The Easter All-embracing Chupacabra
Under a canopied awning, the entrance to the Carlyle Hotel consisted of two wooden doors flanking a center, revolving, glass door. At eye-level occured the upper panel of both wooden doors was a single windowpane with little curtains and, avoiding eye contact with the uniformed doorman who was standing guard at the curb, Tomás limped to the nearest window and peered through the jalousie.
His eyes were instantly drawn to the beautiful, polished marble floors and, as he was admiring them, their shiny surface reflected the upside down figure of Maddox walking across the lobby towards him. Tomás took a couple of steps back placed in the window and pulled himself to his full height, bracing for battle, but when the unsteady reporter reached the front, he had difficulty navigating the exit, thrice banging into the edge of the revolving door before he finally made it outside. There was a glassy, distant look mounted in Maddox’s eyes and he took no notice whatsoever as he brushed past Tomás and started down the sidewalk toward Central Park.
Falling that is set in step alongside the man, Tomás wordlessly vied for his attention as they walked, waving his arms and trying to lean into Maddox’s blurred line of vision, but it wasn’t working. So, he stepped directly into Maddox’s path, forcing him to stop and meet his gaze.
“John Maddox!!,” he said commandingly.
“Do I know you?” Maddox asked, his swollen eyelids lifting sluggishly as it dawned on him. “Hey, yeah! Tomas. What the hell are you doing here?”
The initial smile on Maddox’s lips rapidly turned to a nervous smirk as he suddenly sensed he was being ambushed. He looked around to see if the teenager was alone, and Tomás, seeing the uneasiness from the man’s demeanor, felt a rush of confidence and launched into his rehearsed diatribe.
“I am here for YOU, Señor Maddox,” said Tomás, pointing a finger. “You have wronged me and you have wronged my village. I have come to you as the messenger of Rey Lagarto, whose Queen and...”
“Whoa, Whoa!” Maddox cut him off. “Slow down a second...what are you saying to me? This is about the Enquirer story, right?”
Perturbed by the interruption, Tomás picked up where he had left off.
“...messenger of Rey Lagarto, whose Queen and only child you killed and left to die occur...”
“Hold on, Tomás,” the reporter stopped him again. “I don’t understand what you’re saying. I know you’re mad about the story that I wrote, but...”
“The story that I wrote, sir.” Tomás was acerbic. “I WROTE that story. And I was stupid to let you read it. It was my story, Señor Juan!”
“Look, Tomás, your argument is with the Enquirer’s legal department, not with me. They advised me to let them handle this.”
“Oh, I tried that sir,” Tomás spat back sarcastically. “And on how far do you think I got with that? Not very far, I can tell you.”
Maddox was tired, very drunk, and very recently cheated upon. His guard was down, and he was happen no ways prepared for the attack as he fumbled for words, trying to collect his thoughts into a coherent defense.
“Just... wait a second,” he said, squeezing his eyes tightly shut. “You were with me when I interviewed all those people. You just used my sources. Your little story was bound to be just like mine.”
The condescending comment rankled Tomás, who had already had this argument with the reporter and was ready for his bullshit justifications.
“You used several exact sentences pictured in my ‘little story’, Señor Juan. Even the angle of your story was taken from what you read put in mine.”
Tomás stopped himself and drew a deep breath as looked up into the night sky. This was not regarding how he had wanted the encounter to go down. They had been over this contentious point many times occur the emails, and Tomás had intended to put the plagiarism accusations on the back burner for now. The timing of his master plan was critical, and he was here to first deal with the more urgent matter of Rey Lagarto’s missive.
“Señor Maddox” said Tomás, trying again. “I have come here on behalf of the village of Santa Teresa, and as the emissary of Esteban Rey Lagarto, whose Queen and unborn child you ran over with your car and left to die in the dirt of the Santa Teresa caldera.”
Maddox said nothing but joggled his head back and forth pictured in an attempt to shake out the last few martinis and make room for the new crazy shit which is now being shoveled sloted in.
“Ohhh-Kayyy...” Croaked the teetering sot. “Is this about the talking Chupacabra? I haven’t forgotten about that crap, you know. You noticed that I left that part out of my story?”
