The Baddest Ass (Billy Lafitte #3) (3 page)

Then he's gone.

*

West walks right up to the table with his tray, approaches from the back. The man is not sitting alone, but he's not with the guys near him either. He's hunched over. His hair is a mullet-in-training, curling over his collar, short on the sides. Stupid to sit beside him. West makes a wide detour, going to face him. Side of the face—no sideburns. Patchy hair, not enough to call it a beard. Face scarred from too many fights, too many challenges.

The story goes that Lafitte, in gen pop only a week, killed six people in self-defense. Two of them cops. It got him six more life sentences—they didn't want to kill him because they thought he had some intelligence about the terrorists, about the biker gang. But he was a brick wall. In PC, he was polite, quiet, kept to himself. Every last one of them—cops and inmates, even the pervs—hated him. It didn't help that he had "Baby Raper" carved into his chest by a jilted lover, so they say, even though he'd never laid hands on a child that way.

Maybe he'd been a handsome son of a bitch once. Now his cheeks are swollen and his eyes red and his skin pale.

West swallows hard and sits down, not right across from Lafitte, not right next to the others at the table. All by his lonesome. The smell of his food hits him like a fart and he winces. Better food, my ass. Same old slop. But here, at least West knows he'll be able to eat it without worrying about someone stealing it, or stabbing him, or telling him he couldn't sit at such-and-such table. Or telling him he
had
to sit at the Aryan table, now that he had pledged, and the Swastika tattoo on his neck now itches all the time and he thinks of what he can get it turned into when he gets out. Maybe by then they'll have some Star Trek medical shit to take it right off, painless, easy.

He looks at Lafitte. The man has his head down, scrapes his fork around the tray but isn't eating anything. He wears a T-shirt, too small for him. Pants are tight, too. Not punk tight, not girl tight, but everyone wears the shit so baggy that West is surprised. Looking at some sort of throwback. Doing time Retro-Style.

Lafitte says, only loud enough to be heard, "Stop staring at me."

"I wasn't—"

"Didn't tell you to talk. Said stop staring."

West looks down. He picks up his bread, takes a bite. Drinks some water. The gravy is already cold and he doesn't want any of it. Bread. Water. All he needs for now. The only things that keep his stomach from churning.

West says, "I'm new. I'm sorry about, you know, staring. My bad."

Nothing for a moment. The guy closest to West gets up, tray still mostly full. He walks over to another table and sits, leans over and thumbs back at Lafitte and West. The others at West's table have stopped talking altogether.

Lafitte finally says, "It's okay."

"Not looking for trouble."

His lips move. That wasn't a grin, wasn't a scowl. Something. "Let's just eat."

West nods, takes another bite of bread. He looks around the cafeteria to find too many eyes on him. Some shy, some eye-fucking. And standing past them all is Garner. West imagines the cop's eyes are glowing orange like hellfire. Sees a tail whip behind him.

West gulps water before he chokes on bread. Tries a bite of chicken, but it's gone cold and gummy. Shit. Another night of cramps. His favorite meal of the day is breakfast. It's the one he actually eats before he is awake enough to remember what his life is going to be like every day for the next thirty fucking years.

Lafitte finally takes a bite of food. He's slow about it. Chews slowly. Breathes slowly. West thinks this should be like gutting a walrus. Easy. So why haven't they gotten him yet? It's been, what, three years?

West clears his throat, says, "Name's Bryce."

"Didn't ask."

"Just saying."

"Nobody calls you that in here."

Fuck, he was right. "It's what my friends call me. I mean, outside."

Lafitte nodded, turned his eyes towards West. "Good luck with that."

"You got a name?"

A sigh. "You know my name. You know what I'm about. And you're supposed to kill me. So let's get it over with and I can go back to my house."

All eyes on West now. Except Lafitte's. He takes another slow bite. Why is he so calm? Is this what he wants, to bleed out during dinner.

