She let go of Lemmen and slid back behind the wheel of the Lexus. “Otherwise, I don’t need you. Now get Smale and sink his ass.” She fired up the engine and roared off.
They stood staring at Ronney’s half-smoked cigarette, smoldering on the cracked concrete, her deep red lipstick still fresh on the butt. “I gotta tell ya,” said Chappham, rubbing his finger stubs, “After that little pep-talk, my heart ain’t in this.”
“Had the boss right here, shoulda aired out your grievances and backed me up. We coulda turned down the job.”
Chappham’s eyes widened. “You serious? You know what happens if I do that. She’ll go apeshit. No way I’m paintin’ us into that corner.”
Lemmen grunted. “I ain’t as scared of Ron Ronney as I am that freak we been feedin’. It’s got enough teeth to saw through a Rhino’s hide. I got a good look at its belly when it laid into me. It’s got hair. What kinda fuckin fish grows hair?”
Chappham stared at the space where his fingers use to be. “The kind that eats people. We gonna do Smale, or what?”
Lemmen put his foot on Ron Ronney’s cigarette and ground the smoldering butt into the concrete, turning it into a brown and red smudge. “What the hell, you only live once, right?”
***
An hour later, they were sitting in Chappham’s Envoy, waiting for Bennie Smale to show up at the Blue Star. Except for a green Ford sedan, the lot was empty. It was 8:50. The place opened at 10:00. Like clockwork, at 9:55, the OPEN sign lit up and Smale’s Audi pulled up in front.
Chappham eased the Envoy up next to the Audi. In the back of the truck, he had rigged a plywood box with a hinged lid and steel latches. He elbowed Lemmen. “You know what to do?”
“I bag him, drag him, stuff him in the box and you slam the lid and latch it tight.”
“Bingo.”
They waited.
When Smale opened the door of his Audi, Lemmen was on him. The Envoy’s door pinned Smale long enough for Lemmen to get him in a chokehold. Smale began to squirm, thrashing his legs and screeching for help. Lemmen gave him a whack on the dome and dragged him to the back of the truck.
“Shit,” said Chappham, “I thought we weren’t going to make a scene.”
“I just gave him a little thump. Nobody saw. Lookit,” Lemmen said, pointing to Smales twitching legs. “He’s down, but he ain’t out.”
Chappham put some shoe leather into Smale’s ribs and grabbed him by the ankles. “Grab his arms. Let’s box him up.”
They tossed him in the box, slapped the lid shut, fastened the latches and hit the road. Once they had cleared the heavy traffic, Lemmen began fidgeting in his seat.
“Settle down,” said Chappham. “You got worms or somethin’?”
“You knew Ron Ronney’s dad, right?”
Chappham shrugged. “Cliff? Yeah, me and Cliffy, we went back a ways, why?”
“He ever tell you what that thing out there was? Maybe let it slip, where in hell it came from?”
“Hell,” Chappham mumbled and stared off into space. “You’re closer than you think.”
“What’sat supposed to mean?”
“That lake out there where the boat is?”
“Yeah?”
“It used to be a holding pond for one of Cliff’s factories. Once business started boomin’ he had guys pumpin’ all kindsa shit into that water. We’re talkin’ paint sludge, fish guts, raw sewage, radioactive waste, the whole nine. If they could haul it, Cliff had ‘em dumpin’ it.”
Lemmen stared at the stumps on Chappham’s hand. “Outa sight, outa mind.”
The box began thumping, like a pack of third-graders running down a flight of stairs. “Listen to that guy back there,” said Chappham. “I put a boot in his ribs six or eight times, he’s still hoppin’ around like a freakin’ jack rabbit.” He took a hard left and put the Envoy on single-lane gravel.
“I don’t get it,” said Lemmen.
“Don’t get what?”
“The mooks workin’ for Cliff, what’d that have to do with that thing out in the water?”
Chappham jerked his thumb over the seat at the noise coming from the box. “I was getting’ to that before our pal back there interrupted.”
“Want me to hush him up?”
“Nah, we’re almost there. Then we can sink him and be done with it.”
Lemmen shrugged. “Your call. You change your mind, let me know.”
Chappham was silent, listening to the rumble inside the box, his eyes fixed on the gravel road.
“You gonna finish your story?”
