I drove over to No Enterprise. I drove carefully. There was a little park by the side of the road just outside of the city limits. I pulled over there and opened the trunk and took out the golf bag and dug in there until I found the shotgun. It was in two pieces. There was a little bag with tools in it. I put the shotgun together swiftly. There were shells in a plastic bag. I loaded the gun.
I looked up as a black Volkswagen drove by, heading back the way I had come. I hoped they weren’t pulling into the park.
They drove on.
I put the bag back in the trunk and took the shotgun and laid it on the front passenger’s seat and drove on into No Enterprise. There was no reason to expect Jimson to be where I hoped he was, but Shit Fingers or someone there would know. I’d get him to come there if I had to beat the information out of an innocent bystander. I might even make them drink the coffee.
When I got to No Enterprise, I saw the service station/convenience store. It occurred to me as I arrived that it might not be open. But it was. It was all night. It was the swinging spot in No Enterprise.
The lights were on, but right then it wasn’t swinging.
I cruised into the lot and parked. There was a dark SUV parked in front of the store, near the door. I tried to determine if it was the one in the Wal-Mart lot, came to the conclusion it was not.
I got the shotgun off the seat and opened the door. My legs felt like lead, but I made them move anyway. I held the gun down by my side, and used my other hand to tap the revolver beneath my coat.
I walked straight to the door and went in.
No one was there. That was alive.
I saw Jimson on the floor, his head turned funny and his mouth open. So were his eyes. His blood was all over the floor. He had one hand inside his coat. Probably reaching for a gun.
Sitting in a chair at the table was Muscles. He had his head thrown back, and his mouth was open, like something you were supposed to toss a ball into.
The thin man lay on the floor. He was on his back. He had his hand on his gun, but it wasn’t drawn. He had a hole in the center of his forehead, nice and neat, like it was painted there with a paint pen. The back of his head was oozing blood. The place smelled of blood, gunfire, and feces from evacuated bowels.
I took a breath and looked around. No one. I walked over to the counter and looked behind it. Like I expected. Shit Fingers. He was dead too, crumpled on his side with his knees drawn up. His mouth was leaking blood. Blood was splattered on the cigarettes in a rack behind him.
For some reason the only thing I could think was a dedicated smoker could buy those cheap.
Blood. All of it fresh. This had just happened.
I felt the hair on the back of my neck crawl around. I took another deep breath and backed out of there.