Even at the lowest points of his life, he never stooped to trying heroin. He wanted nothing that such a drug could provide. During rehab, he met heroin addicts, and the stories they told were horrifying.
Carlos leaves the living room, and Owen tries to catch Joe’s eyes, but the man looks away and mumbles, “Don’t look at me, narc. Fuck you and your smoke tricks. What kind of undercover pig does cocaine?”
Owen tries to push the gag out with his tongue, and finally, he succeeds. He coughs and says, “I’m not a cop! I just did them a favor.”
“Yeah, a favor that was gonna put me in prison.”
“It wasn’t about getting you in prison. We wanted to find out who is flooding the streets with drugs.”
Joe chews on his lower lip, doubt in his eyes.
“Are you a murderer?” Owen asks him, not sure if he can handle the answer.
Before Joe can reply, Carlos returns, holding a small pouch. “Why’d you let him speak?”
“He pushed the gag out. Listen, he says it wasn’t about taking us down.”
Carlos rolls his eyes. His bald head is damp and shining under the ceiling light. “You’re gonna believe a narc now? Estúpido.”
Joe sits on a chair, running a hand through his hair. “This is bad.”
Carlos sits next to Owen. “Go smoke. Relax.”
“I can’t relax now.”
“Then shut up.”
Carlos meets Owen’s eyes. “You’ll feel good in a few minutes.”
“Please don’t. I just wanted to help people.” He doesn’t want to beg, but what other option does he have? In any movie he ever saw with someone being kidnapped, the best you could hope for is either reasoning with your captors or gaining more time so you couldbe rescued.
Maybe Carlos has seen those movies too, since he tells Owen, “Shut up. We’ll finish this quickly.”
He pulls out a syringe from the pouch and a small nylon bag with brown powder. “Bring me a lighter and a spoon,” he tells Joe.
Owen stares at the syringe like it’s a loaded gun. “They’ll know you killed me. My aunt is a cop. The sheriff is her best friend.”
Carlos narrows his eyes. “Bullshit.”
“It’s not. I came to Van Buren because I got into trouble back home, and my parents thought I’d be better off staying with my aunt, who’s a cop. I’m supposed to be at dinner with her right now. She’s looking for me, Carlos, and maybe other cops are as well.”
Carlos glances at his brother, who’s standing close by with a lighter and a spoon. “They won’t know to look for you here.”
“Won’t they? I think they will.”I hope they will.
Joe says something angry in Spanish to his brother, who shakes his head. “We’ll be in more trouble if we fuck this up.” He reaches for the cloth that Owen spat out. “Be quiet now.”
Owen tries to get up from the couch, hoping to break something or scream loud enough to make the neighbors notice, but Carlos pulls him back down, bringing the syringe close to his face. “Calm down, or I’m shoving this into your pretty eye.”
He doesn’t resist when Carlos shoves the cloth deep into his mouth.
He knows he should look away, but he can’t stop himself from watching Carlos tapping the powder onto the spoon. He uses the lighter to heat up the metal, turning the powder into brown liquid in seconds. He’s about to pour it into the syringe when Owen sharply moves and hits him with his shoulder, making Carlos spill the liquid. He curses in Spanish and smashes the back of his hand against Owen’s head.
He sees stars, but at least he bought a bit more time. Joe hurries over and sits on Owen, squeezing him against the couch.
“We need to get him out of here,” Joe says. “If the police are coming over—”
“I’ll give him two shots of this, then we’ll leave him in the woods.”
