Chapter 13 #2
A growl rumbled up my chest from the pit of my gut, scratching my throat. Smashing the cigarette in the ashtray, I stormed to the door and shouted, “Bitch!”
A very irritated Tyler shouted back, “What?”
“Come here.” Going back to the desk, I sat down, tapping on the keyboard to start recording the feed. The floor creaked outside, so I called him again.
“What the…”
Ignoring him, I concentrated on the screen with Vincent. He was chasing the kids around the trees, acting like nothing was wrong.
“Dash?” Tyler asked, standing beside me. “What exactly do your parents do for a living?”
So discombobulated with everything going on in my scattered brain, I didn’t even think before honestly answering with, “Mafia.”
He threw his head back and rumbled with laughter, pressing the heel of a palm in an eye. “No, seriously.”
Bit by bit, I twisted my waist and tipped my head back to glare up at him.
Flushing, he stared, his jaw falling. Whispering, as if someone could actually hear, he asked, “There’s mafia in Georgia?”
Snorting and rolling my eyes, I gazed at Vincent once again. I just confessed a secret to Tyler I’d never divulged to even him. How could I be pissed at him concealing his sexuality when I’ve hidden something just as significant?
Frustrated, I snapped, “Oh, yeah. Lots of mobsters running the streets down here. Get the fuck outta here. We’re from Florida. This is just their vacation house. That’s why they ain’t here.”
He strolled to the other side, his hands on his sides. Not even questioning or even acting weird about it, he simply asked, “What’s up?”
“I need to head to town and do some shopping. This fucking beard is driving me up the goddamn wall. Man, I don’t know how you deal with it.” I grunted and scratched at my jaw, my upper lip curled. “Gotta get some food, too.”
“Okay.”
“Okay, so.” I pushed the chair back and stood. “You’re on duty.” I smacked the back of his shoulder and shoved him down.
He plopped to the leather, dumbfounded. “What? What am I looking for?”
“Anything that moves that ain’t family.”
“And if I see something?”
I froze, having not thought of that. “Oh, yeah. Uh. Huh.” Strutting across the room, I opened the closet that hid the gun safe. “You know how to shoot?”
“No!” he snorted, shrugging his hands out. “Are you kidding? I’m a fucking singer, not a banger.”
Now that was humorous. Chuckling through my nose, I opted for the Governor, quickly going through the motions of loading it. “That’s actually kinda funny, bitch.” Spinning around, I strode back to him, offering the gun.
For a moment, he just stared in horror.
“Man, take it. Here.” I held my hand out to the side to show him where my fingers were. “Hold it like this.”
Though he tried to hide it, his hand shook when he took the weapon, copying my movements to hold it properly. “And if I need to use it?”
“Use your thumb to pull that back.” I bent over to point. “Then pull the trigger. My only advice is aim low.”
“Low?”
“Yeah. See, this is a Smith & Wesson Governor, it takes several different kinds of ammo. Right now, it’s loaded with .410s.”
He squinted, having no idea what I was talking about.
“Shotgun shells, bitch. Shotgun shells,” I snickered, patting his shoulder again.
“You know how those work, right?” I leaned away a bit, held my hands in front, and then spread the fingers wide while making a booming sound.
“They spray out. If you aim too high, you could miss him, altogether. If you aim low, you’re bound to hit something.
Even if it’s a foot, you got the upper hand long enough to make another shot. ”
Stiffly nodding, he turned his hand one way then the other, his lips taut.
“When I get back, me and Vin will take you out back and teach you how to shoot for real.”
“Yeah, okay.”
“Great. You need anything? Has Tiny or the kids said something about needing anything?”
“No. I mean, popcorn. Eddie wants popcorn. Oh, and she’s due for her cycle soon, so she’s gonna need—”
“Whoa, whoa, fucking whoa!” I shouted, waving my palms. “Nope. Not happening.”
“You’d rather her bleed all over the house?”
I retched, my cheeks puffing out.
“Look, you’re married. What did your wife do when her Aunt Flo visited? Just get her the same shit.”
The mention of my wife had my insides turning to stone. So caught up with everything going on with Vincent, I’d not even had time to miss her lately. “Yeah, okay,” I grumbled. “Anything else?”
He was staring at the monitors. “Tonic water.”
“Huh?”
“Yeah, you can get them in six pack cans. I’ll need about two or three packs.”
“Ew. You drink that shit? Why?”
“Sometimes, the bad leg cramps up real bad and I can’t fucking move. Can’t even fucking breathe right. Tonic water helps stop the cramps.”
My stomach sank, a silence falling between us as the events of that night in Kentucky swam through my thoughts. I had taken so much pleasure when I swung that pipe as hard as I could, cracking his knee.
After a moment, he twisted his neck to sneer up at me.
Snorting, he slumped and refocused on the screens.
“You got no fucking clue how good you did your job that night, Dash. You not only stole my NBA career, you stole any chance of me ever going one entire day without pain for the rest of my fucking life.”
Cringing with shame, I coughed, shifting my weight from foot to foot. “Every day?”
“Yup. Every. Fucking. Day. Until the day I die.”
“Uh, ahem. No…N-No surgery can fix that?”
“They already did the surgery. This,” he hissed, finally casting a sinister sneer. “Is the improvement. Best it’s ever gonna get.”
I coughed again and looked away, tugging my nape.
For the first time since that night, I was regretting my actions.
Sure, since being here, there had been a time or two when I’d felt bad, but in this moment, if I could rewind time, I would let Jackyl beat my ass instead of going through with the job.
Clearing my throat, I bent over a second time and scribbled a number on a piece of paper. “That’s my phone.”
“You have a phone?”
“It’s one of those Walmart disposable things. I just got it when we first got here. Anything happens and you need me back asap, gimme a call. There’s a landline over there by the bed.”
He twisted to look that way.
My palm smacked the back of his shoulder again. “All right. I’m out. Keep your eyes on everything. It’s been almost two weeks. Jackyl’s gotta be losing his fucking mind right about now. It’s just a matter of time before he finds us.”
He scoffed and rolled his eyes while I went to the dresser on the other side of the room’s entrance to get my keys.
Without saying another word, I left, closing the door.
I needed to get the hell out of this house for a while.
Away from the bullshit with Jackyl, away from Vincent and everything he stirred up in my head, and away from the guilt that was gnawing at my insides for what I did to an innocent teenage boy in the prime of his life.
A couple hours to clear my head was exactly what I needed.