The Slayer (Untamed Hearts #2) (33 page)

But he kept up his route for two fucking weeks.

Through the backwoods, where the snowy roads weren’t as well kept, and it left his shoes soaked and freezing. The fifth time someone flashed a shotgun at him, he finally just flashed his gun back, daring them to try and shoot him, ’cause he had decent aim and a shotgun was the tortoise of weapons.

Really, the shotguns were bothering him.

These pendejos were not very good at this shit. They’d die in two seconds in Miami and probably faster than that in New York.

One thing was for sure—if Chuito or Tino ever did feel like falling off the wagon, they weren’t going to be able to buy drugs in Garnet.

Chuito was friends of the Conners, and everyone knew it.

Tino was tied to them by marriage.

They might as well drive up in a sheriff’s SUV. They’d get the same reception, and Chuito told Tino that one night when he stopped by, but like Chuito, he had a harder time moving past the shotguns than the knowledge that they weren’t going to be welcomed into the crime underbelly of Garnet even if they wanted to be.

Which they didn’t.

“Was it a semiautomatic?”

“No, motherfucker, it was a 12 gauge. Same tonight as it was yesterday at the place down the way that I guarantee you is a meth house,” Chuito growled at Tino as the two of them sat at the table in Tino’s apartment over the garage, polishing off a bottle of Tino’s Johnnie Walker Black when Chuito stopped by there after his run. “You think I don’t know what a shotgun looks like?”

“But you could shoot them five times before they racked the pump,” Tino pointed out. “Really, they’d be dead five times over.”

Chuito held up a hand and took another drink, slowly, because he was supposed to walk home after this. “I feel like I should start teaching classes. Gangster 101 for rednecks.”

Tino laughed, because he was drunker than Chuito. “Can I help?”

“No, motherfucker, you can’t help.” Chuito laughed with him. “You’re supposed to be here playing domestic.”

“You know, Jules did take out two of my father’s crew with a shotgun the night she and Romeo were attacked in that hotel room. She clipped my cousin Al and Johnny Napoli. I never got over that. She got off two shots, and these were old-school wiseguys.”

“Then the rest of your father’s crew decorated the room with lead and put both Jules and Romeo in ICU. If she had used a semiautomatic, that shit wouldn’t have happened.”

“You shouldn’t underestimate the rednecks. I knew those guys Jules took out. I grew up around them. They were real motherfuckers. Both of them. If I’d known it was that easy to kill them, I’d have saved Jules the effort. A fucking shotgun. What’d they do, just friggin’ stand there and say
ice me
?”

“They were Italians,” Chuito said with a grin. “You motherfuckers expect people to just lay there and die for you because you’re mafia. They were probably lazy.”

Tino shrugged at that. “They probably were. Assholes are dead now. Don’t underestimate rednecks, Chu. I’m telling you. They can do some damage. Is there a reason you’re stalling on this?”

“I’m not stalling.”

“I can do it,” Tino said so dispassionately it was disheartening. “Nova doesn’t need to know.”

“Tino—”

“I’m just saying.” Tino took another drink. “He’s been out on bail for two weeks.”

“I have a plan,” Chuito said sharply. “Can you have a little faith?”

“What’s your plan?” Tino arched an eyebrow at him. “Let him go gray waiting for you to put him out of his misery?”

“Look, if they see me running every day, and then they happen to see me at the trailer park the night I take him out, it’s not going to look weird, is it? I need to run by there enough times that they stop flashing shotguns at me. It’s just an insurance policy. People get lazy. We just discussed that. The second I stop looking out of place running by the trailer park will be the second I take him out.”

Tino considered that for a moment and then asked, “Did Nova tell you to do that?”

“No.” Chuito gave him an insulted look. “I was covering my own ass for a long time before I met Nova.”

Tino took another drink and admitted, “That’s not a bad plan. Are you going to keep running by there after you do it?”

“Probably just keep the route indefinitely. It’s hillier. It’s an okay route. I just wished the roads weren’t so slick. Hopefully I won’t have to keep running strapped. Look at this.” He pulled up his hoodie, showing Tino the chafing from his holster. “It’s irritating me.”

“Your holster’s too loose,” Tino said as he looked at it. “And you need to wear a shirt under your sweats.”

Chuito groaned.

“What is the Puerto Rican aversion to undershirts?”

“What is the Italian obsession with them?” Chuito countered.

