“Y’know, Jack, I’m surprised to see you. I’m happy to see you, don’t get me wrong, but I’m surprised.”
“Oh yeah? Why’s that?”
“After all that shit with Tommy, I figured you’d be cooling your heels in Costa Rica.”
“I hear it’s nice.”
“Oh, it is. Waterfalls, flowers, monkeys … they got it all.”
“That shit with Tommy was a long time ago.”
“Thing is, Jack, Tommy disappearing was like throwing a pebble into a pond, you dig? That shit sends up ripples and those ripples keep rippling.”
“Tommy made his own bed.”
“No doubt, no doubt. Just between you, me, and the lamppost, the man was a real piece of shit.”
I nodded.
“A made man goes missing, though … I figure the bosses got to do something.”
“And you’re saying that something is me.”
Freddy nodded. “You were his bodyguard.”
I shook my head. “No. I was paying off a debt.”
“Either way, word is you saw the man last.” Freddy shrugged. “Blame’s got to fall somewhere.” Freddy drained the last of his vodka. “There’s a new guy on the council. He wants to clean house. They’re sending a guy up from New York.”
“You know what he looks like?”
Freddy smiled. “Yankees cap, I Heart New York T-shirt.”
I smiled back. “Where’d you say he was from again?”
Freddy laughed. “See, that’s why I like you, Jack. You tell most folks there’s a hit man coming up from New York and they get all agitated. I tell you and you’re sitting there joking around with a drink in your hand.”
I shrugged. “Getting agitated isn’t going to fix anything.”
“No, sir, it certainly will not.” Freddy pushed back from the bar and stood up. “So, you good? You need anything else?”
I sipped my vodka. “Tell you what. When the guy from New York shows up, shoot him in the head for me, will you?”
Freddy laughed and pointed at me. “You’re a joker, Jack. Watch your back now, you hear?”
“One other thing.”
“What, that wasn’t enough?”
“I’m looking for a game.”
The man’s eyebrows shot up. “Yeah? You and Eddie have a falling out?”
“It’s not like that. I’ve got a friend, a poker player. She’s looking for a big game. I know the Canada Day Game is coming up. She wants in.”
Freddy nodded. “You’re talking about Cassandra?”
“Yeah, that’s right.”
Freddy kept nodding. “Good player. One of the best. She has a lot of heart.”
“She does. Her backers crapped out on her, though. She needs the buy-in.”
“You can’t float her?”
I shook my head. “What can I say, Freddy? Times are tough all over.”
The huge man laughed. “All right, all right. As a favour to you, I’ll back her play. She and I will split any profits sixty-forty. I get the sixty.”
“Come on now, Freddy.”
“That’s fair, my friend. That’s more than fair.”
It was highway fucking robbery. But those were the terms and they weren’t going to get better. “Yeah, all right.”
We shook on it.
CHAPTER 27
The man from New York came around the corner without a care in the world. Grover stepped forward and hit the hit man in the face with the butt of his gun. The man reeled back. I put him in a sleeper hold and choked him out.
Grover got under the man’s shoulder and I got under the other, and together we dragged him through the alley to Grover’s waiting car.
“I still think we should’ve done it right here,” Grover said. “This guy’s gonna get blood all over everything.”
“You got plastic in the trunk, right?” I supported the man’s full weight as Grover popped the trunk.
“Yeah, but …” Grover looked down at his white pants. “See? There’s a drop right there. Now I’ve got to burn this suit.”
“The whole thing? Or just the pants?” I heaved the man into the trunk. He was still breathing. Good.
“Without pants, it’s not a suit. I’m not Donald Duck, Jack. I’m not going to run around the city wearing a sailor hat and a jacket with no pants.” Grover slammed the trunk closed.
We drove the guy to the boat. We tried to make it look like Mr. New York was drunk. Just three buddies out on a tear, wobbling down the dock for a midnight ride.
Right before we boarded the boat, Grover glanced over at me. “The guys who tipped me off … they’re going to want something in return.”
