by Frank Zafiro
He leaned forward conspiratorially and lowered his voice to a stage whisper. “Cause ya know I had her first, don’chya? Had her when she was a ripe young thing. Had her every which way you can imagine, too.”
“Shut up.”
He leered at me. “She still give good head?”
“Do you want to work out a deal or not?” I gritted through a clenched the jaw.
His leer spread into a greasy smile. “Does she still like to take it in the—”
I hit him.
I didn’t plan it, but the smug look on his face and the image of him and Cassie together was just too much. I lashed out with my left hand before I even thought about it. My hand curled into a fist on its way toward the center of his face. I drove that fist into the tip of his nose, smashing it. Blood exploded from his nostrils.
Yeager squealed. His hands flew to his face. I threw my right as a reflex, stepping into the hook punch and catching him low in the gut. My fist powered through the roll of fat with a slap. Yeager grunted and sank to a knee.
I didn’t hesitate. The left came back across, landing on his jaw, right on the knockout button. This time he didn’t make a noise, but his eyelids fluttered and he fell forward to the carpet with a thud.
I stood stock-still in his living room for a moment, staring down at his unmoving body. The coppery smell of blood mixed with the putrid odors already dominating the air. Then I looked around. The far wall was dominated by a computer desk. Wild lines drew themselves randomly against the dark background of the computer monitor. Next to the desk, I spotted a bookshelf full of videotapes and DVDs.
Yeager groaned and stirred.
I strode to the bookshelf. Many of the movies were commercial titles I recognized. Some were obvious porn titles. On the third shelf, nearest to the desk, I found a series of homemade labels. Each label had a name. The fifth one was Cassie.
“You son of a bitch,” Yeager muttered in a thick voice.
The DVD cover showed a much younger Cassie, arms in air and topless. I ground my teeth and slid it into the inside pocket of my bomber jacket.
“Take it,” Yeager said. “I’ll just make another one.”
He looked at me from his knees, one hand pressed against his nose to staunch the bleeding. His eyes remained smug.
I’d have to destroy the computer file. I touched the computer mouse, exiting the screensaver. A password request popped up.
“What’s the password?” I demanded.
“Fuck you,” he said.
I stepped toward him and drove the point of my boot into his stomach. He folded over, retching. I stepped to the side to avoid the vomit. My bad knee throbbed.
When he’d caught his breath, Yeager began to laugh. He looked up at me, blood streaming from his nose. “You can beat on me if you want. Maybe I’ll eventually tell you my password. But then you’ll have to find the file. And even if you do, it’s backed up online.”
I stared down at him, processing what he’d said.
“You think I’m stupid?” he asked me. “Now where’s my fucking money?”
I shook my head slowly. “She doesn’t have it.”
His eyes burned into me. “Then she’ll be the star of the Internet.”
“How about if she just calls the cops?”
“How about if I call them on you?” he sneered.
I considered that. Right now, I couldn’t prove the blackmail, but he could easily prove that I assaulted him.
He shook his head and spit on the carpet. “If the cops were an option, she’d have called them already.”
He was right, but I didn’t want to show it. “Then maybe she’ll just sue your ass. Take your shitty little house.”
He laughed harder. “Now that’d be real quiet, huh? A public lawsuit?”
I lowered my voice. “If you don’t delete those files and destroy the DVDs, I’ll come back and visit you.”
His laughter turned hysterical. Fresh droplets of blood flew from his mouth as he howled. “Oh, that’s good, that’s good.”
I narrowed my eyes at him. His mood swings were lunatic. “I’m serious,” told him.
His laughter melted away. “Oh, I hope so. Because next time I’ll be waiting for you with a little friend.”
We stood there, not speaking. I glanced around the room to see if he had a gun stashed anywhere nearby. The hum of the computer fan was the loudest thing in the room. When I looked back at him, he glowered darkly. I noticed that all the smashing I’d done hadn’t knocked that smugness off his face.
“What do you want?” I finally asked.
“Five thousand dollars,” he said, and grinned at me.
“Asshole,” I said. “You shoulda taken the fifteen hundred.”
I walked past him and out the door.
On the way home, I pulled in next to a dumpster. I removed the picture from the sleeve of the DVD case and tore it into small bits. Then I snapped the DVD into pieces and threw it all away.
I wanted to see her again. I wanted to kiss her, hold her, love her. But I knew I wouldn’t. I’d failed her. And she’d be humiliated because of it. I knew from experience that you can live through humiliation, but she didn’t.
Until she figured that out, if she ever did, she’d remain lost to me.
I called her on the phone. She listened to my words and hung up quietly. I stayed on the line a little longer, listening to the dial tone until it became an insistent, harsh beep. Then I hung it up and was alone with the thickness in my throat and the unbidden tears.
SHAE & LADDIE
Shae
“My name is Charity and welcome back to the program.” The woman’s voice on the radio was silky sweet. “We have another caller on the line. Micah, is it?”
“Yes, ma’am,” a younger woman, maybe even just a girl, answered.
“Welcome to the show. What song did you want to request?”
There was some hesitation. Maybe a sniffle.
