Tobias shook his head, embarrassment gone. “You said I get the million and one. I get top end of the cut.”
Everett swapped him for the Israeli’s valise.
Tobias said, “Next time, nothing diplomatic and no sneaky mind fucks. Next time we pick a score that’s more my style, deal?”
“As said, retired.”
Tobias snorted. “You’re not looking very retired lately.”
“You don’t need to go in there,” Everett asked. “Larry’s not your boss, and being a Lost Boy’s not a job description. There’s no 401K at the end of the road with him.”
“So?” Tobias said.
“So let’s go in and say hello to Larry then.”
When they got out, Everett stuck the bread knife down the front of his belt. A blurry head peered at them out one windowpane where the paint had been scraped away: a lookout, scoping on them.
“Drink will flow and drugs be done,” Tobias said as they headed toward the open door. “Larry may have even trucked in a few working girls to entertain the troops.”
“If so that fact will be irrelevant to you,” Agnes said.
“What? Oh yeah,” Tobias said. “That’s right.”
They walked into the Clubhouse.
‘You Know What You Are’ by Ministry blasted from the speakers. There were no females in evidence. Rather, the Clubhouse was a sausage fest tonight.
Larry sat at his desk glaring balefully at them from his office. Tobias was puzzled but wary as he keyed in on Larry’s mood, the ominous postures of the twenty odd Lost Boys surrounding them. Agnes shared his apprehension. She wasn’t armed and so could do no more than evidence wary uncertainty.
Someone shut the rolling door behind them. The three stopped in the middle of the room and both men set down their grips.
Everett rummaged in his briefcase, pulled out a double handful of bundled bills and held it up for display. “This is by eyeball, but should be about a ten percent tithe. Would’ve given it up to keep the peace. Would’ve persuaded Tobias to give up ten points too. 200 large for sitting on your ass without breaking a sweat? You’d’ve been happy after you calmed down, Larry.”
A hissing intake of air from Tobias. “What the fuck you talking about, Everett?”
“Haven’t you figured it out yet? You’re not supposed to be here. Larry never intended for you to come back. You think you were the first? It’s a game we played long before I moved to Mendo. Every so often Larry’d send somebody, usually whichever of his Lost Boys he was most tired of looking at. But he’s been known to send others in a pinch when he’s especially mad at me.”
“Everett,” Larry said.
“Shut up,” Everett said. “You don’t have the floor. Larry would get them riled up. ‘Everett is a king badass, you’ll never hold a candle to him.’ ‘Everett was a dark lord of the gutter when he was working, you wouldn’t stand a chance against him.’”
Everett glanced at Tobias, who stood trembling and sweating. “Ring any bells kid? He didn’t actually sic you, did he? No, he likes it deniable.”
He looked around at the surrounding eyes. “Larry could always aim us at the prey unerringly. He’s a fine snoop and a decent business manager. However, he always gloated too much. Presumptuous, doesn’t change the fact that he was nothing more than a human bird dog.”
Everett took a step toward Larry. Larry sprang up, a puppet yanked erect. Larry’s eyes rolled to the side. He refused to turn his back on Everett long enough to lay eyes on the shotgun.
Everett smiled. “Told you before it’s too far away to keep your weapon. You reach for the pump and it’s over. We’re still talking. You own a few heartbeats more.”
Everett scanned the Lost Boys, cataloging their relative positions for the possible targeting frenzy.
“You know who I am,” Everett told those staring faces. “This is for succession of leadership. If none of you interfere, only he dies.”
“I’m your friend, Everett,” Larry said. “There’s something wrong with you in the head if you think different.”
Everett nodded. “We were friends despite all, Larry. Leastways, until you fed my family to the Widow.”
“You. Are. Crazy.”
“Not,” Everett said. “Process of elimination. She’d have scooped me up as a malleable kid if she’d known where I was, and done her best to fuck me into slavery. Hence, she didn’t know until relatively recent.
“So who reaches out to coax me into her ambush? How’s about the guy who had to call about Bambi and Rolly as bait to reel me in? There’s a reason I never gave you my forwarding address.
