Chapter Ten
~Jessie~
Jessie perched a hoof up on the hood of Big Bobby’s sports car and kept it from moving forward.
Tire iron over his shoulder, he pointed his hoof down and crunched the metal.
Jessie looked at Bobby in his big, green eyes and arched a brow.
Bobby shrieked, changing gears, and trying to peel out. Jessie sighed, “Nik?”
“Got ‘em boss!” Nik called out, swinging a hatchet at the back tires. The pop of the rubber was only second to the sound of the car dropping to the concrete. Dust kicked up from the old, cracked driveway.
Bobby, a barrel-chested gnome, threw himself out of the car. Red in face, little button nose dripping with blood from where Jessie popped him with the door, and busted lip, Bobby cried out. “Not the car! Anything but the car.”
Jessie pushed down onto the hood, crunching it further before sauntering toward the distressed man dressed in nothing but his boxers and slippers.
“Oops.” Nik smirked as he dropped the hatchet on the other tire. Big Bobby squealed like a rabbit being murdered as he lunged toward the back of his car. Jessie caught his ankle with the tire iron. Bobby slid across the concrete, belly first.
“Look, Bobby, we tried to be civil about this, but you weren’t listening. So now I gotta make you listen,” Jessie sighed, scratching his head around his horns. He planted a hoof to Bobby’s back. I really did try to be nice about this.
“I’ll get you the money!” Bobby cried, arms and feet flailing.
“See, that’s what you said last time.” Jessie pointed a finger at Nik then at the front door that Bobby fled out of just moments ago. “Nik, would you help Bobby find his wallet?”
“Yeah, Boss.” Nik dragged the hatchet across the back of the car before letting the weapon clatter to the ground behind the sunken car. Bobby was trembling by the time Nik lumbered inside his house.
“You’re a rotten bastard, you know that!” Bobby sniffled.
“And you have a deal that says to use my services, you pay me a cleaning fee. Now, I tried to have my nice guy come collect for you, and you turned him away. I even paid a visit to your office myself, all cordial like. And I know you pay the Devil in the woods upfront. It’s about time you start respecting me like you respect him.
” Jessie lifted his hoof off Bobby’s back and nudged him to get up.
As the shivering, nearly naked entrepreneur climbed to his wobbly legs, Jessie watched for Nik’s return.
While Jessie didn’t consider himself a genius, he considered himself wise.
Wise enough to know when another bozo is about to try something.
Jessie clocked Bobby going for the hatchet before the business owner even knew he was about to do it.
He simply waited for him to act on it. When he did, Jessie swung with a fraction of his strength, knocking Bobby’s head into the side of his vehicle.
At first Jessie worried he’d killed the man, but then Bobby groaned as he slid down the side of the vehicle.
Nik returned to the front lawn with a sack of gold and a wallet. Jessie’s enforcer snatched up his hatchet and returned it to his belt loop. He steadied his gaze on the minotaur in charge. “House is empty now.”
“Leave him five for new boxers. He’s gonna need ‘em,” Jessie sneered as he took the sack of coin out of Nik’s hands.
While he was sure that Bobby wouldn’t use their services anymore, it wasn’t about losing a client.
The Bonesaws graveyard was accessible to any who wanted to pay a cleaning fee.
Many people needed clean tags or plates or numbers for vehicles they acquired through less than proper means.
This was about sending a message. Jessie Bonesaw wasn’t suffering any more insults to his reputation.
If people wanted the Bonesaw service? They paid the Bonesaw price.
Jessie slid into the front of his truck, throwing the tire iron into the back seat for cleaning.
Nik hopped up into his side, stashing the credit cards into the glove compartment for shredding.
Only a fool left a digital footprint of their crimes.
It was more about leaving Bobby with work to get his shit back.
Jessie was nothing if not efficient. If Big Bobby wanted to make his business hard, Jessie was going to make Bobby’s life harder.
Nik giggled evilly as Jessie pulled away from the dead-end road on the western edge of the city.
“What?” Jessie peeked at his evil smirking enforcer.
“I stole his library card and his parking pass for that garage uptown.” Nik held up his hand, showing off the only two cards he hadn’t tossed aside.
“And what are you planning to do with those?” Jessie scoffed, furrowing his brows. You can’t even use those for money!
