Max - Bey Deckard Page 0,45
he walked to the roof access. He wasn’t actually worried… But he needed to take a piss anyway, and he’d check on Max at the same time.
Crane jogged down the short flight of stairs to the hallway, and as he neared their condo, he felt a strange shiver of foreboding, as if he instinctively knew there was something wrong half a second before he heard the muffled yell from the other side of the front door. Heart racing, he pushed open the door and saw three men in his living room, one of which had Max in a headlock.
“What the fuck is going on?” Startled, the men turned to him, and Max gasped and struggled to get loose.
The stranger closest to Crane took a step towards him. He was a huge man with a bulldog face, brandishing a revolver in one meaty red hand.
“Hey, hey… The boyfriend is home!” said Bulldog with an ugly sneer.
“What… What’s going on? Max?”
“Huhhh… just do what they, huhh, say, Doc,” Max replied, his voice garbled from the pressure on his throat. The man holding him looked like an extra out of a bad ’90s action movie, with his too-small beige suit jacket and his blond ponytail.
The third man was half a head shorter than the other two, but just as wide, and he stared up at Crane with piercing black eyes. His nose was squashed flat, like he’d been hit in the face too many times with a baseball bat. He pointed at Crane, and Crane noticed a gold signet ring on his pinky to match the gold chains around his neck. The three of them were so ludicrous that Crane might have laughed if he wasn’t absolutely terrified.
“Sit.” The man said, identifying him as the ringleader with that single quiet syllable.
Crane opened his mouth to ask where he would like him to sit, but Bulldog clarified for him by grabbing him on the shoulder and shoving him down to the floor.
“Tie ’im up,” said the short man, and he turned back to Max. While Bulldog zip-tied Crane’s wrists behind his back, Ponytail adjusted his grip on Max, then smacked him hard on the side of the head when he tried to wiggle free. “You wanna know what’s goin’ on?” continued the man, his accent pegging him as Franco-Italian. “Diss little cocksucker here… He owes me ten grand. Ain’t dat right?”
Ponytail shook Max, and Max nodded quickly with a wincing smile. “I’m good for the money, I swear, Vinny. I’m just cash poor at the moment. What about bitcoins? No? Well… Can I write you a cheque? As long as you don’t cash it until—oof.” Max crashed to the floor, doubled over from Vinny’s punch to the gut. Ponytail kicked Max in his side, and Max let out a yelp.
Crane rose up on his knees, his heart lodged in his throat, watching helplessly as Bulldog went over to deliver a few blows of his own.
“Oh God oh God… no… fuck…” Max covered his face with his hands, blood pouring from his nose.
“Please. Please, stop hurting him!” Crane shouted. “Please… There’s got to be a solution. Please don’t…”
“You wanna few lumps of yer own, eh?” growled Vinny. “Go tape de faggot’s mout’ shut.”
Crane tried to evade Bulldog but ended up getting a smack that made his ear ring, so he held still while the man put a piece of duct tape over his mouth.
“Me, I’m a reasonable man. But when I say t’ree weeks, I fuckin’ mean t’ree weeks, capice?”
“Just gimme a couple of days, Vinny. A couple of days? Please?” Max begged him, kneeling at his feet. One of his eyes was purpling, and blood dripped from his chin onto the carpet. He looked absolutely terrified and that made it so much worse… Max wasn’t afraid of anyone or anything.
Crane groaned, working the zip up and down against the back of his belt, hoping it would somehow wear down the plastic. Then he’d find a weapon of some sort.
Vinny glanced over his shoulder at Crane. “Diss guy! Diss fuckin’ guy,” he said, pointing to Max. Then he slapped Max hard across the face, and Max grunted from the force of the blow. “You borrow money; you pay it back. Dat’s de deal. Why you gotta make me come to you? I’m a busy man. I ain’t got time for diss.” Sighing, Vinny reached out for Max and stroked his curls back gently.
“Please, Vinny. Please,” whispered Max.
“You, yer a smart kid.” He patted Max’s cheek.