by David Levien
There had been a labored quality to the conversation from the start, and now this. Usually Behr could blame himself for the awkward pauses, but in this case he had plenty of help. “Look, man, you just tell me what you want me to know and we’ll leave it at that. I don’t need to check your military record.”
“Fair enough,” Decker said, the closest thing to a smile yet briefly creasing his lips.
“How’d you end up here?”
“India-no-place?”
“Yeah. I came out after college because the department was hiring,” Behr told him. “You live in Indy before you joined up?”
“I was born in Missouri. Spent some time near Springfield growing up. Then Parris Island, Camp Lejeune, a few other fun places and points east.”
“The folks still down in Springfield?” Behr wondered.
“No,” Decker said as more black seemed to flood into those eyes of his and more light squeezed out, if that was even possible, before he continued, “grandparents. They raised me.”
Five words over two sentences, an impressive average, even by Behr’s standards.
Well, that’s that, he thought.
The favor was to come, but he didn’t guarantee results.
“Okay,” Behr said, casting his eyes around the room, disengaging from the Decker project. As he watched pockets of office girls getting chatted up by snappily dressed guys, he spotted an attractive brunette by the bar, and noticed a worried, rather than sociable, expression on her face. He followed her gaze and saw a familiar looking young man next to her. Behr recognized the silver-framed aviators with smoked gray lenses, and, more than that, the attitude required to wear sunglasses indoors. It was Susan’s little pecker-head friend Chad. And his back was currently pressed up against the bar, the forearm of a large man wedged against his throat. The geometry of the situation was pretty clear, even from a distance.
Behr zeroed in and watched it for a moment over the rim of his glass. The large man’s face was purple with anger. Behr couldn’t deny having pictured himself taking similar action in the past, but he’d never really considered it because of Susan. Chad was doing his best to stand firm, but white fear was leaking out from behind his spray-on tan. Things got worse when another solid-looking dude leaned into the fray at Chad’s shoulder, clearly backing the first big guy. Behr turned toward Decker, put his drink down, and stood.
“ ’Scuse me one sec,” he said, and crossed the bar.
“Back door,” Behr heard the second-to-arrive side of beef suggest to his friend, grabbing one of Chad’s arms with a wrenching grip. The first florid-faced fellow caught hold of Chad’s other arm and they practically frog-marched him along the length of the bar toward the rear. Chad’s feet only occasionally touched the ground as he stumbled along, struggling in a growing panic that wasn’t doing any good. A pair of girl bartenders in leather pants were head down and pouring drinks, oblivious to the situation. There were no bouncers in sight.
Behr moved around a pool table and interrupted the group’s progress.
“Hold up,” he said, putting enough bark in his voice to stop the procession.
The first man turned, let go of Chad, and fronted Behr.
“Move,” he said.
“No,” Behr said back.
“What’s that?” red face asked, his words a wave of incipient violence and beer breath.
“What are you doing?” Behr demanded.
“None of your business-” the helper chimed in.
“Shut up,” Behr said low and mean into the helper’s face. It had the nearly physical effect of knocking him back a step, and it disengaged his hands from Chad’s arm. Loose, Chad moved a few feet down the bar in a desperate attempt to escape further notice.
“Why don’t you go back to your drinking,” Behr suggested.
“Because this smart-ass motherfucker”-a thumb went in Chad’s general direction-“fucked my girl”-the thumb now waved in the worried brunette’s vicinity-“or tried to fuck my girl-”
“I’m not your girl, Bill,” the brunette chimed in, “anymore.”
Pain and rage flared in Bill’s eyes. “Some shit went down. And I’m gonna push in his pretty boy face.”
“If something gets pushed in, it’s not gonna be that,” Behr told him. Now Bill squared toward him, and Behr took in his thick neck, pimpled with razor burn and ingrown hairs.
“No? How come? You want to fuck him?” the man said.
