And what was that the Old Man had said about Leonard having a heart attack? That didn’t make any sense. His grandfather had been fine when Val had left him a few hours earlier. The Old Man must be lying… but why that lie?
And if Leonard had suffered a heart attack—Val was pretty sure that the Old Man had said a sort of heart attack, whatever the fuck that meant—Val didn’t know what he could do about it. It was too bad, but Leonard was old. And Val had known for a while now that his grandfather had been hurting, some kind of chest pains, no matter how hard old Leonard had tried to hide it from him. Nobody lives forever.
Nothing I can do about it, thought Val. But he realized at once that if he killed his father, there’d be no one left to take care of Leonard. That Gunny G. character would almost certainly throw a dying old man out of that shitty mall-turned-cubies fortress, whether Leonard was dying or not.
Not my fucking problem, thought Val. That had been the shout-mantra of his—Billy Coyne’s, really—flashgang. Not… my… fucking… problem.
Dottie Davison wanted to feed him another meal, but Val gave the overly friendly old couple their phone back, thanked them awkwardly for the use of the pillow and blanket, and said he had to be going. He said his grandfather was going to pick him up down the street a ways.
Harold still tried to talk him into staying a while but Val shook his head, turned his back, and walked around the lake toward the trees and larger tent village of the homeless on the other side until he was out of sight of the old couple. He kept his hand on the butt of the Beretta in his belt.
He finally saw the rusty old G.M. gelding the Old Man had described. There’d been several beaters come driving through this west side of the park, but Val could tell by how slowly this one was going, and by the weird bullet holes in the hood—even with the low sunlight reflecting and making it impossible for Val to see through the windshield—that it had to be the Old Man. Hunting for him. Not knowing what was really waiting for him.
At the last minute, Val ducked behind some pine trees and let the car go slowly past.
Chickenshit!
But it wasn’t just fear, Val knew as he crouched behind the trees and waited for his Old Man to make another slow circuit of the park loop back to him.
He just wasn’t sure that he could get in the car and show the gun and force his father to take him to an ATM and all that crap and then do what he had to do. He hadn’t been able to talk to the Old Man on the phone, he hated him so much… how could he sit in a car with him for ten minutes?
Plus, the Old Man was a cop. Or had been before he became a hopeless flash addict. He used to be fast. The Old Man had seen people—punks—brandishing guns at him before and had handled the situation. The front seat of that piece-a-shit car would be a cramped space. A cop might know how to get a gun away from someone in the passenger seat without getting shot himself.
Val realized that he was losing his nerve.
Just shoot him. Just walk up to the car and shoot him. And fuck the money.
He realized that the whole thing about becoming a free trucker was bullshit. He didn’t even know how to drive a car. He’d never learn how to drive a truck with all its gears—just backing one of those rigs up with the trailer attached was a nightmare. And he’d never get $300,000 in new bucks to pay for that fake NICC. It was all bullshit.
Just shoot him. He murdered Mom. Walk up to the car when he comes back around and shoot him.
The old G.M. gelding rattled around the parkway loop north of the lake again and headed south toward Val and the homeless tent village.
Val pulled the Beretta from his belt, worked the slide to chamber a round, and held the weapon behind his back. He took five steps out of the pine trees to stand next to the road.
He could see the Old Man’s face this time and saw the jerk of his head as his father saw him. The car brake-screeched to a stop.
Val realized that he was on the wrong side of the road. To get a clean shot, he should have been on the east side, the driver’s side. The Old Man would know something was weird if Val walked around the front or back of the car to get closer to the driver’s-side window.
As if understanding Val’s problem, the Old Man touched a button and the passenger-side window clunked down.
Val walked right up to the car and—holding the suddenly heavy Beretta in both hands—aimed the muzzle at the Old Man’s blandly staring face. Stiff-armed, not shaking, Val extended the pistol inside the window until it was less than three feet from its target.
Doitnow doitnow doitnow don’twait doitnow…
Nick Bottom didn’t seem to be surprised. He said softly, “I’m wearing Kevlar-three under my shirt, Val. You’ll have to aim for my head… the face.”
Val blinked. The Old Man was trying to mess with his head.
Squeeze the trigger!! Doitnow… doitnow… don’twait… doitnow…
Val’s finger was off the trigger guard and on the trigger, exerting pressure.
“The safety’s still on, kid,” said the Old Man in the same tone he’d used to help Val learn how to balance his bicycle.
Val didn’t believe his father but looked anyway. It was true. The safety lever was down, the red dot covered. Fuck!! Fumbling with both hands, he got the safety lever up until the red dot was visible.
The Old Man could have floored the gelding and gotten away in those seconds, but he hadn’t done a thing. His left arm over the steering wheel, his right hand empty and visible on the beat-up old console between the seats, the Old Man just looked at Val.
He knows he deserves to die for killing Mom, thought Val. He came here knowing what I had to do. He’s guilty as hell.
Val’s finger was on the trigger again when he saw movement in the backseat. His arms still extended stiffly, the pistol aimed at the middle of the Old Man’s forehead, Val flicked a glance left.
Leonard was lying across the backseat nestled in a clumsy nest of pillows. The old man’s mouth was open and his eyes were closed. A bottle with some sort of clear liquid in it had been wired to the hook above the left-side car door where dry cleaning was usually hung and an IV line ran to Leonard’s bare and bruised left arm.
“What the fuck?” said Val.
The Old Man turned his head to look back at Leonard. “He’s all right. Or rather, he’s a mess from that attack I told you about. It’s called aortic stenosis and means that one of the valves of his heart is pretty messed up. Unless he gets a surgical valve replacement, your grandfather’s future looks pretty dim. But he’s okay right now. Dr. Tak gave him a sedative so he’d sleep awhile.”
Val didn’t ask who Dr. Tak was. He shook his head, although he wasn’t sure what he was denying. The Old Man’s attempt to distract him, maybe. Val peered down the iron sights at his father’s face.
Now!
Val knew he could do it. He remembered the muffled blast and kick of the Beretta as he’d fired it through the ski mask in his hand. He remembered Coyne saying “Ugh!” and dropping the flashlight. He remembered the round hole in the T-shirt just above Vladimir Putin’s pale face blobbing out into a red butterfly and continuing to grow and Coyne smirking at Val and saying “You shot me.”
Val remembered shooting the other boy in the throat and remembered the sound of Billy’s teeth snapping off as Coyne’s open mouth hit the cement floor of the tunnel. He remembered killing the animated T-shirt Putin AI by putting a third bullet between the Russian’s two beady little eyes.