Guns Will Keep Us Together (12 page)

Unfortunately, the dentist/assassin saw that I saw. I jumped for the door to block his escape. He charged, and I threw him to the floor, where we wrestled silently on the linoleum. The man grabbed my testicles and squeezed—an act of war as far as I was concerned. Pain flooded my line of vision, and I bit my tongue so I wouldn't scream. Of course, then my tongue hurt too. My hand reached the tray above us, and I found a long handled dental mirror.

My assailant flipped me into a submission hold. This guy was good. So good that my vision was starting to blur. I could feel myself losing consciousness. So I took the only chance I had and plunged the end of the mirror deep into his eye socket. His hold relaxed, and I scrambled to my feet as he flopped around on the floor.

"You killed my denthal thurgeon?" Gin asked woozily. Oops. I forgot about her.

I nodded. "He's one of the National Resources guys. I had to take him out." I lifted his twitching wrist to show her the tattoo. "They all have these. Besides, he recognized me."

"Well, thath jutht fantathtic." Gin rolled her eyes. "How the hell are we going to deal with thith? The nurth will be in any moment!"

I hadn't thought of that. Bombays never left behind a body if it could implicate them. And this sure seemed to be that situation. It would be tough to leave him in here when Gin was listed as the last patient he had before he died.

Think, Dak! Gin looked like a deranged chipmunk with her cheeks stuffed with gauze. She wouldn't be a lot of help. Great.

The building was designed like a bunker. Low-slung, one-story with high, thin windows. I squinted, wondering if I could pass the body through it. Of course, it was getting close to rush hour and we were facing a street with a lot of traffic. No, that wouldn't look suspicious at all.

We'd run out of time. If they didn't have Gin's name, address and insurance provider, I'd just stuff the doctor in the closet and run for it. But it wouldn't take long for them to notice he wasn't anywhere in the building. They'd find him, and Gin would be a suspect. I didn't feel like busting her out of the police department a la the Terminator, so I had to come up with something else…and quickly.

I started screaming like a little girl (mainly due to the fact that my testicles had just been crushed), "Oh my God! Doctor! Somebody call 911!"

Gin narrowed her eyes at me, then rolled them. Okay, so it wasn't much of a plan, but I needed her compliance.

"Thocther Munth? Thocther Munth?" She knelt down beside the body, which I turned facedown. After shooting me a pissed off look, she continued. "I think he'th dead!"

Two nurses and another surgeon ran into the room and stopped when they saw their colleague face down on the stick end of a dental mirror.

We had to stay there for three hours while the police (or "poleeth," as Gin called them) and coroner came to investigate. At one point I think the Novocain wore off and Gin was in desperate need for painkillers because she fainted. Somehow we managed to convince everyone that the doctor was walking with the implement in his hand, when he slipped on a little puddle of Gin's drool (I made that part up just for fun—Gin didn't like it much because when everyone's back was turned she had to spit on the floor.) and fell onto his mirror.

"Happens all the time," the bored coroner said to me, "You wouldn't believe how many people die in freak accidents."

Actually, he'd be surprised to know how many "freak accidents" were really Bombay family hits. But I wasn't about to tell him that.

"You bastard!" Gin lit into me once I got her back home. "What if I get dry socket? I can't ever go back there, you know!"

I ran my hands through my hair. "I said I was sorry! I didn't expect him to be who he was." We were talking in code because the kids were in the next room. Diego finished making an icepack for his wife and handed it to her in silence. I knew he was uncomfortable with our livelihood. But he didn't argue either.

I took out my cell phone and dialed Paris. "Got one. Four more to go."

I could feel him nodding—how weird is that? "I found number two. We're going to Indianapolis tomorrow." He clicked off.

 

 

 

 

"The first rule of Fight Club is—you do not talk about Fight Club. The second rule of Fight Club is—you DO NOT talk about Fight Club…and the final rule, if this is your first night at Fight Club, you have to fight."

~Tyler Durden, Fight Club

 

 

"Are you sure this is him?" I whispered. We had fifth-row seats to a motivational business seminar in Indy. Paris had bought our tickets online under assumed names, and we were wearing wigs, cheap suits, and large, plastic-framed glasses.

