Man Down by Roger Smith Page A

Johnny’s head at the front door of their house, knew to a bone certainty that she had drawn this to her, conjured these men and their masks and their guns and their madness from a humid Petri dish of American savagery, and that the very thing she had been running from for half her life was right here, right now.

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    As Lucy and the bald guy—in his panic Turner, even though Tanya had recently dragged him to a mind-numbingly boring barbecue at the man’s house, struggled to remember his name—approached the front door, Shorty leaned in close and Turner could feel the warmth of his breath through the mouth hole of the mask.
    “You open the door, get rid of that asshole and bring your kid in here. Don’t fuck up. You hearing me?”
    “Yes,” Turner said, his voice raw with fear.
    Shorty shrank back, hugging the wall, his weapon pointed at Turner’s head.
    A movement caught Turner’s eye and he glimpsed Bone cross the room, slip out of the glass door and move past the pool, the beam of one of the underwater lights catching the long blade of the knife he held in his gloved hand.
    Turner heard Lucy’s key in the lock and fixed what he imagined was a look of benign surprise on his face as the door opened.
    “Hey, kiddo,” he said, “what’re you doing back?”
    The man, Peter—Turner suddenly recalled his name—spoke.
    “John, hi, we’ve had a family emergency. We tried to call.”
    He was tall and running to fat, with a nose broken from some contact sport he’d played in his youth. He and his freckled wife were reborn Christians who spoke about Jesus as if he were on the PTA, their Ford bearing a bumper sticker that read, “Warning: In case of Rapture, this car will be unmanned.”
    “Hell, sorry, Peter,” Turner said, “I think my phone’s in my office and Tanya has a migraine. She’s resting and her phone’s off.”
    “We tried your landline, also,” Peter said.
    “Weird, it must be down. I’ll check that out.”
    Lucy stepped into the room, out of Peter’s view and saw Shorty, her eyes widening and her mouth opening to scream.
    Shorty grabbed her, clamped his gloved hand over her mouth and put his gun to her head, pushing her against the wall.
    “What’s happened, Peter?” Turner asked, fighting to keep his voice level. “What’s the emergency?”
    “My mother-in-law up in Alaska fell and broke her hip. Beth and the kids are on their way to the airport right now.”
    “I’m sorry to hear that.”
    “Thanks, John. It took some knee-time with Jesus to get them on a flight but, hey, he came through for us and they’re booked for Anchorage. I’ll tie up some business tomorrow and fly out and join them.”
    Turner nodded and cleared his throat.
    Peter stared at him. “Everything okay, John?”
    “Sure,” Turner said, aware that he was sweating, beads of perspiration dripping into his eyes. “I think I’m going down with something. The flu, maybe.”
    Peter nodded. “Okay, well, you take it easy now.”
    “Give our best to Beth. I hope her mom’s going to be okay. And sorry for the trouble, you having to bring Lucy home.”
    “No trouble.”
    The man smiled and waved and then he turned and headed back toward his car.
    Turner was closing the door when he heard a hoarse yell.
    Tanya.
    “Peter! Help! Get the police!”

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    Tanya’s voice was choked off but the bald man swung around, heading back toward the door that Turner hadn’t yet shut.
    “What’s going on, John?”
    “Nothing. That’s just the TV.”
    Peter shook his head, peering over Turner’s shoulder into the house. “No way. That was Tanya. I think you’d better let me take a look.”
    “Peter, please, just go home.”
    As Turner started to close the door the bald guy reached into his pocket for his cell phone, prodding at the keypad.
    Bone appeared from the shadows behind Peter, wrapped a thick arm around his chest and drew the blade across