by Sam Burns
He tuned up, playing a few basic scales to work the morning clumsiness out of his fingers and then headed over to get to work.
“How was your date?” Elsi asked.
He smiled at her dreamily. “It was nice.”
“I’m glad. It’s good that you’ve found someone.” She gave him the beat of their usual first number, and he followed along with his part, closing his eyes and enjoying the feel of the instrument in his hands.
“Thanks, Els,” he said after a moment. “How’s, uh, Howard?”
“Hugh,” she corrected. “He’s good. And I think it’s over. He can’t take Nana, and she can’t stand him. We just haven’t made it official yet.”
Jake frowned at her. “That sucks, Elsi. I know you liked this one a lot.”
She shrugged. “Not meant to be. I just wish Nana would stop trying to set me up with boys she knows. Mrs. Silver’s grandson is like sixteen. Pretty sure it would be illegal for me to date him.”
They all tried to hide their laughter, but failed. Elsi played a joke rimshot and gave a tiny bow from her stool. “Thank you, thank you, I’m here all week. And then some more. And my love life is just getting lamer with time.”
They practiced at Elsi’s family home in La Grange. It was a really nice place, complete with four bedrooms and a two-car garage where the band practiced. It had been remodeled as a proper part of the house, so it was insulated from the outside world but still windowless.
Alex figured it had been a playroom when Elsi and her brother were younger. He was married and living in Lincoln Park with his wife and kids, though, so the room had long since been repurposed to Elsi’s new needs, complete with soundproofing foam.
Elsi’s mother slipped into the room, looking apologetic. “Sorry if I’m interrupting something, I just needed to grab some things out of the fridge.”
Elsi covered her face with her hand. “Seriously, Mom? You couldn’t have done that, like, before practice?”
“It didn’t sound like you were playing anything important, so I figured you weren’t busy,” she protested. “And if I don’t have dinner done on time, you know how your grandmother is.”
“And if dinner’s late because of not being able to get into the garage, she’ll blame us,” Jenna pointed out diplomatically. “We don’t want that.”
Despite not really understanding the band, Elsi’s parents were supportive of what they saw as a passing whim. Alex suspected that they would be less enthusiastic when they realized how serious she was about Fred. Her Nana was already saying that she needed to settle down and get married.
Jenna, on the other hand, was pushing for a tour. Elsi had the van, and since Alex wasn’t in school anymore, she figured they could just pack up and go, playing for gas money as they went. Alex was thankful for the upcoming nights at Wilde’s, since they mollified her. He wanted to go on tour sometime, but not in the middle of getting out on his own and trying to start a relationship, both for the first time.
Mrs. Spielman smiled at them. “You know I would never sell you out. I just don’t want to face her wrath.”
“She’s pretty tough on you,” Jake agreed.
“I’m the opposite of what she wanted in a daughter-in-law.” She said it without malice, and Alex had to admire her for it. “I’m just happy that your brother married a nice Jewish girl, so she doesn’t have to face your grandmother’s displeasure so often.”
He liked Nana Spielman, but he thought that if he had to be on her bad side for more than two decades, he probably wouldn’t. She didn’t hold back her insults when she was feeling salty.
Mrs. Spielman dug through the extra fridge for a few minutes before cursing under her breath. “Unbelievable.”
“No chicken?” Elsi asked, sounding unsurprised.
Her mother shook her head and closed the fridge. “Forget about it. I’ll call your father to bring food home from the deli. Oh, I almost forgot,” she said, trailing off.
Elsi gave them an exasperated look, as if to point out that her mother obviously had not forgotten. and it seemed she had been waiting for the right time to bring something up. “Yes, mom?”
“You were talking about something next Tuesday. You’re playing somewhere? On a weeknight?” Her voice held a note of displeasure.
Elsi’s mouth fell open. “Yes? You remember I’m not in high school anymore, right? Done with college, too.”
“I know, dear. It’s not that, really. I just worry about you being in the city after dark.” She did look concerned. Alex wondered what that was like for Elsi. He felt like he’d gotten away with more than her because his mother didn’t emote enough to make him feel guilty.
