All Due Respect Issue #1 (8 page)

‘But how did brushes ever get the reputation of being daft, then?’ said Marta, in between hiccoughs. ‘It’s actually a pretty daft expression in itself, if you ask me, actually.’

With her big Marie Osmond grin, hair in pigtails, polka-dot shirt tied up at the front and cut-off Wranglers, Marta now looked like something straight from the Dukes Of Hazzard, but in fact she was Yorkshire born and bred, just like her mother. She started drumming her fingers on the steering wheel to some horrible tuneless racket that seemed to be about starting fires. This was the ‘oldies’ station, apparently, although to Quigley it sounded more like the music from another planet. Or from hell.

Still, there wasn’t a lot he could do but grin and bear it. He and Marta were in it for the whole journey. And not just this particular late-night trip down some typically depressing, rain-soaked North Yorkshire road.

Quigley had only been back in his home country for a few days and before he knew it he was wishing he was back in Spain. Some early retirement that had turned out to be. He’d tried three doctors—one in Spain and two in London—but their findings had been the same. Six months and he’d be worm food. A year tops.

It was the Spanish quack that had a suggested a bucket list. Apparently, he’d seen it in a Jack Nicholson film. A list of things that you want to do before you die. And that had set Quigley’s cogs whirring. Whirring so much they were almost screeching inside his brain. Screeching one word. Revenge.

‘Maybe it’s to do with Basil Brush?’ he said, fiddling with an unlit Marlborough.

She took a narrow side road and headed towards a large, darkened building with a small car park in front of it.

‘Who’s that? Never heard of him,’ said Marta.

Quigley sighed. Another sign of the fact that he never shared her childhood. Not after what happened to her mother.

‘He was a very popular kids’ entertainer back in the olden days,’ he said.

‘Was he one of those kiddie fiddlers that used to work at the BBC?’ she said.

‘Well, you never can tell.’

Marta pulled the car into The Latham Arms’ deserted car park. The pub was closed, of course. This being the aptly named Blighty, the idea of even a cup of luke-warm tea after midnight on a Sunday was considered the height of decadence. It was what they were hoping for, though.

‘What do we do now, then?’ said Marta.

‘Not a lot we can do.’ He was looking at himself in the mirror. Noticing the flecks of grey in his stubble. The creases in his face. How his ear lobes seemed to be getting even bigger.

‘Best switch off the light,’ he said. ‘Better safe than sorry.’

They sat in darkness and listened to an overheated radio talk show about gay priests.

‘A man who wears a dress and doesn’t get married is bound to be gay,’ said Marta. ‘Stands to reason.’

‘You could be onto something there,’ said Quigley, who was nodding off. He wrenched open his eyes when a massive black limousine with blacked-out windows rolled up.

‘Ready for it?’ said Quigley. He yawned.

‘Ready when you are.’

She kissed him on the cheek.

‘Time for the night shift to start work, Dad.’

They both shuffled into long, black-leather trench-coats, leaned over into the cramped back seat and picked up their sawn-off shotguns.

‘I’ve been looking forward to this all day,’ said Marta.

‘Well, you only live once.’

Marta held his hand for a moment. Gave a weak smile.

They slammed the car doors behind them as they stepped out into the cold autumn night. Quigley began to cough.

‘Slowly, slowly catchy monkey,’ said Marta.

The limo driver wound down his window as the approached it, keeping their shotguns hidden under their coats. The driver was all suntan, dyed hair, and bleached teeth. Manic eyes. Like a psychotic game-show host.

‘Well, well,’ said Tonto. ‘It’s really you. A blast from the past. We all thought you were dead.’

‘Hoped it, I’m sure,’ rasped Quigley.

‘Not at all, at all. The past is dead and gone, as far as I’m concerned. Things change. I’m the gaffer now, you know?’

‘So, I heard, Tonto.’

Tonto cringed. For over a couple of decades or more, Tonto had been Wacko Jacko Butler’s chief enforcer and with Butler being ‘the lone arranger.’ Barry Greenwood had been nicknamed Tonto. Everyone found it hilarious. Except for Tonto, that is.

‘I did contact Wacko Jacko,’ said Quigley. ‘But he seemed to be unavoidably detained.’

