“Two of them? You sure?” Lado asks.
They’re really sure.
Two tall guys.
Lado thinks that’s interesting.
Wearing masks.
“What kind of masks?”
Jay Leno and …
“Letterman,” the driver says.
The other one got the car make and license plate.
“It’s a wonder,” Lado says, “that neither of you two got hurt at all.”
Very fortunate, they agree.
Yeah, well,
152
Lado is pretty sure they’re telling the truth and had nothing to do with it.
Other than being stupid, lazy cowards and letting it happen.
These
Fuck job references—you want to guarantee good performance and loyalty you keep parents, brothers and sisters, even cousins in your pocket. Men who think nothing of risking their own lives would never think of risking their families’.
He tosses the bullwhip to the ground.
Two tall guys …
No, it’s not likely. How would the two
They couldn’t.
No, a
“Cut them down,” he snaps.
153
Designer coffee joint on Ritz-Carlton Drive.
And the PCH, coast side.
Chon refers to the place as Yummy Mummy Heaven.
Useta park himself at one of the outdoor tables, sip cappuccinos, and watch the parade of rich young mommies jog past pushing their three-wheeled running strollers. Tight bodies in T-shirts (or designer hoodies, in colder weather) and sweatpants.
“That’s the early shift,” he explained to Ben.
The later shift involves the exclusive day care just up the street. The slightly older YMs would drop the brats off and then come in for their lattes and, maybe, post-latte sex with Chon.
“Bored and resentful,” Chon observed to Ben. “Perfect in bed.”
“Adulterer.”
“I’m not married.”
“What ever happened to morality?” Ben sighed.
“Same thing that happened to CDs.”
Replaced by a newer, faster, easier technology.
Ben asked, “What would O think about these squalid escapades?”
“You kidding?” Chon answered. “She talent-spots for me.”
“Shut up.”
No, it’s truth. O, when she can get up that early, has spent many happy hours handicapping Chon’s odds. That one’s hot, that one’s horny, that one is happy at home, forget her, check out that ass, I’d do
“Did she ever …”
“Nah.”
They’re not thinking about O’s barely latent lesbian tendencies or Yummy Mummys this morning. They’re thinking about O, however, as
Alex and Jaime walk in—
“Siamese beaners.”
“Easy.”
—stand at the counter and order coffee to go.
Ben and Chon follow them out to the parking lot and get in the backseat of Alex’s Mercedes.
“What?” Ben asks.
Alex turns around to look at Ben. “One of our cars was hijacked last night.”
Ben is stone. The son of two incessantly probing shrinks, he knows how to outface an interrogation.
“So?”
Alex is an amateur at this.
Shows all over his lawyer face. “Would you know anything about it?”
Ben jumps all over the conditional tense. “Yeah, I
Fun with language.
Alex tries Chon for a stare-down.
Yeah, that’s going to work.
Try making a Rottweiler blink.
“Okay,” Alex says finally.
Chon is Chon but Ben is Ben. “Try not calling me out for nonsense in the future, okay? How is O?”
“Who?”
“Who”? Chon looks like he might slap the guy. It’s a real possibility there for a second, but Ben jumps in. “Ophelia. We call her O. The young lady you kidnapped. How is she? We want to talk to her.”
“Maybe that can be worked out,” Alex says.
Ben notices the passive verb form.
Responsibility is being avoided, or
Authority is not possessed.
Interesting.
“Work it out,” Ben says. He opens the car door. “If there’s nothing else, Chon has marriages to destroy and I have product to produce.”
They stand in the parking lot as the Mercedes pulls away.
“You’re good,” Chon says. “You think they really suspect us?”
“If they did, we’d have seen Chain Saw Guy.”
They walk back to the shop.
“By the way?” Chon says. “I feel I make the marriages better.”
“Really?”
“Oh yeah.”
