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“Who is Thuggie and why does he want you?”
“He started the Carnivores. LaTrell something. He says I strong-armed his auntie or his nana.”
“You robbed his grandmother?”
“Yeah. Bitch be cruisin’ through my hood, she pays the toll. Fuck that bitch. I ain’t in this business to help other peoples’ grannies. Shit is simple.”
“You robbed an old woman?”
“I said yes. Bitch ain’t walkin through my hood and not know who owns it.”
“What kind of guy robs an old woman?”
“I always let ’em know I mean business. That’s how I run my show.”
Let ’em know I mean business. Translation: I use a gun.
I look up, out into the street. Party is over.
“You know what Thuggie drives?”
“Eighty-one Buick Regal, up on hydraulics.”
“What about an old Pontiac Grand Am? Dark body with a red driver’s side door?”
“He got crew with that car, yeah.”
“Didn’t take them long to figure out they hit the wrong house,” I say to myself.
“What?”
The car douses the headlamps. Crawling by. Back window down.
“Andre, you said something about paying a toll, right?”
“Yeah! That bitch—”
I throw an elbow across his eye socket and shove him full-body into the air. Into view.
He tries to scream as the night erupts into a cacophony of shrill barks. Street sweeper. Andre gets perforated. I duck and roll before they get me.
Bullets spray the house. I get behind the three hundred pound guy. Shove him up, use him as a wall and feel one bullet punch into him. Glass shatters. Wood plinks and gives way to lead. Snaps come alive all around and I make myself as small as I can.
Andre collapses in a pile, blood everywhere. The bullets stop the same time the car peels out and I move. Grab my heater and I’ve got one more thing to accomplish.
Andre committed the original sin here. He lived in the mirror address of Clevenger’s grandparents. He committed the crime that put a bounty on his head. He got Eudora killed. He’s now done. Toll paid. That end is clean.
The guys in the car are no doubt the same ones who rolled up on Clevenger’s family.
Engine snarls. Tires squeal. I brace against the stair railing. Sights to my eye. One good shot. The shooter is in the backseat, driver’s side. A single .44 Magnum roars into the night. Back windshield shatters. The shooter’s head drops down. The driver freaks the fuck out and sideswipes a tree as he mashes the gas. Nearly loses control of the car. Swerves, over-corrects and swerves again. Takes the corner on two wheels.
Fatty took a round in his chest. His eyes are too glazed to be alive. Younger brother has at least one entry wound in his thigh. He hasn’t moved since I punched him. Hard.
No looking back. I bolt back down between houses. Lungs burn. I swear behind every shadow there is someone waiting to shoot me. Nerves. Gun in hand, keys in the other. Get to the car, unlocked in case I need to clear scene in a hurry. Gun on the seat, ram the keys home. No headlamps for a quarter mile. I get it three times the speed limit within ten seconds. Dart through neighborhoods, head north.
PD will flood the new shooting. Once Collins hears the address he’ll follow. I cross the Mannasmith Memorial Bridge back into the northland and start to think about Clarence Petticoat, his at-large rapist, Clevenger, calling Howard Michigan at five a.m.
The usual fare.
