Barely Legal

95

Josh had no problem spotting the thug. He was diagonally across Park Avenue from the corner of Herbie’s building, right where he could watch the entrance and the garage at the same time. The guy was clearly a pro. There was no way he was just the enforcer for some two-bit loan shark. He was Taperelli’s man for sure.

And Herbie hadn’t wanted to tell him. That bothered Josh. Did Herbie think he was getting old? Slow? Losing it? Or did he just think Taperelli’s men were that scary? Herbie had been dealing with them, and clearly they’d scared him, enough to drive all the way upstate to get a gun. Well, no matter. He’d agreed to do it, so he’d do it.

And Josh was that good. He just needed to be careful, but effective. Come right at the guy. Taunt him. Get him off balance.

Josh walked up to the thug and said, “Hey, asshole, what do you think you’re doing?”

The guy ignored him, pretended not to hear.

“Hey, asshole, I’m talking to you,” Josh said.

The thug turned then, assessed him calmly. “Run along, buddy.”

“No, you run along. I like this corner. You’ve had it long enough.”

“I’m glad to hear that because it was getting boring,” the thug said, and turned away to continue his surveillance.

“Hey!” Josh said.

The thug turned back. “What?”

“You going to leave this corner?”

The thug stared him down. “No.”

Josh punched him in the face.

The blow caught him by surprise. He went down to one knee. He reached for his gun. Josh grabbed his arm, pulled it up behind him until something cracked.

He howled in pain and lashed out with his left hand. He caught Josh just above the left eye and raised a welt. Josh might not have noticed. He cocked his fist.

The thug’s arm wasn’t broken. He managed a punch to Josh’s stomach that took some of the joy out of life. Josh grabbed him by the jacket lapels, dropped to the ground, and rolled over backward, flipping him over his head. He turned around and dove on him before he could scramble to his feet.

A police car with its siren and lights on made a U-turn on Park Avenue and careened to a stop beside them. A second police car took the shorter route against the traffic and screeched to a stop head-to-head with the first. Policemen jumped out of the cars and descended on the combatants. Two grabbed Josh. Two grabbed the thug. They wrestled them toward the cars.

One of the officers holding the thug said, “Hey, this one’s armed!”

“I’m a cop, you moron!”

“Yeah, right,” the officer scoffed. He threw him into the back of the car.

The other officers had a harder time dealing with Josh Hook. He managed to keep his feet until he saw Herbie, completely forgotten, come out the front door of his apartment building and walk off down the street.