Chapter 42
SCYLLA OPENED HIS front door, and Steemcleena entered, Morbid right behind him. They seemed purposeful and serious, and Jason got the feeling that the two of them had been longtime buddies, maybe even outside the game. Actually, it was cool that they were letting him in at all.
“How’s the nose?” Morbid asked, taking a leather lounge chair, sprawling in it, as Steem looked over the bookshelves.
“It’s okay. You guys want a beer?” Jason asked.
“Not for me, thanks. Nice place, Scylla. The view is great from here,” Steem said as he headed toward the sliding door that led out to the terrace.
“Let me get that,” Jason said, limping after him. He unlatched the door and pulled it open. “It’s the shits—like a thirty-mile view,” he said.
Steemcleena whistled. “Hey, Morbid. You should see this. Come out here, man. It’s like a movie. Cinematic.”
Jason moved aside the metal bistro chairs so that all three of them could line up at the terrace wall and share Los Angeles.
Steemcleena said to Jason, “See that?” He pointed to a van across the street, the one with the Comcast logo. “That’s redemption for you, partner. Tonight’s ride. You believe you’re getting a second chance?”
“Sure I do,” said Scylla.
“Well, you’re not, asshole. You’re tonight’s pigeon.”
Steemcleena bent quickly. He grabbed Scylla by the knees. At the same time, Morbid pushed his shoulders so that Jason was lying across the wall, head and chest over the sheer cliff of the terrace. Below him was sixty feet of air.
“Don’t,” Jason cried out. “Please, just put me down. Please?”
“Don’t whine, you little twerp. Just spread your wings and fly.”
Jason’s belly scraped concrete as he was shoved a few more inches over the wall. Cars sped by on the street below. Blood rushed to his brain, and his mind spun. What could he say? That this was the most incredible game of all?
Jason’s mind kicked off disconnected images. His father’s hand holding a pen. The priest who gave him first communion. The look on Marguerite Esperanza’s face while she fought for her life.
His own voice was loud inside his head.
I’m not supposed to die this way.
I’m not supposed to die at all.
He was too scared to scream as he dropped over the rail, and he clearly heard Steem yell, “Pigeon!”