Page 23 of Reaper
I shake his hand. “I’m Ricky. You can call me that or ‘shameful one.’ Either’s fine.”
“Adriana,” she says, holding out her hand. He takes it. “And don’t fucking dare call me ‘the woman.’”
“Adriana, Ricky, I am Danny Lin.” His eyes scan the two of us, then focus on my shoulder. “May I examine you?”
“Yes,” I answer.
It doesn’t take him long to diagnose my problem: a stab wound in the shoulder. It doesn’t take him long to stitch me up, either. Then, bandaged and not-bleeding, I’m able to put on the Disney shirt I’d found in the clothing bin, which makes Adriana smile. Maybe this isn’t so bad.
“You’ll be fine, except for some bruising and soreness,” Danny Lin says, finishing with Adriana. “Try to avoid fighting with armed criminals. It isn’t good for your health.”
“I’ll remember that,” she says with a glance at me.
“There is one other thing. My grandmother has requested that I take you elsewhere. Your needless drama is not wanted in her Mahjong club. My car is parked in back. I can take you anywhere you want to go.”
I trade another look with Adriana and nod. She nods, too. After a shower, a beating, and some free, under-sized clothing, there isn’t much more I could hope to take from these old ladies and their club dedicated to playing around with tiles, so we might as well get the hell out of here.
“Fine. Lead the way.”
Danny takes us out of the club through a back door, down the end of a hallway that passes by the club’s kitchen, and empties into an alley next to a dumpster. I grunt at the sight.It figures they’d send us out like they’re taking out the trash.
Danny’s car is a black, expensive-looking Audi sedan that shines as if it was just driven off the lot and given a masturbatory amount of polish. With the press of his key fob, he opens it for us.
“Shotgun,” I say as I slip into the front passenger seat. A leather heated seat holds my skinny jeans-wearing ass. “Nice ride.”
It isn’t, really. Overpriced, four wheels, too large, sitting in this coddling seat makes me wish I was on my bike.
“Thank you. Where am I taking you?” He says as he backs the car out of the alley and onto the road.
“Somewhere isolated. Far out of town,” I say.
Adriana nods. “Yes.”
“Why?” Danny says. “I’m not going to just take you somewhere where you can rob me or steal my car.”
“I don’t want your shiny car, and your grandmother is scary as hell. So no one’s going to rob you. No one’s going to touch you. ”
Danny smiles. “She is scary. Her face haunts my nightmares. I love my grandmother dearly. But I will not take you where you’re asking unless you tell me the truth about why you want to go there.”
“We need to get out of town so we can get far away from these assholes who are trying to hurt us, and then figure out what we need to do so they don’t bother us or anyone else — like your grandmother’s club — any more,” Adriana says.
“That’s a good goal. I will take you,” Danny says, stepping on the gas and taking us down the road. There’s a smug look on his face, like beneath the facade of being a dutiful grandson to a terrifying grandmother who Satan probably worried would be lurking under his bed when he was just a little fucking imp, he’s enjoying this bit of power he has over us.
Smug bastard probably gets a hard-on from all the lives he saves and jacks off while looking at patient files.
He just fucking loves we owe him.
“Why are you staring at me so much?” He says as we slow down and approach a turnoff for a truck stop about twenty miles outside of Sacramento.
“What? Something bothering you?” I say, not taking my eyes off him. I know every wrinkle and crease and fucking pore of his perverted, life-saving face.
“You just keep looking at me. Intensely. I don’t like it.”
“Stop fucking with him, Ricky,” Adriana chimes in.
“I’m not fucking with him. I’m debating.”
“Debating what?” He says, slowing the car. My gaze leaves his face for a moment and takes in the truck stop. A handful of semis sit parked in the lot. It’s a drab building, with lights illuminating a small cafe in a dreary, lifeless fluorescence.I’ll bet the only thing that cafe serves is lukewarm coffee, moldy pastries from a vending machine, and watery scrambled eggs that taste like salt, stale pepper, and emotional abuse.
