Five Beautiful Boys

Look at All the Confusion You've Caused, Mikey

"How's your head?" Mikey asked, aware that Ray was angry; he tried to appease him.
"It's fine," he snapped, "Don't worry, I'm thinking well enough to know what you're up to."
"What do you mean?"
Ray leaned forward and pulled Mikey's left shoulder back against the seat.
"Don't play games with me, Way, your pretty little face doesn't hold any sway with me."
"It's not what you think," Mikey replied but stopped short of actually explaining; Ray seemed too angry to even consider listening to him.
"Back off, Ray!" Frank snapped, frowning briefly into the rear view mirror hoping to catch Ray's eye.
"See!" Ray scowled. "It's exactly what I thought!"

Slumping back into his seat, Ray seethed with anger. As far as he could see Mikey was playing Frank for a fool, and Frank was falling for it.

Without another word, Frank turned the key in the ignition and pulled out of the parking space. It was already starting to go dark and there was very little chance of anyone noticing that Mikey was handcuffed, nevertheless, Frank deliberately kept to quieter roads even though the journey would be longer. In complete silence, the journey seemed twice as long. For the main part, Mikey looked down or out of the window, anywhere but at Frank. The one occasion he had briefly glanced in his direction, Ray had thumped the back of his seat as a warning.

Driving into the garage at his house, Frank sighed heavily as he switched off the engine and lights. By the time he had unbuckled his seatbelt, Ray was already dragging Mikey from the car.

"Ray," Frank pleaded, "you've got it wrong, listen to me."
"We'll discuss this inside, first I'll deal with pretty boy, here."

Mikey pulled out of Ray's grip and spun on his heels only to pull up sharp as he realised the garage door was already closed and he had nowhere to run.

"Mikey, please..." Frank called, willing him to be still. Ray was furious and likely to hurt him, if only to get revenge for Gerard biting his fingers.

Now with his back to the garage door, Mikey turned his head to look at Frank, realising too late that he was trying to help him.The first blow sunk deep into his abdomen, winding him, he sank to his knees and doubled over in agony. The second came like a hammer between his shoulder blades. Mikey hit the floor slumping onto his side with his legs curled up, gasping for breath.

"I know what you're trying to do, Way! You may have Frank fooled but not me!"
"Ray, you've got it all wrong," Frank pulled at his arm.
"Have I? Ray turned to ask. "Or was he coming on to you?"
"No," Frank shook his head. "We were just talking."
"So how come when I got in the car, you were offering him the trigger device?"
"I told him it didn't do anything," Frank replied with a sigh. "But he..."
"He didn't get chance to run, because I turned up." Ray threw his hands in the air in frustration. "We're not going to discuss this here."

Reaching down, Ray pulled Mikey to his feet and dragged him through the door into the house with Frank following behind.Hearing them return, Bob was in the hallway and watched with silent curiosity as Ray stormed past him, dragging Mikey with him and headed for the cellar door.

"You can walk down or I can push you down, it's up to you," Ray said gruffly.

Without a word, Mikey stepped ahead of him and walked downstairs into the room that had become his prison. At the bottom of the stairs he turned to face Ray.

"Look, it's not what you think, we were just talking."
"You were trying to get him to let you go."
Mikey took a deep breath. "Do I want to get out of here? Of course I fucking do! And if he'd let me go, yeah, I would have gone, but I'm not doing whatever it is you think I'm doing."

Ray emitted a short laugh, unimpressed by Mikey's response. "Do you really think I'm going to believe you? You just said it yourself, you want to get out and you know what? I don't blame you. But here's the deal, you're not going anywhere, not now, not ever. Understand? You think you're just gonna walk out of here? A lawyer? Knowing where Frank lives? Knowing who we are?"
"Frank said he'd never killed anyone before."
"What the fuck!" Ray spluttered finding it hard to believe that Frank had been so honest with him. "Lie down!"