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My Kind of Town Don Chapman |
Revenge of the kid’s ghost
» Aiea
The bodyguards were on edge, but not alert. Big difference.
OK, and big difference too from the security guys Mario and Kenny had in their employ and the Secret Service.
Mario's guy at the door, Glock in the waistband of his board shorts, had done a cursory check of the black UH gym bag Wili unzipped, revealing packets of cash. He nodded solemnly to Mario.
From the rude rambling sound coming from the other side of the bathroom door, Mario's other guy was in there doing some business.
Kenny's guy sat with him on a couch, Smith & Wesson .45 on the coffee table beside a plastic-wrapped brick of brown heroin. They all knew these three, did business with them in the past, expected they would in the future. So why not relax and enjoy the buzz.
Mario's guy started to close the door behind Tai.
That's when things started happening fast and crazy.
All at the same time, Tai blocked the door with his foot, Wili said, "Hey Kenny, catch!" -- how's he know my name, nobody knows my name, not the cops, not the prosecutor, nobody! -- and in an instant unscrewed the tops of both canisters inside the gym bag and tossed one at Kenny, one at Mario, and as a fog of insect killer hissed in their faces, Seth false-cracked Mario's guy, karate chop to the back of the head, and he crumpled as Wili, Tai and Seth went for their guns.
Tai took out Mario with a shot to the chest, another to the neck. "From your cousin," he said.
A moment before he lost consciousness, Mario knew -- the ghost of that afternoon at the park was coming back to get him. He slumped to the floor, dead.
Kenny understood too. Coughing, half-blind from the spray, Kenny's guy lurched for his .45, but Tai jumped across the room, kicked him in the head.
"The kid from the park sends greetings," Wili said to Kenny. "The new convict who kept your name secret from the law too."
He and Tai squeezed off rounds, both bulls-eyes to the heart. Tai added a shot to the head for good luck as Wili scooped the heroin and the .45 into the gym bag.
They walked purposefully back to the black SUV in guest parking, not wanting to attract further attention, though it's not like gunfire was unusual here. Seth used the remote-key to unlock the doors. They'd just reached the vehicle when another shot rang out, a bullet hit the passenger door, just missing Tai. As they sped away, Wili glanced back, saw Mario's guy from the bathroom jumping into a Honda, the guy Tai decked following on wobbly legs.
At that moment, Quinn Ah Sun and the second Lama Jey Tsong Khapa, riding Quinn's BMW bike, were turning onto Likelike from Kahekili.
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Don Chapman is editor of MidWeek. His serialized novel runs daily in the Star-Bulletin. He can be e-mailed at dchapman@midweek.com