Chapter 2: Ernesto's End and Valley Girls

So things aren't too cool, but they aren't all that bad either. Everything changes one Wednesday evening. I'm chilling at the apartment after a long day at the shop, when Ash comes in crying. "Eric, this guy just won't leave me alone!"

"Slow down babe, what guy?"

"I was at work and this group of Mexican guys came in, and I was waiting on their table, and one of them was talking to me, he kept asking for my number and saying he was a big man in town. The others all called him 'Jefe'"

"Ok, so that's all?"

"Nn... o. There's a place near the kitchen where the hallway goes to the bathrooms. When I was going through there to get food from the kitchen, he grabbed me and pulled me into the corner. He told me, "Ernesto always gets what he wants."

This wasn't good. I was pretty familiar with the local criminal element, as I'd kept my ear pretty close to the ground. Ernesto Salazar was a small time player, but he had some family connections. In any case, I wasn't going to wait around and let us get fucked in the ass.

"Alright babe, I'll take care of it."

"Eric, what are you going to do?"

"Leave it to me, babe."

Later that night, I slipped out of the apartment around 3 AM, wearing black jeans and sweatshirt. The Glock was in my waistband behind my back, and I had a K-Bar combat knife tucked into the top of one of my boots, a sap in the other, and I was wearing black gloves and a small nylon backpack.

Ernesto lived in a small house in the southern outskirts of East Palo Alto. While the area was supposedly becoming rehabbed, the drug business was still huge here, and that's how Ernesto made his living. I knew he usually had someone watching the house, and as I crept below the bushes, I saw the sentry, a short Hispanic who was looking away from me and smoking a cigarette. I quietly moved behind him and gave him a nice tap on the head with the sap, he keeled over and lay there. Moving quickly I grabbed a nice H&K 45 from his waistband and smaller Saturday night special from his ankle, a wallet containing about $500 in cash, and a folding knife. I used his keys to unlock the house, and moved inside. A quick search found no one occupying any of the rooms except for the master bedroom, and no items of any particular value in the lower part of the house, at least not anything that could be easily carried away.

Ernesto's bedroom was actually pretty nice. It held a pretty nice king sized bed and would be good for female companionship, but was empty now. The thought raced through my head that he wanted my sister to help him warm the bed, and that made me angry. Angry or not, I wasn't going to shoot a man while he was sleeping. "Ernesto!" I called. He had quick reflexes, I'll give him that. He got his hands on his gun before I could even register the move. Unfortunately for him, I already had the saturday night special trained on his face. My first shot went through his eye and exploded out the back of his head. I could tell immediately that that was enough, and lowered the revolver, my hand trembling slightly.

I stowed his nickel plated 1911 in my bag, and a quick search of the room found a Ziploc baggie of some white powder and a thick roll of bills. I grabbed any valuables I could find and headed out, jingling the keys to Ernesto's car. While a gunshot wouldn't be anything too surprising in EP, I figured it would be best to leave the scene as soon as possible. I drove back to the apartment and woke Ash. "Babe, we need to leave town, now." She was too sleepy to complain and we grabbed our meager belongings and got the fuck out of Dodge.

Now many of you might think stealing the car was a stupid idea, but the way I saw it, it wasn't likely the body was going to be discovered for awhile. Even when the guard woke a couple hours later, it wasn't likely he was gonna call the cops, and it was only five short hours to LA. We made it there right around 8 AM, and I left the car with the motor running at a McDonalds in Chatsworth. I figure it wouldn't take long for someone to grab it.

My impromptu raid had gotten me four guns, a few knives, about a pound of what I looked to be at least decent quality coke, and what ended up being about $13000 when everything was said and done. We had a decent stake, but had to abandon what little bit of a life we had up in Santa Clara. However, if you had to find a place to start over, the San Fernando Valley wasn't a bad place to do it. I mean, what the hell would a guy with a lot of computer skills do in a place like this? That's right, I became a producer.