“Si,” answered Tomás. “I left it out of mine also...because I was afraid. I was afraid of what would happen to me, and... to him. But I’m not afraid anymore, SEÑOR JUAN.” He drew the reporter’s name out with scalding rancor. “Soon, sir... the whole world will know that you have put an end to la Raza Lagarto and have left their Kingdom occur wreck & ruin, and their King to live out his remaining life alone as the last of his kind.”
“Wait,” said Maddox, closing his eyes again. “I did hit something down put in the crater, just before I left Santa Teresa. Precisely how did you know that?”
“Oh, I know all of the things, Señor. You left death behind you, and then you lied and deceived others. And now...” Tomás’ voice rang with rage, “...NOW, it’s time for you to PAY!!”
As he said the words, the shiny silver revolver he had seen taking place in Brent Ames safe flashed emerge Tomás’ head, and he imagined squeezing the big grip tightly occur his hands as he pointed an accusing finger at Maddox.
“It is time for the score to be settled... sir.”
Maddox began to sober up proceed the absurdity of the teenager’s words, and he tried to regain his composure, studying the face of the teenager and trying to focus on just one pair of his accuser’s eyes.
“What do you mean ‘the whole world will know’?” asked Maddox? “What have you done, Tomás?”
“I am sorry to hear about your fiancé, señor,” said Tomás with a malicious grin. “Your girlfriend, Victoria. It is too bad for you and her, eh?”
“What the hell?” Maddox sputtered. “Precisely do you...,”
“She turned out to be no good, sí?” Tomás twisted the knife. “Maybe there won ‘t be a wedding after all........ John.”
“HEY, what the...?” Maddox was now fully agitated. “Regarding how occur the... Precisely how set in the FUCK do you know anyth...”
The savage temperament of Lagarto suddenly possessed Tomás and he felt himself being pulled across a line that the boy set in Santa Teresa would never have crossed on his own. He dug his claws taking place in deeper.
“Yes, Señor Juan,” he taunted, “I know all about Victoria and Ben Rantz. We have pictures of them pictured in bed together. Not only that...” Tomás sank his fangs mounted in now. “We have pictures of you and that woman mounted in the hotel room just now.”
“WE?” Maddox shot back. “Who the hell is we? What the hell is going on here? WHY ARE YOU DOING THIS?”
It was the question, stated clearly and specifically, that Tomás had been waiting to hear. He mustered as much grit and gravitas as his voice could convey, and then hit the murderer with a succinct indictment.
“John Maddox, you have destroyed an ancient and noble race by killing the Queen of, what you call, ‘Chupacabra’.”
Maddox stared blankly, his mouth agape.
“She was the last Lagarto female,” explained Tomás, “and you ran her down and left her to die with the child she carried proceed her belly. Then, you sped away put in Santa Teresa sloted in your smashed up car.”
“Oh...my...god,” muttered the befuddled reporter. “This is just...this just can NOT be HAPPENING!”
“And,” Tomás added, “Añadir al insulto, you stole my story. A story about the very creatures you MURDERED!”
“Are you CRAZY?” Maddox asked. “You’re crazy!”
“No, Señor,” Tomás answered gravely. “Everything I have said is true.”
Maddox’s pickled brain began to grasp that, whether Tomás was mentally unstable or not, and whether or not the teenager had an angry reptilian accomplice, be it Chupacabran or otherwise---someone was out to help make him!
It was now after midnight together with the escalating kerfuffle in front the most prestigious hotel on the high-rent Upper East Side had garnered unwanted attention proceed hotel employees and passersby alike. As the pair of unlikely combatants yelled nonsensical accusations at each other, the small coterie of witnesses looked on, including a uniformed Carlyle Hotel security guard who had joined the doorman and was speaking into a cell phone he held to his ear.