“Pretending to find Rolly was laying it on a bit thick, but you wanted to make sure so you took the risk of heavy handedness. You probably knew where Rolly was shortly after you set him up. It is your speciality after all: betrayal.”
“One last time,” Everett said to the Lost Boys. “Don’t help him. Don’t help me. Stay alive.”
He pulled the bread knife from his belt, stepped off to close the gap.
Afterwards, whenever Tobias thought about those next few moments he saw again Everett propelling toward Larry quick as a watermelon seed squeezed from between thumb and forefinger. That, or a mouse trap snapping shut, a flea leaping into invisibility.
Larry swiveled in place as Everett approached, scooped up the shot gun from against the wall, and racked it one handed as he spun forward to aim in.
Nobody’s fast enough to dodge a bullet. Everett had met people as quick as himself exactly twice, and had outlived them both. What he had that those others didn’t, was the line. The intuitive sense of what the mark would do next, and which direction events were likely to tumble.
No one can dodge a bullet. But if you’re nimble enough, you can make sure not to be where they’re aiming.
Larry had a perfectly respectable amount of speed. However, he was desperate and stiff. As Everett closed in, while still out of range he stuck his hand out toward Larry’s face. Larry’s eyes crossed at the feint, and he jerked the shotgun’s barrel toward the point in space he believed Everett would occupy in the next second.
Everett veered off and away in a tangent, commencing a cartwheel just outside the barrel’s aiming point. Larry tried to correct, yanked prematurely on the trigger, and a spread of 12-gauge double-ought whipped past close enough for Everett to feel the wind. Behind him, a caterwauling chorus of screams commenced.
Larry tried smacking Everett with the shotgun as he cart wheeled past. Everett grabbed the proffered barrel with his free hand as he bounced into the air with the knife crossed over by his opposite ear. As he sailed past, he used the shotgun as a handhold and hacked the knife so it chopped into Larry’s neck far enough to embed in the cervical vertebrae.
Hacking a blade into someone typically produces an awful enough wound. With a bread knife, like with Japanese blades, the most horrific damage is inflicted on the pull. Then the meat gapes like a carved ham, though of course living flesh resists more vehemently than roast pork.
Everett tugged in a ripping stroke, the serrations shuddering bumpily across Larry’s neck bones with the feel of an opening zipper. Everett intended full follow through on the cut. To tumble the head off Larry’s shoulders while he was still in the air, then spin away in a twinkle toes killing dance when he landed if necessary.
Things went south when the knife’s edge bound up in the gristle and bone. Everett had to stop the drag or risk snapping the thin, flexible blade.
Everett plopped flatfooted and graceless to the ground. He yanked Larry around as a shield between himself and the rest of the room, his face an incandescent mask of shame.
Larry was slicing his hands to the bone, tendons severing and palms becoming ribbons as he fumbled at the blade embedded in his neck. Neither jugular nor carotid had been nicked, so there was a lot less blood than you’d expect. Yet.
Less than three seconds had passed since Larry’s murder began. Tobias stood in the middle of the room, Desert Eagle in h
and, rotating in place and giggling. Agnes rotated with him, unarmed but watching his blind side.
Two of the Lost Boys were down in a welter of gore, the ones who were in the way when Larry pulled the trigger. The rest of the Lost Boys were too frozen in shock and awe to have responded. A couple had advanced a step or two in his direction. They leaned forward immobilized in mid stride tableau like kids playing Statues, staring at whatever was happening on Larry’s face.
Everett held Larry’s corn rows, his grip savage with embarrassment as he sawed the rest of the way through the neck. Larry slumped to the floor as the decapitation progressed. Everett dropped to one knee and tugged up hard on the hair for the last couple strokes. This was an unforgivably sloppy kill.
He was on his feet holding the head aloft in his outstretched hand. Once more he saw the terror in their eyes; the usual emotion expressed when people realized they were in the storm giants’ playroom. It was like a surfer sitting his board beyond the surf line, when a yard high dorsal fin cuts the water next to him close enough to touch. People had literally shit themselves when Everett kicked into turbo. They would again tonight if he wanted to toy with them.
