“Yeah. Sure. Just like me. Except you can come and go and I’m trapped in here with Tommy.”
Nemo held out his ham-sized hand. “No one’s trapped, all right? This right here is what you call a temporary situation. It’s for Tommy’s own protection. And your own protection.”
Rocco turned his mournful eyes toward me. “You hear that, Jack? My own protection.” Rocco leapt up and Nemo stepped back, his hand darting toward the waistband of his track pants. “Why the fuck do I need protection, Nemo? Huh? I’ve worked my ass off for this family. Now they’re going to turn their back?”
In a quiet, calm voice Nemo said, “Rocco. Sit down.”
Rocco blinked. I stepped away, removing myself from the line of fire. Without taking his eyes off Nemo, Rocco slowly shook his head. “What’s the matter with you, man? We go fishing together. I held your son in my arms.”
“You leave my son out of this.”
“In my arms! How many times have I eaten at your table? How many times?”
Nemo glanced away. “You know that shit doesn’t matter.”
“We’re friends! We’re fucking friends!”
The muffled gunshot sounded like a kid’s toy. Rocco’s mouth hung open as he looked down at the red hole in his chest. Wordlessly he slumped back and slid down the hallway wall.
Nemo loomed over Rocco’s body and shouted, “THAT SHIT DOESN’T MATTER!” Then Nemo turned to me. With a sheepish look in his eyes, he said, “Sorry you had to see that, Jack.”
I didn’t say anything. In less than half a second I could have a knife in my hand. In another half a second the big man could have a second mouth slashed across his throat.
Nemo lowered the gun. He shook his head. “Things … things are a little fucked up. I’ve been under a lot of pressure recently. A lot of stress. Sleep is important, you know? You don’t realize how important it is until you don’t get enough. You know what I mean?”
Rocco’s blood seeped into the carpet. I nodded at Nemo. “Sure. You got to get enough sleep.”
“Oh yeah. And it’s got to be quality. You can’t just toss and turn and wake up every five minutes. You got to get down into it, you know?”
“Yep.” I wondered if Nemo ever woke up screaming. “Sometimes when I’m travelling I bring my own pillow.”
“Oh yeah? Hey, that’s a good idea.”
I took a step away from the seeping puddle of blood. “You bet. It’s like a little piece of home wherever you go.”
“Yeah. Yeah. You know what, Jack? I’m gonna try that. Next time I go out of town, I’m going to bring my own pillow.” Nemo shook his head again. “I really am sorry about that. He deserved better, you know?”
I felt the air change and I braced myself. Nemo’s shot punched into the wall behind me but I was no longer there. Slow down the film: there I was kicking the gun from Nemo’s hand. That’s me spinning, the knife in my fist. The blade dipped into Nemo’s throat. My momentum carried me forward and pulled the knife free. There’s Nemo, a startled look on his face. His shattered trigger finger jerked, trying to fire the gun that was no longer in his hand. He stumbled back. With a lunge I stabbed the big man in his heart. The look of surprise turned into a look of agony. Nemo fell back dead.
I was standing in the hallway of the abandoned nightclub with two bodies on the floor and a bloody knife in my fist. Breathe in, breathe out. Slowly I stepped around the blood, squared my shoulders, and knocked on Tommy’s office door.
No answer.
“Tommy. It’s Jack.”
Strange whimpering sounds came from behind the door.
“It’s Jack. I’m here to help you.”
Tommy’s muffled voice. “Jack?”
“Yeah, Tommy. It’s me.”
“Rocco?”
“Nemo shot him. He’s dead.”
“Nemo?”
“He’s dead, too.”
The door opened a crack. A shaft of light sliced across the hallway. Tommy peered through the crack and blinked.
He looked horrible. Unshaven, dark circles, greasy hair. But something more than that. He looked haggard, as if wolves had been chasing him for weeks through abandoned frontier towns. For the first time that I could remember, Tommy looked afraid.
“Jack.” Tommy’s voice was hoarse, raspy, almost gone. “I’m a dead man.”
“Tommy.”
“They’re going to kill me.”
“No one’s going to kill you. I’m going to get us out of here.”
Cautiously, I moved forward. “I’m going to come into the office now. Okay? You’re going to be okay.”
