Читать книгу Keeping The Record - Travis Richardson - Страница 9

Victor Remmy called every pawn shop in Richmond, El Sobronte, Berkeley, and Emeryville. Nobody had seen a hulking black man come in looking to exchange unique memorabilia for cash. Pawn shop owners are cagey to begin with, but Remmy had a pretty good BS detector, and they had all passed. Not so for the proprietor of G-Dawg Pawn and Loan in downtown Oakland. Something in his voice, that “hell no,” followed by a hang up. That G-Dawg character had lied and was hiding something. Something Remmy was going to find out about. Plus, nobody hangs up on Victor Remmy. Nobody does who doesn’t regret it.

Remmy threw open the pawn shop door. Two men, both in their sixties, one Hispanic and one black, looked up.

“Which one of youse is G-Dawg?” Remmy said, slipping into a tough guy Jersey gangster talk, even though he was from San Francisco and only a quarter Italian.

The men looked at each other and then back to Remmy. They pointed at each other and said simultaneously, “He is.”

They laughed. That’s another thing. Nobody laughs at Remmy. He brought out his .45. Let’s see if they keep laughing now, fuckheads.

“Hands up where I can see—”

The Latino man reached for the side of his belt, and Remmy blew him away. His brains covered a section of samurai swords displayed on the wall. Stupid move, Pancho. He’d never met a greaser named G-Dawg in his life. He turned the gun on the black man, G-Dawg, obviously.

The Dawg had his hands under the table, and his lined face was hard. “What’d you do that for, shorty?”

Remmy was hitting 11 on a pissed off scale of 10. His inadequate height was a personal issue not to be discussed with a soon-to-be dead pawnbroker. “Put your hands up where I can see ’em.”

G-Dawg shook his head slowly. “Best you drop your gun if you wanna keep your head.”

Remmy didn’t have to have it spelled out for him. G-Dawg had a shotgun underneath the counter.

“Look, I think we got off on the wrong foot here,” Remmy said.

“You think so?”

“Yeah, you see he was reachin’ for—”

“Hold up now. You come in here askin’ for me, and then you blow Rafael to smithereens, messin’ up my sword collection. And you call that getting off on the wrong foot?”

“You saw him reaching for a gun or something.”

“Something like an insulin pump he has on his belt. It helps him regulate his blood sugar. Especially when something crazy happens like you walking in here waving that gun around.”

Remmy shrugged. What could he say?

G-Dawg’s nostril’s flared. Looked like he was building up enough anger to pull the trigger and send them both on a one-way ticket to hell.