I scratched the stubble on the side of my face and took a sip of whiskey from the glass in my other hand. I held the liquid in my mouth, listening.
“Micah?” the hostess asked. “You all right, honey?”
The sniffle turned into a short sob.
I swallowed. The liquid burned my throat.
“I’m sorry,” Micah told the hostess. “It’s just…oh, I hate Valentine’s Day.”
I stared down into my glass and the bag of money beside it. I knew how she felt.
The job was supposed to easy, and quick. They all are. Somewhere between what they’re supposed to be and what eventually happens, things get fucked up. Usually it’s something small and I’m able to adapt to it. Like some general on the History Channel said, no plan ever survives contact with the enemy. A true soldier adapts.
Shae was a go with the flow type of woman anyway. When I laid out the plan for her, she only half-listened to me. I had to raise my voice twice to get her attention and even then, I don’t think she really heard every detail. For her, it was easy. Walk in, point the gun, get the money, and walk out. Everything else was flexible.
Well, it wasn’t.
I’d like to say the whole thing would’ve gone like clockwork if we’d just stuck to my plan, but that would be a lie. Things came up that I hadn’t planned for. I mean, how do you account for what customers will be in a bank at any given time? You can’t. And if one of those customers happens to be a police detective in plain clothes, depositing his paycheck, how do you plan for that?
Go with the flow, baby. That’s what Shae would’ve said.
The flow.
It was a flow of bad shit, that’s what it was.
For starters, Shae lost her mask. I bought two plastic masks with elastic straps. Mine was Darth Vader and hers was one of the white Stormtroopers. She laughed at me at first when I brought them home from the costume shop. But when I showed her the eyes, with the large, darkened plastic lenses, she smiled broadly.
“Good vision, baby,” she said, her thick Iri
sh accent arousing me. “Nice choice.”
Then she went and forgot the thing in the car. We arrived at the door of the bank, ready to rock, and she snapped her fingers. I asked her the problem and she told me.
The car was safely parked around two corners, a right and a left. It was about forty seconds away at a dead run and out of sight of any external bank cameras.
“Go get it,” I told her. “I’ll wait.”
She smiled and shook her head. “Feck it, Laddie. Let’s just do it.”
With that, she threw her long hair back over her shoulders and strode into the bank like she was the Queen of England.
I slipped on my mask and hurried after her.
The next thing that went wrong was the security guard. It wasn’t the old guy that was there all three times I cased the place. It was a younger guy, though he was fatter than the regular mope. He was looking at Shae, admiring her form as she headed to the nearest teller. I was almost on him when he turned and saw my mask.
He was fast, I’ll give him that. He managed to get his .38 out of the holster before I clubbed him with my sap.
“Nobody feckin’ move!” screamed Shae, the silver Beretta in her hand and sweeping across all the customers and employees. Her thick brogue made the words sing.
Of course, everybody did move and it took me pointing my .45 at several of them and barking orders to back them away from the door.
Then the second security guard came out of the vault area at a dead run, his gun clasped in both hands. His tie flew back over his shoulder as he sprinted into the lobby. When he slammed on the brakes, he slid several feet on the tile floor. Then he pointed the gun at my Shae, which was a mistake.
I snapped off two rounds, catching him just below the armpit about an inch apart. He grunted and fell over without even looking my direction.
The screams broke out again and I wheeled around, pointing my gun everywhere and bellowing for them to shut up, just shut the fuck up.
Shae’s eyes were alight with excitement and after I dropped the second guard, she gave me a look of pure lust from beneath hooded eyes and touched the tip of her tongue to her lip.
I opened my mouth to tell her to get moving, but before I could say a word, she turned and grabbed the nearest teller. The brunette woman with blonde tips shook her head in small shakes when Shae pointed the silver pistol at her.
“Be a dear,” she said, holding out the shopping bag “and fill it up. None of those feckin’ dye packs, neither.”
She walked from teller station to station, making sure that the woman left the dye packs in the drawer, didn’t hit an alarm button, or pull out the special bill that was tucked in an alarmed slot.
I forced myself to keep an eye on the customers and checked my watch every few seconds.
“Let’s go,” I urged her. I was pretty certain no one had punched the alarm, but I couldn’t be sure. Plus the gunshots might have been heard outside the bank and someone could have called the cops. We needed to get out of the bank with the money inside of the police response time.
When the brunette had pushed the last bundle of bills from the last drawer into the bag, Shae flashed her a smile. “Thanks. Now, down on floor with ye.”
The teller sank to the floor with a whimper.
Shae vaulted over the counter and strode toward me. The bag swayed heavily in her grasp. We hadn’t even considered hitting the vault. There was enough in that bag for a clean start. We weren’t greedy.
She reached me and held out the bag. “Be a gentleman for once, why don’t ye?”
I reached for the bag.
More shots rang out.
Shae’s eyes widened in surprise. Her mouth fell open and a light gurgle escaped. Confusion, then sadness, came into her eyes. She collapsed to the floor. All of that happened in less than a second, but it was burned into my memory for a thousand years.
I wheeled around, firing in the direction of the shots. Customers screamed in panic. Some crawled toward a wall or a desk, while others scampered toward the back of the bank, hunched over and shuffling their feet as quickly as they could.
