-- end scene --

"I told him to take this car!" Lou grumbles as Opelika's scattered streetlights cast eerie shadows in the pre-dawn light. He's making an effort to drive casual, but his visible anger, the stress of being saddled with a car loaded full of drugs right after three messy murders have drawn the attention of Alabama's finest, and a lifetime of city driving is making it a challenge. He looks over at Donna as they stop at yet another red light with absolutely nothing coming the other way. "And where the fuck do you get off thinking you can rob me, huh? Your own father!? What the hell was that back there? As if this wasn't already a clusterfuck."

Donna is nothing if not the proverbial chip off the old block.

"You think I'd set this up if I didn't have a goddamned good reason Lou?" - she fires back, emphasizing his name instead of dad - "Trust me on this, I'm helping you out here! I - I can't tell you why, you'll just have to trust me."

When he doesn't immediately change his tone, she crosses her arms and stares out the window to hide the panic that washes over her face.

"Trust you? Hah, that's rich!" Lou gives the old car a little more gas than it needs as the light turns green and he barrels for the next intersection. "I'm not gonna trust you, Donna, I'm gonna drive you to your uncle's house and someone is gonna sit on you until tomorrow when this" - he waves one hand, indicating the drugs hidden in the car - "goes on its merry fuckin' way."

Donna inhales deeply, obviously annoyed. "Stop the car dad."

When he doesn't, she grabs the wheel and looks him in the eye.

"Stop. The. Car."

Lou groans, then pulls over to one side. "What?" he demands, impatiently.

Donna looks him over for a moment, she thinks her words over for a moment, then begins, uncertainly. "I'm doing this for us - for you - dad. Remember agents Wise and Codd? They came to me last year, and threatened me. If we didn't get them a name, someone they can pin a bit bust on, we'd both be headed for jail. So we talked."

Seeing Lou's face turn red with anger, she continued defiantly. "Yeah, we talked. I don't want to wear those shitty orange jumpsuits, and you don't want to spend the rest of your life looking over your shoulder in Sing Sing. I cut a deal. We set up Rocco, the Feds sweep in and grab him, then they pressure him for a name, while you and I go free. THAT is why I am here, you ungrateful asshole."

"I told Rocco to take this fuckin' car..." Lou growls, his knuckles white on the wheel. The Caddy's cabin glowed red with brakelight reflecting off the dust swirled up from their sudden stop, giving the interior a hellish glint. Donna's father's eyes track back and forth as he tries to think his way past the anger and the shame of what he agreed to do months ago.

"Taking the stash outta Rocco's car isn't gonna help set him up, though," Lou deduces. "Why those two mooks from the video place? Why the extra muscle? And what the fuck was that in Rocco's trunk?"

Donna looks at him sheepishly, caught in her own lie.

"I..I thought I might figure out that bit later. Never overlook the chance to make a bit on the side, right? Isn't that what you taught me?" Involuntarily she reaches into her ostrich-skin Prada handbag, fondling the half-empty bottle of Demerol. "How can we fix it daddy" she purrs, "you always make things right."

The Demerol felt good as it filtered into her system.

"Now I'm daddy again, huh?" Lou's anger was still hot but his daughter was his kryptonite. "Just... goddammit," he sighs. "Fix it... how we fix it is we need to get Rocco and the stash in this jalopy in one spot, and I need to be gone. This is some ill-considered fucked-up timing, is what this is. So you get the Feds here and I put a couple more states between me and them in the meantime."

Friday Morning, 10:17 AM

Donna has already spent more time on this phone call than she wanted. Bastards always make her call before noon. No fuckin' courtesy, she thinks. She moves the phone onto her shoulder, and pops a few more ibuprofen.

"Sunday morning. Right."
"Yes yes goddamnit, I'll make sure."
"No, I don't know anyone who does books for football games (fuckin' nerve of this guy!)"
"Whatever. Just make sure our records are clean."

Donna hangs hangs up the phone, and double-checks it for change. She mutters to no one in particular. "I don't know how those assholes ever got their jobs; they are dirtier than Rocco's car dealership." She gets into her 1990 Mazda MX-5 Miata convertible, looks in the mirror, and adjusts her hair. She puts the key in the ignition, but doesn't turn it on. Instead, she looks over to the passenger-side floorboard.

She pushes aside all the things she picked up this morning: a bottle or Zinfandel, some new clothes, and the remnants of a half-eaten Hardee's breakfast meal to reveal a black duffel bag.

She can't help herself. Smiling, she unzips it just enough to see the coke she kept from the stash, along with copy of The Whores of Eddie Coyle (give it up already Drew). She's not going down, she's gonna make out like a Capo.

