“The last time I told you we needed to be cautious with our money, you bought that two thousand dollar sword,” Jordan pointed out.
Okay, yeah, that was true… but shit, for the kind of sword it was, it was a steal. I had to take advantage of the idiot selling it for a mere two grand when the motherfucker was worth a hundred times that amount. I tried to explain the importance of the deal I got to Jordan last month, but his geek ass didn’t see the point of me buying it, period. I bet if it had been some vintage comic book or action figure, then I’d be speaking his language.
I held my hands up, surrendering in this argument before it ballooned into nonsense. “Fine. I won’t go on any ‘frivolous sprees’,” I said, complete with air quotes. “Come on, let’s go out. I’m fucking starving.”
“Out? At this time of night?” Jordan asked.
“Yeah, I’m hungry. It’s only one in the morning. We can go to that twenty-four hour diner down the block. I can grab a burger and you can eat whatever you want to eat. Knowing you, you will probably get a bowl of oatmeal.”
He rolled his eyes. “I don’t want any damned oatmeal. But sure, we can go. First, let me contact our employer and let him know we have the package.” He pulled out his burner phone and made the call.
Ooh, the package. Jordan was really into this spy-type shit. For me, it was a way to get money on the sly without having to worry about taxes taking what little I already had. I gave my blood, sweat, and flesh for my country already. Now, it was all about my slice of the pie. I rose out of my chair when Jordan ended the call. He stood to his feet, stretching.
For a nerd, he was sexy as fuck. He was shorter than me, about five-eight, with a slender build like an Olympic swimmer and an ass I loved stuffing my face and cock into. His hair was shaved on the sides with a bit of an afro at the top, like the way a lot of young, black, twenty-something males liked to style their hair these days. It looked great on him. We weren’t boyfriends, more like fuck buddies, but our unconventional relationship worked. He was free to see who he wanted and so was I.
We walked side by side out of our warehouse home and down the street to the diner. There was a slight swish to his hips as he walked, which was what a group of pieces of shit gay bashers targeted when they decided he was the one to fuck with six months ago. I was leaving a bar that night and was still a little under the effects of the liquor I’d consumed when I heard the commotion. I walked in the direction of the noise until I saw them. I fucking hated when bitch ass bullies picked on people they thought were weaker than themselves. Now, at the time, I hadn’t known Jordan from a hole in the wall, but I couldn’t just continue to walk by with my head down when I saw four men stomping the shit out of him as he cried for help and begged them to stop.
Jordan was terrified for his life as he screamed, cried, and tried his best to shield himself from their vicious blows and kicks. I came up behind one of the tall turds and punched him hard in the back of his head and he hit the ground like a sack of rocks. That caught the other douchebags’ attentions and they thought to combine their efforts against me. Super strength and invincibility really did come in handy when taking out human sewage.
I fucked them up good that night, killing one, but the bastard had deserved it. Shouldn’t have pulled a knife on me. I made him eat that motherfucker…literally. I snatched it from his hand and jammed it down his throat. The last punk left standing ran when he saw all of the blood pouring from his friend’s mouth. I let him go, though I could have chased after him or even have used the same knife I’d just killed a man with to toss at his ass. But I decided to give him a second chance. Maybe he’d change his ways. If I ever saw him again and he was still fucking with people, I would end him.
As for Jordan, he had been beaten up pretty bad, but didn’t have any health insurance, so he was afraid to go to the hospital. Fortunately for him, I happened to know a little bit about patching up wounds, so I’d taken him home and mended him up. I’d let him sleep off that spectacular ass whooping in my bed, while I’d taken the sofa. The next day, we got to know each other a little bit more. We talked and I told him about my abilities. I didn’t know why I’d trusted him with the truth at that time, but I just had. He saw me as his hero, but I was nobody’s hero. I just didn’t like seeing bad people get away with the crap they did. For instance, I would have gladly kicked his parents’ asses for disowning him for being gay and leaving him without a penny to his name.
