A Broken Woman

Chapter 3

3

I arrived home around eleven o’clock to the boundless energy of Diana, my nine-month-old golden retriever. She jumped and yipped with excitement as I closed the front door. Her paws were covered in dirt from digging in the backyard, but I didn’t care. With all the s**t going on in my life, Diana was my one source of happiness. I’d never thought of myself as a dog person before my brother, Jake, gave her to me as a Christmas present. But now I couldn’t imagine my life without her.

“Hey, baby girl.” I lay on the floor and let her slather me with slobbery puppy kisses. “How you doing?”

I went to hug her, and she bolted to the kitchen. “Fine. Be that way.”

She returned a moment later with her empty food bowl in her mouth. s**t. I forgot to fill it before I left this morning. “I’m sorry, baby. Mama was out later than expected.”

I grabbed the bag of gourmet kibble from the pantry and filled her bowl. She dug in, tail wagging like a high-speed metronome.

I tried to remember if I’d eaten that day and couldn’t recall anything. The dishes in my sink were at least a couple of days old. The fridge was empty except for a gallon of milk that was turning lumpy. I checked the pantry. A package of ramen, a few dusty cans of tuna, and a box of Rice-A-Roni. I looked at the instructions on the Rice-A-Roni box. It required butter, which I didn’t have, unless the sour milk counted. I settled for the ramen dusted with the contents of the “oriental-flavor” seasoning packet. I concluded that if oriental really was a flavor, it shouldn’t be.

The old me would have had plenty of healthy food in the kitchen. And it wasn’t like I was short of funds. End of last year, I’d brought in two hundred grand for capturing one of the FBI’s most wanted. My fiancé, Conor Doyle, had listed me as his beneficiary on his life insurance policy, so when he was declared dead, I’d inherited a sizable sum.

If anything, I was short on motivation. The thought of wandering the grocery store aisles, dodging idiots who paid no attention to where they were going, set my teeth on edge. Last time I was there, I was two seconds away from bludgeoning an old man who’d been blocking the aisle with his cart for five minutes, trying to decide between two brands of canned peas. They were canned peas, for f**k’s sake. They all taste like green mush, so just pick one!

Using the wall for balance, I zombie-shuffled down the hall to my bedroom with Diana trailing me. I lay on sheets that hadn’t been washed in weeks and stared at the popcorn ceiling. My body craved sleep, but my mind wouldn’t shut off.

As Diana snuggled her warm body next to me, I kept thinking about Wilhelm Penzler. Was it an accident? Was it suicide? Either way, he’d still be alive if not for me. A lot of people would still be alive if not for me. In nine years as a bounty hunter, I’d killed nearly a dozen people. Granted, the world was a better place without most of them—d**g dealers, human traffickers, rapists, murderers, and a few terrorists.

But each one came with a cost. What made me better than any of them? I didn’t solve crimes. I just tracked down people who didn’t show up for court and took them to jail. Before you knew it, most were bailed out again. I was useless. A drain on society. A drain with a mail-order badge and a g*n.

At some point, I drifted off because the next thing I heard was the garbage truck rumbling down the street. Diana dangled a slobbery leash in my face.

“Hey, puppy.” I gave her a head scratch. “What’s up?” As if I didn’t know.

She dropped the leash beside me on the bed and gave an impatient whine.

“Okay, let’s go for a run.”

I dragged myself to the bathroom, emptied my bladder, and stared at my reflection in the mirror. Gaunt didn’t describe it. Aside from the limp black hair, the pale woman staring back at me looked like a White Walker from Game of Thrones.

“b***h, get your s**t together,” I muttered.

My phone rang. I glanced at the screen. Ugh. Sadie f*****g Levinson of Assurity Bail Bonds. I sent the call to voice mail. She was going to have a s**t fit when I told her dear old Wilhelm Penzler failed his first flying lesson.

A text appeared on the screen. “Ms. Ballou, get your tuchus in here.”

I was in no mood to deal with her attitude. It’s Saturday, I replied.

Don’t care what day it is. Get here now. Not a request.

I pulled on a mostly clean T-shirt and a pair of shorts, grabbed a Wonder Woman baseball cap, snapped a leash to Diana’s collar, and we went for a run through the neighborhood.

I lived in Phoenix’s historic Willo District, near Third Avenue and McDowell Road. The neighborhood was a labyrinth of streets lined with small but pricey brick houses sheltered by maturing shade trees. The area attracted quirky Gen Xers and millennials who sported a lot of ink and had a live-and-let-live attitude.

Up until last December, I’d lived a couple of streets north in a house that my brother had renovated and sold to me for a song after the housing bubble burst.

After Conor was declared dead, I inherited his house, which I’d nicknamed the Bunker. It had twelve-inch-thick brick outer walls, bullet-resistant polycarbonate windows, and steel-reinforced doors. Oh, and there was the underground tunnel that led from the coat closet to the back room of a tattoo shop on McDowell Road. Conor had hardened the place’s defenses after a d**g dealer he’d returned to jail sent his crew to retaliate.

I’d offered my old house rent free to a few transgender friends who needed a safe place to transition and rebuild their lives. Not everyone had a supportive family like mine.

The cool air buzzed with the droning of leaf blowers, their modulating pitches going in and out of phase with each other. Despite the high temperature hitting the triple-digit mark just days ago, a cool front had settled in, giving the city a temporary reprieve before summer blazed into full fury.

Fellow residents walking with their canine companions waved as we passed. I knew faces and dogs but not names. The petite Korean woman with the Shiba Inu. The older white guy with the pug. The muscular Latino with the Belgian Malinois.

Just as well we never spoke. Who in their right mind would want to know me? I was a drunken loser who’d been engaged to a man wanted for terrorism. Didn’t exactly make for pleasant small talk.

How was your day?

It was great! I got wasted and let a fugitive take a twenty-foot nosedive into a parking lot. How was yours?

Diana stopped to lift a leg next to the tire of a pickup decorated with MAGA and NRA bumper stickers.

“Good dog,” I said before rounding the corner back toward home.

After our run, I hopped into the shower to wash off the previous night’s shame, got dressed, and pulled my hair into a ponytail without bothering to blow it dry. This was Arizona. It’d be dry in thirty minutes, anyway.

For breakfast, I poured coffee into a travel mug and flavored it with a dash of coconut rum. Or more than a dash. I needed a little liquid courage before I told Sadie about Penzler’s recent demise, assuming she didn’t already know.

I strapped my ballistic vest over my T-shirt. I hooked my utility belt around my waist and slipped a Taser in the holster on my right hip, a Ruger nine-mil in a cross-draw on my left. Pouches in back held two pairs of handcuffs, a spare Taser cartridge, and a spare magazine of ammo. I hung my bail enforcement agent badge around my neck and slipped on a pair of wraparound shades, followed by a pair of fingerless gloves. Ready for action.

“Okay, Diana. Be good while I’m gone.” I topped off her food bowl and filled her water bowl from the RO spout. “Try not to terrorize the feral cats too much.”

She responded with a bark, which I took to mean, “Yeah, who are you kidding?”

I hopped into the Charger and cruised downtown for my meeting with Sadie.