“The Land Rover had a funny number plate?” Gabriel asked.
“Yeah.” LC giggled, his veneer of toughness gave way to his childhood naiveté.
Gabriel tugged at the cable. “Is this how you want to be treated the rest of your life? Like an animal?”
“Man, cut the crap. I’m ready for the slammer.”
“You’ve been?”
“First time for everything.”
“Then you aren’t entirely gone. You think life is unfair to you and you gotta push back and take what you want? Take what doesn’t belong to you?”
“You know how it feels to not have stuff?” LC said.
“I do. I also know poverty doesn’t justify stealing.”
“You don’t know what you talking about.” LC shook his head. “You haven’t been through shit.”
“Let’s say your assumption is correct, and that I haven’t been through shit. But I know someone who’s been through shit. Tough shit. Shit that will make your shit look like a cake walk.”
“Yeah?” LC sat straight, challenging Gabriel. “Like what?”
“His family was so poor that he was born on a dirt floor. He lost his mom at ten. Not rich enough to go to school, he taught himself to read, after working as a farmhand during his days. Say, you’ve been through this shit, working in hot sun from dawn till dusk and then study?”
LC’s eyes fluttered and he looked down.
Gabriel continued. “He tried to be a politician, but it didn’t work out. Tried to be a lawyer, and that didn’t work out either. He tried his hand in business with a partner and guess what?”
LC said, “It ain’t worked out?”
Gabriel nodded. “His partner drank to death and left him with a huge debt that he worked for 15 years to settle.”
“Man, this ain’t inspiring me. This fool born to be a loser.”
Gabriel smiled drily. “He was a loser. Just like how you are right now. Everyone’s a loser at some point in life. I was too, trust me. We all have to be losers before we become winners. Before we get our shit together.”
“So this guy, he got his shit together?”
“He did. Went on to achieve many great things. He’s kind of famous, actually.”
“Why? What’d he do?”
Gabriel stifled a yawn. “Just freed slaves is all.”
LC’s eyes bulged. “Honest Abe was a loser?”
Gabriel nodded. “Every great man had to go through trials and tribulations. Poverty, failure, humiliation, betrayal, self-loathing, you name it.”
“But why?”
“How else would you get the wisdom to be great? You go to the gym, you put your muscles through pain, and in the end, they become stronger. Likewise, being a loser puts your mind in extreme pain but it gives you the strength to handle the eventual success,” Gabriel said. “Pain is good. It means you’re blessed and gonna live a fulfilling life.”
LC was at the loss of words.
Gabriel asked, “You don’t lie, do you, LC? Only punk ass snitches lie, right?”
LC nodded. “Word.”
“Then promise me something.”
LC laughed. “You a fool? You believe in promises?”
Gabriel shrugged.
“Okay.” LC wiped his nose and giggled. “First tell me what it is.”
“You go to a candy store called Goodwill. It’s in Rosa Parks Blvd. Tell the nice old lady there that you’d like to become a pilot.”
LC stared at Gabriel. “What? You crazy? Why will I go tell a stranger something personal like that?”
“Just do it.”
“If I do, I get to fly planes?” LC asked, his eyes wide, voice animated.
“Yes.”
“She like a genie or something?”
“Just. Do. It.”
“B-but how?” LC lifted and showed his tied-up hands.
Gabriel smiled. “Promise.”
LC frowned, but said, “Alright, promise.”
“Good.” Gabriel let go of the cable, which dropped to the floor.
LC looked at it and then at Gabriel, his face slowly registering what was happening. Opening the door, he quickly got down.
As he made his way to the other side, he stopped mid-road and jogged back to the car.
He leaned into the window. “It’s Benjamin.”
Then he crouched and ran towards the alley mouth across the road. When he was there, he got out of the makeshift cuffs. He looked at Gabriel and smiled, before putting his arms out and running into it.
A few minutes later, Gabriel ambled to the shop and pulled the shutter up.
“Fuck! You scared the bejesus out of me,” the woman behind the billing counter said. She was watching something on a PC.
Gabriel showed her his ID. “You found out what happened here?”
“Yes.” She turned the monitor in Gabriel’s direction and rewound the video back to a specific point.
A lone man was sitting at the counter, scrolling through his phone. He was tall and beefy, like a retired bodybuilder. He must be the Black Hulk Hogan that LC had mentioned, Thomas. A few seconds later, his focus shifted from the phone to the shop’s entrance. Lifting his hands, he got up from the chair. Two guys in balaclava came through the door, pointing shotguns at Thomas. They had ponytails; the twins Gabriel had seen outside Calabria.
One of the guys lifted the stock and hit Thomas on the nose, whose hands tended to the hurt instinctively.
Grabbing Thomas’s arms, they dragged him out over the table. When he was down, they stomped and beat him some more, turning his face into a bloody pulp. Then they pulled Thomas to his feet and shoved him out of the shop.
Gabriel scratched his nose, smirking behind his hand. Now to the next part of the plan.
And he needed the FBI for it.
Chapter 40
May 12, 2019. 09:48 A.M.
The Camaro headed northeast, and the Google lady told Gabriel to take the Trumbull Ave. After a few
