Jordan Turnbow was a man in his mid-forties, with pale skin, sunken-in gray-blue eyes, graying hair and an ever-receding hairline. But he hadn’t always been so washed out. He had once worked for Japantown’s well-known and only strip club, More Buck For Your Bang, back when he was...more fit. And in his prime, Jordan had been one of the previous owner’s favorites. He had a bond with her, sexually, romantically, maybe even spiritually. She was Hugh Hefner and he was her Playmate. He had power, he had prestige among his fellow strippers, before that little Aussie asshole came along.

Once Jordan had hit forty, his ability to charm and seduce patrons steeply diminished. His muscle mass had started to fade and his hairline had begun to creep away from his face, both features taking with them a great deal of his physical attractiveness.

His boss, a younger guy that the former owner had given birth to on one of her escapades in Australia, had told him he needed to be ‘let go’ once the crowds had started to get too small. And he’d been without work ever since.

That was over a year ago. Over fifteen years as a stripper, all that hard work, only for it to come to that. Body-shamed out of a job for something out of his control by a scrawny chronically ill douche canoe.

Why did she have to go and catch HPV? he internally lamented. Her stupid son ruined everything. And Jordan knew that dumb Aussie tool was fucking Breanna Van Dyke, a co-worker at the club. He could see it in the way they looked at each other during the last few weeks leading up to his termination. He could see it in their body language and hear it in their words.

He was bitter now. Bitter and vengeful. Why did they get to be happy? Why did Breanna get to keep her job?

“I don’t understand why Gator would let me go,” he said. “I’m pretty sure he’s into men too!”

Jordan’s unwitting audience consisted of one Blake Van Dyke, a small child, and son of that trifling hoe Breanna, or ‘Honeybunch’ as she was called while working. Honey bunches of disrespect! Breanna was in her thirties, which made her one of the older strippers still performing at the co-ed club. And yet, unlike Jordan, Gator never told her she had ‘aged out’.

Of course he didn’t, Jordan had to remind himself. The fucker’s doing favoritism.

Breanna, like many of the other women working there, had had injections and surgeries and various alterations done to her body in the lips and breast and butt regions to make herself look more appealing to patrons. The changes worked, of course, but it made Jordan feel like all his hard work to naturally get jacked like a Chippendale was for nothing. And he was still jacked—at least more than the average shmuck! But Breanna never had to work to keep her figure. The bitch.

Jordan glanced to the ground at Blake, who he had tied up with ropes and silenced with duct tape. The boy stared back at him with large, scared eyes. It had been a full day since he had snatched the boy from the last stop on his bus ride home from summer school and brought him to their current location. He had not been given the child any food or water, or even been given a chance to use a restroom. He didn’t deserve these freedoms.

The two were situated in a small pink plastic backyard playhouse on a property belonging to an elderly Japanese couple on vacation in Central America. It was one of those playhouses with the walls and roof that fit together like very large puzzle pieces. Jordan had planned to do this for months, making sure the property he would hold Blake hostage on would be empty. He stretched out his legs, which were sore from being crossed all day in a tiny pink plastic chair intended for children. The tips of his black sneakers brushed against Blake’s ropes.

“The folks that live here aren’t due back for another week,” he told Blake. “I’ve been following them all year and stakin’ the place out just to make sure of it. You know I’m gonna hold you here for the whole week if I have to. Maybe longer, if you don’t starve before then. Your mom’s gonna learn what it’s like to have to struggle for once.”

He reached into the front pocket of the solid black hoodie he was wearing and produced a switchblade. He rotated it in his hand, purposely displaying it to Blake as a warning. Pale light coming from the low playhouse window glinted off the silver blade. “Your mom’s a witch, you know. She’s an evil witch who put a spell on her boss so he’d fire me. She owes me. And if she doesn’t bring me what she owes me, well, I’m gonna have to cut you.”

* * * * *

When the van was in motion, a sort of pocket of air and sound made it difficult for the trio in the back to communicate with Pradeep as he drove, but not the other way around. Pradeep knew they couldn’t see anything outside from back there, and they were probably getting more anxious with every passing minute, not knowing where they were. So to ease the discomfort of the three strangers sitting in his portable arsenal, Pradeep figured he’d talk about any random thing that came to mind.