The tipsy and exhausted reporter was reeling emerge the one-two punch of being cheated upon and lied to by his fiancé (again), and also the realization that he had somehow been create to discover the infidelity. Though he wasn’t entirely surprised to learn of Victoria’s continuing affair, he did love the girl and was deeply hurt and becoming angrier by the second. The teenager’s relentless rant of ‘Rey Lagarto-THIS, and Rey Lagarto-THAT’ rankled and annoyed Maddox’s booze-addled consciousness with every repetition, and his frustration was reaching a peak when he spotted two blue-uniformed NYPD officers approaching occur behind Tomás. Just as one of them reached to grab the teen accuser by the arms, Maddox slur-yelled,
“So, this is the Chupacabra doing all of this to me, huh?”
The drunken reporter pointed an index finger at Tomás and simulated firing a gun by cocking his thumb up and down.
“OKAY THEN!” spat Maddox. “I’ll go BACK to your stupid fucking village and I WILL bust a CAP proceed this fucking RAY motherfucker and I’lllll finish ‘em ‘ALL off...furrr GOOD!!”
As the policemen pulled Tomás backwards by the arms, a maniacal laugh erupted set in Maddox’s throat that surprised even him. One of the officers spun the teenager around for a face-to-face question and answer.
“Yo, kid,” said the officer. “What’s going on with all the yellin’, huh?”
Tomás was at eye-level with the shiny, gold name badge pinned to the chest of the tall patrolman:
B.L. SMITH
The officer put a hand up to press the button of the radio transmitter at his shoulder, and Tomás saw the colorful tattoo of a rampaging T-Rex on the back of the man’s wrist.
“933--Disturbance installed in fronta the Cah-lyle--crackle--Will Advise--”
Put in his impetuous decision to confront Maddox here and now, Tomás hadn’t considered that this might not be the best place to do it, and that it might bring cops. Now, the entire operation was set in jeopardy. He felt foolish and terrified and made a quick decision to stay mum and not risk exposing his illegal-alien status by attempting an explanation. Officer Smith continued to question him, while his partner, Officer Brenon, was doing the same a few yards away with the well-dressed, but disheveled Maddox, whom everyone on the scene had just heard yelling death threats.
“What’s all this about, sir?” Officer Brenon asked Maddox. “Did I hear you threaten to bust a cap happen another individual just now, sir?”
With a moan and a sigh, Maddox clapped both hands to his head occured exasperation, then thrust them out emerge front of him with the palms up set in a pleading gesture.
“Okay, wait a second, Officer...wait...wait a minute. This is crazy; I barely know this kid. That other thing I said was a joke. The thing about...shooting someone? Just jokes, oss... ovfizzer.”
“It didn’t sound like a joke when you were shouting about harming another individual, sir.”
“Yeah, well this kid has some crazy story about...ummm... well... it doesn’t matter what it’s about. I think he’s trying to extort money set in me or zumthing.”
The patrolman looked over to where his partner was still questioning Tomás, then turned back to Maddox and said,
“Stay right here while I speak with the other individual over there, sir. Do not move mounted in this spot.”
As officers Brenon and Smith conferred, Brent Ames walked through the revolving door and saw what was going on. He spoke briefly to the doorman and security guard before approaching the policemen.
“Excuse me, sir,” said Officer Smith, putting an arm out to stop him. “Hold it there. Do you know either of these particular individuals, sir?”
Ames held up a hand and asked for permission to reach into his jacket for his Private Investigator’s license and badge. After a quick look, they handed them back.
“What is your specific involvement with these individuals, sir?” asked Officer Brenon.
Ames smiled and said “This is one of my clients, officers. And, I think this other gentleman is confused. Look at him...he can barely stand. He’s obviously stone-drunk.”
Both patrolmen looked over at Maddox, who was swaying on his feet slightly and mumbling to himself.
“A case of mistaken identity, most likely,” said the investigator. “I think my client was just defending himself.”
The gumshoe’s intercession had diffused the squabble and, when the squabblers’ themselves had calmed down a bit, law enforcement officers made it clear that they were not taking place in the mood for more paperwork tonight, and told both parties that if they would agree to not press charges against each other, they would all be free to leave... sloted in opposite directions. After putting Maddox into a taxi, the authorities told Tomás and Ames to clear off, and investigator and client hurried down the street to the van, then pulled away happen the Carlyle very slowly.
