Here Be Monsters - By M T Murphy Page 0,1

on the head. “Get your noggin in the game. She’s the enemy.”

“I told you I don’t want any part of this.”

“Tim”—Barry tapped his chin and wrinkled his brow as if deep in thought—“I’m drawing a blank here. Who was it that loaned you the money for that last year of grad school when they cut your scholarship?”

Tim grimaced. He knew where the question was heading and he didn’t like it. “You did, but—”

“Who made the other seniors stop beating you up every day in high school when he was a senior and you were a freshman?”

“You did.”

“And whose family took yours in when your good-for-nothing father left?”

“Yours,” Tim replied.

“And who helped you get a dream accounting job right out of college when you had no other job prospects?”

“You did.” He wanted to point out that he had paid back the loan and his mother had paid more than their share of the rent and other expenses for the month they stayed with Barry’s family all those years ago. That didn’t change the fact that Barry had helped him again and again. Reminding him of that seemed to be one of Barry’s favorite pastimes.

“You’re like a brother to me, Tim—albeit a younger, stupider brother. I’ve always looked out for you and I need you to back me up on this.”

“Barry, how much money do you make?”

Barry waved away the implications of the statement. “I make low six figures, but you don’t understand. I have some…vices.”

After resisting Barry’s invitations to go with him to the casinos every weekend for the past two years, Tim was actually very aware of the man’s dirty little “secrets.” If gambling debts, drugs, and prostitutes were riches, Barry would have been King Midas.

“Look,” Barry said. “I got invited to a celebrity poker game after hours last month, but I was already out of cash. To make a long story short: I owe some guy named Vince seventy-five thousand dollars by the end of the week.”

“Have you thought about talking to human resources at the office? They always talk about us being a part of the Romana ‘family.’ Maybe they could…”

“They could what?” Barry yelled. “Fire me on the spot?” He took a deep breath and regained his cool. “I’m sorry. Did you bring the package I left?”

“Yes.” Tim removed the brown pack from this bag. “I don’t see why you couldn’t bring it.”

“It would have been too suspicious if I did it.” Barry opened the box and shuffled through the contents. “Did you look at what’s in here?”

“No,” Tim said.

“Good. Plausible deniability for you.” Barry flipped through the documents, stopping at one very old photograph.

Tim couldn’t see the image, but the corners of the photo were rounded and the back had yellowed with age. It had to be at least fifty years old, if not older.

“Our CEO has a secret,” Barry said, “and I think the price tag for keeping that secret is a cool 1.5 million dollars.”

“Let’s set aside the fact that you are obviously bat-shit crazy for a minute. How did you arrive at that number?”

“Don’t you pay attention, rookie? This company makes so much dough that anything less than two million is not even a blip on the radar. It’s a rounding error. I’ll pay back what I owe to the sharks and take a million for myself. I know a guy in Costa Rica who needs a financial director for his new resort. I’ll take that job and retire in style at the ripe old age of thirty-four.”

“And the rest?” Tim asked, already afraid of the answer.

“That is your cut just for helping me with a few simple, untraceable tasks. You deserve it. I won’t take no for an answer.” Barry reached into his work bag next to the couch. “Check this out.” He tossed a dark object toward Tim’s face.

Tim caught the thing in self defense. He turned it over in his hands, and it took him almost a full second to realize what it was. “A gun? Why do you have a gun?”

Barry shrugged. “Hey, man. These are some rough characters I owe. It’s just for protection.”

Tim moved slowly, placing the gun on the table as though it were a bomb that was ready to explode. “I’ll see you tomorrow, Barry. This is getting crazy.”

He wanted stay and argue with his old friend, but the thought of what Barry wanted him to do made him nauseous. Instead, he went home and dreamed of guns, loan sharks, jail cells, and the CEO’s