100 Proof Stud (The Darcy Walker Series) (26 page)

My stomach churned, and I felt like I’d scarfed a bag of jalapeno poppers. Nico Drake’s stare was glazed over and wide-eyed, and his body so covered in blood I didn’t know from where the mortal wound originated. His hands were bloody, his white shirt soaked to the skin, and his tongue hung out to the side like someone struck him from the back, and it was a reflex reaction. I have to admit I’d imagined him dead, but the reality was a whole lot scarier than what I’d pictured in my head. It’s like he’d totally bled out because the ground was soggy underneath him. I’d like to say I was surprised, but Nico Drake was mongoose-mean. Apparently, he had enemies that didn’t mind to take a beef to the next level. Still, my heart broke a little with the discovery. Not even the bad should die young. You should have time to live, make mistakes, make them twice, fall in love, get married, have kids, feel like your life’s been a waste, make peace, and only
then
should you be allowed to die.

Whatever Nico thought would be useful to me followed him to the land of worms.

But why? Why was he
here
…and
dead
?

A shrill laugh escaped my trembling lips, followed by a cry so bizarre it felt like the earth took pause. Stick a fork in me…I’m done. I can’t do this. People were falling dead all around me, and no amount of money in the world was worth Vinnie and me getting shot at. Well, getting shot at and potentially finding success.

I tried to get up and fell.

I tried again, this time even shakier.

When I finally scrambled to my feet…I realized Vinnie hadn’t followed.

And that’s when I heard it…

Chaos everywhere.

Furniture moved; there was a shout, more gunfire, a man’s scream, the sounds of rolling and thrashing fists, the cracking of heads, grunts, a loud thud, Vinnie’s muffled cry and now…

Nothing.

For God’s sake…nothing.

I attempted a scream but instead whispered a strangled prayer. “God,
please
,” I whispered. “
Pleeeeease
…”

I couldn’t imagine a world without a Vinnie—especially when it was my fault he’d been placed in this situation. Vinnie had a life, a mom, a girlfriend named Donatella, and maybe a budding acting career. I crawled to the Bug, opened the driver’s side door, and crumbled inside. “Be calm, be calm,” I sniffed to myself. As my conscience prickled with guilt, I bumbled my iPhone out of my purse when the door was thrown wide with Vinnie tossing me to the passenger side. His gray suit had been splattered with blood, but I knew innately it wasn’t his. A rip. There was a rip in his left knee. A simple rip.

I cried nerd tears; I cried happy tears.

I launched myself at Vinnie, sniffling, “Vinnie, I love you. I love you…”

Vinnie gazed at me cockily, like it was a given he would’ve walked away unscathed. Amidst all my blubbering, he did the indescribable. He placed The Minstrel Cramps vintage t-shirt in my lap, tenderly squeezing my knee. The dueling emotions of love and hate immediately boiled up inside me. Vinnie was one of a handful that knew what that band meant to me. What that memory meant. Nerd tears resurfaced. Desperate tears won out. Stabbing his keys into the ignition, he rocketed out of the driveway on a squeal. We’d raised the bar on crazy, and I was bawling like a baby. At this juncture, I didn’t care I looked like a wuss…I
was
a wuss…but Vinnie was alive and that’s all that mattered.

Vinnie slid worried eyes over. “Whatever or whoever you were looking for…I saw it in his eyes. He’s the right guy, Dolce, but we gotta split. I might’ve killed him.”

14. Big Moby

I
f my life were a
bowling alley, I was the gutter ball.

Mr. B felt that’s where my life was headed…
in the gutter
. When I punched the clock this afternoon, he spat nails I hadn’t worked at all yesterday. A situation due to the fact I’d been banished to detention. I considered telling him I’d been abducted by the government, but one look at the Christmas tree by the checkout counter and I couldn’t lie.

So I gave them a partial truth which in turn launched Detention Lecture 2.0…yeah, call me an idiot.

“So this Nico Drake,” he gruffed, “do I need to go rough him up?”

Um, he’s already dead
, I said in my mind. “No, but thanks for the offer” was my official response.

Another grunt. “I’d better not be pulling you off of skid row some day, Walker,” he told me. “I love a charity case as much as any other employer, but I don’t invest in idiots.”

