The man Danny worked for—big guy named Buck—thought they needed four to do the job right. Could they have done it with three? Probably, but he liked the idea of four, the symmetry of it, two guys inside and two guys outside. Danny thought four was overkill, but Buck called the shots. That’s how it worked. Buck made big decisions, and then Danny made shit happen.
He called Ash first because he was reliable, never greedy, no ego—just went in there, helped with the safe, and got the hell out. Then you never heard about it again, like it didn’t happen. Danny and Ash, friends since elementary school, still lived in the North Side and saw each other at the same bars, on the same buses. There was never a question about whether Ash would do it: he was always a yes.
Danny’s second call was Lindy, his sister’s husband. Tiffany was only twenty when Lindy got her pregnant. After they got married, she told Lindy it was time to grow up, before they had the baby. So she and Lindy moved to a shitty North Hills development, where he worked as an HVAC guy and hated every minute of it. Danny called and offered him a spot on the team.
“This is a big job,” he said.
“How big?” Lindy asked.
“Six figures.”
“What are the six figures?”
“Buck says it’s at least a few hundred thousand.”
“I don’t know, man,” Lindy said. “It’s not a great time for me.”
“This is a great time for you. It’s the whole reason I’m calling. You got the baby coming, you guys need the extra cash.”
“I’m doing good at my job,” Lindy said.
“Sure, you are, no question. But you can’t be doing that good. Think how happy Tiffany will be with the extra money.”
Danny knew this was a lie. Tiffany moved them out of the North Side to get Lindy away from Danny.
“Trust me,” Danny said, “we’ll get the whole thing done in a few hours, in and out.”
Danny wasn’t surprised when Lindy finally agreed. He obviously wanted to do it. These guys were restless; they needed some excitement to get them out of bed in the morning.
The fourth guy wasn’t up to Danny. Buck wanted his cousin Brandon to be there. Brandon, twenty-five now, had made parole that fall and was working for Buck’s junk-hauling business. Danny and Brandon hadn’t seen each other in four years. When they met at Buck’s office, a small trailer in a junkyard over in McKees Rocks, Brandon looked basically the same: tall, very skinny, and pale, but now his head was nearly shaved and both arms bore sleeves, ink artistry that told some twisted narrative of Brandon’s life, a story Danny didn’t even want to know about. Brandon had always been rough around the edges, a little off, a bit antisocial, but now he was more taciturn and brooding than ever. Danny supposed that was fine—you don’t need guys who talk on the job, he thought.
When Lindy found out Brandon was the fourth guy, he called Danny right away.
“Come on, man,” he said, “not him.”
“You got a better idea?”
“Do it with the three of us.”
“Not my call.”
“That guy’s insane.”
“This is Buck’s decision. And it’s too late to change it now, anyway. Tomorrow’s the day.”
There was a brief moment of silence, a hesitation before Lindy said, “Fine, whatever,” and hung up.
The next night, around eight o’clock, the four of them met at an abandoned warehouse by the Ohio River, a mile from the junkyard, everyone coming in on foot, no cars, except for the one they were going to use, which they’d dropped there a few days earlier. It was the middle of February, snow coming down lightly but a bigger storm on the way.
“There’s going to be one resident in the house,” Danny said. “His wife and kids left on a trip today.”
“Why not wait until the place is empty?” Lindy asked.
“Because then we’d be dealing with alarm systems and shit,” Danny said. “It’s easier this way. We break in and take the guy outside. Brandon and Lindy, you hold him there while me and Ash go through the house. We’re in and out in fifteen minutes. Everyone good?”
Brandon stood with arms crossed and studied his own tattoos. Lindy glared at him, saying, “You got that, Brandon?”
Brandon looked up, stared back at him, his eyes two bottomless pools of black water, and nodded very slowly.
Everything was supposed to be untraceable—stolen car, black-market guns, no cell phones. Buck picked up this stuff when they junked out houses for the city. The plan was, after they finished for the night, Danny would drop the other three guys off at different points on the way home—a bar, a diner, a grocery store—and then drive the car to get chopped before going back to the warehouse and stashing the money.
It was a twenty-five-minute drive out to the site, a newer suburban plan built for millionaires—a long winding road, houses perched up on hills, everything private, each house obscured from its neighbors’ view. Danny killed the headlights as they pulled slowly up the driveway. The nice thing about these big houses was that people got lost in them and forgot to look out their windows, so no one saw them approach.
They parked the car in the driveway, pulled on their masks, and got out quietly. Danny looked at the other three, everyone dressed in black, tough guys holding handguns. They walked around the house single file, hugging the wall to stay at the edge of the security cameras’ view. There were several rear entrances to the house, including a pair of French doors, all glass panes and muntins. The door was locked. Danny jiggled the handle to be sure, paused, and then broke the pane closest to the lock. They burst into the house, Danny and Ash headed upstairs while Lindy and Brandon cleared the first floor. A television was playing somewhere, the volume up high.
