The Long Fall

by Daniel Quentin Steele

  He was surrounded by a dozen bodyguards, lawyers, flunkies and PR guys but it only took five armed cops to separate him from his entourage and escort him up to my office. It was just Carlos, Henry and myself in my office. Everyone else had been encouraged to be elsewhere.

  He stood there looking at me and shaking his head.

  “You are so stupid I can’t believe someone hasn’t killed you before this. In about five minutes my people are going to have everybody from the governor up to the president’s office tearing your hide off. You’re done. And the Spic, well I have to be careful of my words because I’m sure you have this place bugged, but I wouldn’t make any long range plans if I were you.”

  I leaned back against my desk and motioned for Carlos to sit in a comfortable chair. He had no idea what was going on.

  “Mr. LaMark, please strip.”

  “Go fuck yourself.”

  I walked around the desk and opened the top drawer. I pulled out the loaded Glock I always kept there. I pointed it at LaMark’s head and asked, Carlos, “You did see Mr. LaMark pick up that poker (pointing at an ornamental poker upright near the fake fireplace in the corner) and try to attack me with it. You saw it.”

  He had no idea, but he went along, nodding his head and saying, “Si, yes. I saw him attack you.”

  I spoke quietly and conversationally to LaMark who looked like he was about to stroke out with rage.

  “I suppose it was understandable. You were overcome with grief and rage and lost control. Unfortunately, with two bullets in your brain, you won’t be able to deny my version of events. Your family and your people will probably try to cause me trouble, but I doubt that the Florida powers that be will be too upset about a Texas blowhard meeting his fate here. I might even get a raise out of this.”

  “You wouldn’t dare.”

  “You threatened the lives of my wife and children. Forget about Carlos, who I like, you crossed the line. Unfortunately you’re rich and powerful enough that you could get to them. But you’re a lot less worrisome if you’re dead.”

  “I-“

  “Strip or die.”

  When he was naked I asked Carlos to hold the Glock and I inspected his clothing very carefully, then ran an electronic anti-bugging wand over every item of clothing. I let him put his clothes back on.

  “This is a very carefully engineered office. There’s no way conversations can be taped here. Unless you brought in a bug, which now I’m sure you didn’t. So we can have a little conversation.”

  I unlocked a drawer that no one has a key to except myself and took out a packet of photos. I gave them to LaMark. He glanced through them and the color left his face.

  “What is this?”

  “When you’re in this job you meet a lot of people. You have the opportunity to do favors, to go easy when mercy is justified, even to some bad people. And sometimes the people you take pity on have very powerful, and very cruel and very dangerous friends and family. I’ve done favors over the years for some of those people.

  “Before we leave here today, I’m going to call one of those friends on a throw-away cell I keep in my office. Can’t be traced. And if, in the next few years or even later, I fall down an elevator shaft, or Carlos has an unexplained car accident, or my wife vanishes and is never seen again, the word will go out.

  “I know you have a pretty new bride and two four-year-old twins at home in Houston. Nothing will happen right away. But one day, no matter how many bodyguards you hire or where you run, they will find you. You’ll come home one day and find your wife’s headless body in bed, with evidence that she was raped every way a woman can be raped and tortured before her head was taken. You’ll find pieces of your children.

  “Now I wouldn’t, couldn’t, do that even if you harmed my family, but it’s out of my hands once I make that phone call. And the people I call…well, they can do that kind of thing.”

  I put the Glock back in my drawer and gestured to the door.

  “You can go now, Mr. LaMark. We’re through.”

  He just stood there. You don’t get that wealthy without being very smart.

  “Don’t make the call. Mr. Maitland, don’t do it. I apologize. He’s my son. You’ve got a boy. You have to know how hard it is to see him behind bars for the best part of his life. Whether you believe me or not, I wouldn’t have hurt you or – Mr. Herrerra. I wanted to scare you, make you pay by wondering every day when the axe would fall. I’m a tough businessman, but I’m not a killer, even by proxy.”

