Frank watched it carefully from behind his bar. The club was empty by this hour, thank goodness. He didn’t want it getting out that he had resorted to this.
A demon.
Frank Delgatto, how low can you go?
Hell, he was desperate. This cop, this Lt. Demming, was closing in, and none of the conventional means of sending him on his way had worked.
It occurred to Frank, as he was pouring a healthy serving of whisky into each glass, that it might not drink.
His eyes moved up to the round, bloody hole that was the things mouth. To be honest, he didn’t want to think about it.
“So,” Frank made his way over to the table as nonchalantly as he could, glasses in hand. “Mr. Mac. You’ve come highly recommended to me.” The glasses hit the table, ice clinking against the crystal. “And I must say, you look as though you’re the right…” Frank struggled briefly with the noun before recovering, “…individual for the job I have in mind.”
Mac said nothing, yellow eyes staring lazily at Frank from behind half-closed lids. It’s hands tapped rhythmically on the table, and it was with a sudden wave of nausea that Frank realized it wasn’t it’s fingernails that were making the clicking noise – it was the teeth.
Frank sat down in the chair, not bothering to pull it closer to the table. “You’ve been in L.A. long, Mr. Mac?”
It’s just Mac. No mister. My price is fifteen grand now, fifteen after.
Frank hadn’t heard it speak. The words just appeared in his consciousness, cold and stark like a sliver of ice slipping into his ear and melting.
He ignored the sudden, sharp headache that typically accompanied unexpected telepathy. The bastard could’ve warned him. “30 g’s.” Frank wiped the condensation off his glass, staring into the eyes of the thing across the table. “Pretty steep for a simple hit.”
Mac said nothing. He moved with a slow deliberateness, cupping a hand over his glass. The bile colored eyes widened, the inner eyelids coming across vertically to keep them moist. Frank scrambled to fill the precariously silent void he had created. “I mean, I’m sure you’re very good at what you do, uh, Mac, but…it’s just some dumb flat foot who doesn’t know how to take a hint.”
Mac adjusted his tie with his free hand, his posture slackening into the visual representation of a sigh.
You want this man dead.
“Yes.” Frank couldn’t stop fidgeting in his seat, shifting and re-shifting.
You want this man to disappear.
“Yes, so?”
You want this man to be completely eradicated, no trace of him left.
“Yes, yes, goddamnit!”
Mac removed his hand from his now empty whisky glass, shaking his hand so as to remove the last few drops of amber liquid.
That’s gonna cost you thirty thousand, Mr. Delgato.
Frank looked from the glass, to Mac, several times.
So that’s what Willy meant when he said this fellow ate cops for breakfast.
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Robin Jeffrey 