Killer Calories

half-objections, she jerked open the car door and slid onto the passenger’s seat. She allowed her short leather skirt to creep upward, displaying the tops of stockings and garter fastenings. Even through the dark lenses, she could see his eyes bug. Good. He was a stockings kind of guy. They were all stockings guys.
    He shot a quick glance at Andy’s front door, then at her legs. “I don’t have a lot of money... not yet, anyway.”
    “Then you’re in luck, ‘ cause I don’t charge much. Not for what you need. How about thirty bucks?”
    “Well... I don’t know. I—”
    “Twenty.”
    “Like I said, I’m sorta busy, and you...”
    “Yeah?”
    “And you’ve kinda got a big butt.”
    She resisted the urge to feed him his own face, feature by ugly feature. “Yeah, and you got zits and a beer gut. But then, we ain’t exactly going on a date to the prom, right? Now, unzip it and let’s get this show on the road.”
    After only a moment’s hesitation, he muttered, “All right, I guess,” and started to fumble with his fly.
    “Not that, sweet thing,” she said as she pulled her Beretta from her red, sequined purse and shoved the barrel against the side of his neck. “You can just leave your pants on for this one.”
    “ Wh — wha —what?”
    With her left hand, she jerked down the zipper of his decrepit Dodgers jacket. “It’s your coat I want, and the cap and the glasses. Hand them over and make it snappy.”

    When Franky Morick —a.k.a. Frank the Crank, a.k.a. Creep Number One—exited Andy’s Bookstore with his pillowcase of loot in one hand and his .22 in the other, he thought Buzz had taken off without him. The car was gone! That stupid—
    But no, it had been moved a few yards down, toward the corner. Why, he had no idea, but he’d have a talk with Buzz about it later. And after they had that conversation, and Buzz got back from the hospital emergency room, he’d hire himself a better driver. Like one with a brain.
    He ran to the Olds, threw open the door, and jumped inside. “Go! Go, you asshole!” he yelled.
    But the car didn’t budge. Neither did Buzz . He just sat there, staring straight ahead, wearing those stupid sunglasses, which were useless as the sun hadn’t risen yet.
    Frank glanced back at Andy’s and saw the shopkeeper’s rotund form filling the doorway, taking down the license number, no doubt. Damn! He’d forgotten to switch the plates with his mom’s, like he usually did before a job.
    “Go, dammit! Don’t sit there picking your nose for chrissake ! Step on it!”
    Still, Buzz didn’t budge.
    Frank shoved his pistol into the waistband of his jeans and tossed the pillowcase with the cash onto the floor. When he did, something caught his eye.
    He blinked, sure he was seeing things in the dim semidarkness of the car’s interior. Along with Buzz’s lame shades, his baseball cap, and mangy Dodgers jacket, he was wearing black stockings... garters... and high heels.
    “What the hell!”
    Frank raised his eyes and stared down the cavernous barrel of a 9 mm pistol. Frank thought he had lost his mind completely. One too many cranks for Frank the Crank.
    When “Buzz” lowered his glasses onto his nose and peered over the top of them, Frank found himself looking into the coldest, bluest eyes he had ever seen.
    A soft, feminine voice with a Southern drawl said, “Put your hands on the dash, sweetie, before I rearrange your brain cells for you... both of them.”
    “But you’re a... who are... where’s...?”
    “Where’s your friend?” She chuckled and nodded toward the corner, where Frank saw Buzz standing beside a wino in a rumpled raincoat. Buzz didn’t look happy, and Frank assumed it might have something to do with the handcuffs he was wearing.
    “What the fuck is this?” Frank turned to the woman with the blue eyes and the gun at his head. “Are you a cop or something?”
    “I’m an ‘or something,’ ” she said. “The bum’s a cop .“
    “So, am I under arrest, or what?”
    “At the moment, you’re ‘or what.’ If you stick around, you’ll be under arrest. And if you move, you’re dead. What’s it gonna be?”
    She looked like she meant it.
    Frank the Crank decided just to sit.

    Savannah pulled her red 1968 Camaro into her driveway and cut the ignition, but the old car continued to chug, wheeze, and shudder, refusing to give up the ghost.
    “Stop, or I’ll take a sledgehammer to you,” she threatened lt ’ pounding the steering