“Um, how ’bout the fact that we’re not sweating out our clothes and chafing the fuck out of our arms when we’re strapped. I bet you don’t wear one under a suit.”

“I use deodorant. You should try it sometime.”

Tino covered his face with his hand and mumbled against his fingers, “I’m buying you some undershirts.”

“No.”

Tino gave him an annoyed look. “I use deodorant.”

“I’m just saying I heard things about Italians.” Chuito laughed as he took another drink.

“Motherfucker—”

Chuito dropped his head to the table and cracked up before Tino could finish.

“I keep my shit clean,” Tino went on. “I even manscape. I’m the cleanest motherfucker in Garnet.”

Chuito was still laughing, and he realized he was going to end up sleeping on Tino’s couch. “I got to stop drinking after running.”

“Puerto Ricans can’t hold their liquor like Italians.”

“You just told me you manscaped. You’re fucked-up too.”

“It’s a common courtesy,” Tino went on. “No woman wants to suck on a hairy dick.”

“Tino, no.” Chuito hid his face in his arm, trying to block that horrible image. “Ay Dios mio.”

“You don’t manscape?” Tino asked him, completely oblivious to personal privacy the way Italians were apt to be.

“Would it bother you if I didn’t?”

“Yes, it’d insult me as a man,” Tino said as if he meant it. “You’d let a chick suck on your hairy dick? That’s rude. It gives men a bad name. That’s ten thousand times worse than sweating all over a fine suit ’cause you don’t like undershirts.”

Chuito was still laughing, the booze making it funnier than it probably should be. “No one’s sucking on my hairy dick.”

“Then that’s a whole other issue,” Tino growled as if he was still insulted as a man. “What is your deal?”

“I manscape,” Chuito admitted rather than own up to the rest of it.

“Thank God,” Tino said, clearly appeased and forgetting the rest because he was completely fucked-up. “I was about to buy you a buzzer to go with the undershirts.”

Chapter Thirty-Three

Ironically, the next day, not one redneck flashed a shotgun at Chuito when he ran past. He became part of the scenery. They barely noticed him. They just kept on doing whatever the hell they were doing and didn’t see the Boricua fighter who ran past the same time that day as he had nearly every other day for the last two weeks.

They got lazy.

Just to test it, he turned around and walked back, faking a stitch in his side. It was snowing. He really did not want to be out in this shit. Usually he used the treadmills at the Cellar during the winter.

Now he was stuck running through the rest of the winter in this mierda.

Just to cover his ass.

That chafed worse than the holster.

Talk about paying back debts.

The Conners’ shady investments paid off in a way they would never know. Taking a chance on sponsoring Chuito had gotten a Miami Boricua to run in twenty degrees just so Wyatt wouldn’t go to prison.

Chuito stopped at the trailer park. He leaned over and grabbed his side as he looked at the front door to Vaughn Davis’s place.

Then, as he stood there, the door opened, and a tall, heavyset man Chuito had seen more than once walked out. He was one of the motherfuckers who favored shotguns. He lived at the meth house down the way, and Chuito got the impression most drugs in Garnet funneled through him. The drug dealer paused on the porch and called out, “Hey, Rocky, do you fight in meat lockers when you’re done running?”

Chuito arched an eyebrow and kept his hand on his side as he straightened up. He used the excuse to study the lock on the trailer again, but he couldn’t help but ask, “Where’s your shotgun?”

The drug dealer laughed. “Where’s your .38?”

Chuito lifted his sweatshirt, showing off the holster he was wearing. “Can I run without it? It’s chafing like a bitch.”

The drug dealer waved him off. “If you want to slum, be my guest.”

“Gracias.” Chuito nodded and started walking away.

“Hey, Rocky.”

Chuito turned back to him, arching an eyebrow once more.

“Is it true what they say ’bout ya?”

“What do they say?” Chuito asked him.

“They say you did some pretty interesting things back in Miami.”

Chuito gave him an unimpressed look. “Shopping for employees or customers?”

“Just curious.”

“We’re good,” Chuito assured him. “I don’t give a fuck what you do, man. Everyone’s got to make a living.”

“What ’bout the sheriff?”

“You think I talk with the sheriff about what I used to do in Miami?” Chuito snorted and repeated, “
We’re good
.”

He nodded, seeming to hear the truth in Chuito’s words. “Okay, then.”

