Curves by Michael Bracken

“I want you to kill my husband.”
My gaze traveled the long way around her curves and returned to her eyes. “What’s in it for me?”
“Ten thousand. Small bills. Non-sequential.”
Ten thousand would get Lemmy off my back. “Why me?”
“No reason,” she said. “You just look like a guy could do something like this.”
I had killed for less. I didn’t tell her that. “When?”
“Tonight. Late. I’ll give you the key and the alarm code.”
“When do I get paid?”
“After.”
I shook my head. “Give me something up front. A retainer, like.”
“How much?”
“A thousand,” I said. “I’ll look the place over tonight. Maybe I’ll do it and maybe I won’t. Either way I keep the grand.”
She retrieved a wad of cash from her shoulder bag, counted out $1,000 in crumpled bills of various denominations, and shoved the remaining currency back into her bag. Then she handed me a door key and slip of paper with an address and an alarm code written on it.
“I’ll be there, too,” she said. “Don’t make a mistake.”
She turned and walked away, her hips swaying to a rhythm all their own.

* * *

“This ain’t all of it,” my bookie said as he counted the money I’d handed him.
“I’ll get the rest.”
Lemmy glared at me from behind his desk. I’d never seen him anywhere but behind his desk. “When?”
“Tomorrow or the next day.” When he didn’t say anything, I added, “I always been good for it. You know that.”
“Two days.” He shoved the money in his desk drawer. “You got two days.”

* * *

I had a snub-nose with the serial number filed off tucked into my pocket. I removed it before I stepped into the bedroom. I prodded one of the sleeping figures with the barrel of the gun until he threw back the cover and sat up.
“Lemmy?”
“What the fuck you doing in my bedroom, Jackson?”
“I come to kill you, Lemmy.”
“I always knew you’d welsh on a bet.”
“It ain’t like that, Lemmy,” I said. “I been hired to kill you.”
“Who hired you?”
I didn’t reply, but I cut my eyes toward the lump in the bed next to him.
“I always knew she was trouble.”
I was finished talking so I squeezed the trigger three times.
The woman in bed next to Lemmy rose up screaming. She wasn’t the woman who had hired me, and I put three slugs into her before she shut up.

* * *

On my way home I tossed the snub-nose into the lake. I was unarmed when I pushed my apartment door open and found myself facing the woman who had hired me.
She asked, “Is it done?”
“It’s done, but you wasn’t in bed with him.”
She shrugged. “Plans change.”
“You didn’t tell me you was married to Lemmy.”
“You didn’t ask.” She pushed herself off my couch and indicated a bloated pillowcase she’d left behind. “Your money’s in there.”

* * *

Several hours later I was awoken when my apartment door crashed open and my bedroom quickly filled with police officers. I didn’t resist, and I was taken to the station wearing only my pajama bottoms and an undershirt.
I learned later that the pillowcase had been taken from Lemmy’s house where its mate remained. The money had been taken from Lemmy’s safe, which had been left open. Lemmy’s wife had returned home that morning from an overnight spa trip to discover her husband’s body next to the body of a stripper from one of the downtown clubs.
The cops never found the snub-nose. But they said I had means. I had motive. I had opportunity.
Now I’m serving twenty to life.
But at least I don’t owe Lemmy anything.

​© 2025 Michael Bracken

About the author:
Michael Bracken is an Edgar Award and Shamus Award nominee, with stories published in The Best American Mystery Stories and The Best Mystery Stories of the Year.  He is also the editor or co-editor of three-dozen anthologies, including three Anthony Award nominees.