Blood Money Read online

  “Have you touched her yet?”

  Jason shook his head quickly from side to side. “No. I swear.”

  “How many others have you done this to?”

  Jason shrugged and looked down at the floor. He was not an effective liar, at least not when a gun was trained on him.

  “Don’t give me that crap,” Kelton said. “You know exactly how many.”

  Jason opened his mouth, paused, then said, “Ten. Maybe twelve.”

  “Lie to me again and I put a bullet in your kneecap,” Kelton said, his tone conversational, completely absent of malice. “Now look at me and tell me how many.”

  Amazingly, when Jason tilted his head up, there was the hint of a smile on his face, as though thinking about his victims elicited some kind of uncontrollable pleasure. “Thirty-four.”

  Kelton sighed and shook his head. His blood was boiling, threatening to spill over.

  He knew the job explicitly stated “no permanent damage” but every fiber in his being screamed out to make this punk-ass daddy’s boy suffer for what he’d done to all those girls.

  Kelton wanted to hurt Jason. Badly.

  Still unsure of what the final act in this episode would be, Kelton stood up and pointed the Glock at Jason’s head.

  Jason’s smile disappeared along with the blood of his suddenly pale face. “Ah shit, man, don’t.” He tried unsuccessfully to twist out of the line of fire. His panic seemed to give him a rush of energy. “Come on, man, don’t . . . don’t do this! You said if I told you the truth you wouldn’t kill me!”

  Kelton shrugged, put another half-pound of pressure on the trigger. “I lied.”

  Jason’s face quivered. Pleading now, he said, “Whatever you’re getting paid, I’ll double it!”

  “That’s what everyone says.”

  “Then I’ll triple it!”

  “They all say that too.”

  Jason burst into tears.

  Kelton stifled a smile. He enjoyed watching Jason squirm like the worm that he was.

  “My dad, he’s a powerful man,” Jason said, the words now rushing out of his mouth in a torrent. “I can get you however much you want! Five million. Ten million. More. Whatever it takes, I can pay it. Just tell me how much!”

  “You can’t buy me off,” Kelton said. “I don’t do this for the money.”

  Jason stopped crying and considered Kelton with a slightly cocked head and a confused look, as though he couldn’t comprehend anyone that wasn’t motivated by profit. “Then why?”

  “I do it because it’s the right thing to do,” Kelton said. “Think of me as an avenging angel.”

  Jason’s eyes widened and he opened his mouth to scream but nothing came out as Kelton squeezed the trigger but there was only a click and Jason cried out, “Oh God! Oh God no!” before he realized that the gun hadn’t fired.

  Jason sucked in a giant breath of air, started giggling, then wrapped his arms around his chest and rocked back and forth. His face was a bright red mask of terror.

  “Silly me,” Kelton said. “I must have forgot to rack the slide.” He did so now. The sound reverberated throughout the bathroom, echoing off the tile walls.

  Jason’s breath caught in his throat, and then he broke down completely and fell onto the bathroom tile and into the fetal position for the second time in the evening.

  Kelton kept the gun trained on Jason until the young man’s sobs had turned into deep, whooping breaths, then let his arm drop to his side and again sat down on the edge of the tub.

  “Get yourself together and sit up you little shit,” Kelton said.

  Jason flashed him a confused look.

  “I said, sit up.”

  Jason did as he was told.

  “I’ll tell you what, Jason, you’re one lucky little bastard. Lucky that the person who asked me to come here tonight is a better man than me. Lucky that he just wanted me to teach you a lesson instead of kill you. Because if you would have done these things to someone I knew? Well, let’s just say you wouldn’t have been around to see the sun come up.”

  Jason’s sobbing had ceased, but his eyes were still leaking and his chest was shuddering with every breath.