She turns on the ignition, and turns on the radio. She recognizes the opening strains of "This Is How We Do It," grins and slams down the accelerator. Now I just gotta figure out how to put that bitch Tammy Lee in the cross-hairs too.

--- End Scene ---

Drew's Video Emporium

"Hey, they got King Kong Lives! Love that movie," the fed called from the stacks. Sure, they didn't flash badges or anything, but they wore fed suits, had fed haircuts, drank cheap fed coffee and had parked a fed Crown Vic in the Chicken Hut parking lot before sauntering into Drew's store. The scary one with the too-blond hair was poking around the back, his dead shark eyes scanning the shelves, then moving towards the back office. The other one was a little older, a little shorter, and a little wider, like a stately bulldog given human form. After a few minutes of the fed standing there, Drew thought maybe he was the scarier one. Disapproval dripped off the man like sweat.

"You don't see places like this anymore," the old one said, whether to Drew, his partner, or the air, he couldn't tell. "Brings me back."

"You see a video store nowadays... you gotta figure, they got somethin' special keepin' 'em alive," the blond one called back. "Somethin' on the side."

The old fed glanced at Drew.

It had been the worst night of Drew's life. He could have sworn he could here some of those bullets zinging right past his ears in his mad dash for safety. Then, the mafia goons had chased him in their cars, and when he finally lost them, he had to trek half across town on foot to get back to the Video Emporium. 'Cause that's where he needed to go now: get his cash, get the sawed-off, and get the hell outta Dodge. He had a good think built up here, but he sure as shit wasn't gonna fight it out with the Florida mob. No, there had to be many other little shit holes in the South where he could set up shop and hide from Rocco and his family.

For one hour, he had waited near the Video Emporium to make sure there weren't any goons around before he finally manned up a half hour after dawn and walked over. But he didn't even get five fuckin' minutes before these two Feds walked in. He'd almost gone for the sawed-off, too, but there was a shred of self-preservation instinct left that stayed his hand. Now they were walking around like they owned the place, and -shit- his stash was still in the office. Well, time to put on the charmingest smile he could muster.

"We-ell, gentlemen, there's two things what keeps us in business", he began as he slid out from behind the counter, "good customer service, and, uh, porn." He stepped smoothly besides the blond guy and pointed him towards the back shelves, hoping to distract him from the office. "All prime grade, feature length porn, not like the stuff you get online." He reaches randomly into the shelves and pulls out Bare Trek: Penises and Bare Trek III: The Search for Cock. The former looked a lot like gay porn, and he stuffed the two VHS cassettes quickly back into the shelf, lest the two Feds started thinking he was making implications. "Ain't that many people got internet in this here town, and those what do, they get these pop-up things and computer viruses, so we got ourselves a steady stream of customers." He knew he was rambling now.

"Plus we open up the earliest, so if you need some gum or snacks for the trip, we got that, too."

"Oh, yeah, snacks, that one's new to me," the old fed said.

"Didn't figure that," the blond one shot back. "But yah, snacks for the trip, what are you trying to tell us here? Do you think anybody's buying that line about the porn?"

"They don't buy it, it's rental," the old one said. "Listen to the man, Wise. He's got himself a nice, sustainable business model, doesn't he? I mean, it's not exactly reputable, but you gotta appreciate that it's honest."

"Honest, right," the blond one says. "Well, if we're being so honest, I could stand to drain the lizard. Long drive out here, you know? Where are your facilities, Sir?" He nodded towards Drew's office. "Back there?"

Shit, it's not working, why can't those two buzzards just mind their own damn business.. Think they're real funny, too, just my unfortunate choice of words.

Drew steps over to the blond Fed, just a bit too quickly. "Oh, no, bathroom's outside. The key is, um, behind the counter." Drew is obviously loathe to leave the Fed back here on his own, and is clearly waiting for him to step in the direction of the key - away from the back door.

"Outside bathrooms, that takes me back," the old one says.

"All the way to the Stone Age," the blond one says. He steps toward the door to Drew's office. "Then this is your office, yeah? You got any coffee for my partner in there?"

"What a great idea," the old one says, looking at Drew. "Why don't we let my partner relieve himself while we sit down in your office and have a nice cup of joe?"

"Yeah, why don't you?" the blond one says, grinning like a shark at Drew.

'Ah don' have... we don't make", stammers Drew, "Ah go get coffee at the Chicken Hut, normally."

Recovering some semblance of composure, he plunges on: "The customers go fer other caffeinated drinks, see, like the Mountain Dew and Monster over there in the fridge." The fridge, thank goodness, is also nowhere near the office.

