by Seth Harwood
But now that all seems dull, boring. Something far away.
They pull up outside The Coast and Jack sees Maxine’s VW Bug among the few in the lot. He’s seen it a few times in front of her house, and she mentioned it when he dropped her off at home this morning—how that’s still part of the same day is more than he can imagine at this point. Thinking back to last night at The Mirage, the shooting feels like last night, but waking up in Sausalito with Maxine this morning feels like months ago. Somehow it seems like the whole arc of their relationship has happened since then.
Now he’s sure he’ll be awake to see it when the sun comes up in a few hours, and there’ll be something good to that. He says to Niki and Vlade, “Breakfast when this is over?”
“Yes,” Vlade says. “Fucking steak and eggs, motherfucker.”
Jack laughs at Vlade’s accent around the familiar word that he must’ve picked up from Junius or someone along the way. “That’s right,” he says.
Jack pulls the Mustang around the corner to park on the side of the club, where the front doormen won’t see them coming. Judging by the number of cars, The Coast is close to empty at this hour, not long before closing. There are just two guys at the front door, and they didn’t look familiar to Jack as he checked them out while driving by.
“You boys ready for this?” Jack asks. He gets out of the car and waits while Niki and Vlade get out on the other side.
“The Russian KGB are inside?” Vlade asks.
Jack nods.
Niki smiles. “Then I am ready.”
Vlade puts his chin to his chest, looks down at his body, his stomach mainly—a small-to-medium-sized protrusion around his middle—and then agrees.
Junius is slow to park his car, getting it into the spot just right, and then he gets out, stands wearing a black fleece over his shirt. “Yo!” he says. “Let’s do this.” He goes around back to his trunk and takes out a black, stocky submachine gun with a big sight on top and something thick below the front barrel. He bounces it a few times in his hands, feeling the weight, and then slams the trunk closed. He looks at Jack. “H and K MP-seven, motherfucker. Let’s roll.”
Freeman steps out of the car, stretching his arms and cracking his knuckles. He stretches one arm across his chest, then does the same on the other side. Then he hits his chest with his forearms. When he makes fists, his knuckles crack, and Jack can imagine him doing something awful to somebody’s head. He’s got on big black warm-up pants and a matching top, and Jack wishes he were wearing the same thing, something more comfortable than the jeans and button-up he’s had on all day.
Niki and Vlade have their guns out, look as if they need to be doing something. So Vlade drops the clip out of his weapon and checks to make sure it’s full. When he nods, Jack can see that he already knew this would be the case.
“Long night?”
Vlade and Niki agree quickly, Vlade putting one finger over his nostril and inhaling deeply, then putting both hands together on the side of his face, as if they were a pillow, and resting his cheek against them.
He laughs, pushes both eyes open with the first finger and thumb of each hand. “Let’s go.”
“Plan of attack?”
Junius and Freeman walk over to join Jack and the Czechs. “This place has a front and a back,” Junius says. “That’s all. Tony’s office is in the back. That’s where he’ll be with his boys. Whatever’s going on, they be doing it there.” He points around the opposite side of the club. “Front is the part you already saw: the tables and stages, the bars. They got some private rooms in there, but those mostly just for hand jobs and shit.”
Vlade laughs, tilts his head two inches to the side to grudgingly admit that he knows what Junius means.
“So we will go in the front, you three go in the back?” Niki says, pointing to Jack, Junius, and Freeman.
“I’m not going in shooting, just so you all know,” Jack says. “I want to talk with this guy. We find any hard evidence of him killing Ralph or Castroneves, something that can lead us to his supply, I call the cops, we bring the heat down on this place. That’s all they want.”
“Shit,” Junius says. “We can all say boo right now.” He looks around at the others. “I’m not saying I’d testify, but we know enough between us to say he killed both Ralph and Castroneves.”
“And had Michal killed,” Niki says.
“No,” Vlade says. “That was KGB.”
