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The Bump

Bob Strother

    Jay nodded at the waitress as she poured his coffee and waited while she filled Leonard’s cup. It was raining outside, and chilly for April, like winter was unwilling to give up its hold on the city. Big, fat raindrops chattered against the plate glass window, making him glad he was inside the diner where the only thing cold was the ice in his water glass. He would have preferred sunny and warm but guessed any day was a good enough day for a killing.
    He dumped sugar and cream into his cup and stirred. Decaf—his doctor had suggested it, and Jay was trying his best to comply. He took a careful sip and then added more sugar.
    “Decaf, huh?” Leonard asked. “Thought all us tough guys drank it black.”
    “Got a little hypertension,” Jay answered. “Not bad. Just trying to keep it under control.” His new partner nodded and slurped coffee from his own mug. Leonard was in from Philly, transferred by the Old Man a week ago. He was younger than Jay, mid-forties, with owlish-looking eyeglasses that gave him the appearance of a college professor.
    “Know what you mean,” Leonard said. “Got to stay on top of your health.”
    Jay drank some more coffee. The sugar and cream helped, but not much. “So why’d you get transferred?”
    “Philly was getting a little hot for me. You know Philly; business was booming. The cops were getting crucified, putting the pressure on everybody. The Old Man thought a change of scenery would be good for me.”
    “Uh-huh.” Jay understood; he’d been moved around some in the past. One thing he had to say for his employer, the Old Man took care of his own.
    “So how’s the decaf?” Leonard asked.
    “Not too bad.”
    The waitress came around again topping off Leonard’s coffee. Christ, Jay thought, he could actually smell the caffeine. She poured more for him as well, from the pot with the orange top. No smell there. Now he had to add more cream and sugar—but only one sugar packet this time—and only half a container of cream. Seemed like a hell of a lot of trouble to make the stuff drinkable.
    “You married?” Leonard asked.
    “Nope. Thought about it a couple of times but never made the leap. You?”
    “No, but I got a girlfriend back in Philly, a real mellow chick. I’m thinking about moving her up here. Maybe getting engaged.”
    “Probably not a bad idea,” Jay said. “They say married men live longer.”
    “Most married men are not exactly in our line of work.”
    “Right, but I’m just saying ...” Jay checked his watch, took another sip of lukewarm, impotent coffee, and slid out of the booth. He tossed a few bills on the tabletop. “Let’s get out of here.”
    Both men shrugged into their trench coats and headed out the door. They turned their collars up against the weather and crossed the street. The morning rush hour was over, and the rain made for minimal pedestrian traffic.
    “So what’d this guy do,” Leonard asked, “that somebody wants him dead?”
    “I’m not sure. All the Old Man said was that he’d crossed somebody pretty bad.”
    “Probably sex or money,” Leonard offered. “It’s almost always sex or money.”
    Jay nodded, checking street numbers as they walked. “What else is there?”
    “Of course, if it was sex, most guys would take care of it themselves, not contract it out.”
    “Possibly, but what if the guy doesn’t live around here? What if he lives in, say, Chicago or Milwaukee or somewhere?”
    “I see your point,” Leonard said. “I guess it doesn’t matter anyway. It’s just another job for us, huh?”
    “It’s another five large for each of us—not bad for a morning’s work.”
    “I wonder how much The Old Man keeps?”
    Jay stopped in front of a three-story brick apartment house. “I was you, I wouldn’t ask. This is the place.” He checked the street and said, “Let’s do it.”
    Inside the doorway to the left, a group of mailboxes was built into the wall. An aging staircase was located off to the right. Leonard checked the mailbox names and said, “Third floor, number 10.” They gloved up on the second floor landing. Then they checked their weapons, attached noise suppressors, and crept slowly up to the third floor. The hallway was deserted and dimly lit by a window at the far end. Apartment 10 was halfway down on the right.
    Jay knocked on the door, softly at first, then a bit harder. There was nothing, no footsteps, no sound of movement. He tried again, still heard nothing.
    “Maybe he’s not at home,” Leonard said.
    “Then we’ll wait,” Jay said, and pulled a small penknife from his pocket. He slipped the blade between the doorjamb and the lock, forced the latch backward, and twisted the knob. He pushed the door open slowly and stepped inside.
    Leonard followed and closed the door behind him. “I can’t see why anybody would rely on a cheap piece of shit lock like that. Where does he think he is? New Hampshire?”