Danny was in the upstairs balcony when he heard Brandon say, “What the fuck is this? Okay, everybody up.”
Danny ran back downstairs and found Lindy and Brandon with guns trained on a family of four—a man and woman and two children, boys aged about eight and ten, the whole family in pajamas. They’d apparently been watching a movie.
Lindy came over to Danny and whispered, “Why are they still here, man?”
“Maybe their flight got canceled.”
“Or maybe you got bad information.”
“From Buck?”
“Maybe he got bad information.”
“It doesn’t really matter at this point, does it?”
Danny looked over at the two kids, and saw tears straining the younger boy’s cheeks.
“We should get out of here,” Lindy said.
“I’m not leaving now,” Danny told him. He turned to Brandon and said, “Take them outside.”
“You heard the man,” Brandon said, keeping the pistol aimed at the husband’s head, “get the fuck outside.”
Lindy looked hopeless ushering the two boys outside, while Danny and Ash went back upstairs and found the master bedroom, where Buck had said they’d find the safe.
Outside, Brandon lined up the family while Lindy started duct-taping them from head to foot. It was cold on the lawn, especially in pajamas and bare feet. The snow was coming down harder now, about an inch of it covering the ground. Brandon kept his pistol going from one to the next.
“Don’t fucking move,” he said, tugging down on his face mask. “You move, you’re dead.” With terrible slowness, he mimed the kick of the gun, pointing at each of them in turn. The boys were shifting from foot to foot on the cold, hard ground.
It was slow work for Lindy as he wrapped the four hostages, Brandon saying it would be a pleasure to shoot them.
“It’s okay, boys,” the dad said. “They’re not going to hurt us.”
Brandon walked over and slapped a piece of tape over his mouth. After about five minutes, the task was done, all four taped up and unable to speak or move. Lindy thought if they could just stay like that for fifteen minutes, everything would be fine—they’d carry the people inside, leave them on the floor where someone, a maid or something, would find them soon enough.
But then the dad tried to speak again, mumbling through the tape.
“What’s that?” Brandon asked in a prison-yard voice. “I can’t hear you.”
When the dad tried again, Brandon walked over, pressed the gun to his forehead, and pressed forward, making the man lose his balance until he went down hard and began to writhe on the ground, his muffled cries barely audible. Lindy turned to Brandon.
“What the hell, man. What is the point of that?”
“Shut the fuck up,” Brandon said. “I don’t explain myself to you.”
“Can you just calm down?”
“You need to back the fuck off me,” Brandon said, raising his voice. He took a step toward Lindy and now pointed the gun at him.
Inside the house, Danny and Ash were making a racket that you could hear clearly on the lawn.
“For fuck’s sake, what are they doing in there?” Lindy said. All he needed was for everyone to hang on for another ten minutes.
“They better find that safe,” Brandon said, squatting down next to the dad, “or I’m going to make you watch your family die.”
Lindy looked at the enormous house where these people lived, isolated from their neighbors, who couldn’t see or hear any of what was now happening.
“I’ll take you out back,” Brandon said, “and you can watch as I drown them in the pool.”
“Man, shut the fuck up,” Lindy said. “That pool isn’t even open.”
Brandon’s eyes flashed, and without a moment’s hesitation he fired a shot into the air.
“You goddamn idiot,” Lindy said, shaking his head. Because the clock was ticking now; the police would be hopping in their cruisers any second. “Now this was a complete waste.”
Brandon turned again to the man, who was still on the ground, his eyes the only things not taped up. Brandon, still on one knee, flipped his gun around and brought the butt of it down on the man’s face three times. He stood and kicked the man ten, maybe twelve times before turning to Lindy.
“I think it was worth it,” he said.
“Man, you are so fucked up.”
Lindy walked over and peeled back the tape from the man’s mouth, and a stream of bloody vomit spilled forth. Danny and Ash came charging out the front door.
“What the hell happened?” Ash said.
“This guy is an unhinged fucking moron,” Lindy said.
And that was it for Brandon, the last indignity he would tolerate that day. He turned and shot Lindy twice, in the belly and the thigh. Lindy fell to the ground, and dark blood seeped out around him, staining the snow red. Ash rushed over to him, while Danny tackled Brandon and wrestled away the pistol.
Danny told Brandon to get in the front passenger seat, while Ash dragged Lindy to the car by the armpits, leaving a long trail of blood across the lawn. Lindy asked weakly, “Did you find the safe?”
Danny and Ash exchanged a glance.
“Not enough time,” Ash said.
“Fucking asshole,” Lindy said.