The Storm Giants still wanted to bubble up. No, he told them – not this time. He owned this room. He didn’t have to kill everyone in it.
Everett strolled in a circle around Tobias and Agnes, panning the head to the right and left, making sure they all got a good gander. Blood dripped in spatters like incense from a swaying censer.
He came up on the guys that had been blown up by the shotgun. Two disjointed puppets, squirming around on pure end-of-the-line instinct. As if the meat could regain its intact form if it contorted into the right position.
There was nothing to be done for either. No one here was calling 911.
Everett looked at them and he thought: Raymond will never have to see such sights as this. Raymond will never have to stand in a room full of homicidal strangers and dominate them. Such a feeling of peaceful joy enfolded him that he lowered Larry’s head and sighed. He was filled with a sense of beatitude as he tamped the Storm Giants down to a safe level.
“Did I ever say you were past your prime?” Tobias asked with a jack o lantern smile.
Everett jerked his chin at these dying Lost Boys.
Tobias pulled his Desert Eagle and held it out to Agnes without breaking eye contact with Everett. She took it, stepped close enough to be sure, and gave them grace with two shots in quick succession. Both hunks of meat stopped pretending to be alive. Their exposed innards glistened as they settled into morbidity.
Tobias continued to look Everett in the eyes this whole time. He held his hand out to Agnes expectantly. She replaced the pistol in his hand, he re holstered it, and the little man exuded obnoxious smugness. Everett realized that he was witnessing the birth of a 21st Century Bonnie and Clyde. They’d play it loud and messy; they’d be famous on TV soon enough. More than that, they were a breeding pair in the making . . .
Everett took one more look around, making non-threatening eye contact with each Lost Boy in turn. Making them believe each was considered individually significant. “Relax now. Tobias runs things for me. You give up your usual end to him. He holds my cut until such time as I deem fit.”
He went to the office and sat at the desk. He tried to stand Larry’s head up on its stump but it squelched over onto its side. He turned it so its face was pointed away, toward the room.
Tobias and Agnes joined him. The Lost Boys commenced cleanup like a barrel full of monkeys. The bodies rolled up in tarps; the larger puddles scooped up with dust pans, and the clotting blood dumped in a trash can to be bleached and burned. The Boys kept flicking glances at Larry’s head while they worked, or furtively peeping Everett’s way with mingled fear and admiration.
Tobias put both grips on the desk next to Larry’s head. He pulled a bundle of bills from his satchel and hefted it once before tossing it in Everett’s valise. “Dude, you sure are free and easy about money.”
Everett grunted, exhausted and numb from the adrenaline crash. “This is America, Tobias. The streets are paved with gold. There’s always someone else to rob.”
Chapter 44 : Martian Tripods & the Walking Dead
Everett called Kerri and told her he was coming home. He found himself speaking truths to her, words she absorbed in silence. He spoke the things she deserved to hear, that he’d never said in person. Then he drove.
Everett parked down the block and watched Rolly standing guard outside the community center as his kids arrived. A beautiful woman stood next to him. Today was Christmas Eve; Rolly had replaced the ‘Murderball’ cap with an incongruous red Santa hat.
Kids in wheelchairs were helped off lift equipped vans by staff. Others were assisted out of various vehicles by parents. Rolly sat by the wall with the attractive woman, ignoring both kids and parents. His attention shuttled between his conversation with the woman, the busy boulevard, and both ways down the sidewalk. Rolly saw him right off but didn’t desert his post.
Everett sat in the snack truck and had a smoke. As he often did while waiting, he amused himself by envisioning the best tactical response if Martian tripods reared up behind the Oakland skyline, or if hordes of undead zombies thronged his way down the Avenue.
The last kid entered the building. The beautiful woman and Rolly exchanged friendly words before she went inside. Everett got out the truck to approach his friend. Rolly assayed a smile, which disappeared when he got a good look at Everett’s expression.
