The Boss of Hampton Beach

by Jed Power

  Chapter 37

  "Is . . . is . . . is it over, Buzz? Huh? Is it over?"

  Buzz couldn't believe it. His big dream had been this close, and he'd watched it die right there in front of him. And it had all happened in the time it took those two crazy cops to chase the spic and the goon from the storage joint to the shopping plaza. He could just about taste those piña coladas in Jamaica turning into 7 & 7's with a beer chaser at Duggan's Cafe. Shit. "Yeah, it's over."

  "You sure?"

  "Get up here, you fucking nitwit."

  Skinny unrolled himself from under the dash and sat back in the shotgun seat. "What happened?"

  "Nothing good."

  Through the crowd that was slowly accumulating Buzz could still make out the two cops, one on the ground. Sirens sounded off in the distance. There had to be a way to salvage this mess. Buzz stared at the Lincoln and imagined the hundred beautiful, oval footballs in there. They'd be confiscated now. "Damn."

  Skinny turned and looked at him with those sad, watery, junkie eyes. Even the thin man knew there wasn't any damn way to pull this thing out of the fire, not now. It was over, finished, and that's all she wrote.

  "Damn," Buzz said again. Why the hell did this happen? he thought. I was this fucking close. Why?

  "Well, there goes the coke," Skinny said, unwrapping a stick of gum and casually popping it into in his mouth.

  The sirens were getting closer. Time to make tracks. But first there was one thing he had to do. He turned to Skinny and gave him a hard gangster smack upside the head with the back of his hand.

  "Yowww," Skinny hollered, throwing his hands up over his face. "What the fuck did you do that for?"

  "Because of that voice of yours, that's what for." Buzz felt real good–for half a second. Until Skinny looked over at him with those frightened eyes, like maybe he thought he was going to get pounded.

  Skinny glanced around like he was trying to come up with something to keep Buzz from whacking him again. "I just thought of something."

  "What?" Probably another dumb Skinny idea.

  "Why don't we shake down the guy with the gym bag?"

  Maybe it was the timing, maybe Buzz was that desperate, but Skinny's new idea didn't sound all that dumb. No, not dumb at all. Hell, he wouldn't be able to retire today like he'd hoped, that was for sure. But maybe someday. Until then a man had to make a living, didn't he? There was just one problem though. "Got any brilliant suggestions on how we're gonna find out who the hell that guy was?"

  Buzz was really surprised when Skinny answered, "Only person it can be. The bartender . . . Dan Marlowe."

  The thin man was right. Marlowe was the only one left in the picture. He must've buffaloed the staties. Either he'd had the cocaine all along or he'd latched onto it somewhere along the line. Buzz scratched his chin. "I wonder how much was in that bag?"

  "Maybe a few hundred grand," Skinny said.

  A few hundred grand. Not likely. But still, something–whatever that something was–had to be better than nothing. "All right, we'll give it a shot."

  "You know what?" Skinny sounded almost cheery now.

  "What?" Buzz was half afraid to ask. Getting more than one good idea out of Skinny was as likely as getting a good night's sleep.

  "He'll be easy to handle. A lot easier than they would've been." Skinny nodded in the direction of the Lincoln.

  "Yeah, I suppose you're right."

  Buzz turned the Sentra around and drove out of the lot onto Route1 just as an ambulance and what looked like every goddamn police car in creation began pulling in.

  ~*~*~