  “Fair enough, Mr. LaMark. Now you can sweat every day for a long time wondering if I am going to make that phone call. I hope I never see you again.”

  When he walked out shakily, Herrerra came to me and put his hand on my shoulder.

  “Would you have made that phone call?”

  “He’ll never know.”

  Carlos still had the same old gym which was really a training site for would-be and never-will-be boxing hopefuls. It had weights and weight bags and a ring and posters of old time fighters. It still smelled like old gym socks. I think he probably could have had it smelling nice and fresh, but the image of the place would have suffered.

  He hugged me and introduced me to a few guys who were all whipcord muscle and tattoos, in their early 20s.

  “This is Mr. Maitland, the District Attorney I told you about. He got justice for my Juan. He is a good man.”

  After exchanging pleasantries, Carlos and I went off into his office. Any smaller and you’d have to call it a walk-in closet.

  We talked and I explained why I’d come.

  “I am sorry to hear of this,” he said. “I lost my wife 20 years ago, but it was different. She had the cancer. But we loved each other until she drew her last breath. I cannot imagine how it would hurt – that kind of betrayal.”

  He took a sip of a steaming cup of coffee, the small cup filled with that black sludge that Cubans consider coffee which will dissolve metal spoons if you leave them in it long enough.

  “But, Billy, wouldn’t it be easier just to get a gun and shoot this bastard?”

  I shook my head.

  “He hasn’t killed anybody. He just stole my wife. And he didn’t really steal her because you can’t steal people. She gave herself to him. I don’t even know that I’ll ever touch him. It’s just – just that he humiliated me. In front of her. Not only is he sleeping with her, but when we meet we’ll both know he could mop the floor with me. I want to know in my own mind that I’m his equal – physically.”

  He looked at me for a moment, rubbed his chin and then said, “Come with me.”

  I walked back into the gym area with him. He motioned to a bare chested young man with the typical rangy build of a boxer and the tattoo of a huge fierce eagle covering his entire chest, the wings spreading out to his shoulders.

  “Ernesto, c’mere.”

  Ernesto ambled over, looking at me curiously. He was close to six feet tall and had arms that seemed three feet long. He had been sparring and had gloves on.

  “What, Papa?”

  “Get on up into the ring. I want you to go around with Billy – Mr. Maitland.”

  “Around?”

  The look on his face said it all. He didn’t think I’d last three seconds.

  Carlos gave him a stern look.

  “Billy is not a professional. Take it easy. Just a workout. I want to get an idea what kind of fighter Billy could become. If I took him on.”

  Ernesto shook his head.

  “He’s an old man.”

  In a move that was fast even for a younger man, Carlos cuffed him on the right ear and said, “I’m older than he is, and I can kick your ass. Get in there.”

  Ernesto stepped into the ring. I stood on the apron.

  “You sure this is a good idea?”

  “Step in or walk away, Billy. It’s like when you decide to chase a woman. You either go for it, or you don’t. What do you want to do?”

  I stepped inside the ring. Ernesto just stood ther
e. There was a faint grin on his face.

  “Try to hit him, Billy, and try to keep him away from you. Ernesto, don’t hurt him, too badly.”

  I remembered the night with Doug. I felt just as foolish, but I raised my hands, then thought to call to Carlos as I turned back to look at him, “Do I need boxing g-“

  A moment later I felt my cheek on the canvas and realized I was lying on my face. Blood was dripping from my lip. Somehow a tooth on the lower right of my mouth had carved a chunk out of the inside of my lip. I shook my head and got to one knee. I looked over at Carlos.

  He shrugged apologetically and said, “No gloves. And you never turn your back on a man you’re facing in the ring. Call it lesson one.”

  Ernesto also shrugged as I got to my feet but he didn’t look guilty.

  I raised my fists and swung, first the right, then the left. He deflected both punches without seeming to move his arms and suddenly there was blood spurting out of my nose and he was dancing away. As it had with Doug, being hit in the nose hurt like hell.

  I rubbed the blood away.

