Flash Fiction by Mick Rose
“Good fucking riddance,” my fiancé’s father snapped. “Do us a favor and die while you’re in Guam.”
Typical asshole billionaire. As if I caused the shark attack that left Cloe in a coma, her brilliant brain battling death in a room across the hall. My broad back blocked the hospital’s closest security camera. So I whacked his solar plexus: pinned the bastard’s lard-ass to the corridor wall.
Fear filled douchebag’s eyes. “Don’t poke bears, Clarence. They’ll rip your fool head off, shit down your throat—and your remains will disappear—like you never existed. Your skank whore trophy wife won’t miss you one iota. And Cloe’s mother will throw a party when they finally decide to bury your empty casket.”
During my service to Uncle Sam? I’d killed a dozen men far better than him—and slew twenty the world considered worse. The last two years as a civilian I hadn’t killed a soul. But I could snap Clarence’s neck like kids snap their fingers—and with less noise.
I’d told mangled Cloe about my pending trip. Though after six weeks in her comatose condition? I held doubts she heard me. Leaving weak-kneed Clarence to his pea-brained thoughts, I strode to the elevators, hoping he’d shit his pants. Outside the main entrance? I flung aside the hospital’s stark oppression and snagged a cab.
My destination? A boutique watering hole called the Bar Leather Apron, tucked on the mezzanine at the Topa Financial Center in downtown Honolulu—a ten-minute hop from Honolulu International.
Flights from HNL to GUM only run once a week. Departure times also suck and vary. Available flights get wedged into an afternoon window between 2:20 and 3:20.
While the bar didn’t open til 5 p.m.? My boss let me in at noon. And without asking me? Ordered Leather Soul cocktails from his mate behind the counter. Prime ingredients? A ten-year-old Laphraoig whiskey and a Knob Creek single barrel. We sipped silently … until he slid me a white envelope, an old school burner phone—and a silver key ring thumb drive, with three decoy keys attached. I knew the excess keys were blanks and didn’t open shit.
“Nice to have you back,” Frank said. “Hope this trip will do you good. Three tit jobs in 72 hours. Then nearly four days to yourself. Your travel kit’s in my Mercedes. All relevant numbers are in your phone’s contacts, using our standard code. I don’t foresee any problems—but hey you’re going to Guam. Hawaii it ain’t.”
Inside the envelope? My airline tickets, cash, and a stack of Visa Gift Cards. Sometimes jobs require items that should never appear on company credit card records. Like guns, knives or bullets bought in an island country 3,800 miles from home.
We finished our costly drinks. Frank dropped me at the airport.
Yipee-ki-yee. Nine hours later? Our plane’s wheels touched the tarmac in Guam’s dry season. My April trip coincided with Spring Break at a slew of American schools. Average daily temp this time of year? Eighty-six degrees.
I’d wrestled nearly a week before accepting Frank’s assignments and breaking my nightmare vigils at Cloe’s bedside. “Guys like you and me? We crave control,” Frank said. “You can stay—or you can go. But Cloe’s coma is outta your hands.”
Short-term at least, I’d gained a sense of purpose. I stayed professional and alert. Grabbed sleep as needed. And the first three days flew by—
Tit Job No.1: Deliver thumb drive to client. Mission completed. No problems.
Tit Job No. 2: Join a ten-man security team aboard thumb drive client’s yacht for the duration of his night-long party, attended by two hundred guests. Mission completed. No major problems. I foiled the drunken advances of a sixty-year-old rich bitch hell-bent on fucking me like an impoverished cabana boy. A simple chokehold behind a velvet curtain put her gently to sleep in Dream Land, propped on a chaise lounger.
Tit Job No. 3: Accompany thumb drive client to a business meeting in Hagåtña, Guam’s inland capital city. Mission completed. No problems.
But surviving nearly four days of “Me Time?” That struck me as a major fucking problem.
Drinking myself blind in a foreign country? Not a viable option. Drinking just enough to maintain a constant buzz? Sounded like a plan that’d keep me busy.
Finding quiet places to safely drink close to my hotel in this coastal tourist trap also kept me busy. My first free morning? I nearly killed a hundred yahoos at the hotel pool and bar before fleeing in despair.
Free morning number two before sunrise? Armed with a liter of vodka and a water bottle, I beelined for Tanguisson Beach, described in some guide books as “uncultivated”—but praised for stunning cliffs, rock formations, pristine sands and coral. The only beach access? A quarter-mile dirt lane ending at a massive cliff.
Jungle vegetation dwarfed the deserted lane, and I stuck to sipping water. Apollo’s steeds cracked the horizon as I hit the beach sands. Huh, I blinked. A woman swimming in calm waters just offshore. But WTF—
Two snorkelers surfaced … one in front, the other behind her. One bastard grabbed her feet. The second snatched her neck—choking off her screams—and plunged her face underwater, his twisted partner raining body blows.
I raced to join the fray.
Shit. The woman stopped thrashing: they’d cinched her wrists with a zip tie … strapped a ball gag cross her mouth.
Impossible to surprise them. Arms waving, fingers pointing—the pair barked Chamorro when my feet pounded the water. Waist-deep in the water the smaller prick clutched the woman; the bigger one braced to fight.
My first blow broke his nose. As the second knocked him cold? Little prick knifed me in the back. Shit. A surprise third lookout cracked my skull with a chunk of coral—
Fuck.
Sprawled on my back semi-conscious, my lights blinked off-n-on.
But I knew the men were gone … the woman and I floating in a realm of broken dreams.
Bio: Crime writer Mick Rose pens haiku and prose while wandering the United States in a Quest for the Perfect Pizza. While his crime fiction can loom dark, and not for the faint-of-heart, he typically tells tall tales involving sexual humor (which sometimes prove explicit). His stories have kindly found homes in print and online mags, including Close To The Bone, The Yard: Crime Blog, and the story collections Born Under a Bad Sign, Vampirology, and Rumble Magazine from Screaming Eye Press. Care to say “Hello?” You can visit Mick below:
https://www.facebook.com/mick.rose.56808
https://amazonauthormickrose.weebly.com
https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/18458942.Mick_Rose
Cover photo from the Author
Read More Flash Fiction on The Yard: Crime Blog
Follow Us On:
Looking for a book to read? Try our Bookstore, or True Crime Library
More from The Yard
Ain’t Afraid
Speculative Fiction by Mord McGhee The wall had closed behind me, and the first thing I thought wasn’t that I was going to die. I thought of my mother’s voice telling me I’d wasted too many blessings learning how to survive wars only to let a rotten prison swallow me whole. I thought of Lee…
Crawlspace
Crime Fiction by By John Bukowski Colleen donned her brightest smile, adding a little extra dimple. “Just let me grab my gear and I’ll check it out for you darlin.” The petite thirty-year-old wore coveralls that hugged her trim figure like a second skin. Her silky blond hair was scrunched into a ponytail. As always,…
Redwood Tomb
Crime Fiction by Linda Boroff The four occupants fall silent as the 1978 Buick Electra Park Avenue crests the top of Empire Grade and begins to wind down the narrow blacktop road, nearly invisible in the night fog. “Pick it out, willya?” says the man beside the driver. In response, Royal throws the car into…