At two ten, Anya and a short red-haired dancer walked out of the club. Anya was dressed in jeans and a hooded sweat-shirt. Street clothes only made her look better, more real. I was about to get out and call to her when a black Mercedes pulled to the curb. The redhead opened the door and they climbed into the back.
On the Westside, Mercedes are more common than skin cancer. But this was the second time I had seen Russian dancers get into a black S class. I couldn’t swear it was the same one that had picked up Marina, but what were the odds?
Maybe I saw a mobster where there was a car service, but I didn’t think so.
For a moment, I tried to convince myself that it was none of my business who they were or how Anya was involved. But when the Mercedes pulled off, I followed. Slipping into traffic a few cars back, I gave them just enough room to roam without noticing me.
The difference between stalking and looking after someone is a fine line, one I decided not to look too closely at as I followed them up Wilshire. At Santa Monica Boulevard they hung a left heading past Beverly Hills, towards Little Kiev, West Hollywood’s Russian neighborhood. Cruising up to an intersection, they slowed down, timing it right so they could blast across the street at the moment the light turned red.
The cars in front of me stopped, blocking me in. I angled into the right-hand turning lane and mashed down the gas pedal. The V8 roared its deep throated war cry as I blasted through the red. I swerved to avoid an oncoming 4x4. They fisted their horn, but I was gone in a cloud of burning rubber.
Two blocks up, I saw the Mercedes squealing left down a small side street. My heart thumped to an adrenaline-driven beat. I wished I hadn’t left my piece at home. With two felony convictions on my back, I never carried unless I was expecting trouble. The three strikes bullshit meant that a firearms bust would buy me the bitch.
I lost sight of the Mercedes when they ripped a quick left down a narrow alley that ran behind a two-story office building. Pulling down the alley, I discovered it was blocked off at the other end by a cement block wall. The Mercedes had vanished. Rolling to a stop halfway to the wall, I searched for their escape route.
Headlights shot into the sky. The Mercedes sped up out of a parking ramp behind me and skidded to a stop sideways, blocking my exit. I was trapped, and whatever came next, I knew it wasn’t going to be good. If I was right and they were Russian mob, it was going to get ugly.
The front passenger door opened and the biggest man I’ve ever seen lumbered out. I’m a big man. This guy was a fucking giant. A freak. He had a huge square head, with a tattooed line of barbed wire running across his forehead. His black beard and thick hair were buzzed to military length. He was wearing a loose black suit with a black tee shirt stretched tight across his massive chest muscles. He walked slowly toward my car. I could clearly make out the bulge of a shoulder holster under his designer jacket.
I jumped out of the Crown Vic, and headed for the brute at a run. Calm in his sizable advantage, he noticed too late that I brought a tire iron behind my back. Only losers bitch about a fair fight. I arced the iron up toward his head. It would have been a great move if he hadn’t raised his arm and taken the blow on his forearm. The tire iron landed with a meaty thud. If it hurt, he didn’t show it on his face.
Fuck. This man was a fucking monster. Swinging back to strike again, I never got the chance. He drove a boulder sized fist into my chest, exploding the air out of my lungs and sending me stumbling back. In battle, the whole world slows to a syrupy crawl. I was fighting for breath when I saw his other fist sailing at me. I had time to notice four skulls tattooed on his knuckles before it connected under my jaw. My head snapped back and my feet left the ground, for a floating moment I thought everything was going to be fine. It wasn’t. I crashed down hard. Lightning sparks darted across my vision and my stomach lurched.
In the back of the Mercedes, Anya had her face pressed to the glass. She looked worried, and in a sick way I was glad. As if it were a sign she liked me. A boot to my ribs made me forget her.
The brute towered over me like King Kong on steroids. I was blurry-eyed and gasping, he hadn’t even broken a sweat. I fought to get up, but he placed one of his size 15s on my chest and vised me to the ground.
“Kak dela mudack?” a voice said from behind the giant. My chest was compressed to the point where it took all my strength to keep breathing; speaking was way beyond my power.
“You want Pasha to squash you?” The driver moved out of the giant’s shadow. He was a thin angular Russian, his head was clean-shaven and he had a bushy black Stalin mustache. A prison tattoo of a cat crawled up out of his open shirt collar, scratching its way onto his cheek. On his knuckles I saw two tattooed skulls.
“Who are you?” he asked.
Only a gasp passed my lips. My head was throbbing and I could feel the flush of blood pulsing in my face.
“Vzdrochennyi,” the giant said with a low chuckle.
“Da.” The driver pointed a bony finger at my face. “Pasha says, you look like cock that’s been jerked too hard.” The brick-like foot on my chest twisted, grinding out what was left of my breath. “You fucked up his jacket, is it your destiny to die under his boot?” I struggled out a head shake. “Ok, maybe it is, maybe it isn’t. We’ll see. Pasha?” He motioned up and the giant stepped off me. Air flooded in, burning my starved lungs. “Now, who the fuck are you, dolboy’eb? Why follow me?”