I nodded. Mr. New York was slipping. “Yeah, I figured. Come on, let’s get him on board.”
We chugged out toward the middle of the lake. The city lights twinkled in the distance.
Mr. New York was duct-taped to a chair in the cabin. Grover poured us some Scotch and then we settled in to wait for the man to wake up.
It didn’t take long. Halfway through our second drink the man stirred and started straining at the tape. Grover set down his Scotch and winked at me. Then he walked over to the man taped to the chair. Grover slapped the man, hard.
The man stared at Grover with full-on contempt. Grover smiled at him, reached down, and snapped one of the man’s fingers. The man screamed. Grover broke another finger. The man kept screaming.
“Stop.”
Grover looked up at me with a frown on his face. “This guy tried to kill you, Jack.”
I stared at the man. What had happened in his life to lead up to this moment?
“Someone sent you to kill me.” I shrugged. “It didn’t work out. Sometimes these things happen. You want a drink?” I took out my knife and started cutting the man’s hands free.
Grover frowned. “What the hell, Jack?”
“Everyone gets a last meal, right?”
The man spit right in my face.
Grover fired twice. The man crumpled and slumped forward. I cut his arms and legs free and manoeuvred him onto the white canvas drop cloth. Grover set his gun on the table and knelt down. Together we started folding the canvas over the body.
“Get his legs, will you?”
We lugged the would-be hit man out of the cabin and over the railing. Grover tossed the man’s gun in after him. There was a splash and then the lake swallowed him up.
We walked back into the cabin and sat there in the dark. Grover poured another Scotch. The waves rocked us slowly from side to side. We sat in silence for a minute.
“I’m thinking of making a change.”
Grover glanced toward me. “Is that right?”
“Yeah. We live right on the edge of the fucking knife, all the goddamn time.” I glanced out the cabin window. “You retired once. It was nice, right?”
Grover nodded. “Yeah, it was, at first. Then just lying on the beach started making me itchy, and I’m not talking about sand fleas.”
“And now you’re back.”
“Now I’m back.”
I paused. “Do you ever worry?”
Grover frowned. “What do you mean?”
“You ever worry that someone’s going to sneak up behind you one day?”
Grover grinned. “They can try.”
CHAPTER 28
In war, one side tries to demonize the other. They claim the other side isn’t even human. Because if you saw the other side as fully human, with hopes and fears and loves and dreams just like you and the people you love, then it would be too damn hard to kill them. For most people, that is.
There’s always some folks out there who enjoy killing. Maybe Mr. New York was one of them. The man was going to kill me and now he wouldn’t. He was gone, but I was still here. I closed my eyes and I saw his face. His eyes widening as Grover raised the gun.
I opened my eyes, reached for the bottle, and poured four fingers of bourbon into a glass. I drank it in one long pull.
I had gone straight from the boat to Melody�
�s house. When I walked into the living room, everything looked so normal. The books on the shelves, the photos on the wall. I leaned closer to one of the photos: Melody laughing with her friends outside a bar, the streetlight casting a halo behind them, snow coming down.
I heard the water running in the shower. Then the water turned off. “Hey, Jack, come in here a minute, would you?”
I walked down the hall and opened the bathroom door. A blast of steam escaped into the hallway.
Melody stepped naked from the shower. My eyes got wide. Her blond hair was darker now, slicked back against her head. Drops of water were rolling down the curves of her breasts. “Hand me that towel, would you, Jack?” I reached out and cupped her breasts. She smiled. I pinched her right nipple and she playfully swatted my hand away. The bathroom air was hot and steamy. I tried to reach my hand between her legs but she took a step back, then looked up at me and winked.
Melody moved past me and sashayed down the hall toward the bedroom. I followed, hypnotized by her fantastic ass. She climbed onto the bed and then turned to face me. She smiled, spreading her legs. “Lick me, Jack.”
