“So now I don’t have a gun,” Dew said. “What do you have to say now, boy?”
“Right,” Perry said. “Like that’s the only piece you’ve got.”
Dew gave an exaggerated nod. The kid was smarter than he looked. Dew pulled up his right pant leg and drew his Taurus Model 85 .38 revolver from his ankle holster. He emptied the five-round cylinder and dropped the gun on the floor. From his left leg, he took a steel telescoping baton and tossed it across the room into a wastebasket. As soon as he did, he wished he’d kept it. A flick of the wrist would expand the baton from six inches to sixteen inches—instant steel billy club. The cat was out of the bag, though; he couldn’t exactly go back and get it. Dew then reached to the small of his back and extracted his Ka-Bar from its horizontal sheath. Finally he slid his hands into his crotch and removed a black switchblade. The switchblade and the Ka-Bar followed the baton into the wastebasket.
“What the fuck, old man? You going to war or something?”
“Every day, kid, every day. Now, unless you’re going to give me a body-cavity search for the frag grenade I carry up my poop-chute, you’re gonna have to take my word for it that I’m disarmed. So are we gonna do this, or are you just gonna sit there wankin’ your crank?”
“Are you serious, old man? Look at you. Gut hanging out. I see you sometimes limping and shit. I hit you half as hard as I can, I’ll probably kill you.”
“I’m not your little butt-buddy Bill,” Dew said quietly.
Perry’s eyes widened, a combination of rage and shame.
“You’re a big man, Dawsey,” Dew said. “Killing someone who weighed all of a buck-fifty soaking wet.”
“Don’t you talk about him,” Dawsey said in a quiet voice that sent goose bumps up Dew’s back.
Dew smiled his best asshole smile. “What’s the matter, pussy? You don’t want to take a swing at me? Maybe I can find a midget around here somewhere. Maybe a baby, or a fat woman, or an eighty-year-old grandmother. But that won’t work, because those people wouldn’t be your friends. They wouldn’t be your best friend. Someone who trusted you, who tried to help you.”
Dawsey’s hands curled up into cinder-block-size fists. “It wasn’t my fault,” he said in that same quiet voice. “I… I wasn’t in control.”
“Sure you weren’t,” Dew said. “It’s called accountability, boy. If you actually had any discipline, your little faggot friend would still be alive.”
Perry reached down with his left hand, across his body, and grabbed the right corner of the table. He lifted and threw in one motion, effortlessly flipping the table to his left. It smashed into the wall, legs breaking on impact. The empty .45 bounced across the carpet.
Dew waited.
A snarling Perry Dawsey raised his right fist. Huge muscles rippling, he stepped forward to throw a haymaker.
And just when Perry took that step, Dew flicked the bullet at Perry’s face.
The bullet bounced off Perry’s forehead. He blinked and flinched, an automatic reaction caused by something flying at his face. He turned his head just a little, his fist hung in the air, and he took an instinctive shuffle-step to maintain his balance as momentum pulled him forward.
Dew opened his right hand, making the space between his thumb and pointer finger as wide as possible. He stepped into the oncoming monster, snapping forward with his horizontal open hand. The crook of his thumb smashed into Dawsey’s throat. Dew held back a little—any harder and he would have broken Dawsey’s windpipe, making him suffocate to death. He wanted to hurt the guy, not kill him.
Not yet, anyway.
Dawsey’s hands shot to his neck, and his eyes scrunched tightly shut. He made a single noise, part-cough, part-gag.
Then Dew Phillips thumbed him in the left eye.
Perry flinched away again, turning his head to the left to protect the eye, left hand coming up to cover it, right hand staying clutched at his throat. He couldn’t breathe. He couldn’t see.
Dew stepped forward to kick Dawsey in the knee, but the big man flailed his fist in a wild arc that caught Dew’s right shoulder. The force spun Dew all the way around, and he fell hard, knocking over the table full of open briefcases. Dew felt the sting of a cut on his right temple, and only a second later a bit of blood came trickling down.
Dew had been in hundreds of fights, and he’d never been hit that hard.
He scrambled to his feet. He tried to move his right arm but couldn’t—it was numb and unresponsive.
Dawsey was still coughing, still trying to draw a breath, still keeping his watering left eye turned away, still swinging wildly and blindly back and forth with his right hand. Dew skirted the wall to the broken table. With his left hand, he picked up a table leg by the thinner end. The leg’s thick top made it look like a polished wooden mace.
Dew stepped forward and swung it low. The thick wood slammed into Dawsey’s right knee. Dawsey cried out, his throat capable of producing only a hoarse whisper. He dropped, left knee and right hand holding his weight.
“You want discipline?” Dew said. “I’ll give you discipline.”
Dew swung the table leg in a big arc and brought it down on Perry’s head. The skin split open instantly, blood spilling out of a two-inch-long gash that stained his blond hair. Despite the cut, Dawsey barely flinched. His right lid fluttered open a bit, but his left stayed pinched shut. From his half-crouch, he lunged forward, both hands reaching out.
Dew Phillips calmly scooted backward and jabbed the table leg into Perry’s mouth, splitting his lip on impact.
Perry fell flat on his face, then put his hands down and tried to rise.
“You’re going to play ball,” Dew said. He brought the table leg around in another vicious arc, the club end whistling through the air before it landed on Dawsey’s back with a meaty thud. Dawsey let out another choking hiss and fell on his face again.
“You’re going to do it because it’s the right thing to do.” Dew whipped the table leg in a low swing that hit Perry’s right side, crunching into the younger man’s ribs. Perry rolled to his left, curling up into a near-fetal ball. He still couldn’t see, squinting eyes betraying his blindness. Blood covered his head, poured from his mouth. His knees curled up to his chest, and his hands stuck out in front of him, trying to ward off the attack.
Dew swung again, as hard as he could this time. The club head hit Dawsey’s right thigh. Dawsey managed to push a deep scream out through his choking throat.
“I don’t want any more shit out of you,” Dew said. He swung the leg and hit the thigh again, knowing that it would hurt far worse the second time. “Are you going to stop being such a prick?”
“Stop!” Perry shouted. “Please!”
“You begging for your life, Dawsey? Like your friend Bill did? Like those triangle hosts did?”
“I was helping them!” His voice sounded like he’d gargled broken glass.
Dew jabbed the leg straight forward, hitting Dawsey in the forehead. The wood-on-wood sound accompanied another cut, this one longer than the first and bleeding even worse.
“Helping them? You psycho fuck, maybe I should just beat you to death right here!”
“No!” Still on his side, knees up to his chest, Perry waved his hands blindly.
Dew raised the table leg for another shot to Dawsey’s ribs. He wanted to make this boy hurt.
Perry’s voice was half-scream, half-cry. “Don’t hit me any more, Daddy!