Jack stared at her, stared at Derry. At Derry’s gun.

  “Back inside,” Derry said.

  Jack said, “You’re a moron.” But he turned and he went back in the house, Gina and Derry following.

  Derry shut the front door behind him. The foyer was marble, white. The old man, Potter, lay in a broken heap at the bottom of the stairs, neck twisted, eyes half-shut as though drowsing in the sun.

  “Drop the bag,” Derry told Jack..

  Jack obeyed. Derry kicked the duffel bag toward Gina. “Make sure the money’s there.”

  Jack said, “You bitch. . .”

  Gina knelt by the bag and unzipped it. Derry saw a flash of green within the zipper’s tracks, neatly bundled bills, wrapped in rubber bands with yellow paper notes stuck underneath the bands, numbers scrawled on the notes.

  “Give me your gun,” Derry said. Damn, a basic and he’d forgotten it in the charge of barking orders and getting steeled for the kill. Some hitman he was. Gina had said Jack would have a gun just in case Potter put up a fight. But he had the gun, and it was all cool.

  “The gun’s in the bag.” Jack’s eyes were wide and white. “Gina, baby, let’s talk about this—”

  Derry shot him, the gun booming like thunder cupped in his hands. A bright bloom of red erupted on Jack’s chest, and he collapsed on the marble, two feet from Potter, a look of stunned surprise and fear vanishing as his face went slack with death.

  “My God,” Gina said. “My God, my God.”

  It was done. Ten seconds, Derry thought, ten seconds and you entirely change the person you are, he was no longer a loser, he was a hitman now. He laughed. He wasn’t scared; he felt great. “I did it. Jesus. Okay. We got to fix it so that it looks like Potter shot him as they fell.”

  The first bullet hit him in the throat, the second and third in the chest, and as he died Derry watched Gina walk away from the duffel bag, wipe the gun, and slip the pistol into Jack’s dead hand.

  “I WANT TO HELP however I can,” Gina said to the police investigator. He was a tall, raw-boned man named Humphrey. He looked to her like he had come from a long line of shrimpers, the sun and salt baked into his genes. “For Jack’s sake.”

  “Did you know Derry Worrell?”

  “Barely. He lived next door to us at the apartment we were staying in temporarily. He had bothered me several times, asking for dates. I told him no. His wife had left him.” She shrugged. “I guess he was lonely. I told Jack; Jack wasn’t too happy. But Derry was younger and tougher and I don’t think Jack wanted to get into a fight. We weren’t planning on staying in town long. But he followed us. Like to the Sailor’s Spoon for breakfast the other day. He must have followed us to Mr. Potter’s once.” She shuddered.

  “So take me through exactly what happened again.”

  Gina folded her hands on the table. “Jack and I went over to see Mr. Potter. He’s an old friend of Jack’s. He’s mostly retired now and Jack is. . .Jack was worried about him. Mr. Potter wasn’t in the best of health. We drove over, we found the door open. Jack carries a gun, because he keeps lots of cash on hand. Lots of his renters pay in cash. He pushed open the door, went inside, told me to stay outside. He thought maybe Mr. Potter had just forgotten to lock up. Next thing I hear shots, Jack screaming. I run down the street, find someone who’s at home, and call the police.” Her voice trembled; she took a long sip of water from the glass at her elbow. “Derry must’ve broken in to rob Mr. Potter, and Jack interrupted him. . .I can’t believe it. I thought Derry was a harmless loser.”

  “Derry Worrell has a record,” one of the other cops said.

  “Petty theft,” the detective said. “And he didn’t have a job.”

  Gina pressed her lips together, wiped the tears from her eyes.

  They questioned her for another two hours and she stuck to her story without variation. The background check on her, she knew, would reveal no criminal history. Even when Jack and Potter’s mob connections came to light, it was nothing to her. The duffel bag with the hundred thousand was hidden in one of the empty vacation homes next door to Potter; she’d found a hidden house key a week ago, made a copy, replaced the key. Jack had interrupted a robbery gone wrong, committed by an out-of-work loser against a helpless old man. It was a tragedy. In case Jack and Potter’s business associates appeared as the news spread and began wondering about Potter’s tampered accounts, she would move the money tomorrow to a bank in Anguilla, start the slow migration of the cash to safety, where only she could find it.