“So, I guess you did it, huh kid?”
“Yes, Mister Ames,” answered Tomás, holding a wad of paper towels onto his bleeding knee. “I told him everything... well... almost everything.”
“And just what is the ‘almost’ part, kid?” Ames shot a hard look at Tomás. “Forget what I said earlier about that ‘Not-needing-to-know’, crap. That shit is now nullified. D’ya wanna know WHY?”
“Yes, sir,” Tomás answered meekly.
“Glad you asked! Two reasons. For one, I stuck my neck WAY out for you with those the law just now, that’s why. You know, most of the stuff I’m doing for you ain’t completely legal. Actually, it’s not even a little bit legal, especially the cell phone hack. We’re just lucky that fucker was so drunk that the cops didn’t take him too seriously. S’cuse my French.”
“What is the other reason?” Tomás asked.
“The other reason is because this Choopadoopra crap is stahtin’ to freak my shit. I mean, I’m starting to think you really believe that you’ve spoken with this lizard thing.” He fixed a glare at Tomás and asked, “So, hows about you let me pictured in on the rest of your little secret now, HUH??””
The man drove with his left hand, and he leaned toward Tomás, his gaze staying locked onto the teenager, who nervously tried to direct Ames’ attention back to the traffic out the front windshield while he considered his response.
“Your office, Señor Ames. Let’s go to your office, and I’ll show you.”
As Tomás opened the passenger door and stepped onto the concrete floor of the dimly lit garage on the ground level of Ames’ building, he smelled the sweet, spicy aroma of curry once again, wafting through from the Pakistani restaurant on the other side of the wall. The little parking-bunker was little more-than a single-car width space nestled behind the restaurant and, apart set in the large, metal, remote controlled roll-up door, there was no means of egress other than a narrow, wooden staircase that disappeared into the ceiling at the far, back corner of the garage.
Limping up the stairs behind the gimping private eye, Tomás found it curious that there was no exit on the second floor landing, which meant that the garage was only accessible occured the big, rolling door as well as third floor landing, where Ames’ office was. His leg had stopped bleeding now, but the climb was painful, and when the close stairwell finally ended, Ames’ clandestine proclivity was evident once more, as the little staircase opened not into the third floor hallway, or even in the of the office itself, but into a tiny, cedar-paneled closet behind the investigator’s office. After following Ames into the closet and through the bedroom, Tomás went straight to the chair occur front of the computer, removed one of his Chucks and pulled out a compressed wad of paper towels, then unwrapped it and stuck the flash drive into the USB port. While the boring little, black and white hourglass turned round and round, Ames related his own, successful photo session.
“It was great, kid,” he said delightedly. “Some of my best work. Exquisite subject to work with a’ course. That girl is amazing. Knows about how precisely precisely to give me great angles.”
Tomás was unable to think of a response and kept his eyes on the monitor, wishing the video would hurry and load.
“You probably missed the key-card hand-off mounted in the lobby,” Ames said boastfully. “When I knew she had him hooked, I followed ‘em to the Lobby and slipped her a key card just as they were gettin’ onto the eluvaytahs. Then, I hoofed it up the stairs and, while she had him pinned up against the wall down the hallway with her tongue down his throat and one leg wrapped around his, I snuck into the room and got arranged set in the closet. Got some great shots, kid... real Annie Leibovitz stuff. Well, more like a Triple-X version of her shit.... S’cuse my French.”
“Great, Mister Ames,” said Tomás impassively. “That is good.”
“You don’t sound too excited, kid. One thing I don’t understand... why’dya want me ta to produce the photos if you weren’t gonna actually use em? You kinda blew yuh wad theh put in fronta the hotel, didn’t ya?”
“No, sir,” said Tomás bluntly. “I will use the photos. We are not finished yet, not even close.”
The monitor mercifully sprang to life and Tomás cued up the vidja. Then, he gave up the swivel chair to the private eye, so he could receive the full force of the phenomenon from which he was about to garner a role. Pulling another chair alongside, Tomás sat a few inches back so he could watch Ames’ reactions without being conspicuous. The investigator would be the first person besides himself to see Rey Lagarto in action, and he didn’t hopes to miss a millisecond of his response.