Behr heard laughter around him and felt black anger in his gut. “Go file some tax returns or whatever the fuck it is you do and get out of my face, old guy,” Bill spat, getting close and grabbing a handful of Behr’s tie.
Lots of men in security work and law enforcement wore clip-on ties in contemplation of this very situation-for instead of a choking handle, which is what a regularly knotted necktie amounted to, the otherwise unfashionable clip-on will come off in an attacker’s hand. Behr was one of these men. And it was what happened to Bill. The tie disengaged. Bill glanced at the length of faux silk in his hand, momentarily confused. But contact had been made and Behr didn’t waste the opening.
He clapped a hand behind Bill’s neck and drove a knee into his groin. The air went out of him with a gasp, and Behr felt him sag forward. He stepped back and let Bill crumple to the ground, but then he felt the thick arms of Bill’s helper wrap around him from behind. Glancing down, Behr saw the canvas Converse All Stars that were considered so stylish by the kids these days.
Wrong footwear for the occasion, Behr thought and drove the rock-solid heel of his size thirteen Florsheim down onto the top of the helper’s foot.
Behr felt the myriad small bones of said foot turn to pulp under his stomp, and the man’s grip broke as he howled and shuffled in pain onto his remaining good foot. Behr spun him, and it took very little force for an ankle sweep to the man’s weighted leg to deposit him on his ass with a thud next to his friend, who was curled up and drooling. Silence had fallen, besides the music, which Behr recognized as the old Pearl Jam song “Even Flow.” All activity in the bar had ceased, as attention was directed toward the altercation.
“Are we done here?” Behr asked the pair on the ground.
Then there was a crashing noise behind him, and Behr whipped his head around to see a third big guy rolling around on the ground holding his throat, a pool cue loose on the floor behind him. Decker was just stepping back from the man, melting into the crowd of onlookers. Behr straightened. It was clear enough what had happened: Behr was about to get cold blasted, and then he didn’t. A moment ago, on his way into the fray, he’d seen what looked like the remainder of the offensive line at a standee table, but stupidly hadn’t clocked them as friends of the pair that was giving Chad the bum’s rush. A pool cue shot to the back of his head could’ve really ruined his evening. Behr looked to Decker, who just shrugged.
Behr turned to Chad, who was wide-eyed and shrinking back against the bar. “Maybe you should call it a night.”
Chad just nodded.
They stood in the dark, in the cool evening air, and were about ready to head for their cars. Decker had badged the lone happy hour bouncer, who had finally trundled up to the fracas, and the guy was plenty happy to let the three of them leave. Chad had at last gone on his way after an uncomfortable profusion of thanks. His mien-equal parts rattled, humiliated, and beholden-was almost more off-putting than his usual self-satisfied buoyancy.
“Well, that was interesting,” Behr said, feeling like a high schooler on a date, when he and Decker were finally standing there alone.
“At least the music picked up there at the end,” Decker added. Only the sound of passing cars filled the silence.
“Look, I don’t know if I accomplished what I was supposed to here, so if you’re up for it, and want to do it again …”
“Yeah, sure,” Decker said, “you’re lots of fun.”
They went their separate ways, and Behr returned home to find Susan on the living room floor, organizing little blankets
and clothing and other baby gear.
“How was it?” she asked.
“Fine. That Decker’s a real handy guy,” Behr said.
“Thanks for doing it, Frank. I know it was a big favor.”
“Favors are my business,” he said, heading off to take a shower.
21
Behr walked into the Caro offices at 8:25 to find a problem waiting for him, and it was one he recognized from the Payroll Place Web site. Karl Potempa was in the coffee area, pouring for a tall, gray-haired man Behr knew was John Lutz, the company president and client he was supposed to have met. Cups filled, they turned and saw him crossing to his desk.
“Mr. Behr,” Potempa called out, warm yet stentorian, using a thumb to invite him toward a conference room. The “Mr.” was something that was attached when clients were around, to impress them with the professional and civilized nature of the Caro Group. Behr grabbed his laptop and headed for the impromptu meeting, wishing he had more work product to show.
