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Driving through the clearly dodgy areas of New York wasn’t exactly my idea of fun, but neither was driving five hours straight to get here all the way from Portland, Maine. But then Wendy had come good on her promise to help and found me the guy I needed.
He was someone who worked at the New York Times and he had written a few articles on the Iron Triangle. This had basically once been a place where stolen cars went to die. It was a place in Corona Queens where the METS played baseball and where people used to turn their heads away from the slum across the street. A place that once looked more like an apocalyptic version of New York than what it did today, now that the city had finally stepped in and reclaimed the land after years of promising to do so. Hence why the flooded, pothole heaven was no more.
But before the high rise complex had been built, it had been Willets Point, a place known for its auto repair shops, scrap yards, waste processing sites, and similar small businesses that consisted of people all trying any way they could to make a dollar. It was a place where junkies slept in broken, rusting cars and only came out at night. It was a place where the smell of garbage had once been a scent people became used to. And where sights like a van’s back doors being held together by three rolls of duct tape was considered the norm. Where graffiti on the walls and burnt out cars became the only flashes of colour in this typically grey part of the world.
But like I said, a world that no longer existed thanks to the city finally intervening. However, this merely meant that a lot more Chop shops ended up opening around different areas of the city, as stealing cars and stripping them down for parts was still a business many didn’t feel like giving up on. Which was where Wendy’s contact came in.
See, after he had followed the wastelands of the Iron Triangle, he had ended up meeting quite a few people and only one name continued to pop up among the drunken chatter of small shop owners during that time. He was the one who dealt with the more, should we say, wealthy side of things, and movies like Gone in 60 Seconds became the documentary of life for this gangster.
They called him Big B, which from what I gathered could mean anything from boss, boulder, berserker and bone breaker. In other words, he was known as a ruthless, hard bastard that took no shit and was one scary motherfucker. This being the word on the street.
Big B was also the one who dealt with cars that weren’t easy to come by or easy to steal for that matter, as it wasn’t as if you could just jimmy a window of a Ferrari and hot wire one. Meaning that he had a syndicate of experienced and highly talented thieves working for him. He was also the one who had them stolen and on a container heading off to his clients before the owner even knew their prized possession had even been stolen.
He was in the big leagues.
And, as insane as it was, he was exactly who I needed right now.
So, I arranged to meet her contact, a guy called Micky and was just pulling up to Central Avenue after Wendy had arranged the meeting place. And well, seeing as I was the one currently sat in a Ferrari, then I wasn’t exactly hard to spot. Which meant the second some skinny white guy with a baseball cap and a hood over the top approached my door and knocked on the window, I lowered it and asked,
“You Micky?”
“Bitch, I will be whoever the fuck you want me to be, now get the fuck outta the car!” he said pulling out a gun and pointing it at me through the window. It was at this point that I rubbed the top of my nose in frustration and said,
“I guess that’s how you people say hi in New York then, huh?” He snapped,
“Bitch you fucking wacked or...AAHHH!” This ended in a scream of pain the second I grabbed his wrist and bent it back on itself making him drop the gun in my lap.
“Tut, tut, Micky, you don’t think I would be stupid enough to drive my nice expensive car around here if I couldn’t take care of myself, now would you?”
“Bitch, my name ain’t...Ahhh, okay, okay.” I cut him off by applying some more of that handy, agonizing pressure before giving him some advice,
“Tip for you Micky, never start off an answer with Bitch, especially if that bitch in question is the one who’s had a bad fucking day and might just snap your wrist for the sheer fucking fun of it...now let’s start again should we?”
“Yeah, yeah, okay cool...shit Bitc...I mean lady, you got it!” he said quickly singing a different tune and wincing through the pain I caused.
“Good, now there is a place I am looking for around here that is owned by a guy known as Big B and well, seeing as you were intent on stealing my car, I will assume you know who I am talking about and where it is.”
“Nah, nah, I was just gonna take it for a spin is all.” I flattened my lips and cleared my throat before bending his wrist back a little more and making him scream again.
