Disavowed by R A McGee

Author:R A McGee [McGee, R A]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Darewood Press
Published: 2020-06-29T16:00:00+00:00

Forty-Four

Clark consulted his phone several times, ensuring the directions he was following were correct. His route from the medical center had taken him from the well-lit and populated roads near Union Station, nearly a mile away, to a several-block stretch of small rowhomes, their color impossible to discern in the dull yellow glow of the street lights.

He walked past a man leaning on an old Cadillac Eldorado with a for sale sign in the window, sparking a cigarette. Clark stopped for a moment, then turned around to talk to the old man. He was thin, wearing blue jeans and a pair of white tennis shoes that practically glowed in the dark. A graying afro perched atop his head. Clark spoke from several feet away, so as not to startle the man.

“You mind if I buy a couple of those from you?”

“These?” the man said, waving the box of menthol smokes.

“Yeah.”

“Shit. I thought you meant my car or something. A real score.” The man fished a couple of cigarettes out of the box and handed them to Clark.

“Let me buy them,” Clark said.

“Why? They’re just cancer sticks. Shit, I should pay you for taking them off my hands. You really doing me a favor. I should be telling you no. Save both our lives.”

“Life’s too short not to, from time to time,” Clark said. He handed the man a folded bill.

The man shrugged and fished out a couple more cigarettes, adding to the ones already in his hand, and gave them to Clark.

“Got a light?”

The man leaned over and sparked a disposable lighter in Clark's face, lighting the smoke.

Clark took a drag, his face feeling the small spark of warmth on the chilly evening. “Thanks.”

“Your funeral,” the old man said as Clark turned to walk away.

He got several steps down the sidewalk when the man called out after him. “Hey, man, this is a hundred. At least let me give you the rest of the pack.”

Clark didn’t answer, instead following the path he’d plotted out.

By the time he’d chained his third cigarette onto the end of his second, he was feeling a pang of guilt. If Miri knew he was smoking, she’d kill him. She always hated it when he did it, and despite his objections, she always trashed his cigarettes when she could.

He thought of his partner, hoping she was having luck getting what she needed from the hacker, then stopped in front of the house he was looking for. It was as nondescript as every other place on the street. Clark was sure it was in need of a new paint job and a strong pressure wash of the concrete stairs. The area was damp and smelled of mold.

He weighed his options. The last time he and the occupant of the house had talked, things hadn’t ended well. There was always the chance that he could knock on the front door and everything would be fine, anger lost and forgotten by time.

“Best not to chance it,” Clark said to himself.

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