by Matt Rogers
‘Holt’s Saloon,’ King said.
Alexis nodded. ‘That one. I’ve got a date at eight tonight. How do you want to play it?’
Slater said, ‘How hard did you sucker him?’
‘He’s already in love with me.’
Slater said, ‘You got his number?’
‘Of course.’
‘Then you don’t show. He’ll call again and again. Send him a text saying you reconsidered and you don’t like his vibe. That’ll make him angry, and he’ll drink. I can almost guarantee he’ll go overboard. We’ll take him when he comes out, and give him a stern talking-to about his future life choices. After that he’ll never even think about touching what the Walcotts left behind.’
King said, ‘You’ll take him.’
Alexis looked at King. ‘Cold feet?’
Slater said, ‘And here we are. Full circle. Back to what you walked in on.’
Her green eyes shone as she computed everything she’d heard, then her internal processor spat out an explanation.
She said, ‘You both want out until the baby’s here?’
She’s prescient, Slater thought.
Violetta smiled. ‘You know us better than Will does.’
‘Not true,’ Slater said. ‘I suspected the same thing. I’m just not happy about it.’
King said, ‘Doesn’t sound like Mickey’s the sharpest tool in the shed. Slater, you can handle this just fine on your own.’
‘Maybe,’ Slater said. ‘But since when has that been our modus operandi? Since when do we do the bare minimum? The odds are a lot better if you’re there alongside me.’
King opened his mouth to speak but Slater shook his head.
‘You’re in a Catch-22,’ he said. ‘If this is no big deal and I can take care of it myself, then there’s no risk. Which means you can come along.’
King cut his retort off.
Slater said, ‘He’s a small-time crook who’s got his wandering eye on the big leagues. All we need to do is intimidate him. Either you come along, or we let him do whatever he’s going to do. And what if it works? What if he’s powerful enough to have more men than we thought? Then he’ll be in power within a week and this problem will be a whole lot worse.’
King said, ‘I’m not making exceptions.’
‘Come for the ride along,’ Slater said. ‘There’s no harm in that. I’ll do all the heavy lifting.’
King shook his head and turned away.
But Violetta nodded to him.
‘Go,’ she said. ‘If anything it’ll prove he can do it on his own. Indulge him.’
‘Indulge me,’ Slater said, winking when King turned back.
King mulled it over.
Slater said, ‘This is part of the Walcott job. An epilogue to it. We keep the wolves at bay for long enough and Walcott’s operation will fizzle out all on its own. Loans will go unpaid, contracts won’t be met, and his empire will slowly be forgotten. Then you can take your hiatus.’
King looked at Violetta. ‘If something goes wrong, don’t even think about coming after me.’
She stared back.
He said, ‘Better the kid has one parent than none.’
She didn’t respond.
He said, ‘Promise me that, and I’ll go.’
‘You have my word,’ she said.
He knew she meant it.
The four of them didn’t make promises lightly.
You couldn’t, doing what they did.
4
Night fell on Nassau.
King and Slater drove their rented Ford Explorer away from their villa on Montagu Bay. The view of Paradise Island shrank in the rear view mirror. The island off the coast had a golf course to the east and the towering hotel/casino complex named Atlantis to the west. The silhouette of the enormous complex faded from sight as they took Bay Street west, passing the ferry terminal and bridges connecting the island to the mainland. From this angle, the sun set under the bridge connecting two of the towers, lending beauty to the gambling powerhouse, sucking tourists into its web.
‘We didn’t change a thing,’ Slater ruminated. ‘Business booms, no matter what we do.’
King looked over. ‘What are you on about?’
Slater said, ‘Dylan Walcott owned a handful of low-tier casinos, and look what he was able to accomplish. You think the big enterprises are any different? We might as well go after it all.’
‘But we can’t go after it all,’ King said. ‘That’s impractical. What we can do is target that low tier you mentioned. Mickey Ream might make it to the upper tier, and then he’ll be a problem. We give him a talking to, and he’ll never become a problem.’
‘Or we get rid of him. That solves things fast. You can get back to Violetta. You can start your hiatus.’
King shot him a look as the sun melted into the horizon behind them. ‘Don’t start.’
‘Don’t start what?’
‘You know.’
‘You expect to carry on living with us, watch me go out to war, and sit back and be okay with it?’
King said, ‘I never said I was okay with any of it. But I know where my priorities lie.’
Slater said, ‘Right now, they lie with Mickey Ream. He gets into power, he starts loaning whatever Walcott’s got left to all the same people. You know you don’t want that to happen.’
King’s face hardened to steel. ‘Then let’s get this done.’
They crossed the north face of Nassau, sticking to Bay Street the whole way, and arrived at Holt’s Saloon at seven p.m., an hour before Mickey’s scheduled rendezvous with Alexis.
