Suckers - J.A. Konrath

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If life were indeed like a box of chocolates, this evening had been one craptastic bitter orange jelly after another. You know the one—it looks deceptively like a chocolate cream or a truffle, but when you bite into it tastes like someone wiped an orange peel in an ashtray and then loogied on it and encased it in rubber. Those candies suck ass. Why even make those nasty things in the first place? Is anyone even listening to me? Where was I? Oh yeah. Staring death in the face, again. I was about to take the shotgun away from Vlad and introduce it into his unhappy place when Tanya exploded into the room and threw herself at me. "We can’t kill him! He’s the One!" she yelled. Or something like that. I was still thinking about chocolates. "He isn’t the One!" Vlad hissed. "He has the Mark!" Tanya screamed. "The Mark of the One? Where?" "There! On his arm!" We all looked at my arm, at a red blotch of psoriasis I’d been meaning to see a doctor about. "It’s the Mark of the One!" Tanya said. "The Pentagram of Ba’al!" "Looks like psoriasis," said Andrew. While I’m quick at many things, most of them horizontal, coming up with ingenious schemes on the spot to get myself out of deadly situations isn’t one of them. So I surprised myself where I raised up my hands in a grandiose way and bellowed: "All bow before the One!" Everyone in the room bowed, except for my sauce buddy. We locked eyes for an instant, then ran like hell. Andrew beat me out the door, and he moved like his feet were spring loaded. I huffed and puffed behind him, my own labored breathing drowning out the yells of confusion and chaos all around us. We went left, down a hall, right, down another hall, through the black light room with those two Bill and Ted Pires still stoned on the couch, and wound up right back where we started, facing Vlad and his shotgun. Andrew back-pedaled, bumping into me, and we took off shoulder-to-shoulder in the direction we came from. "Who the hell designed this house? M.C. Escher?" he asked. "Is he still with the Wu Tang Clan?" I asked. 144
Down another dark hall, left, and right into a Pire with an aluminum baseball bat. "I’m the One!" I intoned. "Bow before the Mark of Balls!" He didn’t bow. He swung the bat. I tried to duck behind Mayberry, but at the same time he tried to duck behind me, and when our heads hit they actually did make a coconut sound. The bat buried itself in the drywall, and while the Pire tugged at it, Andrew and I crawled around him and bumped into a door I hadn’t seen before. I reached for it, turned the knob, pushed it open, and then Andrew screamed in a most feminine way and pushed me forward. We fell. It’s disconcerting falling into darkness, and all I had time to do was let out a small yelp and clench my bladder closed before we hit the first stair. After taking three steps to the chin, instinct took over and I reached out for a soft pillow to hug to my chest and break my fall. It worked, and landing was a relatively painless process. The pillow wasn’t amused. "I think you broke some ribs," he moaned. I checked. "Nope. I’m fine." I climbed off Andrew and squinted at the darkness around me. It smelled like a root cellar, earthy and moldy, with and underlying hint of something. "Now this," my airbag said, "this is a pit." "Nice observation, bright boy. Now see if you can find a door to the outside." "Andrew?" The voice came from the darkness, somewhere ahead of us. A creepy, crackly, moany kind of voice. "Andrew who?" I said. "Andrew Mayhem," it moaned back. I turned to Andrew. “Know anyone named Mayhem?” "You’re a waste of carbon," Mayhem said. Then to the voice, "Horace? Horace Folterkeller? Is that you?" "It’s me, Andrew!" "Horace is my neighbor up the street," Andrew said to me. "Whoop-de-freakin'-doo," I answered. "I thought you left your wife," he said to Horace. 145
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SUCKERS by J.A. Konrath & Jeff Stra
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CONTENTS Introduction by Joe Konrat
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Suckers is a novella I co-wrote wit
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spillover, and there are some parts
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“Tell me a little about Marcus, M
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I checked my watch. 11:09. I attemp
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“Did you bring the money?” “I
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“Then I turn Julia into a set of
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“I’ll take those Tic-Tacs, too.