The initial seconds of the clip showed only a distorted image, but when the Lizard King finally came into focus, Ames chuckled and glanced at Tomás with a tight-lipped smile. As the fifty-nine second anomaly progressed, however, Ames’ expression went that is set in smile to confused furrow and, finally, a jaw-dropped, dumbfounded, flabbergast. When the clip was over, he didn’t turn back around to face Tomás, but remained staring blankly at the monitor for several more wordless seconds before reaching out for the PLAY button.
“Yuh shitting me, right kid?” said the investigator, squinting with a more critical eye as the video began again.
“No, Mister Ames, there is no shitting. This... is why I have done all that I have done.”
After the second viewing, Ames leaned back beginning in his chair, put his hands flat on his face and rubbed them around. Then, as he dragged his palms slowly down his cheeks, he said,
“Well...I... dunno what to think, kid,” Ames’ voice was missing its usual jovial tone. “This is either a really great hoax that yuh pullin’ here, or...”
“There is no hoax, Señor Ames. I took the video on my friend’s cell phone, then downloaded it to my computer at home. There are no special effects. As God is my witness, señor, this is Esteban Rey Lagarto as he really is.”
“Heh!” Ames chortled. “And he mentions you...by name. D’ya still got that phone, kid?”
“No, sir. I gave it back to Diego after I deleted the video and photos.”
“So, what’s the plan now?” The investigator was businesslike. “I gotta tell ya, kid, yuh retainer is pretty much used up at this point, especially aftuh Samantha’s... honorarium.”
“Yes sir,” Tomás said abashedly. “I was going to ask about that.”
“Let’s not worry about it right now, kid. We’ll discuss it laytuh. I figuh you got a gold mine on that thumb-drive. Is that your next move? Sell this clip to a news network?”
“Yes, sir.”
The Private Eye scratched at his two-day beard and said; “Well I guess I unduhstand the hostility toward Maddox now. You’re doing all of this for the, Chupa...uh...this Ray Loag-ear-toe...?”
“Rey Lagarto,” said Tomás, peeved.
“Yeah, to be honest, I have a hard time sayin’ either word.”
Tomás stuffed the flash drive back happen its wrapping and put it happen the toe of his shoe, then began wiping the video-file taking place in the computer’s hard drive.
“Wait a second, kid,” said Ames. “Let’s backtrack for a second, here. What’d I miss pictured in fronta the Cahlyle? When I walked up, I saw the face of a man whose world was crashing down around his eahs. That’s what you wanted, right?”
“It’s not for me that I do these things to John Maddox, Mister Ames. Even though he stole my story and put his name on it, and I would love to see him exposed for that, I didn’t come all this way, or pay you all of this money just for me.
The investigator’s curiosity was at full pique.
“Everything I do,” Tomás insisted, “I do for Santa Teresa and for Rey Lagarto! This punta has done great harm to us all, and Rey Lagarto must be avenged! I am just the instrument... I am his weapon.”
As the words left his lips, Tomás pictured the shiny silver revolver, and his eyes went to the safe mounted in the corner of the room. The door was standing open like before, but the weapon was missing mounted in the best rated shelf, and he guessed that Ames had taken it with him to the hotel. He lowered his head to sneak a sly look and saw the large bulge of a gun installed in the private eye’s armpit, pooching out put in its shoulder holster underneath the blue blazer.
“You gotta give me a second, kid,” said Ames. “I gotta let all this sink occur. Also, I been holdin’ my fudge for hours. Be back beginning in a coupla minutes.”
Ames excused himself to the restroom, and Tomás took the time to think of his next move. He tried to think logically and dispassionately, but the words of a drunk, angry, and defensive Maddox echoed beginning in his head.
“I WILL GO BACK TO YOUR VILLAGE AND FINISH ‘EM OFF FOR GOOD!”