They parked in the public lot across the street, facing the building and Cable Beach beyond. Out at sea, they saw the outline of Balmoral Island, rapidly disappearing in the gloom.
Holt’s was a speakeasy, designed to look like it belonged in the Prohibition Era, with faux-Wild-West decor and an old-school façade. It mirrored the most popular bars and eateries on the island by taking a certain region’s culture and ratcheting the cheesiness up to eleven. But it was busy enough. Customers flowed in and out through the swinging saloon doors, and the murmur of a packed house floated through the open windows. It was a perfect night — the air was hot and the purple remnants of the sunset were brilliant in the sky overhead.
Slater called Alexis. ‘Break his heart.’
She said, ‘I’ll send the text now.’
They waited.
Not long, because trouble presented itself almost immediately.
It turned out Mickey Ream brought a few fellow Aussies along for the ride.
Three guys came out for a smoke break and lingered long after they finished their cigarettes. The whole trio were red-faced and thin-haired, but they were trying to look professional. They wore leather jackets and jeans despite the heat, and they cursed loudly and affectionately to one another, audible across the street. Their accents were thick but their tones were unsure, like they were pretending to be something they weren’t. Slater sensed them personifying the “fake it ’til you make it” axiom, acting like tough henchmen when they were really nothing more than hangers-on.
But Mickey was smarter than your average player, so they’d need to be dealt with.
Slater said, ‘We can’t jump him if his boys are there to form a guard of honour.’
King said, ‘What makes you think they’re with Mickey?’
Thirty seconds later, the guy on the left spoke a little too loud. ‘Nah, mate. We’re better out here. Bloke got the cold shoulder from that bird. Let him drink on his own.’
The words floated in through Slater’s driver’s window, which he’d buzzed halfway down as soon as they’d arrived.
Slater said, ‘Plan’s working.’
King said, ‘They’ll need taking care of, then.’
‘Surely a group of tough guys is minimum-wage work for you. You can handle it.’
King looked over. ‘Nice try.’
‘I’m serious.’
‘So am I. Go do wh
at you need to do. I’ll be here.’
Slater knew he wouldn’t make any progress with King, and the opening was there. It was dark now, and there was plenty of room in the shadows for a beatdown. He grumbled as he unbuckled his seatbelt, but King saw right through it.
King said, ‘You’ll survive.’
Slater said, ‘Maybe.’
He got out, crossed the street, and made to go inside. The trio parted, making way for him, but he pulled up short and stared daggers at the guy on the left. He’d been the loudest, and Slater targeted his ego. ‘You got a boss?’
The Australian cocked his head. ‘You drunk, mate?’
‘Not yet,’ Slater said. ‘That’ll come later. Business first.’
‘What’s your business?’
‘Go inside and tell your boss he needs to do better than hiring three limp-dick morons to protect him. That’s not going to cut it out here.’
Before the guy could stop him, Slater reached out and patted him on the cheek with a firm hand.
Then he turned and walked round the side of the building, out of sight of King and everyone else in Holt’s Tavern.
It was a gamble, but he was confident in the outcome.
They had two options.
Go inside and deliver the message like obedient dogs — the smart move. Or massage their bruised egos and follow the mystery man into the shadows. There were three of them. They could teach him a lesson he’d never forget.
They followed him like he had them on a leash.
Either way they were puppies, but this made them think they had a choice.
Slater squared up as soon as they rounded the corner, keeping the beach to his back.
Ready for a fight.
They read the atmosphere, and the guy he’d patted on the cheek sprinted at him with sinister intentions.
5
Slater saw the punch coming from a mile away.
The guy’s right cheek was redder than his left, the flush of alcohol accentuated by Slater patting his cheek seconds earlier. He was brimming with anger, seeing nothing but red, which helps you put all your adrenaline into the first punch but ruins your chances of fighting smart.
These guys had never fought smart in their lives.
The three of them were built, and that gave them confidence. Slater had seen it a thousand times before. The most dangerous person in a street fight is the one that understands they’re outmatched and adapts accordingly. It’s the skinny guy who’s trained in a multitude of effective martial arts to make up for the fact that he risks getting dropped by the first punch.
These guys here usually won with the first punch against untrained brawlers, so the first Aussie swung like he was looking to knock Slater unconscious with one right hook. It probably would have worked if it landed, but Slater employed an iota of head movement and the fist lashed past like a whip.
He felt the displaced air on his cheek but then he was inches from the guy, fighting in a phone booth, and before the man could recalibrate Slater used his forehead like a battering ram to crunch into the bridge of the guy’s nose. He delivered the headbutt with just enough force to shatter the septum. Considering the momentum of each party, it didn’t take much.
The guy was tough.
He didn’t go down.
He didn’t even take a step back.
