Children of a Lesser God

Chapter 50: Making Money

Laz stopped thinking about Malene almost as soon as he left the store. As far as he was concerned, she was just a immature girl. Laz didn't have any thoughts about himself being some mature grown up, but he also wasn't ignorant. He felt like Malene could best be described as a small furry animal, like a bunny. Sure, it could bite you, but it wasn't about to go stark raving mad and try to kill you.

At least not normally. Although currently, even Laz had to admit that the world was far from normal.

As for scarring her, he didn't feel bad about it. If anything, he would blame whoever raised her for allowing her to grow up in a green house, protected on all sides from the wind and the rain. Only once someone was challenged, could they find real growth. Laz had been a part of the wide world before his parents dropped him off here, in the middle of nowhere, to live with his Grandpa.

In some of the places he had been, girls like Malene would have been taken advantage of long ago. Since she was going to have to face the world from the outside from now on, he might as well do her this one favor and let her understand that there is actual danger in the world. It might save her life.

As far as anything else went? That was her problem.

Walking along down the street, Laz quickly came upon the pool hall and walking past it, he turned down the alleyway where he was suppose to meet with Kennedy. He was right on time for their meeting.

Strangely though, he didn't see her in the alley.

It wasn't some sort of dark and dismal place that was littered with trash and smelled bad. That kind of alley was reserved for deep inner city and Hollywood movies. It was just somewhat dark with only an overhead street lamp that dimly lit the area. The back was blocked off by a chain link fence that served as a deterrent to someone using it as a short cut, but other than a dumpster and a few trash cans that probably belonged to the coffee shop and the pool hall, it was pretty empty.

Walking back into the deepening darkness, Laz focused himself and sent his sense ability flowing outward. He could make out a range of almost 30 meters now in a circle so if Kennedy was around, he would find her.

Strangely, he noticed her aura was coming from in the pool hall. She was standing in front of a locker on the wall that ran parallel to the alley and was taking something out of it. After closing it up and locking it, she made her way to the door that would bring her right next to him.

As she walked out the door, Laz was able to get a clear view of her, despite the lack of light. She had a handbag that wasn't really a purse, but wasn't like a backpack. It was something that would look nature for either a guy or girl to have, which considering her tastes, wasn't natural.

She also basically had on a bunch of dark clothing and was wearing a somewhat tight fitted petty coat. The whole get up reminded Laz of a female spy. She couldn't stand out more if she tried. In a similar sense, she blended in quite well with the surroundings and didn't look anything like a teenage girl.

'Maybe this was intentional?' Was Laz's thought.

Without making a sound, he walked up to her as she turned to face him.

"EEPPP!" Kennedy couldn't help but be surprised.

'Did she just eeppp?' Laz actually thought it was somewhat cute.

"Damn it, couldn't you have at least said something?" Kennedy said as she took a deep breath.

"It's not like you didn't know I was out here somewhere," Laz responded, his meaning indicating their resonance.

"Well it's not like I know you're standing right behind the god damn door now do I?" Kennedy shot back before walking over towards the dumpster.

"What now?" Laz asked, looking up and down the alley.

"Now, I wait and see.. If my buyers are interested, they will show up, tell me what they want and pay on the spot. I send out one message each week for whatever time and date I do this, so it's up to them to show up or not. After that, I leave what's left and the money in the locker. At some point, someone will pick it up, leave a new stash and my cut and we repeat to process. Simple right?".

Now Laz was convinced this was some sort of spy movie and almost felt like looking around for hidden cameras.

Kennedy, noticing his actions, couldn't help but giggle.

"It's not what you think. The less a handler touches the goods and the cash, the less problems there will be. Unless I need something special, I don't want to store this stuff anywhere near me. Afterall, this kind of business is like a bomb. It's going to blow up at some point, it's just a question of when and if you will make it out ok."

Laz was a bit surprised. From the sounds of it, she didn't seem to enjoy doing this.

"Then why?" He couldn't really voice the question, so he just asked what was in his head.

"We don't have a choice sometimes, do we?" Kennedy looked up and stared straight into Laz's eyes, and he could feel the pain she had inside, reflected in those shimmering irises. He had seen this kind of pain in others before, but he had no idea what to do or say about it. Inner demons aren't something that can be solved by others.

"As for you, go make yourself scarce, but keep an eye on me and on the street if possible. I don't like surprises. Even though the cops in this town are about as useful as sunglasses as night, it doesn't mean they are complete idiots." Kennedy said, waving Laz away.

