“Bro, say the word. I can Perc you up no problem.” Beau reached into his pocket. He offered Will a round, white tablet.
Will considered accepting the pill. He wouldn’t take it, but it would be a good idea to try to get Beau on his side. It was hard to kill a man if you knew him. Rejecting the offer could be seen as yet another reminder that Will was a cop, and the cops were the ones who had him by the short hairs.
“Your loss.” Beau popped the pill into his mouth. He swallowed. He grinned.
Will stared at the field. He could hear the thonk of a heated tennis game on the courts behind him. His head turned when he heard the flicker of a lighter.
A cigarette dangled from Beau’s mouth.
Will told him, “Put that out.”
Beau squinted past the smoke. “Relax, bro.”
Will punched him in the ear.
Beau’s arms shot out as he struggled to stay upright. The cigarette dropped from his lips. He cursed, touching his fingers to his ear, checking for blood. “Jesus, bro. You need to chill.”
“I’m not your bro,” Will said, another fantastic reminder that they were not on the same side. “Don’t do another God damn thing that makes me think you’re trying to signal Dash’s man.”
“Just chill, all right? It wasn’t a sign.” Beau used the toe of his boot to stamp out the cigarette. He leaned back against the bleachers. The long sigh he gave could’ve come out of a fog horn.
Will looked down at his hand. Beau’s ear had re-opened the skin. He rolled his wrist, making the blood slide across his palm the same way he used to play with caterpillars when he was a boy.
One of the first times Will was inside of Sara’s apartment, his hands were bleeding. Will had gone off on a really terrible human being, which was understandable, but also not the kind of cop Will wanted to be. Sara had guided him to the couch. She’d brought over a bowl of warm water. She had cleaned his wounds, bandaged the cuts, and told him that doing bad things was a habit that you could either give in to or try to break.
Will wiped his hand on his jeans. He no longer cared what kind of cop he was going to be. He was the man who was going to bring Sara home to her family.
“That’s him,” Beau said.
Dash’s Flunky was in the parking lot, exactly where Beau had said he would be. He was getting out of a blue four-door sedan. Still no sign of the van. The Flunky traversed the lot with a rolling gait. He rounded the fence at the back of the field. Short dark hair, white polo shirt, khaki cargo shorts and white sneakers. He was early twenties, probably a former high school baseball player, judging by his keen interest in the ballfield. He wore a backward baseball cap. His sunglasses wrapped around his face. A blue canvas backpack was slung over his shoulder. He looked like a frat boy in search of a kegger.
Will asked, “You recognize him from before?”
“Nah, man, they all look like that.” Beau stood up. He walked down to the fence. He shoved his hands into his pockets. He waited.
Will left the duffel on the bleachers and joined Beau by the fence. He looked at the scuffed home plate. He counted down a few seconds. He looked up at the kid.
The Flunky was playing it cool. Taking his time. Beau had already told Will what usually happened: the Flunky walked behind him and traded out the contents of the duffel bag for the contents of his backpack, then he kept on walking around the field and got into his car.
Real James Bond spycraft.
This time, Beau was supposed to stop the Flunky for a conversation. He was going to introduce Will as an old Army buddy. He was going to say they needed to talk to Dash. The Flunky was going to call the guy in the van instead. Will was going to work some as-yet-to-be-determined magic and wrangle an invitation to meet the leader.
Only the Flunky didn’t seem interested in playing his part.
He had stopped twenty yards away from them.
Will could almost hear the gears clicking in the kid’s head. He had been told there would be one man near the bleachers. There were two men near the bleachers. Should he still make the exchange?
The Flunky looked back at his car. Checked the parking lot. Checked the woods. He looked at the tennis courts. He looked up at the sky for—drones? Finally, the Flunky returned his attention to Beau and Will. His hand went into his pocket. He tapped the screen on his phone and put it to his ear.
Will asked Beau, “What’s he doing?”
“Ordering a pizza.” Beau had his hands out of his pockets, hanging loose at his sides. Ready to fight? Ready to run? Ready to signal?