He needed to invest in a heart monitor because he was leaned over the counter, sucking the calories out of his fourth ham sandwich. I watched a greasy bite enter his mouth, knowing full well he’d taken another sixty seconds off his life.

He wasn’t through yet…unfortunately. “Were you drunk?”

“I wish,” I muttered.

He threw out a JC, and he wasn’t praying. “You need to straighten up, Walker. God has plans for you. He’s watching.”

This coming from a man who should have AA on his speed dial. “He’s watching?” I mumbled.

“Yeah, an eye for a porkin’ eye.”

That statement didn’t even fit within the context of the conversation.

Mr. B had been up in my business for the past hour and a half, his jean suspenders hanging from one fat shoulder. He’d splashed eggnog—schnapps was my guess—all over my shirt. I wore my normal uniform of black yoga pants, Chuck Taylor sneakers, and bookstore t-shirt that bragged, “Belinski’s is the Bomb”
on the front. Now the bomb smelled like hard liquor.

It was nine o’clock, and I closed out the cash register, waiting for Dylan to pick me up so we could eat a late dinner at Big Moby’s. Somehow I’d made it through the day without raiding the liquor in the back, and that was a miracle in itself. Vinnie and I immediately went to his home and ditched our clothing. He took the bag with him back to Ohio State with the promise, “I’ll take care of it.”

To that, I had no doubt.

Vinnie’s will to survive might be greater than mine.

We didn’t know what to do about Nico Drake but assumed his parents would issue a missing person’s report sometime soon.

Even so, I still had my eyes on the prize despite the fact that A) Vinnie and I’d been shot at this morning; B) we found human remains in a closet; C) Nico Drake’s dead body was mysteriously present; and D) a large possibility existed Vinnie might’ve killed someone. I’d had the local news rolling since arriving at one o’clock, but not one single thing went over the airwaves about gunfire at 9139 Calypso Cove Drive—what I now referred to as The Bates Motel. That being said, it was paramount I inform Tito about the things and bodies I’d discovered. Trouble was, I hadn’t quite figured out how to open that can of worms. If, in fact, Vinnie accidentally killed Brantley McCoy, a chance existed he could be arrested. Heck, they might even say he knocked off Nico Drake too out of vengeance for me. How, you say, would authorities know to look for Vinnie? Let’s not forget Vinnie drives a pink VW Bug…complete with eyelashes. If they went CSI on the scene, they’d discover the Bug was a one-of-a-kind in the Cincinnati area, and although I could swear no one saw us, I couldn’t say for sure.

My brain was spent. Getting shot at sort of ruined anything. I ugly-cried the whole way home, my eyes currently so red they looked like a newborn vampire’s. Plus Dylan’s and my discussion weighed on my mind. He’d accused me of “editing our conversations,” as if it was as devastating as finding out your spouse cheated on you. No, what was freaking devastating was getting freaking shot at.

Ugh…

“Have you learned your lesson?” Mr. B grunted.

I punched the register door shut, dusting the breadcrumbs into my hand that’d fallen from his sandwich. I didn’t think we had rats, but random breadcrumbs were one surefire way to attract vermin. I dropped them into the waste can and removed the clear plastic trash bag, tying it at the top.

I reiterated exactly what I’d told Murphy. “I’m extremely remorseful, and I will never embarrass you or my family again. I plan on being a productive citizen of society, and you have my word you won’t be reading about me in the prison round-up.”

Because I don’t plan on getting caught.

Apparently, that’s all he needed to hear. He ran his greasy hand through my ponytail and lumbered back toward the break room where Chichi, real name Conchita Diaz, was preparing to read his palm.

From Ecuador, Chichi stood about five foot five with shiny, black hair and eyes that were burgundy. Her claim to fame was reading palms and tealeaves. She saw your future and those who’d make the biggest dent in your life. To the best of my knowledge, she operated on one hundred percent prophetic status. Pretty impressive for a seventeen-year-old; although, it smelled of BS.

