Robert Ferrigno - The wake-up

"So, you ripping off our cookers was just self-defense," said Arturo.

"That's right," said Pinto. "Absolutely, self-defense."

"Where we going to find this Mellon?" asked Arturo.

"Mellon… he's got a place just off Seventeenth Avenue," said Pinto. "I don't know the address, but I'll take you there."

"This is a nice car," said Vlad. "Lot nicer than the other one."

"I guess that's what you did with the crank you stole from us," said Arturo.

"You shouldn't have taken my Mustang," said Pinto, defiant now. "I loved that fucking car."

Vlad tapped the side panel. "What's with the snake emblem?"

"It's a '68 Shelby GT Five Hundred Cobra. Almost cherry," said Pinto. "Zero to sixty in four point eight seconds. Less than fifty of them left in this condition." Even in his position, he couldn't keep the pride out of his voice. "Just let me out of here, okay? I'll show you the interior. All leather. Matched hides and everything."

Arturo's PDA beeped and he pulled it out of his jacket, checked it. "Missy wants to know how things are going," he said to Vlad. He keyed a reply.

Vlad watched Pinto try to squeeze out from under, the creeper's metal wheels squeaking on the concrete. Vlad let him make an inch of progress, then adjusted the jack, dropping the car down slightly so that Pinto retreated, thinking it was some permutation of the Cobra's undercarriage, trying again from a different direction. They went back and forth, Vlad humming as Arturo tapped away on the PDA.

"Come on, man, this is so unnecessary," said Pinto, gasping, farther under the car than he had been before, only his knees free now. "Mellon is the one you want to deal with. He's a total crank maniac… I'd go in guns blazing if I was you. Let me out and I'll take you right over. We'll settle this, then go back to business as usual."

Arturo put away the PDA. "You don't know his address?"

"I wish I did, man. Just let me out, and I'll take you there."

"His address is 1209 Plesa, right off Twenty-fifth, not Seventeenth." Arturo smiled, but Pinto couldn't see it. "I was having a little fun with you. Don't worry about taking us over. We've already been there."

"Place was a real mess," said Vlad. "Smelled bad, too. I don't think Mellon had taken out the garbage in weeks. Drugs… they ruin a person's perspective."

"Fuck you, man. Fuck the both of you."

Vlad lowered the jack and Pinto screamed, the sound uncoiling from his chest, echoing in the garage.

"Mellon only had about a half ounce of that gold meth you took off Weezer," said Arturo. "He said you kept the rest, promised to move it out later this week. Where is it?"

Pinto made gurgling sounds, boots kicking feebly.

Arturo beckoned to Vlad, waited until the jack was raised. "Where's the rest of the meth?"

"Fuck… you."

"You need to work on your vocabulary," said Arturo.

Pinto gagged, legs twitching.

Vlad raised the car slightly.

"Better?" said Arturo.

"My ribs…" Pinto tried to scuttle out, but his legs weren't working. "You fuckers…" His voice was high-pitched now, like a little girl's. A brave little girl's. "I think… I think you broke something important."

"I'm sure it's nothing that an Ace bandage and a little bedrest won't cure," said Arturo. "Come on, Pinto, just tell us what we want to know, and then we'll let you finish working on your beautiful car."

"Sure… sure you will."

"You can trust us," said Arturo. "Have we ever lied to you?"

Pinto's breathing was ragged.

Arturo looked over, and Vlad raised the jack, kept going, lifted the car three feet off the floor. Arturo squatted down, keeping his knees clean, and looked in at Pinto. Vlad looked, too. Pinto's head lay against the floor, his eyes half-closed. Blood dribbled from his mouth and nose. "Pinto? Pinto! Where did you stash our goods?"

Pinto opened his eyes, stared back at them. "Fuck… you."

"Bueno." Arturo nodded, then took the smoldering cigarette from the bent-can ashtray, puffed it back into life. He reached under the car, offered it to Pinto, but the man's hands just twitched. Arturo stuck the cigarette into the side of Pinto's mouth, then backed away, squatting on his haunches, watching. "Good for you, hombre. I wouldn't talk to me, either." Pinto dragged deeply on the cigarette, started to cough.

Arturo nodded, and Vlad released the jack, brought it crashing down. It sounded like someone stepping on a baby chick with a heavy boot.

"Still nothing?" Arturo stood in the middle of the media room, arms crossed. He was still wearing the green Kevlar three-piece suit he had on yesterday afternoon.

"Nobody is reporting anything at the grove," said Clark, the recliner tilted back almost horizontal as he flipped channels on the big-screen TV. "No blood, no body, no reports of gunshots. Say what you want, Guillermo never leaves the cops anything to chew on. Man is tidy."

"Frank said he was tidy, too," snapped Missy, cinching her red bathrobe tighter. "That didn't count for much, did it?"

"Frank lied to us, just like Arturo said." Vlad sat on the floor, knobby knees pressed against his chest. His socks drooped around his ankles. "I'm sad about it, too, but Pinto was the one who killed our cookers. Pinto and some guy named Mellon, not Guillermo."

"Maybe Guillermo lied to Frank," Cecil said from the edge of the sunken media room, perched uncomfortably on the steps. "I agree with Missy: You should have gone ahead and killed Guillermo."

They ignored him.

Clark kept switching channels. The coffee table in front of him was strewn with half-eaten bowls of cereal, congealed eggs, and coffee cups. Sugar granules were scattered across the shiny black surface from where Clark had loaded up his Frosted Flakes.

"You fucked up, Arturo, no two ways about it." Missy sat on the couch, her legs tucked up, twisting her blond hair back and forth as if trying to start a fire. "Driving off the way you did, to interrogate a grease monkey, no less… no wonder Guillermo thinks we're weak."

"Guillermo thinks we're not dumb enough to fall into a trap- that's what he's thinking now," Arturo said to her, his voice wound as tightly as one of the watches Vlad wanted to take apart someday. "You should be thanking me and Vlad, instead of insulting us. You should be grateful for what we did last night, and what we did a hundred other nights."

"Arturo… dude, maybe you should have brought Frank here, so we could talk to him." Clark tapped the remote control on the arm of the chair as he spoke, sleepy-eyed and slack. "See, now we're not sure if he was hired by Guillermo or the Yellow Magic boys or maybe even-"

"How could we trust anything he said?" asked Arturo.

"You make him tell us the truth," said Missy. "Isn't that what you and Vlad do?"

"We do a lot more than that," said Arturo.

"Too late to argue about now, so let's kiss and make up." Clark yawned, pulled a vial of pills from the pocket of his pajamas. "Who wants to get high?"

"I do," called Cecil.

"Anybody?"

"Me!" said Cecil.

Clark looked around, shrugged, and shoved the vial back into his pocket.

"You should have brought Frank back here and forced the truth out of him," Missy said to Arturo. "That's all I intend to say on the matter."

"Let me tell you something." Arturo stepped toward her, but she just kept on twisting her hair. "Some people, it don't matter what you do to them, they're going to lie to you with their dying breath. Just like Pinto last night. Raising the car up, giving him room, letting him think there's a chance… that's when they break. Not Pinto. He was hard-core to the bone. Guys like him, they're going to lie just so they can feel like they got the last laugh. That's what Frank is like, too. Exact same."