Hostage (2001) (2 page)

The minimart was on Flanders Road, a rural boulevard that linked several expensive housing tracts. Four pump islands framed a bunkerlike market that sold toiletries, soft drinks, booze, and convenience items. Dennis pulled up behind the building so they couldn't be seen from inside, the Nissan bucking as he downshifted. The transmission was a piece of shit.

'Look at this, man. The fuckin' place is dead. It's perfect.'

'C'mon, Dennis, this is stupid. We'll get caught.'

'I'm just gonna see, is all. Don't give yourself a piss enema.'

The parking lot was empty except for a black Beemer at the pumps and two bicycles by the front door. Dennis's heart was pounding, his underarms clammy even in the awful dry heat that sapped his spit. He would never admit it, but he was nervous. Fresh off the Farm, he didn't want to go back, but he didn't see how they could get caught, or what could go wrong. It was like being swept along by a mindless urge. Resistance was futile.

Cold air rolled over him as Dennis pushed inside. Two kids were at the magazine rack by the door. A fat Chinaman was hunkered behind the counter, so low that all Dennis could see was his head poking up like a frog playing submarine in a mud puddle.

The minimart was two aisles and a cold case packed with beer, yogurt, and Cokes. Dennis had a flash of uncertainty, and thought about telling Mars and Kevin that a whole pile of Chinamen were behind the counter so he could get out of having to rob the place, but he didn't. He went to the cold case, then along the rear wall to make sure no one was in the aisles, his heart pounding because he knew he was going to do it. He was going to rob this fucking place. As he was walking back to the truck, the Beemer pulled away. He went to the passenger window. To Mars.

'There's nothing but two kids and a Chinaman in there, the Chinaman behind the counter, a fat guy.'

Kevin said, 'They're Korean.'

'What?'

'The sign says "Kim." Kim is a Korean name.'

That was Kevin, always with something to say like that. Dennis wanted to reach across Mars and grab Kevin by the fucking neck. He pulled up his T-shirt to flash the butt of his pistol.

'Who gives a shit, Kevin? That Chinaman is gonna shit his pants when he sees this. I won't even have to take it out, goddamnit. Thirty seconds, we'll be down the road. He'll have to wipe himself before he calls the cops.'

Kevin squirmed with a case of the chicken-shits, his nerves making his eyes dance around like beans in hot grease.

'Dennis, please. What are we going to get here, a couple of hundred bucks? Jesus, let's go to the movie.'

Dennis told himself that he might have driven away if Kevin wasn't such a whiner, but, no, Kevin had to put on the goddamned pussy face, putting Dennis on the spot.

Mars was watching. Dennis felt himself flush, and wondered if Mars was judging him. Mars was a boulder of a guy; dense and quiet, watchful, with the patience of a rock. Dennis had noticed that about Mars on the job site; Mars considered people. He would watch a conversation, say, like when two of the Mexicans hammered a third to throw in with them on buying some tamales. Mars would watch, not really part of it but above it, as if he could see all the way back to when they were born, see them wetting the bed when they were five or jerking off when they thought they were alone. Then he would make a vacant smile like he knew everything they might do now or in the future, even about the goddamned tamales. It was creepy, sometimes, that expression on his face, but Mars thought that Dennis had good ideas and usually went along. First time they met, four days ago, Dennis felt that his destiny was finally at hand. Here was Mars, charged with some dangerous electrical potential that crackled under his skin, and he did whatever Dennis told him.

'Mars, we're gonna do this. We're robbing this fuckin' store.'

Mars climbed out of the truck, so cool that even heat like this couldn't melt him.

'Let's do it.'

Kevin didn't move. The two kids pedaled away.

'No one's here, Kevin! All you have to do is stand by the door and watch. This fat fuck will cough right up with the cash. They're insured, so they just hand over the cash. They get fired if they don't.'

Dennis grabbed his brother's T-shirt. The Lemonheads, for chrissake. His fucking brother was a lemonhead. Mars was already halfway to the door.

'Get out of the truck, you turd. You're making us look bad.'

Kevin wilted and slid out like a fuckin' baby.

JUNIOR KIM, JR.

KIM'S MINIMART

Junior Kim, Jr., knew a cheese dip when he saw one.

Junior, a second-generation Korean-American, had put in sixteen years behind a minimart counter in the Newton area of Los Angeles. Down in Shootin' Newton (as the LAPD called it), Junior had been beaten, mugged, stabbed, shot at, clubbed, and robbed forty-three times. Enough was enough. After sixteen years of that, Junior, his wife, their six children, and all four grandparents had bailed on the multicultural melting pot of greater LA, and moved north to the far less dangerous demographic of bedroom suburbia.

Junior was not naive. A minimart, by its nature, draws cheese dips like bad meat draws flies. Even here in Bristo Camino, you had your shoplifters (mostly teenagers, but often men in business suits), your paperhangers (mostly women), your hookers passing counterfeit currency (driven up from LA by their pimps), and your drunks (mostly belligerent white men sprouting gin blossoms). Lightweight stuff compared to LA, but Junior believed in being prepared. After sixteen years of hard-won inner-city lessons, Junior kept 'a little something' under the counter for anyone who got out of hand.

When three cheese dips walked in that Friday afternoon, Junior leaned forward so that his chest touched the counter and his hands were hidden.

'May I help you?'

A skinny kid in a Lemonheads T-shirt stayed by the door. An older kid in a faded black wife-beater and a large man with a shaved head walked toward him, the older kid raising his shirt to show the ugly black grip of a pistol. 'Two packs of Marlboros for my friend here and all the cash you got in that box, you gook motherfucker.'

Junior Kim could read a cheese dip a mile away.