He looked around for a few seconds before jumping up to the fire escape on the second floor. As Kennedy watched on in shock, he made his way up to the top of the building, above the 4th floor and moved towards the corner edge, in front. In this spot, he could not only view the street, but also the alleyway.

"How the hell did he jump that high?" Kennedy asked herself, thinking about him being able to jump right from the road to the second floor.

*This coming from the monkey that liked to play in the trees?* Laz had taken the time to spread his sense out to connect with her mind. He didn't think a phone call or texting would be the right thing to do at this moment.

*Damn it, can you warn me before you do this shit, please?* Kennedy responded back, having somewhat forgotten about this trick of his. Over all, she seemed a bit jumpy.

*Then what would be the point?* Since the light was coming from a lamp at the end of the alley, if someone wanted to see him, it would be really hard to do so from close up. Luckily, there was quite the ledge on the edge of the building so he could squat down if he needed to. Besides a roof access door and some heating units, there wasn't much else up there.

*Whatever, just remember to pay attention.*

*Got it boss.*

*Asshole.*

As the first car pulled up and parked, the driver got out and went in for coffee while the passenger walked back to the alley. He walked around the dumpster and seeing Kennedy standing there, leaning against the wall, walked over on said what he was after. She just replied with a price and once he passed her the money, she took out what he wanted.

The bag had been divided into several sections and everything was arranged in order. She could find what she wanted just by feel. The money would be slid into a locked pocket in the front of the bag that was lined with a mesh steel. Neither the handler nor the courier have a key, so there was never a issue of who might be involved if the money didn't end up in the bag. It would be entirely on the handler's head.

Laz, looking down at the process, couldn't help but feel this whole thing was a bit surreal. There was basically a whole business model at work here. It left nothing up to chance. And from what he could tell, she was getting a lot of money from these people. A couple hundred to a couple thousand per customer. It was unreal.

The entire process happened several times and Kennedy seemed to settle down a bit after the first time.

'Seems she is still kind of new to this,' Laz thought to himself.

As the night went on, there were several customers, who either went for coffee first and came back before leaving, had a passenger go for the transaction, or just walked straight back and left right after. Seems like they had different levels of fear and thought they were being clever and inconspicuous.

From Laz's point of view, they all basically came off as guilty of something. During the occasional times when Laz saw a cop car drive by, He would message Kennedy and tell her to hide behind the dumpster all together. Even if it was unlikely she would be seen, he didn't leave it up to chance.

For Kennedy's part, she couldn't help but feel a bit safer knowing there was another pair of eyes on her. Even though Laz kept quiet and didn't joke around like she thought he would, she soon understood that it was because he was taking this very seriously.

He wasn't going to let something happen while he was there. Be it due to his sense of commitment, him liking her or his fear of her cousin's blackmail, she didn't know. But she felt better knowing he was close all the same.

Just as she was getting a bit comfortable about this whole thing, Laz sent her a message.

Laz had seen a rather nice BMW driving up the street slowly, as though looking around for something. Normally, this could be any number of things, but the more he looked, the less right it felt. There was the sense of hostility coming from the car, like people who had bad intentions. There was also three of them in the car and all of them were looking out the windows while searching.

After Laz relayed this info to Kennedy, she couldn't help but frown and told him,

*These cock suckers are a kind of rival of mine who work for someone different. They normally don't come out to this town often, but when they do, they sell a lot of shit. The problem is that people stopped buying so much from them since I'm around every week. They caught me out here a few weeks ago and said that I need to get the hell off their turf before they get pissed and bad things happen. Thanks to that, my cousin decided I needed a bit of help. The only reason they didn't act right then was because they didn't know who my backer was. Offending someone higher up never leads to a good ending in this business.*

*Would it really be a problem for you to handle these guys?* Laz couldn't help but ask, knowing about her ability. It wasn't a threat to him, but to a normal human, it would be.

*I didn't have this ability at the time. The whole thing scared me more than I wanted to admit which is why I told Tony about it. Sometime after that and before I met you, I started to gain my ability.* Kennedy admitted. It wasn't really a secret, although she didn't tell anyone. After all, who would believe her?

*Interesting... so what do you want to do now?* Laz asked, wondering what her thoughts were. If she wanted him to take action or if she wanted revenge.

*What would be the point in you being here if I were to do this myself?* Kennedy shot back, showing that it was clearly time for Laz to earn his pay.

Laz couldn't help but chuckle a but to himself as we walked over to the side of the building to descend down the fire escape.

At the same time, the three somewhat well dressed men entered the alley, looking like they wanted to get violent.