Apaches - Lorenzo Carcaterra [65]
“Be polite,” Boomer said. “It counts toward your final grade.”
“You two have no idea who you’re playing with,” Junior said, trying to sound tough, blood running past his chin and down onto his shirt collar. “None at all. If my father knew any of this, he would have the both of you in jail before dark.”
“Pop ever been up here?” Dead-Eye asked. “Check out your collection? Or he just pays out whenever psycho son gets jammed up?”
“You’re gonna be a dot on the sidewalk outside before your father even knows where the fuck you are,” Boomer said. “So save the my-daddy’s-rich routine for people who scare easy. Now, I wanna know names and places and I’m gonna get them from you. If I don’t, I start putting your body parts up there on the wall. Nod if you’re starting to understand.”
Junior nodded, blood streaming down the front of his shirt, his arrogance giving way to uneasiness.
Boomer snapped open the top two buttons of Junior’s shirt, exposing a gold chain around his neck. Boomer’s fingers slowly began to scan the items hanging down from it. They were dried animal parts mostly—teeth, nails, stretched skin.
Boomer stopped when he saw the finger.
It was human and the cut was fresh, pink polish still gleaming on the nail. The flesh around the finger was unlined, free of scars and the bruises of age. It belonged to someone young, and the lack of calluses told Boomer that someone was a girl.
A hard look filled Boomer’s eyes and Junior was quick to catch it. Fear started to creep into his voice.
“I don’t know where that came from,” Junior said. “I swear to you. It was a gift.”
“Hey, Dead-Eye,” Boomer said, his eyes not moving away from Junior.
“Yeah, Boom?” Disgust etched across the angles of Dead-Eye’s face.
“I think I just came up with plan B,” Boomer said.
• • •
MALCOLM PUT A light to the top end of the sheer plastic pipe and closed his eyes, letting the thin vapors of smoke fill his lungs and jolt his brain. His lips curled into a smile as he rested the hot pipe on his lap and looked across at the man with the long scar running down the right side of his face. The man sat with his legs crossed, staring out onto the empty side street.
They were in the back of a new four-door Cadillac that had plush leather seats and a well-stocked bar. A driver in a dark blue suit sat up front, keeping the engine on idle and the car warm.
“I never smoked rock was this clean,” Malcolm said, the smile on his face growing wider, his words coming out slow and slurred.
The man turned from the window and looked at Malcolm, eyes hidden by a pair of dark, wraparound ski shades. “You supply what I need, Malcolm,” the man said, his lips barely moving as he spoke, “and you’ll die with a clean pipe in your hand.”
“A man can’t ask for more,” Malcolm said with a nervous laugh.
“A man like you shouldn’t,” the man said.
He had jumped out in front of Malcolm by the Eighth Avenue side of the Lincoln Tunnel entrance. A smart man in a smart suit, standing by a new car, wanting to talk over a little business. He said he got Malcolm’s name from Smiley Glimmer and was waiting there, ready to offer him all the free smoke he could handle. All Malcolm had to do in return was sit back in the car, get high, and listen.
Malcolm was in a hurry, rushing to get back to his room and do the girl a few more times before handing her over to Junior so he could start shredding her up. Then he planned to wash down the taste of the girl with a week’s supply of smoke Junior was going to dish as payoff. But the promise of a taste of rock, a taste that cost more than Malcolm would see in a year, was too strong for him to pass up. Besides, taking a couple of slides off the pipe would put him in a better mood, make him enjoy the girl even more.
The driver never spoke and the man only in short sentences. The man put a hand into his coat pocket and handed Malcolm two more cocaine rocks.
“These are for later,” the man said. “Help you get to sleep the right way.”
“What’s your market?