Rough Men (8 page)

“I want to go talk to Jason Wixom.”

“Jason Wixom?” Isaac said, then began shaking his head back and forth. “No way, Will. No fucking way. That’s beyond just a bad idea; that’s fucking suicide.”

“He might be able to get us information that the cops can’t.”

“Yeah, he might. He also might beat the shit out of you, put a bullet in your eye, pull out all your teeth, cut off your hands, and bury you in pits of quicklime out by Dorr.”

“He was never that bad.”

“You ran with a bad bunch, and he was the worst of the lot. Not to mention your old partner Wixom just might still harbor a little bit of a grudge about you taking that unexplained vacation day and then getting off scot-free while he went to go sit in Jackson for five years. Amazing to me you never heard from him when he got out, to clear up that little question. That’s the sort of thing that would make anyone curious, if not a little angry, much less a guy like Jason. Besides, how in the hell would you even go about finding him?”

“I know where he works,” Will said. “I heard in the bar he owns a tattoo shop on the west side of town. And as for him not coming after me, by the time he got out I had a five-year-old son, and he’d had enough of being locked up. All that time must have made asking why I stayed home and watched TV instead of going to jail with him seem less important.”

“OK, so you can find him, great. But I guarantee he knew you worked in a bar, just like you knew about him tattooing. If he wanted to be buddies, why wouldn’t he have come by and bent your ear while you served him a few pints of Founders?”

“I don’t really care why he didn’t come by or what he thinks about me and why I might’ve stayed away that day. I’m going to talk to him. I’m asking if you’ll come with me, and that’s it. As much as I appreciate your advice, that’s not what I need right now. Unless you have criminal ties still—and we both know that you don’t—Jason is the only person we know with a chance to help us.”

“What are you going to tell Ally?”

“That we’re going grocery shopping.”

“She’ll believe that?”

“She knows I don’t lie to her anymore.”

“So you’re going to break that trust by lying again.”

“It’s not like I have a choice.”

T
hey took Isaac’s car, Will giving directions as they drove through the blowing snow and ice-covered streets.
His fingers kept finding the Sig Sauer in its shoulder holster, feeling the gun over and over again to be sure it was there and, once reassured, repeating the action again. He was nervous in an indescribable way, as though his whole life had somehow led to this moment, and it still might end up being meaningless.

Alison had said little about them leaving, other than to help put together a list of groceries they needed. And they did need food. Even eating as little as they had been, three adults were churning through what he and Alison had picked up the week before.

Before.

List in hand, discreetly holstered pistol under his jacket, Will had ventured with his brother into the snow and aboard Isaac’s Toyota Camry.

“I think we should wait to get groceries,” Will said. “If something bad happens, it’d be a waste of money to have gotten them first.”

Isaac gave a laugh like a cough. “That’s very thrifty thinking. You trying to get me to turn the car around?”

“No. I just think we should go talk to Jason first. You know, just get it over with. We’re both just going to be on edge until we do it. I’m a wreck.”

“Yeah, I noticed. You need to cool it with that gun shit. If Wixom is like he used to be, he’ll have you dead before you unzip your coat to get that thing out.”

Will scowled at his brother. “I’m not planning on trying to get the drop on him. This is just insurance. And it’s not like we’re going to walk in and get frisked. He’s running a business, and we’re going to go in and ask for a few minutes of his time. He’ll either oblige us or tell us to get the fuck out, and if he does the latter, then I’ll plead our case. The gun is in case he tries to do something else, which, yeah, with a guy like Jason, is a possibility. I don’t want to have to use it, but better to have it and not need it than to need it and not have it.”

“Yeah, and better to not get caught with it when you’re already dealing with someone who hates you. He sees that gun, he’ll know we’re not all smiles.”

“I’m not leaving it in the car.”

“I don’t want you to,” said Isaac as he pulled the Toyota off the highway. “I’m just being honest with you. If you need to use it, you need to just use it, not think about it.”

Isaac parked the car in front of the shop. The building was old but not as decrepit as the rest of the neighborhood, which appeared to be doing a brisk business in liquor sales, massage work done by “American girls,” and the sale of cheap—but not chain—fast food.

The tattoo shop was painted blue, and the most recent coat looked like it probably should’ve been scraped and redone about two years prior. The window was full of a mixture of neon signs, flyers, and advertising. The neon said things like,
PIERCING
$25 or
TATTOO
, but most promising was
OPEN
.

Will closed the door on the Camry, walked around the vehicle, and stepping ahead of his brother, opened the door to the shop.

A bell chimed with the door, and though Will didn’t jump, the noise made him tense. There was a glass countertop full of
jewelry directly in front of him, and behind that was a skinny girl whose arms looked as though they’d seen a few practice sessions. She had the grayish pallor that tends to suggest a history with either heroin or time served, if not both. There was a scarab tattooed on her throat, and Will stared at the dancing bug as she said, “Can I help you with something?” There was no mistaking the irritation in her voice.

It wasn’t like Will and Isaac were dressed well, and the car wasn’t a showpiece by any means, but still, it was obvious this wasn’t a world they belonged to anymore, if they ever had.
This is what happens if you keep fucking up and none of your friends shoots you
, thought Will.

Smiling at the girl, he said, “We’re here to talk to Jason.”

