CHAPTER 1
Bo Short (Bo being short for Bob which was short for Robert) went into the bar. He'd been told to meet Charlie and Eddie Hooker there because a well-paying job was on offer.
The brother's Sergeant at Arms, a beefy guy called Herb, frisked Bo and the guy said through broken teeth, "Go to them. They're behind me."
The bar was half-full of guys who looked like crims and all the women looked like sluts, as women tend to do when they slouch in bars or show their panties sitting on stools, instead of standing back in long skirts and adjusting their hair like ladies.
But two hard-faced guys with stubble sitting at a corner table watching Bo as if suspecting he was a few cents short in the dollar told Bo he'd found The Hooker Boys, confirmed because they were the only guys sitting behind Herb. It paid to be careful.
"Pull up a chair and have a drink Bo. I'm Charlie."
Bo waited for the drink to appear until Eddie asked him didn't he want to buy a drink for himself.
"Huh, my mom doesn't like me drinking before midday."
"Yeah moms are good on things like that," Eddie sniggered.
"Of course you wouldn't know your father so your mother would be important to you."
Eddie looked at Bo suspiciously. "What's that suppose to mean?"
"Shut up Eddie. Let's talk business Bo."
It was simply really. All Bo had to do was to plant a bomb under the fuel tank of a woman's car. That's all. The boys would explode it remotely by radio.
"Who's the broad?"
"Shirley Ashley the heiress but Charlie and I are not allowed to tell anyone."
Charlie sighed. "Go home Bo. You'll find the bomb in your mailbox. Here's the address of the broad. She drives a red sports car and parks it in front of the house where she lives."
"Why?"
"How the fuck would I know? I guess she's lazy. How much do you want for doing this little favor for us?"
"Ten thousand bucks."
"Listen asshole, for that amount it would pay me to shut your mouth permanently and do the job myself."
"Then five thou. I get jail if caught."
"Okay, at least that saves me having to get Herb to dispose of your body. Plant the bomb the night after next."
"Okay," Bo said and left the bar whistling. He cursed and retraced his steps feeling quite a fool. Charlie got a big laugh out of that but paid him $2500 with the remainder to be paid 'post-explosion'.
Bo didn't like this job at all. He'd expected his 'finder' to find him a part-time position counting money at a counterfeiting operation, or doping racehorses or training the outfit's molls how to serve drinks and improve their sex performance. Carrying around a bomb was dangerous stuff.
Then Bo became really grumpy. He was waiting for a bus when a guy came up behind him, stuck a gun in his back and robbed him. Bo was surprised the big guy took only the $2500 from his inside jacket pocket. He became more than suspicious when he heard the guy say into a phone as he was walking off, "Hi Charlie. I hauled your money off the weasel without him knowing what day it is. He's thinking random robbery, heh-heh-heh."
Bo decided those jerks wouldn't get away with this. He went to the gym where he worked part-time as a cleaner and had a talk to the boss who'd been a Navy Seal before being discharged with a bunch of medals.
When Bo apologized for interrupting him Waldo Jones said, "Sit Bo, I always have time to talk to my people."
"Boss this is confidential okay?"
"Yep, shoot Bo. Is someone stealing paper rolls from the toilets?"
"Worse than that boss. It concerns that good looking babe Lindy Ashley who comes here."
"Ah, yum yum. She's here now."
"Could you please get her in here and I'll tell you both at the same time. She's in big trouble."
"You mean grave danger like life threatening danger?"
"You can say that again."
A few minutes later Waldo returned with Miss Ashley. She was just out of the shower, her blonde hair slicked back. She wore a tight-fitting summer dress that sculptured her breasts and thighs. Although thinking such tight clothing shouldn't be permitted, Bo licked his lips.
Her blue eyes bored into him and the look said, 'You slimy weasel'.
Bo told them everything including being robbed.
"This is beyond belief, you're making it up Bo."
"No I'm not," Bo said indignantly, thinking she was a slimy bitch with a big mouth.
Waldo frowned. "Lindy, have you every thought of yourself being in danger?"
"No of course not. Bo is trying something on here. Cleaning the toilets has his mind in the sewer."
"Bo?"
"Of course not boss."
Waldo said there was one way to test what they'd been told. "Come on guys."
They piled into Waldo's old black Mercedes.
"Christ this old Mercedes is a front," Lindy said, as Waldo tickled the gas pedal before pushing the stick into drive, her ear tuned to the very powerful growl of a beast wanting to be unleashed.
"I've upgraded the motor and the running gear and brakes. This baby has 600 hp sitting under the hood. If I bought an eye-catching super car it would only get stolen. This model Merc was always considered under-powered and every auto thief knows that."
"God you're smarter than you look," teased Lindy and she was quite upset when Bo said to his boss to thump her.
"Give me directions to your mom's home Bo."
They arrived ten minutes later. The house was up a long driveway so the mailbox was at the street entrance. Waldo opened the mailbox and gingerly removed a shoebox. He rejoined the other two in the car and lifted the lid.