“You know how hard it is to get a new parking pass for that garage? Plus, he’ll forget about the library card, and those books I accidentally hid in his vents are going to go late. He won’t be able to renew it until he pays.” Nik eyed him like it were completely obvious what his evil plans were.
“Calm down, killer,” Jessie laughed. “Remind me to never piss you off.”
“I’d just replace your lube with icy hot cream,” Nik snickered darkly.
“You’re a monster,” Jessie huffed.
“Maybe if someone’s cock wasn't so sensitive,” Nik smirked, dropping the spoils of their afternoon into the cup holders. “How is it?”
“My cock?” Jessie teased, flashing his shit-eating grin in the other man’s direction.
“Never mind,” Nik grumbled. Jessie tossed his head back, cackling.
“Heat’s okay. Didn’t have a raging boner while we were beating Big Bobby so, that’s a plus.
I should be good till later tonight.” Jessie turned off a street, heading to the shop once more.
While grabbing their money and sending a message was important, he had a shop to run for the rest of the evening.
There was paperwork to do plus he’d gotten a text that a ‘shipment’ arrived early.
He wanted to oversee that personally. He’d just head out early some other day while he was really hurting.
Keeping focused always helped in the past.
“I’m gonna go work on Bubbles then.”
Jessie shook his head. Still can’t believe that motherfucker named his pet car Bubbles!
Nik said nothing, already lost to Jessie in his own world.
While Jessie liked cars, worked on cars all the time.
He preferred his car to run. Nik? Nik liked to play with parts.
He was currently in the middle of restoring a Piston Armarillo, an old muscle car that he kept tucked away behind the townhouse they lived in.
While they had two inches of yard in the back and front, they had a massive concrete block that Jessie built a wooden cover for Nik to park and play.
When it came to that car, Jessie wasn’t sure Nik loved anyone more than he loved that hunk of metal.
That was, until he finally finished this one and inevitably found a new empty shell needing remaking. Nik loved cars.
When he finally got to the shop, he parked on the far end that was blocked off by a rope.
It mostly dissuaded customers from parking in the employee lot.
Nik got out to let him in, then left without so much as another word.
Jessie was so used to it, he was shocked to find as he got to the bays that Nik did, in fact, whip around and yell his name.
He glanced up in surprise to find Nik passing Katarina on the sidewalk.
The succubus nudged the bugbear with an elbow, but he brushed past her just as wordlessly.
Jessie jogged across the lot to meet her as she stepped onto the asphalt. “Was it me?” She laughed.
“Nah, he’s got Bubbles on the brain,” Jessie shrugged, pocking the sack of coin in his pockets to keep it hidden.
“Please tell me that’s his car name,” Katarina closed her eyes, pressing her palms together in a false prayer.
“That’s his current baby car.” Jessie watched with his eyebrows up to his horns as the succubus cheered. Katarina pumped her arms and did a twirl like an excited toddler.
“Oh, I’m going to give him so much shit for that,” she snickered wickedly. Considering how rude Nik threatened to be to me earlier?
Jessie beamed. “He likes to stroke her sides and call her a good girl when no one is watching.”
“Beautiful!” Katarina rubbed her hands together like an evil little fly.
Jessie shook his head. What I wouldn’t give to see those two going at it.
Images of Katarina and Nik filled his head.
..innocent at first. Laughing over the dining room table, throwing things at each other in the car.
Then he saw her blush, her little fangs nipping at her lower lip as she peeked up at him through her lashes.
The imagination strayed to not so innocent as she gave him a cheeky wink.
“I’ve got some inventory to check in,” he chuckled, tucking his hands in his pockets to keep from letting them find her. His cock was threatening to make an entrance and her pretty rubies for eyes roaming him was going right to it. “You need something?”
“Uh, yeah, so...I was wondering if I could borrow your car tomorrow? I need to get into the bank and get some other stuff done, and as I don’t have a vehicle of my own.
..and unfortunately my best friend does have work tomorrow, I am sans transportation?
” She grimaced, putting her palms before her in a sweet prayer.
“Of course.” He nodded for her to walk with him. “I’ve gotta do something in the shop but meet me in the backyard? You can take my truck, or we’ve got some loaners floating around you can borrow if you’re gonna need it all day.”