Rough Men (13 page)

“Mom, when did Patty say she was coming back?”

“Will,” his mother said slowly, “Patty isn’t coming back. This boy is only going to have a decent life if we can give him one. You might not feel like his father yet, but you will. Give it time. Give him time. He’s your son, my grandson. He’s a Daniels.”

Isaac was still standing in the doorway when Jason tapped Will on the shoulder. “You can stop shooting now.” Will took his finger off the controller’s trigger, then set down the controller. Jason
gave him a look, so he stuck the thing in his jacket pocket before reholstering the Sig.

The three walked to the car in a group, and when Isaac began to choke on a mouthful of vomit, Jason took the keys from his hand and threw him headfirst behind the wheel.

“W
hy in the fuck did you make me puke in my car?”

Isaac screamed at Jason, vomit dripping from his mouth and covering his lap and the steering wheel.

Jason looked at Isaac from the passenger seat, smiled, and then slapped him, hard enough to spray the puke from his lips across the windshield. Will, sitting in the backseat now, thought for sure it was all going to unravel now. He had just watched a man be tortured and then strangled to death, and not only had he stood by and watched, but some small and very cruel part of him had enjoyed it. Hadn’t Mumbo been there with Alex? He had, and if they were really friends, he would have killed Chris for shooting Alex, and none of this would have had to happen.

“You feel better now?” Jason asked Isaac, and Will was shocked to see his older brother nodding.

“You slapped me because we just killed a guy, and the cops would have probably tested my puke for DNA.”

“Exactly. Now, roll down the windows, and drive to a gas station. I’ll tell you when to turn.”

“It’s freezing back here with the windows down!” Will yelled, and Jason called back, “Can you still smell the puke?”

Realizing that he couldn’t, or at least not as much, Will kept his mouth shut for the rest of the ride. Two minutes later, and one flashing red light, they pulled into a Marathon station.

“You guys stay put. I’m going to get some towels so we can get most of the sick off of you, and then you can go in the bathroom
and wash up.” Jason left the car, and the two brothers watched him walk inside to talk to the cashier.

“Are you OK, dude?” Will said it in a way that he thought might not be too offensive, but he could tell by Isaac’s tone that he had failed.

“No. No, I’m not OK. I’m covered in puke, I feel like I’ve got a loose tooth from where he slapped me, and we could be charged with torturing and murdering that man. Not to mention we’re about to go do the same thing again.”

“I think we have to. If you ask Jason, he’ll say the same thing. Right now, we’ve got the element of surprise. The cops aren’t looking for us, and neither are the bad guys. I have a feeling that everything will stop after we find this Chris guy.”

Will shut his mouth. They could see Jason returning to the car with a fistful of paper towels, a bathroom key attached to a hubcap by a chain, and a lit cigarette hanging from his lip. Isaac got out, and Jason handed him the towels, then went around to the passenger side and stood next to the car, smoking.

Most of the puke scraped off of Isaac and the dashboard, Jason handed him the key and pointed to the bathroom. “Over there.” Jason and Will watched Isaac leave, and Jason said, “Will, get out.”

Will did and stood beside him. Jason gave him a look, and Will said, “What?”

“Was it as bad as you thought?”

“No. Yes—I don’t know. It was terrible, but even though he was kind of a funny guy, Mumbo shot up a bank for no reason other than that he was asked to do so. That’s some seriously sociopathic shit.”

“Yeah, it takes a certain type of individual to do something like that. Most of the guys I’ve known, even the really bad ones, wouldn’t have done that unless they absolutely had to, and it never would have been part of the rules going in. To be frank,
it’s a really stupid plan and doesn’t make any sense. Makes me excited to talk to Chris and Rob.”

“What if they’re not together? Mumbo said that no one knows where Chris lives.”

“No matter what you’re doing, there is always a solution to a problem, even if that solution turns out to be folding instead of going all-in. I have a feeling that Chris will be there. The question, and one I was worried about when we went to Mumbo’s, is what your brother is going to do if we actually need his help. We got the drop on Mumbo pretty easily, but if we don’t get the drop on these next two idiots, he could be a serious liability. I thought one of you might freeze, but Isaac was worse than frozen. He was trying to wish his way out of that room, and that’s a dangerous thing to be doing. I don’t need to remind you that this is all very serious, do I?”

“No, of course not.”

Jason dropped the cigarette to the ground and crushed it with a boot. “Your brother will be back soon, and when he is, I want to go to Rob’s place. We’re right in the neighborhood, and if he hasn’t already called Mumbo, he will soon, guaranteed. And he’ll wonder when he doesn’t get an answer. Is Isaac going to be able to do this or not?”