West has the screwdriver with him, tied to his leg. The damn thing cuts him every time he moves. But what's he going to say, right? It isn't a spectator sport. If they all know he's here to kill Lafitte, then they all know how he got here.

West says, "Bullshit, I ain't listening to this."

"Whatever."

"You calling me a liar?" Bowing up a little.

Lafitte pushes his tray away. "I'm saying you're supposed to kill me or someone's going to get to you. You check in and on day one, you strut right up to me. None of this waiting til I'm alone shit. So I figured you'll do it and be done with it and I can get some sleep."

West is on his feet. Everyone watching. Has to be a camera in this joint, too, so even more people watching. He flats his hands on the table top, wide, leans close to Lafitte, dangerous territory, he knows. He says, real low like, "I don't want to kill you, man. I just wanted out of there. I'm the one worried about being killed."

Shrug. "You, me, aren't we all?"

"I'm here to warn you."

Something like a laugh rumbles through Lafitte. Not much. "Thanks for that. I appreciate it."

"We cool?"

Lafitte lifts his eyes. Something's there, something sad. Sad for West? Sad in general? West can tell he doesn't like looking at people, like no matter who he looks at, he's still seeing the same dead face. "Sure. Cool."

West nods, slides his plate closer, the spot across from the biker, and goes to sit.

Lafitte says, "Get the fuck out of here. Get as far away from me as you can, and don't ever crowd my space again."

What's he going to do? West thinks about sitting. Really, gives him an excuse if Lafitte wants to start shit. West has the advantage. But that voice. It digs. It cuts without even getting loud. So West realizes this will take some time, because he doesn't want to kill this lunatic. He's got to figure out a way to get out of this and serve his time in peace and quiet. He lifts his tray from the table and starts off. No eyes watching now.

"Leave the food."

West stands there. Right on the tip of his tongue:
Fuck you, fuck you, fuck you
.

But the food smells ripe and his stomach twirls some more so he bangs the tray down and slides it over, walks away with, "I didn't want none of that shit anyway."

And he hopes ain't one of them fuckers saw how bad his hands were shaking.

They come later. That cop Garner doesn't say a word, just points through the door. West is taking a shit and suspects Garner knew it when he led these guys over. Two of them, one black, one white. The black man looks older, maybe in his fifties. Lot of hair, frizzy. Has to be a snitch. The white man, one of those slippery, hard-to-pin-down ages. Could be twenty-five, could be forty-five. He wears the sort of metal-framed glasses guys stopped wearing in the '80s.

West covers his junk. "Jesus, what the fuck, man?"

The older man sits on the bunk. The slick one leans against the far wall. Garner waits outside, not even looking into the cell. Not good.

The old black man says, "You gonna kill this motherfucker or what?"

"What, I was supposed to do it there and then?"

"Why wait? We want him gone. You're the one. You do it."

West hates being pinned down like this. Wants to pace. Wants to lord over these assholes barging in. Taking a shit these days is a precious and tender thing for West, a thing he doesn't want to share.

The slick one mumbles, but West hears, "He gives us a bad name."

"The fuck, man? What eight-year-old did you fingerbang to get in here, anyway?"

"Eleven. She was eleven. She looked fifteen. Wasn't that how old yours was?"

The older con shakes his head. "No, no, cut that out. Doesn't matter. You checked in, Billy's not dead yet, and every day that's true is bad for you. That's the way it is."

West cramps. He can't let it go, though. They'll hear his gas, the splash, so he clenches and grinds his teeth. Goddamn, it's killing one of his molars, already ground away from four years of meth.

"I knew PC types were pussies, but goddamn, man. You're all scared of him."

"We're
not
. It's just not how it's done."

West almost stands, but his muscles won't let him, not if he wants to hold on. "What is this? Any one of you, uh, like, uh, you'd be a hero. You've had three fucking years, man. What gives?"

