|
Benny was scrubbing dishes when he heard a soft, Southern
drawl. The scars from the microchip implant began to itch. Inserted in his
spine, the chip gave Cindy all the control she needed when he was within a few
yards. When he wore the collar, she could kill him anywhere in the world, and a
few times nearly did.
A chill ran up his spine. Benny slid along the wall in a
crouch to peer over the counter. Mitch gave him a worried look. Benny shook his
head.
Dolores was coming back. The place was full of people that
could have been from the South. The accent was warm and pleasing and easy on the
throat. But the itch grew furious, burning into his soul, and a small knot of
ice developed in his stomach.
He moved up using a red, plastic coated menu for cover.
People milled around, blocking his view.
“Hey, kid,” Dolores said, and he nearly jumped out of his
skin.
“What?” he whispered.
“You got a prob?”
“Yeah . . . I mean, no.”
Dolores scratched something on a ticket, handing it to Mitch.
“What’s this?”
“Anglo. Says he wants a hot toddy, a chili-toddy.” She
motioned at the far corner under the picture of the president, then frowned.
“Who the hey keeps putting horns on the Doc?”
Mitch turned and coughed into his fist. Not turning, he said,
“Donno.”
“Chili-toddy?” Benny stared at the picture. It was a
cheap lithograph, but would have cost a thousand credits at the Party store. The
Doc was short, with sandy blond hair parted at a sharp angle to the right. A
small mustache hung directly under a rather prominent nose.
Scowling, she muttered, “The law. We could all wind up
arrested for that.”
“If they dared to come down this far into Penn’s turf.”
Mitch shrugged. “I don’t know how to make a toddy.”
Staring over the menu, Benny said, “Boiling water in
whiskey, fifty-fifty mix, and a shot of hot pepper oil.”
He caught sight of a man with broad shoulders and a good suit
sitting in the corner. His breath caught in his throat. Sweet-Bottom’s
biggest, meanest brother.
“What a freekin night.”
“Anything else?”
Still staring at Mike, Benny glanced back. “Huh? Yeah,
arsenic if you got it.”
Mitch scowled. “Pardòne?”
“Uh, just hot water. Scalding hot.”
When the drinks came, Mike found the glass of whiskey hot to
the touch. He sniffed, then felt the glass. It was close to boiling and the
peppers made his eyes water.
“Can you hold him for me?”
“Excuse me?” Dolores was picking up the credits for the
drinks. She stopped, staring at Mike.
“My partner. I’m going to pour this down his throat, and
he’s going to fight it. Sore throat,” Mike said. “It’s going to
sting.”
Dolores turned and whistled a short blast. The guard darted
over with the shotgun at arms and people ducking out of his way.
“Yeah, woman?”
She pointed at Mike, then said in alarm, “No, don’ shoot
him. He needs help with his partner.”
The sad look changed to a warm grin. “What ya want?”
Mike told him, and the guard held Creel’s head in a firm
grip while Mike dumped in the toddy, then dropped the glass in time to clamp
down on the agent’s jaws and nose.
Creel’s eyes shot open and were flooded by tears. A scream
bubbled in his throat, and he tried to jerk away, but the Jamaican held him hard.
The table shuddered from Creel’s shoes drumming on the
bottom of it, and the man bounced once, hard. The long neck shivered, the
Adam’s apple shot up, then down in a hard swallow.
Mike nodded to the guard. Dolores hurried over with a brown
bottle.
Setting it and a glass down, she said, “Drink this. It’s
ginger beer, the real thing like they make in the Islands. Ginger will dry his
sinuses, but too much might make him worse,” she said, a note of warning in her
voice.
“Good t’ing fo’ the morning after da party, too,” the
guard said with a vigorous nod. “Even the meanest hangover, she got to go when
ye drinks the ginger.” Shouldering the shotgun, Jason gave a weeping Creel a
sympathetic grin and marched back to the door.
Mike looked at the mess smeared on Creel’s face, then his
hands and scrubbed them off with a white bandana. He threw it at Creel.
A trembling hand stretched out for it, and Creel slowly wiped
at his face.
"Thanking Dolores," Mike slid into the booth and took the
boilermaker. He sipped it with caution. It wasn’t called a widow maker for
nothing. The beer was ice cold, but the whiskey warmed him to the bones, the
shot glass clicking in the bottom of the beer.
He glanced at Creel. A little ginger beer soaked into the
man’s shirt, but he was drinking it. Mike raised a hand but Creel shook his
head.
“Gotta go the bar.” Creel gave what might have been a
man-to-man wink. “Ask the big Mex where Sue is.”
“If I find her, you’re sleeping in the bar.”
Eyes sad, Creel mumbled, “But, she’s mine.”
Gathering the
glasses and bottle, Mike said, “When I’m done we’ll switch places. End of
story,” he said as Creel tried to protest. “I like my privacy.”
Creel brightened. “Oh. OK. I thought you were mad at me or
somethin’.”
“That is a distinct possibility.”
Turning on one heel, Mike wound his way through the crowd to
the bar, setting the glasses there and waiting for the bartender to come down
his way. Behind this part of the bar he could see the narrow hall of the
kitchen, the stainless steel and glass gleaming, the grill smoking with burgers
and minute steaks for the beef-‘n-cheese hoagies.
And he could see some kid or short man scrubbing away at a
mountain of dirty dishes.
He looked harder. The man was wearing a hospital shirt and
dirty jeans. The hair was a little shaggy, but caught up under a clean blue
bandana. Mike squinted. He blinked to moisten his eyes, then squinted again. A
small, star-like scar was dead center in the middle of the man’s neck.
“I’ll be dipped,” he whispered. “Benny
Wya Grey.”
©2004 StoriesByEmail.com
|
