BooksBarbecue
Back Parting Shot Save as PDF
Chapters (68)
  1. Dedication
  2. Title Page
  3. Contents
  4. One
  5. Two
  6. Three
  7. Four
  8. Five
  9. Six
  10. Seven
  11. Eight
  12. Nine
  13. Ten
  14. Eleven
  15. Thirteen
  16. Fourteen
  17. Fifteen
  18. Sixteen
  19. Seventeen
  20. Eighteen
  21. Nineteen
  22. Twenty
  23. Twenty-One
  24. Twenty-Two
  25. Twenty-Three
  26. Twenty-Four
  27. Twenty-Five
  28. Twenty-Six
  29. Twenty-Seven
  30. Twenty-Eight
  31. Twenty-Nine
  32. Thirty
  33. Thirty-One
  34. Thirty-Two
  35. Thirty-Three
  36. Thirty-Four
  37. Thirty-Five
  38. Thirty-Six
  39. Thirty-Seven
  40. Thirty-Eight
  41. Thirty-Nine
  42. Forty
  43. Forty-One
  44. Forty-Two
  45. Forty-Three
  46. Forty-Four
  47. Forty-Five
  48. Forty-Six
  49. Forty-Seven
  50. Forty-Eight
  51. Forty-Nine
  52. Fifty
  53. Fifty-One
  54. Fifty-Two
  55. Fifty-Three
  56. Fifty-Four
  57. Fifty-Five
  58. Fifty-Six
  59. Fifty-Seven
  60. Fifty-Eight
  61. Fifty-Nine
  62. Sixty
  63. Sixty-One
  64. Sixty-Two
  65. Sixty-Three
  66. Sixty-Four
  67. Sixty-Five
  68. Copyright

At least Gaffney had never seen them, never had a real look at them. Not even Dolly, who’d called him into the alley. It was dark, and they were confident he’d never be able to describe her for the cops. The whole time they had him in the barn at Dolly’s place, he was out of it, but they’d kept him blindfolded, just in case. So they were able to let him go. Dumped him out of the van two days later in the same place they’d found him, and took off.

Man, they sure fucked that one up. And after all the trouble Dolly had gone to steal the necessary equipment from her boss.

The Pilford kid was still out there, with no idea how close he’d come to having to pay for what he’d done.

Cory felt committed to correcting his mistake.

They’d gotten it so right with Craig Pierce. Wow, had they ever. Man, when that dog made a meal of him, boy, that was something else. Dolly threw up, but Cory was blown away by what they’d accomplished. For a moment, he thought maybe they’d gone too far, that Pierce was actually dead, because that was not what he wanted. Cory believed, at least at the time, that it was better for bad people to endure their punishments.

So he chased off the dog and went back to see if Pierce had survived. The son of a bitch was still breathing, but Jesus, what a mess. And there was even a little something left behind, that must have fallen out of the dog’s mouth. Cory had taken some pictures, but here was an actual souvenir. (He was proud of the fact that he’d never been a particularly squeamish kid.)

The real payoff had been the attention the deed garnered. Cory uploaded the pictures to Just Deserts, careful not to leave any digital trail that would lead back to him, with plenty of information about what Pierce had done. He thought very carefully about the words that would accompany the pictures, about how “revenj” had been exacted upon this disgusting pervert.

The website ran with it. Scores of other sites picked it up.

Seeing the response was without question the most exciting thing that had ever happened to Cory Calder. He sat on the website non-stop for several days, watching the fallout. First, the site tracked the number of visitors. There were thousands of them, and that didn’t even count the other sites that carried the story.