Free The Carrier by Preston Lang Page B

here.”
    Cyril and Willow were now
closer to the center of town. They passed a frat house, blasting
out Atlanta rap for white Iowans. Put a
Tec-9 up in his face , the kids sang along
with the chorus. The sound system was not equal to the bass in this
song.
    “ Where are you parked?”
Cyril asked.
    “ Close to
Ridley’s.”
    “ What’s
Ridley’s?”
    “ You know, that magic place
where we first met?”
    Walking down Main Street of a small
college town, Cyril had an easy opportunity to take off running,
but he didn’t do it. He still thought he could have it all. Greedy?
Was he getting greedy? Not giving up on a payday is not the same
thing as being greedy.
    Willow decided they should walk one
block north of Main Street, instead of walking down the central
strip of town. She spotted the Ford with Massachusetts plates
parked just off one of the side streets.
    “ There’s his car,” she
said.
    “ Where’d he go?”
    “ You set off his alarm. When
he shows up, I shoot him.”
    “ You’re serious?”
    She’d drawn on silly frat boys who
weren’t likely to hurt them too much. It wasn’t a stretch to think
she’d shoot someone sent to kill them.
    “ You don’t think that’s a
good idea?” she asked.
    “ There’s a hundred kids out
on the streets. They’ll all hear it.”
    “ I’m parked two blocks from
here. If we run as soon as I drop him, we’ll be in my car and gone
before anyone sees the body.”
    “ What if the guy has a
partner?”
    “ He’ll be angry, but he
won’t be any more dangerous, will he? We head right to the highway,
and we are miles away from this cow town before the police even
know they should be doing anything.”
    The plan wasn’t bad, but it was
frightening. Cyril had seen a lot of guns, even had a few pointed
at him to read his pulse, but he’d never been around when the guns
went off.
    “ If you start shooting, I’m
running away as fast as I can,” he said.
    “ Wow, you’re really against
violence.”
    “ I’m just—”
    “ You went Dalai Lama on me
all of a sudden.”
    “ Can’t we just slash out his
tires?”
    “ Go ahead, but if he shows
up while we’re doing it, then I’ll shoot him.”
    The driver couldn’t be too far away.
Cyril would have to work quickly. He’d watched Duane slash tires
before—five times in a row to the neighbor who’d moved in on their
mom just after she’d been widowed. The neighbor kept buying new
tires, and he never got anywhere with their mom. Duane had always
kept his knife sharp, and Cyril worried his would be too dull after
all that scraping at the tracker. But he slashed right through the
sidewall of the front left tire. It gave a satisfying hiss. Then he
made his way clockwise to the others. He finished the job in less
than a minute.
    “ Okay, let’s go,” he
said.
    “ So you were a juvenile
delinquent?”
    They walked away quickly, past the bar
where they’d met, to Willow’s car, a Toyota like Cyril’s, but a
little older and shabbier with Delaware plates. Less than fifteen
minutes later they were rolling west down Interstate 80.

CHAPTER 16
     
    Marcus parked just off Main Street. On
the very next block he saw a small Toyota with Delaware plates. It
was the first car he’d seen that didn’t have Iowa plates or a
Graham College sticker. He peeked inside, but there was nothing
remarkable. It felt like a woman’s car to him, though, so he tried
to memorize the license number.
    He walked back to Main Street along
this side path. He had a decent place to wait, just outside a bar,
where a few other people—some townies, some students—stood smoking.
He wasn’t a real smoker, but he asked a student for a
cigarette.
    “ Yeah. How about I just give
you a dollar? I mean—this is an expensive habit,” the student
said.
    “ A dollar?”
    “ I don’t get them
free.”
    “ Here, bud. I’ll give you
one,” an older man said.
    “ Thank you, sir.”
    Marcus took a Camel and realized that
it might make him sick.