Magnolias in Paradise: The Man with the Hourglass by Leonard Seet

Author:Leonard Seet [Seet, Leonard]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: mystery, Leonard Seet, noir, crime
ISBN: 9780967493732
Publisher: Excelsior Publishing
Published: 2016-09-30T11:00:00+00:00

Chapter 27 Rick

Rick rested on the ground and faced the starry sky. Just die before the gangsters could torture him. One night about three months ago, he and Lucy-Jane had lain on the beach and counted the stars.

Oh, Lucy-Jane, I love you.

About a month ago, Rick was in Bliss Park devising a plan to swindle Ernst of fifty-thousand dollars while the waves crashed against the shore and helped him think. When Mitch and Luc drove their Road Kings down the boardwalk, chasing a girl into the street. She ran across Bliss Parkway but before she reached the Botanical Garden, they gunned her down. She lifted her face twisted and bloodied, crawled about a foot, then dropped her head. Rick hid behind a sycamore tree avoiding her eyes, and after the psychopaths had taken the body and left, he lay on the ground for about half an hour, staring at the sky. Two weeks later, the newscaster announced that police had found her body parts in Noah’s Beach and several public parks.

As he lay in the alley searching for the Little Dipper, waiting for the gangsters to cut him up, just as they had that girl. That’d be fine as long as he was dead. But when he located the constellation, the pain in his back had subsided. That was something, a miracle. He checked the pavement. No blood. Did he become Superman? He picked up a bullet and squeezed the rubber. The goddamn Vampire and the Werewolf were toying with him. They’d torture him before killing him. He couldn’t get up and run. His freaking limbs had abandoned him. The gangsters walked up to him.

No, please, no.

“What the hell?” Luc examined his rifle and said, “Supposed to be dead.”

“God damn whore monger.” Mitch raised his semi-automatic handgun and pointed it at Rick, but before shooting, he glanced down the alley as if searching for a shadow in the darkness.

Rick turned his head. A figure in bowler and trench coat sauntered down the alley, the shadow draping over the wall and the trashcans.

“Waste that whore monger.”

Mitch and Luc raise their weapons and shot five rounds at the figure. Rick wrapped his arms around his head to shield from the shell casings. When he lifted his head, the phantom, whose trench coat was flapping in the wind, passed him and kept walking toward the gangsters, the bowler shielding the stranger’s face.

“What the hell’s going on here?” Luc examined his weapon and at the man. “What the hell do we do?”

The man drew out a handgun. He fired. Luc dropped his weapon and fell onto the ground. Mitch hesitated for a second before dropping his weapon and fleeing down the alley.

The man kicked aside several casings and passed Ernst. When he reached Luc, he kicked aside the rifle and stepped on the Werewolf’s wounded arm. A scream echoed through the alley. A cat screeched and dashed past Rick.

“Why were you tickling me with your rubber bullets?” The man rubbed his sole on Luc’s wound and ignored the screams.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.