“Let’s try that once again, should we Micky?” I said in a calm tone that was the total opposite to his. His fearful eyes scanned left and right making me add,
“Okay, let me put it this way, just how many cars do you hope to jack after I have broken your arm in three places...huh?” I asked adding even more pressure at the end to make my point and making him scream out louder this time.
“AHHH, Fuck! Fuck, Jesus Christ! Okay, okay, shit yeah it’s over on Washington Avenue, just a couple streets down!”
“And this fine establishment, what does it look like?” I asked next and this time, he didn’t hold back.
“Two double doors, blue, windows above...fuck oww, okay, just ease up, it looks like a shithole but it’s a front,” he said and like they say in the movies, he was singing like a canary.
“That’s good. Right, now here is what’s gonna happen. I am going to let you go, and I want you to remember that I have your gun, so no funny shit, Micky,” I warned making him nod fast, obviously desperate for me to let him go and relieve the pain I knew my hold on him had inflicted. So, I picked up his gun with my free hand and pointed it at him making him back up the second I let go.
Then I opened the car door which shot up into the sky just like on a Lambo, giving it the appearance as if it had wings. After this I unfolded myself from the car and kept the gun on him, which was when he started to get braver, putting more space between us as he told me,
“Bitch, the joke is on you! Fucking wacked piece of shit...and my name isn’t fucking Micky!” he said as he started running off, trying to get away from me as quickly as he could, cradling his abused wrist to his chest.
“I know, asshole,” I muttered just as another car pulled up and from the looks of the family man saloon, it was safe to say that this was the real Micky. Mr family man got out of the car dressed like he had just thrown on whatever was to hand first, as the milky stain on his shoulder told me that it was more than likely he had a newborn at home. The stick family stickers on the car’s window also told me he had three other children and a wife at home that was mostly likely wondering what her husband was doing leaving in the middle of the night. But then he had a kind, honest face with tired eyes that told me he needed at least five more hours of sleep at night. This also told me that the favour he owed Wendy must have been a big one.
“Wow, so Wendy wasn’t kidding...hey, nice to meet you, I’m...”
“Micky, yeah... I know,” I said but then he spotted the gun and lifted his hands and looked freaked.
“Shit, whoa...okay, not sure what you are...” I quickly cut him off and said,
“Oh this, ah don’t worry, I just pulled it off some punk who tried to steal my car, that was also my first indication that I was in the right place...although, I have to confess, I have no clue whether this thing is even loaded or not. The last gun I fired ended up being...well, should we say, under slightly unusual circumstances and let’s leave it at that.” He gave me a wary look, obviously wondering why his now ‘not so good friend Wendy’ had missed out the part where I was clearly bat shit crazy. Which I wasn’t, I was just stepping firmly into the pissed off, woman scorned stage of a breakup.
“Look, she didn’t explain exactly all the details and seeing as you have just turned up in that car, then I am not sure I want to know?” This was definitely said as a question, making me tell him,
“Oh, trust me Micky... you really, really don’t want to know.”
“Right, well then I will just quickly give you the basics as a favour to Wendy and then I was never here, if you know what I mean.”
“I sure do, the real Micky...I sure as shit do,” I answered cryptically.
Okay, so one look at what I was about to do, and I most definitely wished I had taken the time to change my outfit. As, let’s just say that a tight pencil skirt, skintight shirt and little blue tie was not exactly the bad ass image I was hoping to go for here. But then again, maybe I was going about this all wrong. Maybe the whole sexy, unsuspecting act would be better? Now, if I could just pull it off without first falling on my ass as I got out the car, then yeah, that would be swell.
“Well, here’s hoping that these thugs think with their dicks first and their trigger-happy fingers second,” I said to myself after rummaging through the overnight bag and finding what I was looking for...jeez, was this chick a party girl or what? Blood red lipstick, eyeliner, hairspray...okay, so who needed a glitter stick in their travel bag for work? Where was she expecting we were headed, Vegas?