I walked over, knelt down, and spread her legs wider. I buried my face between her thighs. She tasted sweet like honey. Melody moaned and ran her fingers through my hair. She broke away and smiled. I reached for her, caressed her skin, and then grabbed her hips. She gasped as I flipped her onto her stomach. My fingers dipped into her folds. She moaned again and raised her ass toward me. I had a full rear view of her beautiful shaved pussy. I yanked down my pants. I was throbbing, jutting out like a cannon about to fire. I got behind her and pulled her closer. I slipped inside her warm slickness and began to move, slowly at first and then harder and faster. We rocked together. She moaned and I held her tight as we came, our bodies shuddering together.
Melody was quiet for a minute. We sat up and snuggled in together. She twirled her fingers through my chest hair.
“Jack, have you ever been in love?”
“Yes.” I thought about Cassandra. I thought about Suzanne. “Have you?”
Melody grinned. Her long fake nails raked across my chest. “What’s it like?”
CHAPTER 29
Melody and I were having fun together, but we weren’t exclusive. I’d been down that road before and it never ended well. My last girlfriend, Suzanne, had gotten shot because of me. She survived, but if the bullet had gone an inch to the left it would’ve been a different story. I met women sometimes, mostly at bars, women who smiled at me with a certain light in their eyes. I could offer them a fun night or two, but nothing more than that. I didn’t want to put anyone in harm’s way ever again.
I took a shower, got dressed, said goodbye to Melody, and took the Queen streetcar back toward Chinatown.
Cassandra woke up and bolted upright when I came through the door. She scrambled for the knife sitting on the floor next to the couch.
“Whoa, whoa! It’s only me.”
She pressed her hand to her chest. “You scared the shit out of me.”
I tilted my chin at the knife on the floor. “You take that from my desk?”
“Yeah. Hope you don’t mind.” Cassandra smiled her sad little half smile. “It makes me feel a little safer.”
I walked over to my desk and made a beeline for the bourbon bottle. Cassie frowned. “You ever think about quitting drinking?”
The brown booze glugged into the glass. That sharp, rotted fruit smell. “Sometimes,” I grinned, “when I’m hungover.”
“I’m serious. The way you drink … you’re killing yourself. You know how Jack Kerouac died?”
I shook my head.
“His guts blew up. An abdominal hemorrhage caused by too much drinking. He literally died drowning in his own blood.”
I stared at the bourbon glass in my hand.
“I know some people in the Program. I could make some calls.”
I set the bourbon glass down. “No. Don’t worry about me.”
“I do.” Cassie stared into my eyes. “I don’t want you to die.”
“I’m alive right now and so are you.” I picked up the glass of bourbon and knocked it back. “You got everything you need? Towels? Toothbrush?”
“Where are you going?”
“I’m heading down to the casino. Try to get some sleep, okay?”
“I’m serious, Jack. I don’t want you to die.”
I smiled. “That makes two of us.”
CHAPTER 30
Eddie inhaled, exhaled. A thin curl of smoke hung briefly in the air and then vanished. “Bad news, Jack. Aunt Cecilia died.”
I always thought Aunt Cecilia was going to live forever. She’d gone to sleep the night before in her Richmond Hill mansion, surrounded by gold-coloured furniture and goldfish and family photos in gold frames and all her other golden shit, and she never woke up. Vin found her in her bedroom, half on the floor, tangled in the sheets. He tried to revive her, but it was a no go. The entire time Vin was there, Aunt Cecilia’s cellphone kept buzzing on the night table. Word would spread fast that she was gone.
I walked over Eddie’s office rug to put my hand on the big man’s shoulder. “I’m so sorry, Eddie.”
Eddie exhaled. “It’s fucked up, you know? I just saw her the other night.”
“They’re sure it was her heart?”
Eddie nodded. “That’s the word. I’ve got my guys at the police station looking into it.” Eddie’s eyes narrowed. “I’ll tell you what, though. If it wasn’t her heart — if this shit comes back as murder — then a whole lot of motherfuckers are in for a world of hurt.”
I nodded. “Just say the word.”
Eddie patted his pockets, searching for his cigarettes. “Funeral’s in three days. She wanted you to be a pallbearer.”
