by Nick Thacker
“Makes sense,” the mark said. “Hey, this isn’t half bad,” he said, rotating his drink around in the glass like a pro. His eyes flicked up at me, taking me in, calculating something, and it was the first moment I thought of him as anything more than an idiot frat boy between summer flings. There was depth there, something unspoken. Something he hadn’t even told his buddy.
It also irked me in that I didn’t know how to respond. “Yeah,” I said quickly. “Took me awhile, but I think I mixed it pretty well.”
We stared each other down for a few seconds until he burst out laughing. “Nice — good one, champ. Just pure Scotch and pure ice, can’t go wrong with that, right? Unless you’re mixing something else in there?”
He said it with just a bit of a lilt, just the slightest of questions. I of course didn’t think he was really asking me, since there was no way he could know I was the one who’d do it, but it took me a split-second to recover. “Not this time, champ. Just Scotch and frozen water.”
3
I DID THE KARATE KID thing with my towel all the way to the opposite end of the bar where a new couple had come to sit. I noticed them walk in a few minutes before the mark and take up a place at a table to my right, but I hadn’t gone over yet to check on them. Since they’d moved up to the bar instead of waiting for me to walk over, I decided to make sure they weren’t upset with me.
“Howdy,” I said. I neither like cowboys nor am I from Texas, but it seemed like a good fit in the moment.
Clearly I was wrong about the moment and I needed to step it down a notch, judging by the man’s wide-eyed expression. He had a ring on his left hand, so I assumed this was a husband-wife pair, in for an evening of drinking.
“Sorry,” I said, “just getting a little bored. Thought I’d try to have a little fun.”
He looked at me like I’d just insulted his mother in a language he didn’t understand, so I turned to the woman. I was about to ask what they wanted when I realized this was not just a typical Wednesday night visitor.
The girl in front of me was absolutely stunning. Her hair was light brown, woven around itself and gently perched on top of her head, streaks of lighter blond interspersed through it all. Small diamond earrings brightened her face but took nothing away from it. She had a petite, youthful look in her eyes, yet she couldn’t have been more than ten years younger than me.
He, however, seemed just a bit older. Maybe there was something offset about him, or I was just imagining it, but he had a distant expression and stoic stance, even as he leaned — curled forward like an aging librarian — with both elbows on the bar top.
Finally I found the words. “What are you drinking?”
I directed the question at the space just between both of them, as I couldn’t look at him without asking what was wrong, and I couldn’t look at her because… well she just reminded me…
Stop it.
I wasn’t sure I wanted to go down that train of thought, at least not yet. She had something about her that seemed familiar, and I didn’t think I liked that. Her beauty wasn’t the same as a supermodel’s or that of a Photoshopped actress on a magazine cover. It was simple, unassuming yet confident.
The man spoke first, while she just smiled. “Uh, yeah, I — give me a — or give her a martini… no, a Cosmopolitan. I’ll have — I’ll have a water, for now.”
I hate ‘for now.’ ‘For now’ means they’re either afraid to drink in front of who they’re with or they just read too slow. If they just want a water, without the ‘for now,’ they’re probably a recovering alcoholic or they’re sick, or they’re just not wanting to drink that night. I can respect that, but a ‘for now…’
I turned around to make the drinks, but the gal got in a quick order: “Make it up however you like it. I’m not picky.”
Her voice danced around in the air, and I immediately latched on to her words. I respected that. Every bar has their ‘own way’ of doing things, and most of them aren’t any good. I don’t like messing with classic drinks unless they need messing with. I’ll squirt a lime over the top of a whiskey smash just to bring some of the flavors out, and I’ll kindly redirect an unassuming victim asking for one of the ‘candy martinis’ like a Lemon Drop or a Washington Apple to something a bit more respectable, but I’m not about to screw with a tried-and-true like a Cosmo.
I made it up perfectly, using a jigger just to show her I cared, and brought that and the water back to them. They’d pulled up at the bar now, each taking a seat on an old wooden stool I’d salvaged from a liquidation a few months back, and started sipping.
I watched, waiting to see if the man was truly content with the lukewarm H2O-on-ice or he’d man up and get something harder, but he was still off in la-la-land. She, on the other hand, followed my eyes and finally caught up to them.
“This your place?” she asked.
It was almost like she already knew the answer to the question.
“Yeah,” I said. I flicked over to the frat boys to make sure the mark hadn’t taken off, then came back to her. “Been here ten years almost. Built it myself, trying to pay it off.”
She smiled. “We — we’re just traveling through.” She motioned to the guy next to her. “He’s my brother. We’re heading to a funeral.”
“Sorry to hear that,” I said. “Staying here in town?”
She laughed. “Is there anywhere to even stay here?”
I returned a smile, nodding. “It’s not big, but it’s got everything you need. Came here to settle down myself, but that sort of morphed into ‘making myself crazy trying to run a business.’”
She sipped the cosmopolitan. “This is really good. Thank you.”
I wasn’t sure if that was intended to be the end of our conversation or not, but as the man was still staring at the mirror along the back wall of my bar, I decided to see how the mark and his buddy were warming up to the night.
