Uprising - The Suspense Thriller Part 24

Hands shaking, Oth.e.l.lo slipped it off the ring, then handed it to Raider.

"Now go back upstairs," Raider ordered him.

"Help me, somebody!" Gus yelled, struggling to break free.

"What are you going to do?" pleaded Oth.e.l.lo.

"Go upstairs." Raider twisted Gus's arm tighter. "We don't have time. I'll be back."

Oth.e.l.lo looked around anxiously, and fearing the possibility of someone answering the cry for help, he decided to put his life in Raider's hands and did as he was told.

For close to three hours, Oth.e.l.lo waited in the apartment, trying to process what had just happened between Raider and himself, what was possibly happening now between Raider and Gus, and what might happen to all of them in the future once Raider came through that apartment door. He thought about leaving a dozen times, even imagined Raider returning with the police. But he stayed there, inexplicably drawn to Raider's command to wait.

In the meantime, he stripped off the old man getup and borrowed a white Dartmouth T-shirt and a pair of faded blue sweats from Raider's closet. He also had the leftover pasta from an Italian restaurant in Raider's refrigerator and went through all of Raider's things. No need to justify the snooping. Raider was far from being in the clear in Oth.e.l.lo's mind. He didn't find anything that further incriminated Raider anyway. The place was practically bare. The bedroom was as spare as the living room, simply consisting of the bed and a closet full of dirty laundry. His whole apartment was that of a bachelor who was preoccupied with more manly pursuits than the upkeep of his new pad. It was almost a romantic notion to Oth.e.l.lo, if only he could be sure Raider was indeed the man he claimed to be. To find out more about Gus or Crane Malloy or whatever his name was, he used the phone to call Sweeney and have his manager check up on the right-winger. He was on the sofa, hanging up, just as there was a knock at the door.

"Who's there?" Oth.e.l.lo asked cautiously in the old man's voice.

"Me."

Quickly, Oth.e.l.lo unbolted the door. Raider staggered in, looking worn and vacant. He was wearing Gus's leather jacket. His arms were clutching a big bundle of something inside the jacket. "Close the door," he said, then made his way toward the bathroom.

"What happened?"

Raider didn't answer; Oth.e.l.lo followed him. In the bathroom, Raider stood over the pedestal sink and opened the jacket. Blood was everywhere, on his T-shirt, inside the jacket and especially on the white shirt and pair of jeans that fell into the sink.

"Gus won't bother you or the uprising anymore," Raider said matter-of-factly.

"Whata"Ia"are you hurt?"

"This is all his, not mine," Raider said of the blood. He washed his hands and looked in the mirror. Behind him, Oth.e.l.lo's eyes were as wide as saucers. He looked on the verge of hyperventilating.

"Let me explain." Hastily, Raider dried his hands, then took Oth.e.l.lo by the arms and backed him out of the bathroom and into the bedroom. Once there, he sat Oth.e.l.lo down at the foot of the bed and pulled up his gym bag as a seat for himself. "Gus wouldn't have stopped till he found out who you are." He talked without looking up, as if caught up in his own personal justification of his acts. "I wasn't going to let that happen. I care about you way too much. I'm in love with you, Oth.e.l.lo." He looked up. "There, I said it: I'm in love with you. I'm not about to see you or us or all our dreams go up in flames because of some gay-hating, conservative traitor."

Oth.e.l.lo was stunned. "Did youa"what did you do to him?"

"The less you know the better, if...whatever. I will say his body is stripped naked and in the mountains near Malibu. If they ever find it, they won't have much to go on. Oth.e.l.lo, I hope you know I had no other choice."

"What about other moles?"

"He told me before today he was the only one. I gotta think that's true."

Oth.e.l.lo was on the verge of bursting into tears.

"I had to do it," Raider said, his voice almost breaking up. "I don't care if you do doubt me; I did this for you. You've taught me so much; you're so good to me. I wanted this to worka"you and me...." He broke off, going for the hurt little boy look.

Oth.e.l.lo remembered his accusations against Raider earlier in the afternoon, so much as calling him the traitor. Now, Raider had murdered for him, to protect him, to preserve what they had going.

"I'm sorry a thousand times for ever doubting you," Oth.e.l.lo stammered. "Can you ever begin to understand how I could be so paranoid? My whole lifea""

"Tell me you don't disapprove of what I did," said a still-wounded Raider. "As long as you can tell me that, we can go on from here."

"But the cops...you're in jeopardy...for me."

