A broad smile appeared on Dante’s face as he spotted Chew Lewis making his way towards him from down the block. It had nearly been a week since they’d exchanged words outside of Club 65 and Dante was beginning to worry about his old friend. When Chew called him that morning he’d been more relieved than he imagined he would be to hear from him again. When Chew asked him to find them a ride and some heat Dante had been ecstatic. He could tell by the sound of Chew’s voice that they were back in business. Whatever it was, whatever Chew needed, Dante was just glad to have Chew back. Not the one that had been talking that workingman shtick for the past couple weeks.

Chew opened the passenger side door to the silver Honda Accord that Dante had stolen that morning and sat down in the passenger seat. 

Dante looked round and smiled at him smugly. “I knew it was only a matter of time.”

Without so much as a look in his direction Chew barked back. “Shut up.”

And that was it. No need for some lengthy discussion about things. Dante pulled away from the curb and the two men drove for a time as Chew directed Dante to wherever the hell it was they were headed. They didn’t need to talk much, they’d never needed to, but Dante felt reassured to know they were back on good terms. With anyone else he might have worried that they were carrying a grudge but Dante knew Chew better than that. If Chew had wanted him dead he’d have a hole in his head before he even knew a thing about it. There was a reason the little hoppers around Norman still told stories about Chew-motherfucking-Lewis, after all.

“You were right about that thing with Topher,” Dante said with a smile. “Heard that meet of his with the Dominicans was a fucking massacre.”

From beside him Chew shrugged a little and continued to stare out of the window impassively. “Yeah, well, didn’t taking a fucking rocket scientist to see that one coming. He make it out of there alive?”

All Dante had heard was that the Cubans had been waiting there for them armed to the teeth with AKs and had made mincemeat out of the crew Topher had taken down there. As much as Dante hoped that Topher had got out of there alive, he didn’t think it was very likely, those Cubans didn’t sound like the type to take prisoners. Though he’d been spitting feathers at Chew for walking out that night the doubts he’d placed in Dante’s mind had stopped Dante from signing up for it too. Guess that meant Dante owed him one.

“Fuck if I know, man.”

Finally Chew gestured to Dante to bring the car to a stop and Dante scanned around for a few moments as he tried to figure out what he was meant to be seeing. There was nothing around other than Roland Spencer’s tire place and what possible business Chew could possibly have with him was lost on Dante.

He looked round at Chew to work out why the hell they were there and found his eyes fixed on the glowing neon sign above it. “You going to explain to me why we’re staking out Spencer’s place?”

Chew reached into the pocket of his track pants and threw a balaclava into his lap.

“We need to send a little message.”

About twenty-five questions ran through Dante’s mind but he shrugged and pulled the balaclava over his head instead.

“Alright, can’t believe you worked at a fucking bowling alley when we could have been out here making bank,” Dante smiled. “Doing what we do best. You feel me?”

Chew pulled on his balaclava and stared at Dante, his face deathly serious. “This is a one time thing. Once this is done with I go back to the bowling alley and you do whatever the fuck it is you do, Dante.”

Dante flashed his smug smile and pointed beneath the dash.

“Yeah, well, we’ll see about that. Heats in the glove compartment.”

Chew gave it a punch and it fell open to reveal the fourth generation Glock 17 that Dante liked to use and a silver Colt 1911. To the best of Dante’s memory Chew had used a Colt before they went inside. It was a touch that his friend seemed to appreciate as he reached down for the Colt and handed Dante his Glock. They sat in the car for a few seconds checking their weapons until both men were satisfied and they left the car behind and began to walk towards Roland’s business.

Antwan could feel his heart beating as they approached it. “This something to do with you going to Alicia’s boy getting shot?”

Chew nodded.

“Something like that.”

[b][center]*****[/center][/b]
Roland Spencer sat in his office staring at the stacks of paperwork that lay on his desk. Get into the tire business they said, there’d be stacks of money in it they said, but no one had told him how much paperwork he’d have to shift through on a nightly basis. Things were hectic enough between Jayson being shot and Antwan staying at his for the past two nights. That he’d spent every day since trying to scale the mountain of never-ending paperwork that wasn’t exactly helping. With that being said, Antwan seemed to be coping with things better than Roland had expected and had even braved going to school. Most importantly he’d stopped talking that nonsense he’d been talking the night Jayson was shot which left Roland’s arrangement with Billy Brown on much surer footing.

Without warning Yolanda Thomas popped her head around through the doorway of Roland’s office, smiling like butter wouldn’t melt in her mouth. “Is it okay if I head home for the night, Mr. Spencer? It’s getting late.”