“…She wasn’t even part of the —“
He stopped talking when I came over, and Dawson turned to me. “‘Sup, champ.”
“‘Sup.” I gave a one-shot back nod, like I’d seen the kids do, and tried to feign nonchalance. “Ready for a second round?”
“Uh, yeah.” Dawson cleared his throat. “Probably need to be going after this,” he said.
“Yeah? Whereabouts you headed?”
As much as I’d tried not to, I had picked up some of the lazy small-town speak of the area when I’d moved in.
“We, uh — we’re going to —“
Kid B cut in. “Just around. We were told this place had a decent nightlife, but…”
I nodded, smirking. “I get it. Bunch of old folks clogging up the place. No music, no ladies. That about right?”
Kid B laughed. “Don’t be so hard on yourself, man. It’s a nice —“
I grabbed his drink — still half-full — and sloshed it up onto his shirt. On ‘accident.’ “My bad, bud, let me get a new one for you. On the house, of course.”
He seemed rightly perturbed, and not a little bit shocked, either with the speed with which I’d sloshed him or the fact that I had in the first place, but he did exactly what I’d expected.
“Let me — thanks, for that — let me hit the restroom. Back there?” he flicked his head sideways.
“Mm hmm, yeah. Back there. Drink’s waiting for you when you return.”
When he left I turned my attention back to the mark.
“So, what else can I do for you this evening?” I asked. It was a long shot, that he’d just somehow and for some reason jump into a perfect explanation of why I should kill him. I knew it was vetted as well, by the boss, and that anyone coming in here as a mark was someone they deemed worthy to be offed, but I always got more proof. Just a little will do it, but I have to get it.
For me.
A lot of times it’s as simple as following them home. Sneaking in when they’re not around, checking message threads, emails, hell — one mark even left a sticky note on the fridge with the use
rname and password of their online alter ego. An alter ego, I soon learned, that they used to lure adolescent children into scenarios that would allow this mark to ‘interact’ with them in person.
I didn’t need to know any more details than that — the boss had already done the research and given the orders, I just wanted to make sure it was the right mark.
It’s a sick world out there, and the kinds of things that piss normal people off drive me to do things I’m really good at: the ‘sticky note’ mark, for example, ended up skewered inside the smashed, twisted metal of a horrific vehicular explosion. What can I say? He came in and ordered an Irish car bomb.
Another one ordered a Sidecar. Respectable, actually, but I had no idea how I was going to find an actual, real-life sidecar, and even then what I’d do with it. Do you attach it to a motorcycle? Does it have to be one of those German ones they drove around in WWII? So I improvised and just ran him down with my car. A few times over the lower back to wake him up, then once over the neck to put him back to sleep.
But as I’d suspected, this particular mark wasn’t going to fall for any stupid tricks of mine. He looked at me with those big, dopey, frat-boy eyes and then smiled.
“Nah, man, you don’t mean what I think you mean, do you?”
I cocked my head sideways.
“Like ‘happy ending’ stuff?” He made the finger quotes when he said it.
I shook my head. “Sorry to disappoint. This is a respectable pub. I just meant food — you want any food?” At least pivoting to another topic didn’t sound awkward. We did serve food.
“You mentioned that catfish. Any good?”
4
I HAD JOEY FLIP A few catfish fillets on the griddle, as the smell of a single one cooking usually earns us a few more orders. I have no idea what the man puts on those things, except butter — lots of butter — but they really are delicious. I keep getting the town’s ‘best catfish’ award, but in a town of 400 with about five other restaurants, I’m not sure it’s much of a compliment. I have a plan to one day pitch to the Chamber of Commerce expanding the award to ‘best grilled food’ or even just ‘best food,’ but for now, I’ll be the town’s official ‘catfish king.’
I came back out to the bar to find that the half-lovely couple had vanished. Weird. Her drink was still sitting there, a few drops of condensation finding their way down the spout and onto the bar top. His glass was completely empty, save for the ice cubes and straw.
I glanced around to see if they’d just moved somewhere else, hoping for a view of the beach — (there wasn’t one) or just better company (there wasn’t any). A group of older folks, regulars, sat at two of the five tables on one side of the place, talking amongst themselves. No one sat on the other side; the card sharks had taken off a while ago. The center of the larger room was empty and cleared, partly because I liked the idea that we might do some dancing in here at some point, but mostly because I liked the lack of clutter.
Joey knew the old folks’ orders well enough to handle them, so he usually took care of drink-running while I parked it behind the bar most nights. It had the best vantage point, and with the addition of a small three-camera closed-circuit system with a monitor just beneath the bar top, I could keep an eye on the entire facility with just an eye flick.
So it was pretty obvious the couple had left — ditched without paying, too. I thought about checking the restroom, but it seemed unlikely both would go at the same time. Their chairs were empty, too. No purses, sweaters, hats. They were gone.
What struck me as worse, however, was that my frat boy friends were gone. The two that had pulled up to a table in the corner near the door were gone, and my mark’s buddy was gone as well. The main man, too, was nowhere to be found.
