Page 32 of Revenge At Raleigh High
“Next time, Stell. Gotta find the boss man,” I shout back at her. There won’t be a next time, of course. I’ve never fucked with the girls here. Why? First and foremost, I’m not fucking stupid. If I caused drama within the walls of the Rock, Monty would have my fucking hide. Secondly, fake tits gross me out. However, both of those points are academic now because I’m with Silver, and all other women are dead to me.
Stella’s really sweet. She’s one of the younger dancers, a freshman in college; my old friends at Bellingham would have gnawed off their own right arms for a chance at fucking her, but my skin feels like it’s crawling as I shove my way through the heaving press of bodies on the bar floor, heading for the door by the bathrooms that reads “Employees Only.’
Paulie, the bartender, is rushed off his feet, hands flying everywhere, pouring numerous drinks at once, knocking a flowing beer tap off with his elbow. He notices me and shouts a hello as I disappear through the door.
Takes a moment for my eyes to adjust to the darkness in the hallway. I step over stacks of empty boxes and narrowly miss kicking over a row of empty Jack Daniels bottles as I negotiate my way down the corridor toward Monty’s office. When I turn the corner, weirdly pumped, adrenalin surging through my veins, I catch the old man standing outside the doorway to his private sanctuary, pinning a guy up against the wall by his fucking throat. The guy—some piece of shit in a leather jacket with a buzzcut—pats down his pockets, searching for something. A gun? A knife?
Monty doesn’t seem perturbed by the potential that he might be about to get shot or shanked. He stabs a finger into the guy’s face, flecks of spittle flying as he snarls. “I didn’t ask you to tell me where heisn’t. I told you tobring him here.Instead, you’re sitting at the bar, drinking off my promo tab, trying to get your dick sucked? Did I not tell you this was urgent?”
The punk gurgles. I can’t tell if he’s trying to say something or simply trying to breathe. Finally managing to stick his hand into his pocket, he goes to pull something out and I decide I’ve seen enough.
I drop the duffel bag I’ve been carrying to the floor and charge down the hallway, a threatening growl on my lips. Monty never gets angry. For him to be this openly pissed off, this Neo-Nazi looking asshole must have really fucked up, and I’m not about to let my boss get stabbed by him.
My fist’s raised, body prepped for a fight, when two things happen: the punk pulls out a tattered, worn piece of paper from his pocket, and Monty sees my barreling approach. He holds up a hand, calling me off before I even reach them.
“Calm, Son. No need for any of that. Jonas was just explaining something to me, weren’t you, Jo? Go on in and make yourself comfortable, Alex. I’ll be with you in a second.”
I’d argue, offer to stay, but then I make eye contact with Jonas and see that the guy’s absolutely shitting himself. He might look like a hardened thug, but he won’t be causing any trouble for Monty, that’s for sure.
I go and grab the bag I just dropped, giving the old man a tight smile as I head into his office. Monty boots the door closed behind me, but I can still hear his furious words.
“Anaddress? What thefuckis wrong with you?”
“I thought you’d want to pay him a visit yourself, boss!”
“For fuck’s sake. There’s a reason why you’re not on Q’s payroll yet, Jonas. You can’t follow simple directions. I didn’t ask you tothink. I made it real fucking simple for you. ‘Bring him here’ means exactly that, motherfucker. Why the fuck would I want to drive all the way to Vancouver and drag the piece of shit across borderlines myself?”
“I’m—I’m sorry, man. I’ll go now. I—I I can be back here with him by morning.”
Monty curses colorfully. “You fuck this up and Q’s gonna relegate you to prospect quicker than you can say shit-kicker. Get the fuck out of my sight, boy, before I demote you myself.”
Ahh. Club business, then, not bar business. I forget Monty’s even affiliated with an M.C. most days. He’s diligent about keeping those two parts of his life separate. Church and State, he calls it, church being his club, state being the Rock. He’s always preferred the two organizations never cross over unless it’s for pleasure, but seems as though there was no helping it today.
When he barges into the office, slamming the door closed behind him, the old man’s so angry he looks like he’s going to burst a blood vessel. “Fucking moron. I swear that son of a bitch was dropped on his head repeatedly when he was a child.” He collapses into his chair with anumpfff, setting his hands down on the black bag that I’ve placed on his desk for him.
“I needed this three nights ago.Badly,” he tells me.
“Sorry, man. You asked me to keep hold of it. Then the snow—”
“I know, I know. You’re not to blame. I just…” He pinches at the bridge of his nose, sighing heavily. “Just been one of those weeks. Don’t suppose you took a peek inside?” His voice is weary, but he’s added a dash of playfulness to his tone.
Unlike Jonas,Iam not a dumb motherfucker. “Nope. The contents of that bag are none of my business.”
Monty nods, smiling from ear to ear. “Good. Glad to hear it.” And then he unzips the bag, opening it up right in front of me. My eyes hit the ceiling. My midnight runs for Monty have been a science experiment of sorts. Paradoxical. A demonstration of the legitimacy of the Copenhagen interpretation of quantum mechanics. Schrödinger explained the experiment best with his cat analogy, but in this circumstance, there is no box and there is no cat. There have been bags, and there have been theoretical drugs. Without looking inside any of the bags I’ve been running for Monty, the drugs have both existed and not existed at the same time.
Once I look inside, the contents of the bags will manifest themselves into being and there will be no denying their existence one way or another. What I’m trying to say, in a round-about way, is that ignorance is fucking bliss. If I see bricks of coke in that bag right now, I become complicit in something that, up until this very moment, I would be able to deny…
“Ahh, quit being such a little bitch,” Monty mutters under his breath. “Here. Hold this.” He offers something out to me. I look down…and it’s too late. I’ve just been handed a fucking gun. A mean-looking silver thing, big enough to blow someone’s fucking head off. I’ve never held a gun this big before.
“Desert Eagle,” Monty informs me, leaning forward across his desk, steepling his fingers. He’s frowning at the weapon like it’s a rearing cobra and it’s about to strike at him any second. “Heavy, huh? Hard to come by, Desert Eagles. Not really the kind of gun you wanna be carrying around stuffed in the back of your waistband. Too ostentatious. Conspicuous, you could say.”
I lay the gun down on his desk, muzzle pointing away, toward the door. “Guns aren’t really my thing.”
“Me either,” Monty agrees. “A necessary evil sometimes, though. You disposed of the one I gave you the other night like I asked? Wait, never mind. That doesn’t matter right now. This bag belongs to an enforcer in Seattle. Some hotshot who likes to carry the tools of his trade around with him wherever he goes. I hear he’s pretty good at torturing people. Jesus Christ, would you look at this?” Monty’s eyebrows nearly hit his hairline, which is impressive given the fact that he’s receding. In his hand: a weird metal contraption with handles that looks like a caliper or some sort of vice. The ends of it are sharp. Wickedly sharp. The kind of damage you could inflict upon a person with something like that…
At least it’s not fucking drugs. There are other items and implements visible through the opening of the bag. Handcuffs. Scalpels. Brass knuckles. Small boxes containing god knows what. A huge hunting knife in a sheath. Aside from the gun, none of it isillegalthough.
I can’t help myself. “And this shit’s so important to you because…?”