“I don’t know.” Jack kicks the ground. “Why’s that Russian with the sweater still hanging around? If he’s not hooked to those guys, what were they doing at The Mirage?”
Vlade shakes his head. He looks at his gun and then at Jack. “That is what we need to know.”
“Right.” Niki looks firm in his readiness to go in and get something done. “What about Maxine?”
Vlade puffs out his lower lip, shakes his head at Niki.
“No,” Jack says. “That’s all right.” He points at the club. “I think she’ll be inside. She said something about that guy being Tony’s new supplier. We’ll just have to find out.”
“Oh,” Niki says. “I am sorry.”
Junius cocks his gun and the parts engage, make a locking sound. “This your girl, Jack?”
“Was. Maybe.”
Junius squints, grimaces. He looks like he’s imagining one of his women ending up with Tony Vitelli. “Shit,” he says. “Come on, then. Let’s do this.”
Jack starts to walk around the back of the club with Junius and Freeman. Niki and Vlade say something in Czech and then start for the front door. As they go around the other side, Jack loses sight of them. The outside walls of The Coast are all black, tall—about two stories, though it’s all one high-ceilinged level inside—with a small parking lot stretched around the perimeter. Where they are in SoMa, there are a couple of streetlights on the street and not much else: cars and taxis going past to get to or from the Bay Bridge, and just a few people walking from the clubs to their cars. After the regular bars close, places like this stay open for “After Hours,” but it’s officially late, the part of the night where you can already start to feel some of the pain you’re going to be feeling the next day.
Freeman looks like he’s had some sleep, though reading him is like reading a vending machine; he’s moving all right, fluid and without any hitches, but Jack can’t guess what the big man’s thinking. He’d guess Freeman caught a few hours of sleep somewhere in the night before Junius called for a pickup.
Junius still wears his suit pants, but the tie is long gone. Jack still wishes he had on something more like the warm-up suit he wore back when he went to Ralph’s.
In his mind, he’s not all there; the day and the lack of sleep in the past few days are getting to him. But he tells himself that it’ll all be over soon, that if he takes care of this he’ll be able to sleep in his own bed instead of a small cell with bars for walls for the next few years. And that’s compelling. That and the thought of the bills piled up in the leather bag in his trunk. Jack leans his neck toward his shoulders and cracks it, pulls his arms back toward each other behind him, and feels a good crack in his back. There’s a release that comes from this, and if there were time, he’d spend a few minutes stretching out and trying to loosen up, get his blood flowing again. But Junius gets to the back door of The Coast and starts banging on it with the back of his fist.
“Stay in the moment,” Jack says, just to feel his lips moving over the words.
“Open the fuck up,” Junius says, and when one of Tony’s boys opens the door just slightly, Junius slams it against him with all his weight, pushing the guy back to the floor. Jack and Freeman follow into a dark corridor with a concrete floor and gray walls. Junius moves to the guy he just knocked down and holds his gun against the guy’s temple. He puts his finger over his lips. “Shhh,” he says.
Freeman produces a roll of duct tape from somewhere in his pants and rips off a strip that he puts over the guy’s mouth. Then he flips him over and runs the duct t
ape quickly around his hands and feet. Jack’s having a hard time hiding how impressed he is with all this precision, actually says, “Wow.”
Junius just winks at Jack, once, and points down the hall toward a door not twenty feet away. From farther inside the club, Jack hears the music, Sir Mix-A-Lot doing “Baby Got Back”—a song that’s sure to accompany a special performance onstage. Freeman closes the door behind them and makes sure it locks.
Wondering where the Czechs are, Jack stops for a moment, thinking, but Junius is already headed down the hall.
They come to a door and Junius puts his head against it. After listening for a few seconds, he points at it and whispers, “They in there.”
“Okay.” Jack nods. “Do this.”
Junius and Freeman exchange a glance, and that’s when Freeman kicks the door open, loud and hard. Junius jumps into the opening, yelling, “Boo!” After a quick look to see the scene inside, Jack follows Freeman into the room.