Ash got in the driver’s seat, and Danny sat behind Brandon, holding the pistol out of sight, ready if needed.
As they sped off, the family remained in the yard, snow gently descending on their silent figures, mom and two kids wrapped up tight in three layers of duct tape but still upright, dad motionless on the ground, blood streaming from his mouth. Brandon rested his head on the passenger window and watched the scene, admiring its strange beauty, the way they were lined up, voiceless and stationary, like silver statues, looking down on the fallen one.
They were pulling out on the neighborhood’s main road when they heard the wail of sirens. Ash took a few backroads and made his way to the highway. He knew they’d be scrapping the drop-off plan because now they had to figure out what to do with Lindy. If they dropped him at the hospital’s ER entrance, they’d all end up in prison. But if that’s what Danny wanted to do, he’d do it. He was awaiting instructions, when Danny spoke.
“He’s dead.”
“Who is?” Ash asked.
“Lindy.”
Brandon didn’t seem to hear. His head was pressed against the window as he watched the world whizz by. Nobody spoke the remainder of the drive.
Ash crossed the bridge over the Ohio River and drove dark streets through slums until they reached the warehouse where they’d gathered only a few hours earlier. If he’d had any sense, Brandon would have rolled out the car door before Danny and Ash could avenge their friend’s death. But he must have known he was untouchable, one of Buck’s chosen guys, staring out the window like it was an ordinary evening. There was some part of him that was missing.
Ash killed the headlights and pulled slowly into the warehouse. It was eerie down there at night.
“What now?” Ash said.
“Let’s bag him up,” Danny said.
A long night lay ahead of them. Behind some old pallets, there were several large black duffel bags. Danny unzipped one, and he and Ash rolled Lindy’s body into it, followed by two cinder blocks. When they’d finished, they were both slick with blood. Brandon had by now gotten out of the passenger seat and was leaning against the car, having a cigarette.
A few blocks away a low railway bridge crossed the river. It was accessible from a road that ran parallel to the river. Brandon waited in the warehouse while Danny and Ash drove slowly to the bridge, lights off, bag in the trunk. Neither said anything. They parked and walked onto the tracks, holding the bag between them. It was hard work, especially with the extra weight inside. The snow was coming down in thick flakes that collected on their black shirts and hats. The river was frozen at the edges but not the center.
When they were halfway across the water, they hoisted the bag over the edge, listened to it splash, and watched it sink slowly beneath the water’s surface. Once that was done, they went to the river’s edge, cracked the thin ice, and feebly attempted to wash some of the blood off their hands and faces. The icy water felt sharp on their skin. Ash looked over at Danny, who appeared lost in thought.
“What do we do about him?” Ash asked.
“Nothing.”
“You know we can’t let that go.”
“He’s Buck’s guy. Nothing I can do about it.”
“That’s fucking bullshit.”
When they got back to the warehouse, Brandon was gone.
“Where the hell is he?”
“Fuck him, whatever,” Danny said. He was thinking about Lindy, who had been reluctant at every step before Danny convinced him to stay. Now he was dead, and Danny would have to visit his sister—twenty years old and seven months’ pregnant—to deliver the news.
“You go on home,” Danny told Ash. “I’ll take care of the car.”
He drove a mile to the junkyard and found the guy waiting, ready to crush the car, cigarette hanging from his lips, his clothes unwashed for what must have been weeks. Danny was still watching the car get smashed into a cube of scrap metal when the office phone rang. He picked it up, and there was Buck on the line, furious about the botched job, uninterested in explanations. Brandon must have told him what happened—or some version of it.
“Your boy shot my brother-in-law.”
“I don’t want to hear about it,” Buck said,
“I saw it happen. Shot him for no reason.”
There was a short pause.
“Danny, you know how this works. Now leave him alone.”
Danny didn’t speak.
“You need to get out of town for a few weeks. Until things blow over. Crime’s supposed to stay in the city. A thing like this and people start to get skittish. You understand?”
“Sure thing,” Danny said.
“I’ll let you know when it’s a good time to come back.”
“You let me know.”
There was a click and a dial tone, and Danny set the phone receiver back in its cradle. The walk home was cold and long, but it was still dark when he got there and found Ash waiting on the front porch steps. He wasn’t smoking. Just sitting there, hands on his legs.
“You know we can’t let it go,” Ash said.
“Buck wants me to leave town.”
“Did you hear me?”
“Yeah, I heard you. What do you want me to do about it?”
“Let’s do it right now. This is the only time. Fucking psycho like that, what do you think he’s going to do?”
“Can we have this conversation inside?”
They sat at the round kitchen table, harsh light above them, the two of them drinking cans of Iron City. Danny thought about how some dogs have longer life spans. Maybe it was like that for people, too.
“You realize what happens if we do it,” Danny said.
“I don’t give a shit.”
