3. Corey Curse

Chapter Three

Mercedes, Number One

Roanoke City, Strike County

A beat was thumping as Mercedes entered the club from the back door, cigarette hanging from his lips. The interior was dark and filled with strobe lights, neon lights, and every other exotic type of light imaginable. Mercedes navigated through the crush of bodies in the back room to the bar and dance floor. The center was dominated by a large stegosaurus statue. People climbed all over the thing, cowboy riding at the shoulders, sliding down the tail, gyrating against each other on its back.

Mercedes went over to the bar counter and leaned down.

“Get you something to drink?” the bartender asked.

“Nah,” Mercedes said, puffing smoke into the man’s face.

He felt people watching him but didn’t bother to turn around. It happened every time he went anywhere but no one bothered to approach him most times.

“I demand a rematch,” Splinter said as the man came up behind Mercedes.

Mercedes flinched as Splinter patted his back.

“Hit me with a scotch,” Splinter told the bartender.

“You don’t get a rematch for that,” Charm said joining them. “Hey, Mercy. You’re getting a lot of looks.”

“It happens.” Mercedes took a drag, offering his adoptive father a tentative smile. He couldn’t look at Charm without his lungs clouding with hurt and loss over his real father. And just knowing how much Mercedes was not the same person as Wheels had been, especially to Charm.

“The fuzz ruined the whole damn thing,” Splinter said. He yanked the scotch out of the bartender’s hand.

“That is the nature of a Czar Challenge,” Mercedes said, turning back to the disgruntled racer.

“So if you want to try again it’ll be the same way,” Charm said. “Hit me with a whiskey. You want something to drink, Mercy?”

“I’m good,” Mercedes said, exhaling cigarette smoke through his nostrils. He felt sorrow drain with it.

Splinter turned abruptly and stormed away from the counter.

“He didn’t stand a chance anyway,” Charm said, sipping from his whiskey.

“Of course not,” Mercedes agreed.

“How are things?” Charm asked then.

Mercedes hated getting into this conversation with his foster father. “The same,” he said as evening sunlight came in through the front door.

A teenager came in carrying an armload of books.

“I gotta take this,” Mercedes said. He patted Charm’s shoulder, feeling tension in the older man’s muscles, before stubbing out his cigarette and crossing through the club to intercept the boy’s path.

“What are you doing here?” Mercedes demanded.

“It’s harder to concentrate when I’m alone,” Alcatraz said. “And I knew I’d find you here.”

“There are at least three other underground establishments in this district alone,” Mercedes said. He grabbed Alcatraz by the shoulder and led him over to the L part of the bar counter where Charm was not. “Who’s to say that I’d have been at this one?”

“We both know that it’s your favorite,” Alcatraz said.

“And the place to be in this city,” the bartender said. “Having a root beer, Cat?”

Alcatraz nodded. “Hit me,” he said.

Mercedes whacked him on top of the head. “Don’t start talking like them,” he said.

Alcatraz opened his textbook as the bartender served him. “I don’t understand why I have to do this,” he said. “You didn’t finish school.”

“I’m not your father so that’s a poor comparison,” Mercedes told Alcatraz. “And you can decide to join the racers after you graduate next year.”

Alcatraz rolled his eyes. “Just go hang out with the three hundred guys who’d like to see you naked,” he said. “I have homework to do.”

Mercedes smiled at Alcatraz and moved away from the bar. “Let me know when you’re ready to go home,” he called.

“I hear Peace Harbor Czar is in town,” an older man said, catching up to Mercedes with a pen hovering over an open notepad.

“Yeah, he’s over there,” Mercedes said, tossing his head towards the bar. “You can report that Czar Charm’s title remains. Splinter of Rockingham Falls lost the challenge. Any other hot news?”

Stunt looked up from scribbling on the notepad. “You’ll have to wait for this week’s issue of The Pitstop Articles to come out for that,” he said. “Though I will say, guess who I heard is prowling the alley outside, rumored to be looking for you?”

“Could be anyone,” Mercedes said. “Do I get a hint?”

Stunt pursed his lips and closed up his notepad. “Probably the last person you want to see tonight.”

Mercedes needed a cigarette just imagining who that could be. “Thanks, Stunt,” he said. He shrugged deep into his leather jacket and navigated to the Kegasaurus’ front door. He looked over his shoulder to see that Stunt had gone to join Charm at the bar, probably looking for a quote for the paper. His eyes scanned the rest of the club, finding familiar faces in the crowd. Lastly, his gaze fell on Alcatraz and guilt stabbed through his chest.

Shaking himself, Mercedes stepped into the crisp evening air of early November. He looked up and down the sidewalk, freezing when he saw Corey Curse’s retreating form.

“Officer Curse,” Mercedes called.

The man stopped walking and spun around slowly. “Mercedes,” he said, familiar voice clearer than it had been on the scanner earlier. He started to close the distance between Mercedes and himself. Corey was wearing street clothes. He pulled a half red and half green box of cigarettes out as they stopped an arm’s length apart.