  “Next time you consider doing what you were about to do to that girl out there, I want you to remember what happened here tonight,” Kelton said. “Because if you so much as think about doing it again, to anyone, whether it be in San Diego or fucking Timbuktu, I’ll find out. And I’ll come for you. Trust me when I tell you it’ll be a much longer, far more unpleasant night than this one has been. And you won’t wake up the next morning. Understand?”

  Jason nodded. He managed a weak, “Yeah.”

  “Are you sure?” Kelton said. “Because you sure don’t sound like you mean it.”

  “I mean it,” Jason said, more forcefully this time. “I do. I swear. I really do.”

  Kelton held the young man’s eyes for an extra beat before offering a tiny nod. “You know, I think I actually believe you.”

  Relief flooded over Jason’s features, but hidden behind it was something else; a tiny shred of impertinence similar to the one that had showed up briefly when telling Kelton the true number of how many women he’d done this to.

  Kelton sighed and shook his head. He knew that there was no way this privileged little fuck was going to be able to control himself. He might take a break for a couple of months, maybe even a year, but one of these days, he’d rape someone else. It wasn’t just a distinct possibility, it was a certainty.

  Something rose in Kelton’s chest. Not rage this time—for that burned hot—but a different sensation, something cold, detached; resignation perhaps. Even though Kelton knew he wasn’t supposed to permanently hurt Jason, there was no way in hell he was going to let the little shit off the hook without something to remember the night by.

  Kelton stood up and stepped forward and raised the gun and shot Jason in the right foot.

  CHAPTER TWO

  After dropping the young woman off at a nearby hospital, Kelton arranged the customary post-operation meeting with his business partner, Jake Slania, known universally as Slake.

  They met at their regular haunt; The Garage, a bar across the street from Seaport Village in the heart of downtown San Diego.

  Unlike the vast majority of the newer, trendier bars in the recently refurbished downtown area, The Garage was a dive that catered almost exclusively to locals. The inside was dark and poorly ventilated, the floor consisting solely of bare concrete and the walls spotty with old paint. When Kelton arrived, it was sparsely populated—as always—and the few people present were far more interested in their drinks than the other inhabitants.

  Slake was sitting in a booth near the back of the room, his 300 pounds packed disproportionately into the upper half of his six-foot frame. His full head of bright red hair made him immediately recognizable, even in the gloom of the bar. In front of him were two pint glasses, both full.

  Kelton sat down across from his large friend and reached for one of the glasses, but Slake pulled it away from him with a little grin.

  “First, you need to tell me if you’re in or out,” Slake said.

  “I’m in,” Kelton replied.

  “Loser buys?”

  “As always.”

  Slake smiled and pushed the beer across the table. “Then be my guest.”

  Kelton brought the glass to his lips, tilted it, let the beer sit in his mouth for a moment, then swallowed it down. He held the glass up to the meager light, inspected the color and density of the liquid inside, and set it back on the table.

  “Well?” Slake said.

  “Piece of cake,” Kelton said. “Half JW Dundee Honey Brown, half Guinness. It’s a variation of Black and Tan that I believe is officially called Black Honey.”

  Slake laughed under his breath. “Not bad, my friend. Not bad at all.”

  “Yeah, well I’ve had lots of practice.”

  “I’ll say. When’s the last time you bought the pitcher?”r />
  Kelton shrugged. “I can’t say that I remember.”

  “Neither do I,” Slake said. “Next time, I’ll have to make it a bit more challenging.”

  “Please do,” Kelton said. “I’m getting sick of you buying me beer all the time.”

  “Yeah, I’m sure you are,” Slake said. He drank from his glass, grimacing slightly as it went down.

  “You don’t like it?” Kelton said.

  “Not really.”

  “Then why’d you buy it?”

  “I was just trying to pick something that you wouldn’t know,” Slake said.

  Kelton laughed, shook his head.

  “I know, I know,” Slake said. “Silly me, thinking you wouldn’t know what Black Honey was after one drink. What the hell was going through my head?”

  “I have no idea.”

  “Neither do I,” Slake said. He pushed his glass towards Kelton. “You can have this. I’m going to go get something I can actually enjoy.”

