“You clearly labor under a misconception of what the term ‘betrayal’ really means,” I said, munching on his sammich. “You knew the price when you squealed, Diego. What, did you think you were gonna be the exception? The guy who gets to stick a knife in Don Maloik’s balls and get away with it? They popped his nephew, man. He’s looking at hard time.”
“I don’t know what I was thinking.” Diego covered his face with his hands. “All right? I got upside down on my car loan and was on the verge of getting kicked out of my girlfriend’s place, and I got desperate.”
“The whole world’s desperate, Diego,” I replied, not unkindly. “That’s why family is so important. Family looks out for each other, takes care of each other—”
“Nobody would even loan me a couple hundred bucks so I could keep my car,” Diego lamented.
“Diego, come on, you hit up everybody on the food chain for months before we cut you off. If you could stop laying down sucker’s bets on the ponies for five freaking minutes, maybe you wouldn’t be in such dire straits.”
Diego’s face tightened into a scowl. “So, that’s it then? You’re going to rub me out, after all we’ve been through together?”
“You’ve brought this on yourself, Diego,” I sighed. “Besides, I never liked you much anyway—”
That son of a bitch hurled his bowl of hot ass soup right in my face.
“Jesus Fucking Christ,” I said, grabbing my forehead while spots danced in front of my eyes. Soup dripped down my nose as Diego leaped out of that booth like a bat out of hell and tore off out the door.
“God damn it, Diego,” I sputtered, grabbing a handful of napkins to wipe my eyes so I could see. “You’re going to make me go out in the fucking cold again covered in fucking soup.”
I don’t always enjoy popping somebody in the dome, but when I do, it’s usually a dumb ass like Diego.
Chapter Two
Indro
I ran out into the cold, the sheen of soup on my mug changing from warm to icy in the blink of a friggin’ eye. Diego’s heavy footfalls echoed up through the concrete canyon and I homed in on the sound.
I caught him dashing through a strip club parking lot, weaving between the cars. He slowed for a moment, turning his gaze back my way to see if I was still coming. When he spotted me, Diego flipped the fuck out and fell flat on his face.
I hopped the curb and ran after him, careful to pace myself. When you’ve run down enough guys, you learn that it’s a marathon, not a sprint. I kept my breathing under control and didn’t wear out my legs. Meantime, my prey was going on pure adrenaline, gassing himself out before he even knew it was too late.
Diego hit the edge of the parking lot, his head turned around to watch me instead of where he was going. He ran smack dab into the chain link fence and bounced off.
Now, had Diego kept some semblance of composure, he’d have realized the fence didn’t encompass the entire property. All he’d have had to do was run about twenty feet to his left or right and he’d have been past it. Instead, his dumb ass tried to make like King Freaking Kong and climb the damn thing.
I ran up underneath him when he was about ten feet up, shaking my head in disgust.
“Look at you, Diego. You’re pathetic. This only ends one way, you know that. All you’re gonna do is die tired.”
“Screw you!” Diego made it to the top of the fence and swung his legs over. He lost his balance and tumbled down to the sidewalk to land in a groaning heap.
“Looks to me like you screwed yourself,” I said sadly. Diego leaped up, leaning on the fence for support. We stood there looking at each other for a moment, separated by the fence.
Then Diego turned about and ran once again. His feet slipped on a patch of black ice and he went sprawling again. I tsked as he struggled to his feet, clutching his bleeding mouth. I would have been more sympathetic if he hadn’t given me a whop knot from that stupid bowl of soup.
I jogged around the fence right about the time he finally got his bearings and took off again. He was less than twenty feet from me then, his stride faltering, breaths coming in ragged gasps. Diego wouldn’t last much longer.
He skidded around a corner and plowed into an old lady struggling to get her groceries home. A bottle of milk crashed to the ground, spilling out white fluid and glittering glass shards onto the sidewalk.
I stopped long enough to help her back to her feet while Diego scrambled to flee.
“You all right, ma’am?” I asked.
“I think so,” she said. I propped her against a parked car and patted her cheek.
“You got a cell phone?”
“Uh huh.”
“Call yourself an ambulance, you’ve got a nasty cut on your chin.” I dug a handkerchief out of my pocket and shoved it into her hand, and then pushed it up to her face. “Keep the pressure on.”
“Someone should throw that hooligan in jail,” she said.
“Ha. Trust me, where he’s going, jail’s gonna look like Club Med.”
I pursued Diego as he dashed into an alley. I grinned, knowing that he’d just corralled himself. That alley ended in a fence what maked the one at the strip club look like a kiddie corral.
Diego’s footfalls slowed when he realized the truth. He was trapped. Trapped like the rat he was.
“End of the line, Diego,” I said, coming in behind him. I glanced around and found every window nailed shut with plywood. Nobody was going to see shit.
