Up in Smoke

  Smoke walks over to his duffle bag and pulls out a photo which he pushes into my hands.

  It’s a black and white still image from the same bloody surveillance footage Nine and I found. Same date and time stamp in the upper right corner.

  “Oh my fucking god,” I gasp, holding my hand over my mouth. I don’t have to pretend to be shocked even though I’ve seen it before. It’s just as gruesome now as it was the first time.

  “I think I’m going to be sick,” I say, holding my churning stomach.

  “Your old man didn’t just steal from Griff. He stole from me,” Smoke points to the corner of the image.

  This picture is different than the one I found with Nine. The background is the same. The body is the same. The blood is the same. But the man in this image is a very different man than the one from the video. There’s no hat with black stripe. It’s a different man all together.

  Someone had tampered with the image. One of them is fake.

  And when I recognize the man in the image, I know immediately which one.

  I begin to hyperventilate; my chest feels like someone’s sitting on it. “No, no. It can’t be.” I start to say.

  “Yes. It can,” Smoke argues, slamming his hand down on the counter.

  I understand now. Why Smoke is doing this. Why I’m here. What he wants out of all this.

  Revenge.

  Because the man in the photo isn’t just vaguely familiar. He’s veryfamiliar.

  He’s my father.