“It’s not a bad spot, Mrs. Spielman,” Jenna offered. “It’s an upscale place in Old Town.”
“Really?” Elsi’s mother asked. “That sounds important. Are you actually getting paid for this one?”
Elsi opened her mouth to rebut, but Jenna stepped between them. “We are. Quite well, in fact.”
“Oh.” Mrs. Spielman seemed nonplussed. It was as though all the fight had gone out of her at the notion that they had a ‘real’ job. “Where is it, then? In case I need to come pick you up.”
Elsi scoffed, and Alex had to bite his lip to keep from laughing. He shared a look with Jake that said he was doing the same. “Busybody,” Elsi whispered, too low for her mother to hear.
Jenna just kept smiling, ever the consummate actress and people pleaser. “Wilde’s. It’s a great place. Reservations, food too expensive for me to afford, the works. The owner’s name is Keegan Quinn. He’s a great guy. I can give you his card if you want. Heck, Alex works there.”
Mrs. Spielman’s face scrunched up in confusion. “Quinn?”
Jenna nodded. She glanced back at the rest of the band with a quizzical look. They all shrugged at her, in sync with each other.
“I know that name,” Elsi’s mother continued. “I’m sure I—oh! Quinn! Did your father introduce you, Alex?”
Anyone could have heard the proverbial pin drop in the garage.
Alex hadn’t even realized Mrs. Spielman knew who his father was, let alone anyone he might have worked for.
“My father?” he asked, and he was proud of how even his voice was.
She nodded. “Your father was a big deal in this town. I remember seeing him in the news sometimes. He worked for Mr. Quinn, didn’t he? I mean, Brendan Quinn?”
“Who’s that?” Elsi asked. When everyone else stayed quiet, she tapped her snare. “Um, hello?”
“He’s a bad guy,” Jake answered. “A really bad guy. He’s related to Keegan?”
Mrs. Spielman nodded. “He must be related. I mean, how many Keegan Quinns are there in the world? He’s his son, I think.” She seemed to realize the gravity of her revelation, and tried to backtrack. “I’m sure Mr. Quinn isn’t as bad as they say, though. He always seems so nice when he’s on television.”
“Mom,” Elsi said gently. “You should go call Dad before he leaves the deli and it’s too late for him to bring dinner.”
Despite the fact that there were probably hours before her husband left the deli for the day, Mrs. Spielman nodded and left, looking concerned and a little bit chastised.
Silence descended on the garage as the door shut behind her.
8
Liam's Terrible, No Good, Very Bad Day
Patrick O’Hanrahan was one of the most unpleasant people Liam had ever had the misfortune to meet. Everything about him screamed ‘villain’, from his slicked-back hair to his perpetual sneer. He even had a goatee. His hair still had hints of the gold it must have been in his youth, but he had gone mostly gray, and it made him look older than he was.
None of that really mattered, though. It was his eyes that told the story. Despite the warm brown of them, they were shark eyes, flat and cold.
They were focused on Liam, and it was all he could do not to shudder. He had seen men die right in front of him, but a guy nicknamed Patty freaked him out. It was kind
of embarrassing.
“So what have you been up to, Kennedy?” O’Hanrahan asked.
He must already know the answer, which meant that the question itself was a test. “The assignment Quinn gave me,” he answered. He tried to look bored, and he was pretty sure he pulled it off.
O’Hanrahan scratched his chin and nodded as though remembering. “Right. The cake job. Following some rich brat around.”
Liam raised an eyebrow, but didn’t say anything. He’d been watching Casey turn men to jelly with that look for a year. He thought he had it down.
It seemed he was right, since O’Hanrahan gave up after just a second or two. “What the hell ever. If Bren wants to waste time and money on a debt that doesn’t exist anymore, it’s his to waste.” He sneered again. “But I hired you. You remember that, boy.”
Liam nodded. It was true. Patty was the one he had gone to for the job. Liam had gotten his start in the organization through him, because he was the best suspect in the gun smuggling.
In that moment, Liam was absolutely certain that his initial suspicion was correct. Trying to make Liam admit loyalty to him over Quinn? It meant Patty O’Hanrahan was up to even less good than usual.