  “Fuck, that hurt.”

  “It’s supposed to,” Ernesto said, glancing over at his mentor. “It don’t hurt, you don’t learn to cover up.”

  I went at him again, and again, and again. I never laid a hand on anything but the outer sides of his forearms and once or twice I bopped him on a shoulder. He busted my lips three times and hit me in the nose twice more and the second time he made me scream. Damn, but it hurt.

  “Work the body,” Carlos called and suddenly Ernesto hit me twice, hard in the stomach. I was down on one knee gasping for air. I lurched to my feet gasping and he hit me again twice. This time I was down on the canvas rolling back and forth trying to catch a good breath. It felt like he’d busted ribs.

  After awhile I was able to roll to my knees. I was getting ready to smash Ernesto in the balls if he was gentlemanly enough to try to help me up, but he just stood there. Carlos was kneeling down beside me.

  “It’s okay, Billy. This was just to see some things.”

  “Like what,” I gasped.

  “Your reflexes, speed, upper body strength. I got to tell you, we got some work to do. You got no reflexes, your speed is pathetic, and you really hit like a girl.”

  I managed to grin at him.

  “Don’t sugarcoat it, Carlos. Be straight.”

  He patted me on the shoulder.

  “It’s not so bad. You’re a 40-year-old guy with no conditioning. You got no strength or speed and I don’t think you’re going to be contending for any titles soon, but we can turn you into a fighter. We’ll put you on the heavy bag for strength, work on timing and rhythm, put you on the free weights. You need to start running. For endurance and conditioning.”

  He helped me to my feet. I realized my face hurt like hell.

  “What about my face?”

  “Put some ice on it. Don’t worry, Ernesto didn’t do any damage.”

  “No damage?”

  “Billy, it won’t be long you won’t even notice crap like that. It’s like scratching your arm. It’s nothing. That’s part of learning to fight. But right now, we need to go somewhere.”

  I followed him out of the downtown to a gym in Avondale. It was a big two story affair, an older place. There were plenty of cars and lots of men and women inside. They were working on weights, Nautilus machines, stationary bikes and treadmills and there was a pool at the back end. He introduced me to Dan Hurly, the owner and told him he wanted to get me set up with a personal trainer, at least at first until I got to know the ropes.

  “I want you to give Mr. Maitland a key, Dan. He works strange hours and I want him to be able to come in here any time he needs to. The cops won’t hassle him because he’s a prosecutor.

  Hurly looked at me funny for a minute, then shrugged and said, “If Carlos vouches for you, okay. I’ll get you a key. Wait here and I’ll get you a trainer.”

  Carlos patted me on the shoulder.

  “You start exercising and working out here. And come by the gym for the bags and a little sparring. It won’t be quick, but you work at it and it won’t be too long before you’ll be kicking this guy’s ass. And maybe getting some of your wife’s? Right?”

  I just shook my head but said, “Thank you, Carlos.”

  “De nada, my friend. I can never pay you back. Not in this lifetime. Good luck.”

  Hurly came back with a short muscular black guy who spent the next hour going over the weights and the Nautilus machines. I tried not to feel too self-conscious, because there were 70 year old grannies and guys with pot guts three times bigger than mine on some of the machines.

  Or course, there were also some middle aged matrons with spectacular butts and even better chests in outfits that ranged from the nearly obscene to relatively demure. And there were teeny boppers as young as Kelly and watching their hard young bodies really made me feel like a pervert.

  After only an hour it was all I could do to drag myself to my Escalade and make it back to the Liberty Street condo. I was able to get to the bed where I intended to catch a few winks. That was at 4 p.m. When I opened my eyes again it was 1 a.m. and I just threw my clothes on the floor, crawled under the covers, and for a little while I was able to forget that I was alone.

  “Aaaaaaaaaaghgghghghghgh.”

  “Ohhhh….my god…baby….baby, don’t move…leave it in there.”

  She could feel his heart hammering in his chest, that gorgeous hairless, smooth hard chest and it was almost as if they shared the same heartbeat. She gasped and tried to draw oxygen in because it felt like she was going to pass out.

