Boyle dropped the Berreta back in his pocket. He shook a smoke out of his hardpack for himself and rustled the deck in the direction of Stefanos.
Stefanos put a cigarette between his lips and pushed in the lighter on the dash.
“Describe all the players to me,” said Boyle. “I don’t want to shoot the wrong guy.”
The lighter popped out of the dash. Stefanos lit his smoke and handed the lighter to Boyle.
“Looks like you done fucked up again, T. W.,” said Otis. “You should’ve been more firm with that key man. Ain’t you learned yet about these inside jobs?”
Otis turned into the industrial park and drove along the red-brick buildings.
“Man’s taking a risk,” said Thomas Wilson. “He just wants a little extra.”
“I’ll just have to explain it to him,” said Farrow. “If he pushes it, he’s gonna get hurt.”
“Hope he takes it better than that other inside man T. W. had,” said Otis.
“The pizza chef?” said Farrow.
Otis and Farrow exchanged a glance. Wilson saw the eye contact and thought he saw a brief smile crease Otis’s face. They were fuckin’ with him, he knew. Trying to keep him weak. Wilson’s blood jumped at Otis’s smile. But the feeling he had was not familiar. It was not a feeling of fear.
“You talkin’ about Charles?” said Wilson.
“Whatever his name was,” said Otis. “He didn’t take it in a very masculine way when he saw what we had to do. The bartender, that light-steppin’ waiter… shoot, man, you can believe that those two were afraid to die. But even that sissy waiter took it like a man compared to your pizza chef. You remember the way he begged us, Frank?”
Farrow nodded. “He cried like a girl.”
“Screamed like one, too,” said Otis.
Wilson felt tears come to his eyes.
Lord, give me strength to kill these men.
“Charles was a man,” said Wilson, surprised at the force in his own voice.
Otis’s eyes smiled in the rearview. “Listen to T. W., Frank. Gettin’ all ma-cho on us now.”
Wilson swallowed hard. “Make a left into that alley, where that Dumpster is.”
Otis made the turn and drove slowly between the buildings. The brick walls were very close to the sides of the car.
“Damn, this is a tight squeeze,” said Otis.
“Thought you liked tight things,” said Farrow.
“You know I do,” said Otis, smiling in the mirror, giving his gold tooth a lick.
The Mustang came out of the alley and then there was the wide-open lot and the strip of warehouses fronting the creek.
“Park in the middle,” said Wilson, “by that door right there.”
Otis pumped the brakes. The Mach 1 came to a stop.
Dimitri Karras heard the rumble of a muscle car as it cleared the alley. He drew his. 45, pulled back on the receiver, and jacked a round into the chamber. He slipped the automatic barrel-down into the holster, behind the belt line of his jeans and against the small of his back.
He reached behind him, drew the. 45, and replaced it once again.
Karras heard car doors slam and voices as the men approached. He thought of Bernie. He tried to recall Bernie’s advice from that day in the woods. He couldn’t remember what Bernie had said.
He was cold. He hadn’t worn a coat so that he would not fumble the gun. His teeth were chattering, and his hands had grown numb. He tried to raise spit and he could not.
He looked around the empty warehouse and backed up so that he was near the cheap desk. He heard the key turn in the lock and he backed up another step. The door swung open, and Karras stood still.
Farrow, Otis, and Wilson stepped out of the Mustang. Wilson watched Otis twirl the car keys on his finger and drop them in the pocket of his slacks. Otis examined his ID bracelet in the light of the spot lamps hung on the exterior of the warehouse walls.
“What’s the key man’s name?” said Farrow.
“Dimitri,” said Wilson. It was meaningless to lie about it now.
Farrow drew his. 45 from his belt line and chambered a round. He looked at Otis and Otis did the same. They holstered their guns and walked toward the warehouse door.
Wilson looked over his shoulder to the alley before putting the key to the lock. He guessed it wasn’t any use in stalling. Stefanos wasn’t going to make it. Wilson had waited too long to call for his help. Just another fuckup in a lifetime full of them.
“Need help with that, T. W.?” said Otis.
Roman, always with that thing to his voice. Wilson turned the key roughly and opened the door. He went in first. Farrow and Otis followed.
Frank Farrow saw a gray-haired man without a coat, standing by a desk in the back of the warehouse. A defective fluorescent light set above the desk flashed continuously across the man’s face. The warehouse was bathed in fluorescence, and the insect sound of the lights filled the room.
Farrow, Otis, and Wilson moved forward. They walked onto a series of blue plastic tarps that had been spread out on the concrete floor. Farrow looked into the man’s strange eyes as they approached him. There was something familiar about the eyes.
This is not a card game that’s happening here tonight, thought Farrow. This is something else.
Wilson fanned off to the left of Otis. A looked passed between Farrow and Otis and they stopped walking.
“Who are you?” said Farrow to the gray-haired man.
“Dimitri Karras.”
Farrow shifted his weight. “That supposed to mean something to me?”
“Jimmy Karras was my son.”
Farrow spread his hands. “So?”
As Farrow’s coat opened, Karras saw the butt of Farrow’s gun holstered at his waistline.
No one spoke. Their breath was heavy and visible in the buzzing light.
“What is this?” said Otis, looking from Karras to Wilson, who stood facing him now on his left. “Y ’all lookin’ to take us off?”
“It’s not a robbery, Roman.” Farrow looked down at the tarp beneath his feet. “It’s a slaughter.”
“That’s right,” said Karras. “Like you slaughtered those people in the pizza parlor. Like you slaughtered my son.”
Farrow nodded slowly. “That boy in the road. That’s what this is about.”
Karras drew the. 45 from behind his back. Wilson drew the. 38.
Farrow and Otis did not move their hands. Otis turned his head and saw the revolver in Wilson’s hand. He’d shoot the white man with the blank eyes first. He knew that Wilson would never have the courage to use the gun.
Karras raised his gun and pointed it at Farrow’s face. Bernie’s voice entered his head.
Always aim for the body.
Karras lowered the barrel of the gun.
“Kill him, Dimitri,” said Wilson.
Karras watched Farrow move a step to the right.
Lead that body a little if it’s moving.
“Your son,” said Farrow very quietly. “That was an accident.”
“It’s all an accident,” said Karras.
“Kill him!” screamed Wilson.
Otis looked over at Wilson and laughed. The revolver was shaking wildly in Wilson’s hand.
Farrow looked into Karras’s eyes, the light winking on his face. Now he knew what had seemed familiar to him. It was as if Farrow were looking at his own eyes in the mirror. There was nothing in the man’s eyes, nothing at all.
Karras stared back.