Perhaps he should have waited until he’d finished college before he came out to the bigots that were lucky enough to birth a child into the world. Too bad they didn’t appreciate that gift and turned on him. I wondered how they would have felt if he had died that night, murdered like a rat in the street by the same kind of people they turned out to be. I wonder.
Anyway, he didn’t have any place to go, I kind of wanted to fuck him, plus, I really liked him, so it was a perfect match. We’d been together ever since and as it turned out, he was a fucking genius where technology was concerned. Thanks to him, I was able to intercept the escort agency Mr. Henley had hired last night. That was why he was waiting for me in the lounge of that upscale bar. As for me, I didn’t really get computers like that. I knew how to search and play games on one, but that hacker shit was a foreign language to me. Good for us, Jordan spoke fluent JavaScript and Klingon.
Getting back to the present, I held the door to the diner open for him, and he walked in. I followed behind him and we took a seat in one of our favorite sections away from the big windows. The waitress came over and took our orders. On the walk over, we had already decided what we wanted to eat, so there was no need to look over menus. She walked away to give our orders to the cook and I slouched in the booth.
“You look pretty sexy in that Star Wars t-shirt,” I said, winking.
Jordan looked down at his faded shirt and scoffed. “You’ll say anything to get laid.”
I snorted. “Did it work?”
“Maybe, but definitely not here.”
“Oh, come on, where’s your sense of adventure? We can go into the bathroom, there’s hardly anyone in here,” I suggested, noting the one other customer sitting several tables away from us eating his meal.
He cocked an eyebrow. “Are you serious, or are you joking and I’m just reading the signs wrong?”
I gave him a wickedly seductive smile. “Depends. Are you willing to give it a go in the bathroom?”
“No,” he said without hesitation.
Damn. “Okay, then I was joking.” I gave him an innocent smile.
He laughed and shook his head. “You can save the charm you think you have, it doesn’t work on me.”
“Now who’s lying?”
He smiled at me this time. “I’m glad we came here, because now that we are, I’m actually feeling hungry.”
“See, told you.”
“Yeah, Yeah.”
I winked. “So, when do we meet with our employer tomorrow… I assume it’s tomorrow.”
He nodded. “Seven o’clock.”
I frowned. “In the morning?”
He nodded again. “Yep.”
“Shit. Who picks that ungodly hour for a business transaction?”
“Businessmen with things to do. They wanted to meet at six, I bought you an extra hour of beauty rest.”
“Are you coming with?”
He shook his head. “I’m the brains behind the brawn. If shit goes south and they try to double cross us, I’ll just get in the way. You’ll be able to kick ass better on your own. As much as I love seeing you do it, it’s safer for me to stay in the shadows.”
He had a point. Jordan couldn’t fight to save his life, in spite of me trying to teach him basic self-defense tactics. His fucking nerd ass was hopeless. I sighed. “Fine. But I’m going back to sleep when I get home.”
“Fair enough.”
We chatted about some other random bullshit like movies we wanted to see and TV shows that were new coming this fall season until our food came
. Then, for me at least, it was all about devouring calories. I had to be careful not to eat like this all of the time. Sure, my metabolism burned like a furnace, but I could still gain weight and I happened to love my eight-pack washboard abs. Jordan had a grilled cheese sandwich with bacon and fries. When I finished my meal off, I started eating the fries I knew he wasn’t going to eat. He knew it too, which was why he didn’t bother to protest.
“Okay, you ready to go?” I asked, swallowing the last fry.
“Yeah, let me just pay the bill.”
I called the waitress over and she started making her way towards us just as two white men dressed in dark hoodies entered the diner and took seats at the counter. Now, they could’ve just been here for a late meal like we were, but my cretin-factor senses were tingling. Better known as my intuition. I didn’t trust this duo. I looked at Jordan.
“Maybe you should go to the bathroom and stay low.”
“Why?” he asked, looking up from his wallet.