“You sure?”
“What do I have to lose? I’m a fucking bricklayer, I live alone. The only thing I enjoy is drinking. I work all day so I can get to those few hours at the bar. Am I going to keep that going for another forty years?”
The clock on the stove said 4:07. It would be dark for a few more hours. Neither said anything else as they got up from the table. Danny retrieved a pair of shotguns from their hiding place in his basement, and then they were on the road, headed to Brandon’s place, a rundown house on a hilltop. It hadn’t stopped snowing once that night. They parked on the hill a block from the house, and as they got out, each stepping into the cold night, Danny was almost breathless at what the world could be when everything went quiet. The houses were all dark except Brandon’s, which stood like a lighthouse amidst the others. They grabbed their guns and began the short climb to the top of the hill.
When they got to the front sidewalk, they could hear Brandon’s death-metal blaring.
“I’ll go around back,” Danny whispered. Ash nodded and began creeping up the wooden porch steps. After Danny got to the back stoop, he opened the hinge of his gun to make sure both chambers were loaded. Extra shells jingled in his coat pocket. He was reaching for the door handle when the music inside abruptly cut out. Danny waited, wondering if Brandon had heard them. Then two quick blasts erupted inside the house. Danny kicked the door three times before the lock finally burst free, and then he rushed into the house expecting to find Brandon on the floor with a hole in his chest. The house was eerily quiet now. Danny walked through the kitchen, down a short hallway, and around a corner into a living room. The place was falling apart—holes in the walls and ceiling—but was weirdly clean.
Danny tiptoed across the room toward the entryway. There was a recliner obscuring his view, but when he stepped around it, he saw not Brandon but Ash lying on the floor, his face beat into a bloody mass. Danny turned to his right just in time to see a crowbar whizzing toward his own face. He raised his right arm to blunt the impact, and he heard a loud crack as something shattered, the shotgun falling to the floor. The pain in Danny’s arm eclipsed everything, but a second later, Brandon was swinging the crowbar again, this time at his head. Danny dropped to the floor, and the crowbar hit the wall, spraying bits of plaster into the air. In one swift movement, Danny grabbed the shotgun and fired it at Brandon’s right leg. There was an explosion of bone, flesh, and blood as everything below the right knee seemed almost to vaporize in an instant. Brandon screamed. Holding himself steady with one hand on the wall, he swung the crowbar again, but he knew it was over. Danny got to his feet, backing away slightly, and raised his gun. He didn’t hesitate. There was no need for last words. In the fleeting moment before Danny pulled the trigger, Brandon smiled. And then his face was gone forever.
Danny let the bodies stay where they were. He left one gun in the house and put the other in his trunk before he drove away. This time there were no sirens, and so he drove slowly down the icy streets in the last moments of darkness. It was the last thing he wanted to do, but he had to tell Tiffany what had happened to her husband. Otherwise, she’d always wonder whether he’d just run off. Danny knew it was his last chance to set the record straight. By the time he reached the highway, the eastern sky had begun to burn.
The lights were off when he arrived at Tiffany’s house. He stood at her doorway, his clothes covered in blood, his right arm hanging limply at his side. The door opened, and she knew what he was going to say before he opened his mouth.
“He didn’t want to go,” Danny said. “I made him do it.”
She fell to her knees and wept.
“I have to leave before anyone sees me here,” he said. As he drove away, he saw in his rearview mirror that she hadn’t moved at all.
It was half past seven when he got back home. He parked in the street and sat for a while in silence, feeling each second pass. Why hadn’t he noticed it before, the incredible sensation of time’s forward movement, like floating in a stream. He remained there for a long time, until he could no longer delay facing what waited for him inside the house. He left his gun in the trunk and walked up his front steps. His door was unlocked, as he’d known it would be. He went to the kitchen, and there, at the table where he and Ash had sat mere hours ago, was Buck. Three other guys, hands in large pockets that concealed weapons, stood in the background.
“I thought you were going to leave town,” Buck said, shaking his head.
“I still can if you want.”
“A little too late for that.”
“I thought so.”
Danny sat at the table across from Buck. It was the last conversation he’d ever have, but Danny couldn’t keep his mind focused on the words. He kept marveling at all the intricate details of the world he’d ignored for so many years: the glittering rings on Buck’s fingers, sunlight warming the window’s edge, the guy in back with the nervous tic, how he rolled his left shoulder every few seconds. Buck’s voice murmured a while longer—Danny focused on the rhythm of it—and then went silent. Then Danny knew it was time. He closed his eyes and breathed and felt for one last time what it was like to be alive.
[Image Credit : Photo by Pawel Czerwinski on Unsplash]
by 
Douglas Baker
Latest posts by Douglas Baker (see all)
- Silver Statues - February 3, 2026
0 Comments