ThornyDevils by T. W. Lawless

pug dog came from nowhere and latched its teeth onto Peter’s pants. Ivy kicked away the dog.
    ‘Get away, Pugsley,’ she chastised.
    As if in protest, the pug squatted and urinated on the rug near the sofa. Peter felt he was the only one noticing. The dog headed to a corner of the room to sulk and scowl at him. Ivy took her seat in an adjacent recliner next to a table covered with bottles of medications and a half empty bottle of brandy. She indicated for Peter to sit on the sofa next to her. Slugger chose to stand in the other corner, in front of an enormous framed picture celebrating his boxing career in photographs.
    ‘At least you tried,’ Ivy sighed. ‘You might be a reporter but you still have a beating heart. I didn’t think you people had hearts at all.’
    ‘How are you feeling now?’ Peter asked. He looked to Slugger for reassurance. Slugger gave a thumbs up sign.
    ‘Oh, you know. Just managing to hold it together,’ she said as she bit back tears. She reached for a glass of brandy and took a sip. ‘Don’t usually drink but it’s calming my nerves. Not easy to see your husband and son die like that.’
    ‘Or any way, I imagine. What do you think happened today, Ivy?’
    ‘I don’t know,’ she replied vaguely. ‘It’s like a dream. I just keep seeing blood everywhere. It’s surreal.’
    Peter cringed when the word surreal came out of her mouth. He hated the word. That and ‘literally’. He could see Slugger giving him another thumbs up sign from the corner of his eye. So far so good .
    ‘Do you have any idea who might have done this?’ Peter said cautiously. He had thrown the cat among the pigeons now. Slugger stepped forward.
    ‘Don’t upset her too much, Jack,’ he warned as he leant into Peter’s ear.
    Peter shook his head with annoyance and waved Slugger aside. ‘Why did you want me to come here tonight?’
    ‘To tell my side of the story and to thank you,’ Ivy replied after taking another sip. ‘Slugger said you could be trusted with telling the right version, not a made up one.’
    ‘But you haven’t really told me anything yet, Ivy. You must know something. Give me something.’
    ‘All I know is that Pat and Mickey have been shot,’ she cried. Slugger rushed forward to comfort her. He sat on the armrest and folded his arm around Ivy. He then kissed her on the head. She continued, ‘And I really don’t know why or who.’
    ‘They’re dead for some reason. Was it to do with Pat’s reappearance?’
    ‘The coppers keep asking me if they had enemies. I don’t know,’ Ivy replied despondently. ‘I thought Pat was dead. And my boys and me, we’re just hard working people. We have no enemies.’
    ‘She doesn’t know,’ Slugger said angrily. ‘That’s what you have to put in the paper.’
    ‘I’m really confused right now. You asked me to come here and you don’t tell me anything?’
    ‘I’m an honest woman,’ she wept, ‘and now you’re picking on me.’
    ‘Answer me one question, then’ Peter began. ‘Where did Pat go to for two years when it was assumed he was dead?’
    ‘He went away on business to South East Asia,’ she stammered, her eyes flicking around the room. She picked up the brandy glass and drained it. Peter had one of the best inbuilt bullshit meters in the business and it was off the scale.
    ‘That’s it, Jack,’ Slugger jumped out of the corner and stompedtowards Peter. Pugsley saw it as an opportune time to start tearing at Peter’s pants again. Slugger kicked the dog away and grabbed Peter by the arm, pulling him off the sofa.
    ‘Do you believe that, Ivy?’ Peter managed as Slugger dragged him by the shirt collar through the lounge. He thought briefly of resisting but Slugger, even in his advanced years, was stronger than he. ‘Are you towing the party line, Ivy?’ he continued as grabbed hold of the punching bag and held on tightly with both hands. Slugger had finally run out of puff and was having trouble dislodging him. Ivy