Slide was going through the guy’s wallet, shouting, “Jesus wept, there is a god, there’s a shitpile of cash in here, this bastard was seriously carrying, you know what this means, babe?”
She knew what it meant-her new boyfriend was seriously deranged. The casual violence, the way he’d chopped down the poor guy. There was something romantic about it, but still.
She said, “Did you have to, you know, go so far?”
Slide gave her a mega smile, crooned, “I did it my way.”
Slide was modeling the Rolex, turning it on his wrist, letting the light bounce off of it. Angela was thinking, So, how come you get the watch? You wanna tell me that?
But Slide was high all right-wired on the blood and the violence, pacing the room, his eyes neon lit with frenzy. Once again, he was seriously reminding Angela of Dillon, that psycho poet nut job, but it was possible that Slide was even more out there, really way perched on the precipice.
Now he was speaking, the words spilling over themselves, tumbling out like floods of rap dementia, going, “Babe, we’re a team, we’re on a hot streak and we should keep the level up and I have just the plan to get us some serious wedge, how do you feel about kidnapping?”
And she thought, Kidnapping, another term for marriage without the rings.
She said, “Wait, you mean how do I feel about you kidnapping me?”
“No,” he snapped as if she’d asked a stupid question. “How do you feel about joining up with me in the kidnapping biz?”
So, what, now she was going to be the Irish version of Patty Hearst? Least she’d remember to wash her hair. What was that girl thinking, letting CCTV pick her up on a bad hair day. Christ, you rob a bank, at least make the effort, put a little blusher on, a hint of eyeliner.
She went, “Kidnapping biz?”
He slowed a tad, said, “You’ll have noticed the chains and shite around the house, right?”
Like you could miss them?
Before she could say, You mean it wasn’t a kink? he went, “I’m in the kidnapping biz, a pro, been doing it for a while.”
And fuck, he looked so proud, like he was really doing something important, his bit for the new prosperity. Meanwhile, she was thinking, And how successful have you been? You live in a shithole, can barely buy the drinks, drive a freaking banger, and have to roll some poor schmuck in a car park.
Here he was again, now looking like he was about to bestow some great honor, going, “I’ve decided to let you be my partner.”
She loved decided. Like he’d been deliberating over it and wasn’t she lucky she’d been picked.
Then she thought, A kidnapper, an Irish well-groomed version of Patty Hearst. She had to admit, there was something glamorous about it. And if you did it right, shite, there could be a real payoff. Christ, wouldn’t she just kill to be rich?
She asked, “But nobody gets hurt, right?”
He gave her a bashful smile, said, “See, that’s my motto right there, no pain, lotsa gain.”
This from a guy who put broken bottles in strangers’ faces.
She went, “You’re a caring man.”
He literally hung his head, whispered, “I put the C in care. Sometimes, I think I care too much.”
She nodded, thinking the C applied if you meant cunt, then asked, “Have you someone in mind?”
He sang, “You can always get what you want.”
Real pleased he was using can, not can’t.
Then, scaring the shite out of her, he did a hip swivel that was supposedly Jagger, but came off like Jim Carrey in The Mask.
“Go on,” she said. “Who?”
“Who?” he said. “Jagger or Richards, one of those fookers. The Stones are in town, and someone’d pay plenty to get those lads back alive.”
“The Rolling Stones,” she said.
He looked at her, nodded.
She said, “You want to kidnap the Rolling Stones? That’s your plan?”
“The fook’s wrong with it?” he said.
The idea started to grow on her. The Stones weren’t so young anymore, probably couldn’t run like they’d’ve been able to back when.
But would there be room here for the lads? And of course she’d need a whole new wardrobe. Mick liked his women in the newest gear. God, she was already seeing Mick’s lips on her neck. So, okay, he had a few wrinkles but fuck, he still had those buns and, come on, if you haven’t sucked a Stone, have you really lived? Have you?
She could see herself on Oprah, Oprah’s fattish face, full of curiosity, asking, And when did Mick give you the diamond ring? Then Angela would modestly flash the huge stone on her engagement finger. She’d make a joke about it, go, “I’ve got my Stone all right.” She pictured her and Mick spending winters in the south of France, and lots of little Stones with Angela’s eyes.
“So what do you say?” Slide said. “You in or out?”
Imagining herself and Mick getting married on an exclusive island off the coast of Who The Fook Cares, Angela sang in a voice much worse than Slide’s: “Wild horses…won’t keep me away…”
Seven
“OK,” I said. “Forget the whole thing.” “Really?”
“Order are orders,” I said. “The alternative is anarchy and chaos.”
Max Fisher was the shit all right. He was living it up-the kingpin of New York, another goddamn Scarface. His crib-he called it FisherLand-was a penthouse sublet on East Sixty-sixth Street and Second Avenue. He’d always liked the building because it was made of dark black glass, like the windows of a limo, and to Max, it oozed class, was a place The Donald would’ve loved before he started naming buildings after himself.
Yeah, everything was going Max’s way, all right. He was making five grand a week in profit as what he liked to call himself, “a high-end crack dealer.” He had the freshest clothes, a live-in sushi chef named Katsu, and best of all he was getting some of the finest poontang in the city from his steady ho, Felicia, a former stripper he’d known from Legz Diamond.
Yeah, it was hard to believe how far Max’s life had come since that weekend from hell in Alabama.
How many other slick brothers like himself could’ve got out of that hole? No cash, a chink in your ass, literally, and not only had he kissed that shithole goodbye, but he’d set up a mini-empire in Manhattan. And we’re not talking years here, buddy. He’d put this shit together in-what was it that Irish cunt used to say? — oh, yeah, jig time.
Where was that Irish bitch now? he wondered. If the curse he’d paid to have put on her worked, she was probably in an Irish prison, sucking some prison guard’s meat in the hope of a free lunch. Yeah, Angela had fucked Max over but good, but who was laughing now, bitch? Who was the player in the toughest game in town and who was on her knees, taking it large in some skank Irish prison? Huh? Huh?
Man, if Max had known the crack business would be such a gold mine, he wouldn’t have wasted years of his life selling goddamn computer networks.
The thing was, unlike a lot of businesses, it was so easy to get the ball rolling as a crack dealer. The startup costs were miniscule, and the obstacles to entry were virtually non-existent. All he needed was product and steady customers. And the great thing about the business was you didn’t have to worry about shit like “competing technology.” Once you hooked a customer, he was yours for life.
The way Max got the action started: a week after he’d hightailed it out of Alabama, Kyle had sent a mule, some high school kid, up to the city with Max’s first supply of rock. He had the merchandise; all he needed was the customers. In his days as head honcho, Max had had to do with whatever was necessary to close sales, including, for many important clients, scoring coke. Max figured that all had to do was “transition” the fucks from coke to crack and he’d make a mint. Easy, right? And of course Kyle had been all for the idea, even though the putz was only getting twenty percent, and it was twenty percent of the profits, and Max had no intention of paying it to him anyway. Poor fuckin’ Kyle. The kid was so in love with the idea of having a foursome with the blond bimbos that if Max had told him to go up to Harlem and stand in front of the Magic Johnson movie theater wearing a FUCK YOU, NIGGERS T-shirt, the stupid moron would’ve done it.