God, sometimes he could be so fucking clueless, like a deer caught in headlights in the face of imminent danger. I gestured with my eyes towards the suspicious two and he finally caught my drift. He got up and walked into the bathroom like I’d told him to. If bullets were going to start flying, I didn’t want him in the way of their trajectories.
I sat back in the booth casually, not wanting to let the two men think I was on to them. Our waitress returned with the check and I thanked her. I looked at it, our meal had been under twenty-dollars, which was why I enjoyed eating at these family-owned establishments. They understood not everyone was rolling in dough, but needed a full meal. The exact opposite of some of those fancy-schmancy restaurants downtown where you pay an arm and a leg and get a pinky finger for a meal.
As for the two at the counter, they looked like they were legit customers as they placed their orders. Fine. I guessed it was about time to get Jordan. I called his phone and he came out of the men’s room. He pulled out a twenty and left it on the table. It covered our bill and gave our waitress a four dollar tip. I stood up from the booth and Jordan and I walked towards the door. As we approached the men, one of them swung around in his swivel stool and grabbed my arm.
“Sit the fuck back down,” he growled to me in a low, menacing voice.
Shit, I knew it! Why hadn’t they just let us leave? This was what I got for not following my intuition. If I pulled something right now and his partner retaliated, I may not be fast enough to stop others from getting hurt. By others, I meant Jordan. Did I take that chance? Jordan backed up several steps like he was reading my mind, and I was happy he was putting some distance between us.
“Get your fucking hand off me,” I snarled back.
That was when he pulled out his 9mm pistol from the middle pocket of his hoodie. Fantastic. “You’ll be the first one I kill, bitch,” he warned me.
I was getting really sick and tired of being called a bitch tonight.
“That is if you don’t sit the fuck down, now,” he added.
Out of the corner of my eye, I could see his partner reaching into his pocket, pulling out his weapon since the jig was up. I took a few steps back and sat in the booth closest to them. The waitress saw what was happening and she walked over to the two men very cautiously, and bravely, I might add.
“Please, we don’t want any trouble. We’ll give you whatever you want, please, just don’t hurt anyone,” she begged.
The asshole aimed his gun at her, while his partner kept his gun on us, panning it from Jordan to the other customer, then to me.
“Shut up, whore. Give us all of the money in the register. Then go in the back where you keep your safe and give us the money in there, too. My boy here is going to go with you to make sure you don’t get any bright ideas,” the brains of their operation said. He was the one who kept his back to me.
“Just do what he says, Marnie,” the cook said from the kitchen.
That was when the bad guy boss pointed his gun at the cook. “Get out from back there, motherfucker, and come up here where I can keep my eyes on you.”
The cook did as he was told, and came to the front with his arms held up high. I must say, they were either pretty desperate or dumb as fuck… or maybe both, to pull this stunt with all of these windows. They were taking the risk of a cop driving by or even stopping in and catching them. But of course, it was late as hell and they might just get away with it. They might.
The guy who had told me to sit down hopped off the stool to “assist” Marnie. He stood over her as she shoved the money from the register into a plastic bag.
“Hurry up, bitch. We ain’t got all night,” he urged.
“I’m going as fast as I can,” she whined.
He slammed the butt of his pistol against the top of her head and she fell down, holding her now bleeding wound as she cried. Yeah, idiot, that ought to make her speed up.
“Don’t talk back, bitch, just follow orders,” he snarled. He snatched up the bag of money she had loaded and shoved the rest of the cash into the bag from the register, then kicked her as she cried out. “Get the fuck up and let’s go to the safe.”
She feebly climbed to her feet, no doubt feeling a bit dizzy after a blow like that, but she managed to stay upright. She led the way and he followed. That gave me the opportunity I was waiting for. Divide and conquer. These two were bold, that was for sure, to hit this place up with just him and his boy as back-up.
