Victor Hale
Aiden's pov.
My head feels so heavy like it's going to drop off any moment.
This goddamn street. It just reeks. Piss and smoke. And it's the kind of smell that gets in your mouth and makes you gag. A taste, like old rust or something rotting. Just sticks to the back of your throat.
I see Dana wrinkle her nose—that look. I almost laugh. Total disgust. She's pulling her thin jacket tighter to her body, like it could actually block out everything here. We step over another beer can, crushed flat, glinting a little in this weak excuse for sunlight. My boots crunch on some glass—loud. Too loud for how quiet this block is.
Then, this cough, so loud and dry.
From a dark alley somewhere. It wasn't normal. It was this deep, wet, ragged sound like the guy was trying to hack up a lung and just spit it out. And a dog that stares back at us. It's all skin and bones, just watching us. Its eyes were smart. Like it knew. Knew not to even try begging from us.
"This neighborhood is a dump," Dana mutters.
A dump? It is more than that. I haven't been to this part of New York before and this place will leave me with high blood pressure if I spend just a day here. Everything is just off and annoying. Boarded up windows I houses that are literally sinking into the dirt and crime of this place. We pass a wall with God knows how long graffiti on it and there's one— FUCK YOU COPS.
It was in red paint followed by one of these so many Snapchat abbreviations.
I hiss under my breath. Even the damn streetlights are flickering like they were about to die and leave the whole place in darkness for good.
I can't breathe properly. The air reek of poss, booze, garbage and unwashed people. I shook my head, shoving my hands into my pockets.
Just looking at these sad, identical houses drives me crazy.
We stop at 114. The door's a wreck. Peeling green paint over God knows what other ugly colors. Twenty years old, at least. Dana doesn't even pause, just starts pounding on it with her fist like the wood's too rotten to even make a real sound.
We wait. Hear some muffled shouting inside, then a lock scrapes.
The door opens a crack. And there she is. A woman, maybe late fifties, but a hard fifty. You know the kind of fifty that isn't pleasant at all. Too much booze, too many cigarettes. Her hair's a mess, greasy and gray, and her eyes are all bloodshot, wide and squinting in the daylight like it's personally pissing her off. She smells bad of gin and old sweat.
"What?" she snaps, voice like gravel.
I try the smile, the easy one. Usually works. Bounces right off her then I clear my throat. “We are looking for someone,” I say, trying to keep my voice low and gentle. “Victor Hale. Goes by—"
"Big Ray?" She cuts me off. And then she laughs. Jeez, what a laugh. Not a happy sound. Just this dry, rattling noise, like bones shaking in a box. "Oh, honey. Everyone knows Big Ray."
Right then, another woman stumbles out of the darkness behind her. Her daughter perhaps. She looks like a younger, more washed-out version. Mid-thirties maybe, but she's got the same tired eyes. Wearing a miniskirt and a bra that leaves nothing to the imagination, nipples almost popping out and skirt too short that her white panties flash. Her face had heavy make up and her mascara smudged and her hair dyed honey brown and grey with a bit of pink.
Her hands shake so badly that she can barely hold the cigarette.
She snaps her chewing gum and blows a bubble. “Oh yea,” she slurs. “Who's askin?”
She blows a cloud of smoke right in Dana's face.
I feel Dana tense up next to me and go rigid. "Friends," she lies, her voice all sharp and cold.
The mom lets out another one of those horrible cackles, showing off a row of yellow teeth. "Big Ray don't got friends," she says, leaning on the door. "Just suckers who buy him drinks and girls he pays for. You'll find him where you always find him. That dive down on Jefferson. Murphy's Hole. Don't bother knockin', though. He never hears a damn thing over the sound of his own bullshit."
Her daughter snorts. "Tell him I said hi," she says, her eyes looking right through us. "And that he still owes me fifty bucks."
Smack.
The mom just slaps her arm hard.
“Shat ya mouth, Evy,” she hisses and just before I can say anything the door slams on our faces and I just blink but the smell still lingers.
Gin and cigarettes.
Dana just shakes her head. "Lovely people."
