Dirty Deeds by Armand Rosamilia

were occupied right now with fellow goons with large guns.
    I wasn’t going to be able to bluff my way out of this one right now. I really didn’t think a sit-down conversation with Chenzo was going to be anything but an end to my life.
    I looked both ways down the street, toying with the insane idea of simply running away. Would their size slow them down? Would my age and bad knees even it out? If I bolted there was no turning back. I was a dead man. The innocent don’t run away, and I already knew why Chenzo wanted this chat. It wasn’t because he was curious about what I knew. It was because, all those many long years ago, he’d entrusted me with killing his kid and I’d failed him. He paid me a huge chunk of money to do this simple task. It was most of the seed money for the sports cards business, too.
    Chenzo was going to kill me and bury me somewhere in New Jersey where they’d never find my body. I had no doubt he was going to make this meeting short and simple.
    It’s crazy when you get older and start to see the end of the line coming closer. Even if I didn’t end up in a shallow grave with my face blown off, I was still getting close to the end of the line. It was times like this I was glad I felt so much older and had taken care of a few things.
    Marisa gets everything. Plain and simple. She earned it, anyway. If it wasn’t for her automating my sports card business online and figuring out everything I needed to do to stay technologically advanced and relevant I’d be lost. Marisa had done it as a whiny teen, too.
    As a fourteen year old she’d built the website from scratch and did all the data entry, since I do the two-finger peck typing and I’m not too fast.
    In case you’re wondering, I was stalling in my own mind. I didn’t want to think about what the next move was because I already knew what was about to happen.
    The goons hooked my arms and started walking me down the street. I guess they knew there was a very small chance I’d try to run.
    I still didn’t know which of the black cars we were headed to, not that it mattered.
    Was Chenzo actually here or would this be one of those long, painfully quiet rides across the river to the swamps of Jersey? I assumed he wanted this more dramatic so he’d be waiting for me at an abandoned warehouse or dilapidated factory somewhere on the Jersey shore with seagulls cawing in the background, finally startled by the gunshot that ended my life.
    I’d like to think I had a great run but I still wanted to do stuff. I had a 1969 Topps baseball card collection to complete. Restaurants I hadn’t eaten at. Women I hadn’t stared at and never talked to.
    “If I were you I’d let the boss do all of the talking,” Goon #1 said to me.
    “I would have no problem switching places with either of you fine gentlemen,” I said. I wasn’t lying, either.
    “Shut up,” Goon #2 said.
    I wondered why they were even bothering to talk to me. Maybe they knew exactly what was coming. I glanced at both men as we walked. Which of them would be my killer? I knew Chenzo wasn’t going to get his hands dirty. When he made the decision to wipe me out it wouldn’t be like in bad Mob movies. He wouldn’t be tossing the first shovelful of dirt over my rotting corpse.
    He’d be sitting poolside sipping a strong adult beverage and one of his cinderblock goons standing across the pool would tap his headset and then nod at Chenzo. It would be done. He could go on with his fabulously illegal life.
    A car door down at the end of the line of cars opened and three men stepped out.
    It figured they were all the way at the end. More walking for me. They were drawing this out quite dramatically. I’ll give Chenzo his props. The kids still say props, right?
    The two goons did something odd. They stopped and tightened their grip on my arms.
    My eyes aren’t what they used to be, so it took me a second to see who was walking towards us and why these goons were now in panic mode.
    They