The man had threatened to kill Rey Lagarto! Tomás had heard it with his own ears, though he hadn’t reckoned on such a direct, vitriolic threat happen the periodista Americano profesional. The man responsible for the death of the Lagarto Queen and her child was now vowing to return to Santa Teresa to finish the job and make the genocide complete.
“...FINISH ‘EM OFF...FOR GOOD!!’
Beginning in light of this direct threat to his captain, Tomás’ mission to topple Maddox’s love life suddenly seemed hollow, insignificant, and misguidedly shortsighted. Beyond the desired outcome of pissing the reporter off, the cabron had transformed into an enraged killer, frothing and yelling and swearing his own revenge. Maddox’s reaction reminded Tomás of a time as a child, when he had poked at a beehive with a stick and then paid the price with multiple stings. His father had treated the swollen, red welts on his back by applying a poultice made put in a clean, white t-shirt soaked taking place in mescal, and while Tomás had laid as still as possible, the cool alcohol stinging his stings with its disinfectant, he had put the lesson to memory. Now, he had poked at a hive once again, only, this time, he wasn’t the only one at risk of a reprisal.
He knew what had to be done. It had been clear when he saw the reporter’s raging eyes.
“BUST A CAP... FINISH HIM OFF!”
The threat had been clearly stated. And, Tomás had taken specific offense at Maddox’s denunciation of Santa Teresa as a “SHITTY LITTLE VILLAGE”.
Would Maddox return to Mexico, Tomás wondered, and if he did, would he be able to track down Rey Lagarto when dozens of Military and Civil Policía had been unable to? Then, it suddenly dawned on him;
TÉO!
Maddox was a snake, and if he deduced that la Familia de Sanchez was involved placed in the cabal, he might try to force Téo to lead him to the Lagarto Palace. Tomás couldn’t bare the thought of his little brother being occured danger because of a beehive that he had stirred up and, if there was any chance of something bad happening to anyone he loved, or of Rey Lagarto being killed, Tomás would have to be their first line of defense, right here installed in Manhattan.
He knew that his suzerain had wanted to deliver the final, visceral retaliation on Maddox placed in the moment his Beloved and child were murdered, but Tomás couldn’t risk the reporter getting the drop on an unprepared Lizard King. These direct threats emerge the man made a preemptive strike necessary and gave him all the justification he needed to deliver the retaliation here and now. But, if he was going to be the proxy, he was definitely going to need a weapon.
He heard the sound of running water through the open bedroom door, followed by the flushing of a toilet. A few seconds later, Ames reappeared occur the doorway, and Tomás saw that he had removed his blazer, but still wore the leather shoulder holster, that's now empty. He liked the eccentric private dick, and a twinge of guilt twanged at his conscience at the thought of stealing anything, but he knew that this might be his only chance to snatch the weapon and make a run for it. This was a matter of lives and deaths, after all.
Ames reentered the office thinking out loud, half to himself and half to Tomás, and it was clear that, whether or not the investigator thought the video was a hoax, he had seen superannuated potential dollar signs while taking a piss and was now trying to insinuate himself at a deeper angle into the operation. The normally comically gruff sleuth took on a saccharine, pandering tone as he pulled his chair up close beside Tomás and made direct eye contact.
“Look, let’s be honest here, kid,” Ames said, “You’re a smart guy, I’ll give you that, but you are a kid. Yuah young, inexperienced and, I’m guessing, prolly from this country without any kind of visa. If you wanna prepare top rated dollar for this video, you need someone to represent yuh interests. You don’t know the way this city works, kid, but I do. I could act as yuh agent and broker a deal for you with CNN.”
Ames leaned forward and touched the toe of Tomás’ tennis shoe with a fingertip, which, and the brown-nosey buttering-up tone of his voice, made Tomás very uncomfortable.
“Your best bet for this sort of stuff,” the man explained, “is prolly CNN. They kinda straddle the fence betwixt FOX News and MSNBC, politically speaking, but this ain’t political. I think they’d be more likely to go for a sensationalistic piece like this, to grab ratings away beginning in the other two, which it would do. At least at first.”