“Yeah? Do you have an appointment?”

“No. I’m an old friend.”

“Acquaintance,” interjected Isaac. “We knew him a long time ago. It’s been a while.”

She didn’t care enough to respond beyond sliding off her stool and walking into the back. A stereo clicked on playing AC/DC, and the girl returned a couple minutes later.

“Sorry, no dice. Says he’s busy.”

“Tell him Will Daniels is here to talk to him.”

She sighed. “Is that name going to mean anything to him? ’Cause he gets mad pretty easy, and he’s got a bad hangover. Might be you want to make an appointment, hope for the best.”

“Tell him Will Daniels is here to talk to him.”

She smirked at him. “If that’s your hard look, you might want to work on getting a new one. I’m going to ask one more time, and when I come back and tell you he said to fuck off, you two are going to fuck off.”

She disappeared into the back of the store again and was back faster this time.

“Jason says to come on back.” She was smiling, and his stomach dropped to his feet. Will’s bravado had been stripped clean
by her Sicilian smile, and the pistol under his coat may as well have been back at the house for all the good it would do him should he fumble to retrieve it.

She led them down a short hallway that had a door on either side of it and another one at the end. They walked through the door on the right, and the girl left them in the room, closing the door behind her as she left.

Sitting on a stool was Jason. Next to him, on a steel cart, were a pair of tattoo guns, and next to them was a different kind of gun, a revolver. Will stared at it with a lump in his throat before turning his attention back to Jason.

His old friend had a stomach that was stretching his shirt taut, the kind of belly earned by cheap food and cheaper booze. He had on an American flag bandanna, and coming out of the bottom of the back of it was a gray braid that lay over his right shoulder and hung almost to his belly. His arms, hands, and neck were covered in tattoos, gray ones that looked like the kind from prison and colored ones that looked like the kind that weren’t. His ears bore two large hoops, silver and thick as pencils, each holding silver beads at its center.

Jason did not stand when they entered, nor did he offer them a seat. “Will Daniels,” he said. “And is that your brother with you? Older, right? I don’t recognize you, but the same family is in both faces.”

Will thought about that statement, his eyes poring over Jason’s familiar and yet foreign face.

“Yeah,” said Isaac, “I’m his brother.” He extended a hand and said, “Name’s I—”

“I don’t give a ruddy fuck what your name is,” said Jason. “I’m curious about why in the fuck you’re here, and once I figure out why, I’m going to run you out of my fucking shop, all right? I have a feeling I’m going to be amused for about thirty seconds, tops.” He turned his attention back to Will. “C’mon,
William.
Spit it out, author-boy. Why are you slumming with your old buddy?”

Will was taken aback. Jason had obviously made some effort to follow his life. His books had sold well, but not that well. Yet Jason knew enough to know he’d published them under
William Daniels
, not
Will.

Will collected himself as best he was able and got on with it. “I’m here to talk to you about my son.”

“Bad start, Will. I’m already bored.”

“My son was killed a little less than a week ago after being involved in a bank robbery.”

“All right, I think I know the one,” said Jason, who winked at him. “Much better start. Now I’m interested.”

“He was killed in an abandoned barn, shot in the head, and then burned to death with some of the evidence.”

“No honor among thieves, right, Will? That’s nothing new there, just how it is. Like when I got penned up and you walked. Just how it is.”

There it was. “I wasn’t there when you got busted.”

“You were there enough other times,” Jason growled. “And we were
expecting
you that night. Waited for you, even, until I said we needed to get on with it.”

“I was tired of doing that stuff. Just dumb luck I wasn’t there, nothing more.”

“Dumb luck.”

It was all Will could do to hold the man’s gaze, but he knew he damn well better. “Lucky, lucky you. You might be the luckiest fucker I know,
William
.”

“Look,” said Will, “I’m here to ask you to help me find the men who killed my son.”

There followed a long, long moment in which Will fell into the blackness of the other man’s eyes and spun down and down in it. It was fine with him. It matched his own blackness, and he found he didn’t mind the company.

It was Jason who pulled out first. “Will, listen to me,” he said, “and then get the fuck out of here. Even if I could help you find
the men who killed your son, I wouldn’t. You know why? You’re not the type for that kind of work. I mean, really, what are you going to do, ask them for a fucking apology? I can see you’ve got a gun in your shirt right now, and it’s just fucking ridiculous on you. You need to get the fuck out of here and forget that this conversation ever happened, all right? Just take your brother and go back to your little house, maybe add this to one of your stories and tell your faggot writer friends about how involved you get in your writing. Either the police will catch them or not. They probably won’t, and that’ll be that.”

“I need you to help me find the men who killed my son,” Will said, “and you’re going to do it.”

Jason’s eyebrows lifted. “Will,” he said, “this is no longer funny, do you understand? I can be a nice enough guy, under the right circumstances, but this ain’t them, and you ain’t a friend. Last chance. Get. The. Fuck. Out.”

“You’re going to help me find the men who killed my son,” said Will, and as he spoke the words, Jason stood from his stool, a sawn-off baseball bat appearing in his right hand like a magic trick. Isaac was grabbing Will’s shoulder, but Will continued. “You’re going to help me find them, because my son could just as easily have had your blood in him as mine.”