  And then play the grieving girlfriend. Get a job here for a few months, waitressing, so she wouldn’t look like she was on the run, had a reason to hide, or was suddenly flush with cash. Then, when the time was right, disappear.

  She went back to the apartment. It was lonely without Jack’s big voice. The police were searching Derry’s apartment; she could hear them rummaging through his few belongings, talking in low whispers. She clicked on the TV to watch the sitcom reruns. The late-night commercials fired up at the first break, the trade schools promising the brightest of prospects. Seize your future, one said, and she fought down a laugh. Derry had said the same words in his excitement over his new career. But the ads, and poor dumb Derry, were right; you had to embrace every opportunity that came your way. Derry had been the right opportunity for her.

  She slid with a smile into the cool of the sheets. Seize your future. Great words to live by.

  REED FARREL COLEMAN

  REED was born and raised in Brooklyn, NY. His sixth novel, THE JAMES DEANS, has been nominated for the Best Paperback Original Edgar Award and he’s just been elected Executive Vice President of the Mystery Writers of America. He’s edited the short story anthology, HARDBOILED BROOKLYN, and his short stories and essays have appeared or will appear in DUBLIN NOIR, BROOKLYN NOIR 3, PLOTS WITH GUNS, DAMN NEAR DEAD, WALL STREET NOIR, F—K NOIR, and CRIME SPREE MAGAZINE. He writes another series under the pen name Tony Spinosa. Reed lives with his wife and children on Long Island.

  On the topic of literary assassins, Reed says: “I think hitmen are the big cats of crime fiction. They’re the alpha predators; hidden, powerful, aloof.”

  Visit Reed at www.ReedColeman.com

  BAT-HEAD SPEED

  Reed Farrel Coleman

  WHEN I KILL for the kikes, I call meself Hank Greenberg. For the niggers, it’s Hammerin’ Hank. Don’t love it that Hank is so popular amongst those two races, but let’s face it, how many Jews were great home run hitters? Yeah. . .I’m waiting, boyo. You can count the number on the thumb stuck up yer arse. Bonds stays healthy a few more years and the problem’ll be solved. For the wops, it’s Joe D. The spies, Roberto Clemente. When the contract is white bread, I go with Mickey Mantle. It appeals to me own sense of vanity. Like I put the Mick in Mickey. Sorry, Babe. Fook, McGwire, the cheatin’ cunt. Don’t kill for the Irish. No profit in it.

  Me specialty or speciality, as me sainted mother would call it, is blunt force trauma. I can take it deep with a mighty blow or play “small ball”, breaking every bone on me way around the bases. Either way, I always touch ’em all and never is the time I miss home plate. It’s management’s choice. He who pays controls the play. Nature of the business. I’ve rigged me iPod so to play the roar of the crowd and the explosion of fireworks in me ears when a job is complete. I’m afraid I’ve not yet figured out how to rig a curtain call. Some day.

  When I began me career as a lad in the disco ’70s, there was great affection for the long ball. Clients wanted the work done quickly, with a single swing. And the pitch. . .Oh, he got all of that one. If it ever comes down, it’s a home run. Man oh man, have you ever seen a skull crack quite like that one? The ’80s saw the advent of junk bonds and morning in America. And with them, please god, came a jones for cocaine and cracked bones. Jaysus, even had the odd client wanted to watch me do me work. Discouraged it. Whenever I’d break the shins, it was vomitville. No sound like it, breaking a man’s shins. Came the ’90s, back we went to tapemeasure shots. 9/11 has brought back bunts and bones broken one at a time. All business is cyclical in nature. I come to the knowledge honestly.

  Was the day I tried changing with the times. Mistake. Turned my back on ash as me material of choice and went aluminum. As effective? Maybe more so. Saved on equipment in the long run. But the sound! Jaysus and his blessed mother, couldn’t stomach it me own self. That pinging was a horror. You kill a man, whatever the reason short of rape and child molestation, and he deserves more than a hollow Ping! at the end of the road. Bollocks. Embarrassing, really, killing a man that way. Give me a solid thud, crunch, snap. That’s music for a man to die by. Lately, I’ve gone the way of Bonds and tried some of those maple bats from north of the border. Sweet. Lovely feel. But I’ll take ash when the job’s to be done right.