  Inside her she could feel the hard rigidity of his maleness softening with each spurt, and each gush made her insides quiver. It was impossible for anything to feel this good. She tried to remember if it had ever been like that in college, even when she was stoned. She didn’t think so.

  She rubbed the sweat from her face and laughed. It was so crazy, discovering sex when you were about to turn 40. Her pussy was sore from the relentless pounding of his dick over the last 20 minutes, her breasts so heavy and swollen they hurt; he had sucked and pulled on them so roughly. But it was a good hurt!

  She thought he had finally stopped cumming inside of her as he rolled to lay beside her.

  “My God, Doug, how much cum do you have stored away in there. We’re going to have to change the sheets to get some sleep.”

  She could feel him grinning in the darkness.

  “A lot of that is you. You know you cum like a fountain?”

  “Damn, that’s your fault. I felt like I’d never stop. I couldn’t count how many times you made me.”

  “I never came like that before.”

  “I bet you say that to all the girls.”

  He held her head in his hands and bruised her lips with his kiss.

  “It’s the truth and you know it, Debbie. You’re special. We’re special together. I thought I knew what great sex was, but now…”

  She knew it was the truth. It was like that for her too. Then something started to enter her head, a thought, and she shook it as if to physically throw it out. To stop thinking she pushed herself away from him and rolled to the edge of the bed.

  “I’ve got to go pee and clean myself up, baby. Change the sheets.”

  She turned the bedroom nightlight on and ate up the sight of his male body lying next to her. As she got up and headed for the bathroom she heard him say behind her, “Hey, where are the sheets.”

  She found herself starting to say, “You know where they are, dummy, in the closet over the-“

  And then she realized who she was talking to. Of course, HE didn’t know where the sheets were. He had only been in her bedroom the last few weeks. He didn’t know where everything was. How could he? She bent over the bathroom sink and tried not to cry, and if she did, not to let him hear.

  “Hey, I’m thirsty. You just absorbed all my bodily fluids. I’m going to get a coke out of the fridge
. You want anything?”

  She tried to make her voice steady as she said, “No, I’ll get the sheets. You go get a coke.”

  He was gone a few minutes and she had changed the sheets when she heard a faint crash, the shattering sound of glass breaking. She almost ran into the kitchen where she saw the fragments of blue black glass and shards of white and a pool of colorless liquid.

  He stood there looking helplessly at the mess on the kitchen floor.

  “I’m sorry, Deb,” he said, looking childishly guilty. “I just turned around and my arm hit it. I didn’t know it was so close to the edge of the counter. What was it?”

  “Just a knick knack. A souvenir. It was a Snow Globe we got up in Alaska years ago. No big deal. Let me get a mop and I’ll clean it up. Won’t take a second. You go back to bed, in case the kids get up. Okay?”

  He came over and kissed her on the cheek, kneading one breast which normally would make butterflies crawl all over her body. Now it just…she casually pushed his hand away and tried to laugh.

  “Not now, you horny bastard. Go back to bed. I’ll be there in a minute.”

  When he had left the room, she sank to her knees and sat there on her haunches looking at the glass and white shards and colorless liquid mess. She remembered the way the glaciers had glistened in the sun as she and Bill had walked the deck of the cruise ship. She remembered the feel of his hand as he stroked her face and how it felt as he came inside her in their cabin at night, how hard his cock was.

  She remembered his picking out the snow globe in the tourist shop and telling her that this would always remind them of their fifth anniversary.

  And now it was just a broken mess on a kitchen floor. The memories were gone, the marriage was gone. The love was gone. How could she be panting under Doug and loving the feel of his hard cock squirting his hot cum deep inside her and still feel this way, about a knick knack?

  It was like life. You plan for things to stay solid and be there forever. But they break and they wind up thrown in the trash. Just like her and Bill. But it wasn’t her fault. She knew that. It was Bill, the sorry bastard. He had thrown their life away.