Something bugged me in that instant. I felt the ‘it’ I talked about before. The sense I have about this stuff, it was suddenly there. I hollered back to Joey to watch the place, generating a positive-sounding grunt from the kitchen area, then booked it through the front door.
I dash out like this from time to time, so I didn’t need to stop and explain anything to the regular patrons. I recognized Jimmy and his wife, a starlet-turned-smoker who’d nabbed an old, rich, retired guy after her forty year-run in Hollywood. They were across a table from Roger Pennington and Jessup McNaab, another pair of fisherman who had nothing better to do when the sun went down than barhop. And being the only bar like mine in town, they ‘hopped’ down here just about every night.
They barely gave me a glance as I got up to speed and nailed the front door. It flew open, and I had that silent freak out of wondering whether or not there might be a person trying to come in at that exact moment, but once again I lucked out. The street was dark, the single lamppost long since overdue for a bulb change and bug cleanout, and it took a second for my eyes to adjust.
When they did, it didn’t help. It was still nearly pitch-black outside, and there was no one around. No cars, no late-night walkers, not even a dog alerting my arrival.
I turned and jogged around the back of the building. A small alleyway for trash pickup and deliveries separated my building from the thick wooded area that ran to the beach. The alley ended at my building, but ran alongside the woods and a few other establishments before connecting to the main road once again. Which, in my initial scoping of the property fifteen years ago, I thought to myself would make a nice hideout for some bad guys.
I saw the silhouette of the woman, only now noticing that she was decked out in a relatively formal-looking dress, standing with her back to me on her phone. I couldn’t hear what she was saying, but it sounded like she was arguing with the other person. Her voice was mostly a whisper, punctuated by a few gasps and surprised breaths. In my opinion, not a good phone call.
I slowed to a walk and cleared my throat, knowing that jogging or running up behind a person in a dark alley is never a good way to start a conversation. Still, she turned and looked for me in the darkness with a weirdly scared expression on her face.
“Hey,” I said, “it’s just me. Sorry, I —“
I saw movement off to the right, farther behind my own building, and assumed it was her brother. Maybe he’d gone outside to relieve himself, which was weird, but not the end of the world.
The guy started running, and from the tiny flickering of the small light I’d installed above my back door, I could see him reaching inside the back of his pants.
Now, there are really only three things you reach for in the back of your pants: the first is contraband, but we weren’t in an airport and if he’d shoved something up there was no way he’d be running so fast. The second is a wallet, and I had the feeling he wasn’t excited to show off his new ID picture.
The third is what I was preparing for. I wasn’t armed — my closest piece was still in a drawer in the tiny office inside — so I pulled out the next-best thing.
The white towel I’d been using to swab the bar.
I wasn’t sure if there would be any use for it, but it was better than nothing.
Maybe.
The pistol came out, smaller than a 9mm from what I could see, with a suppressor attached. Possibly a Glock 42. Not a ton of stopping power, altogether, but there was hardly any distance between us. Even a suppressed .380 from this distance would do some damage.
I started running, hoping I was still in the realm of ‘the element of surprise’ against the mark. I figured he’d come out after her, knowing she was alone outside and somehow sneaking out by getting past Joey in the kitchen.
This guy’s here for her, I knew. I no longer needed to do my due diligence. I knew the sort of asshole I was up against this time around — not a pedophile, but far from a stand-up citizen. Probably the type that preys on women only, assuming they were weaker and easier to nab.
I should introduce him to some of the ladies I know, I thought. I almost smiled, but knew I had to focus. I pushed the thought out of my mind and hauled it toward the attacker. His hair was floppier now, no match
for a gentle breeze and running at full-tilt.
The weapon rose, and I jumped. He wouldn’t dodge out of the way because it might screw with his aim — an unfortunate truth I learned about long ago. Sure enough, he stood his ground and tried to recalculate his shot since I’d suddenly gained a few feet in the air.
My head landed on his chest, but my left arm was out, pushing his right arm up and away as best I could. I’d placed myself directly in the line of fire, hoping the girl wouldn’t move — or if she did, that she would move toward the building to our right and not out to my left where the bullet would go.
Crack! The handgun fired — suppressed but still plenty loud — and we fell, tumbling end-over-end a couple times before stopping in a mud streak that cut across the alley’s asphalt. I was on top, thankfully, so I wrapped his legs into mine and sat high up on his stomach. I bounced as high as I dared a few times, hoping for a cracked or bruised rib, but unleashed with a couple hooks onto any open skin I could find.
Many times in this scenario my mark, not typically a fighter or scrapper, forgets where they are and simply tries to curl up and make it go away. Sometimes they have a little spice to them and they fight back, but they always seem to forget that their weapon is still in their hand.
This time my mark was not unaware. He flicked the Glock sideways, pummeling me in the temple and effectively removing me from his chest. I rolled, in pain, but recovered and swept out with a leg.
He jumped but it caught his right foot and he started to fall sideways. I took the momentary advantage and ran at him again, tackling him into the picket fence at the back of the alley. His body cracked, or the wood cracked, but he sort of imploded into himself and ended up in a sitting position on the asphalt, his back to the fence.