"Yup."

My cousin had hacked into the reservations and got us into the 10,000 strong business seminar as Mr. Tom Olds and Mr. James Smith. Apparently, we were salesmen for Massengill. Yeah, I was excited about that too.

Anthony Lowe had taken the stage, pacing back and forth as he shouted lame encouragements and vague success strategies.

"And with my one hundred percent foolproof plan, you can triple your sales in the next six months…guaranteed!" He went on to share several situations where this worked, but to me it sounded like he was telling the stories of Sam Walton and Bill Gates—just leaving out their names. Lowe went on to plug his ten-CD collection that usually sold for $500. We could get it for $399 today only. Cash and credit cards accepted.

I really hated this guy. But I was starting to hate the audience more for believing this shit. We'd been there for three hours already, and I've got to be honest with you: I still didn't have any idea how to sell douche bags more effectively. All he offered was a bunch of clichés, promising that if you bought his CDs could you achieve nirvana, win "Salesman of the Year," and find yourself wealthy with a knock-out trophy wife. What a rip-off artist.

Finally, a break in the seminar found us in the cement hallways around the auditorium, dining on greasy hot dogs and stale nachos.

"Isn't he brilliant?" A mousy woman in a flower-patterned dress sighed aloud to the tall, thin man next to her.

"Tomorrow," the man said while nodding, "he's going to zip line onto the stage. That'll be cool."

I raised my eyebrows at Paris, and he nodded, indicating he heard it too. We tuned out the stupid couple (Turns out they sold insurance.) and moved on. As the crowd started to re-enter the auditorium, Paris and I slipped around to the backstage area.

"James Smith," I shouted as I stuck out my right hand to the harried-looking teenager with a clipboard. "I was told that my colleague and I won a backstage tour." Paris nodded, pushing his glasses up on his nose.

"Oh! Um, really?" The girl looked like she was wound pretty tight. "I didn't, uh know. Okay." She flipped through the papers on the clipboard, but found nothing indicating that two
Summer's Eve
salesmen had won such a precious commodity.

Fortunately for us, an even more mentally challenged kid walked by.

"Ernie!" the girl shouted. "These guys get a backstage tour!" Then with a nod toward Ernie, she walked away, presumably proud of herself.

Ernie squinted at us. He was tall and skinny, with a pronounced slouch and blue hair. He wiped his nose on the sleeve of a shirt that was way too big for him. His tie had an eagle on it with the words "I'm a winner!" in gilt script.

"Okay," he sniffled. "Let's get this over with."

Apparently Ernie wasn't caught up in the excitement of the show. He looked like he'd hire us to hit himself if he had to do one more day here.

"This is the green room where the celebrities wait until they go onstage." Ernie pointed to a closed door. Celebrities? What, was he kidding? "And that's the staff lounge. We got Fruit Roll-ups and juice boxes in there." I closed my eyes in an attempt to avoid strangling Ernie with his tie.

He led us past vending machines, which he pointed out to us as if we had never seen one before, and light and sound techs who were drinking some mystery liquid from bottles wrapped in brown paper, to the exit doors, and finally to the backstage area.

We stood there, watching Anthony from the wings spin bullshit into gold. Gold that would, at the end of the day, only go into his pockets. My guess was that our tour guide barely made minimum wage. It didn't look like Ernie could afford clothes that fit.

"We heard Mr. Lowe is riding a zip line to the stage tomorrow." Paris pushed his glasses up again. "Is that true?"

I looked at Ernie, who sighed heavily. "Yeah. He's been wanting to do it for a long time. This is the only place the techies think it's possible." I followed the line of his arm as he pointed to a catwalk in the wings.

"He'll go from there, offstage—" he slowly led his index finger down toward the stage—"to center stage. I'm not really sure why he's doing it, but oh well."

A crash came from right behind us, and we watched as Ernie scrambled in its direction. He'd already forgotten our existence, which was good, since we'd have to kill him otherwise.

Back in our seats, Paris whispered, "We'll have to come in tonight and weaken it somehow. Maybe shred some of the cable."

