Riding the Rap

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Book: Riding the Rap by Elmore Leonard Read Free Book Online
Authors: Elmore Leonard
there and do number two by himself and we wouldn’t have to unchain him every time. Last night I took him in there he asked for something to read.”
    Other things didn’t make sense to Bobby. Why take the beds out, put in those little cots? Louis said it was how the Shia done it over in Beirut, the Shia having written the book on how to mind hostages. Louis said Chip wanted to use straw mattresses like he read about in one of the hostage books, but nobody made such a thing.
    Food, they’d bring in on a tray and hand it to him: all different kinds of TV dinners Louis chose. The first time they fed him, that Friday night, they stayed to watch Harry dig in blindfolded. He took a bite of the Mexican Medley and said, “What is this shit?” but kept eating, made a mess cleaning his tray. Finishing up Harry wanted to know what was for dessert. When he didn’t get an answer or any dessert he said, “How about some Jell-O? If you guys don’t know how to make it, go to Wolfie’s on Collins Avenue and pick me up some. Strawberry, with the fruit in it. Get some rice pudding, too.”
    The routine Louis decided on was to feed Harry TV dinners twice a day and snacks in between like cookies, potato chips, candy bars. Louis said the Shia fixed their hostages rice andshit, but no doubt would have given them TV dinners if they had any.
    Â 
    Saturday morning Bobby drove Harry’s Cadillac to a bump shop in South Miami to unload it, Louis following in Bobby’s car to pick him up. On the way back he watched Bobby counting a stack of bills, his lips moving, but never saying how much he got and Louis didn’t ask. Fuck him. He thought since they were alone Bobby would want to talk about Freeport, ask Louis what his idea was to get to Harry’s money; but he didn’t, busy with his own money, and Louis didn’t bring it up.
    Coming to Delray Beach, Louis turned off the freeway and headed east toward the ocean. Bobby, looking around, asked where was he going and Louis said to Tom Junior’s Rib Heaven, get some takeout, best ribs in South Florida. He said they had other good stuff, too, like conch fritters, collards—man, blackeye peas. Bobby said he didn’t eat that shit and Louis held on to the steering wheel.
    When he turned off Old Dixie and pulled into a grocery store on Linton, Bobby said, “What you stopping here for?”
    Louis said, “Supplies,” and got out of the car thinking the P.R. motherfucking bill collector would sit there and wait, but Bobby followed him in the store.
    A man and woman that reminded Louis of the Shia, Arab-looking, were behind the counter in front talking to each other in a foreign language,arguing, it sounded like, ugly people. When they looked up Louis said, “How you doing?” He took a cart and started down the nearest aisle, wondering if the woman had dyed her hair orange or was wearing a wig. You saw people like them all over running little groceries and party stores, Arab or something like it. Louis began picking out snacks from the shelves. He got Oreo chocolate sandwich cookies. He got potato chips, tortilla chips, Cheez-Its, pretzels, a box of peanut brittle, some candy bars, moved on to the cereals, picked out—let’s see—Cocoa Puffs, Cap’n Crunch . . . and Froot Loops. Louis went on to the dairy case for milk, picked up six-packs of beer and Mountain Dew—he’d heard had more caffeine in it than any other kind of soda—and a pair of rubber gloves for cleaning the blindfolded man’s
bathroom. Louis put the groceries on the counter and said to Bobby, looking at the magazine rack, “Since you got all the money, you want to pay for this?” Turning, walking away, Louis said, “I forgot something.” He went down an aisle where he thought Jell-O should be and over to another aisle before he found it, all kinds of flavors in color. He took three boxes of

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