Moonlight Weeps: (A Dick Moonlight PI Thriller Book 8) Page 18

  He holds out his hand for me. I have no choice but to shake it. It’s a thinner hand than Schroder’s. But somehow just as soft, dead, cold, and wet.

  “Oh, well, there’s the public me,” he says, pursing his lips together. “And then there’s the private me who misses his daughter terribly, but who recognizes a great business venture when it stares him in the face.”

  “Pushing Oxy.”

  “Oxy is a pharmaceutical. It’s not like we’re dealing in heroin or crack cocaine to the minorities of the world.”

  He’s giving me this look like he’s not really believing his own words, which shouldn’t be a stretch for him considering his role as a professional politician. But, the way he’s blinking rapidly, licking his lips and gums, and sniffling hard through his nostrils tells me something else: It tells me the good Senator isn’t into selling Oxy for money he probably doesn’t need, but instead he’s being coerced into pushing it by the very man who facilitates his drug habit. That man being Doc Schroder.

  “Never truer words have been spoken,” I say, praying Elvis is getting all this with his audio/visual setup. “Oxy is practically an over-the-counter drug. Where’s the harm in selling a little on the side, Senator? It’s like a hobby.”

  Schroder joins us as the music gets all the louder the closer I come to the house.

  “Do you have the money, Moonlight?”

  “In the car. Shall I retrieve it?”

  He holds up his hand.

  “No, not quite yet.” Shooting me a wink. “After you finish your first order of business.” He turns, puts his hand on the sliding glass door opener. “Gentlemen, perhaps now is a good time to sing Happy Birthday to my dear son, Stephen.”

  I follow both men inside.

  The death metal is deafening. The kitchen is a covered in empty beer cans and vodka bottles. Dozens of Oxy capsules occupy the surface of the big kitchen table to my left, along with two good sized mirrors with lines of coke laid out on top of them. Instead of passing right by the table and into the living room, Schroder stops at it, bends over, and, using a rolled up dollar bill like a short straw that he’s shoved into his nostril, snorts a line the size of my index finger. Setting the rolled up bill back onto the mirror, he places his index finger in a glass that’s still got some vodka in it. He sets the vodka-soaked finger under his nostril and inhales the liquid. Then he clothespins his nose and breathes in even harder so that the coke he just inhaled rushes into his brain. As a final gesture, he presses the index finger onto some of the coke and rubs it over his gums.

  “Wooo wooo,” he shouts, “that’s some damn good shit, Senator.”

  That’s when I hear the familiar sound of a toilet flushing. A door opens up behind me, and a woman steps out of the bathroom. It’s Lisa, Bates’ sister-in-law. She’s dressed in a red mini-dress with matching suit jacket, along with black stockings and leather pumps. Her dark hair is parted over her left eye, just like Lola would do, and she glares at me wide-eyed.

  “Oh,” she says. “It’s you.”

  “Welcome to the party,” I say. “Or maybe you should be saying that to me.”

  She steps on out and nearly trips over her own two feet. I manage to catch her before she falls.

  “Oh my,” she says, slurring her words. “A little too much to drink.”

  “And snort,” I say.

  Letting go of her, I take a look over my left shoulder. I see the business-suited senator staring down at one of the mirrors filled with glorious white nose powder.

  “Don’t mind if I do,” he says, repeating Schroder’s coke inhalation process movement for movement. “There, now that makes me feel a whole lot better. Like I can take on the entire world. Like I can be, dare I say it, President of the United States of America.”

  He steps on over to me, hands me the rolled up bill. I look at Lisa, and she looks at me. Without having to say a word, I know what she’s thinking: You don’t tell anyone about our impromptu fuck session inside your loft, I won’t tell anyone that you’re working for the cops.

  “How’s about it, Moonlight?” the Senator says. “You don’t look like a stranger to snow in May.”

  I take the bill in hand.

  A soldier’s got to do what a soldier’s got to do . . .

  I bend down over the mirror, sniff up a line. The effect is immediate. My damaged brain suddenly feels like it’s healed again, my synapses on fire. I rub a little of the coke on my gums and feel the pleasant numbness settle in. Suddenly, the thought of having to kill two Russian thugs doesn’t seem so bad. But then, maybe it won’t come to that. Maybe if Elvis has collected enough evidence with his spy gear to convict these clowns, I can call in Miller’s cavalry earlier than expected and end this party pronto.