"The law never has to know. I did a good job. I didn't leave anything on his body that could pinpoint me."

"But you risked your life for me."

"You're worth it, can't you see?" He reached up and grabbed Oth.e.l.lo by the shoulders. "Tell me you're okay with this, O, just tell me."

Oth.e.l.lo's face was full of tears now, and Raider had a genuine impulse to kiss them away. Instead, he held Oth.e.l.lo's face in his hands, gently running his thumbs down his cheeks, tracing the trail of tears. He hadn't expected the mastermind of an a.s.sa.s.sination plot to be so emotional. In fact, Raider thought Oth.e.l.lo would take Gus's death in stride, re-affirm his trust in Raider and reveal the details needed to close the case.

But Oth.e.l.lo was truly affected, Raider realized as the pop star responded to the affection by placing his hands on top of Raider's. Sometimes I forget he's a real person, Raider thought, remembering Oth.e.l.lo's comments about all those empty nights in the Big House and never coming close to knowing love. And now somebody just killed for him, somebody Oth.e.l.lo wanted to love and spend the rest of his life with, somebody who claimed to want to love Oth.e.l.lo back. On top of that, Oth.e.l.lo was wrought with guilt for having put that somebody into this situation.

Jesus, Kincaide, what the h.e.l.l have you done?

He fought the instinct to feel guilty. It's called a job, he told himself, pressing his face into Oth.e.l.lo's, his lips tasting Oth.e.l.lo's tears in an effort to make them go away. Someday, he'll learn that Gus is still alive, Raider reasoned. He'll find out I just dragged the weirdo to FBI headquarters and scared him off the case.

"We'll get the old lady if she's done anything," Raider had yelled at Gus, who had been stripped to his underwear and forced to sit in the middle of a room under bright interrogation lights. "You and your Christian soldiers cut loose from this or get your a.s.ses fried for obstructing an investigation."

And someday Oth.e.l.lo would learn the b.l.o.o.d.y clothes were indeed Gus'sa"after they stripped him at headquartersa"but the blood on them was from twenty pounds of red meat, courtesy of Mayfair Market, or as Freedom called it, Gayfair. Someday, Raider promised himself, he'd tell Oth.e.l.lo all this, to hopefully ease the pop star's conscience. He'd visit the head of the Three Wis.e.m.e.n in the federal pen and tell the guy the truth. Hopefully, that would ease his own conscience as well.

Raider sat back on the gym bag, not having to pretend to be exhausted. "You still haven't answered my question," he said.

"Which one is that?"

"Whether or not you're okay with this?"

"I don't have a choice." Oth.e.l.lo ran his hands over his face. They sat in silence for fifteen minutes, no eye contact. Eventually, Oth.e.l.lo said: "Guess I can tell you now: I'm in love with you, too." He shook his head for lack of a better reaction. They were both locked together now, Oth.e.l.lo thought. Their lives and futures were irrevocably intertwined no matter how far the romance went. To that end, he began to speak: "I have to tell you a story, Raider, I have to."

"Right now?" Raider sensed what was coming and wished he had a tape recorder running.

"Yes, now, especially in light of what just transpired. It's a little story about three very famous and wise men who all met at a place they call the Temple...."

SIXTEEN.

T HE EARLY MORNING sun hovered over the three-mile stretch of Santa Monica Boulevard that ran through the heart of West Hollywood and was the epicenter of LA's biggest and most famous gay neighborhood. Today, as it was for one Sunday every June, a mile and a half of the boulevard was closed to vehicular traffic, no party boys swerving into the next lane while making their way home from all-night dances, no early morning cruisers circling the blocks around Circus of Books in search of the s.e.x they couldn't find last night, no muscle-bound boys roaring past in their Jeeps, ready to hit the weights at the two main gyms on the strip. Today, the four-lane east/west thoroughfare would be spared the usual tens of thousands of cars clogging the street. Instead, in three hours, over 250,000 people would gather on the sidewalks for the gay pride parade.

For now though, the boulevard was relatively quiet. Near the wooden barricades bordering the side streets, the men and women of the LA County Sheriff's Department, West Hollywood Division, loitered peacefully around their cars, sipping Styrofoam cups of coffee and chatting. In the grandstands near the end of the route, a television crew was making final adjustments to its cameras for the cable broadcast. Under the rainbow-colored balloons of the main entrance to the all-day festival in West Hollywood Park, a group of pink-shirted volunteers was getting final instructions from a stout, curly-haired woman with a bullhorn. In the many bars on the street, bartenders shined their countertops, antic.i.p.ating good business from the crowd.

