King Suckerman
- Автор: Пелеканос Джордж
- Серия: D.C. Quartet #2
- Год: 1997
- Язык: английский
- Год: Little, Brown and Company
- ISBN: 978-0-316-69590-9
- Жанр: Триллеры
Электронная книга - «King Suckerman». Краткое содержание книги:
“Nice day to get in the wind,” said Larry.
“Huh?” said Albert, who sat on the couch, cleaning pot on the cover of Pronounced Leh-Nerd Skin-Nerd.
“He said it’s a good day to ride,” said Charlie, wearing a Tijuana Pussy Posse T-shirt and sitting next to Albert.
“Oh,” said Albert. “It is a good day.” Albert was high and happy.
Larry stared out the window. “Why don’t somebody put some fuckin’ music on,” he said.
“Put some on,” said Charlie to Albert.
“I’m gettin’ the seeds and stems out of the shit,” said Albert.
“I’ll put some on, then,” said Charlie.
Charlie took his can of Natty Bo off the table in front of him and went to the stereo, where the albums were set face out in a peach crate. Charlie flipped past a couple of Dead albums, a New Riders of the Purple Sage, and a scratched London-label Stones that had no cover. He stopped at a double near the back of the crate.
“Steppenwolf Live all right?” said Charlie.
“Put it on,” said Larry.
Charlie put on side four, his favorite, which kicked off with “Hey Lawdy Mama.” He shook his kinky black hair, played some air guitar with the hand that did not hold a beer as Deborah, Larry’s woman, came into the room.
Deborah stood near six feet and wore hip-hugger jeans with one snap on the fly and a leather headband tied around her long, straight chestnut hair. The headband made her look faintly Indian, that and her deep tan and high cheekbones. The long nipples of her thin, conical breasts pressed out against her shorty T. She flipped her hair off her shoulder, revealing one feather earring. Deborah had just done a line of uncut snow back in the kitchen; she rubbed its residue onto her gums, then licked her finger clean.
“What the fuck’s happening, Larry?” she said.
“Waitin’ on those buyers,” said Larry, turning around to look at his woman. Larry scratched at his beard. He had another swig of beer, tossing his head back for a long one. His jean vest parted to expose his barrel chest and a great white belly covered with hair. Larry belched.
Albert did a bong hit, passed the bong over to Charlie, seated now on the couch. Albert shook a Marlboro red out of his box, gave himself a light. Charlie filled the bowl of the bong.
“You know these guys?” said Deborah.
“Remember that fat guy from Jersey, we met him in that bar in D.C., the dude bought us all those beers?”
“Yeah?”
“He knows ’em.”
“That supposed to mean something?” said Deborah.
“Shit, Deb, it’s a beautiful day. Why you gotta be so negative and shit?”
“Yeah,” said Albert, “you’re killing my high.”
“Just shut the fuck up, Albert,” said Deborah.
“You gonna let your lady harsh me out like that, bro?” said Albert. Albert blinked his close-set eyes and shook a curtain of greasy brown hair out of his face.
Larry didn’t answer. He crossed the room, gave Deborah a kiss, calmed her down. It was more to protect Albert than it was Deborah. Larry had seen Deborah kick Albert’s ass one night at a keg party out by the fire in the middle of the field. Albert claimed it was the barrel acid on top of the 714s that night that had thrown off his timing. But Larry knew it was his lady’s fierce will to come out on top. Hell, she even had to fuck him the same way — always on top. Deborah, she was one tough lady.
“Hey,” he whispered in her ear. “Let’s work on some peaceful vibes around here today, okay?”
“Okay, Larry,” she said. “Okay.”
Charlie used a poker to force the rest of the hit through the bong’s bowl. He put the bong on the lacquered wood table and walked to the front window. He looked out into the yard.
A red muscle car appeared over the hill near the tree line, came slowly down the gravel road. Poor Boy stopped polishing his bike, stared at the car as it stopped fifty yards from the house. Charlie gave a stoned chuckle as he squinted through the streaked window, seeing the Afros inside the car.
“Hey, Larry,” said Charlie, saying it loud enough so Larry could hear over the John Kay vocals and dirty guitar filling the room.
“Yeah,” said Larry.
“Buncha boofers in a cage just pulled up and stopped in the middle of the yard.”
“What kind of a cage, Slo Ride?” said Larry.
“Dodge,” said Charlie, who was called Slo Ride by his bros. “Red ragtop with black hood stripes.”
“That’s the way Eddie described it,” said Larry. “That’s them.”
Charlie watched the doors open, watched two figures emerge from the backseat. Charlie pushed a block of hair back behind his ear.
“Goddamn,” said Charlie.
“What?” said Larry.
“Two of ’em are walking toward the house. One’s packing double automatics and a suitcase and the other’s holding a sawed-off. They ain’t trying to hide it, neither.”
Albert stood up from his seat on the couch. He stabbed his smoke into the tire ashtray that sat on the table. “What the fuck’s going on, Larry?”
Larry picked at his beard. “Hell if I know. The way they do it down in Florida, I guess.”
“I’ll get the guns,” said Deborah, anticipation and excitement in her voice.
“Right.” Larry nodded rapidly. “And you go with her, Albert. Then go out the back door and get yourself against the side of the house.”
Albert and Deborah went back to the bedroom, came back quickly with guns and ammunition stacked like firewood in their arms. They dumped the guns on the couch.
“C’mon, Slo Ride,” said Larry. But Charlie hadn’t moved. He was smiling at the two who were now nearing the bungalow.
“What’re you waitin’ on, Slo Ride?” said Larry.
“Just lookin’ at our visitors, is all.”
“Yeah? Whaddaya see?”
“A bad-lookin’ nigger and a white boy who walks like a nigger. I’m tellin’ you, you ought to see it. It’s funnier than shit.”
“Never mind that,” said Larry. “Get your ass over here, now.”
Deborah slapped a magazine into the house M16 she had picked up off the couch. She switched the selector to full auto, cocked her hip, struck an SLA pose.
“How do I look, baby?” said Deborah.
“Just like Patty,” said Larry, a hint of pride in his voice.
Deborah said, “Bring ’em on.”
Larry could only look at her and smile.
Ronald Thomas leaned over toward the passenger seat, snorted a neat white mound off the crook of Russell’s hand. He felt the burn in his sinuses and almost right after, the medicinal drip in the back of his throat. The freeze was nice, but it made him want to do something: Get out of the car, fuck someone up, talk to some bitches... do something. He heard Russell take some more blow up into his nose.
“Got-damn, boy, this shit is right!” Russell put out his hand. “Gimme one of them double-O’s, man.”
Ronald shook two Kools out from the bottom of the deck. He pushed in the dash lighter. He smiled a little, watching Cooper and that B.R. boy walking toward the house, putting something extra in their strides, Clagget having a time of it, trying to put a city black man’s down-step to it on those four-inch-high stacks of his. The two of them stopped at the shirtless biker cat who had been polishing his hog when they first drove up. Then Cooper got up on the front porch, stepped right in, just opened the screen door without knocking, went inside. B. R. Clagget stayed out in the yard, talking with the shirtless biker with the German army — looking helmet on his head.