‘Yeah? Well, we don’t have that much contact now. Not since he retired.’

Tonto looked over at Marta. She had Quigley’s cap pulled over her head and the coat collars pulled up. The rain poured down in sheets.

‘Who’s the kid?’ said Tonto. ‘Never realised you had a sidekick. Always thought you worked alone.’

‘Things change, like you said, Tonto. Time’s change. Due to circumstances beyond my control, it behoves me to employ an apprentice.’

‘You and them ten-bob words. Mind you, I can’t blame you. Better to be safe than sorry, eh?’

The passenger door opened and a behemoth in an orange anorak got out.

‘You remember my nephew Darren, don’t you?’

Darren Greenwood smirked but then he’d always smirked, ever since he’d run in front of an ice cream van when he was a kid.

‘Once seen never forgotten,’ said Quigley.

‘Are we ready to get down to business, then?’ said Tonto. ‘This weather’s not good for my rheumatism.’

‘How much you got?’

Tonto nodded towards the boot of the car.

‘What you asked for. You got the dosh?’

‘Got the lot.’

Quigley and Tonto locked eyes for a moment and then Tonto made a whistling sound.

Darren walked to the back of the car and opened up the boot.

‘Your turn,’ said Tonto.

‘Pay the man,’ Quigley said to Marta.

Marta stepped forward, pulled out her gun and blasted Tonto in the face at the same time as Quigley blew Darren’s head off.

The gun’s recoil started Quigley’s coughing fit and he leaned forward and spat blood onto the wet concrete. Marta put an arm around him until he stopped shaking.

‘Seems a shame to torch it,’ said Marta, looking down at the bags of cocaine that were stuffed in the limo’s boot. She licked her lips.

‘Best thing for all concerned,’ said Quigley, as he saw the lights in the pub go on.

He headed back to the car and pulled out two cans of petrol.

‘Get moving,’ he said to Marta. The front door of the pub opened and sirens wailed in the distance.

‘Oh, fuck. It’s now, Dad.’

‘It’s now or never, kid.’

They hugged and Quigley pushed her towards the car. Waited until she took a side road away from the motorway. Driving slowly, without any lights, so as not to attract attention.

It’s now, for sure, he thought.

Quigley covered the car, the bodies, and the drugs in petrol, and then soaked himself. Pushed a cigarette into his mouth. Thought about a Duran Duran song, of all things. Clicked the Zippo lighter that he’d last used when he gave up smoking in the ’90s, and let the flames enfold him.

Paul D. Brazill
is the author of
Gumshoe, Guns Of Brixton,
and
Roman Dalton—Werewolf PI.
He was born in England and lives in Poland. He is an International Thriller Writers Inc. member whose writing has been translated into Italian, French, Polish, and Slovene. He has had writing published in various magazines and anthologies, including
The Mammoth Book of Best British Crime 8, 10, and 11,
alongside the likes of Ian Rankin, Neil Gaiman, and Lee Child. He has also edited a few tasty anthologies, including the best-selling
True Brit Grit
with Luca Veste.

Private Practice

Travis Richardson

J
OHN PARKS HIS COOPER
with a screech and strips off his scrubs. They are speckled with drying blood. Underneath he wears a moisture-wicking tank top and skin tight athletic shorts. He checks his face in the rearview mirror. Dabbing his finger with his tongue, he removes brownish splatter from the tip of his nose. Nothing is easy with Razmig, that idiot sadist. Throwing his shoes in the backseat, he grabs his flip-flops, a water bottle, and a yoga mat.

Crossing Glendale Boulevard to the studio, he’s already five minutes late. Inside, students sit on mats, their legs crossed and torsos twisted to the right as new-age music flows through the room. A few glare with accusative eyes, but a blonde named Vicky gives him a bright smile. John returns the grin and unrolls his mat behind her. He crosses his legs and mimics the students.

“Left side,” the instructor announces from the front of the class.

John turns, exhaling. He needs to relax. Release and clear his mind. He takes a deep breath into his belly and holds it until they are instructed to stand and touch their mat. Blood rushes to his head and he wonders why hadn’t he taken up yoga earlier…before all his trouble. He raises his torso, arms reaching for the ceiling and then lowers them, his hands pressed together as if in prayer. No, the younger him wouldn’t have gone to yoga. Not at all. He knew too much then, or at least thought he did.

