by J. L. Abramo
Walking through the doors, John set a deep frown as the pulsing beat blaring out of the speakers reached his ears. The girl behind the glass window by the entrance paid him little attention as he slid past the booth, too busy with her game of solitaire to charge. The inside of Pure Gold in Cary, North Carolina, was cast in purple neon, the lights lurid as the lone dancer gyrating on the stage in room’s center. Behind the stage, sitting at a table littered with empty liquor bottles, Sergei watched the girl shake her bare breasts for his offered dollar, turning around slowly and lowering them to present the band of her G-string.
John passed through the murkiness, coming within five feet of Sergei’s table before the driver noticed him. His hands out at his sides, he approached slowly. “Pistol’s in the belt.”
Sergei looked at him, the circles around his eyes made darker by the purple lights. He used his foot to push back the third chair at the table, offering the seat. “On my hip.”
Taking the black chair, John scooted up to the table, his hands on the round, black surface. The two sat there, watching the girl dance to Motley Crue and then Master P, saying nothing until Antoni stumbled out of the bathrooms, his gait crooked and unbalanced.
“Hey, it’s the midnight rider,” he said, his reddened face opened in a wild grin. He clapped John hard when he retook the leftover seat, reeling in drunkenness as he tried to steady himself. “What are you doing here, my friend? Get bored in that cold home of yours?”
Unsmiling, John met the skinny Ukrainian’s pale gaze, cold against the foolish happiness of the blond and the terse stoniness of his companion. “Did you two know who I took care of?”
“What do you mean?” Antoni asked, squinting at the question. “We talk to lots of people. Pretty girls, funny guys, like Sergei here,” he said, nudging his friend in the arm. Wordless, Sergei poured more vodka into the empty shot glass set between them. Somehow the trickle seemed louder than the music in John’s ears as he watched it fall.
“You picked me up two nights ago, boy,” John replied, gruff. “Do you know who I was supposed to meet at the gym on central?”
Sergei’s dull brown eyes shifted toward Antoni.
His smiled faded, Antoni took the vodka shot and pounded it back, wincing as he swallowed. “Some rich man’s son. Does it matter now?”
“Someone might approach you looking for information on what happened that night,” said John. “Call me if that happens.”
“Or?” asked Sergei. His voice, a deep, rough baritone, rumbled out of his broad chest.
“Or what?” said John. He rose from his chair, his stare bored at the driver. “We’re just talking, aren’t we?”
“For now,” Sergei answered, his hand floating at the each of the table.
The tension between the two thickened over the sickly-sweet smell of the stripper as she wiggled her ass, the pulsing beats through the speakers, the flashes of her movements. They stared at each other, neither cowed by each other’s grim sincerity. Antoni remained silent, too drunk to care and too infatuated with the girl.
John opened the door of his home to find Veronica sitting on the couch in front of his television, wrapped in the comforter from his bed and wearing only the shirt he had worn the previous night before during their date. She smiled broadly as he entered, turning her attention away from the football game on the flat screen.
“Hey, you,” she called. “Get the pipe fixed in your tenant’s bathroom?”
“Took a bit longer than expected, but everything should be fine,” he replied, an easy lie built on another. He plopped down on the couch beside, somewhat amazed by the angelic woman sitting next him. He wished he could have told his friends back in Afghanistan how he had ended up here—if they hadn’t all died. The grim thought did little to drag at this unexpected happiness. Reaching over, he laid a calloused hand on her thigh. “What have you been up to?”
“Just watching TV,” she said, sheepish. “I may have eaten your leftovers in the fridge.”
“That’s okay. I hear we can replace those,” he said, amused.
“Oh, can we?” She twisted on the couch and laid back, her head in his lap. “This has been a perfect weekend, you know.”
“Yeah, save for a faulty pipe.”
“So what now, Mr. Mint? There are still hours in the day.”
Rubbing the black stubble on his chin, John looked to one of the large warehouse windows set in the northern wall. Outside grey clouds streaked a pale blue sky, and try as he did, he could not think of a single thing to do other than what he was doing now. He chuckled at the absurdity of life.
“What if we just stayed in and ordered a pizza?” he proposed, hardly serious.
Veronica smiled her white grin at him, a picture of redemption that promised that, perhaps, the damnation he had brought back from the desert might be lifting. Turning her body against his, she curled under the flower comforter and shut her eyes like some satisfied feline. “Somewhere local.”
A half-eaten pizza laid flat on its open box, the cheese mottled and yellow after hours of letting the air dry until it was hard and rubbery. Neither John nor Veronica cared, twisted in a post-coital embrace upon the couch. The sunlight dappling the concrete turned the gray to gold, and stretching across the floor, it streaked the white walls.
Gunfire shattered the windows, spraying shards of grass.
John covered Veronica with both arms as rounds powdered the wall behind the couch, raining down bits of dust and dry wall. Hundreds of rounds snapped the evening air before chaos died to an absolute silence, which filled with the baying of neighborhood dogs, screeching tires, and a young woman’s terrified sob.