“Uh-huh, I see, uh-huh, hmm,” Lutz said, his eyes raking back and forth over the lines of printed text that held the personal and financial information of his employees.
“We look for obvious flags-large deposits or purchases. Tax trouble or debt that could drive someone to cross the line. But as of yet, we don’t see any of that here.”
Behr had managed to get through most of the conference without looking like a complete fraud to the client. Lutz was merely a conscientious business owner eager to stop the thefts affecting his company, and it wasn’t a problem for Behr to pepper him with preliminary factoids and generalized scenarios of worker malfeasance. To any casual observer it would seem that Behr had done much more on the case than he actually had. Potempa had sat in for the first ten minutes and his eyes, flat and knowing, made it clear he wasn’t buying. What Behr saw there wasn’t anger over a failure, however. It more closely resembled annoyance at the fact that Behr hadn’t coddled the customer well enough on his own, he supposed, and that the complaint had climbed the ladder to the boss.
Then Potempa left and it got easier. Behr spent another forty minutes creating a blizzard of bullshit to distract Lutz. The nature of it brought a slightly sick feeling to his gut. There was no time over the past ten years when Behr would have bothered with a meeting like this, and if he lost business, so be it. But over the past months he’d led or at least been a part of several similar sits. File them under “client relations.” In his past, as a solo operator, he’d probably spent 10 percent of his time on it, versus 90 percent on the work. Moving into the corporate world, he figured it would shift to a 25 to 75 percent ratio. He was wrong. Big-time wrong. Shortly after his arrival, he quickly deduced he’d be better off flipping things altogether, and making it 90 percent client relations, 10 percent work. He hadn’t been able to make the final leap yet, to a complete goldbricking bill padder, but he’d probably get there soon enough. Finally, Lutz was satisfied and Behr got him out the door.
Behr went to his desk, where the smart move would’ve been to bust ass on the case in order to be prepared for when Potempa would have him in to rip him a new one. Instead he dove into the state business permit and licensing database. That’s where he saw that, indeed, Kolodnik’s company had pulled the construction permits on the Indy Flats racetrack project but was not listed on the state gaming license. That important piece was held by an LLC called L.G. Entertainment, the president of that entity being Lowell Gantcher. Behr remembered Gantcher from various articles that came up in his background check of Kolodnik, and it sent him on a new search into the man’s personal history.
Lowell Gantcher had gone to college at the Kelley School at the University of Indiana, where he claimed a bachelor’s of business administration. He worked for a large property management company and eventually did two developments: a standalone supermarket and a small eight-unit condo building. For some reason he hadn’t been able to continue on that track, and began buying distressed loans. Then Gantcher and Kolodnik met at some point, because about three and a half years back they had partnered on Indy Flats.
In the more recent past, there were some interesting filings to the tax board, a petition to reduce estimated taxes based on a projected loss. That jibed with the news coverage on the racinos that he’d read of late, where video slot and poker machines that had been projected to take $350 per day during flush times were lately taking under $250. Some quick math told Behr that with between eighteen hundred and twenty-two hundred machines in play, that would account for around a $200,000 loss. Per day. Over the course of a year, the numbers would be staggering. And, finally, ten months back, the petition was denied, as was the request for a special assembly to convene on the matter. Behr made a note to swing by and pay a visit to Indy Flats to see for himself what was going on there.
It was close to 5:00, and an orange ball of afternoon sun was shooting through the office windows when Potempa’s secretary showed up at his desk.
“He’d like to see you,” Ms. Swanton said. Behr nodded, stood, picked up his paperwork, and followed her.
“Behr, sit,” Potempa said. The client was long gone and so was the “Mr.” right along with him. Behr took a seat across the desk from his boss. He saw that Potempa had a few fingers of amber liquor in a cut crystal glass near his elbow. Potempa saw him notice. “You want one?”
