“All this started after Gordon moved in. And I’m pretty damn sure he drained my crankcase.”
“And that homo classified I got signed up for,” Mr. Woolbright said. “Phil told Jean he had gay porn in his mailbox today.”
“But why?” Mr. Garcia said.
“Why don’t we go ask him?”
The muzzle pressed harder against his spine.
“That’s what I want to know. Why? That ledger of yours – looks like you’re writing reports. Who are they going to?”
He had the ledger! How–?
How didn’t matter. Everything was falling apart. And he was asking the question Theodore never would answer. Never.
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
The muzzle pressed deeper into his flesh, then was removed.
“If we had time, you’d tell. But things are moving faster than I’d planned. Robinson is sharp, and you’re about to have some very angry people on your doorstep.”
“I’ll talk to them, reason with them.”
“No amount of talk will calm them after they see what’s in your garage.”
“My garage?”
“Yeah. I raised the door halfway. Front and center is Rashid’s wrench set. But there’s also an empty can of Speed Weed, some strychnine-containing rat poison, and Robinson’s drain plug along with pink panties and photos of his daughter.”
Theodore felt as if his bones were dissolving.
“What do you think Robinson is going do when he sees all that?” the intruder continued. “Oh, and I called the vet. I said I was from poison control and he told me it looked like the Garcia dog died from strychnine. So I called Garcia – again as poison control – and told him to make sure he didn’t have any strychnine-containing pest control around. How do you think he’ll react when he sees that box of rat poison?”
Theodore closed his eyes and trembled.
“You’re busted, pal. I’d love to have more time with you, but I don’t want to be here when company comes calling. Have a nice day.”
Rising on wobbly legs, Theodore turned and faced him. He found his voice. “You’d make a good distributor.”
“Is that your game?”
Game? It wasn’t a game. It was serious business.
“Who would I be working for?”
Theodore shook his head.
A gloved hand shot out and smashed against his jaw, rocking his head back and sending him to the floor.
“Just in case you thought I’d forgotten about the dog.”
Theodore lay there, groaning. After a moment he heard the back door open and close. And then he heard the voices in his front yard.
“What if he’s not home?”
“He’s always home – haven’t you noticed?”
“Maybe he – hey! That’s my wrench set! What’s it doing–?”
The voices moved toward the garage.
“Speed Weed! That kills grass doesn’t?”
“And geraniums too.”
“What’s this? Pictures of Chelsea and – oh shit!”
“Rat poison! The motherfucker!”
An angry babble rose as someone began pounding on the door.
Theodore struggled to his feet and stumbled upstairs.
Exposed . . . bad enough, but losing the ledger was the final humiliation
He was finished. Nothing to do now but bow out and avoid further embarrassment.
He jumped at the sound of smashing glass. Something had crashed through the front window.
His shaking fingers removed the cyanide capsule from its container. He put it between his teeth and bit hard.
Time to move.
introduction to “Piney Power”
In mid-2008 I agreed to donate a short young-adult thriller to another ITW-sponsored anthology. Once again, I’d be limited to 5k words. At the time I was deep into the young-adult Repairman Jack novels I’d contracted to write and had introduced some piney kids into the trilogy. (If you’re not familiar with what a piney is, it’s explained in the story.) I thought maybe I’d take them out for a spin in their own story (with young Jack along, of course) and see what they could do.
Piney Power
1
Old Man Foster had the signs posted all over his land.
NO FISHING
NO HUNTING
NO TRAPPING
NO TRESPASSING
No kidding. And no big deal.
Jack never paid them much attention. He figured since he wasn’t involved in the first three, he deserved a pass on the last. No, what caught Jack’s eye was the bright red object tacked to the bark just below the sign.
“Hey, check it out,” he said, hitting the brakes. His tires skidded in the sandy soil as his BMX came to a stop. “Who’d put a reflector way out here?”
Weezy stopped her bike beside his. “Doesn’t make sense.”
Her birth certificate said “Louise” but no one had called her that since she turned two. She was older than Jack – hit fifteen last week, while Jack still had a few months to go. As usual, she was all in black – sneaks, jeans, Bauhaus T-shirt. She’d wound her dark hair into two braids today, giving her a Wednesday Addams look.
“Never noticed it before.”
“Because it wasn’t there,” she said.
Jack accepted that as fact. They used this firebreak trail a lot when they were cruising the Barrens, and if the reflector had been here before, she’d remember. Weezy never forgot anything. Ever.
He touched the clear sap coating on the head of the nail that fixed it to the tree. His fingertip came away wet. He showed her.
“This is fresh – really fresh.”
Weezy touched the goop and nodded. “Like maybe this morning.”
Jack checked the ground and saw tire tracks. It had rained last night and these weren’t washed out in the slightest.
“Looks like a truck,” he said, pointing.
Weezy nodded. “Two sets – coming and going. And one’s deeper than the other.” She looked at Jack. “Hauled something in or took something out.”
“Maybe it was Old Man Foster himself.”
“Could be.”
Foster had supposedly owned this chunk of the Jersey Pine Barrens forever, but no one had ever seen him. No one had ever seen anyone posting the land, either, but the signs were everywhere.
“Want to follow?”
She glanced at her watch and shook her head. “Got to go to Medford with my mom.”
“Again? What’s this – an every Wednesday thing?”
She looked away. “No. Just works out that way.” When she looked back, disappointment shone in her eyes. “You going without me?”
Jack sensed she wanted them to go together, but he didn’t think he could hold off.
“Yeah. Probably nothing to see. If I find anything, we can come back together.”
She nodded and offered half a smile. “Sure you won’t get lost without me?”
He glanced at the sun sliding down the western sky. Every year, people – mostly hunters – entered the Barrens and were never seen again. Folks assumed they got lost and starved. No big surprise in a million-plus acres of mostly uninhabited pine forest. If a vanilla sky moved in, you could lose all sense of direction and wander in circles for days. But with the sun visible, Jack knew all he had to do was keep heading west and he’d hit civilization.
“I’ll manage somehow. See you later.”
He watched her turn her Schwinn, straddle the banana seat, and ride off with a wave. After the trees had swallowed her, Jack turned off the fire trail and began following the tire tracks along the narrow passage – little more than two ruts separated by a grassy ridge and flanked by the forty-foot scrub pines that dominated the Barrens. They formed a thick wall, crowding the edges of the path, reaching over him with their crooked, scraggly branches.