I don't say anything. My stomach's twisting. If Greta, sweet Greta, was tangled up with a guy who lives in this... this filth... then of course she ended up dead. Of course.
\---
Twenty minutes later, we're at Murphy's Hole. The walk was just as bad. The sign's busted, neon buzzing. MURPH OLE. Yeah, fitting. The smell hits us hard through the door that I stagger. Stale beer, sweat, and something sour I don't even want to name.
"God," Dana mutters. "Smells like regret in here."
She's not wrong. I push the heavy door open.
And damn. The place is packed. And darkness rules here too, everyone and everything is packed just like sardines, loud noise and laughter and few girls dancing off the rhythm on a wooden stage. A T.V flickers somewhere and someone hits it hard to steady it.
Men hunched over cheap whiskey. Betting, yelling. Some women are sitting on their laps laughing at jokes that they themselves know aren't too funny, skirts hiked way too high and some old rock sound blasting from the jukebox, scratchy and annoying.
And then I see him.
Big Ray. Victor Hale.
Can't miss him. Built like a bull, huge stomach and drinking like his whole life depends on it, gut spilling over his jeans and plaid shirt with a stain on it.
And that laugh. Loud and arrogant. Just rolls over everyone.
He's got a crew, of course. All look like him. A woman in torn fishnets is on his lap—and his hands are all over her. No tenderness. Just grabbing her boobs.
"Come on, sweetheart," he's groaning, all drunk and slurring as he grabs her chest. "You know once my wife's dead, all this—" he waves his glass around, spilling whiskey, "—all this'll be yours."
His buddies just howl.
Dana's jaw is clenched tight. I feel it too. This hot, white anger crawling up my spine.
The woman on his lap just giggles. It sounds practiced. "You say that every week, Ray."
"And I mean it every damn week!" he shouts, and he slaps her thigh. Hard. Leaves a red mark.
His friends roar again. One of them, a skinny guy, calls out, "Tell 'em about the boat, Ray!"
Ray puffs out his chest. Soaking it in. "Almost? I did buy it! A beauty. Just lost it. Bank took it."
Another one snickers. "Like the car?"
Ray flips him off but he's laughing. "Yeah, yeah. Car, boat, house... who's countin'?"
The woman on his lap, she sounds bored. "What about that job? The one that was gonna make you rich?"
Ray's laugh booms. "Ha! Which one? The car lot I ran into the ground? The construction gig I quit? The bar the health department shut down? Lady, I've had more jobs than you've had customers."
The whole table just loses it and they laugh so loud and stupid even when they know nothing is actually funny.
The bartender, a scrawny man who looks like he just rose from the dead, hits the TV and changes the channel.
Local news.
And there she is. Greta Johnson.
Her picture. The one with her in her suit and lawyer wig, smiling at the camera.
The headline reads: POPULAR LAWYER FOUND DEAD— INVESTIGATION STILL CONTINUES.
The bar gets quiet. Not silent, but kind of quiet. That little hush when something real cuts through the bullshit.
But Ray?
He laughs, throwing his head back as he grabs his glass.
“Told ya she's going to hell. Good riddance.” He laughs. “Thinks it's all about wearing that goddamn lawyer wig.”
And that's it. Something inside me just snaps. A wire breaks, blood pounding in my ears. I take a step.
Dana's hand cokes. right on my wrist. Like a vice. Her eyes are like steel.
I swallow it. The rage. Force myself to stand still.
Ray shoves the woman off his lap, staggers to his feet. "Drink on me, boys! To new beginnings!"
They cheer and the woman just rolls her eyes and lights another cigarette and walks off.
I'm just watching him. Every move, every stupid laugh. Because behind all that pathetic, drunken bluster I saw it. Just for a second. When Greta's picture came on screen, something flickered in his eyes. Something cold. He knows. He knows something.And I swear to god, I'm gonna force the truth out of him.
Dana leans in, her voice a low whisper in my ear. “Take him now? Or when he's alone?”
Ray's yelling for another drink, still laughing. Still the town drunk.
I slam the door behind me and t
he bar suddenly went quiet. All eyes on us. Bug Ray looks shocked, confused and he blinks.
“Victor Hale?” I ask. “We have much to discuss.”