The shooter was a man in his forties. He was thin and resolute. I learned later that he was a cop and looking back, I should have made him right away. But he had blended right in with the other customers. Now he was crouched and duck-walking toward one of the desks.
“You motherfucker!” I screamed and fired directly at him. The bullet struck low in front of him, ripping out a chunk of tile and whizzing off. Before I could fire again, he reached the desk and took cover.
I looked down at Shae. She was perfectly still, as if posed for a snapshot. Her hair was splayed out on the ground beneath her and a dark red pool was spreading outward from her body.
There was a short, guttural sound, full of despair. I realized a moment later it came from me.
I turned fired over the top of the desk just as the cop started to pop up and he hunkered down again immediately. My best guess said that I had one, maybe two rounds left in this magazine. The second mag was in my back pocket, but I’d have to put the bag of money down to reload.
More than anything, I wanted to stay and shoot it out. I wanted to kill the sonofabitch who fucked up my plan, who took away our future.
Go with the flow, baby, I heard her say.
I backpedaled toward the door. The cop stayed behind the desk and no civilians got suddenly brave. At the door, I emptied the rest of the clip into the desk the cop was hiding behind, turned and ran out of the bank.
The rest of the plan went off perfect.
“That one was for Micah,” the woman on the radio said, “sending her love from far away to Jordan, stationed in Germany.”
I sat at the desk, sipping the whiskey and listening to the saccharine dedication show that Shae loved. She called it her guilty pleasure. The .45 rested next to the bag full of money. I stared at the droplets of blood on the bag. I hadn’t noticed them at the bank, or as I ran to the car and drove back to our shithole motel. But under the weak yellow light at the desk, the dark red drops stood out.
It wouldn’t take the police long to put the pieces together. They’d probably have her identified in less than a day. Two at the most. Her prints weren’t on file locally or in the U.S., so that would buy me some time. Once the cops struck out, though, they’d think to check with Canada. They’d find out about the banks we did in Vancouver. Maybe we left some prints behind on one of those jobs. They’d figure it out.
I reached down to my abdomen. Through my shirt, I felt the rough edges of scar tissue. I knew that the coarse skin under my fingers was still a deep and angry red.
Tears stung my eyes.
I should be driving north instead of drinking and sitting. And I suppose I would, just as soon as I drained my glass. I’d tuck the money in my suitcase, already packed before we even left for the bank, dump the shopping bag and the gun into a sewer grate and drive north. It was an hour or so to Colville, where my cousin Murph lived. I could hole up there, check the news coverage and get some rest. Then we’d drive further north, hauling a snowmobile in the back of his truck. One snowmobile instead of two. I’d pay him off and then snowmobile across the border into British Columbia.
I hoped Shae’s Uncle Terry would still take me in after what happened. I suppose I had enough money to make it happen, but with blood, you never know. Especially Irish blood.
And maybe it wouldn’t be so bad if Terry showed up with his truck, right where we’d gone cutting wood last winter in B.C., and met me with a shotgun. If he chose to do that, he’d do it without a sneer or curse. He’d just level it at me and blast me in the heart, without a word. That was his way. And maybe that’s what I deserved.
I could lie on the cold ground and my blood would spill out onto the white snow, just like Shae’s did on the cold tile of that bank.
“I’m Charity,” the woman on the radio said, “and you can call me with your long-distance dedication.”
I imagined a bit of ligh
t brogue in her voice that wasn’t really there, smiled and downed the last of the whiskey.
Another saccharine song started playing.
“This one is for all of you long distance lovers out there,” Charity intoned.
I’d head north, and go with the flow.
Laddie
“Hold on, Laddie.” Shae reached back and grabbed hold of my arm. “Jes’ feckin’ hold on.”
I opened my mouth to reply but only a gurgle escaped. The fiery pain in my gut sent shock waves outward.
“Oh, Jaysus,” Shae moaned, glancing back and forth between me and the road in front of her. Stress always deepened her already thick Irish brogue. “Oh, sweet Jaysus, Laddie. Don’t feckin’ die on me!”
I shook my head at her the next time she looked back. “Just drive,” I managed to say.
She pulled her hand away and clamped both on the steering wheel and headed north.
Pain lanced through my belly, and I bit back a scream.
Her hair hung in my face. She brushed her lips with mine and then suddenly, she stopped. “We should get outta Vancouver,” she said, her voice firm with decision.
“What?”
“Ye heard me,” she said. “We should leave fer a while.”
I moved my face toward hers, but she pulled away.
“I’m serious,” she said.
“You’re coming up with travel plans while we’re making love?” I asked, a little hurt.
She lowered her face to mine and planted a kiss on me. “It’s not like that, baby. I was jes thinking about how much I love ye and never wanna lose ye. I’d do anything to keep that from happenin’.”
“You’re not going to lose me.”
“It’s gettin’ too dangerous. Three banks in two months. We’re too hot around here.”
I ran my hand through her long black hair, enjoying the cool, silky feel of it. “You’re too hot, that’s for sure.”
“We should go somewhere else.”
“Where?”
“What about your hometown?”