He had almost blown off the meeting to stay with Alex. O’Hanrahan wasn’t supposed to be taking up his time anymore; Quinn had given him a full-time assignment watching Alex. Admittedly, that assignment had mostly consisted of hanging out at Wilde’s a lot, but it was still his job. He tried to ignore the little voice in his head reminding him that his real job had nothing to do with Alex, and everything to do with meetings like this one.
His job was to find Chicago’s new source of illegal firearms. Liam was pretty sure that source was O’Hanrahan. The sooner he could put the man away, the sooner he could tell Alex the truth. He needed to focus on that. If he wanted a chance with Alex, he needed to finish the job, tell him everything, and hope that Alex could forgive him.
That was why he was sitting on a crate at the docks, waiting around. He didn’t know what they were waiting for, but he suspected that whatever it was, it wasn’t going to be good.
Patty’s nephew Donny wandered up, and Liam reflexively gave him a dirty look.
“Problem, Kennedy?” Patty asked.
He did a short mental list of acceptable answers, and decided to go with the closest thing to the truth. “If he hadn’t told anybody I screwed the kid, I wouldn’t be stuck on babysitting duty.”
Donny laughed. “S’what ya get for being a queer.”
O’Hanrahan gave him a dirty look. “Maybe you should try it some time, Donald. You’d stop bringing those damn gold-digging waitresses home and making your mother sad.”
Donny wrinkled up his nose. “Ya can’t try being queer, Uncle Pat. It makes ya queer.”
Snorting, O’Hanrahan looked at Liam and rolled his eyes. “I may not like you, Kennedy, but at least you’re not this fucking lump.”
Instead of taking offense at his uncle’s words, Donny turned an accusing glare on Liam. Liam made a face at him. It was childish, sure, but sometimes it was best to fight fire with fire. In this case, he figured no one cared if he disrespected Donny O’Hanrahan.
Liam wasn’t sure how long they waited, only that it seemed to be longer than the entire last two weeks.
He finally heard the sound of a car behind him and slipped off his crate, turning to watch and getting a bit of cover between himself and whoever was approaching.
It was exactly the sort of vehicle one expected at such a meet. A big, black SUV with tinted windows pulled up next to a nearby warehouse. Two thugs climbed out of the front seat, looked around, and when they spotted Liam and the O’Hanrahans, one watched them while the other went to open the back door.
A guy in a suit got out of the back, an aluminum briefcase in his hand. He sent an oily smile in their direction and slid a hand over his hair. He looked like he went to the O’Hanrahan school of villainy, where they taught the joys of too much hair gel and extensive facial hair sculpting.
The man slammed the door of the SUV closed, and it set Liam’s teeth on edge. There was something discordant about deliberately making a loud noise at a back-alley deal.
His gait was smooth, like a dancer’s, as he headed toward them, flanked by his thugs.
“Patrick,” he said in a smooth, Spanish accented voice as he got closer. “How lovely it is to see you again.”
Something was bothering Liam. He glanced at the others, and while Patty seemed suspicious, that was nothing out of the ordinary. Donny looked bored.
“Donald,” the man greeted Donny, then looked at Liam. “And who is this?”
“Kennedy,” O’Hanrahan answered in a clipped tone. He wasn’t sure the man liked Patty, but he was sure Patty didn’t like him. Of course, he didn’t think Patty liked anyone. “But he’s not important. Why are we here, Miguel?”
Miguel held his hands up in a placating gesture. “No need to be angry, Patrick. I simply wanted to be sure that we were making the correct arrangements. I did not want anyone to be disappointed in the merchandise they received.”
“It’s never been a problem before,” O’Hanrahan answered. Liam looked hard at him. He was more tense than usual. He knew something was wrong, too.
The something that was bothering Liam gelled in his mind. A car. He could hear another car on their mostly abandoned section of the docks. Just as he was thinking that, tires squealed as another SUV came around the corner.
Dammit.
There was only one thing to be done. Liam gritted his teeth against the dirty feeling of saving a monster’s life, and threw himself bodily into Patrick O’Hanrahan, knocking the man down just as the barrels of two guns came through the SUV’s windows and their owners opened fire.