“Had to do it again,” Everett said.
“Damn. Did the storm giants come out?”
Everett nodded.
“All the way out?” Rolly asked.
Everett shook his head. “No, kept the muzzle on them. Only had to do three. Well, three and a half.” It felt like bragging, to be able to say he’d kept the body count so low.
“Good,” Rolly said. “It was always a bad scene when those fuckers showed their faces all the way.”
“Had to make some meat all right,” Everett said. “Could have used you.”
“Kerri?” Rolly asked. “Raymond?”
“Both okay. Larry’s gone though. Finally forced me to do him.”
Rolly raised a brow. "Larry ever bother telling you he’s the one assigned me that last botched job?”
Everett shrugged. “He called me at 3AM to let me know the night it happened.”
Rolly continued studying Everett, sensing the seething behind the mask.
“Am I a bad man, Rolly?” Everett asked.
Rolly’s eyes widened. “You and me, we did a lot of damage all right. But you can’t change what’s dead and gone, bro. Like, you can’t wipe out the stains but maybe you can try going toward something better.
“Everett, my goodest bestest friend – you’re stuck. You’re one of those dinosaur bugs, buried in that amber shit. You’re frozen, petrified like. You got to get past your history, somehow.
“Are you bad?” Rolly asked. “I ain’t the one to say. What does Kerri think?”
Rolly rolled his wheel chair at Everett and bumped his shins. “What does Raymond think?”
Everett chewed on that. “Raymond would probably like to meet you again, Rolly.”
Rolly laughed. “That your way of saying you miss me, bro?”
“Was thinking you might want to come up for a couple days. Spend Christmas with us. Watch Raymond open his presents.” Everett gestured toward the handicapped center. “If your kids could spare you.”
Chapter 45 : The End of His Usefulness?
They pulled off the highway onto the access road and started down the hill’s switchbacks.
“What the hell is that, Everett?” Rolly asked, getting a look at all Everett’s recent cement work.
They pulled onto the extra wide concrete driveway Everett had laid in front of the house. Kerri stood in the door.
Everett pulled the wheelchair out the back and rolled it around to the passenger side. Rolly already had t
he door open as Everett moved the chair into place. When Everett reached over to help him exit the truck Rolly said “Back the fuck off. I got it.”
Everett held the chair long enough for Rolly to get his ass settled, then let go.
Rolly spun the chair round to face Everett. “Sorry, Everett. I get testy.”
“Don’t make no never mind, bro. Let’s show you around the spread.”
He led Rolly to the edge of the driveway. From there, flat cement tracks led to every building and landscape feature: to the fire pit, to the outbuildings, down to the river and even uphill on switchbacks to the forest’s edge.
It was amateurish work as Everett had never done real construction before Mendocino, but it was still useful. Rolly could go anywhere he wanted on the property. He had unrestricted access any time he came up to visit.
“Damn,” Rolly said.
The front door to the house opened, and Raymond came out. He looked at Rolly. “Who are you?”
“I’m your Uncle Rolly. You don’t remember me because you were too little. I remember you though.”
“Oh,” Raymond said. “Do you want to see the river?”
“Sure,” Rolly said, and the two headed that way down the access path.
“I almost left,” Kerri said. “I had us all packed. Then I realized that wasn’t the smart move. The protection here wasn’t too bad. She would’ve just followed us and caught us alone. It would have tipped her off you were up to something anyways. I knew it was important to make her feel safe, so you could get close enough to make sure we never saw her again.”
“Very smart,” Everett said, letting his pride convey. “Good girl.”
“Yes. That was part of why I stayed. It wasn’t just her I would’ve been running from. It was you, too.”
There was a ringing in his ears as he turned to her.
She took his hands. “This wasn’t your doing, Everett. But when will your past come calling again? I knew who and what you were. I’m neither a fool nor a hypocrite. You’ve kept every promise you’ve made to me. Anything I ask from you, you give. But you’re so busy staying on top of things, you can only give us a fraction of yourself. It’s getting old, Everett.”
The Storm Giants Page 16