Driver

Driver - Chapter 5

Danny had a new score to prepare for. The man at the bar had agreed to pay him handsomely. The score had been set for nine in the morning just after the store would open and start with its daily business. The crew was to have four guys; Danny was yet to meet them. Another important task had to be done first—picking and preparing the car.

Danny started his preparations three days before the job. He always picked his own car. The cars were never stolen, which was the first mistake that people made both pros and amateurs alike. Using a stolen car for the job increased the chances of a car being identified while running down the gig. Danny instead bought his cars from small lots and dealers. He looked for something bland, something that would fade into the background of the city. But he also wanted a ride that could get up on its rear wheels and fly if the time ever came for it. He had a preference for older cars in shades of brown or grey but was not locked into any particular model. He would modify the car before the drive anyway.

After going around a couple of dealers he selected a ten-year old dodge. The thing about a dodge is that you could run it near the side of its tank and it still would keep going. The more you pushed a dodge the further it could go. Danny remembered this was a four man job. Backseats will have to be added to this one, he figured. Danny took it out for a test drive. He did not have to push the car too much, just turn it loose and see how it handled. Watch and feel how it cornered, if it stayed its course when accelerated, slowed sufficiently on turns or cut in or out. But most of all he listened. He listened carefully at the transmission to see if it choked. The clutch needed to come up some more. And it pulled towards the right. But otherwise it was about as perfect as as he had any right to expect.  

Back at the lot he crawled under the car to make sure that the carriage was straight, axles and ties were in good shape. He then asked about the back seats.

"We can get one for you", replied the salesman.

Danny paid the man in cash and drove the car off the lot. He went straight to one of the several garages he used to fix up a car. His guys at the garage would install new tires, replace the oil and lubricants, and give it a tune up, the works. The car would then be stored at the garage, out of sight, till Danny picked it up for the job.  

***

Sometimes things go wrong so subtly on a job that you don't see it at first. Some other times things blow up right in your face like a firecracker. This was somewhere in between.

They arrived at the store at nine in the morning just as they had planned. Sitting in the dodge pretending to read a newspaper Danny watched the others enter the store. There was a small line of people waiting outside the door, maybe five or six people. Among them was Sherry, a tall, red haired woman, chatting up the security guard trying to keep his attention away from the two other men in front of her. Both men were eager to get on with it and add a gun to the mix. They were smiling at the guard for now.

Danny watched every direction around the store carefully still holding the newspaper in his hand.

Two kids were skateboarding down the opposite sidewalk, the usual pack of suit-and-tie wearing people heading their way to work looking tired already, a Latino offloading vegetable crates from a truck to a restaurant down the block, a Chevy parked in the narrow alley three storefronts down.

The Chevy caught Danny's attention. It was like looking in a mirror. Car just sitting there, a driver waiting inside, his eyes scanning every direction left, right, up and down. Something about that car did not fit the scene at all. Absolutely no reason for that car to be where it was.

Then the sudden motion within the dodge caught his attention. Everything happened so quickly Danny would only figure it out later. He saw the backup guy, Logan, firing shots in Sherry's direction. She looked like she had been shot herself. She returned fire from within the car and watched Logan go down. What kind of crew fires on its own members. Before Danny could gather his thoughts and ask what was going on, Sherry screamed at him, "Drive".