The Last Job

Doran Dixon, Contributor

"Gunshots. Dad tells me they were the first thing I heard coming into this world. And the last thing my mom heard as she left. I don't have time to go into the details of how those two events are connected, do I, Detective ... ?"

"You know my name," he says curtly without blinking or flinching. He's been giving me the stare down for so long now, I think his eyes are about to dry out. Those eyes.

Those eyes seem to have burnt a hole through my head as he now appears to be looking through me. Into me. He wants to know what I know, but in a little while, he'll wish he remained ignorant.

"I thought you wanted to talk," I say just as tersely.

"I want to listen."

"Even whores get something in return, Detective."

"A smart whore in your shoes would cut her losses." Those eyes. Now they've gone cold and a chill up my spine tells me it would be unwise to make him use force - I mean, interrogation.

"Fine," I say, simulating defeat. "Listen closely."

It was a day like any other. I know this sounds silly, but I woke up with a feeling of déjà vu, almost like I'd lived the whole day before and it was only 7 a.m. Dad had a new assignment, a big one. "The assignment of my dreams," he said, as he swept me up in his arms and danced about the room. He said after this bounty, we wouldn't have to live like dogs killing other dogs for scraps of meat. He said we'd be free.

"You'll both be free to spend the rest of your lives in jail if you don't tell me what I want to know."

"How often do detectives abduct and threaten civilians? Hard to imagine you could do this if I weren't an 'undesirable'."

"I'm sure after I arrest the man responsible for the death of Kim Jong Jee, I'll get off easy on roughing up a whore."

"You never mentioned you beat your wife, but your secret's safe with me." I shouldn't have said that. He's like a dog and I can see his patience and restraint wavering.

"Look ..."

"I'm not done."

That morning after Dad left, I heard a sound behind me; but before I could turn around, there was a hand over my mouth and the next thing I knew, I was in a dark, danky, disgusting cellar. Still not as bad as this place.

"Wait, wait, wait," he says, exasperated. "You want me to believe you were kidnapped twice today? Once by me and once by one your father's many enemies?"

"What can I say ... my milkshake brings all the boys to the yard."

He smirks. A smirk I don't much care for, considering the implica-tions it could have for me. "Then what?"

Then just when things were looking darker than the hole I was in, a raid happens on the crack-house above my cell.

"You know that's something I can check for legitimacy?"

"I wouldn't say it if I thought you'd find out I was lying. Besides, I don't see why it matters when you and I know Dad only hunts wanted men and Jong Jee was no wanted man."

"He was wanted, just not by the proper authorities."

"There is no proper way to cut off a man's head."

"How did you know he was beheaded?" Those eyes are now metallic, and that expression ... I've seen warmer icebergs.

"I watch the news."

"Not in the last few days you haven't. I've had you here in my own apartment for four days just watching paint peel. You're starved, tired, anxious and afraid and I AM RUNNING OUT OF PATIENCE FOR THIS!" With that he lobs a coffee mug at my face and I almost faint from the impact that shatters the ceramic mug into a million pieces.

"Serve and protect, they said ...," I manage weakly, trying desperately to stay conscious. And I do. Just long enough to hear the door open.

"You ... I knew it ... I KNEW SHE WAS LYING! YOU KILLED HIM!"

I can make out the sound of 22 gunshots before I go deaf from exhaustion. I remember the now-late detective saying something about being able to fire a tank inside his apartment with the outside world being none the wiser, so I don't think anyone took notice. I feel my body being lifted; and as I'm once again carried away in the arms of a man I cannot see, for the first time in my life, I feel truly, joyously free.