  Kelton drank his beer with a small grin on his face and watched Slake move towards the bar with a grace that belied his portly appearance.

  They’d been working together for almost two years, Slake lining up the jobs and Kelton knocking them down. Although they were a good team, perfectly suited to each other’s needs, there were no illusions between them.

  Kelton trusted Slake as much as he trusted anyone, but he knew their trust only extended so far. They were business partners; no more, no less. They would protect the other as long as it made good business sense, but no further. Neither man expected the other to take a bullet to protect their relationship; if forced to, each would give up the other to save themselves. This was understood. And both men were fine with it.

  Slake returned a short time later with a pint of Coors Light. He sat down and proceeded to drain half of it in a single, massive pull.

  “Ahh, much better,” Slake said. “So how did it go tonight?”

  “Perfectly. No complications at all.”

  “And our friend is still breathing?”

  “For the time being,” Kelton said. “Although if it were up to me, that wouldn’t be the case.”

  “But it’s not up to you,” Slake reminded him. “It’s up to the person who hired you.”

  “I know,” Kelton said. He finished his first beer and started on the second. “Still, guys like that little punk shouldn’t be walking around. They deserve to be fertilizer for someone’s lawn.”

  “Maybe, but unfortunately, what someone deserves and what they get rarely have anything to do with each other.”

  “That’s pretty deep, Slake. Give me a second while I write it down.”

  “Ahh, Kelton, always talking smack. One of these days it’s going to come up and bite you in the ass.”

  “Not likely,” Kelton said. “Besides, I left our little friend with a parting gift to remember me by. On the house.”

  “What the hell does that mean?”

  “I shot him in the foot.”

  Slake closed his eyes. “Tell me you’re joking.”

  “No. Why?”

  “Because you were only supposed to scare him,” Slake said. “Not put him in the freaking hospital.”

  Kelton shrugged. “What do you want me to say? The little punk wasn’t getting the message, so I made sure to give him one he wouldn’t forget.”

  “Dammit, Kelton. I thought you understood the job. Nothing permanent.”

  Kelton waved this off. “So he’ll be limping around for a while, big deal. It was only a .22. His daddy will pay for the surgery, and they’ll fix him up like new.” He finished the rest of his beer in one long pull. “I mean, who pays that much money just to scare a guy anyway?”

  “His father does, that’s who.”

  Kelton looked at his empty glass for a moment before setting it down. “Are you serious?”

  Slake nodded.

  “Why?” Kelton said. “So he wouldn’t have to bail him out of jail anymore?”

  “Pretty much,” Slake said. “The father was afraid his son would end up spoiling the family name, and all other attempts to get the kid’s attention just ended in failure. So he decided he needed to up the ante a bit.”

  Kelton tried to stifle his smile but couldn’t.

  “It’s not funny,” Slake said.

  “Actually, it is.”

  “No, it’s really not,” Slake said. “His father is not going to be happy about this. And he’s not a guy you want to piss off. There’s no way in hell he’s going to let something like this go.”

  “Fuck him. What the hell is he going to do to me? He doesn’t even know who I am.”

  “He does know who I am, though,” Slake said softly, almost apologetically.

  “You dealt with him directly?”

  Slake nodded.

  Kelton bit down on his annoyance. “Now why would you go and do something stupid like that?”

  “It was a special circumstance,” Slake said. “We were brought together by a mutual friend and I had no other choice but to meet with him. But don’t try and pin the blame on me for this one, Kelton. No matter how the job was arranged, it was a simple assignment. Go in, scare the kid, and get out, without permanently hurting him. Is it really that hard to follow?”

  Kelton opened his mouth to explain himself further but Slake waved him off before he could say anything.

  “Just give me a minute to think,” Slake said. He leaned forward, closed his eyes, and started to massage his temples.

  Kelton stood up and headed towards the bar. He returned a few seconds later with a pitcher of Coors Light and two fresh glasses. A peace offering.