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He shook his head, terrified. “Sp
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your girl, or talked behind your ba
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was hard to tell under the jacket,
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"Is it just about the money, though
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—stopping a few inches from my no
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"I think there's one in the fridge.
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Mrs. Garbonzo had never been to a p
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She leaned down to kiss me. Not wan
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“If you stay out in the sun, the
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I considered hitting him again, but
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him and a bullet.” “So what the
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agger.” “A double-bagger?”
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maybe it was a den, and then I woun
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“Sorry. Had to check.” Marietta
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“Hello, Mr. McGlade.” “Happy
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A BIT OF HALLOWEEN MAYHEM An Andrew
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"Hi, Roger," I said. My best friend
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Jarvis was still there, watching th
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"So would running through the Chamb
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said hi!" Roger and I got out of th
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yourself! Reveal your spectral pres
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Roger?" "Not me!" said Becky. "Not
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I walked slowly, carefully, making
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his knees. "I'm sorry," he said, gi
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The police never did find him. And
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“It’s my job to know, ma’am.
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face too, like Richard Dreyfuss in
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Why was I so edgy? Had my subconsci
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school actually existed. But it did
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seconds. When I finally reached the
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and a pair of eyes stared out at me
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I tried to pull away, but these mon
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how disgustingly horrible it was. I
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made my way to the exit before the
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card for $260. The card had some te
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like a Pepperidge Farm County Style
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“No.” I noticed she had some or
Page 94 and 95: air guitar, broke an air string, pu
Page 96 and 97: store. The knots were tight, expert
Page 98 and 99: I go to the cops, and you get put i
Page 100 and 101: Incredibly, he stopped. “What?”
Page 102 and 103: “Don’t be coy. This could be a
Page 104 and 105: Tim, who was my best friend in Ms.
Page 106 and 107: As we walked home from school, Roge
Page 108 and 109: "Then...I dunno, do something to de
Page 110 and 111: "He’s practicing for a play audit
Page 112 and 113: And then an answer: "Leave me alone
Page 114 and 115: this gentleman is sounding depresse
Page 116 and 117: "No?" Dennis asked. Roger shook his
Page 118 and 119: SUCKERS A Harry McGlade/Andrew Mayh
Page 120 and 121: she's the kind of person who would
Page 122 and 123: "I know she looks different," Phoeb
Page 124 and 125: "Neither do I. So my only alternati
Page 126 and 127: The man aimed his penlight back at
Page 128 and 129: ut this was the first one to take p
Page 130 and 131: starter cord. "You're at least goin
Page 132 and 133: "Honored, huh?" I said, though in m
Page 134 and 135: "Yes," somebody replied. My heart g
Page 136 and 137: let the ladies take what they wante
Page 138 and 139: with lunging fangs got a Moe-style
Page 140 and 141: Andrew "Ow! Ow! Ow! Ow! Ow! Ow! Hee
Page 142 and 143: giggled with her. I, myself, did no
Page 146 and 147: "I didn’t leave her! I was kidnap
Page 148 and 149: ag off the IV stand, and then plodd
Page 150 and 151: Correction #3: Dan didn't even have
Page 152 and 153: You know, Ann somebody, the one who
Page 154 and 155: - 10 - Harry "Keeeyaaaa!" I struck
Page 156 and 157: —Harrison Harold McGlade, Chicago
Page 158 and 159: Harry McGlade's stupidity saved his
Page 160 and 161: INTERVIEW Jeff Strand interviews Jo
Page 162 and 163: Jeff: Jim Varney is dead, and I’l
Page 164 and 165: Jeff: What about them? I’m not su
Page 166 and 167: Jeff: -and we’re out of time for
Page 168: Read the Andrew Mayhem series by Je
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Suckers - J.A. Konrath

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