I flipped open her compact mirror and went to work, starting with getting rid of any evidence of heartache. Like the black track lines running down my cheeks from the mascara I was never wearing ever again! But thankfully, heavy makeup most definitely helped in this and with the whole sultry look I was hoping to achieve I snapped the compact shut. I completed the look with twisting my hair up into a loose bun and holding it there with a pen I found in her purse. This was so I could do the whole, hair flicky thing the second I got out the car.
Then I sat across the street and waited. And fake Micky had been right, the place looked like a real shithole. Like a large house that had cracked windows on the top floor held together by a geometrical shape of tape. Faded, peeling paint from split wooden siding framed the two large, blue roller doors that were the only part of the building that didn’t look close to giving up and buggering off to find a scrap yard themselves like the rest of the tired building did. Next to it was an empty lot that was fenced and filled with scrap cars piled up, telling me this was a way to hide the good stuff at the back. Because one look at those solid locked gates and it was easy to see where the money had been spent.
Meaning, I knew instantly that I was in the right place and all I had to wait for was one of the big roller doors to go up, so I could make my entrance. This was after first sticking the gun in the waistband of my skirt, hiding it with the fitted suit jacket that matched the navy skirt. Then slipping my heels back on and hoping I could drive the car the way I needed to with them on, I focused on getting my timing right.
In the end it was only about fifteen minutes wait until up they went, and my opportunity presented itself.
“Here goes nothing, Fae...time not to get dead,” I said starting the engine and the second the random car started to clear from the opening, I floored it, making the car roar like a fucking beast was coming out of the shadows of Hell!
Needless to say, I got myself noticed pretty damn quick as the second they saw me coming everyone jumped out of my way. And this was just as the roller doors were lowering, which meant that I was thanking my lucky stars that this car was as low to the floor as you could get! Because I only just made it inside, slamming on the brakes and barely stopping in time before I hit anything or anyone, for that matter as one guy obviously wasn’t as quick as the rest. Which meant that he ended up closing his eyes instead just as the stallion looked close enough to make a permanent imprint on his legs. The cocktail stick he’d had in his mouth fell from his lips the second he realised he could have died by a Ferrari related injury.
“Phew,” I said on a sigh, looking lower so he could see me and in doing so I could make my Aunty Pip proud and mouth at him,
‘My bad.’
Then, I took in a quick scan of the space, seeing a large twin garage that housed at least twenty cars on one side and a workshop on the other. Naturally, as expected, there were also multiple cars in different stages of being fixed or stripped down for parts.
The side I had driven the Ferrari into was where the work was done as there was a lift, a pit, and the walls that were framed above by half naked chicks, auto part signs, and shelves of paint cans. Below this were benches, and heavy-duty tools that were used to get the illegal jobs done.
Five guys all stood around wearing pretty much the same expressions, which was my cue to get out and start my pitch, hoping it didn’t include my gun. One that I found out after fake Micky told me that the joke was on me, was actually because it was minus any bullets and was pretty much useless. But hey, you couldn’t tell that from looking at it right?
Thanks for that one, fake Micky. Jeez the guy couldn’t even steal a car properly I thought as I raised the door and tried my hardest not to trip on my heels as I got up out of the car. Then, as I did, I plastered on a grin, even going so far as winking at one guy whose mouth actually dropped open as I pulled the pen from my hair and shook out my two-minute hairstyle.
“Well, hello boys,” I said with a smirk as they scanned the length of me, having no clue what was about to go down if the shit hit the fan. Thankfully for me, I didn’t see an arsenal of weaponry amongst the cans of oil, so I was taking this as a good sign. Otherwise, I would have been up shit creek with a bullet shot limb as my only paddle!
But this was when I noticed that there was also a mezzanine level right ahead of me at the end of the shop. One that seemed to be where the office was, if the sound of one pissed off male was any indication. I knew this as I heard a door slamming and an angry voice snarl,
“What the fuck is all the fucking noise and who do I have to fucking kill to shut them the fuck up?!” Sheesh, that guy needed to relax, or maybe a valium...I mean the guy said fuck more than a certain, shall forever now be known as, ‘asshole Vampire’ did.