He exhales, dropping flat on the floor to do a Chataronga. He inhales, planting his hands like a push-up, but raises his glutes into the air, using his abs to pull up his body and create an upside down V, also known as a Downward Facing Dog. Go figure. Looking up, he admires Vicky’s body wrapped in spandex. She exudes fierce intelligence and inherent kindness, creating a trifecta of absolute perfection. Not that he’ll ever get to know her outside of the class. He can’t allow it. It’s too dangerous for both of them.

They move into Runner’s Pose, feet spread apart, arms in the air, fingertips aiming at the heavens. Why had he done it? Being a top UCLA med student wasn’t enough. He had to gamble. Had to snort. Had to take idiot risks. He wishes he could tell his younger self to be satisfied with ordinary challenges, just love life and all its fragile moments. But that young, arrogant, devil-may-care man wouldn’t have listened. He was hell-bent on self-destruction. What an asshole.

He switches legs. The instructor, a woman in her sixties, smiles at him as she evaluates her students’ posture. They do the Chataronga again. He feels tension leave his chest as he exhales into Downward Facing Dog. Then he goes into Warrior One position. A ridiculous name. Legs stretched like a runner’s crouch, but with the left back foot turned at a forty-five-degree angle. Holding his arms above his head, he knows that even if held a spear, he’d be vulnerable to an attack from the side or the rear.

Ridiculous, that was how he felt when Green Bay lost and the Patriots didn’t make the point spread. Twice. He had been so famously consistent at predicting wins, until he didn’t. A losing streak with double or nothings that turned into an enormous, unpayable debt. The residency pay wasn’t enough to cover what he owed, so he brokered a deal to steal drugs to keep the interest down. He started popping some of them too. Why not? They were a valuable commodity and it kept him trucking full steam. When he was busted, a bag full of Oxycotin was discovered in his locker by the police. His blood test results revealed a cocktail of chemicals that nobody holding a scalpel should ever have in their system.

The class switches to a left leg leading Warrior Stance. John exhales, arms high. Clear your mind. Breathe in and out. The instructor walks around evaluating the positions.

“Looks like you cut yourself shaving, John.”

She touches the side of his cheek and flirts a wink like she was in her twenties. Shit. He had tried to scrub it all away, but sometimes specks linger. Too many things linger. The idea of bringing any remnant of his work outside into the public is unnerving. The blood wasn’t his, but a fool’s who claimed to have misplaced a duffel bag. Not just any duffel bag, but one with hundreds of thousands of dollars of narcotics. Swore he lost it. John believed him. But not Razmig. He lived to torture people and other living things. Nobody would have endured that much pain unless they were telling the truth.

John steps into the Warrior Two position. The Hippocratic Oath he’d taken, like his license, might as well be used as toilet paper. Sure he keeps people alive: those who are tortured and need to be sustained for longer sessions. He’s seen the inhumanity of humans and has been an active participant. He’s also preserved those who deserve to die. Men who committed heinous criminal acts. Men on his employer’s payroll. His employer, a powerhouse organization of vice and illicit deeds that owns him until he dies. Until then, John will be pulling out bullet fragments or pieces of glass and sewing up knife gouges so those men can heal and wreak more havoc.

He switches to Warrior Two on the left side. The money is very good though. Almost the same as a specialist, but without taxes or malpractice insurance. Of course, it’s blood money. Evil money. By accepting the stacks of hundreds and twenties, which he must, a stain of wickedness spreads from his hands over his body and deep down into the bowels his soul. Impossible to wash away. Neither soap nor booze help. At least yoga reduces his stress, sometimes.

“Lie on your backs in Shavasana,” the instructor says. She switches her iPod to a somber Tibetan chant.

Shavasana, the corpse pose. How appropriate, John thinks. This position, lying on his back with his feet and arms spread apart, is his favorite. It allows him to let go and not be. Blankness achieved. There is nothing else, only breath and the chant. Nir-fucking-vana.

Dread fills John when the instructor tells the class to take deep breaths and wiggle their toes. He is returning. Back to earth, back to obligations, back to aiding the crimemongers.