What they come into is a big play den for Tony and some of his boys. It’s something of an extension to the club: There’s a big glass window on the back wall through which you can see the girls onstage, the other side of a two-way mirror, Jack realizes; the lights are dim enough inside the room to keep it reflective on the other side. Tony sits behind a big desk off on the right-hand side with a significant pile of blow, about the size of a softball, and a small mountain of white pills that must be ecstasy piled up in front of him. He starts nodding when Junius walks in and then laughs when he sees Jack. He reaches up to the back of his head and straightens his ponytail, pulling it tight. “Jack Palms,” he says. “This is fucking hilarious. Call this your next movie, right?”
“I’ll get you as the big star,” Jack says.
Tony laughs. “But this ain’t no playacting here.” He looks around the room. “And I don’t see any stunt doubles to protect you, you fuck.”
In the middle of the room, two of the strip club’s bouncers in black shirts have been playing pool with one of the clean-cut, slick bouncers from The Mirage. Now they stop and stand, holding their pool cues and looking at Jack and the other visitors. Two of them are the ones who beat Jack up when he got under Tony’s skin a few nights ago, the Surfer and a black guy with a shaved head that reflects the ceiling lights. These two smile especially wide smiles at him. The other one is the asshole from outside The Mirage, the one who wouldn’t answer Jack’s question, one of the clean-cut professionals.
The shiny Bald Head says, “We’re glad to see you back here, Jackie.”
Another guy leans against the pool table, smoking. He’s got on khaki pants and a light blue polo shirt. He looks at Jack with pure contempt. He’s hard to place without a jacket and tie on, but Jack remembers his face from somewhere he’s been with Hopkins, maybe from the Hall of Justice.
Beyond the pool table, on the left, is a sectional leather couch with Maxine stretched across one part, lying back with her wrist on her forehead. She sees them come in, doesn’t make a move to sit up or change position. “Jack,” she says, smiling. “What a dumbass.”
The bald Russian with the beard sits bolt upright on another section of the couch, smoking a long cigarette out of a plastic holder. He’s got his other arm draped over the back of the couch, an automatic resting on one of his thighs. The way he looks, the gun seems like the furthest thing from his mind. He touches his mustache with the first fingers of his cigarette hand as if he’s considering the situation.
“No, movie man,” Tony says. “No stunt doubles here.”
Jack says, “Right. Just you, your stooges, a cop, and a Russian mobster.”
Junius steps farther into the room, waving the gun around to make sure everyone sees it.
Tony stands up, clapping his hands. “That is very good, Junior. Nice work with the flashing of your thing there. How are you with the business end?”
Junius points his gun straight ahead, between two of Tony’s guys, the Surfer and the Bald Head, and lets off a few shots into the wood side of the pool table. They both jump back, but the cop stays put. The Professional throws his cue down on the floor. Onstage, the stripper keeps dancing, kicking her legs high, the music thumping through the wall.
“Fuck!” Tony says. “That’s a three-thousand-dollar table, you fuck! What are you thinking?”
Junius holds the gun up, makes a show of blowing off the barrel. “I was just checking to see I could shoot this thing.” He holds the gun out away from his body as if he’s looking it over, and then levels its barrel at Tony. “I’d say I can.”
Tony raises his hands lackadaisically, as if he’s just playing along with a game. “So what is it you boys want? Would you like a share of my coke? Do you want to buy some X? Or”—he looks at Junius—“do you want to know where I get it now? Because I think that you must already know.”
Jack nods at the guy in khakis and the polo shirt. “Maybe we want to know how you got to be so comfortable with the force here.”
Tony laughs. “That’s right. You haven’t officially met our friend, Officer O’Malley. Sorry I didn’t do the introduce.”
“Man, fuck.” Still aiming the gun at Tony, Junius turns to Freeman. “What is the deal with this guy?”
Freeman cracks his knuckles, starts toward the little man.