The guys all looked up the second he appeared, as did I to see a large brute of a man appear, who kind of reminded me of the dude who played Drax in Guardians of the Galaxy. Only without all the grey and red skin and very literal sense of...well, pretty much everything.
Then again, this guy wasn’t half naked, although he looked just as angry as Drax could get, especially in a fight. His dark hair was shaved short, with the hair on his lower face longer than the top. He had hard eyes that looked smaller due to the furious look he seemed to be holding onto and his large nose had clearly been broken more than once. It was also easy to see him as the boss, especially with all the muscle that looked as though it was worked at by tossing rival gang members in some car crusher on the weekends. That or he just bench-pressed auto parts giving new meaning to the term ‘muscle cars’.
Oh, and my guess was that Big B didn’t like getting disturbed much.
“And who the fuck are you, lady?!” he snapped making me really wish I had rethought this plan of mine. Maybe I should have tried getting my hands on an actual weapon that wasn’t useless and its only use was as a gangster looking paperweight. Although, I had a pen, so that had to count for something after the night with the merc...right?
“Oh, don’t mind me, I’m just here to browse, you know, thinking of getting an upgrade...” They all looked at me as if I had lost my damn mind, so I rolled my eyes and decided to cut through the bullshit and get right to it,
“You’re an illegal chop shop that deals in stolen cars and I just drove in here with a Ferrari, what do you think I am fucking doing here...about to ask for an oil change?!” And this was when I dropped the bomb and the reaction was what I had been expecting, but not what I had been hoping for.
“Bitch, you should have just said you were in the wrong place...damn shame, you were one fine bitch,” Big B said before nodding to one of his guys that was wearing oil stained coveralls. I released a sigh and shook my head a little, taking note of the confused glances from the others. They were no doubt asking themselves why I hadn’t yet started to run away in a panicked, girly fashion.
Well, they were about to find out, as the second the first one reached out to grab me, obviously acting as if he was about to fight with a girl and outright punching me in the face obviously didn’t sit well enough with him. But hey, reaching out to grab me by the hair was fair game I thought with a roll of my eyes...oh, but I didn’t think so!
The second he did, I grabbed his arm, ducked under it and took it back on itself before kicking out at the back of his knee so he went down, then I twisted his arm in such a way that it dislocated his shoulder with a sickening sound. Then I dropped the screaming man to the floor and calmly stepped over him.
“Right, so as I was saying...I am interested in a trade...no?” I said as another man in coveralls, suddenly stepped towards me, this time grabbing a knife that was amongst the tools and also...was that an apple he’d been cutting?
He then looked up at his boss who folded his arms and nodded, obviously giving him the go ahead to stab me, presumably to death. Well, this should be fun, I thought with another tiresome eyeroll.
“Well, whatcha gonna do with that, grease monkey, bore me to death whilst I wait for you to get permission from daddy up there?” I taunted knowing that this was also a technique to use, as anger often made people slip up and act sloppy.
Some of the guys grunted a laugh and muttered about how ‘this bitch’ was going down. But a quick glance up at the big boss man and he seemed somewhat intrigued as to how this would go. Well, maybe putting his boys on the floor would be the start of good business. I mean jeez, I worked in a freaking museum, so what did I know, maybe this was like the initiation process or something. I mean come on, what was next for me after this, watching Pink Panther movies and training to become an international jewel thief? Oh, how my resume was certainly looking more colourful by the day.
Grease Monkey came at me and I instantly grabbed his wrist, twisting slightly as I tugged it down against his torso, then as I turned the blade back on himself, I thrust up after stepping into him. This move ended how I’d anticipated as it stabbed up into his balls, making him actually scream like a little girl. I even heard the collective hisses of imagined pain from the other three as they watched their colleague drop to the floor and more than likely no longer be able to father children. Which from the looks of him, was me probably doing the world a favour by not allowing him to add anything to the gene pool of life. Dude could have eaten corn through a picket fence after first scaring away the sheep!
