Invincible(9)

A two hour nap and two hours at the gym-slash-boxing ring gave me all the energy I needed for the night. The old man who ran the gym - Jack - told me that life wasn’t made to be easy, fun, fair, or pretty. Life was meant to make death look enjoyable. Jack believed in heaven, hell, demons, and angels.

I faced all that in the mirror and in the circle where I fought. I didn’t need to believe a thing when I lived it.

“Okay, we’re good now,” Tommy said and opened the car door.

He climbed out and I followed him. I kept my eyes open, watching, not sure what the hell to look for.

Tommy walked across the lot like it was nothing. I figured for a couple of guys about to blow up a car, we should be laying a little low. Moving a little quicker. Trying to blend in with the night.

When we got to the car, Tommy took out a long rod from somewhere. He leaned against the door of the car and stuck the rod between the window and door. With a few wiggles and a grunt, the door popped open.

“Pop the hood,” he said to me. “I’m going to get set up.”

I reached into the car and pulled the lever for the hood.

A smell overtook me – a flowery, fruity smell. I looked around the car, realizing it was a woman’s car. There was no way a guy drove this tiny little thing and smelled like this. The smell was almost familiar. That wasn’t a shock though since there was a good chance women used the same sprays or lotions or whatever.

Tommy opened the hood and went right to work.

I reached across the car and opened the glovebox. I had absolutely no reason to find out who owned the car. It was a terrible idea.

When I opened the glovebox, a picture fell out onto the floor. I stuck my hand into the glovebox and then retreated. I shut the glovebox and shook my head. The less I knew the better. Christ, if this went wrong and I got pulled in for questioning, it was better to know nothing.

I saw the picture on the floor and reached for it. I was going to put it back where it had been. But when I saw the woman in the picture, I froze.

She was f*cking stunning.

It was a five-by-seven of a woman in a leather jacket. The jacket was down off her left shoulder. She stood sideways, head turned at the camera, her blonde hair covering half her face. She had blood red lips, big blue eyes, and a beauty about her that caught me off guard. Where the leather jacket opened, she wasn’t wearing anything under it. Not to mention the leather jacket was long enough to go just beyond her ass, leaving the eyes to wonder if she was fully nude under the jacket.

Was this the woman we were going to kill? What the hell did she do to deserve this kind of fate?

My mind then started to play it all out.

This woman climbing into her car. The key going in the ignition. Turning the key to start the car and then…

Boom!

The hood slammed shut and I jumped.

I moved from the car, quickly folding the picture and sticking it in my back pocket.

“Done,” Tommy announced.

I stood and looked at him. “That quick, huh?”

“When you know your shit, it’s easy. Trust me, this car ain’t going anywhere but the junkyard as a charred piece of metal. Probably some skin and bone stuck to the metal frame forever.”

Tommy grinned like a kid who just won a big prize at a carnival. He was sick, but this was his job. He got to muscle people around and murder when Aton and his family needed.

I thought about the picture in my back pocket. That beautiful woman was going to die. She could have been out to dinner or something right now, not thinking about death. Then again, what if she deserved it? If Aton wanted her dead…

“Come on,” Tommy said. “Let’s get out of here. I’d love to sit and watch my work but I can’t risk anything. This one is serious.”

“Who is it?” I asked.

“None of your damn business.”

We got back into the car and drove away.

Tommy dropped me off at my place and I raced inside. I took the picture out of my pocket and tossed it to the table. I went to the fridge and opened a beer. It tasted like shit. I opened the picture and looked at it again. She was goddamn beautiful. Seductive in her pose. I turned the picture around and there was an address on the back. Handwritten with the name Rose on it.

There was nothing I could do about this. I couldn’t stop it from happening. If I tried, Aton would have me killed in a second. Plus, if he wanted someone gone, they were gone. There was no stopping it. Especially if the call came from above. Higher up in his family. Deeper connections that nobody really wanted to know the truth of.

I drank the shitty beer and walked to my bedroom with the picture of Rose.

I crashed to the bed and tossed the picture to the nightstand.

“Sorry, Rose,” I whispered.

I then felt guilty and had no damn reason to. For all I knew this woman was a murderer. Christ, maybe she had been involved with Shane’s death. Whatever she did, she deserved to die, blown up when she started her car.

I shut my eyes, leaving half a beer behind. I demanded sleep, but my mind thought about Rose. The smell of her car. That smell…

My eyes shot open and I sat up.

Christ…

That’s where I knew the smell.

Rose was the woman standing behind me before the fight with Johnny. She was the one I told to go away.

What the hell was a woman that beautiful doing at a fight?

I turned on the lamp next to my bed and grabbed the picture again. I ran my hand through my hair and shook my head.