“Ah-ah-hah.” Tony waves his finger at Freeman, turns his chin an inch toward the Russian, who now has his gun in his hand, the barrel leveled at Freeman’s head. The guy’s twenty feet from Freeman and the desk, but his gun has a laser sight on it that shows where he’s pointing, even from this far away. Whether Freeman knows it or not, he now has a single bright red dot in the middle of his forehead.
“Man, fuck,” Junius says. He turns his gun toward the Russian. “You better put that down.”
“Really,” the Russian says, still pointing at Freeman. “Had I better?” He raises his eyebrows.
Jack feels the tension in the room rise a few levels. There’s a moment when he thinks Junius considers blasting the Russian, blowing him away, wondering whether Freeman would live through it. But it seems there’d be a chain reaction, that somehow the Russian would pull the trigger—at least that’s the decision Junius makes; he doesn’t do anything.
“Oh, carnage in here,” Tony says, stepping around the desk. “Wouldn’t that be awful?”
“Shut the fuck up!” Junius turns to hold his gun on Tony and as he does, in the moment of that move, the Russian turns his gun onto him, shines the light across his eyes, and then trains it on his chest, over his heart. Junius looks down and sees the bright dot. “Shit,” he says, still holding his gun on Tony.
Jack steps forward toward the Russian. “I just want to talk for a minute here. Let’s all keep calm.”
Now Maxine sits up. “You’re doing the talking? Why don’t you just shut up, Jack?” She’s slurring a little, must have been drinking since she arrived. Jack sees an empty glass in front of her on the coffee table.
Tony clicks his tongue against his teeth. “Oh,” he says, nodding toward one shoulder. “A lover’s quarrel?”
The cop, O’Malley, drops his cigarette on the floor and grinds it out. “This is a nice party you got here, Tony, but I think I should be going. Don’t want to interrupt any family business.” He steps forward as if to start walking out.
Tony shakes his head. “Why would you leave now, Joe? This is the perfect place for you to be. You just witnessed a breaking and entering. Maybe you’ll even get to make some arrests. Hmm?”
The Surfer taps the cop on the shoulder with the thin end of his pool cue, making sure he realizes that Tony’s demanding, not offering.
“This shit’s getting ugly,” Freeman says. He takes a quick step to his side, moving surprisingly fast for a man his size—showing he still has some NFL speed—and reaches out to backhand Tony across the face, knocking him into a cabinet behind his desk. Tony’s fall breaks the glass front of the piece, and he drops to the floor. He scrambles up fast and then looks at his hand, holds it up wi
th blood running down the side of his wrist.
“Ahh,” Tony says. “Will you look at that?”
Jack realizes he’s probably coked out of his mind.
Freeman raises his hands, but the Russian says, “Don’t!” loud enough to stop him before he can move on Tony again.
“Can you please waste these fucks right now?” Tony asks the Russian.
The Russian tilts his head, as if considering this possibility. Then he shakes just the middle of his face—just his mouth and nose—holding his head still. “No. Not quite yet.” He looks at Freeman. “Though one of those is certainly enough. Okay, friend?”
Freeman backs a step away from Tony.
“Very well,” the Russian says. “Now, here’s what I’d like to know.” He takes a long time making a very pronounced move to fix his gaze on Jack. Then he raises his eyebrows. “Where are your Eastern European friends? I believe I have some business with them.”
Jack looks away from the Russian; something about the way his eyebrows rise up on his bald head—it almost looks like they’ve become his hairline, gone beyond his forehead—creeps Jack out. He looks out of the two-way mirror and sees a big-busted stripper wrap her arms around her back and undo the tie of her top. She’s bringing the ends around, when suddenly she stops, screams, and drops out of sight below the bottom edge of the mirror.
Jack hears a gunshot, and a second outside in the main room: shots from handguns.
He turns back to the Russian, who’s got his gun still on Junius but his attention in the direction of the mirror. Jack says, “I’d say that’s them outside now.”
From outside in the club, Jack hears the spray of an automatic weapon followed by a scream. The Russian looks at Jack, expectant. Jack shakes his head. “That is not them.”