Inside, the office smelled like fear: sweat and salt and urine. In the far corner Tommy had made a makeshift fort out of black leather sofa cushions.
Tommy had a gun in his hand. I took a step toward him, moving slowly, carefully. “Give me the gun, Tommy.”
Tommy scowled and shook his head. “Yeah, right. No fucking way.”
“Listen to me very carefully. Do you want to live? I can get you out of here, but we’re going to do it my way. Do you understand?”
Tommy’s eyes narrowed. “How do I know you’re not here to kill me?”
“You know me, Tommy. I’m not a killer.” Behind me, Nemo’s blood pooled in the hallway. “Now give me the gun.”
He did. For a split second an image flashed through my brain: me, turning the gun on Tommy and squeezing the trigger. Who would complain? One shot and I’d be free of Tommy forever. But I couldn’t do that. I checked the gun for bullets. It was fully loaded.
Tommy stumped across the carpet to the safe embedded above the bar. “I’m not leaving without my money.”
The money, the money. It was always about the fucking money. I felt like grabbing Tommy by his stinking shirtfront and shaking him like a dog with a chew toy. “FORGET THE FUCKING MONEY!” Tommy was the sort who would drown in a shipwreck, plummeting down into his watery grave still clutching a chest full of treasure. Let go and live. It’s that fucking simple.
Inside the safe were stacks and stacks of banded twenties. Tommy scooped them into a black leather bag and then turned to me. “All right, Jack. Get me the fuck out of here.”
Tommy headed for the door, but I stopped him. My palm thudded against his chest. “Here’s how this is going to work. You follow me. Stick close. Do whatever I say when I say it. No, don’t say anything. I know you don’t like it, but this is how it has to be. When I say jump, you fucking jump. You listen to me and you’ll live. You got that?”
Tommy clutched his money bag and sulked. “You wouldn’t talk to me like that if my dad was alive.”
Maybe he was right. “This has nothing do with your dad. This is about you and me staying alive. You ready? Come on, let’s go.”
In the hallway I led Tommy past the corpses of Rocco and Nemo. As he passed Nemo’s body Tommy kicked the big man’s corpse in the head and spat. “That’s what you get, you fucking prick.”
“Quiet.”
“I was just —”
“I said BE QUIET!”
Slowly I moved across the second floor toward a window overlooking the street. Two black SUVS were parked outside, drivers with sunglasses at the wheel. Four men in suits lounged against the cars. Another man in a suit was talking to the gangster with the hairpiece. Looked like for once Tommy was right. Little Vito’s crew was coming to kill him.
I doubled back.
“Hey, where the fuck are you going?”
“Your office. Come on.”
“Are you fucking crazy? We’ll be sitting ducks!”
I didn’t answer. Tommy shut his trap and followed me back down the hallway.
My fingers got sticky with blood as I lifted Rocco’s and Nemo’s guns. I don’t like guns, but sometimes you don’t have a choice. What had Grover said? “Don’t bring a knife to a gunfight.” I don’t like guns, but I do like living. I wasn’t going to let them carve “He Didn’t Like Guns” onto my tombstone.
I stuck Tommy’s gun in my waistband and checke
d the other guns for bullets. Other than the bullet Nemo had shot at me and the one bullet now lodged in Rocco’s chest, the guns were full. Good.
Inside Tommy’s office I made a beeline for the bar. Tommy opened his mouth and I shot him a look that could wilt flowers. Wisely he shut the fuck up. Amber liquid sloshed as I grabbed two big bottles of 150-proof rum. Tommy trembled as I strode over to him. Before he could protest, I ripped two strips from his dirty shirt.
“Hey! What the fuck?”
“Shut up.” The rum smelled like a doctor’s office in the Caribbean: pure alcohol with just a hint of cane sugar. I splashed the overproof booze onto the strips of Tommy’s shirt. Then I stuffed the booze-soaked strips into the now three-quarters-full bottles.
Tommy caught wise. His eyes lit up. I passed him one of the Molotov cocktails. “You still have your lighter?”
Tommy’s eyes gleamed as he held up his silver Zippo.
“Check it.”
Using his thumb, Tommy flipped the top. A butane flame leapt from the lighter.
“Good. No, don’t light it yet. Let’s go.”
