He shook his head slowly. “No, he’s having a bad time today.”
“Right, so, if this is a bad time,” Simon noted, shaking his head, “I can’t imagine what a good time is.”
“Well, it’s been a bad week, let me say that,” he muttered.
“What are you doing hanging around with him? You know this guy will just get your ass thrown in jail.”
He nervously moistened his lips. “Nah, he’s my friend.”
“Meaning, he gets you food and drugs, right?”
The guy looked at him, somewhat haunted.
“Stop talking,” the other guy said in a hard voice to Simon. “You ain’t got no truck trying to cause trouble between us.”
“I’m not trying to cause trouble,” Simon stated, looking at him. “Where’d you get that idea?”
“Yes, you are,” argued the homeless guy with the knife. “You’re making it sound like this is a bad deal.”
“Well, it is a bad deal. I don’t have to do anything to make itsoundlike that. Any idiot can see that it’s a bad deal.”
“I’m the one with the knife,” he jeered. “So what will you do about it?” he asked, brandishing it in front of Simon’s face.
Unwilling to waste any more time, Simon elbowed away the knife, clanging down to the alleyway, and flipped the guy around, until he was pinned against the building. “I’ll do whatever the hell I want to do.” Hearing protests from the second guy, Simon snatched him by the throat and slammed him up beside his buddy and squeezed. When the second guy started choking, the first man tried to move, but no way he could break Simon’s grip.
“See? This is what happens when you attack somebody who is minding his own business and not causing you any trouble, and here you go pulling a knife and making all kinds of threats.”
The second guy was still choking loudly.
“You’ll kill him,” the first guy cried out. “Leave him alone. Leave him alone!”
“Yeah, why is that? Is he your special buddy or something? You’re the one who put him in this position. So this is all on you, man.”
The guy looked at him and then back at his friend. “Please don’t kill him.”
“I don’t plan on killing him, unless he has a heart attack or something right now. I mean, it’s not my fault if he doesn’t have any oxygen to breathe.”
The first guy looked at Simon and then his shoulders sagged. “Please, just let him go.”
With that, Simon slowly released his grip around the second guy’s throat, who immediately bent over, gasping and choking for air. “That is your one and only warning,” Simon said to the first guy. “If you ever come close to me again,” he stated, “I’ll take you down the minute I see you. Got it? I’m walking this area all the time, every day of the week out here. This is my turf. It’s not your turf. So cross me one more time, and you’ll pay for it.”
And, with that, he shoved the man away from him.
The two men helped each other, and together they scrambled away. “Come on. Let’s go.” Shooting a glance of hatred toward Simon, they took off.
Simon looked down at the knife, knowing that, if he touched it, he would probably get completely engulfed in visions that he didn’t want to see. But he also didn’t want to leave it here. Pulling his handkerchief from his suit pocket, he picked up the knife and, with nobody else around to see anything at the moment, walked over to a dumpster close by and buried it in a corner. The last thing he wanted was to leave a weapon for someone else to pick up out here. The world was a dangerous-enough place to be without adding to it.
With one final look around, he turned and walked away.
Chapter 5
Kate stood outsidein the bustle of the downtown area, studying all the buildings, the traffic, and the parking around her. She was at a busy intersection, and people hustled up and down the streets. Vendors were on the corners, with storefront shops on some of the lower levels, and hundreds and hundreds of offices on the upper levels.
Rodney stood at her side and asked, “What are you looking at?”
“What would it take for somebody to actually notice a man kidnapping a woman out here?”
“It depends on what else is going on. It depends on what it would look like too. If she hopped into his vehicle, nobody would care. If he opened the vehicle door and held a gun against her so nobody could see, he’d get her inside without a fuss probably, and again nobody would know. If he came up and surprised her, and she didn’t struggle very much, didn’t cry out, didn’t do anything, nobody would actually know.”