“No shotguns.” Chuito gave him a harsh glare. “They irritate me.”

The drug dealer laughed and agreed. “No shotguns. I promise. I’ll tell the boys you’re all right.”

* * * *

The next two nights, Chuito ran later, closer to ten o’clock, and it was cold as fuck. The lighting was bad without the last fading streaks of the sunset to help. He nearly busted his ass more than once.

And of course, it was snowing both nights. He was officially done with this project. This motherfucker needed to die just for making Chuito be out in this.

On the third night, he ran at midnight. No one was on the road. No one was outside. No lights were on. Everyone in Garnet slept early, even the criminals.

He had run past the trailer park for over two weeks, and he hadn’t once seen Vaughn Davis since he got out on bail for shooting at Wyatt.

Chuito was sort of stunned they set bail.

They sure as fuck wouldn’t have set bail if a Latino shot at a sheriff. It didn’t matter where it was in the country; Chuito would bet his career that if this rapist bastard, Vaughn Davis, hadn’t been white, his ass would still be rotting away in jail.

He even had a record.

He
still
got bail.

It just made Chuito angrier as he walked up the stairs to Vaughn’s trailer, keeping his steps light. Thank God they didn’t creak. He leaned in, staring at the lock when he got onto the porch, seeing that there wasn’t a dead bolt. He didn’t think there was, because he had been glancing at this door for two weeks.

Bonus.

He’d worn light gloves on purpose—the kind he’d used when he was younger and robbed houses, because cars weren’t all he’d stolen in his youth.

Marcos used to say Chuito had a rare gift when it came to picking locks. So much so that when they talked about going straight, Marcos would suggest that Chuito would be an amazing locksmith because there wasn’t a car or house he couldn’t break into.

It turned out Chuito hadn’t lost his touch, even if his fingers were near frozen. His old key chain, with all the tools a thief would need, felt like it had never left his hand. He opened the door in less than ten seconds and had his gun out faster than that.

The pendejo on the couch didn’t have a chance to pump the shotgun in his hands. There was a reason gangsters didn’t use them. They were a poor self-defense choice.

“Drop it, motherfucker,” Chuito growled at him as he used his foot to kick the door shut. “We both know your aim sucks.”

Vaughn Davis’s hands were shaking on the shotgun. His eyes were bloodshot. His brown hair was stringy and unkempt, making it clear he probably hadn’t showered since he got out of jail. His voice was scratchy as he shouted, “I told the Italian—”

Chuito put a finger to his lips, his gun still leveled at Vaughn’s chest, because this motherfucker was
strung out.

Chuito had promised to do things the Italian way, but if Vaughn moved, if he kept shouting, they were going to do this Boricua style. Life was going to take Chuito out eventually, but it wasn’t going to be with a shotgun shell fired by a redneck rapist junkie.

Chuito would shoot him in a fucking heartbeat and deal with Nova’s bitching later.

“The Italian said—” Vaughn went on, after stuttering to a stop at Chuito’s warning. “He said! He said if I didn’t say anything.”

“Motherfucker, do I look Italian?” Chuito asked him in a calm, quiet voice. “Set the shotgun down. We’ll talk, okay? Do you wanna fucking talk to me? Or do you want me to shoot you?”

Vaughn took a deep breath, his gaze darting from Chuito to the door behind him. Then he set the shotgun down on the table and slid back on the couch, his eyes wide and stunned, making it obvious he knew he was about to die.

“The Italian told me,” he whispered, looking lost. “He said—”

“Yeah, what’d he say?” Chuito asked as he looked at the table that was covered with half-full glasses of booze and drug paraphernalia. This place was a real shithole, so filthy Chuito had the sudden need to set his gun down and go wash his hands. Instead he sat next to Vaughn on the couch and kicked the shotgun off the table. “I’m honestly really fucking curious what he said that kept you from singing to the Department of Justice about Wyatt.”

“He, um—” Vaughn scratched at his arms, which were raw and scarred, as if this was a habit he’d had for a long time. “He said that, uh—”

“Me cago en ná.” Chuito rolled his eyes. “You make me glad I gave up drugs, man. You’re like the worst-fucking-case scenario over here.” He looked at the table, spying crack rocks, and that didn’t help Chuito’s well-being. “I was a fan of cocaine too. I never got into rocks, ’cause motherfuckers who start smoking it turn out like you, but I was getting there.”