Closer to the parade's starting point, the neighboring streets were buzzing with the kind of backstage nervousness usually reserved for theater premieres. Three male baton twirlers tossed their batons high in the air. Scantily-clad male and female dancers hiked their g-strings just a little farther up their b.u.t.ts. A black gospel choir practiced an African spiritual. And the West Hollywood Cheerleaders, all male, went over their new routine one last time.

Farther down, on a subdued block of Santa Monica that had yet to feel the electricity of the morning, Oth.e.l.lo and Raider sat quietly on the curb. Raider was absently rocking back and forth and Oth.e.l.lo was gently feeling his face, wondering if Old Man Joe was going to wither away in the encroaching heat. They sat without saying mucha"focusing instead on the few other early birds wandering bya"until Oth.e.l.lo could no longer stand the silence.

"I know what you're thinking. I can see the look on your face."

"What look?"

"The look that says we were fools to get here this early, that the parade doesn't start for hours and I should have listened to you."

"That's not what I'm thinking at all," Raider said, trying to be nice.

"Yes, it is."

"No, it isn't."

"Yes, it is," Oth.e.l.lo insisted.

"Okay, it is," Raider admitted.

"Well, I wanted to make sure we got a good seata""

"We're guaranteed that all right."

"Sweeney told me a gazillion people show up and I figured it's like the Rose Parade or something."

"Or Macy's Thanksgiving in Manhattan," mused Raider.

"Exactly," Oth.e.l.lo chimed a second before he caught Raider's sarcasm. "Anyway, it's better this way. We're here; we had a nice leisurely stroll from your apartment; plus we get a good look at the layout in case something goes wrong, like my face melting."

"That's one of the reasons you wanted to come early, isn't it? You're nervous about something going haywire."

"No, it isn't."

"Yes, it is."

"No, it isn't."

"Yes, it is," Raider said, drawing it out with a teasing lilt.

"Okay, it is," Oth.e.l.lo admitted.

Raider laughed triumphantly. He's like a kid finally getting to go to DisneyWorld, he thought. Just then, he saw two overweight men pa.s.sing by across the street. They were both dressed like Marilyn Monroe, complete with blond wigs and the white dress she wore over that subway grate. The day was bound to be a weird one, Raider figured, but it was a small price to pay for meeting the other two Wis.e.m.e.n in person later in the week at Jasper's ranch. There, he'd add to the mountain of evidence, and he'd also be able to tell the boys at the bureau: sure I hung out with Deon Anthonya"we were like old girlfriends. Intimidated? Are you kidding? You're talking to Panty-Raider, here.

He also had to admit he didn't mind giving Oth.e.l.lo this one last day in the sun, especially at an event the pop star had been dying to be a part of. Guy deserved it maybe, even if he was acting paranoid.

"Well, I promise you this, my old man." He patted Oth.e.l.lo's arm. "Nothing's gonna happen to Joe on my watch."

"You do have a way of bailing me out, don't you?" said Oth.e.l.lo. Raider c.o.c.ked his head to one side and shrugged, as if to say: what can I say, I'm da man. "Really, you do," Oth.e.l.lo went on, knowing when to stroke his man's ego. "Simi Valley for one."

"The Jesus freak for two."

"Let's not mention Gus." Oth.e.l.lo glanced around at the sidewalk behind them, noticing the increasing number of legs busily pa.s.sing by. He still hadn't reconciled Gus's death at the hands of the man he was dating. Having Jimmy Herman b.u.mped off was one thing; his would-be lover committing murder was an entirely different story. But it had to be done, he kept telling himself, for his life to continue "as is," for them, for the uprising. Still, no justification helped him get to sleep at night. "You know," he began, "after Herman, Joe will disappear off the face of the earth. Some of the members of Level 3 are bound to figure out the old lady was behind Freedom. I'll have to sever all ties. In fact, I think I've spoken my last words to Travis."

"So this will be the end of you in the revolution?"

"The Fund has enough money to run itself for years. We put in over a couple million each. The people in charge will have to decide who gets what. Laying low will be top priority. I didn't think of that when I concocted all this, but maybe this was as much as I was meant to do."

"You sure you're ready to retire?"

"What more can I do?"