  “I assume you took all the necessary precautions after the job?” Slake said as Kelton poured them each a new glass.

  “Of course.”

  “You ditched the weapon?”

  Kelton nodded.

  “And destroyed all your clothes?”

  “I took care of everything,” Kelton said. “I have done this sort of thing once or twice before, you know.”

  “I know,” Slake said. “But humor me, okay? Just this once.”

  “Fine.”

  “You tossed your shoes, your gloves, your ski mask?”

  “All of them,” Kelton said.

  “And you left nothing in the house that could be tracked back to you?”

  “It’s as if I was never even there,” Kelton said. “Just like every other job I’ve ever done for you. Or anyone else, for that matter.”

  “Then maybe I can play it off,” Slake said. He looked down at the table and spoke softly, talking to himself more than Kelton. “I’ll have to be proactive, go in and talk directly to the father, apologize, give him his money back, tell him it was a big mistake, tell him that I don’t know who you are, that I’ve only worked with you a couple of times, that I’m never going to work with you again, and then give him some bogus information about how I reached you, a big giant bullshit sandwich.”

  “You think he’ll buy it?” Kelton said.

  “Yeah, he’ll buy it,” Slake said. “But you’re going to owe me big time after this.”

  “I can deal with that,” Kelton said.

  “You damn well better be able to. Otherwise I’ll just tell him where you live and be done with it.”

  “Yeah right,” Kelton said. “Then who would you call when you needed a job done?”

  “I’m sure I can find someone. After all, I found you.”

  Kelton snorted. “Yeah, you found me when I showed up on your doorstep, asking you if you wanted to start making some easy money.”

  “You call this easy money?”

  “It’s a hell of a lot easier than real work.”

  Slake tipped his beer in Kelton’s direction and took a drink. “True enough, my friend. But do me a favor and just stick to the assignment from now on. This freelance crap is bad for my heart.”

  CHAPTER THREE

  It was just after 2AM when Kelton arrived at the meager three-bedroom hou
se he rented on the outskirts of downtown San Diego. He parked his pickup in the driveway and headed along the walkway towards the front door. He had just put his key in the lock when he felt an itch in the back of his mind.

  Normally, that single moment of intuition would have put Kelton on high alert. He would have pulled his firearm from his holster and barged into the room ready to put three holes into the first thing that moved, or perhaps headed towards the back door, where he could get a better look inside the house before entering.

  But having just finished an operation a few hours ago, he simply chalked the feeling up to frayed nerves and let it slide. He had no other choice, really, seeing as how he was currently unarmed.

  Besides, if someone was looking to settle an old score, he’d already be dead. Any professional worth his salt would have taken him down on neutral ground instead of waiting for him at his home.

  With these thoughts in mind, Kelton took a deep breath, opened the door and stepped into his house.

  Despite all his rationalizing, he involuntarily held his breath as he crossed the threshold of the room, exhaling only after a full five seconds of stillness.

  The lights were off and the blinds were pulled down, blocking the light from the street. The only illumination came from the soft light of the green numbers of the digital clock on the wall and the dim glow of the streetlights behind him.

  Kelton closed the door and walked directly into the kitchen. He opened the fridge, grabbed a bottle of water off the shelf, drank half of it, and headed towards his bedroom, the plastic bottle still in hand.

  He had just turned the corner when he saw a one-inch flame appear in the darkness near the back wall of his bedroom. The flame illuminated a surprisingly small area for just a moment, allowing Kelton a brief glimpse of a shadowy, wrinkled face behind the lighter before it cut out, leaving only the red tip of cigarette in the darkness.

  The red dot grew in intensity and Kelton heard the soft sniffle of burning paper. A few seconds later a puff of smoke shot towards the ceiling. Kelton stood silently, waiting for his visitor to speak.

  “Hello Kelton,” said the unmistakable voice of a life-long smoker. “How are you doing?”