Page 34 of More Tricks

“I’ll have one of what he’s having,” I said.

Tops scowled. “You sure? He’s got horrible taste in liquor.”

“What is it?” I questioned, curious what could be so bad that a bartender would warn you off it.

Grabbing a bottle, he slammed it on the counter and just raised a brow as I read the label. “Oh, that shit can fuck all the way off,” I blurted. “Damn, son, why the hell are you drinking El Toro? Do you want to feel like a shit stain tomorrow?”

“What does it matter? I’m the reason my sister doesn’t have ears anymore,” Demitri slurred.

My gaze snapped up to Tops. “How many of those has he had?”

“Oh, this is his bottle. It was full when he set it on the counter. I told him he couldn’t drink it like that. I don’t want people thinking I actually use this swill,” Tops explained.

The bottle in question was about half full and that just made me feel nauseous. “How long has he been sitting here?”

“Twenty minutes or so ago, he stumbled in,” Tops answered. “Figured it was better to keep an eye on him instead of kicking him out for being a drunken mess. Damn, you should hear the things he’s been babbling on about. Guy needs to stop playing so many video games or something.”

Great. So much for keeping this on the down low.

“I’m gonna take him back to the house. You hide that bottle or dump it out for all I care,” I instructed, feeling it was best to get him the hell out of the public eye.

“Good call. Someone might actually believe what he’s saying about being a rat,” Tops commented, giving me a look that told me he was one of them.

I held his gaze a moment, but I didn’t see any trouble coming from him, just being a true brother to his fellow crew member. “Thanks, Tops, you’re good people.”

Sliding off the stool, I shoved the box in my back pocket where it barely fit, but I needed both hands to deal with the drunken mess. “Alright, here we go.” Grabbing an arm, I pulled it over my shoulders and dragged him with me.

Thankfully, he could still stumble about and wasn’t dead weight. At this point, I would have taken him by the ankles and hauled his ass back to the house like the moron he was. What the hell was he thinking, getting lit and flapping his gums about being a rat? Fuck, I had so many other things to worry about, and taking care of this kid wasn’t one of them.

Sprocket was on the porch steps, probably waiting for me to come back when he spotted what I was dealing with. He set his own beer down and made his way over to us. “What the hell happened?”

“What always happens when you drink bad tequila, poor life choices,” I answered. “Damn fool is sharing all the secrets as he tried to smother his sorrows in a bottle of paint thinner.”

Sprocket took the other side, but our height difference made this awkward in another way. Finally, I gave up and just let Sprocket handle the problem as I got to the top of the stairs first to open the door for them.

“The fuck is going on?” Eagle demanded from his nephew. “God, why does your breath smell like it could be lit on fire?”

I chuckled to myself. “That’s about all that shit is good for. Found him in the clubhouse knocking back shots like it was water. Kind of impressive for it being El Toro if you ask me.”

“Sprocket put him on the couch, and someone find a bucket that boy can puke in,” Eagle instructed, then he turned to me. “So?”

“There is a chance it might not be her,” I answered in a low voice. “I stopped to talk to him because I wanted to know if he remembered her fighting with Gabby about getting her ears pierced without permission. One piercing seems too far off the mark for it to have been done professionally.”

“No, Gabby took her on her tenth birthday to get her ears pierced. It was all she wanted for her birthday,” Eagle shared. “I remember Gabby telling me how still Elena sat for the lady doing it, saying she wanted them to be perfect. Elena is just as particular as Gabby is about details. It would have bothered her to have it off-center.”

“Then these aren’t her ears,” I stated, pulling the box out of my back pocket. “My money is on that wasn’t her finger either. They’ve kept her too long, and I doubt they would waste a hospital trip to keep her healthy. If you don’t treat a missing finger, you could bleed out.”

Eagle’s shoulders sagged in relief as he guided me toward Picasso’s room. “Tell him. He won’t listen to me, but I bet he’ll listen to you.”

“That is if he doesn’t cuss me out again,” I muttered, entering into the space.

There he stood before his easel, a new canvas set up that he was sketching something out. Keeping silent, I approached and tried to figure out what he was trying to process. It was a tree, but not one I would think of depicting life. Instead, it looked like it was sick, dying, gnarled, and knotted. The branches seemed to be trying to reach out and grab the viewer if only they could make it off the canvas. What I was more curious about was to know who exactly this was depicting. Himself? Me? Our enemies? Maybe even the world as a whole.

“I'm almost positive they aren’t hers,” I whispered.

His hand faltered for just a moment before he continued. I understood this state of mind. It had been building and building up inside him until he was ready to burst. Now he was using that emotion and spilling it onto this canvas. So I watched and waited, picked up a pad of drawing paper, and started to sketch him. I was trying to capture everything I could feel flowing out of him, curious to see if that could translate into an image when there were no words to explain it.

Having no idea how long we stayed like this until Eagle opened the door to call us for dinner. That seemed to be enough for Picasso to break out of his trance and jump in surprise when he saw me sitting on a stool next to him.