“Holy shit!” one guy muttered under his breath making me smirk as I winked at him. This was after I had pointed the end of my now bloody blade at him, scanning the tip down the length of him until it ended at his meat and two veg...my guess, they were now the size of sprouts after just witnessing what happened to his friend.
Hell, for all I knew they could have just jumped back up inside his body to hide until this shit was over with. And from the looks of things, shit was far from over as I was left with three guys who all looked like thug extras from some old James Bond movie...seriously, was that actually a black turtleneck I saw beneath the cheap leather jacket?
“Anyone else wanna go, or you done with me breaking people yet and finally want to do a deal?” I asked, only looking up at the boss at the end. But then he scoffed, snapping,
“Tommy, you’re up!” The biggest guy at the back then came forward and looked ready to go as if he was going to enjoy trying to kill me. Especially as he picked up a heavy looking tyre iron and started testing its weight by letting it fall a few times in the palm of his free hand. I gave him a wry look, tilted my head and said,
“Really, is that supposed to intimidate me or something...you see that in a movie, sweetheart?” I mocked this last part in an overly girly voice making him sneer at me in anger now aiming it high and hoping to hit me over the head with it, using his added height to do so. Well, lucky for me, I still had my knife, however, not so much for him.
“Time to crack your skull, bitch!” he snarled.
“Seriously, do you guys not know anything else to call a woman kicking your ass?” I asked before I pivoted my body, minimizing the surface of my body as I was trained to do in case a blow managed to get through my defense. I also needed to put myself out of his reach in case he grabbed hold of me to try and keep me trapped to the oncoming blows.
It was strange, how the moves seemed ingrained in my brain. As if I didn’t even need to think about it, almost like breathing, it just came natural to me. Which was good because in fluid movements that barely even registered to my attacker, I delivered what could easily be considered as one of my most brutal attacks yet...well, other than the pencil in the brain thing.
I stepped inside the arch of his longer weapon as the attack came down from above, to strike out first before he could hit me with it. I sliced my blade down the inside of his elbow against the muscle that effectively took away his ability to grip the tyre iron. Then, I instantly put my arm up to block, with my palm facing me, which was another instinct kicking in. One done to protect my own vital parts of my arm, like my arteries and veins on my wrist.
Blood burst all over the sleeve of my jacket, coming from the deep slice I made to the inside of his arm before I thrust up and stabbed the blade into his armpit. This was to hit at the nerves there that prevented his brain telling his arm what to do...now his limb was mine. Oh, and how he was about to know it.
But before he could even think too long on that particular ouchy, I turned my hand, putting my palm to his forearm. I did this so I could push his damaged arm down in front of his body and at the same time sliced up with my knife, cutting out from his armpit and straight through the top of his bicep with a sickening sound. This ended up severing his nerves completely, rendering his arm pretty much useless and in desperate need of medical attention before he bled to death.
“AAAHHHH!” he screamed after the mere seconds it took me to complete this brutal move as he dropped to the floor right after the tyre iron did, its clatter drowned out by the sound of sheer agony.
But after this I felt the gun being snatched from my waistband and held against my head.
“Drop the blade and turn around slowly!” he shouted making me stretch a hand out, making a point of dropping the blade with a clatter on the oil stained concrete floor. Then I turned around slowly and faced the last two guys.
“Try dodging this, bitch!” he said with a snicker that didn’t last long as he pulled the trigger, no doubt wondering why he didn’t see a bullet redecorating my face red. Instead, I cocked my head to the side and looked around the barrel of the gun and smiled.
“My turn, turtleneck...try dodging this!” I said before I kicked him straight on, getting him the nuts and making him fall to his knees. He did so cupping them, like this would somehow help. After which I grabbed the back of his head and brought it down on my knee, splitting my skirt at the side with the action. After this I let go, making him drop to the floor now unconscious and with a broken nose.
“No bullets, dickhead,” I said in cocky tone that lasted about two seconds after it was said, as I heard the hammer cock back on another gun behind me and the threat from Big B was clear...
“No, but there is in this one.”