His head recoiled from the sharp shock of the pain, but apart from that he was still very much in the fight. He started swinging wildly, both fists clenched, refusing to aim and instead trying to hit anything he could get his hands on.
Which was the right strategy.
Sometimes stupidity benefits you by helping you accidentally make the correct decision.
Slater took three punches — one to the gut, one to the side of his arm, and one to the shoulder. The last two were meaningless, but the first left a sting. Nothing to be overly concerned about, but still impressive given the skill gap. It’d take a clean full-power strike to Slater’s liver to shut him down — in the past he’d fought with broken bones, severe concussions, torn muscles. This was nothing in comparison, but it might have worked on someone less experienced.
Shame, Slater thought. You did better than you’ll end up thinking you did.
The three punches bounced off him and he returned with a precise right hook to the guy’s jaw, putting a little extra pop into it to pay the guy back for his successful hit. It broke the guy’s jaw and the stunning reverberation of the crack in his head made him recoil harder. Now physics required him to take a step back to stop himself toppling over, so he did.
As soon as he was separated from the phone-booth style fight, understanding washed over him. He realised his nose and jaw were both cracked. He bent over, caved to the pain, and went down. Incapacitated not by the damage itself, but by his acceptance of the damage. Slater had learned to control that decades ago. If he hadn’t, he wouldn’t be standing here.
The other two Aussies saw their friend fall over and submit, which had a stronger effect than if they’d seen him get sparked clean unconscious. Giving up is a whole lot more demoralising than being taken out of the fight involuntarily.
But they were brave.
Or stupid.
Sometimes the two go hand in hand.
They charged at the same time, which was also the right idea, and Slater got the impression they were more than casual brawlers. You take the movie approach of attacking the hero one by one and — surprise, surprise — it doesn’t work in your favour.
But Slater was physically stronger than both of them put together so he just grabbed the side of one guy’s skull and used it as a bowling ball to smash against the second guy’s shoulder. The first guy went down and the second guy stumbled off-course from the impact, and Slater lined up a high kick like he had an invisible targeting system and threw it. Which is a terrible idea if you’re evenly matched in a street fight, because as soon as you take one leg off the ground you risk getting taken down, where your adversary can beat your brains into the pavement, but Slater recognised a fight-ending sequence and went for it.
It landed, boot to jaw.
The guy walked right into it.
He went out cold with his feet still under him and collapsed at the knees, probably twisting an ankle as he went down.
It’s hard to protect your joints when you’re asleep at the wheel.
Slater took stock.
The first guy was done, the second guy was swimming in the unreality of semi-consciousness, and the third wouldn’t have his senses back for hours. He’d wake up in thirty seconds — no one stays out for much longer than that unless they’re comatosed or dead — but he’d be awfully confused for the rest of the night, dizzy and sick and disoriented.
Slater squatted by the second guy — the one he’d used as a makeshift bowling ball — and lifted his head off the pavement.
The guy stared up with unfocused eyes, but he was certainly more lucid than the other two.
Slater said, ‘Here’s what you do. You’ll be back to full health first, before your buddies. They’re both going to need trips to the ER. One’s got most of his face rearranged and the other’ll have a mean concussion. You’ll have a headache for a few days, but you’ll be fine in the long run. All of you will. That’s unless you try to do the brave thing and go inside and tell your boss what happened. If it goes that way, all three of you will be in a ditch by the morning. I don’t think you’re ready to die, so I think you’ll make the smart move. If Mickey’s alive tomorrow and asks what happened, you show him your injuries and tell him an ambulance got to you before you could contact him. You throw your phones away and tell him your attacker took them. Then everyone walks away happy to be alive. My people and I are going to have a chat with Mickey later tonight, and if we get a whiff that he’s onto us beforehand, all three of you are dead. Look me in the eyes and tell me you’re not ready to die.’
The guy’s lip was split where he’d bitten it in the clash of head against shoulder, so blood ran down
his chin as he mumbled, ‘I’m not ready to die.’
‘Good. Tell me you’re going to do the right thing.’
‘I’ll do the right thing.’
‘Get to it,’ Slater said. ‘As soon as you start considering dialling Mickey’s number, think of me.’
He lowered the guy’s head back to the concrete and rounded to the front of Holt’s Tavern.
A couple in their thirties were on their way out of the saloon doors.
The man nodded a friendly greeting to Slater.
Slater nodded back, and returned to the rented SUV across the street like nothing was amiss.
6
King gave him the evil eye as he slipped back into the driver’s seat.
Slater closed the door behind him. ‘What?’
‘You just left them there? Round the corner.’
‘Yeah,’ Slater said.
King stiffened. ‘Don’t tell me you killed them.’
Slater rolled his eyes. ‘Of course. I murdered three idiots who probably have no idea what they’re really doing here.’