  “Please grab a beverage, gentleman,” Schroder insists, as he freshens up his drink with a full bar that’s been set up on the kitchen counter. “Beer’s in the fridge.”

  I go to the refrigerator. As promised, it’s stocked with beer. I grab one, pop the tab, take a deep drink. I have to admit; Schroder knows how to party. But then, I already knew that. Drinks in hand, the four of us then proceed on into the living room. The music is blaring through an iPod system of little Bose speakers that boast a big volume punch. Stephen is seated on the couch, passing in and out of consciousness, a big glob of vomit staining his baby blue IZOD, and a piss stain soaking his white Bermuda shorts. The site of him is enough to sober me up and remember why I’m here.

  The two Russians are dancing to the music, glasses of vodka in hand, lit cigarettes planted in their mouths. They’re still wearing the same track suits they always wear, their thick black hair slicked back against their cannon ball heads.

  “Look what dog dragged in,” Hector, says in his deeply accented voice. “It’s Dickbreath Moonlight, da?” Then, smiling. “Get it? Dick . . . Breath?”

  Vadim stops dancing, looks Hector up and down.

  “It’s ‘Look what cat dragged in’ stupid fucking big dumb moron,” he spits. “Not dog.”

  Hector stops dancing.

  “Dogs I like better than cats,” he says. “The cats, they make me sneeze, da?”

  Schroder goes to the iPod, pulls it from the dock, presses Stop.

  “Everyone gather around,” he announces. “I’d like to sing happy birthday to my one and only pride and joy. My son, Stephen.”

  “But wait!” Vadim shouts. “You have no cake?”

  We all stare down at Stephen. Head bobbing, mumbling something indiscernible, he’s oblivious to us.

  “Who needs cake to sing Happy Birthday,” the Doc says.

  “Exactly,” the Senator says. “Let’s just sing and enjoy the festivities.” He raises his glass, clears his throat. “Happy birthday to you . . .” he begins to sing.

  “Wait, wait, Senator Drug Addict,” Vadim insists, waving his hands in the air. “Hector, go get surprise.”

  Hector turns, heads back out into the kitchen. Within seconds, I can make out the sound of him rummaging around inside some cabinets and then opening and closing the oven door like maybe he’s hidden something inside it. And maybe he is, because when he comes back in, he’s carrying a big sheet cake. There’s a bunch of candles on it, and they’re lit. He carries the cake over to Stephen. The cake is both thick and big, and beneath the candles is an image of Al Pacino as Scarface. Scarface is made out of different colored frostings, but the image is uncanny. The master froster, whoever he or she is, nailed precisely Pacino’s white leisure suit, cropped black hair, and even the scowl on his scarred face.

  “Oh my, Stephen seems just a little too drunk to work up a big bunch of air, Hector,” the Doc says. “Maybe I should blow the candles out for him.”

  “No, no,” Vadim says. “That would be bad luck.” Then, turning back to Hector. “You know what to do, big fella.”

  Once more Hector disappears into the kitchen. This time, when he returns, he’s holding one of the mirrors filled with a small hill of cocaine in one hand, and in t
he other, he’s holding a small video camera. Placing the mirror under Stephen’s nose, Vadim tells the kid to inhale.

  “Do like Scarface, Stephen,” Hector insists, the video camera now poised at eye level. “You must say, ‘My wife, she can’t have a leetle baby.’ Say that . . . Say the line, da?”

  Stephen drops his face into the hill of cocaine, inhales. When he lifts his face up, the entire bottom half is covered in white powder.

  “Say it . . . Say it,” Hector pushes like the director of a big-budget Hollywood epic. “Say Scarface thing.”

  “My baby,” Stephen drunkenly mumbles, “she can’t even haff a leetle wife.”

  Lisa lets out a high pitched laugh and nearly falls flat on her face while going for the couch. She somehow manages to keep her balance before collapsing onto the cushions, her head resting only a few inches away from Stephen’s right thigh.

  “No,” Hector says, pulling the video camera from his face. “It’s ‘My wife, she can’t even haff a leetle baby!’ Stupid fucking brat boy.”

  “Easy, Hector,” Schroder smiles, “that’s my son and your boss you’re speaking, too.”