Corey lifted the box to Mercedes’ face, green side up. Mercedes leaned forward and took the offering with his teeth. Corey lit the end and Mercedes took a long drag.

“What are you doing here?” Mercedes asked as he watched the cloud of smoke rise to the sky. “Have you come to take me by surprise?”

“I have more respect for your kind than to storm an unsuspecting club with a legion of officers,” Corey said and Mercedes had to glance over his shoulder at the remark to check its validity. “Besides, I wouldn’t have come in street clothes if that was my intention.”

“I see you’re still buying the half packs,” Mercedes said.

“Out of habit,” Corey said and shrugged. “I never could get a taste for your brand so I always end up wasting half the pack.”

“Aren’t police officers notoriously underpaid?” Mercedes asked. “So unlike me, I know you can’t afford that waste.”

Corey pulled a cigarette out of the red half of the pack. He lit it up and took a puff. “Not really any of your concern,” Corey said.

“Why are you here?” Mercedes asked as he took the last drag of his cigarette, pocketing the butt. Corey offered him another one and he took it.

“You never used to smoke this much around me.”

“And you used to show your face inside the club.”

“I’d probably get eaten alive if I went in there now.”

“Why?” Mercedes said again.

“We busted up a race earlier,” Corey said.

“I heard,” Mercedes said. “Boys are from out of town.”

“Look, I came here because the race was called in by the Reporter,” Corey said. “He told dispatch exactly where the drivers were and where they were going well before they got there. Do you know anything about this guy?”

Hearing Corey say the 0-1-1 code name for Mercedes in person was quite a different sensation than the sound had inspired in him over the police scanner. He felts his arms break out in goose flesh and the hair on the back of his neck stood up. Mercedes took a long drag on his cigarette to calm down.

“What makes you think that I would know anything about that?” Mercedes watched as their smoke trails entwined with each other as they rose to the sky.

“Don’t you know everything that happens in all the streets of Raymond?” Corey asked.

“Please. I don’t have the entire state in my back pocket,” Mercedes said. “That’s what my Numbers and czars are for.” And the Psyphers, he thought but he wasn’t about to give the officer information about their secret network.

“Do you not even realize the implications of this?” Corey asked.

“Please, enlighten me,” Mercedes said. He finished the cigarette and dropped the butt to the ground, stomping it with his foot.

“That’s a $300 fine,” Corey said, raising the green end of the box to Mercedes’ lips again.

“Put it on my tab,” Mercedes said pulling another cigarette out with his teeth. He leaned forward as Corey lit it and then took a long drag, crossing his arms over his chest.

“One of your guys has to be playing for both teams,” Corey said.

“Are you insinuating that the Reporter is a loose-lipped street racer?” Mercedes asked.

“His anonymity isn’t doing him any favors,” Corey said, “but yes. The Reporter is likely a tattletale.”

“And?” Mercedes asked. “Why tell me?”

“I thought I should let you know what I was dealing with,” Corey said. He stubbed out his cigarette and pocketed the butt. Mercedes remembered then where he had picked that habit up from. “For old time’s sake.”

Mercedes wanted to laugh at that but it pained his chest too much to think about it. Instead, he said, “I don’t need your sympathy.”

“I wasn’t giving you any,” Corey said.

Mercedes waved his cigarette in the air between them. A car drove by in the distance. “Then what do you call this?”

“Well, I could begin to build a DNA profile of you,” Corey said looking pointedly at the butt on the pavement.

“I would’ve thought that you would’ve done that years ago,” Mercedes said. “Like when I needed blood.”

“One of two things is going to happen,” Corey said, ignoring the comment.

“I didn’t realize the future was so diametric,” Mercedes said.

Corey frowned. “Either I’m going to catch this guy calling himself the Reporter or he is going to lead me right into a trap for you,” he said.

“You know what the difference between me and you is?” Mercedes asked. He didn’t bother to point out the fact that it was law enforcement that had begun calling him the Reporter and not a name that he had given to himself. He took a final drag on his cigarette and held it in his lips a moment. “Even people who dislike me respect me.”

Mercedes snubbed out the cigarette with his index finger and thumb. He closed the gap between Corey and himself, holding the cigarette butt between them. Seemingly without thought, Corey lifted a cupped, ebony hand. Mercedes pressed the cigarette butt into it and leaned his lips close to Corey’s ear.

“For your profile,” he said before tipping backwards and turning around.

He walked back to the Kegasaurus. Alcatraz was standing in the shadow of its door way and Mercedes didn’t doubt that the kid had seen everything. It didn’t matter. He didn’t have to explain himself to Alcatraz.

Mercedes pushed his way past the kid and back into the club. The stupid place was still the same as it had been before he went out. So many familiar faces. Racers of all levels. Their girlfriends. Boyfriends. People Mercedes would consider a friend. People he used to love. Who broke his heart.

Shaking the slimy feeling that Corey had left on his skin off, Mercedes shoved his way to the back door. He no longer had any interest in being out. As he went to find his car, Mercedes heard Alcatraz calling after him. He ignored the boy and shut the back door on the club’s pulsing beat and explosive light show.