Ken Bruen - Headstone

Jimmy would have agreed to anything but Sean thought it was way out there. Bine said,

“Now we begin. Jimmy, your first job is to go to a graveyard and get us a headstone.”

Sean was beginning to think he was in a movie by Sam Raimi, asked, “A headstone?”

Bine moved to his feet in an easy almost elegant way, said,

“From now on, we have to have certain rules:

One, you don’t question my orders.

Two, I say jump, you ask, how high?”

Sean was thinking, like fuck.

Bine tossed the Colt to Sean, said,

“My gift to you and Headstone. It’s our name and it’s where we are going. . to lay every fuckhead this side of the Shannon.” He then went off on a rant about the losers, the scum, the parasites, and how they personally would make a statement to rid the country of all the flotsam.

What snared Sean was when Bine asked,

“You had some dealings with a so-called PI named Taylor?”

Jesus, Sean was shocked, how could he know that?

And that fire of rage that burned in Sean for that man. A few years back, Sean was, he thought, doing good with a babe in a nightclub. Sean ever doing anything with a girl was a nonstarter and so, OK, she was protesting but Sean was flying on dust when this bouncer, an ex-cop, filling in for that one night, grabbed him, said,

“You wanna be a rapist.”

Him? Sean. . rape?

And in the middle of the club, he had beaten Sean mercilessly, to the jeers and delight of the clubbers.

And then dragged Sean, literally by his hair, very long then, to the door, put his shoe in his arse, said,

“I see you again, I won’t go so easy.”

Before Sean could ask anything, Bine said,

“He’s on the list.”

Sean was sold.

Later Sean would realize that Bine knew exactly what buttons to press for whomever he needed. It was like a black gift.

Bine ranted on again about Darwin and about the superior races and a lot of stuff that Sean tuned out till Bine said,

“There’s another member of our crew.”

The brothers waited for this revelation.

But Bine was thinking how much these two eejits reminded him of the Menendez brothers. Not that it mattered.

Much.

He never intended them to survive C-Day anyway and if by any chance they did, he’d off the stupid fucks himself. Jimmy he regarded as simply fodder but he didn’t much care for the looks Sean gave him. Time to sweeten the pie. He said,

“There’s a girl-sweet, sweet wee fang.”

Sean nearly groaned. The rants were easier to listen to than the awful American twang.

He let that sink in.

Jimmy simply drooled. Sean waited, so Bine continued,

“Name of Bethany, but don’t let her gorgeous body fool you.

This is a lethal fox and you disher, she’d have your balls for a bracelet.”

He reached in his jacket and Sean thought,

“What, he’s got, like, a photo?”

It was a list.

He said,

“I want that last taken care of ASAP.”

Then threw a shitload of euros on the table.

Jimmy was thinking, takeaway pizza. Sean was thinking, phewoh, large-denomination notes. Bine said,

“Where was I? Oh, right, Beth. She’s my fuck buddy, but you guys do right by me, I’ll give you some of that sweet meat.” Finally, he put a Stanley knife on the battered table, said,

“Use this as much as possible. Call it a sentimental quirk.”

He made to leave, paused, said,

“Keep this in mind.”

He paused for effect, then said,

“More rage, more rage, remember what our guys said: it’s humans I hate.”

He looked at Sean.

“Look it up, you’re a bright kid.”

As he got to the door, he added,

“Here’s a hint, we’re going to kick-start a revolution, I’ve declared war on the human race and war is what it is .”

He withheld the other part of that rant:

“You guys will all die and it will be fucking soon.”

Revenge Tango

— Jerry A. Rodriguez

It’s quite difficult to get beaten up in hospital. I mean, apart from the Saturday night war zone of the A and E. That’s open season as the skels, the drunks, the dopers, the crazies, show up. Plus, I don’t mean the arrogance of the consultants who verbally cut you to shreds at every opportunity. Despite the array of marauding infections, if you actually have a bed, you are reasonably safe.

You’d think.

Right?

I was almost fully recovered from the virus I’d picked up and feeling, if not exactly healthy, at least less battered. Lord in heaven, I’d even managed some nights’ sleep without aids. Day before my discharge, I woke or rather was dragged from my sleep. A burly man had a ferocious grip on my pajamas top and was hauling me upright. It took me a few moments to grasp this was real, not part of the recent fever. I tried to focus and then recognized Liam, the ex-Guard who owned the pub in Ough-terard. I’d phoned him about Father Loyola under the pretext of booking a table at his restaurant and quizzed him as to the fugitive priest’s location. He’d fallen for my story and confirmed that Loyola was staying near Oughterard.

Liam was one of those old-style cops you rarely see much anymore. Big, built like a shithouse, and rough as bejaysus. He’d been a fierce hurler, one of the best, and we’d played together a few times. He took no prisoners, ever. Regular methods of policing held no interest for him; his fists were his investigative technique.

His face was testament to his career: bruised, the nose broken many times, the skin mottled by rosacea and a riot of broken veins. He drank like he played hurling. Like a lunatic. Spittle leaked from his lips as he shouted,

“You lying piece of shite, Taylor.”

As a wake-up call, it sure beats tea and toast. It gets you wide-awake.

Fast.

Before I could speak, he drew back his mighty fist and smashed it to the right side of my face. It bounced me off the bed frame. He was about to follow through when he noticed my emaciated chest through my torn top. He pulled the punch. When my head cleared a bit, I gasped,

“What the hell did I do?”

He considered that second punch, said,

“You phoned me, you treacherous bollix, got me to confirm Loyola’s home.”

I tried to pull together the tattered top, grab, if not dignity, at least a wee modicum of decency, asked,

“So, what’s the big deal?”

Bad, bad mistake.

He punched me in the kidneys and I’d have thrown up the breakfast I hadn’t yet had. He spat,

“You told somebody and guess what? Guess fucking what, Mr. Private Eye. Three days after I talk to you, that lovely man is found floating in the river outside his cottage.”

I muttered,

“Sweet Jesus.”

He moved back from the bed, having caught sight of my mutilated hand, said,

“They say your fingers were sliced off.”

Delicately put.

He was spent. I guess kicking the living shit out of a half-dead guy in a hospital bed has its drawbacks. He said,

“You know, Jack, I used to like you. You were always as odd as two left feet but I thought you had some principles.”

I tried,

“What a terrible accident for that poor man.”

Jesus, he nearly blew again, roared,

“Accident! Accident my arse.”

I didn’t know what to say, my right cheek was already swelling and I knew, from past experience, I’d have one beauty of a black eye. I mumbled,

“I’m sorry.”

He was at the door, said,

“I’m sorry too, sorry they didn’t cut your balls off.

Two days later, finally, I was released. Ireland was coming to the end of the freakish three-week period of freezing ice and snow. People had broken hips, bones, on footpaths deadly with black ice. The government had imported salt from Spain.