    The apartment was small, with a rectangular sitting area and a kitchenette to one side. A sofa, coffee table, and TV occupied most of the space. A short hallway showing two doors branched off to the left. One opened into a bathroom, the other had to be the bedroom. Leonard walked silently to the bedroom door, glanced inside, and held up his hand. He looked back into the bedroom again and then jerked his head, motioning Jay over.
    Inside the bedroom, lying snug under the covers was C. Oliver Treadwell, recently under contract for disposal. Jay looked at his partner and shrugged. The men stepped into the room, nine-millimeters at their sides, and approached the bed. Oliver’s eyes were closed. He might have been sleeping. Jay nudged him with the pistol then felt the man’s neck for a pulse. He wasn’t sleeping. He wasn’t in rigor yet so he must have kicked off in his sleep, maybe even while they were at the diner. Or not long before.
    “Shit,” Jay said. “He’s already dead.”
    “Fuck,” Leonard offered. “I can’t believe this. What do we do now?”
    Jay removed the suppressor and holstered his weapon. “Let me think. This has never happened before.” He returned to the sitting area and stood looking out the single window down toward the street. “We don’t get paid for people dying in their sleep. The son of a bitch just couldn’t hold out a little longer, could he?” He heard a noise behind him and turned to find Leonard going through the apartment’s small refrigerator.
    “Hey, he’s got beer,” Leonard said, dragging a six-pack from the shelf. “Want some?”
    “I don’t normally drink alcohol before six.”
    “Like you said, man, this isn’t exactly normal.” He twisted off the cap and turned up the bottle.
    Jay moved over to the counter and began opening cabinet shelves. “You see any coffee?” He found a jar of instant and opened it. The coffee crystals seemed to have hardened, but at least it wasn’t decaf. He grabbed a spoon and worked it around inside the jar, breaking up the clumps. Then he ran water from the tap into a pan, sat it on the stove eye, and turned on the burner. When the water boiled, he placed a spoonful of powder in a cup and poured in the water. Some of the crystals gathered on the sides of the cup around the surface of the liquid. He stirred the mixture then took a tentative sip. It was hot and bitter but tasted nothing like coffee. He emptied the cup into the sink, then rinsed it and the spoon and placed them in the drain rack.
    Leonard lounged on the sofa. He had finished his beer and opened another. “Should we call the Old Man and tell him what happened?”
    “He won’t be happy about this turn of events. It means he won’t get paid either.” Jay closed his eyes and rubbed the back of his neck. When he opened them again he said, “Let’s improvise.” Then he went back into the bedroom with Leonard following close behind. He took out his nine-millimeter and reattached the noise suppressor.
    “What,” Leonard asked, “we’re going to shoot Oliver anyway?”
    “Not just shoot him,” Jay said. “If we just shot him, he’s already dead, so he wouldn’t bleed. There’d be a problem with that. The client might ask questions, be suspicious about the why blood wasn’t pooling. So ...” He knelt, placed the barrel of the gun to Oliver’s temple, and squeezed the trigger. The muffled pop from the nine sounded like someone had dropped a light bulb. Bits of bone and gelatinous chunks of brain matter spattered the pillow and decorated the wall beside Oliver’s bed like some kind of modern art poster.
    Jay straightened up and splayed his hands out, palms up. “What do you think? Was he bumped off or did he die in his sleep?”
    Leonard tapped his own temple. “Good thinking, partner. Now everybody’s happy.”
    “Except Oliver,” Jay said, grinning. “But then he wouldn’t have been happy either way.” He took a cell phone from his pocket and snapped a couple of photos of Oliver, making sure he got good coverage of the wall detritus. Then he sent them to the Old Man as proof the job had been completed. Standard procedure. “Okay, partner, let’s roll.”
    On the street a few minutes later Jay received a text message he shared with Leonard. Short and to the point—just like the Old Man, Jay thought. It said: Good job.
    “So, how’ll you spend your five grand?” Leonard asked.
    “I don’t know. There’s nothing I really need. What about you? Planning to buy your girlfriend a big diamond ring?”
    “Yeah, I think she’s kind of expecting it, but not too big. I try to live modestly, you know? Stay under the radar.”
    Jay turned up his collar again. The rain had slacked off, but the wind was kicking up. “Does she know what you do for a living?”
    Leonard smiled and glanced sideways at Jay. “She thinks I’m a business consultant.”
    “I get it, sort of like a ... trouble shooter, huh?”
    They both laughed.
    “Really, though,” Leonard said, “there’s nothing you need? I wish I could be like that.”
    Jay shrugged. “Well, maybe not nothing.” He reached for his phone again. “There must be a Starbucks around here somewhere.”

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