“Are you hurt?” John whispered, looking to the floor for where he left his gun. When he felt her shake her head he let go and went for it. One hand on the grip, he ran towards the front door.
Outside the cold fogged his breath, and searching the street, he raised his gun at a black Yukon as it turned away at the end of road, but held his first shot as it disappeared.
For John, it was simple math.
Charging back into his home, he found Veronica still huddled on the floor, searching her cloths for her cell phone. “Don’t,” he said in a voice he had never used in front of her, a voice that hearkened back to grim days under the sun.
“We have to call...” Veronica sobbed again, her hands shaking. She looked to the iron in his hand. “Why, John? Why do you have a gun?”
Unflinching, John walked past the weeping woman on his floor, headed for his armoire. “Because I need it.”
She followed, stepping gently over the glass. “Why? Why would you need it? Did you bring it back from the war?” Veronica reached for his arm, stopping him as he pulled out a fresh T-shirt.
He glared.
Shrinking back, she stood silent before him, wearing the face every civilian wore when they saw him for who he really was—a man with the devil in him.
She had pushed, and as John had known all along, there would be no home for him when he returned.
“Stay or go,” he said, tugging on his shirt. “You won’t like my answers.”
Vitali had called after sunset, a rare thing for a man who never spoke to John unless they met.
“Come to the fish mart, Thresher. We have them.”
The drive had been quiet beneath the graying skies, filled with a silence that spelled something worse than any form of hell John had heard spoken from the lips of the blessed, a void of life, love, and a future. Down the black highways sandwiched between forests of skeleton branches and dull, dark hills, he yearned for the sound of gunfire, of mortars and desert winds.
His gun lay light on his lap, a tool readied for a work he would relish.
Veronica had begged him not to leave. She had cried, and screamed, and pounded on his chest, whispering every promise she had that they could make this work, that whatever happened was by mere chance, not something to pay back with anger, hate—all the things John knew so well.
The farmer’s market was empty when he pulled into the parking lots, save for a few cars he recognized.
And that black Yukon.
Vitali answered the back door, silently waving him in before bolting it shut. In the center of the concrete floor that made up the fish market sat Sergei, bound and bloody on an old wicker chair. Antoni’s corpse slumped forward in the seat beside his, blood running from the hole in his forehead to stain his white pants and neon-sprayed shirt. A few of Vitali’s lieutenants stood in a circle around them, smoking cigarettes and playing on their smart phones.
“What’s going to happen now?” John asked.
“We’ll have a war,” Vitali answered, tired. He shook his head. “They gave us up for twenty grand, Thresher. Is there no honor anymore?”
“Never was, old man.” John went forward, drew his gun from his coat, and entered the circle.
“Fucking American,” Sergei screamed when he saw him emerge into the light. “Fucking ugly, dumb, American! I hope they rape your whore! I hope they rape her!”
John fired two rounds into his skull. Without another moment of attention to the bodies, he returned to Vitali’s side. “Call me when the fireworks start.”
Unlocking the door to his house, John had not expected to find Veronica there, but to his surprise there she was, seat on the couch before the television, her naked feet on the recently bought coffee table. She did not look his way, deciding to stare forward in silence. The glass on the floor glittered in the light of the fluorescents set in the ceiling.
He drew his gun and unloaded it, leaving it on the table by the door. “Did you stay here all day?” he called to her, monotone.
She said nothing. Looking to her chest, John noticed that her breasts did not rise or fall. Slowly he inched forward. “Veronica?”
No answer. Waking into the space between the TV and the coffee table, John stopped when he noticed she held something in her lap. A frame picture leaned against her stomach, and behind the clear plastic smiled a father soon, one a well-dressed businessman, the other a muscle-bound man with his arms covered in black tribal tattoos.
Red dripped from a clean bullet hole in Veronica’s forehead.
Wordless, John’s breath caught in his chest, and his knees gave out. Drowning in rivers of tears, clenched teeth, and damnation, knew then and there a single truth:
He should have pushed her away.
Back to TOC
AIN’T LIVIN’ LONG LIKE THIS
Bobby Nash
Jamie Southern grew impatient.
She hated waiting...for anything. That included a table at her favorite Hollywood bistro, the cinema, or police headquarters when she needed information. So, naturally, her profession of choice involved sitting around waiting for someone outside of her control to do something that was also out of her control. It frustrated her no end, but she tried to cope.
Jamie Southern was a private detective and a good one at that. Before taking over the agency started by her late father and his late business partner years earlier, she had already begun to make a name for herself as the “P. I. to the stars.” It was a misnomer, of course. While it was true she had a couple of clients in her files that could be considered Hollywood royalty, she also had just as many files, if not more, from small businessmen, families, and local politicians. Jamie got results, which was usually of the utmost concern of her clients. She was discreet and worked fast because no one liked having their dirty laundry aired publicly.
It was a sentiment that Jamie understood well. Her father’s high-profile death had brought all kinds of unwanted attention. At first it had been well-wishes and condolences, but once she made her plans to continue Southern and North Investigations, it turned to questions of competence, threats, intimidation, and condescension. While those tactics might have scared off another her age, twenty-eight-year-old Jamie Southern was made of sterner stuff.