For a moment, Raider regarded Oth.e.l.lo's profile, trying to look beyond the makeup and gla.s.ses and fake beard. "Don't do it, O," he said, his tone dead serious. "Call it off; let it go; stop." It was worth a shot, he figured. He couldn't have cared less about The D.A., Hollinquest or the radicals at ACTNOW, but he didn't want to see Oth.e.l.lo waste his whole life on a cracker like Jimmy Herman. h.e.l.l, Raider said to himself, if he could get Oth.e.l.lo to end this now, he'd consider only turning him in on the counter-bashing charges. "None of this is worth your life."

"When I let you in on everything, you agreed not to try and talk me out of it."

"I know, but," he looked up and saw the dueling Marilyns pa.s.sing by again. They were going the other way this time, "who you doing this for: these people?"

"I'm doing it for myself," Oth.e.l.lo paused, "and these people."

"I really mean this when I say I'm worried about you. If you get caught, what they can get you for so far is nothing compared to what you're on the verge of doing."

"It's no less than what you already did," said Oth.e.l.lo. "And you did it for me."

"Doesn't mean I wish it had come to that."

"You think I wished for Gus to happen? I'll let you in on a little secret, Raider: the closer you and I get, the more I think about the chances I'm taking and the more I wonder if it's worth it. I mean, if I had to choose, I'd much rather be in love without being in danger. Or best of all, in my dream world of dream worlds, I'd rather be in love and just be out, I mean, loving the man I love and the man who loves me with the both of us out and open to the whole d.a.m.ned world. Maybe then, I don't know, I'd end all this madness. At least I'd consider it."

Raider remained silent, having already decided not to make any more promises designed to further sucker Oth.e.l.lo, promises that would only serve to break the guy's heart that much more when it all came out in the wash.

Meanwhile, Oth.e.l.lo tapped his feet on the pavement, waiting for Raider to say: let's do it, let's declare our love to the entire world and become the most outspoken, gay couple in the universe. Not that Oth.e.l.lo was ready to arrange the press conference and come barreling out of the closet, but Raider by his side would be a d.a.m.ned good reason to consider it. But the man from Nantucket offered nothing, apparently just as scared as Oth.e.l.lo at the prospect of going public.

"Besides," said Oth.e.l.lo, "talk of the Wis.e.m.e.n not following through now is pointless. We couldn't stop things now if we wanted to, and we don't. It's all set. You-know-who already has all his instructions." He drew a short breath and looked toward the haze clearing in the sky.

The final meeting with Freedom had taken place a few days ago and every detail of the plan had been settled. Freedom would fly to Atlanta, where a car would be waiting for him at the airport. From there, he would drive to Columbia, South Carolina, and register in a motel under an a.s.sumed name. The morning of the museum opening, he was to show up at Bruce Jones's hotel suite pretending to be a courier with a delivery from CNC. Once inside, he would inject the fledging journalist with the same drug Oth.e.l.lo had used to kidnap Jasper and Deon, then make himself over in the image of a respectable blond reporter with the clothes and makeup kit Oth.e.l.lo had given him. Next, he would use Bruce's press pa.s.s to gain entrance to the opening ceremonies and locate the gun in the staff bathroom near the Hall of Greats. Then it was up to hima"and him alonea"to get close enough to Senator Evil and aim for immortality.

"Harrison Ford won't be able to do it any better," Freedom had promised, seemingly enthralled with the covert nature of the operation. Right before they parted, Oth.e.l.lo had felt the urge to strip off Old Man Joe and reveal himself to his triggerman right there in the boarded-up bar.

"Why you standing there like that?" Freedom had asked when Oth.e.l.lo hesitated to leave.

"I just wish we could have gotten to know each other better."

"I'm an open book. Can you say the same?"

Do you know who I am? Oth.e.l.lo had wanted to ask. Do you want to know?

Instead, he said, "Good-bye and good luck," and turned around and left.

"I just wish you would reconsider this," Raider said now, but his plea was interrupted by a ruckus in the distance.

Fifteen yards away, eight men were carrying signs through an intersection, garnering lots of attention from the dozen or so people crossing the street in the opposite direction. The placards bore warnings. SINNERS REPENT. READ THE BIBLE, IT SPEAKS THE TRUTH. SODOMIZERS SHALL NOT INHERIT THE KINGDOM OF G.o.d. LEVITICUS 18:22. One man was already making use of his bullhorn. He had long brown hair and a sizable beer belly and wore a black T-shirt that read FEAR G.o.d. "The Lord will punish you for this day," he said, to which the pa.s.sersby yelled "shame" over and over.