cards accepted. They chatted him up while he asked everyone in sight if Johnny was around.

  He kept asking for Johnny and they kept saying, “Johnny who?” The ladies had no idea and he got the feeling they were telling the truth. He wasn’t sure what else to do but tell it straight. He said he was Ellie’s brother and that she’d been hurt and he’d found the card and knew what she did and he wanted to get some information from her employers and fellow employees. They said they had no idea who Ellie was.

  It got the bouncers up in his face. They said he was bothering the girls. They ushered him into a different back room than the ones where you had sex. They worked his gut and kidneys for about five minutes. It was nothing compared to what the MP’s used to do to him when he was fucking around off base. He kept asking about Ellie and Johnny and the bruisers just looked at him like he was crazy. They tried to drag him out the back door into the alley but they hadn’t hurt him nearly as bad as they’d thought. He walked out on his own power past the madam, asked her the question too, and saw no flicker of deceit in her eyes when she said she didn’t know. He described Ellie to her. She said there were lots of girls who fit that description and he figured she was right. The bouncers started getting itchy to kick the shit out of him again and got in close, breathed threats in his ear.

  Total bust. Grey grabbed a cab home.

  Ellie was still out cold but he didn’t like the idea of leaving her on the couch alone until morning, so he changed her dressings and carefully hefted her into the bedroom. He crawled in beside her and made sure he laid far enough away from her that he didn’t accidentally roll over and re-open her wound.

  At three in the morning he got up and pissed a little blood. He checked Ellie’s bandages again and got her to wake up long enough to give her the antibiotics. In a stupor she said, “We’re both naked.”

  “Yeah.”

  “Did we have sex?”

  “No.”

  “Do you want to?”

  It was a tough question to answer, even if he did consider her to be his sister. It wasn’t kink. It wasn’t fetish. He loved her. He hadn’t loved anyone else in a very long time and a need to hold on to and be held by someone you loved was almost overpowering. While he stood there thinking about it she passed out again and solved the problem.

  In the morning when he woke she was gone.

  So were the pills, some of his clothes, and the rest of the stash from the bottom of his closet.

  She left a note saying:

  Thank you.
I love you. Forgive me. I’ll see you again one day.

  He called T.S. and asked, “My sister. What name did she perform under?”

  “Give me a second.”

  Grey could hear T.S. rummaging through his porn collection. Grey knew it was extensive but it sounded like T.S. was climbing over boxes, digging through two or three closets, unlocking trunks.

  “No, not this one...no...no...Assbusters 7, this it?...no...no...Cum Home for Christmas...this the one?...wait...no...Sidesaddle Sally...Knee-deep Throat...Teen Cum Dumpsters...no...”

  “T.S., you don’t have to read all the—”

  “Here it is. Teen Ball Busters 2. Yeah. Her name is...Eva Rains. That’s right, now I remember. She did a lot of movies with Harvey Wallbanger, him and his twelve-inch wonder of the world. I think they were a couple. You know, in real life.”

  “Thanks.”

  Grey called Pax’s U.S. number and left a voice mail. If he wasn’t in the hot zone he’d call within the next day or two.

  It took less than two hours. Pax said, “You should’ve phoned sooner.”

  “I had my hands full.”

  “Tell me everything.”

  Grey told him everything and Pax said, “Wait for me.”

  “I’m not sure that I can.”

  “I’ll be done with this leg of my tour in less than three months.”

  “That’s too long. I have to do something.”

  “All you have to do is wait for me. In fact, you don’t even have to do that much. You can forget it ever happened, go on about your business.”

  Pax was too kind to tell him that he would probably just fuck things up. “You know I can’t do that.”

  “Then sit tight and just wait.”

  But Grey hadn’t been able to do that either. He checked the phone book, found nothing. He checked the Internet, found about ten thousand websites devoted to Eva Rains. The message boards went on and on. The fanboys were some seriously fucked up individuals. Half of them wanted to marry her, half of them wanted to plow her to death.