“In a sec.” Chappham tapped the brakes and took a right. The box tipped on its edge, rode out the curve and righted itself with a hard slap. The thumping stopped. “So, anyway, Cliff told me he got this frantic call from the cannery. The night foreman is all Marty Feldman, said he needed Cliff to come down to the docks right fucking now. The guy was about to pop his cork.”
Lemmen grunted. “I’da told him to pound sand.”
“That’s what Cliff said he did.”
“End of story, right?”
“Nope. The guy blew Cliff some heavy shit, so Cliff hopped in his Seville, jetted down to the cannery, said he figured if nothing else he’d give the guy a righteous reamin’ in front of everybody, then shit-can him.”
“I’ll bet he tore the guy a new one,” said Lemmen.
“Once he got there, he found the whole night shift crew huddled around this big green lump on the dock. The foreman told Cliff it was packed in with a crate of Blue Fin and when it rolled out onto the canning line, the stench made half the crew sick. It ruined the whole shipment of tuna too.”
“I’m gettin’ sick just hearin’ about it.”
“Cliff was pissed. To him, it was eight-thousand pounds of useless fish that he paid top-dollar-tuna prices for. He wanted a piece of someone’s ass. He told the foreman to stow the thing on the back dock and pack it in dry ice while he got the fish broker on the phone to talk refund.”
“And?”
“The mooks on the dumpin’ crew, they don’t know from nothin’. They figured that if it was sittin’ on the back dock, it was good to go. They loaded this crate of ugly on the truck, along with sixty barrels of sludge and head for the holding pond.”
“But you said the thing was dead, right?”
“Cliff swore to it. He said it never took a breath or twitched the whole time it was in the cannery.”
“Then how…?”
“Nearest he could figure, that mutant carcass hit that pond full of Jeckyl and Hyde chemistry, soaked it up, and got a high octane jump-start.” Chappham pulled the Envoy next to the boat dock and backed up to the boat. They got out and walked to the back of the truck. Chappham opened the hatch and stared out at the lake. “It’s the same fish we been feedin’ for Ron Ronney.”
Lemmen held up his hands in disbelief. “Wait a minute. You sayin’ that that dead hunk of gills and goo at Cliff’s cannery came back to life?”
“Damn thing gobbled up three of those mooks from the dumpin’ crew, then rolled over pretty-as-you-please and disappeared under the scummy surface.”
Lemmen stared down at the clear blue water lapping at the hull of the boat. “Water looks pretty clean now.”
Chappham shook his head. “That’s because the thing feeds off the sludge. Well, that and the losers we been bringin’ it.”
“One bottom feeder eating another, huh?”
“Exactly. Now let’s get this over with.”
Lemmen tugged at the box, snagging it on the headliner. “Shit,” said Chappham. “That’s comin’ out of your half of our fee.”
“No biggie. I know a guy in Clifton, does good work. He’ll fix ya up good as new. No one’ll ever know.”
“Wrong. I’ll know. Now come on.”
They grabbed the box and carried it to the boat. Chappham flipped the latches and popped the lid. Smale was in the fetal position, knees to his chest, hands shielding his eyes from whatever fate awaited him
. The water around the dock churned. A thick glob of black oil belched to the surface. Chappham grabbed an arm and hauled Smale out of the box. The front of Smale’s pants was wet from belt to crotch. “You better hope you didn’t soak my carpet, Betsy-Wetsy, else I’m gonna thump you good.” Chappham kicked the box shut and shoved Smale hard against the rail.
Smale raised his arms in defense. “What do you want with me?”
Lemmen stepped up. “It ain’t what we want, it’s what Ron Ronney wants.”
Smale lowered his arms and blew out a long, slow breath. “You’re joking.”
“I look like Lewis Black to you?”
“Impossible.” Smale crossed his arms in a lame attempt to pout. “I’ve worked for Ms. Ronney for years with no complaints. I have her utmost trust.”
Chappham cocked an eyebrow. “Hate to break it to ya, counselor, but she’s terminated your contract.”
Smale ruffled. “I won’t hear of it. I must speak to her at once.”
Lemmen spotted a puffy red eye dart under the hull in a foaming rush of brackish water. He turned to Smale. “What’re you, terminally ignorant? Who’d you think had us gift wrap you and haul you out here; Santa Claus?”
