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“Wait out here?” he said, aghast. “Alone? With no weapon?”
What a wimp. “Then let’s go.”
A feral-looking man with black grease streaks covering every exposed part of his body came to the front of the store as soon as we entered.
“Hello, there,” he said. “What brings you folks in today?”
I really, really wasn’t in the mood for this transaction. “I’m looking for a windshield for a 1999 Mercury Cougar,” I said. “Do you happen to have one available?”
He placed his hands on his hips in awell, I’ll be darnedway. “You are not going to believe this,” he said. “But wouldn’t you know it, one got delivered here not more than fifteen minutes ago. This must be your lucky day.”
“Must be,” I said, already bored with the charade. “How much?”
“How much you got?”
No way was I playing this game. “How much?” I repeated.
“Two hundred.”
“Not a chance,” I said.
“One-fifty.”
“I’ll give you fifty,” I said.
He crossed his arms over his chest, ready to play hardball. “One hundred,” he said. “And I’ll throw in the inspection sticker for free.”
“That’s very generous of you,” I said. “Tell you what, throw in the inspection stickerandinstallation, and I’ll give you one-twenty. Final offer.”
He gave me a stare. But when he saw that I wasn’t backing down, he broke into a smile. “You drive a hard bargain,” he said. “Congratulations, you got a deal.”
We followed him to the register.
“Could I interest you folks in a stereo today?” he said as he rang me up. “Ten percent off for first-time customers.”
“No,” I said. “Thank you.”
“And will you be needing any license plates with your order?”
Son of a bitch. This guy had me exactly where he wanted me. I had two options: one, call the police and wait around three days for them to show up and do absolutely nothing, or two, play along. I decided to play along, if only to get Ian out of my life sooner. “I don’t know,” I said to the mechanic. “You tell me.”
“I always say, you can’t have enough license plates. If you like Georgia, I just got a shipment in yesterday. They got peaches on them.”
“I think I’ll stick to New York,” I said.
“Any special number you had in mind?”
“I’m partial to JMR-436,” I said. “You got anything in that model?”
He turned around and started thumbing through a crate behind the register.
“Well, would you look at that,” he said, pulling two plates from the box. “This really is your lucky day. I just happen to have two New York plates with that exact number. Thirty bucks and they’re all yours.”
“Ten.”
“Are you crazy?” he said. “This is a matching set in pristine condition. You know how hard it is to find—”
“Just give me my goddamned plates!” I said, slamming a hundred-dollar bill and thirty singles on the counter before grabbing the plates from his hand and storming back out to my car.