Behr shrugged, more out of surprise at the offer than a desire for the drink, and Potempa spun in his chair and poured a lean one from a decanter. He slid the glass across to Behr, who nodded his thanks and took a sip. It was a silk rocket of single malt that had to be eighteen years old.
“I get it,” Potempa said. “You don’t like the Payroll Place case. It’s a hump job, a grinder. I’ll put you on something else …”
Now Behr’s surprise grew. “No, no,” he began.
“Didn’t expect it out of you is all,” Potempa said. “You’re not like most of those leather asses out there looking to do the minimum.”
“Well, I’m not,” Behr said.
“What is it, then?”
Behr took a moment, and then decided to speak to it.
“It’s not about a different case, Karl, it’s about the night in the garage.”
“Still that …” Potempa started, suddenly looking weary. “I heard you called Breslau and that you visited Kolodnik,” he said.
“Yes,” Behr answered. If Potempa wanted more by way of explanation, he was going to remain unsatisfied.
“All right, look, there’s shit about this you don’t know,” the older man finally said.
“Care to enlighten me?”
“Shit you don’t need to know. Can’t.”
“Still, I’d like to,” Behr said, forcing himself not to lean forward in his seat.
Potempa paused and scratched his chin. “Well, one bit I can tell you is: we weren’t hired for security. It was just meant to be risk assessment, and an … advisory role.”
“The political thing.”
“That’s right. We’re not just steaming envelopes and running drivers’ licenses here.”
“I know that,” Behr said.
“That exec protection bullshit was just something we threw in for … it was loss leader for-” Potempa stopped himself.
Behr suddenly understood. “For when he goes to Washington. So he’d be happy with you when he became important.”
“And he is. He’s happy. Thanks to you.” Potempa smiled and put his hands out in a you-see gesture.
“Uh-huh,” Behr breathed. “But he went with another company as soon as he announced.”
“Well, it’s unfortunate, but I’ve seen it before. They’re looking for a little distance. We’re hoping it’s temporary. Look, Frank, this is a complicated situation. Caro is a sophisticated organization. Protecting people, property, that’s just the surface. There’s another layer-risk assessment, assets, digital proprietary-we’re like … Do you play the piano?”
“The piano? No.”
“Me neither. We
ll, I play a little. Not well. My daughter, now she …” There was a slight hitch in Potempa’s voice, then he gathered himself and continued. “She was a hell of a little player. I could’ve had a ski condo in Vail for what I paid in lessons for her.”
Potempa looked to Behr for the sympathetic laugh between well-to-do fathers. There was nothing there for him. “I picked up a few things coming in and out during her lessons, her practice.” Behr’s eyes went to the photos behind Potempa, to the pretty, dark-haired girl in them, who became a woman in the shots, and then went absent.
“Anyway, this place”-Potempa waved his hands toward the outer office and beyond-“is a grand piano. It runs on a complex set of levers and wires, various offices and pieces, all interconnected. And the personnel, we’re all the keys. We each have our role, our note to play. Without any one of us, things aren’t complete. But the A sharp doesn’t necessarily know what the D flat is doing, when it’s going to sound. And it doesn’t need to. The keys all just need to be ready when they’re called on to do their part. Like you were the other night. You performed, no question. And Kolodnik was goddamned lucky it was you there. But now it’s time to stop the inquiries and go back to position until you’re pressed into service again. The rest will work itself out. You know what I’m saying?”
Behr let the aria settle. “Maybe,” he finally said, standing.
“Maybe,” Potempa said, laughing to himself and pointing at Behr, who headed for the door and paused before leaving.
“What does she do with it now?” he asked.
“What’s that?” Potempa wondered.
“Your daughter. The piano. Does she still play?”
“No,” Potempa said, a new gravity joining the worn aspect. “She doesn’t do that anymore.”
Potempa turned his chair, picking his glass off the desk as he went, and faced the window. The room descended into a stony silence. Behr lingered for another moment and then left.