Roland had only hired her because of the way her curves shook as she walked. Why the hell would a tire business need a receptionist? He hadn’t known at the time that Yolanda had a long-term boyfriend and that piece of news had been particularly unpleasing. Nonetheless she was nice to look at after a long day’s work, even if she did tend to treat Roland like a doddering old man at the best of times. 

Roland smiled. “Sure, I can close up here tonight, Yolanda.”

Yolanda thanked him and disappeared from sight. He heard her footsteps echoing out of the showroom and allowed himself a moment to picture her behind as she walked. If she’d give him a chance, Roland would show her he still had some life in his old bones. He had enough at least to see to it that she wouldn’t be able to walk straight once he was done.

Roland laughed to himself a little at the thought and stepped out of the office for a second, mindful of being in the back room with the door unlocked, as he approached the doors he saw two figures appearing out of the darkness approaching him at speed.

One was tall and muscular and clad in black track pants and a white t-shirt. The other was average height with a white dress shirt and cheap black pants on. Both men wore black balaclavas and had weapons trained on Roland before he had a chance to lock the doors and keep them out. The taller of the two men kicked the doors open and they smashed against Roland and knocked him to the ground.

The man in the dress shirt bounded through the open doors and brandished the Glock in his hand at Roland. “Put your fucking hands up.”

Roland felt a trickle of blood from his lip where the force of the doors hitting him had reopened the cut on his lip, he pressed his hand against it slowly, and then looked up at the two men with his hands in the air.

“What’s going on here?”

The tall man strode in and placed his hand on the lapels of Roland’s suit and dragged him away from the entrance and out of sight of anyone that happened to walk past. The ease with which he moved him was terrifying. At least it might have been if anyone but Billy Brown owned this place. One mention of his name and these punks would be gone in a second. 

The man in the pants strode forwards and pushed the muzzle of his Glock against Roland’s cheek. “You don’t get to ask questions around here anymore, motherfucker.”

A titter emerged from Spencer’s lips as he thought about what Billy would have done to them once he tracked down whoever these amateurs were.

“You stupid sons of bitches,” Roland said, blood dripping from his lip. “You know who owns this place?”

His laughter seemed to anger the man in the black pants and he brought the butt of his Glock down against the top of Roland’s skull so hard that it almost knocked Roland clean out. There was a burning pain from the top of his head and he could feel the blood trickling down the back of his neck, but he was conscious.

The man in the black pants smiled. “I don’t give a fuck who owns this place.”

From behind him the huge one in the t-shirt stepped forward, directing the man in the black pants to get behind him, and then knelt beside Roland. He placed his Colt in Roland’s face and cocked it to show him that he was serious. 

A deep voice emanated from behind his balaclava.

“You and I are going to have a little chat about Antwan Dixon.”

Roland could feel the man’s breath on his face and he tried his best to maintain eye contact with him but the pain in his head made it almost unbearable. What did they want with Antwan? Maybe Brown had cut a deal with someone else and he needed Roland dealt with. No, that made no sense, Brown could have put a bullet in him in the middle of town and every person there would have sworn they’d seen the ghost of Custer do it if he told them to. Who were these people?

Before the hulk of a man knelt beside him could pick his point back up there came a tinkling sound as the doors to the showroom opened.

Roland identified Yolanda’s footsteps before he heard her voice. “Sorry, Mr. Spencer, I left my purse in the back.”

The man in the black pants looked round at Yolanda and raised his Glock in her direction. She froze, dropping her phone to the ground as she put her hands into the air without a word.

The man in the black pants shook his head and looked at his colleague. “What do we do, man?”

Yolanda raised an eyebrow as if she recognised the man’s voice. “Dante? Is that you?”

Dante took a glance at his muscular friend.

“Don’t do it.”

Before the words had even finished coming out of the brick-house’s mouth his friend had pulled the trigger and blown Yolanda’s brains clean out. She landed with a dull thud and Roland’s gasped in shock as he watched her twitch around on the floor for a few seconds. If they had killed her, what were they intending to do to him? He tried to crawl backwards away from the man in the t-shirt without him noticing but the man’s hands were on him before he knew it.

With a heavy sigh the man slapped Roland across the face with his weapon hard enough that Roland was sure he felt his nose break. It wasn’t the blow that knocked him out but the impact of his head bouncing against the hard floor in the showroom. As he drifted out of consciousness he could still make out the silhouettes of the two men stood over him. The last thing he heard was the tall man’s deep voice.

“Fuck.”