  “Blow out candles, Stephen,” Vadim insists, trying to avoid what is fast becoming a train wreck.

  “He’s not my boss,” Hector says working up a wad of mucous, spitting it onto the floor. “I have no boss.”

  “Hector, please,” Senator Bates barks, his face taking on a green hue as he stares down at the wad of yellow, blood-laced goop.

  “Come, Stephen,” Vadim presses, placing the little candles directly below the kid’s mouth. “Blow!”

  Stephen inhales a deep breath, puckers his lips, and lets loose with a rush of air.

  The candles don’t blow out.

  “Trick candles,” Doc Schroder says. “Oh how fun.”

  Stephen inhales again, lets loose with another, harder breath.

  That’s when Vadim turns his head, drops the cake into Stephen’s lap, shouting, “Fire in the hole!”

  Chapter 64

  What follows is not one explosion, but three separate explosions. Or, more specifically, ear piercing short, sharp cracks that sound like a high caliber rifle discharging high capacity rounds. I hit the floor. So do the Senator and the brain surgeon.

  “Oh God! Oh God!” shouts the politician, “I think I’m hit.”

  His chest is covered in frosting.

  “Am I dead?” Schroder cries.

  Meanwhile, the Russians are bent over in laughter.

  “Exploding cake!” Vadim shouts. “Filled with M80s. Old Soviet army birthday surprise! It’s no fun unless someone lose a finger or two, da?”

  I wipe away frosting from my face with the back of my hand, stand up. Stephen is covered in cake and frosting. Beside him on the couch, is Lisa. She’s not moving. There’s something dripping from her left eye socket. It’s blood and the eyeball is missing. Obviously M80s weren’t the only deadly thing stored inside the surprise Soviet army cake.

  “It is big ass gag,” Vadim says through a shit eating smile. “Like in your television program, Five Stooges.”

  “Three Stooges, stupid fuck,” Hector corrects. He’s still videotaping like the exploding cake is all a part of his script.

  “Whatever,” Vadim says. “No harm done, da?”

  “No harm?” shouts the Senator. “No fucking harm. You’ve killed Lisa.”

  The politician goes to her, kneels down on the floor, shakes Lisa. She’s not responding.

  “She’s dead!” he cries.

  “Hey, Hector,” Vadim says, “this isn’t Soviet barracks. You were supposed to leave the screw-and-nail shrapnel out of the cake.”

  “Oops,” Hector smiles. “I forget that Americans don’t like to play rough.”

  Stephen shoots a glare that my long dead dad can feel. Without even attempting to wipe his face off, he reaches around the small of his back, comes back out with a chrome-plated automatic.

  “Stephen put that down!” Schroder insists.

  “Shut up, old man,” the suddenly sobered up and very angry kid says while slowly rising up from the couch. “You want Scarface, you Russian fucks. Well, then, ‘Say Hello to my leetle fuckin’ frien . . .’” He cocks back the hammer. Fires. The piece of wall directly above Vadim explodes. The Russian goon reaches into his sweat suit jacket, pulls out his own automatic. Hector follows suit by pulling out his .44 Magnum. The two Russians and Stephen are pointing the barrels of their respective hand cannons in one another’s frosting splattered faces.

  Then something unexpected happens. The front door opens.

  “Well it’s one for the money!” a voice sings out. “Two for the show! Three to get ready now go cat go!”

  All heads turn.

  “It’s Elvis!” Hector shouts. “Elvis fucking Presley.”

  “Dead Elvis in flesh!” Vadim shouts.

  “I hate Elvis,” Stephen barks.

  Elvis takes on the pose of a black belt karate man, reaches around under his cape, grabs hold of my .38, tosses it to me. I catch it, drop back down to the floor, let loose with a spray of rounds that makes the Russians dive for cover.

  I see Stephen’s gun. It’s pointed at me. I point mine at him, squeeze off another round. It doesn’t connect with his chubby flesh and bone but instead nails the portion of V-shaped couch cushion in between his thighs. He screams like a girl. The Senator bounds up, tries to run away, but Elvis gives him chase, dives, tackles him at the ankles.

  I jump up onto one knee, look up.

  That’s when I see a black ceramic ashtray come down on my forehead.