“That picture has him looking older than he actually is,” he told the group through the partition window. He was referring to his son, a missing boy named Blake. “He’s only seven, but it looks like he’s already becoming a man. I’m so proud. I do wish Breanna had taken my suggestion to name him ‘Omaha’ though. It’s a much better name for him. It means sunshine and joy in Hindi. Plus, it is the name of a city here; a wonderful coincidence.” He made sure to give the impression that he was positive Blake would be found safe, and not to show fear. Fear was infectious, and his passengers already had enough on their plates, what with them being stalked by a deranged policeman. Not ten seconds later, in the same spirit of filling the void with any old string of words, he spouted the question “by the way, did you leave a rickshaw out in front of the courthouse?”

Kevin, who had been up until that moment preoccupied in a banjo melody, abruptly stopped. He had forgotten about the rickshaw.

“I had to move it to properly park the van,” Pradeep stated.

Great.

“Shit,” Kevin grumbled. “I’m gonna have to pay a fine…” He shot a glare at Astra, but she turned out to have fallen asleep. Her face was pointing upward in the corner of the vehicle cabin, mouth open in a silent snore, drooling. Just below her in his line of sight, Ruse was glaring right back at him. Why was she being so damn insistent on protecting this gender-confused criminal? “I’m not fucking moneybags,” Kevin mouthed at her.

Astra twitched in her sleep and smacked her lips.

“Leave it be,” Ruse mouthed back.

“You know, I think you three should consider getting getting a gun,” Pradeep said, as if he already hadn’t breezed through two other subjects in under a minute. “It’s important to be able to protect yourself—oh my god, Breanna.”

He immediately stalled the van.

Ruse nudged Astra to wake up, then freed herself from her arms and walked hunched over to the partition window and peered through.

They were at a park in the rich, gated upside of Japantown. Ruse hadn’t even noticed them stopping to enter the key code to get in. Astra’s lap was super cozy though, so she was probably was a little...preoccupied.

It was gloomy outside, and who just so happened to be fretting and pacing around out there? Miss Breanna Van Dyke. She was wearing hot pink sweatpants with double white stripes down the legs and a matching zip-up crop top sweater. Pink fake nails on her fingertips matched her getup. She looked just like her social media pictures: curvy, caramel complected, tight golden blonde curls…

Not important! Ruse scolded herself.

This situation required a more solemn and serious approach! And Breanna looked like she was on it—eyes glued to her phone as if following a lead in mama bear mode.

Ruse looked into the rear view mirror; Pradeep was looking back at her through it. They shared a nod. Pradeep parked the van in the park parking lot and, as quickly as he could, unlocked the back doors to let his three riders out.

As soon as the white van caught Breanna’s eye, she sprinted over, her large, obviously fake breasts bouncing with each step. When she reached the parking lot, she had tears in her eyes.

“Did you get the Amber alert?” she asked Pradeep. And although she was afraid, the way she spoke to him sounded so natural, as if she was speaking to an old friend. “Your son is missing!”

At least this confirmed Pradeep was telling the truth...

“He’s in danger, somebody’s holding him hostage! I’ve been trying to track him using that ‘find my phone’ feature. His watch is connected to my phone, but I think the weather is messing with my GPS signal.” She showed the phone to Pradeep and used her opposite sleeve to wipe away her tears.

On the screen, a blue spot on a map of the neighborhood kept flickering on and off. “Whoever took him knows my number; they know where I live or his school’s bus route or something! And now they know I’m looking for him! I don’t know what to do! My baby…”

“Why didn’t you call the police immediately!?” Pradeep asked her, placing both hands on her shoulders. “Why are you doing this all by yourself?” And she was, in fact, alone. There was not another soul at the park to be seen. “I saw on the alert that he was last seen hours ago!”

“Why didn’t you call the police?” Breanna retorted back with a pout.

They both stared at each other for a moment, then both looked away and muttered, “he’s a little black boy.”

Their disdain for the idea of putting police around a black child was palpable. Those guys were always either ready to sweep the case under the rug, or to be more trigger happy than anybody should be when around children. Even Japantown PD.

“I’m sorry for asking,” Pradeep told Breanna, sounding a bit guilty for interrogating her so straight away. “You know I don’t like police attention either.” The vague few personal details he had provided the trio backed up that theory. “I am just terribly anxious. I want him to be safe.”

“I didn’t even want to speak to authorities to have the Amber alert sent out, but I was running out of options,” Breanna sobbed. “I didn’t give them any details, just that he never came home after summer school yesterday...that’s why there’s nobody here, they need more information to send out a search party and I just can’t stand the thought of all these gun-wielding men around my baby…”

Pradeep bit his lip. There were several guns not even ten feet away from them at that very moment…