  Yer thinking, how’d a thick-headed donkey like meself develop a taste for baseball? Fair question. First, I think it was out of necessity. Tis always the way, is it not? Came stateside when I was eleven. Da had a run-in with the Brits, the hoors. An explosive personality, me father, if ya catch the drift. Till I landed stateside, had a hurly near glued to my palms. A hurly, you say? A lethal piece of hardwood shaped roughly like a human femur. Hurling? Take a week to explain. Let it suffice to say it’s bloodier than politics or ice hockey and a fair bit more entertaining. The sport the real Fighting Irish play.

  Guess I saw baseball as the closest thing to it, minus the carnage, of course. I’d more than make up for that. I was quite the prodigy. Couldn’t field worth shite, but I was a natural DH. Ron Bloomberg can kiss me arse. Shame me career predated the DH. Coaches tried burying me in right field. And in spite of me shortcomings, made it one game short of the Little League World Series. Didn’t show the qualifying games on TV back in the day, only the final on Wide World of Sports. Would’ve shown those chinks a thing or three had we made it to the finals.

  Pushing fifty now and still I’ve the bat-head speed of a thirty-year-old slugger. Tiger Woods come to me, I’d get his club head speed up a good five miles. I’ve got the whole setup in me house: batting cage, video tape, VR exercises on the computer to keep my hand-eye coordination sharp. Do yoga, trunk strengthening, and quick-twitch muscle exercises every day. Read every book, seen every instructional tape on hitting that’s been produced. Fook Einstein. Ted Williams, now there’s a feckin’ genius. Charlie Lau was a cunt. Set hitting back a decade with his bat release shite.

  Still, with all me own equipment, I love showing off for the colleens at the local batting cages. No matter the town I’m in or the job to be done, I manage to get a session in at the local bat-aw ay. Particularly love the jobs in college towns or hamlets with a minor-league squad. Visiting California, Florida, or Arizona is a pleasure. Always baseball to be played. Always a blond to be had. Hustled me more money than Paul Newman and Tom Cruise put together. Though it grieves me hard to say it, I’ll cede the number of blonds to them boyos.

  Currently, I’m on Long Island, expensive fooking shitehole. Bad timing as well. The Ducks, the local minor-league squad, is on the road and the colleges are out of session. Needless to say, me mood’s not great. I’m still waiting for me wedge and instructions. Don’t like this much to be up in the air, but the money’s too good to turn away from. I’ve waited for two days now and me patience is near as thin as me own hair. The phone, praise god. Salvation at last. Instructions of a sort.

  THE BAR WAS CROWDED but dark. I was in the loose-fitting, road-gray, Detroit jersey. Very retro. No name across the back. Even if there were, Greenberg wouldn’t resonate with this bunch. More likely think I was a dentist than a slugger.

  “Hey Hank,” she says, strolling up to me seat at the bar. Raven hair framing a green-eyed goddess’ face. “Whatcha having?”

  Loaded question that. Let it hang there like blue smoke. Moved on.

  “Sam Adams.”

  “Not Guiness?”

  “You’ll want to watch that. Stereotypes’ll get you in trouble,” I warned.

  “Max! Two Sams.”

  “Max is it? Know all the barmen on Long Island by their first names?”

  “Not on the entire Island. Just Suffolk County.” The sarcasm dripped off her tongue like honey. “Slainte.”

  Impressed me. Clinked glasses and put their contents down in a swallow.

  “C’mon, Hank, let’s take a ride.”

  Another loaded line. Curious. Said, “Where to?”

  “Your motel room. I want to see your stuff.”

  Christ, I wondered, did she say anything that wasn’t loaded?

  Got in her yellow Vette. Stopped at me room. She stayed in the car. Picked up me Lousiville Slugger. Burned The Mick into the top of the barrel me own self.

  “Now where to?”

  “You’ll see,” she purred.

  Drove through a darkened industrial park. Pulled into an empty parking lot in front of what looked to be a warehouse. The local bat-away. She had the keys. Stepped inside the darkened hall, punched numbers into a keypad, threw a light switch. Have you ever entered an empty church? Was what it felt like for me. This was me own St. Paddy’s.