  Chapter 65

  When I come to, my head feels like it’s been split down the center and sewed back up with fishing line. Soon as I can focus my eyes, I can tell that we’ve been packed into the master bath off the doc’s bedroom. Elvis, the Senator, Schroder, and I are duct-taped to kitchen chairs, hands taped behind our backs at the wrists, tape covering our mouths. Our chairs have been positioned in front of a stand-alone bathtub that can fit up to four people. Directly before us is a window wall that looks out onto a small wood of tall trees that’s lit up by a spotlight and beyond that the country club golf course which is bathed in darkness. The Senator is to my left. Elvis is to my right. To his right sits Schroder. The heavy metal is once more blaring downstairs where the body of Lisa is surely still lying on the couch, bleeding out from an exploding cake filled with metal screws.

  Stephen in the only one who isn’t duct taped to a chair.

  He’s standing directly behind his father. He’s got a gas-powered chainsaw clutched in his hands. Behind him, Hector has his .44 Magnum pressed up against the wounded kid’s head.

  “Start the saw, Stephen,” Hector directs. “As you hold the saw, you say ‘Antonio, watch what happens to your friend. You don’t want this to happen to you.’ You got it, da?”

  Vadim is standing off to the side. This time, it’s he who’s in charge of filming. The video camera pressed to his smiling face, he’s recording everything that’s going down in the bathroom. The satchel containing Miller’s ten grand is on the floor by his sneakered feet, the zipper opened. I can only wonder if he spotted my .22 stuffed under the driver’s seat when he retrieved the bag of cash. It also makes me wonder if he knew what Doc Schroder was planning for him and his partner all along. My gut tells me he did.

  “Ready, set, action!” Vadim shouts.

  Stephen awkwardly pulls the ripcord on the chainsaw. Unluckily for him, it starts up on the first pull, buzzing deafeningly loud, its exhaust spitting out bits of flame and smoke like a man-eating dragon. Stephen is revving the motor and crying so hard he can barely stand. Like Steven Spielberg’s evil twin brother, Hector reaches out with his right hand, points at the exact place he wants the kid to begin cutting his father’s right arm off.

  The brain surgeon starts to squirm. He’s panicking and screaming through the duct tape.

  “Say the line, da?” Hector says. “You know the line. You watch the S
carface one-thousand times before, da? You watch with me, with Vadim. You replay the chainsaw scene, many more times.”

  The chainsaw is bobbing in Stephen’s hands. He looks like he’s about to pass out from fear and from the booze, Oxy, and coke floating through his veins. If he drops the saw, it will take his foot off.

  “The line,” Hector insists. “Say the line.”

  Stephen opens his mouth, just enough to speak through the strands of snot that are pouring out of his nose. “Antonio . . . Watch what happens . . . to your friend . . . You don’t want . . . this to happen . . . to you.”

  “Da, da!” shouts Hector. “Now cut it off!”

  Stephen lets loose with a burst of new tears as the screaming buzz saw blade enters into his father’s arm, spraying the entire room with blood, bone, and little pieces of pink flesh.

  The arm drops to the floor with a thud.

  A now in-shock Doc Schroder is rocking back and forth in his chair while Elvis passes out, chin against barrel chest. Some of the blood spatter has sprayed his white Elvis jumpsuit. He’ll never get the stains out now. Not even if he Shout’s it out. Doc Schroder is squirming in his chair, yelping something high-pitched and heart wrenching. The nub of flesh where his arm used to be is twitching while blood pours out of it like an open spigot

  Stephen is hysterical, his face, arms and chest covered in a thin layer of dark arterial blood.

  Vadim is happy as a clam, and it shows on his red-speckled face.

  “You know next line,” an excited Hector insists. “You know what to do.”

  Stephen holds up the saw once more, positions it over his father’s right leg.

  “Now . . . the leg . . . huh?”

  The saw revs once more. Stephen takes aim while his father desperately tries to get away but can’t possibly move due to the binding duct tape. The red laser that flashes through the picture window doesn’t register at first. And even if it did, there’s not a damn thing any of us can do about it. Especially Stephen, who, at present, is oblivious to everything that’s happening all around him, except for the pit of despair he’s drowning in. But the despair is over in the flash of a rifle burst as a bullet makes a round hole in the glass window and then makes jelly filling of his brains as it enters into his forehead and exits sloppily out the back.