Page 13 of Intent to Kill
Pausing for dramatic effect, always a showman, Adam took a deep breath. “Are you in?”
Paul looked at Adam like he’d just sprouted a third arm out of his forehead and waved. “Jesus Christ, Adam. No, I’m not fuckingin.”
“Oh, come on, you never used to be afraid of a fight.”
“This isn’t a fight! It’s a suicide mission.”
“That’s a bit dramatic.” Adam rolled his eyes.
“There’s nothing heretofight. This is Blake’s world now, we just live in it.”
“Wow, you’re more beaten down than I thought...” He searched his friend’s eyes, but only found answers he didn’t want to see.
He’d seen their new lives firsthand, how far they were living below their potential. But he never thought they would start to believe they weren’t capable of more. Blake could break their bodies, but never could he break their spirits. Or so Adam had thought.
“The fight isn’t over, it’s barely even begun. Come on. Let’s kill this son-of-a-bitch,” Adam said.
“For fuck’s sake.”
“Come on,” Adam prodded. As if Paul would finally break from sheer annoyance if he asked enough times in a row.
Paul rubbed at his eyes. “Is there anything I can say to make you go away?”
Adam shook his head. “It’s now or never, man. Just say you’ll think about it.”
He’d settle for that, for now. Because they’d all come around eventually.All of them.
“Dammit,” Paul said, clenching his fists. “Fine. I’ll think about it.”
“Alright,” Adam smiled. “Well, I am actually gonna get the fuck out of here before someone sees me. Come by the old lot after your shift.”
* * *
JULY 1985
“This is it?” Dan scoffed.
Paul opened the door to his trailer at the Ridge City trailer lot, Adam, Dan, and Carlos shuffling inside behind him.
Adam cringed as Paul pushed dirty clothes down the back of the couch. Seeing Dan and Carlos’s disgusted faces, he elbowed his friends in the ribs. Could they just behave and play nice for one goddamn day?
“It’s better than nothing. Paul’s offering a place for us to work from,” Adam reminded them.
“A dingy, dodgy place,” Carlos said.
He wasn’t wrong, the whole trailer took on an orange hue through the closed blinds, and the appliances were falling apart at the joints. At the front of the trailer was a small dining table and couch, while at the back were curtains that hid Paul’s bed. Barely big enough to fit his six-foot frame.
“Well, none of you are exactly rolling in the dough, are you?” Paul hit back.
“Fucking Blake Family errand boy,” Dan hissed.
“Second-rate Cortez pusher,” Paul said, pushing into Dan’s face.
“Enough!” Adam said, jumping to break them apart. “If we want to be a team, we can’t keep yelling at each other. We’ve done well so far, going out on our own. Let’s try to trust each other.”
“For all we know this one is pushing facts back up to the Blakes,” Dan said.
“Or you’re pushing facts back to the Cortez’s,” Paul said.