Back into the hallway. With a grunt I heaved Rocco’s body onto my shoulder in a fireman’s hold. Lift with your legs, not your back. My teeth ground together as I struggled down the stairs. I was wishing anyone but Tommy was bringing up the rear. I wished The Chief were here, silently smiling, an AK-47 cradled lovingly in his arms. Or Grover. No, don’t think about Grover. What kind of madman blows up his own boat?
Downstairs I dropped Rocco’s body onto a chair. His blood had soaked through my shirt. I smelled copper and rum and Tommy’s sweat. The legs of Rocco’s chair scraped against the dance floor as I dragged it toward the door.
Tommy’s voice hissed in my ear. His breath could curdle milk. “What the fuck are you doing?”
“Shh. Wait.”
Rocco’s head slumped to the left. I positioned the chair about fifty feet away from the front door and pulled Rocco’s head upright. From a distance it looked like the dead man was guarding the door. At least, that’s what I was hoping. It won’t fool anyone for long, but it doesn’t have to.
I tilted my head close to Tommy’s ear. “They’re coming in the front. We’re going out the back. Hang on to that Molotov until we get outside. Got it?”
“Yeah. Yeah.”
“Good.”
I strode over to the bar and pulled down another bottle of overproof rum. Liquid amber splashed all over the floor in front of the front door. I saved the last swallow for myself. It was like drinking fire.
Tommy was a bundle of jittery nerves. I closed my eyes. If this didn’t work we were both dead.
Outside the door I heard voices, talking and laughing. Here they came.
I pointed toward the back door and Tommy ran, the Molotov sloshing in his hand. I raised my gun. The door opened and all hell broke loose.
Rapid-fire gunshots: the first two gangsters fell to the floor. Shouts and screams. More gunfire: bullets flew across the room and slammed into Rocco’s body. Rocco and his chair went tumbling backward. I dropped Tommy’s now-empty gun, sparked the Molotov with my lighter, and threw it overhand toward the gangsters storming through the door. More screams as the gangsters went up. Orange flames leapt toward the ceiling. My heart jackhammered in my chest as I ran for the back, unloading Rocco’s gun behind me.
Tommy was bug-eyed by the back door. From the alley I heard shouting and the revving of a car engine. Not much time. I chucked Rocco’s gun, pulled out Nemo’s revolver, and kicked down the back door. The door caught a gangster in the face. A hairpiece went flying. Nemo’s gun barked and two gangsters in suits spun and fell into the trash.
“Light and throw! LIGHT AND THROW!”
Behind me Tommy fumbled with his lighter. A black SUV pulled into the alley and rumbled straight toward us. A bullet whined, ricocheting off the brick wall, and I whirled and returned fire. A gangster in track pants clutched his throat and dropped to the ground. I grabbed Tommy’s Molotov, lit it, and hurled it at the oncoming car. Flames flickered against the windshield.
I shoved Tommy back into the club as the burning SUV hurtled by, missing us by inches. I grabbed Tommy’s arm and yanked him toward the street. “COME ON!”
Smoke alarms started to scream. How many left? I’d lost count. We pounded down the street and ducked into another alley. My chest heaved. It felt like my lungs had been packed full of broken glass. I flattened out against the brick alley wall and steadied my gun. No one was following.
We staggered through a maze of alleys, past bricks and graffiti and garbage. I ditched Nemo’s gun. It clattered into a Dumpster as we ran.
“Jack!” Over my shoulder I saw Tommy, legs wobbling, staggering over to a graffiti-covered wall. His face was as pink as a boiled lobster. Tommy braced himself against the wall, vomited all over his shoes, staggered a few feet and then collapsed in a doorway. “That’s it … I can’t … no more. No —” Tommy’s whole body shuddered. He turned and threw up again, a sickly green trickle.
I knew how he felt. I scanned the alley, trying to crane my neck toward the street beyond. “Wait here.”
The coast was clear. At the mouth of the alley I put my hands on my knees and lowered my head, trying to steady my breathing. Sweat dripped from my forehead to the dirty concrete. Cars passed by, the hush of tires on asphalt. From a window far above me I heard a girl singing. I’d heard that song before. Cassandra used to sing it, a million years ago. Leonard Cohen’s “Anthem.” The girl’s voice floated down into the alley, so sad, so sweet. I pulled myself upright, brushed sweat from my face, slicked back my hair, and casually sauntered across the street to a payphone. Men and women dressed in business casual gave me a wide berth. One blond woman in sunglasses saw me coming and crossed to the other side of the street. Hey lady, I may be sweaty, dishevelled, and covered in a dead man’s blood, but don’t judge a book by its cover. Really, I’m one hell of a fellow.