  “Fast cage is over there.” She pointed to the far right end of the facility. “What size helmet?”

  “Yer joking me lady. Helmets are for pussies. No offense intended.”

  “None taken. It’s your funeral.”

  Got in the cage. Stood in the right-hand batter’s box. “Whenever you’re ready.”

  Five seconds later, a yellow ball whizzed by me at the knees. I made no move. Judged the speed at ninety. Next ball, same thing. Statues have made more movement. This time I eyed where the ball was coming from. Third ball I smacked right through the square in the netting through which the pitch had come. Next ball, same result. And the next and the next and the. . .Jumped into the lefty batter’s box. Closed my eyes. Listened. Smacked the ball just above the hole in the netting.

  “Shite!”

  “I’m convinced,” she said. “You’re the best I’ve seen.”

  The pitching machine went silent. As I stepped out of the cage, the lights dimmed. Nothing more frightening than a dark church. Got into hitting position.

  “Fuck is th—”

  The tail end of the question was shoved back into me mouth along with me front teeth. Something snapped. Heard it more than felt it. Coughing up teeth and blood, I was down, dazed, me arms and legs as useless as tits on a tennis racket. After a second she came back into focus. Standing over me, a hurly in her hands.

  “Manny Alcazar,” she hissed. “Remember him, Mr. Clemente?”

  Mind racing. Yeah, shite, I recalled. A thick-bodied, squat spic, took his time dying, too. He was one of my early nineties one-bone-at-a-time jobs. Didn’t know why management wanted him done or done that way. Never questioned the instructions.

  “Yer father,” I choked.

  “You caught on about five minutes too late, asshole. Fucking shame that I snapped your vertebrae. Would have liked to have you feel the bones breaking.”

  “The hurly?”

  “Faith and begorrah, me mother’s Irish, you prick.”

  Last thing she said to me. She put down the hurly and picked up me own bat. Poetic justice, I suppose. I watched her shatter me legs. Well done. She’d a powerful swing. The girl had real potential and there was little doubt, with proper training, mind you, I could have added a good ten miles an hour to her bat-head speed.

  LISA MANNETTI

  LISA Mannetti is a former editor and adjunct English instructor who discovered she preferred full-time writing to real work when she volunteered to be the family member who cared for her ailing mother. Her work has appeared in SMALL BITES (an anthology to benefit Charles Grant), SPOOKS! published by Twilight Tales; and HELL HATH NO FURY. Her short story, “Hungry for the Flesh” will be in Space and Time #102. Two of her novels, as well as two other book projects illustrated by Glenn Chadbourne, are in the ninth circle of limbo on publishers’ desks.

  When asked about the topic of this anthology, Lisa replied: “Hitman stories appeal to the outlaw in all of us. Who wouldn’t occasionally love to get rid of troublesome acquaintances (or relatives) without actually having to clean up messy forensic evidence?”

  Visit her at www.TheChanceryHouse. com.

  EVERYBODY WINS

  Lisa Mannetti

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  That was as far as Sally Grimshaw read. She punched in the phone number.

  “We’re here for you,” a young woman on the other end said. Sally began explaining, talking faster and faster. Her black moods, her low self-esteem (and what good did it do to know it was low self esteem? As if knowing could make you feel less like shit).

  “I want to die,” Sally finished.

  “Mr. Vinny can see you in twenty minutes—”

  “See me?”

  “Certainly.” The woman rattled out an address in the West Eighties. “Can you get here?”

  “Yes. Thank you. God bless you, yes—”

  “Don’t worry about your hair, your clothes—don’t worry about a thing. Just get in a cab and come right now.”

  Sally hung up and rushed into her old trench coat, throwing it on over a flannel nightgown. She snagged an oversized worn black leather pocketbook from the hook inside the closet door.

  Five minutes later she walked into a cold gray day and wishy-washy December flurries. But she had hope, she told herself. Now there was hope.

  “I’M FORTY-SEVEN and I’ve never even had a date.” Sally snuffled into a white Kleenex tissue. “I hate my job. I think they’re going to fire me because I call in sick a lot. I can’t help it.” She twisted the soft paper to shreds, as if it might prevent her from breaking into hysterical sobs. “Four years ago at my high school reunion, not one person remembered me. . .”