Page 19 of Wall

Grinder’s got himself a tire iron. I don’t think it’s a matter of preference for him so much as what was in the back of his truck. We’re lucky he didn’t roll up with an empty whiskey bottle.

Forty’s probably packing a semi-automatic with a scope and a bowie knife in his boot. You can’t take the Rangers out of the man. He’s obsessed with his gear.

“What’s the plan?” Grinder hocks and spits.

“Mikey’s out back. Grinder, you and Forty bust down the side door. I go in the front. We flush whoever’s in there out the back. Forty clears upstairs.”

Grinder knits his thick, gray brows. “I know I ain’t as fit as I once was, but ain’t Mikey about a hundred twenty pounds soakin’ wet?”

“We gave him the RPG.”

Grinder busts out in a guffaw. “You didn’t give that boy actual grenades, did you?”

“How’s the boy gonna become a man if we coddle him?” Forty stands, brushing snow off his perfectly pressed cargo pants.

“On three?” I don’t want to stand here gabbing any longer. Every second this takes is a second away from Mona. She came to me. Shefinallycame to me.

The hardest thing I ever did was stand in the parking lot and let her drive away. I need to get this ring, put this little asshole on ice until I have time to deal with him, and then go to my woman.

God, why couldn’t it have been this simple this whole time? Find the ring, kill the asshole, get the girl. It’s like a video game.

My brain knows it’s nowhere near a done deal, but my body is beyond ready. I’ve been sporting a semi for hours, and my adrenaline’s surging. I’m bouncing on my toes. In a few hours, I’m gonna be alone with Mona.Finally.

Grinder’s lookin’ at me funny. “All right, son. You call it.”

“One. Two. Three!” We break.

Forty sprints around the house, Grinder lagging several feet behind. He’s almost sixty, and his workouts consist of drinking beers while he spots me as I lift. He wanted to come, though. Change of scenery.

When I calculate that Forty must be close to his mark, I charge the front door. The original plan was to knock, but when I saw the tracks in the snow, plans changed.

I kick down the door and rush in, shouting, “Tommy Merrill! You are dead, motherfucker!”

Three young dudes blink at me from a sofa. Two have videogame controllers in their hands. The third has a bong.

Forty sails past me up the stairs. Grinder blocks the exit to the kitchen, huffing and puffing.

“Which one of you is Tommy Merrill?”

The two playing video games look at the third, a scrawny guy with gauges. There’s a brief pause, then he gently sets down his bong, pitches the remote control at me full force—missing by several feet—and scrambles over the back of the sofa.

He dashes for Grinder. I guess he don’t see the tire iron.

There’s a thwack, a crack, and then Tommy Merrill is writhing on the filthy carpet, clutching his stomach, moaning.

Grinder twirls his weapon. “Steee-rike!”

Forty clumps down the stairs. “Second level is all clear.”

The prospect races in, launcher over his shoulder, warhead in his hand. “What’s goin’ on? No one came out.”

“Well, that’s anticlimactic,” Forty says.

“Holy shit. Is that an RPG?” a guy from the sofa asks. A damp spot spreads in the crotch of his friend’s shorts, and the smell of piss fills the room.

I head for our boy Tommy, and Forty takes my place in the gaping hole where the front door used to be. I’ll have to fix that later, just in case the old lady still owns the house.

Tommy’s a skinny guy, but he’s got some height on him and the stringy muscles of an addict who spends a lot of time hustling. He’s more than big enough to intimidate a woman like Mona. Mona ain’t never hurt a fly.

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