The Hard Bounce - страница 63

“Fuck your mother,” Snake said.

“Fair enough. One chance. Where’s the body?”

The question stuck in my chest like a barb.

Snake got out one puzzled, “Huh?”

As the stun gun crackled, it suddenly popped into my head just what a bonehead move we-well, Junior-were about to make.

Par for the course, I realized it one second too goddamn late.

“Junior, no! He’s-”

I wasn’t fast enough. Junior applied an electric charge to a man we’d dumped a pot of water on. Junior was still soaked from the rain. I didn’t know the math or physics of it, but I knew that electricity plus water makes bad.

Big bad.

Snake shrieked and convulsed. Junior hollered and flew back as though struck by lightning. Snake slumped into his seat, unconscious. Junior bounced into the wall and came down hard on his ass.

“Ohhhh,” Junior groaned and hugged himself. “That sucked so, so bad.”

I walked over to Snake and placed my thumb under his ear. He still had a pulse. Good. I wasn’t done yet.

The bedroom door clicked. I froze. Junior looked to the door, then at me, then back to the bedroom. The door stuck a little from the humidity and then pulled opened. A girl in sweats walked out, yawning and rubbing her eyes. Freshly dyed black hair hung over a big shiner on her right eye. Her iPod was turned up so loud I could hear the bass line across the room. She hadn’t heard a thing.

Cassandra Donnelly stared at the three of us, just as flabbergasted as we were.

I could only imagine how it looked. Snake, unconscious and bloody, taped to a chair and two gawping numbnuts, mouths open wide enough to park a pair of Humvees.

Then, of course, she screamed and ran for the door. “Help me! Somebody!”

I roped her around the waist, momentum swinging her halfway around me. Junior was trying hard to stand, but his electrocuted body fought stiffly against him.

“Cassie!” I yelled. “Wait! Wait. Hold it!”

Saying her name had no effect. I lifted her off the ground, and she shrieked right into my ear. Her heels kicked brutally into my shins as I covered her mouth to stifle her caterwauling. Attention was not what we needed. Simultaneously, a tiny heel collided with my hairy beanbag just as Cassandra’s teeth found the fleshy part of my thumb. I felt bone crunching just as the air exploded out of my lungs from the nut-shot. My poor, poor balls were having a shitty week. The combo made my knees turn to rubber, and I fell on top of Cassandra with a howl of my own. At least my fat ass landing on her got her to loosen her jaws off my knuckle. My other hand went reflexively to my balls. Cassie saw the opening and scrambled out from under me, heading for the door again.

“Please! Somebod-”

Zap.

Cassandra was on the floor. Junior convulsed, flew back into the wall a second time, then face-planted on the floor next to Cassie. “Fucking ow,” he croaked. “I taste smoke in my mouth.”

“You think you’d have learned.” I pulled him up under his armpits into a seated position. I may have imagined it, but he felt warmer. I slumped back to the floor myself, cradling my abused crotch while I debated the pros and cons of vomiting.

Junior weakly punched me on the chest. “At least I didn’t get my ass kicked by two girls this week.”

“If I throw up, will you hold my hair?”

“Fuck you.”

“There’s my hetero life-partner.” I remained fetal for a bit, trying to decide which hurt worse: my balls, my hand, or my pride. At the moment, it was a three-way draw.

Always helpful, Junior said, “Bleeding there, Boo.”

“Thanks, doc. Hadn’t noticed.” A deep laceration creased the webbing of my thumb, but I was still able to wiggle my fingers. Small favor, nothing was broken. I’ve broken both my hands enough times to recognize that particular brand of pain. All in all, I’d have rather had a cookie.

“Little broad’s got a strong set of teeth on her, huh?”

“Like wrestling a hundred-pound mastiff.” I stood shakily, one knee buckling. I walked toward the bathroom. “Watch them.”

“Aye, aye, cap’n.” Junior saluted me, then dropped his head back to the hardwood with a thump. Once inside the bathroom, I heard Junior mutter, “I still taste smoke.”