“This where I butcher meat.”
“No shit. You cut it up yourself?”
“Sometimes. Sometimes I need an assistant.” He poked his ringed pinky finger against El Paso’s shoulder. “That’s why I brought you. Business is about to pick up. I want you to start assisting me.”
“I don’t know anything about cutting up cows.”
“Not cows. People. You know a lot about that, don’t you, David Rodriguez?”
Looking a bit thrown off, El Paso took a step back.
Roland didn’t move a muscle as the kid sized him up. He continued in his monotone style. “Butchering meat can get messy. So can cutting someone’s throat. I have a hose back there bigger than a stallion’s dick. It’s connected to a tank of water that’s kept almost to the boiling point. Like sterilizing, you know. Washes everything down a drain that’s as wide as you are tall. I let the bodies practically drain dry, then… relocate them.”
El Paso’s initial caution had been replaced by interest. “That guy whose place I took? Adler? That’s how he bought it, right?” He made a slicing motion across his throat.
Roland took a step toward him. He thought of the lectures he’d received from his mother, always shaking her finger at him. But he kept his hands at his sides and used his cold gaze to get his point across.
“The first thing you gotta learn if you’re going to do this for Oz’s operation. Never talk about it. Don’t boast about a hit, not if it’s a two-bit dealer like Adler, or a politician who won’t play along, or a strung-out celebrity with a loose tongue. Even if you kill a narc who thinks he’s smarter and tougher than us, you don’t take credit. You keep your mouth shut. You say nothing. Not ever. Got it?”
“Yeah, man, I got it. How much money are we talking?”
“For your first, five grand.”
“That’s chicken shit!”
“That’s the offer. You do well, maybe I can persuade Oz into being more generous. He wasn’t convinced you were ready for this. Especially after that stunt you pulled last night. I had to twist his arm into letting you in on this.”
He took a step closer and then another. “But hear me good. From now on, you don’t call the shots. You don’t even get an opinion. You don’t ask questions.You do as you’re told.”
By now he was right in El Paso’s face. He waited several seconds, then stepped back and shot his cuffs. “Don’t fuck up again, kid. Impress me, impress Oz, we’ll renegotiate your pay.”
El Paso relaxed, gave a little shiver as though to shake himself out of a trance, then shrugged. “I’m in.”
“Okay. Let’s get started. There’s a lot you gotta learn.”
Roland motioned him forward. The kid went ahead of him. Like a sheep to slaughter, Roland thought as he reached into his jacket pocket for the garrote.
They’d taken only two steps before a voice boomed out of the darkness behind them.
“This has been an interesting conversation.”
Startled, Roland turned. “Oz?”
“Oz?” El Paso repeated, sounding both awed and terrified.
Roland was almost as shocked as the kid. He had impressed upon Oz how risky it would be for him to show up to witness El Paso’s departure. But Oz was staying out of sight as he’d said he would. He was completely undetectable within the blackness beyond the narrow field of light shed by the row of overheads.
“So this is the famous El Paso,” he said. “Or, should I say, infamous?”
El Paso said nothing.
“This is him,” Roland said. “The one who caused such a ruckus last night by slicing open a cop.”
“What?”El Paso squeaked.
Roland turned back around to face him. “Oh, yeah. Working undercover. A guy named Haskell who’s always been a pain in the ass to our organization, and you just made him a bigger one.” He hadn’t raised his voice, but he had frozen El Paso where he stood.
The kid’s lupine eyes were shifting to and fro as though looking for an escape. Not surprisingly, he whipped out his switchblade and opened it. Roland didn’t react, didn’t even blink. He’d been expecting it.