"It's a fake, Bo is having us on."
"Jesus," Waldo said, having examined the device and noted the explosive pack. "This baby packs enough punch to turn this car into scrap metal. Here Lindy hold it and we'll take it to the cops."
"Eeek no, I can't bear to touch it."
"Hand it to me boss," Bo said from the back seat and took it. "Try not to bang into anything or get shunted from behind."
"Oh Christ," Lindy wailed.
Waldo drove off and said they'd take Lindy back to her car.
"I went to the gym by cab. My car is out of action. Three days ago... Ohmigod."
Waldo glanced at her. "What is it?"
"Three days ago I was hit by a delivery van with big bumper bars. The collusion slewed my light vehicle around to nullify the impact. I wasn't injured. One of the front tires of the van disintegrated in the collision and the driver ran away. The police found the van had been reported stolen. It was loaded with concrete rubble."
"Ah, to give it more dynamic forward thrust at point of impact," Waldo said, rubbing his chin. "Where did this collusion occur?"
"Right outside my home as I was crossing the street and was side on, my body on the side of the approaching fast-moving vehicle. I accelerated into a turn but was caught in the rear."
"Jesus."
Bo asked what was it but was ignored. Waldo said this threat on Lindy's life was too difficult to place into the hands of the police.
"That's two attempts on Lindy's life. There will be more to come," Bo said.
"Good thinking pal, I think the same way. Lindy you're being targeted."
"I believe you Waldo," she said, playing with the hair on Waldo's nape.
Bo almost dropped the bomb attempting to throw up his hands in disgust. That Lindy was such a slut.
Waldo dropped Bo off near the docks and told Bo to heave the bomb out into deep water and not attempt to defuse it because it had been professionally assembled.
"I'll take Lindy home to my place for tonight. It will be safer for her there."
Bo accepted that. The hero always got the girl. Huh? Wasn't he the hero raising the alarm? But it was too late to claim Lindy's pussy... the Merc had already rumbled off.
While sitting on a waterfront seat and having to fight off a hobo who'd tried to steal the shoebox, Bo thought he should visit his sister who lived two hundred miles away and not return until the Hooker brother's reward for Bo's assassination had time to expire. He was looking at two broads leaning over the railing looking into the water, exposing their stocking tops. He grinned. Then that rush of blood had given him a great idea.
Bo waited till late dusk before entering the ally behind the bar the brother's apparently used as their office. The vehicles were all junk cars except for one. He grinned because it was a black Escalade as favored by the Sopranos. Bo attached the bomb under the car, jamming it tightly above some metal thinking it might go off when they drove over a big bump. The scum had robbed him so deserved to die accidentally. He now had to act quickly and make sure it was the brother's vehicle.
Bo pulled a slatted steel cover off a gutter drain and smashed a rear side window of the Escalade and opened he door. The rear seat area smelt sweaty, reminding him of Herb's odor. The car alarm was making a din so no time to lose. He searched the pockets and found a box of ammo so chucked that on to a seat, a device that looked like a TV controller so tossed that on to the seat but under the front passenger seat found a black string tied bag that felt like loot so grabbed that and ran.
The backdoor of the bar burst open and as he was about to exit the ally Bo heard the smaller brother Eddie cry incredulously, "Hey boss, us has been robbed!"
Then Charlie yelled, "Get into the car. We'll run the mother-fucker down."
Bo ran across the street and down an alley only wide enough to give people foot access to the river walk. He heard the roar of the Escalade and shuddered, almost wetting himself. And then there was a violent explosion and Bo thought he felt the ground shake beneath his feet. He couldn't hear the vehicle and alarms inside buildings began sounding and people were screaming and other calling out.
Bo fled to the city's transit center.
By the time he left town Bo had it figured out. In the back seat Herb had looked at the box of ammo and opening found it was full and then looked on the seat at found the TV controller only it wasn't a TV controller was it? And then the dummy must have accidentally pressed a button, the wrong one, and the bomb detonated.
Bo had thought about detonating the bomb himself but when in the car had looked unsuccessfully for a little black box with a plunger handle with a safety device over it to prevent accidental misuse. Apparently the radio device the brothers had purchased was not a classy as the manufacturer of the bomb. Heh, heh, heh. The city was now a safer place for people.
Bo opened the black bag and to his astonishment found it was full of banknotes, neatly held in packs by rubber bands. The broad sitting next to him also looked as said, "Ohmigod, is that money?"
Bo was too boastful to lie. "Yeah."
"Oh hi handsome. My name's Nancy."
A decision was called for. Bo decided to go nowhere alone with Nancy until he deposited most of the cash into his bank account and refilled the black bag with bank deposit slips with just a couple of packs of bills on the top. He managed to do that doing a coffee break. Then after Nancy fucked him near senseless he'd be happy for her to run off with all the cash she could find because it wouldn't be much compared with what had been in the bag. But then perhaps once she saw what he packed she mightn't be in a hurry to run off.
Nancy smiled like a long-lost friend. "What's your name honey?"
