Page 84 of Genesis

I hit a bump and I hear Mason jars rattle in the trunk. It’s well after lunch. Moretti got a new supply of heroin this morning, so we spent the better half bagging it. Now that Warren and his crew aren’t an issue anymore, business has picked back up and the overdoses have stopped. We’re headed back to the clubhouse with a fresh stock of moonshine and less heroin than we rode up here with because our guy asked for a little to try to sell. Meth is big around there, but he might be able to move some smack.

“Anyway,” Mickey says to me, “Moretti has been in touch with a cocaine smuggler that lives in Atlanta who has a connection in Miami. I’ve already been down a few times to establish a relationship.”

“What’s his name?” I ask.

He looks over at me. “Simon. Motherfucker is crazy, Danny. This shit is going to take time, but there’s money to be made, and you know Moretti’s all about that shit.”

I nod, looking back at the road. Moretti has these ideas all the time. He’s always looking for more ways to make money.

Atlanta, though? That’s far and a lot of traveling.

I decide not to worry about it right now. It’s only in the beginning phase, and like Mickey just said, it’s going to take time, probably even years before Moretti trusts the man enough to go all the way with this.

I squint from the sun and look in my rearview mirror. Traffic is busy per usual. I get over, grabbing my shades from the middle console, sliding them on, and noticing another car get over behind me when I dart my eyes back to the rearview.

I tilt my head, rotating my hand around the wheel as we head down the highway. Every so often, I glance up and notice the gray car still behind us. I turn my blinker on, slowing the car.

“What are you doing?” Mickey asks me.

“We’ve got a tail,” I say. “This car has been following us since we parted ways with Rummy.”

I turn down a two-lane road with the car still behind us.

“Pull down there,” Mickey says. “Let’s see why.”

I turn off the paved road and stop the car. We four get out just as the guys in the other car stop.

“Are you following us for a reason?” Mickey calls out to them. I narrow my eyes, seeing Johnny holding his gun.

The driver gets out and the rest follow, walking toward us. Jesus Christ. They’re fucked off meth.

“We want what you got in your trunk,” the driver says, his jaw working.

“And what’s that?” I ask.

“The moonshine and the drugs.”

“Not sure what you’re talking about,” Mickey says. My eyes dart over to Carson who’s got his hands behind his back, flicking the rubber band on his wrist right over the gun tucked in his jeans. Carson started going to therapy last year after he beat a guy in the clubhouse for taking his chair. He’s got this thing now where he wears a rubber band when he feels slightly angered. It helps ground him…sometimes.

“Shit,” I say under my breath.

“I think you do,” the passenger says.

“You need to go on back where you came from,” I say. “There’s nothing for you here but trouble.”

The driver laughs, giving us a shit-eating grin. “We like trouble.”

I sigh, and without a chance for any of us to react, Carson grabs his gun and shoots the driver. The man goes down, holding his throat as blood rushes out.

I swing and punch the passenger in the face, as Johnny takes on one of the boys in the back. The guy hits me in the jaw, clipping my lip, and I feel it when the skin breaks. Quickly, I grab my gun and knock him on the side of the head. He slumps down and a gunshot goes off.

“Oh fuck,” Johnny says.

“Let’s get out of here,” one of the back seat guys shouts. “I didn’t sign up for this shit.” The two pussies run to the car, leaving the shot guy and the one I knocked out behind. I look over as they reverse out of here, dirt and gravel flying up, mixing with the severity of all this.

Mickey lies on the ground, holding his inner thigh.

I run over to him, dropping on my knees. “Fuck, man.” My hands shake over his wound. I look back. “Get something from the car to wrap this up.”

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