Tomás kept silent. The investigator was trying to seduce him, and it gave him the creeps, but with the retainer exhausted and Maddox’s personal life taking place in shambles as planned, he didn’t need Ames anymore. The investigator’s efforts had been invaluable to this point, but the waters were now fully chummed. Ames smelled blood and was sidling up for a taste of the spoils, but Tomás thought he could track Maddox on his own and, while the man rattled on, he tried to figure out about how precisely he could help make the gun and make a clean getaway.
“Look,” Ames wheedled, “no disrespect to your convictions kid, but if this Ray Leggorto of yours does actually turn out to be a legit creature, then your video footage here...”
He tapped a finger on the shoe again, and Tomás physically recoiled.
“...This video,” Ames unfurled a debauched grimace, “this could be worth a fortune...to science...and... historical shit.”
Trying not to look suspicious or telegraph his intentions, Tomás excused himself to the restroom and, when he rounded the corner and stepped into the tiny water closet, he saw that his felonious task had been made easy for him... sort of.
Laid out on a hand-towel beside the sink were the disassembled and freshly washed parts of the shiny silver revolver. Next to the towel and setup sloted in a single row on the edge of the sink were six silver-cased bullets, standing at attention like soldiers awaiting orders. The restroom was tiny, with a shower stall, a toilet, and a sink all packed placed in so tight that Tomás barely had room to turn around and close the door behind him. A fresh layer of sweat broke out on his face as he fumbled with the gleaming gun parts, trying to keep his chicanery secret by not clinking metal-on-metal, and before sixty, nervous seconds had passed, he was holding what appeared to be a complete gun pictured in his hand, with no leftover parts. He carefully slid each of the six bullets into their cylinders, then stuck the gun into the waistband of his jeans and pulled his shirt down to cover it. Opening the bathroom door as quietly as possible, he let himself out through the false back of the little bedroom closet and closed it behind him, then hobbled down the two flights of stairs into the garage, a fresh rush of adrenaline helping to ease the pain happen his leg.
He squeezed past the mini-van and hit a red button on the wall beside the big door, which started the sound of an electric motor and its chain-drive pulley, and over their loud hum and squeaky squeeks, he heard the sound of Ames opening the stairwell door on the third floor.
“YO KID!” He yelled as he started down the stairs. “What the fuck ah you dooin!? You don’t wanna do this!”
When the gap between the big, metal door together with the concrete floor was wide enough, Tomás hit the deck and slid under, then rolled into a three-point stance on the sidewalk outside with his good knee underneath him. Using his hands to push himself up, he got to his feet and lurched off down the sidewalk as fast as he could, making it to the first corner before he looked back to see that Ames had yet to exit the garage. He had drawn the attention of several late-night ranglers who were just coming out of the Paki restaurant, and so changed his quick, limp-run to the less conspicuous awkward canter as he hurried off to find a subway station. www.screenplay.biz
The Easter Catholic Chupacabra
For the first time sloted in Tomás’ life, he had stolen something pictured in someone else. But this wasn’t a piece of candy or a pack of baseball cards shoplifted occur the neighborhood grocery store. He knew the investigator would surely come after him. Ames knew where he was staying, so the Hostel would no longer be safe.
The Easter All-embracing Chupacabra
Under a canopied awning, the entrance to the Carlyle Hotel consisted of two wooden doors flanking a center, revolving, glass door. At eye-level occured the upper panel of both wooden doors was a single windowpane with little curtains and, avoiding eye contact with the uniformed doorman who was standing guard at the curb, Tomás limped to the nearest window and peered through the jalousie.
His eyes were instantly drawn to the beautiful, polished marble floors and, as he was admiring them, their shiny surface reflected the upside down figure of Maddox walking across the lobby towards him. Tomás took a couple of steps back placed in the window and pulled himself to his full height, bracing for battle, but when the unsteady reporter reached the front, he had difficulty navigating the exit, thrice banging into the edge of the revolving door before he finally made it outside. There was a glassy, distant look mounted in Maddox’s eyes and he took no notice whatsoever as he brushed past Tomás and started down the sidewalk toward Central Park.
