Storm Prey

do you think?”
    “I think we go after Joe,” Barakat said.
    “If we take Joe, we might have to take Lyle. They’re pretty tight.”
    Barakat said, “So?”
    The coke was on top of both of them now, and they were stuffing the fries into their mouths, eyes bright, faces animated. “Do that, we gotta figure out where they put that dope,” Cappy mumbled through the potatoes.
    They snarled through the rest of the meal, and when wiping their hands and faces with paper napkins, Barakat asked, “Why didn’t you take Joe when you could have? At the airport?”
    Cappy raised his eyebrows, shook his head. “Hell, you know, I wasn’t thinking about it. I was there to do the chick. I had a contract, you know, with the brothers: so I went and did it. I only got to thinking about it later, when you brought it up. If it wasn’t for the doctor chick, and then the kidnapping, I’d let it go. Trust that they’d keep their mouths shut, and that we could ride it out. That’s not going to happen, now. If they catch Joe without killing him ...”
    “We better get him,” Barakat said.
    Cappy suggested that they would have to wait until the next day: “Honey Bee usually goes home about seven o’clock. If she’s there, she adds to the problem.”
    “All right, but tomorrow ...” He stopped, and looked around. “We should talk about this somewhere else. My place is two minutes from here.”
     
     
    THEY WENT to Barakat’s and Barakat brought out the cocaine again, still far enough from a shortage that he didn’t worry about it. The coke helped with that attitude, steadied him with its cold clearheadedness, its chemical confidence, the sense of potency.
    They started to argue.
    “You go in there with a gun, you can’t pussy out,” Cappy told him. “The second that Joe figures out what you’re doing, he’ll be all over you. He’s a tough guy, you know. A little stupid, but he can fight. Strong as an ox. You gotta put the gun on him and keep it there.”
    “No worry,” Barakat said. “I’m no pussy.”
    “You know what does it? It’s that accent, you know?” Cappy said, his eyes glowing. “It’s kind of a pussy accent. What kind of accent is that, anyway?”
    “There’s nothing pussy about my accent,” Barakat said. “I’m Lebanese, I speak French, you know, I have a French accent in English.”
    “You an Arab?”
    “No. I am a descendant of the Phoenicians. The Arabs come from Arabia. My family, we were in Lebanon since Adam.”
    “Whatever the fuck all that means,” Cappy said. He lit one of the Gauloises and added, “I just hope you don’t pussy out.”
    Barakat stared at him for a second, then jumped out of his chair and stormed into the bedroom. Poured coke into his hand, pulled it through his nose in a burst that was as cold as an icicle. Snatched open the closet door, and found the gun. A minute later, he was back with the .45. “You think I’m a pussy?” he demanded.
    “Whoa, whoa, whoa,” Cappy said. He pulled his feet up on the couch. He’d always thought that he wasn’t long for this life, but he didn’t want to cut it any shorter than necessary.
    “I’m not a pussy,” Barakat said. He wiped his face and nose with his free hand. “You fuckin’ American gangsters, you think you’re the only people who can do this. You know nothing at all.” He yanked the magazine out of the .45, tested the spring with his thumb, and slapped it back in the butt and jacked a shell into the chamber, pointed the barrel at the ceiling.
    “You think—”
    “Dude—”
    Barakat pulled the trigger, and the gun went off with a deafening explosion, and a trickle of plaster fell from the ceiling. Stunned, they both stared at the small hole above their heads.
    “Dude,” Cappy said, and then he started laughing. Barakat didn’t join in; he got angrier.
    “Let’s go,” he said. He pushed the gun into the front of his pants.
    “Gonna shoot your nuts off,” Cappy said. But he stood up.
    Barakat frowned—an “Oh, yeah” frown. He took the gun back out, checked the safety. “This is, they say, cocked and locked. Let’s go.”
    “Where are we going?” Cappy asked.
    “You a pussy?”
    “I’m smoking this fuckin’ cigarette, ain’t I?”
    They took Cappy’s van, with Barakat behind the wheel. He’d taken a small baggie of coke, and he snorted another pile off the back of his hand and passed the baggie to Cappy. “Pussy,” he said, and he laughed, and turned north, and reached