Not only did she continue her father’s business, she thrived in it and carried on the proud name of Southern and North Investigations. These days there were cases around the block, sometimes more than she could handle alone so she kept a few freelancers on call. They came in handy at times, but not tonight.
Tonight, she was flying solo.
The job was simple.
Jamie’s client was Alexander Bishop. As far as she could tell he was a sweet, kindly old man. A successful businessman, Mr. Bishop was wealthy and influential in both business and politics. Once he had even run for office himself but lost the election. Feeling that the people had spoken, he opted not to run a second time. For good or ill, he helped shape and mold Southern California into what it was today. Like most successful men in his position, Alexander Bishop had more than one skeleton in his closet, secrets that he did not want to get out into the world. The funny thing about buried secrets was that they almost always found a way into the light.
Someone had discovered some of Bishop’s secrets and he was being blackmailed for them. Two other men, David Westerfelt and Roland Carter, both well-known members of society and wealthy businessmen, were also being blackmailed, presumably by the same person. The three men had known each other since their twenties and they all belonged to the Ravenwood Club.
She wouldn’t be much of a P. I. If she discounted that as a coincidence.
Although Jamie had suggested finding the blackmailer and stopping him or her, Mr. Bishop and his friends opted to simply pay what he wanted so the problem would go away. Such thinking was nonsense, but he remained adamant that she handle things his way.
She was simply the bagman—or was that bagwoman?—on this one.
Her job was to follow the directions the blackmailer had sent for the drop. Whoever was behind this was good. The blackmailer had Jamie bouncing from one location to another where new instructions were waiting for her. She had seen the tactic before on a similar case. The blackmailer wanted to make sure that she was acting in good faith, that she had come alone as instructed.
She had.
Her first instinct had been to set up a tail to follow her and the money or to put a tracker on the money. She had considered reaching out to Sam Hunt, a freelance investigator she used from time to time, but her client would hear none of it. For a moment, she considered ignoring Mr. Bishop’s request, but then thought better of it. She could handle a simple drop on her own without any trouble.
After reaching the blackmailer’s final stop, she waited.
And waited.
And then waited some more.
After almost an hour, she grew tired of sitting on her can waiting for the bad guys to make their move.
“This is ridiculous,” she muttered, climbing out of the car and stretching. Ordinarily, a late night rendezvous would have called for a glamorous dress and high heels, but when dealing with criminals, Jamie found that black slacks and low-heeled shoes were the way to go. It was so much easier to run that way and in her line of work she did more than her fair share of running.
“You the money?” a voice called from the darkness.
Show time! Jamie smiled. “That’s what they tell me.”
“Hand it over,” the man who stepped out of the shadows between the buildings said. He was dressed in brown corduroy pants, a blue denim shirt under a green jacket that was zipped up halfway, presumably to allow him easy access to the gun he was fondling inside it. A black ski mask under a golf hat fraying at the edges completed the ensemble. The man was about as nondescript as he could get without wearing a burlap sack.
“Now, you know better than that, mister,” Jamie said in her sweetest tone. “There are rules for these sort of things. I believe you have something for me as well?”
“Yeah. I got it.” He stepped closer, next to her car, but out of arm’s reach. Smart. He had clearly done this before or been coached by someone else who had.
“You’ll pardon me if I don’t take your word for it,” Jamie said. “My client is paying a lot of money for this so I want to see it before I hand it over.”
If he had been expecting her to flinch, she was happy to disappoint him. This wasn’t the first time, nor did she suspect the last, that someone would point a gun in her direction.
“Here’s your envelopes,” the man said, setting three large manila envelopes on the hood of her car. “Now...your turn.”
Jamie pulled a suite case from the car and held it out toward him. “All yours.”
She could just make out the toothy smile through the mouth hole in the mask. “Nice try, toots. Open it. I want to make sure that thing ain’t booby trapped.”
“Whatever you say, dear,” Jamie said, sugar dripping off every syllable. She sat the briefcase on the hood next to the envelope and entered the unlock code. With a double snap, the locks popped loose and Jamie opened the lid so the man with the gun could see the money inside.
He whistled.
“One hundred and fifty thousand dollars. Fifty for each,” Jamie said. “In small non-sequential bills, as requested.”
The man reached over and shut the case before picking it up. He was no longer out of arm’s reach. It would have been so easy for her to get the drop on him. Whoever this man was, be he the blackmailer or a hired flunky, the latter being her best guess, he wasn’t a pro. She was fairly certain she could drop him like a hot potato without breaking so much as a sweat, but out of respect for her client’s wishes, she resisted.
“I take it this concludes our business?” Jamie asked.
“Yeah. We’re done.”
“Good. Before you go, there’s just one more thing.”
“What’s that?” he asked nervously. He glanced around as if he had stepped into some sort of trap.
“Against my better judgment, my client instructed me to follow your guidelines to the letter and I have, but let me be clear here, okay? This ends here and now. If you decide later that fifty thousand apiece wasn’t enough, I will be very upset.”