His face impassive, Junior fished under the counter for his 9mm Glock. He found it just as the cheese dip launched himself over the counter. Junior lurched to his feet, bringing up the Glock as the black-shirted dip crashed into him. Junior hadn't expected this asshole to jump over the counter, and hadn't been able to thumb off the safety.

The larger man shouted, 'He's got a gun!'

Everything happened so quickly that Junior wasn't sure whose hands were where. The black shirt forgot about his own gun and tried to twist away Junior's. The big guy reached across the counter, also grabbing for the gun. Junior was more scared now than any of the other times he had pulled his weapon. If he couldn't release the safety before this kid pulled his own gun, or wrestled away Junior's, Junior knew that he would be fucked. Junior Kim was in a fight for his life.

Then the safety slipped free, and Junior Kim, Jr., knew that he had won.

He said, 'I gotcha, you dips.'

The Glock went off, a heavy 9mm explosion that made the cheese dip's eyes bulge with a terrible surprise.

Junior smiled, victorious.

'Fuck you.'

Then Junior felt the most incredible pain in his chest. It filled him as if he were having a heart attack. He stumbled back into the Slurpee machine as the blood spilled out of his chest and spread across his shirt. Then he slid to the floor.

The last thing Junior heard was the cheese dip by the door, shouting, 'Dennis! Hurry up! Somebody's outside!'

MARGARET HAMMOND,

Outside at the second pump island, Margaret Hammond heard a car backfire as she climbed from her Lexus.

Margaret, who lived across the street in a tile-roofed home that looked exactly like a hundred others in her development, saw three young white males run out of the minimart and get into a red Nissan pickup truck, which lurched away with the jumpy acceleration that tells you the clutch is shot. It headed west toward the freeway.

Margaret locked the pump nozzle to fill her tank, then went into the minimart to buy a Nestle's Crunch chocolate bar, which she intended to eat before she got home.

Less than ten seconds later, by her own estimation, Margaret Hammond ran back into the parking lot. The red Nissan had disappeared. Margaret used her cell phone to call 911, who patched her through to the Bristo Camino Police Department.

Their voices overlapped, Kevin grabbing Dennis's arm, making the truck swerve. Dennis punched him away.

'You killed that guy! You shot him!'

'I don't know if he's dead or what!'

'There was fucking blood everywhere! It's all over you!'

'Stop it, Kevin! He had a fuckin' gun! I didn't know he would have a gun! It just went off!'

Kevin pounded the dash, bouncing between Dennis and Mars like he was going to erupt through the roof.

'We're fucked, Dennis, fucked! What if he's dead?!'

'SHUT UP!'

Dennis licked his lips, tasting copper and salt. He glanced in the rearview. His face was splattered with red dew. Dennis lost it then, certifiably freaked out because he'd eaten human blood. He swiped at his face, wiping the blood on his jeans.

Mars touched him.

'Dude. Take it easy.'

'We've gotta get away!'

'We're getting away. No one saw us. No one caught us. We're fine.'

Mars sat quietly in the shotgun seat. Kevin and Dennis were wild, but Mars was as calm as if he had just awakened from a trance. He was holding the Chinaman's gun.

'Fuck! Throw it out, dude! We might get stopped.'

Mars pushed the gun into his waistband, then left his hand there, holding it the way some men hold their crotch.

'We might need it.'

Dennis upshifted hard, ignoring the clash of gears as he threw the Nissan toward the freeway two miles ahead. At least four people had seen the truck. Even these dumb Bristo cops would be able to put two and two together if they had witnesses who could tie them to the truck.

'Listen, we gotta think. We gotta figure out what to do.'

Kevin's eyes were like dinner plates.

'Jesus, Dennis, we gotta turn ourselves in.'

Dennis felt so much pressure in his head that he thought his eyes were swelling.

'No one's turning themselves in! We can get outta this! We just gotta figure out what to do!'

Mars touched him again.

'Listen.'

Mars was smiling at nothing. Not even looking at them.

'We're just three guys in a red truck. There's a million red trucks.'

Dennis desperately wanted to believe that.

'You think?'

'They've got to find witnesses. If they find those two kids or the woman, then those people have to describe us. Maybe they can, but maybe they can't. When the cops get all that sorted out, then they have to start looking for three white guys in a red truck. You know how many red trucks there are?'

'A million.'

'That's right. And how long does all that take? The rest of the day? Tomorrow? We can be across the border in four hours. Let's go down to Mexico.'

The vacant smile was absolutely sure of itself. Mars was so calm that Dennis found himself convinced; it was as if Mars had run this path before and knew the turns.

'That's a fucking plan, Mars. That's a plan. We can kick back for a few days, then come back when everything blows over. It always blows over.'

'That's right.'

Dennis pushed harder on the accelerator, felt the transmission lag, and then a loud BANG came from under the truck. The transmission let go. Six hundred dollars. Cash. What did he expect?

'MotherFUCKing piece of SHIT!'

The truck lost power, bucking as Dennis guided it off the road. Even before it lurched to a stop, Dennis shoved open the door, desperate to run. Kevin caught his arm, holding him back.

'There's nothing we can do, Dennis. We're only making it worse.'

'Shut up!'

Dennis shook off his brother's hand and slid out of the truck. He searched up and down the road, half expecting to see a highway patrol car, but the cars were few and far between and those were mostly soccer moms. Flanders Road from here to the freeway cut through an area of affluent housing developments. Some of the communities were gated, but most weren't, though most were hidden from the road by hedges that masked heavy stone walls. Dennis looked at the hedges, and the walls that they hid. He wondered if escape lay beyond them.

It was like Mars read his mind.

'Let's steal a car.'

Dennis looked at the wall again. On the other side of it would be a housing development filled with cars. They could crash into a house, tie up the soccer mom to buy some time, and drive.

Dennis didn't think about it any more than that.