Hellhole (38 page)

MAX TIED HIS SHOE,
then double knotted it. His mom was always reminding him of stuff like that now, the little things she'd neglected in her motherly duties for so long. “Don't trip and fall down the stairs and require a heart transplant,” she'd say. “They hurt like hell.”

“But they work,” he'd remind her, patting his chest.

She'd pat hers back.

He cracked his knuckles, the way Audie would before creaming him at
Madden
. She'd probably obliterate him even more epically now that she'd had a couple of months to hone her skills. Recuperating from a crushed pelvis, it turned out, scored you a lot of quality video game time.

Then he pulled the fishing rod out of the whale's flipper. He affixed to the end of the line a briefcase conspicuously overflowing with dollar bills and walked around to the front of the house, placing the bait atop a prominent mound of snow.

Finally he returned to the backyard, took his place behind the whale, and waited.

A few minutes later he spotted Lore jogging down the street. Vapor was puffing out of her mouth, and money was streaming out of her bag. She darted into the backyard and plopped down next to Max.

“Ready?” she asked, out of breath.

Max nodded and handed her the pole. “Ready.”

“Same as last time, okay? I'll reel him in, you drop the payload.”

“I know, I know. I'm getting pretty good at this, remember?”

She leaned in and kissed him. He kissed back—a passionate, artless thing. It had become a sort of tradition of theirs to kiss right before bagging their prey.

Also, they just really liked kissing.

They finished up, wiped off the slobber, and nodded to each other. Lore removed Russell Crowebar from her waistband. Max pulled out the secret weapon.

The Moneygrubber came sniffing around the corner, picking up each bill that Lore had dropped. As soon as he came into view, she began to reel in the fishing line. He sniffed after the briefcase, ratlike, following it all the way to the whale and scuttling inside with a
thump.

Max took a moment to grin at Lore, then dropped Ruckus through the blowhole. She slammed the port shut and jammed the crowbar into its handles to lock it, grinning back at him.

“I'm so glad we found a common interest,” she said.

They flopped back into the snow, their fingers entwining as the whale rocked fiercely back and forth, the devil's wails echoing in the clear winter sky.

 

G
INA
D
AMICO
is the author of
Croak, Scorch,
and
Rogue,
the grim-reapers-gone-wild books of the Croak trilogy. She has also dabbled as a tour guide, transcriptionist, theater house manager, scenic artist, movie extra, office troll, retail monkey, and breadmonger. A native of Syracuse, New York, she now lives in Western Massachusetts with her husband, two cats, and one dog, and while she has never visited hell in person, she has spent countless waking hours at the Albany Regional Bus Terminal, which is pretty darn close.

Visit her website at
www.ginadami.co
.