Plugged - Eoin Colfer [59]
‘McEvoy,’ she chatters, much to my relief. ‘I was wrong. We gotta call it in now.’
Now we gotta call it in?
‘No need for that. The cops are coming soon, one way or another.’
Outside, a man trots into the room like he’s coming on stage in Vegas. A big guy, face a road map of burst corpuscles, soft cap pulled down over one eye. I know who this is. We’ve had text.
‘Irish Mike Madden,’ I whisper to Deacon, who has managed to crank the other eye open.
‘Where’s my gun?’ is her response to this news. Reasonable in the circumstances.
‘Not here. Be quiet.’
Deacon wants to object, but she’s out of energy for the moment and it is all she can do to scowl at me.
Mike Madden does a little shuffle along the carpet, all the time smiling, and comes to a stop with an arm-waving flourish.
‘Counsellor,’ he says to Faber, who is doing his damnedest not to fall down.
‘M . . . Mike,’ he stammers. ‘Mister Madden. What are you . . . What brings you here?’
I love these guys. Still holding on to the civil façade when there’s men dying or dead in the corridor.
Mike taps his chin, like he has to think about Faber’s question.
‘One of my guys is missing, laddie,’ he says finally. ‘I sent him on a job to a pill shop and he never came back.’
Faber straightens his tie, breathing a little better. This is all a misunderstanding.
‘Mike. I know this is your town, everybody knows it. I would never . . .’
Madden talks right over him. ‘I sent him to a pill shop. And here you are with a couple of barrels. Full of pills, are they?’
‘Not your pills. Not yours, Mike. How stupid do you think I am?’
Mike sighs, like the truth makes him sad. ‘Money makes people stupid, laddie. That’s life.’
Faber scoops a handful of blue pills from the open barrel. ‘Steroids is all, Mike. Just steroids. Not your territory. No profit in them hardly.’
‘Is that so?’ Mike dances across to the barrel, casually slapping Faber’s final guy on the cheek on his way past. ‘Let’s have a little look-see.’ He tips the barrel, sending thousands of blue pills bobbling across the floor. Faber pulls one foot up, like it’s piranha-infested water coming his way.
‘Whaddya know. You weren’t lying. Just pills is all.’
And suddenly Madden’s smile disappears. ‘Open the other barrel, counsellor.’
Faber is a smart guy. He gets it then.
‘Oh, Christ. I see. There’s a . . . I got an explanation for you. Probably . . .’
Mike pulls out his cell phone, navigating through the touch-screen menus.
‘So I’m enjoying a late-night bottle of Jameson with my little colleen, when this text message comes through.’ He tosses the phone to Faber, who lets it drip through his hands a few times before he gets a grip. ‘Read it for me.’
Faber reads it to himself first, and whatever blood is in his face drains out of it.
‘Jesus,’ he breathes. ‘Oh God.’
‘Out loud!’ roars Mike, suddenly on his tiptoes. ‘Out loud, you crooked ginger bastard.’
He clicks his fingers and one of his guys drops Faber’s man with a single shot. The man dies quiet, sliding down the wall with no change of expression.
Faber drops the phone and starts crying.
‘Pick it up.’
This is difficult for Faber to comprehend. All his life he’s been talking people out of trouble, and now suddenly here’s this immovable object.
‘Pick up the goddamn phone.’
Faber falls to his knees and has to clasp the phone in both hands before he can steady it enough to make out what’s on the screen.
‘Now, if you’d be so kind . . .’
And Faber reads the message in a hitching voice, filled with fear and phlegm.
‘I’m in a barrel at The Brass Ring. Bleeding real bad. Faber did this . . .’ The lawyer stops, unable to finish.
‘And . . .’
‘Please, Mike. I didn’t do this.’
‘Read the fucking rest of it.’
Faber takes a few deep breaths. ‘It says . . . It says . . .’
Mike can’t wait any longer. ‘It says: If I die, kill the forker. That’s what it says. Kill the forker.’ He laughs. ‘Forker. Predictive text.’
Faber makes a desperate appeal for his life. ‘There’s this