The water around the boat churned, replacing the clear blue with a noxious stew of oily yellow scum and chunks of rotting flesh. A slippery green snout broke the surface and opened up into a cavernous mouthful of clacking teeth. Bits of cloth and rancid meat hung loosely in its flapping jaws.
Lemmen buried his nose in the bend of his arm. “Lordy, that thing stinks.”
The fish turned to face Smale, one red eye the size of a quarter, the other as big as a basketball. Boney yellow spikes jutted from its dorsal fin and a fibrous horn sprouted from the top of its head. A low, wet whistling noise leaked from deep inside its gill slits. Smale fell on his face and began to shiver violently. He watched the thing with wide, terrified eyes while babbling at Chappham and Lemmen. “I promise, I won’t tell anyone Ronney’s business. I swear it. I’m an honorable man.”
“Sure ya are,” said Lemmen.
The thing’s jaws clacked harder, a sound like seasoned oak smacking plate steel.
“Honest, I wouldn’t rat like that. I’ll die before I’ll blab.”
Chappham lit a cigarette, took a long drag and grinned. “Yeah, you will.” He gave Smale a quick foot to the face, nudging him closer to the creature’s mouth.
Smale began sweating and gasping for breath. His feet thrashed wildly, trying to get a grip on the wet deck. He held his ribs and wailed at the starless sky. “Wait, please, I have money. Whatever Ronney’s paying, I’ll double it.
The creature hissed.
“I’ll triple it.”
Chappham kicked Smale in the ribs again, leaning into it. “Gee, Bennie, that’s real original. And normally, we’d take a guy up on an offer like that. Thing is, Ron Ronney, she don’t like to be out-bid.”
“Besides,” Lemmen added, “We do that, and we’ll be the next two guys dangling from a hook. Gotta tell ya, when it comes to bein’ fish bait, we just ain’t feelin’ it.”
The water exploded in a geyser of slippery scales and brown slime. When the spray cleared, Smale’s legs were gone and his eyes had rolled back in his head. Faint squeaking noises leaked from his bloody mouth. He flopped on his side and tumbled overboard.
Chappham flipped his cigarette at the thing’s head as it dragged the rest of Smale to the bottom. “Well, shit, that was easy. Didn’t even have to leave the dock.”
Lemmen gripped the boat railing and backed slowly away from the edge. His hands were shaking, the palms wet with sweat. Bits of Smale’s torso stuck to his shoes. “That thing took Smale like he was a ten pound porterhouse. I almost feel sorry for that poor bastard, lying in that thing’s belly.”
“It’ll be back too,” said Chappham. “A scrawny alcoholic like Smale won’t hold a meat-eater like that for long.”
“I say we don’t find out,” said Lemmen.
“Agreed. Let’s clear the hell out of here.”
They rolled the box overboard and watched till the last bubble broke the surface. When Lemmen started for the Envoy, Chappham caught his arm. “Wipe your feet.” He pointed to Lemmen’s gut-soaked shoes. “I don’t want that mess in my truck.”
“Wipe ‘em? On what?”
“Your shirt, your jockeys, who gives a shit? Just don’t track that mess in my truck.”
Lemmen shrugged and shucked his socks and shoes. He crept to the dock and gently dipped the soles into the water trying to wash away the gore that was once Bennie Smale. The water rippled and belched up a gob of bloody sludge. Lemmen flinched, dropping the shoes into the oily mess. He dashed to the Envoy and piled in. Chappham fired the engine, dropped the truck in drive and tromped on the gas. They rode in silence, till they were back on two-lane blacktop.
“You see the head on that thing?” Lemmen asked.
Chappham’s eyes remained glued to the road, his maimed hand draped loosely over the wheel. Headlights from oncoming traffic cast an orange glow on his stone-cold face. “It’s gettin’ bigger.”
“And hungrier.”
Chappham began to sweat. He lowered the window a notch and took in the rush of air in big gulps. “I thought it was gonna roll the boat. Then where’d we be.”
Lemmen shook his head. “I don’t wanna think about it.”
“That undead piece of shit would go eight-hundred pounds, easy.”
“Maybe more.”
Chappham began fiddling with the radio. His finger nubs stabbed at the buttons, trying to find something to take his mind off the thing, and about what it had done to Smale. He settled on 88.9, WYMS, and cranked up John Lennon’s ‘Nobody Told Me’. When the song was over, it started to rain.