Will looked again for the van. He saw nothing, just the agents who were waiting to spring into action. Unless they were time travelers, none of them could reach him soon enough to do anything but call the coroner.
Will tried to appear casual as he reached behind him. His fingers wrapped around the Sig Sauer P365. The gun was a micro-compact, designed for concealed carry, but held ten in the magazine and one in the chamber. Most cops trained on their service weapon. Will had spent hours at the firing range with the Sig. He was just as accurate with one as the other. The stock was short, but the purchase was like a glove. He could draw the weapon and fire in under one second.
The Flunky ended his call. Will guessed he was still debating. Go or stay? Follow orders or take the consequences? He was skinny, this kid, with gangly arms and legs that were accustomed to lifting dumbbells and swinging bats, not fighting off two grown men or running for his life.
He resumed his long walk toward the bleachers. He was trying to act normal, but his hand had gone into his pocket and he might as well have dangled a sign down from his balls that said GUN.
“’Sup?” He lifted his chin at Will, because he assumed that Will was in charge.
Beau said, “Tell Dash we need to talk.”
The Flunky clearly didn’t want to work with another flunky. He asked Will, “Everything good, bro?”
“He’s not your contact, dickslap.” Beau thumped the Flunky’s chest. “Tell Dash I want more money.”
“For what?”
“For fucking your mother.”
Will was two seconds ahead of what happened next.
The Flunky started to pull his gun out of his shorts. Beau’s hands were already up, because he was in the prediction business, too. He was prepared to take the gun and turn it on the Flunky.
Except the Flunky’s shorts were too baggy. What was it with these guys stashing their guns in their pockets? He should’ve holstered the weapon, or stuck it inside the backpack or maybe the idiot should’ve just paid attention to his surroundings because he had no idea what was coming until Will kicked the ever-loving shit out of his knee.
The crack was like a bat hitting a baseball.
The kid dropped to the ground.
“Fuck!” he screamed. He was rolling on his side, clutching his knee. He was clearly more concerned about the blood than the damaged cartilage. Understandable, because he wouldn’t really get that the cartilage was important until he heard it from an orthopedic surgeon in twenty years.
“Good one, bro.” Beau was nodding his approval. He had the gun in his hand, a Glock 19, but not Will’s Glock 19. He wasn’t pointing it at Will, so Will let him keep it.
Will told the Flunky, “Call your boss.”
“I don’t—” The pain caught his breath. “Fuck, man, is my kneecap supposed to move around like this?”
“Like you popped it off a can of Dinty Moore?” Beau was laughing. “No, bro, that’s some bad shit.”
“Fuck!”
Will dug around in the kid’s pocket until he found the phone. He pulled up the last dialed number. There was an initial beside it—the letter G.
Will tapped the call button.
There was no hello, just—
“Kevin, what the hell? I told you to get it done. We need those pills. This is an infantry-level operation.”
Will had to swallow before he could speak. Did the voice on the end of the line belong to Dash? He sounded irritated, the way you’d be if your kid dinged your car.
Will said, “It’s not Kevin. Beau told me you were down a few men. I served with him in the sandpit, worked CSR.”
Combat Search and Rescue.
Will asked, “You interested or not?”
The man was quiet, thinking. Then he let out a long stream of air. Not a sigh, but an indication of deepening frustration. A this is the last shit I need today kind of sigh.
He said, “Put Beau on the horn.”
Will gave Beau a hard look of warning before passing over the phone.
Beau shoved the Glock into his waistband. He was still smiling. Will couldn’t tell if he was high from the pills or relishing the sudden violence. “It’s me,” he said into the phone. “Yeah, I’m an asshole. Yeah, I get that.” He looked at Will, eyebrows up like he was getting ragged by the teacher. “Yeah, I know, but—” He shook his head. “Listen, Gerald, I didn’t—” He stopped again. “Motherfucker, will you shut up a minute so I can tell you?”
Gerald.