Andrew Vachss: Hard Candy

"Put it on my tab."

I flicked my eyes to the No Gambling sign.

His face went dark. He took a deep breath through his nose, remembering why he was there. Tossed a crumpled ten-spot on the table. I picked it up, smoothed it out. Left it lying on the rail.

I made the nine ball on the break.

Morales put another ten down on the rail. Racked the balls.

I broke again. Two balls dropped. I lined up on the one.

His voice was light, hard-cored. Honey-coated aluminum. "Upstate, when you come in on a homicide beef, you know what they say about you?"

"Tough luck?"

"They say you got a body. Nice, huh? Some punk snuffs an old lady for the Welfare check, he struts around the block saying, 'I got a body.' You ever hear that one?"

"No."

I ran the rest of the table. Morales put a twenty down, taking back one of the tens. He racked the balls. I chalked my cue. Lit a smoke.

"We met once before, remember?"

"No."

"You remember my name?"

I locked his eyes. "Something with an 'M,' right? Miranda?"

"Smart guy. You got a body, Burke?"

My eyes never left his face. "You guys have one?" I asked.

"See you soon," he said, walking away.

I put his money in my pocket. Went back to pushing the balls around the table.

I DIDN'T NEED need the cop's cash.

There'd been a fifty-grand bounty on the Ghost Van. A killing machine for baby prostitutes. Pimps put up the coin- it was bad for business. Marques Dupree made the offer in a parking lot. Take the van off the street and collect the money. It was supposed to be a four-way split: me, the

Then it went to hell. A karateka who called himself Mortay was bodyguarding the van. The freak was a homicide-junkie. He fought a death-match in the basement of a porno circus. The players liked it even better than watching pit bulls or cockfights. And after that he walked through Times Square, frightening even the hard-core freaks. But the whispers stayed on the street. Max the Silent. The life-taking, widow-making wind of death, as the Prof named him years ago. Max could beat this Mortay.

The freak wanted Max. I tried to talk to him and he raised the stakes. Max fights him or Max's baby goes down.

I dealt Max out. Called in my chips. One of Mortay's boys was gunned down in a Chelsea playground. By El Cañonero, rifleman for the UGL, the underground Puerto Rican independence group headed by my compadre Pablo. Another was dog food. Belle dealt herself in. The van was scrap metal. And Mortay himself- they'd need a microscope to find the pieces.

I had a lot of bodies. And the cold ground had Belle's.

I didn't have to look for Marques. He called Mama- left frantic messages all over the city. Couldn't wait to put the cash in my hand.

I split it with the Prof and the Mole. The junkyard-genius would take care of Michelle. Belle left a stash behind- that was mine too.

Bail money. For a jail I couldn't walk out of.

BY THE TIME summer left the city, I thought the heat would leave me alone. But even months later, there was no place to go.

I was in a bar off Times Square. Sitting with the Prof, waiting for Michelle. I got up to get the Prof a brew. The place was packed, music screaming so loud the heavy metal clanged. The whole joint was about as much fun as chemotherapy. I bumped into a stud hustler on my way back to the table. He muttered something. I kept moving.

Michelle slipped her way through the crowd. Wearing a white beret, deep purple silk blouse, white pencil skirt, spike heels to match the blouse. An orchid in a sewer. She kissed me on the cheek, her big dark eyes wary.

"How you doing, honey?"

"The same."

The stud hustler I had bumped came over to our table, thumbs hooked in a bicycle chain he used for a belt. Pretty boy. Short spiky haircut. He leaned forward, eyes on me. His buddies behind him a few feet.

"You made me spill my beer."

His voice sounded tough. The way a worn-out car with a bad muffler sounds fast.

I threw a five-dollar bill on the table. "Buy another."

"How about an apology?"

I felt a tiny pulse in my temple. I crumpled the bill in my fist, tossed it onto the dirty floor.

Muscles flexed along the surface of his bare arms. "Get up!"

Michelle lit one of her long black cigarettes. Blew smoke at the ceiling. "Sweetie, go back to whatever you were doing, okay?"

He turned on her. "I don't need no fucking he-she telling me what to do."

Two dots of color on Michelle's cheeks.

The Prof turned his air conditioner on the heat. "There's no beef, Chief. Take the five and slide."

"You got nice friends," the hustler said. "A cross-dresser and a midget nigger."

The Prof smiled. "I'm a thief, boy. I may pull a little vic, but I don't suck dick."

The hustler's face went orange in the nightclub lights. "Let's go outside," he suggested to me, pounding a fist into an open palm.

"He don't have the time, sonny," the Prof answered for me.

"It won't take long."

One of his friends laughed.

The Prof wouldn't let it go. "Yeah it would. About ten to twenty years, punk. Even if they let it slide with manslaughter."

I pushed back my chair.

"Burke!" Michelle snapped.

The place went quiet.

"That's you?" the hustler asked. His voice was a strangulated hernia.

"You know the name, you know the game," the Prof answered for me.

"Hey, man… it was a joke. Okay?"

I sat there, waiting. He backed away. He didn't bump into his friends- they were gone.

It wasn't just the cops who knew I had a body. And whose body I had.

ON THE STREET outside the bar, Michelle grabbed my arm. "What the fuck is wrong with you?" She wheeled on the Prof. "And what about you? You turning back the clock twenty years? This idiot's back to being a gunfighter and you're his manager, right?"

"My man's in pain, lady. Give us some play, back away."

Michelle's eyes glittered, hands on hips. I put my hand on her arm- she shrugged it off.

"This isn't like you, baby. You're making me nervous."

"It's okay," I said.

"It's not okay. You want to go back to prison? Over some stupid argument in a bar?"

"I'm not going back to prison. Just take it easy. We'll drive you home."

She turned and walked away, heels clicking hard on the concrete, not looking back.

THREE MORE dead days later, they took me down. Right off the street. The Prof spotted them first.

"Rollers on the right," the little man said under his breath.

"Probably behind us too. Call Davidson," I said. I tossed my cigarette into the gutter, slipped my right hand into my coat pocket to make them think I might not go along nicely, and slid away to draw them from the Prof. I quick-stepped it along Forty-fifth Street, heading west toward the river. Feeling the heat. Unmarked cop car running parallel to me in the street. Spotted a gay-porn movie house. Heard car doors slam as I slid my money through the slot for a ticket. They wouldn't want to follow me inside. Two slabs of beef shouldered in on each side, pinning my arms, pulling my hands behind me. Cuffs snapped home. They spun me around. A cop I hadn't seen before sang their song.

"You're under arrest. You have the right to remain silent. Anything you say can and will be used against you in…"

They patted me down before they shoved me into the blue-and-white that pulled to the curb.

Nobody said a word on the ride downtown.

They left me alone in a holding cell for an hour or so. I didn't ask to make a phone call. I did that once, when I was a kid. Just to be doing it- I had nobody to call. Now I knew better. On both counts.