“Where the fuck are dipshit and dipshittier?” Icely yelled, smacking the back of Dent’s seat.
“They still had to get gas, Icely,” Schools replied.
“They should have caught up by now.” Icely bent back down over his mirror. “Pull over. We’ll wait for them here.” Icely snorted again.
Schools got out of the car and started doing the math in his head. They’d driven about twelve miles and it would take somewhere in the neighborhood of ten minutes to refuel the car. “They should already be back on the road,” he said aloud. “Ten, fifteen minutes at the most.”
“What the fuck are you going on about out there?” Icely asked. “Is anyone else cold? Shit.”
Schools walked further away. He heard a door open and was relieved to find out it was Dent.
“The boss is asleep, I don’t know how though ‘cause he did enough coke to keep a sorority up for a week. What should we do?” Dent asked.
“I guess we wait.”
When the ten-minute mark came and went with no sign of Ned and Diana, Schools wasn’t overly concerned. At twenty minutes he was. He was fairly certain the devil dog had gone back to finish the job it had started.
“The odds that she was able to get both are slim, especially Diana.”
“You say something?” Dent ambled over. “Say…where are those two?” he asked as if he were just remembering what they had stopped for in the first place.
Schools thought it highly unlikely the two were dead. His cop instincts began to kick into overdrive. No, they left, he thought. They’re heading home for their kids and getting the hell gone. He was angry; not that they left, but rather that he was not afforded the same chance as them.
“Should we get the boss up?” Dent asked.
“Be my guest,” Schools said. “Nothing quite like waking up a pissed off coke hung-over man.”
“Yeah…maybe I should just let him sleep a little longer,” Dent said wisely.
And just maybe that will give Ned and Diana the time they need. They’d better be flying, though. If Icely wakes up and decides to pursue, it will be close. Dent was notorious for hitting shit with his cars, but only at slow speeds and generally when attempting to park. On the open roadway he was damn near a magician. Schools wasn’t sure exactly what Dent did in his previous life but that he wasn’t a racecar driver meant that he’d missed his true calling in life.
Three hours is what they need. Enough time to sustain their lead, grab their kids and get the fuck out. Schools looked over to Icely. His head was thrown back against the seat, white powder coating the base of his nose and upper lip. One errant lick, Schools thought, and Icely will put enough coke back into his system to wake up.
“They’re not coming,” Dent said after a few hours. Both men were sitting on the guardrail. The sun was just beginning to make its presence known
“Who’s not coming?” Icely asked, sitting up groggily.
“Ned and Diana haven’t shown.” Schools got up.
“It’s only been a couple of minutes,” Icely said, wiping his nose. “When did you get so anxious? Sometimes you’re just like a tittering little hen.”
“Boss, it’s been more than two hours, probably closer to three,” Dent said, standing next to Schools.
Icely’s eyes went wide as he extracted himself from the car. “Two fucking hours and nobody thought waking me up was a good idea?”
“What difference does it make?” Schools asked. “We can only pursue one objective, them or the girl.”
“Listen, you little twat,” Icely said, standing directly in front of Schools, “I decide who is worth pursuing, not your little piss ant self. You hear me?”
“I hear you loud and clear,” Schools told him.
“I’m going to skin them alive when we get back, always wanted to try that,” Icely said as he drifted off.
“You still think they’ll be there?” Dent asked Icely.
“Oh, they’ll be there.” Icely snarled. “They’re too stupid to make it on their own…they’re all too stupid, present company included. Especially present company. You smell that?”
Schools wondered how the man could smell anything with the constant flow of drugs up his nasal canal.
“Stupid smells?” Dent asked.