The Jealous Kind (Holland Family Saga #2) - James Lee Burke Page 0,109
your sister. Give her a call,” I said.
“That’ll get you in trouble, man,” the biker said. I had taken my eyes off him. He was closer now, the knife in his palm, sharp edge up. “I got an extra shank, man. Want to go one-on-one?” He was grinning.
“No.”
“I didn’t think so,” he said. “Starting to wet your pants?”
In for a penny, in for a pound, I told myself. I stepped farther into the alley. “Put the frog-sticker away and let’s see what happens.”
The guy in drapes flicked his cigarette into a wall. “Cut this crap out. Where’d they put the convertible, buddy? Wise off one more time, we’re going to break your sticks.”
“I don’t know where it is.”
The guy in drapes and the biker looked at each other. There wasn’t a sound in the alley.
“Cut him,” the guy in drapes said.
That casual and indifferent. An arbitrary command to mutilate someone unarmed and outnumbered. I looked at him as I had never looked at anyone before. I wondered if it would be held against me should I kill someone under these circumstances.
I turned around to go back into the drugstore. Grady’s crew-cut friend was standing as big as a house in the doorway.
“Where’s Valerie?” I said.
“Ladies’ room, I think,” he said. He smiled as though full of goodwill.
“Get out of my way, please.”
“Sorry,” he replied.
“You were a linebacker. You were all-state runner-up.”
His eyes dulled over as though he were trying to remember somebody he used to know. Then he came out of it. “Cain’t let you by. Sorry.”
My options were gone. “Valerie Epstein isn’t part of this. If you hurt her, her father will kill you. That’s not a line.”
“Nobody is going to hurt a girl,” he said. Then he whispered, “Hey, man, give them what they want.”
I turned back to the alley. The guy in drapes was five feet from me. He was scratching the back of his neck with one finger. His other hand was behind him. “Open your palm,” he said.
“What for?”
“You dealt it, boy. You know what for. Nothing’s free.”
“My father will catch up with you.”
“I’m shaking.” He waited. “Come on, Broussard. Get with it.”
“Get with what?”
“Give me your hand. It’ll be over.”
“What will?”
“It’s going to end in only one way. You know that. Why put it off? Take your medicine.”
“Fuck you,” I said. I shoved him and said it again: “Fuck you.”
Then I saw the barber’s razor in his left hand. He reached for my wrist. I heard the pickup truck stop at the end of the alley and the passenger door open, squeaking like a tin roof being wedged up. It was Loren Nichols, an oiled chain as supple as a snake swinging from one hand.
“What’s happenin’, Loren?” said the guy in drapes, his eyes askance.
“You sprouts beat feet. You ever try to touch my buddy Aaron, I’ll be looking you up,” Loren said. He looked at the crew-cut guy in the doorway. “That includes you, fat boy.”
“We got no grief with you, Loren,” the guy in drapes said.
“You can say that again,” Loren replied.
They had no place to hide their shame except in their silence.
Then they were gone. That fast. Loren draped his chain over my shoulder. He cupped his hand on my neck and bent his forehead into mine. “Get out of town.”
“I won’t run.”
“I knew you’d say that,” he replied, tapping his head into mine. “Some guys just got to be a hero.”
Chapter
27
I DROVE VALERIE HOME, and later, when my parents were gone, I put the .32 Loren had given me under my car seat, and put the stiletto I had bought from the pawnshop in my jeans. I had no idea what I would do with either of them. I sat in the backyard in the gloaming of the day, with Major at my feet and the cats on top of the redwood table, and tried to play my Gibson and forget about what happened at the drugstore.
I couldn’t concentrate. I saw images of a human face dissolving into porridge, of blood slung across a garbage can, of a guy in drapes begging for his life. I put my Gibson into its case and threw Major’s rubber ball across the yard. When he returned, waiting for me to pull it from his mouth and throw it again, I was lost in my thoughts. The phone rang inside the house.
At first I didn’t want to pick it up. I was sure the person on the other end was an enemy. “Hello?”