Quarters rattled into the payphone. “Eddie. It’s me.”
“Are you okay?”
“Just peachy. You?”
“I took your advice. Packed up and left.”
“Good man. Listen, we need a pickup.”
“How many?”
“Counting me, two.”
“You got it.”
Back in the alley I found Tommy wandering around in shock. I cracked him one across the face and that seemed to do the trick. His eyes flashed as he raised his fist. “Don’t you ever fucking hit me again. You hear me? I will fucking kill you. I will —”
“Yeah, yeah. I know. You’ll rip off my face and fry it in a pan with some garlic and onions.”
“Is that some sort of slur? Are you putting down my fucking heritage? I know people in the Anti-Defamation League. Don’t make me get litigious on your ass.”
Ignoring Tommy, I bent down and scooped up a fistful of garbage. Tommy watched incredulously as I smeared the garbage across my shirt front.
“What the fuck?”
“You ever hear of Urban Camouflage? Right now you look like a gangster. A fucked-up gangster, but still a gangster. Here.”
I threw a handful of muck at Tommy. He sidestepped. “What the fuck?”
“The Chief taught me this. Not every homeless person is dirty and smelly, but that’s what a lot of people think. If we look ‘homeless’ enough, people will look the other way. Now come on … we’ve got some walking to do.”
Tommy grumbled, but he followed my lead. Together we staggered from the alley, heading south. We weren’t that far from my office but we were heading in the opposite direction, toward the lake.
My office. The couch. My desk, my plant. I might not ever go back. Thinking about my plant dying slowly on my desk made my stomach hurt. Soil drying up, leaves curling and turning brown. Fuck Grover. He could be waiting in my office with a fucking machete for all I cared. I wasn’t going to let him kill my plant.
Tommy and I collapsed onto a park bench and sat there waiting. At our f
eet pigeons clucked and cooed. Cars went by. A young woman in yoga pants jogged past with her German shepherd. She glanced toward us and quickly looked away.
“Whaddaya know,” said Tommy. “It fucking works.”
Suddenly my mouth was the Sierra Desert. There were cacti and cattle skulls on my tongue. I wanted a beer the size of the Empire State Building. I wanted to dunk my face into a river of ice-cold beer and drink until my stomach hit my knees.
A nondescript black car pulled up and idled in front of the park. The passenger window rolled down and there was Eddie, masked behind his giant sunglasses. Salvation.
Inside the car the air conditioning felt like God himself was blowing me kisses. I grinned like a fool as I clapped Eddie on the shoulder. Beside Eddie, his driver muttered something in Cantonese.
“What’d he say?”
Eddie laughed. “He says you smell like shit.”
Tommy stiffened. I put my hand against his chest. “Relax, relax.… Say, Eddie?”
“Yeah?”
“You don’t have any beer in that glove box, do you?”
“Nope. But we’ve got plenty of beer back at the safe house.”
The Safe House. Such beautiful words. In my mind’s eye I saw billowing white sheets and fountains and swimming pools and bikini girls. The Safe House. Kebabs sizzling on the grill. Floating around the pool with an ice-cold beer in a styrofoam beer cooler. Waking up well-rested and stepping out onto the balcony to greet the sunrise. No worries. No hassles. The Safe House.
Needless to say, when we pulled up to the safe house it didn’t quite live up to my expectations. It was a plain old bungalow in Scarborough, all concrete and aluminum siding. Eddie’s driver pulled the car around into the garage and the garage door rumbled closed. Eddie turned to me and grinned. “Home sweet home.”
At the back door we kicked off our shoes. Tommy was asleep almost before we stepped inside. Eddie barked an order and two of his guys leapt up from the kitchen table and manoeuvred Tommy toward a bedroom. Without asking, Eddie opened the fridge and passed me an ice-cold beer. I knocked it back in about three-fifths of a second. Eddie smiled and passed me another.
I put my feet up on one of the avocado-green kitchen chairs. Eddie tilted his head. “There’s a hole in your sock.”
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