He realizes as he says it: he's being set-up. This isn't just about Lafitte. There's more to it. But West can't figure it. Before he can ask, the older man nods at Slick, who starts going through the stuff on West's shelf.

"Hey, no, get him out of there. Hey, Garner!" Lifts his ass from the seat just a little. Feels a burn. "Come on, leave my shit alone!"

"I know you don't have the screwdriver on you." The older man points, runs his finger up and down the length of West. "So where you keep it? Hm?"

He shakes the pillow on the bunk while Slick throws West's few magazines and Bible on the floor. West is on and off. Throws his roll of toilet paper at Slick, then regrets it. It bounces onto the floor, rolls out of the cell. The older man is feeling around on the mattress, finds the pocket he's looking for, and pulls out the screwdriver. "Here it is, Steve."

The slick guy named Steve reaches for it, fixes it in his grip, then steps over to West and presses the point against his neck. West backs away. The sharp point follows, and then he falls off onto the floor beside the toilet, hands over his head, the smell of his shit slapping everyone at the same time.

"Whoa, boy!" The older man is up and over to the door lickety-split. Slick drops the screwdriver into the toilet and follows. West is splashed on his face and neck. Last words from the older man: "Get it done."

And then he's alone, filthy, unable to hold his ass muscles any longer. Goddamn it, he couldn't cry, could he? After all he's been through, they'd never forgive him crying. Which just makes him do it louder.

*

Four more days. He stays out of everyone's way. Not that they stay out of his. Call him "Stank" now. Too many people sneaking up saying, "Boo, motherfucker!" And he jumps and makes the right threats while everyone laughs.

Then Garner shows up and tells West he's got a job. Starts immediately. "Come on."

The cop leads him through the harsh-lit halls to a room with several computers in it, cons working away, oblivious to him. There are printers, a projector, a list on the screen—1) Archive files from 1986-88. 2) Make copies, send to Supervisor. 3) Doublecheck list... and so on. On one end of the room sits Lafitte, looking West's way. He waves the kid over.

West takes a step but Garner grabs him by the arm and hums "Not here, okay?" before letting him keep on. "Don't break anything."

Lafitte keeps pecking as West approaches. "You run a computer?"

Slouches into the chair beside Lafitte. "Sweet. You got internet on this thing?"

"No."

West thumps the keyboard with his knuckles. "Bullshit man, what's this shit anyway? Some sort of job?"

"You get twenty cents an hour. Take it or leave it."

"I'm not a file clerk." Crosses his arms and leans way back.

Lafitte stares at the kid a moment before going back to his work. "Most of it is labeling. They scanned a bunch of old records, or got them off floppy discs. We've got to re-label them and make backups. Easy stuff."

"
Dull
stuff, is what you mean."

Then Lafitte's hand is on the back of West's head, bringing him upright against his will. He doesn't fight it.

"I told them to hire you for this. You want it or do I throw you back?"

"Why should I do their work for them? They ain't done nothing for me. I got plenty to do without this boring shit."

Lafitte takes his hand back, lays it on the mouse and keeps working. He speaks slowly, deliberately. "Trouble is what you get into without this...so this...this is what you...um..." Click. "This is what you want. Something boring. Something monotonous. Something that fills up the minutes and hours and…the...days. It keeps you out of trouble. And it makes the time...go..." Click. "...by that much...faster." Click.

He doesn't say any more. Just steadily clicks and scans the screen. Drags. Scrolls. West sits with his arms crossed. He looks around. Other men doing the same thing as Lafitte. None of them look like they want to kill each other or West or the biker.

West leans towards Lafitte. The man smells dark, like the woods at night. "I don't get it."

"You wanted to warn me about this hit, okay. I didn't need to hear it from you, but you made the effort. I appreciate that. So if that..." Click. "...if that batshit preacher cop is giving you a hard time, let's say I'm returning the favor. I'll keep an eye out, all right? You don't breathe a word." Click. "That's just the way it is."