Brutal by Kevin Weeks

shocks, springs, the transmission, the whole suspension system, the motor, the driveshaft, the rear end. Every part of the car was high-performance. From the motor to the rear suspension, everything had been replaced because with so much power, the weakest link would break under full acceleration. You could turn each light on or off with the flick of a switch. If you got in a chase, all the lights but the headlights could go off so it would be hard for anyone to follow you. Jimmy had a smokescreen put in it where enough thick fog would come out the tailpipe to shut down an entire street. The mechanic had added an extra oil well that was filled with Marvel Mystery Oil, which fed into the exhaust manifold. The heat from the exhaust manifold produced smoke that seeped out of the tailpipes and created a heavy fog. You hit a button and oil would be pumped into the exhaust manifold and the red-hot pipes would steam up. We tested it late one night and watched as it fogged out all of First Street.
    There were also little nozzles on a pipe underneath the rear bumper that were pressurized so oil would shoot out of them. If you were getting chased, as you went into a turn, you’d lay down an oil slick. You could make the turn, but the cars behind you would be spinning out of control. It was like James Bond’s Aston Martin, without the ejector seat. You couldn’t look at that car and not hear the roar of the engine. It literally growled. When you’d step on the accelerator, the car would stand up on its four wheels. The driveshaft, the whole engine would try to twist inside the car. I’d never seen such a phenomenal car. It looked like an ordinary Chevy Malibu, but only until you stepped on the gas. It was a beast.
    I had my own set of keys and would take it out at night once a weekand make sure everything worked. I’d be out on the Southeast Expressway or the Mass Turnpike, going 90 mph, and I’d step on the gas and the car would leave rubber. If a cop ever went after me for speeding, I wasn’t stopping. One night, when I had the car out on the Turnpike, a Porsche Targa 911 and a Corvette blew by me, so I stepped on the gas. The car took off like a rocket and I shot by the two of them. The needle on the speedometer was buried at 160 and the car was still accelerating. Jimmy hardly ever drove it, but he would have been bullshit if he ever saw me racing down the Turnpike that night.
    The Tow Truck was just another example of how far ahead Jimmy thought. There wasn’t one tiny detail that wasn’t perfect on that car as an escape vehicle. It showed how 98 percent of his life was business, with maybe 2 percent pleasure. While other guys might be out drinking, he’d be thinking. While other people would be going to sleep at night, he’d be up planning. He was disciplined and lived and breathed the life of crime, which explains why he is still out there today, rather than in a jail cell.
    Even though we’d tested the Tow Truck’s different features together and I’d taken it out many times, seeing Jimmy pull up with the wig and mustache was the first time I’d ever seen him use it for real. And in broad daylight.
    But the minute I saw him, I thought, This ain’t good . Actually, he looked just like Jimmy Flynn, an old-time Winter Hill associate. Flynn and Jimmy Mantville, who had been part of the original Mullins gang on the other side from Jimmy when the gang wars broke out in Southie in the late 1960s and early 1970s, had allegedly made two prior attempts on Halloran. The story that was circulating was that both Flynn and Mantville had attempted to get Halloran because he was talking on them about a bank or armored car robbery they were allegedly involved in. One attempt had been at Halloran’s house, and the second at a teachers’ union hall parking lot. Both times he got shot at, but they missed and he’d escaped uninjured.
    This time, I was sitting in my car,