2
"This is our guy, Stan."
Not this again, Stan Kozlowski thought as he looked up from his bagel and shmear.
They'd returned to Moishe's this morning and were back at their usual table. His brother Joe was hidden behind The Light's screaming headlines, with only his hands visible. Both of them. Joe wasn't bothering to hide the scarred left this morning.
"Where's it say that?"
Joe lowered the paper. His dark eyes glittered in his puffy face. "Right here where he says he freelances for government agencies but can't say which ones or what he does for them."
"So?"
"Think about it, Stan." He leaned forward and lowered his voice. "Maybe ATF traced the components of one of our little devices back to a point where they suspected us but couldn't make a case. So they hire this ex-SEAL to find our stash and blow it. That happens, what's the first thing the locals do? Call in ATF of course. Bang. They've got their case. Works for me."
Stan thought about that. He had a sense, what with how Waco took so long to go away, that ATF would be a bit shy about burning or blowing up buildings. But if the job was done by an outsider, someone who couldn't be connected to them…
"That would be illegal, Joe," he said, deadpan. "I refuse to believe that an agency of our government would stoop to something like that."
Joe smirked. "Yeah, of course. What was I thinking?"
"What are you thinking?"
Joe pulled a newspaper clipping from the breast pocket of his shirt and unfolded it on the table. Stan recognized the article from the other day—the eyewitness account. Joe stabbed a finger onto the photo of the writer.
"See this guy? Same one as talked to this fucking Savior in today's paper. What I'm thinking is I go hang around The Light offices and see what this microturd's up to."
"You mean follow him?" Sounded like a major waste of time.
"Yeah. Why not? Not like I got much else goin' on in the toilet I call my life these days."
Wasn't that the truth. For both of them.
And now that Stan thought about it, maybe this would be good for Joe. Even if he came up empty handed—as he most likely would—at least he'd be out and about instead of sitting in his chair in that litterbox apartment staring at the TV all day.
"Maybe I'll tag along," Stan said. "Just to keep you out of trouble."
He said it lightly, but he was dead serious. Joe was like a carelessly wired block of C-4 these days. No telling what might set him off.