“Yes. I think so.”

“You better hope so. We don’t need him, but if he comes in, he needs to know that he needs to be there one hundred percent, no questions about it. Getting the drop on Mumbo means nothing now; we’ve got to do it all over again.”

They saw Isaac returning from the bathroom, holding the hubcap and key in his hands like some bizarre trophy. Will could see in the lights from the gas station that his brother’s shirt was stained, but otherwise, what remained of the puke had been washed away. Jason and Will piled in the car, Will back in the front seat. Isaac got behind the wheel, stuck his key in the ignition, and Jason said, “Forgetting something?”

“Oh shit, the key.” The hupcap and key were sitting right there in his lap. Isaac began opening his door, and Jason said, “No, give it to me. Better they only see one of us.” He took it from Isaac, left the car, and sauntered back to the gas station.

“Are we going to the next house?” Isaac asked, and Will said, “Yes. Can you handle that?”

“Yeah. I can. The first time was just bad. This will be easier, right?”

“I wouldn’t count on it.”

It took them a while to get to Rob’s house, but when they did, it looked like they’d just circled the block. This street and Mumbo’s were clones of one another, and Will wondered how big these eerily similar suburbs were. The address they’d had for Rob matched the one on a gray house that needed paint, and Isaac parked a few houses away. There were two cars in the driveway, and the street was littered with vehicles, many more than what they’d seen at Mumbo’s.

“No freezing up this time,” said Jason. “None of that shit. You busted your cherry, and this time needs to go better. There are either a lot of people sharing houses here, or someone is having a party. Now, I’m assuming it’s not Rob, because Mumbo would have been here instead of playing video games, but it is a possibility. Are you guys ready?”

Will let the air collapse from his lungs and said, “Yes.”

Isaac just nodded. It must have looked more impressive in the front than it did to Will, because Jason returned the nod with one of his own.

“Just like last time,” said Jason. “I’ll go first. You guys come in right after me. Remember, just like you saw me do to Mumbo, it’s all about the first fifteen seconds. If you shatter their confidence, they’ll let you do just about anything.” With that, they left the car.

Just as he had the last time, though without even bothering to look at what Jason was doing, Will had his pistol out and pressed to his side.

There were fewer house lights on than when they’d gone into Mumbo’s, but the street felt more alive. Will followed Jason onto the porch. It had a waist-high wall and was covered in cigarette butts and empty beer bottles and cans. Will could feel Isaac behind him, and the sound of loud rap music was coming from the house. As Jason kicked the door in, Will could hear a girl laughing.

W
alking in behind Jason, Will saw a white man, naked from the waist down, sitting on a filthy sofa.
In his lap was the head of a girl in her late teens or early twenties giving him a blow job. Jason walked quickly across the room toward them with his pistol up, Will doing the same thing, and neither of them had been noticed yet. The rap was much louder than it had been outside, booming, and there was a loud thumping noise coming from upstairs. More music. Finally, when they were but a few yards from him, the man opened his eyes and jumped slightly.

The girl working in his lap gagged, lifted her head up, and said to him, “What the fuck?” She turned to look at them, eyes widening, and as Jason raised his finger to his mouth to say,
Shhh
, the girl began to scream.

The man jumped off the couch, throwing the girl away from him like a doll as he dove to the floor toward a pair of jeans lying next to the couch. Jason and Will fired at the same time, one of their bullets hitting him in the back, the other removing a piece of thigh. The girl was still screaming, and Jason walked to her and hit her on the top of the head with his pistol, collapsing her to the floor instantly. Another gun went off, and both Will and Jason jumped, Will’s eyes darting around the room, finally noticing the hole in the side of the man on the floor’s head.

“He was still going for his gun,” explained Isaac. “I had to.”

“You did good,” Jason said, then grabbed the dead man by the hair and began rifling through his jeans, taking a cell phone
from one of the pockets and stuffing it into his own pocket. “Find something and tie her up—gag her too. Do a good job, but do it fast. If you get the chance, try and find the shell casings. Will, come with me.” Walking quickly, pistol held aloft, Jason left the room. Sparing his brother a look, Will turned, his Sig at the ready, and followed Jason into a black hallway.

The thumping noise from upstairs, audible before, even with the music, had stopped.

They made their way swiftly from the quasi foyer/living room and walked into a kitchen, the only light source coming from a single bulb hanging from a string. There were three doors in the kitchen, one of them clearly leading to the backyard. Jason opened one of the others, stuck his gun into the blackness, and over his shoulder, Will could see descending stairs. Jason left the first door open and slowly began to open the second. The stairs in that one went up, and there was a single door at the top of the steps.