Tonight, she planned to dispatch a communiqué from the spirit world on Mr. B’s immediate future. To rephrase, could he get by with killing the “porkin’ scum of the earth that porked up his place” last night after closing? No windows had been broken, but the outside door had been spray painted with words I didn’t understand nor care to repeat. Thing was, that made two acts of vandalism in a week: Nowacki’s Videos and now here. As a precaution, he closed his bank and credit card accounts, but that wouldn’t do any good if the thief had somehow secured his social security number. The best identity thieves only needed one set of identification for you, and they could uncover the rest.

I made my way to the rear of the store, straightening along the way.

The break room had a lime, faux leather couch made of a washable plastic. Mr. B lay on it like a beached whale while Chichi knelt beside him, closed her eyes, and did a quick meditation to herself.

I flopped down beside them when Chichi took his palm, tracing its deep lines. The moment I was certifiably bored out of my mind, Chichi dropped his hand like it had burned, darting her burgundy eyes over to me in a fit of hysteria. “A bad man will bring harm to Darcy.”

Stand in line
, I thought.

Mr. B looked at her grunting, “What are you talking about?”

Chichi’s gaze held a weight. Like she dealt with something so heavy she couldn’t quite carry it. She explained, “Darcy’s and your destinies are intersecting, and it isn’t good.”

When Mr. B still had that dumber-than-rocks thing going on, I realized Chichi spoke in Spanish—which she only did when she was truly, out-of-her-mind scared.

Rudi, now standing in the doorway, frantically signed, “What’s wrong?”

When I debated an answer, Rudi actually grabbed my hand and squeezed so hard the blood flow cut off. She verbally asked, “What’s happened?”

Chichi’s words would give anyone the urge to pause, but right then headlights shone brightly through the front door, and Mr. Do-the-Right-Thing was moments from busting up the party. This fortune stuff would make Dylan as uneasy as it made Murphy. And it would be déjà vu all over again—someone trying to hurt Darcy—when down deep he couldn’t admit I caused most of my…er, problems.

I bolted off the floor, leaving Chichi and Mr. B with mouths agape. Yelling over my shoulder, I grabbed Rudi’s eyes so she could read my lips. “She said Mr. B’s and my destinies are intersecting, and someone bad might try to cause me harm.”

I didn’t stick around for a play-by-play. I jogged to the front, grabbed my coat and purse, and cut through the door to an arctic blast. Only yesterday we had what was considered a winter heat wave; today I might as well have bathed in liquid nitrogen. The sky sparkled like diamonds under a cloud of white smoke. Snow skies. I knew it deep in my bones, like arthritis that ached to remind you it wasn’t going anywhere.

“Well, aren’t we in a hurry?” Dylan laughed as I settled inside. I leaned forward in the heated leather seat, trying to wriggle inside my coat with darn little success. Dylan placed the Beemer in park, helping me fish my arms through.

My normal greeting wasn’t, “What’s up, bro?” It was a full-bodied hug. I’d never thought that to be weird, but since we’d had a let’s-swap-spit-on-a-regular-basis conversation, it felt weird
beyond
weird.

“Come here and let me love on you,” he murmured.

His charm and impossibly seductive smile was all it took for me to cave. I crawled over the console and buried my face in his neck. Dylan wrapped my ponytail in a fist, and I returned the sentiment, sliding my fingers through his dark locks. They were modern-messy and nothing short of mouthwatering. My dimpled best friend sported a brown turtleneck sweater, a fact I found irritating.

I needed flesh-to-flesh contact.

He pulled back with a strange look on his almost-too-perfect face. “Darc, you reek of alcohol.”

I laughed outright. “A little eggnog spilled on me. No big deal.”

As I tugged my gloves on, he pulled onto Tylersville Road and made his way to Big Moby’s Cheeseburger Shack, leaning over to play with my new silver earrings.

“New,” he grinned, “and extremely expensive.”

“Hanukkah gift number eight,” I explained. Dylan gently fingered the two-inch silver, open-heart earrings. All I knew was the box said Tiffany’s, and Red’s grin was bigger than a Cheshire cat when I slid them on. Hanukkah was extremely good to a non-Jew this year: UGGS, a Coach tote bag, jeggings, gelt, fuzzy black sweater, texting gloves, gift card to Bath & Body Works, & silver dangly earrings.

Hopefully, Big Moby would be spreading the love around too.