Jordan kept completely still, as did the cook, so the bastard was keeping his eyes on me and the one other customer who was sitting at his table with both hands lying flat on the surface. He didn’t want to be shot because the guy mistook him for a threat. I got the reason for the submissive pose. I had a feeling they might kill everyone in this place, if only for the fact that we’d seen their faces. The police in Silver City weren’t completely incompetent, they just had a penchant for getting to the scene too late for the victims. So, I wasn’t putting any hope in one of them coming to the rescue.
Now was my time to strike. I rushed the son of a bitch when he turned to look at the cook and grabbed his gun-carrying hand, crushing it. It was one of my favorite and most effective tactics for disarming someone and getting the upper-hand at the same time. He cried out just before I wrapped my hand around his neck, snapping it. His partner heard the hubbub and came running out with the waitress all hysterical and in front of him as a human shield.
I pointed the gun I had taken from his now dead companion at him. “Let her go,” I ordered.
“You a fucking cop?” he asked as he looked around at the other patrons frantically. He was scared now, you could see it in his eyes, because he knew the plan they had was unraveling. Sweat poured down his temples as the fear seeped deeper into him. He hadn’t planned for anyone to stand up to them, let alone kill his partner. His chances of getting away with the money and/or his life were reduced significantly.
“I’m not a cop, but I love killing pieces of shit like you,” I said. From my peripheral vision, I saw Jordan crouched low under a table farthest from where I stood. Good boy. He wouldn’t be able to leave or go to the bathroom without drawing attention to himself, so where he was hiding was best.
“Look, just let me go and I won’t kill this bitch,” the guy said. It was his silly attempt at making a fucking deal, as if I would be interested. I didn’t take kindly to him pointing a gun at me and my friend. Plus, I had had my fill of looking down the barrels of guns today without getting proper revenge.
He was making sure to keep himself hidden behind Marnie pretty well. If I wanted to do a headshot, I’d have to go through hers and hope the bullet met its original target. Damn, I hated cowards. I looked for another way to take him out.
Ahh, I’d found it. “Sorry Marnie,” I said, then pulled the trigger, striking her in the upper thigh. The bullet went straight through her flesh and struck him in the crotch. Both screamed in pain, one was in more pain than the other, but at least he let her go to grab his bleeding dick an
d balls. Blood poured from both of their wounds, but I was only focusing on him. He was laying on the floor now as a pool of his blood formed around him.
“Motherfucker!” he cursed. “I’ll kill you, you son of a bitch ass motherfucker!”
Yeah, yeah, sure you will. Hurry up and die, I thought as I leaped over the counter.
Marnie fell to the floor, screaming and crying as she applied pressure to her wound. I could tell by how much blood she was losing that no vital arteries were nicked. Good. The cook raced over to drag her out of harm’s way as I approached my target. I stood over the would-be thief, gun aimed. “Sorry piece of shit,” I said, then pulled the trigger, blasting his brains, and pieces of his skull out of the back of his head in what resembled a starburst pattern. As far as I was concerned, it was taking him too long to die.
I looked down to see that some of his blood splattered on my clothes, but I didn’t have time to worry about that. There were more screams from the others, so I didn’t bother to stick around to do any consoling or explaining. I leaped back over the counter and ran out of the door. Jordan followed and we ran all the way home, taking a more complicated route back to throw off anyone who might have been on our trail. I wasn’t worried about leaving fingerprints behind, as those had been burned off two years ago when I thought I had a higher calling.
“Holy shit!” Jordan blurted out once we were safely inside of our soon-to-be-former home.
“Fuck!” I yelled in anger and frustration. Why did that shit have to go down there? I loved their food. Now I could never go back, and neither could Jordan. And the damned place was only a block away, no way could we stay here like that shit hadn’t just gone down. Eventually, sooner or later, we’d be spotted and taken away.
“We have to get out of here,” Jordan said, already on the same page I was.
“I know,” I said, slamming my ass into my favorite chair. “You need to rent a U-Haul tomorrow. I’ll find us another location to stay, if only for a little while.” I ran my fingers though my dark brown, curly locks. My hair was a little damp from sweat, but other than that, I was okay.
Cobra- The Vigilante Box Set 1 Page 3