I heard some laughter to my left. It distracted me only for a moment before I leaned in and answered, "Maybe we could take the steel out of the pulley, replace it with plastic or something else that would fall apart quickly." However we did it, I really wanted this idiot to die dramatically. A humiliating death is so much more fun when it happens to an asshole.

The laughter came again, and I turned toward it. Sitting to my left were two burly, good ole boys. You know the kind. The ones who are trapped in the 1950s and still pinch their secretary's ass for fun. The kind that think if a woman isn't interested in them, she's a lesbian. The kind who take their wedding rings off when they travel out of town for business.

"Is there a problem?" I asked. Paris punched me in the arm. I know, I know. Maintain a low profile at all times. But this bullshit seminar was killing me.

"Now that you mention it, son," the larger of the two answered. "I was just wondering what a couple of dandies like you sell?"

Dandies? Are you kidding me? I looked at my polyester suit. It was far more obvious that we resembled '70s porn actors! And who the hell says "dandies" anymore? Thanks, Paris. Next time, I'll pick the disguises.

"I b'lieve my colleague asked you a question," the lesser of two fat men said. "What do you sell?"

"Oh, I don't know if you two boys can handle it," I replied slowly, ignoring the repeated punches from Paris.

"That's funny, son." Son? Were we on the
Dukes of Hazzard
? "But what business are you in?" They looked pissed off.

Never one to shrink from a challenge, I leaned forward and looked carefully from side to side. Paris started kicking me, but I wasn't about to stop. "Lobster semen."

"What?" The one closest to me looked like his eyes were going to pop.

I brought my index finger to my lips. "Shhh! We aren't supposed to tell anyone."

"Boy, are you trying to tell me you sell lobster jizz?" the big one asked.

I nodded. "There's big money in that. Those of us in the business call it white gold." I added a wink for emphasis.

"I don't believe you," the smaller one said, folding his arms across his chest.

I leaned back in my seat. "I don't care if you believe me. But my wife does, every time we visit our ocean-front home in Jamaica, and every time she has the Bentley washed." I would've gone on and on, but what's the point? I still didn't know why I came up with lobster semen.

"You make good commissions on that?" Big One asked, his eyes the size of salad plates.

I nodded. "About thirty grand on the East Coast, twenty thousand in the panhandle, forty-K in California. Breeders are begging for this stuff."

Paris coughed, trying to get my attention, but I was too far gone.

"Our client supplies the seed of giant blue lobsters. We can't keep up with the orders."

"How do we know you're not havin' fun with us?" Little Fat Man broke in, a bit disgruntled about the whole thing.

"Well, let me put it to you this way. You go into any grocery store here in Indianapolis, and you'll see a tank of live lobsters, right?"

Both men nodded.

I continued, "Indiana is a land-locked state. You think about the hundreds of thousands of stores in this great country of ours, and you know in your heart there aren't that many lobsters in both oceans to keep up with supply. That's why there are breeders!" I sat back, looking smug. Paris, snickered in spite of himself.

"How can a couple of guys like us get in on this action?" One of them leaned toward me conspiratorially.

I acted like I was thinking about it. Then Paris whispered in my ear (He said, "You're an idiot," but that's beside the point.), and I nodded.

"I'll tell you what." I pointed at the stage. "Mr. Lowe got us into it about five years ago. Now you go up to him after the show tonight and ask him about it. He'll deny it, and he's supposed to. But if you're really persistent, he'll relent and give you the info." I leaned back in my chair. "Then when we see you boys here next year, we can compare the size of the diamonds we buy for our wives."

The fat men laughed knowingly. Paris and I slipped away at the next break. Sure, I was having a good time, but there was still work to do.

It didn't take us long to find a couple of backstage passes (You'd be surprised how many people just leave those things lying around.) and to question a completely stoned technician about who would be there that night, when do they lock up, etc.

I loved sneaking around backstage. The passes worked like a charm. The staff were few and far between, and it was dark enough we could hide if needed. After about half an hour of this, Paris and I swiped a detailed schedule (again, just lying around), then headed back to the hotel.

"We should head back at midnight," Paris said after a shower. I couldn't blame him. Those clothes were hot and scratchy.