"Would you like ta have one of those while your partner, uh, goes to the outhouse? Ah don't want to appear inhospitable, but the, uh, office is a bit of a mess right now."

"I bet," the blond one says.

"You think that's enough?" the old one asks.

"Yeah, sure," the blond one says. "Let him off the hook."

"Right then," the old one says, then smiles at Drew. "I see that just making conversation isn't prodding your guilty conscience quite enough, so I'll be frank. We know you're a pusher - wouldn't have come out all the way here for your porn collection. And since you're not so good at keeping our attention off your office, I'll bet dollars to donuts that we're gonna find something in your office that'll make you a winner in our monthly sweepstakes. Wise, what's first prize?"

"Stylish new bracelets and an all-expenses-paid ten year trip to scenic Phoenix, Arizona," the young one says.

"Now before you go on one of those TV criminal rants, you know, fifth amendment this, warrant that," the old one says, waving his hand through the air to indicate the amount of useless paperwork, "let me just cut that short. You either give it up yourself or I take out this here cellular phone" - he grabs a flipphone from his jacket - "make a call to the judge and have my warrant in ten minutes flat, during which time me and my partner will keep your right here to make sure you don't go warning anybody or destroying evidence or such. Do you comprehend your current predicament, Sir?"

"I think he knows he's fucked," the blond one says.

"Good, good, I like the ones who don't play dumb," the old one says. "You play a lot of poker, Sir? See, right now I just know - I can smell it - that I'm going to book you for something. I got a pretty good idea, but I ain't seen the facts. It's like I'm pretty sure you're holding like a 7 high with not a pair in sight, and I've got a pair of Jacks. But I ain't sure. So before I go and make sure, now's your chance to make your move."

"He's a waste of time," the blond one says.

"Now that's true," the old one says. "You wouldn't be running this shithole if you were a big fish. You ever go fishing? Like, if a small fish is all I can get then I'm gonna take that, I won't like it but I'll take it. But if I get a real big whopper on the line, you bet your ass Mr. Guppy goes back in the drink to either swim away or get hooked another day." He leans in. "You get what I'm saying?"

Well, well, they're offering me a deal. Now I just gotta play my cards right, to stick to the metaphor, and kill two birds with one stone.

"So, what you're saying is that if I can give you information" - Drew savors the word - "then you'll head straight back out again and leave an honest man to his business?" For a moment, even his accent drops a level in strength.

He looks for the nods, then continues: "Well, bein' an upstandin' citizen an' all, of course there is no need for me to give you this information, but seein' as Ah am concerned about this town, Ah feel that Ah should be reportin' some suspicious activity." Drew feels pretty clever right now, since he caught that the Feds were trying to snare him into an indirect admission of guilt, but he weaseled out of that one right smart!

"At the edge of the town, there is a car dealership belongin' to one Rocco, and Ah heard tell that sometimes them cars is used to move drugs. Might be there is a load there right this week, and if you move fast, you can catch 'em red-handed!"

Then, it occurs to Drew that the Feds might wonder how an upstanding citizen comes by this kind of information.

He glances down at his fingernails:"Ah, uh, well, ah of course wouldn't know much about those kind of dealin's, bein' an upstandin' citizen an' all, but those gangster types, they, uh, they sure like their porn, see, and I overheard them yesterday mornin' 'bout a shipment tonight."

"That sound like good information to you officers?"

"Well, does it, Wise?" the old one asks the blond one.

"Pretty good," the blond one says.

That produces a frown on the old agent's face. "Just pretty good?" he asks.

The blonde one shrugs. "Oh, I like the information just fine, but it's hearsay," he says. "He didn't see it, he just heard them talking about it. Might get us a warrant, but if they've got half a brain we won't turn up anything if we go over there. We're gonna have to do better than that."

And by "we", the blond agent obviously means Drew, fixing him with a stare and just the tiniest hint of a shark smirk.

"So what you're telling me," the old one says for Drew's benefit, "is that if we can't find the evidence, we need a confession from the proverbial horse's mouth."

"Precisely," the blond agent says.

The old agent turns to face Drew again. "Well, son, they already told you all about their racket once. Should be a piece of cake to get them to say it again, right?"

"Uh.. what?" Drew is sweating by now. This wasn't going his way.

"They, uh, they didn't tell me, see? They sorta told each other, and Ah was just there ta hear it. How'ma gonna get them to say it agin? It's not like they even talk to me normally."

Then he has an idea. Would be a bit of a pity, since she had such promise for one of his movies.

"Ah sorta know someone. Might be that person can help. Ah can make the call right now."