The impact knocked the air out of him, and the sound of gunfire was almost deafening. Adrenaline flooded his system, leaving the ugly tang of violence in his throat. Before he formed a conscious thought on the matter, his gun was in his hand, pulled from his shoulder holster in a move that had become second nature since joining the CPD.
Liam rolled off O’Hanrahan and peered around the crate, trying to get a better look without getting shot. Miguel’s thugs both went down bloody, but Miguel himself was nowhere to be seen. Had the man actually led his own thugs into an ambush?
“Uncle Pat?” Donny called, panicked. “Are you okay?” Donny’s survival gave new meaning to the words dumb luck.
“Shut up,” O’Hanrahan hissed. “You’re going to get us killed, ya damned idiot.”
Miguel shot up when the guns stopped firing, his hands waving in the air. “I am not a part of this disagreement,” he called out to the SUV.
Liam couldn’t see the car from his position, but he heard at least one door click open, and a voice sounded in Russian-accented English. “Where are they?”
“Behind those crates,” Miguel called helpfully.
O’Hanrahan growled. “Do you have a bead on the bastard Colombian?”
Liam looked around the crate and considered his answer. He did have the shot, and part of him was tempted to take it. The guy was scum. He was probably a drug dealer who had just gotten his own men shot on purpose. But Liam wasn’t a murderer. He shook his head. “Nope.”
“Fucker,” O’Hanrahan hissed. “I don’t imagine you have a sight on him, Donald?”
“I’ve been shot, Uncle Pat.” Donny’s voice was a little queasy, but not weak or slurred.
O’Hanrahan rolled his eyes. Liam tried, and failed, to imagine his own uncle acting like that if he’d been shot. “Where? You sound fine.”
“My—my shoulder,” Donny answered, sounding more like his feelings were hurt than his body. “It’s bleeding a lot.”
“Through and through?” Patty asked, at least showing a tiny bit of concern, even if his voice was still hard.
“Yeah.”
“Then put pressure on it and stop whining,” Patty said. He glanced at Liam and gave him a look that said, ‘See what I put up w
ith?’ When Donny started to talk again, Patty cut him off. “Shut up or they’ll know where you are and come finish the job, you nitwit.”
Cruel as the words were, it was a fair point. The Russians were moving closer, and not bothering to hide at all. Did they think O’Hanrahan wasn’t armed? If they did, they were in for an ugly surprise. Liam suspected that the man would rather die taking out some bratva enforcers than give them anything they wanted. Liam didn’t want to die, but he’d also been in firefights with worse odds and come out alive, so he was probably less worried than he should have been.
One of them called out. “O’Hanrahan?”
At least, Liam thought that was what he said, since his accent was thicker than the first man who had spoken.
Patty didn’t answer, so the Russian continued. “You have been dipping your dirty Irish fingers in our pot, O’Hanrahan. This is not acceptable.”
Miguel had taken a few steps toward the Russian gunmen, and pointed to the crate Pat had been standing near before the gunfire had erupted. It was just a few feet from where they were hiding. The Russian looked disgusted, and turned to talk to his companion in their native language. After a moment, smirking, he turned his gun on Miguel, who didn’t even have time to protest before the man put a bullet through his head.
Patty jerked his head around the crate, trying to get a look at what was happening, then pulled back and looked at Liam questioningly.
Liam mouthed out ‘Miguel’, and mimed a gun with his left hand. Patty smirked.
“There is no reason to be quiet, O’Hanrahan,” the second Russian spoke up again, his voice closer than before. “We will find you. The longer it takes, the longer it will take you to die.”
Catching Patty’s eye, Liam pointed to his side of the crate with his gun and nodded, indicating that he had a shot. Patty grimaced and shook his head, then held up a finger indicating for Liam to wait a moment. As Liam watched, the man pulled a handful of loose change out of his pocket and mimed throwing it.
Incidentally, the mimed toss was in the same direction as his nephew. Liam glanced that way and raised a brow. Patty shrugged, uncaring. Then he mouthed a countdown from three.