“C4 rigged to explode.” I shrugged. “This entire warehouse is rigged to explode.” I had explosives stored all around Santa Barbara and beyond in the US and world. Some people buried treasure; I buried weaponry. I might not have had any money since coming back from the dead, but I was rich in fire power.
I’d stacked all the C4 I’d buried in Santa Barbara into the storefront. That night, I’d make the night hide. For a few seconds while the explosion tore through the store, it would be like the sun had come out again.
“Are you fucking insane?” Dom yelled. He made a move to stand but I shoved him back down again, so hard the chair nearly snapped.
“Careful,” I warned. “I’m already a dead man, but you still have a life to lose.” Dom shivered like a fucking kid in the snow while I went about making final preparations. I wasn’t exaggerating when I said that the minute I pressed enter on the numbers Dom had leaked to me, people were going to swarm into the building. By the time Alice figured it out, though, by the time any of them figured it out, they would be blown to pieces.
After I’d checked all the wires for the one-hundredth time, I stared at my masterpiece. It looked like any other shitheap out there. Covered in dust. Filled with nothing save cockroaches. But that was the point. Not many people would walk into a room filled with explosives and stay longer than a second. So I’d hidden them. I gave one last look at Dom and said adios motherfucker. I pressed enter on the numbers and got ready to hightail it the fuck out of there.
“You can’t leave me here!” Dom called.
“I can,” I corrected, “and I will. If you even step an inch from where you are, you’ll blow the entire fucking place.” Dom gulped and I saw sweat forming on his brow.
“I thought we were buddies,” he squeaked.
“We are, Dom.” I smiled. “That’s why I gave you an inch.”
I watched faraway on a rooftop as GEM employees loaded into the abandoned storefront, ready to take Dom down for sticking his fingers into pies he didn’t own. Before I detonated the remote trigger, I had to be certain Alice would enter as well.
Alice never pulled the trigger herself, but she liked to be present for the executions. Like a queen watching the lyncher at the gallows.
GEM didn’t give a shit about Lennox; the codes confirme
d it. With me dead, my family was of no importance to them. Alice was a different story. Since the day she’d discovered Lenny, coincidentally the same day she’d discovered someone could care more about someone else than her, Alice had hated Lennox. Lenny was a walking reminder that Alice was worth less to someone else. As long as Alice lived and breathed, Lenny would never be safe. Seven knew that, and he’d exploited it.
I knew better than to leave the motel, but as we neared day five, I was seriously considering it. All I’d seen since the first day at the bar was Seven’s ugly mug. I was starting to think I had died and this was hell.
“Are you fucking with me right now?”
“Why do you think I saved you?” he asked, smiling like a fucking twat.
It was a rhetorical question. If I even tried to find the answer, I’d probably get my dick shot off, so instead I mocked, “Your heart grew three sizes?”
“Few things are stronger than love,” Seven mused. “One of those is one who used to be in love.”
“I feel nothing for that bitch.”
“I wasn’t talking about you.”
I pulled out my binoculars and zoomed onto the window. From my perch I could see Alice talking to Dom. Dom looked completely shocked; like I said, he wasn’t the smartest of the bunch. The conversation didn’t last long, though. Within seconds the man next to Alice had pulled the trigger. Dom dropped to the ground in a lump.
I let the binoculars fall around my neck. I recognized death as a necessity in life, but that didn’t mean I enjoyed it. Unlike others in my profession, death was not something I looked forward to. Seeing Dom die had not brought me anything save relief. I was relieved I didn’t have to worry for Lenny, but I was not happy. There shouldn’t be any happiness in death.
I couldn’t take anymore time to ruminate on Dom’s death, though, because the storefront was still crawling with cockroaches. I took one long look at the place and then pressed the button on the remote detonator. The loud boom, followed by multiple smaller cracks, let me know the explosions had worked.
Soon the entire place was engulfed in flames, the accelerant I’d used doing the job. For an instant I balked at the irony. Only months before I’d nearly been by felled flames, and now there I was returning the same kind of punishment. It wasn’t meant to be vengeance or some kind of biblical eye-for-an-eye, I was simply covering my footsteps. The easiest way to erase something is to burn it.
Char filled my nostrils and I turned, unwilling to watch the world burn. Still, I could feel it even with my back to the building. The night was hotter. Bits and pieces of ash and cinder floated in the air like hellish dandelion wisps. A part of me wanted to turn and look back, but I stayed my course, the fire on my neck like a dragon’s breath.
I shimmied down the fire escape, landing on the ground in seconds. Sirens were already in the air so I knew I needed to get the fuck out of Dodge, quickly. I wouldn’t bother with the car, it was stolen after all. It would stay on the side of the road, maybe to eventually meet again with its owner, but most likely to meet with another thief. With GEM, Alice, and Seven officially out of my afterlife I would—
“Vic Wall.”
I spun around at the voice. Soot covered her cheeks and her pantsuit was burned and mangled, but she looked absolutely stoic. Alice leaned against the brick wall, as if she had just gone for a walk and not escaped a burning death.
“You really are a fucking cockroach.” I spat, unable to withhold the hate I had for her any more. Alice shrugged herself off the wall.
“I got out of there quickly…maybe not quick enough.” She glanced down at her wrist, and I could see the beginnings of blisters. “I knew Dom couldn’t be behind this.” Her eyes darted to mine, sharp, as if knowing that was some kind of victory.