“I’m honoured.” I paused. “Why me, though? I thought she hated me.”
Eddie smiled. “Are you crazy? She loved you, man. You know what she called you? Ngo ge gwaijai.”
“What’s that mean?”
Eddie laughed. “Basically it means ‘my white boy.’ I’m telling you, man, she loved you. You saved Dawn’s life. You think she’d ever forget?”
That was almost twenty years ago. Eddie was just getting started in the casino game. A gangster named King Diamond had decided to muscle in. To improve his bargaining power, King Diamond kidnapped Eddie’s daughter. We got her back. And King Diamond? Let’s just say that no one will ever see him again.
There was a knock on Eddie’s office door. “Come in,” he barked. Eddie’s guy Josh popped his head through the door. “Sorry for interrupting, Boss. There’s a guy upstairs looking for Jack.”
Eddie raised an eyebrow. “Who is it?”
“Said his name was Kevin Rhodes.”
Eddie and I looked at each other blankly. “You know a Kevin Rhodes?” he asked me.
I shook my head and turned to Josh. “What’s he look like?”
Josh shrugged. “You know those guys down in Florida with speedboats full of cocaine? He looks like that.”
Eddie and I went upstairs. The man I saw kicking back at the table near the front window of Eddie’s restaurant was about thirty-something, with wavy light-brown hair and a sunburned face. One thick arm was thrown across the chair next to him. The top few buttons on his light-blue shirt were undone, revealing a gold chain glittering within a mat of chest hair so thick it looked like a pelt. The man grinned and stood up.
“Jack Palace? I’m Kevin Rhodes.” He shook my hand and handed me a business card. “We had a mutual friend. He called himself The Chief.” Rhodes smiled. “I was his lawyer.”
I frowned. “What do you want?”
Rhodes kept smiling. “You got it backwards. It’s not what I want, it’s what I can do for you. You see, here in Ontario, after a person has been missing for at least seven years, they can be declared legally dead. Exceptions can be made if the individual has disappeared ‘in circumstances of peril.’ Like if a depressed person vanishes but a suicide note is fo
und next to the lake, stuff like that.”
I stared at the lawyer. “The Chief didn’t leave a note.”
“Oh, I know. But it’s been” — Kevin Rhodes squinted at his notes — “nine years.” The lawyer looked up and grinned. “I’m a little late. You’re a hard man to find, Mr. Palace.”
He slid an envelope across the table. Ricin … anthrax … Unabomber-style letter bomb.
“Sign here, will ya?”
“What is this?”
Rhodes grinned. “It’s the deed to The Chief’s trailer. Congrats, Mr. Palace. It’s all yours.”
CHAPTER 31
Gravel crunched under the tires as I drove up the long, curved driveway to The Chief’s trailer. The big barn with the gym inside sat about fifty feet behind it. In the winter, we’d move from the trailer to the gym and then back again, tromping our boots down into the snow to make a path. The snow on top of the path would ice over and then our boots would crunch through the ice.
I left a lot of sweat on that barn floor — sweat and more than a little bit of blood. The Chief broke my arm once during a training exercise. I thought I had the drop on him, but I didn’t. In my head, my arm made a sound like a twig snapping when The Chief broke it. Really there had been no sound, just a sudden lightning bolt of pain.
I got out of the car and walked through the weeds toward the trailer. One of the windows was broken and another one was boarded up. The roof was bent and swaybacked like a broken-down mule. The whole place was a lot smaller than I remembered. The Chief had filled this place with his spirit. When he lived here, the trailer and the barn buzzed with energy and activity. Even in quiet moments, sitting on the porch sharpening our knives, listening to the mooing of distant cows, hearing the rumble of trucks out on the highway. With him gone, the trailer had shrunk and started to collapse in on itself. Without The Chief, it was just an empty box.
I stood in front of the trailer door and pulled out the key the lawyer had given me. But I didn’t open it. Instead I put the key back in my pocket and headed over to the barn.
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