“Ya know, Chappy, I been thinkin’.”
“Thinkin’ what?”
Lemmen reclined the seat and started to prop his bare feet on the dash. Chappham gave him the stink-eye and he reeled them in. “This ugly, smelly lump of shit out at the lake, who knows about it?”
Chappham shrugged, concentrating on the rain-slick road.
Lemmen counted on his fingers. “There’s me you, and Ron Ronney. The rest are all dead, including dear old dad.”
“So?”
“So, I think it’s time for a raise. Look at us, stumblin’ around in the cold, arms gettin’ sliced up, fingers getting’ chomped off, and for what?”
“Ronney pays us pretty good.”
Lemmen turned a little in his seat. “Ah, but is it good enough to keep us happy? And healthy? And quiet?”
Chappham shook his head. “Trust me, I know the Ronney family. It’s best if we don’t get greedy, especially if you’re serious about that ‘keeping healthy’ part.” He stopped for a red light and his cell phone chirped. He pulled it out of his pocket and punched it to life. “Yo. Yeah, Ron, we’re just finishing up.”
“Speak of the devil,” Lemmen whispered.
Chappham finished the call and clicked off. “You ain’t gonna believe this.”
“What?”
“She wants us to come to the house.”
“Yeah?”
“Yeah.”
“Her house?”
“No, numbnuts, Donald Trump’s house. Of course, her house.”
“Well, shit the bed. She say why?”
“Nope.”
“She sound pissed?”
“Nope.”
Lemmen let a sinister grin fill his face. “Good. This is perfect timing. I say we hit her up for that raise.”
Chappham dodged a pothole and let out a moan. “Jerry, I’m tellin’ ya, let it go.”
“Chappy, we got her over a barrel. That thing out there won’t stay secret forever. I say we exploit it while we can.”
An oncoming semi shot past, dousing the Envoy in muddy rainwater. Chappham flushed. “Bad enough I gotta keep feedin’ that damned thing, includin’ two of my own fingers. Now I gotta drive around in this shitty weather, screwin�
�� up a perfectly detailed ride, listening to you flap your lips about putting the pinch on the boss.”
“Chappy…”
“Put a lid on it.”
Lemmen let things simmer down, watching the rain beat heavy on the windshield. “Okay, let’s look at this from a different angle.”
“Angles,” Chappham interrupted, “You’ve always got angles. None of ‘em ever pans out, but you got a shitpile of ‘em.” He killed the volume on the radio. “Tell me, ace, what’s your angle this time?”
Lemmen turned the rest of the way in his seat, as if facing Chappham would make it more convincing. “Follow me here. I don’t care how many shlubs there are in Jersey who’ve ruffled Ronney’s feathers, eventually, we’re gonna thin the herd, then what?”
Chappham took the Townsend Street exit. “We’ll retire.”
“Or we’ll get retired. You wanna wind up inside that fuckin’ thing out there? Not me.” He waited for Chappham to chime in. Nothing. “Listen, Chappy, all I’m sayin’ is we get what we can and disappear. We could head for Idaho or Phoenix, get away from this nasty air and give our sinuses a rest.”
Chappham sniffed and rubbed his itchy eyes. “Phoenix is pretty far, but not far enough to evade Ronney. She’d track us down before we had time to launder the cash and buy clean underwear.” He turned into a secluded driveway, approached a security gate and punched in the number Ronney had given him on the phone. The gate swung open. He turned and put his finger in Lemmen’s face. “I’m tellin’ you Jerry, let it drop.”
“We’ll see.”
Chappham parked the Envoy near a carriage house. They dashed through the rain to a darkened entrance at the side of the house. Just as Ronney had instructed, there was another security keypad, this one attached to the entry door. Chappham entered the numbers, the lock popped, and they hurried inside. They let their eyes adjust and scanned the room. It was the kitchen.
An intercom squawked. Ronney’s voice. “Dry your feet on the rug. Come through the kitchen and great room to a long hallway. Follow it to the last door on the right. I’ll be waiting.”
They did as they were told, pausing in the center of the great room to take it all in. “Nice digs, Chappy.” Lemmen rubbed his palm over the mahogany woodwork as he eyed the chandelier. “See my point? We should be livin’ like this. The joint’s probably got a fully stocked bar, wine cellar, sauna and a pool too.”
Dead Bait 3 Page 10