“I wasn’t,” I mumbled out as best as I could. A flick from the driver’s eyes and the giant’s huge hands ripped through my pockets. Rolling me over, he pulled my wallet out of my jeans. It had cash only no ID, I never carried any. It’s easier to be whoever you want when you carry no evidence to the contrary.
“Victor!” The redhead called from the back seat of the car. The thin man walked over and spoke Russian into the window. She said something that made Anya shake her head in denial. Her eyes flicked briefly onto me, then back to the man.
“The girl tells me you were dancing with Anya. Says you were talking a long time. No badge, no gun, not a cop. Who are you?”
“I work… for Mr. Gallico.” Trying to regain some level of calm, I rolled up into a sitting position. I fought the urge to massage my bruised jaw. Dropping LA’s mob boss’ name wasn’t a total bluff, I’d known the old Sicilian since I was a kid. I didn’t work for him, but he owed me a few favors.
“Fuck the guinea bastard,” the driver said. “What is he to me?”
“He’s the man who’s going to have your eggs scrambled if you don’t watch out.” I was making it up as fast as my thumping head could think. These bastards could kill me and never look back. My only hope was to convince them that killing me might piss off their boss.
“Why would the Italians have you follow me?” He wasn’t convinced yet, but doubt was starting to show.
“Word is, you’re running whores in Hollywood. That’s his territory, and you ignorant pricks know it.” I knew I was pushing it, but if the bluff was going to work, I needed to act like I had the upper hand.
“The wop bastard, he controls shit,” he said without conviction.
“Then kill me and let it fall where it does.” I gave him the hardest stare I could muster.
“Maybe you bullshit.”
“Yeah, and maybe I’m not. Want to risk a war with the Italians to find out?”
“Pososi moyu konfetku.” He backhanded me across the face, but after the giant’s blow it felt like a love tap. “I see you in my rearview mirror again, you will be dead.”
“Don’t worry, if I come up behind you again, you won’t notice me until the blood’s running down your cheap suit.”
“Cheap? Versace!” He looked like he was going to smack me again. My cold eyes caught him off balance. If he was going to kill me, so be it. I was tired of playing the bitch to his macho gangster act.
With a twitch of his head he led the giant back to the Mercedes. It would have been comical watching the massive man fold himself into the car if my head wa
sn’t hurting so bad. In the red glow of their brake lights, I saw Anya through the rear window. She looked both frightened and sadly resigned.
While they faded into dark streets, I stayed sitting. Feeling for broken bones, I was relieved to find only bruises and scrapes. The first thing you learn in the military is keep your head down and never volunteer for anything. Only a cherry would go rushing off to try and save a woman he’d just met from a fate she may or may not have chosen. If I could have erased her scared eyes from my mind, I would have. And if my mother had three wheels, she would have been a trike. Besides, take Anya out of the picture, I still owed the Russian bastards. You let someone take you down without retribution you’ve started down that soapy path that ends with you being their shower toy.
The combination of whisky and pain made my drive home a real bundle of joy. I lived in a small rented house in Highland Park, a Latin neighborhood in northeast LA. The yuppies tired of housing prices in Silver Lake and the Westside had starting moving into the adjoining areas. We could hear the drums of urban renewal beating, but for now our corner of LA was safe.
Coming through my door, I was knocked down by hundred and twenty-two pounds of hurling Bullmastiff. Her name was Angel and she had been my dog since her owner was killed. She was my first pet. I always thought it was hard enough to take care of myself, why would I want an animal? But the fact was, she had squirmed her way into my heart. It was good to have a warm body to come home to.
Downing five aspirins with a tall glass of water, I crawled into bed. With a snap of my finger, Angel jumped onto the bed and curled up beside me. We were both snoring moments after I shut off the light.
CHAPTER 5
MEXICO CITY — AUGUST 16TH 5:23 AM
Nika looked down on Mexico City as the plane circled for a landing. Volcanoes rose up above the brown haze that smothered the sprawling metropolis. It had been over twenty-four hours since she left Moscow. In Tel Aviv, she met a man in a very nice suit who had taken her Russian passport and given her an Israeli one. The picture the agent in Moscow had taken was on the new passport, but the name was not hers. When the man in the nice suit gave her a ticket and led her to the gate, he warned her not to talk to anyone until she was met in Mexico. With a kiss on each cheek he sent her off onto the plane. The last real sleep she had gotten was in Edgar’s squat. She stayed with him for three days while the arrangements were made for her trip. The only time he tried to kiss her was just before she climbed into the employment agent’s car to leave, and that was a sweet chaste kiss. She couldn’t believe how suspicious she had been of Edgar. He was nice, and sitting alone on the plane she wished he had come with her. This was her first trip in an airplane. She tried to sleep, but every bump of turbulence sent her heart into a rapid tattoo.
Nika let out an involuntary gasp when the wheels hit the runway. Many of the other passengers applauded the landing. Taxiing to the gate, they sat for several minutes with the seat-belt light still lit. Around her, people ignored the voice on the intercom advising them to please remain seated. The door slid open and a uniformed Mexican official walked onto the plane, followed by a young soldier. Passengers cleared the aisles and let him pass. In his hand he held a form and was checking it against the seat numbers. He stopped when he got to Nika’s row, looking her over carefully. Nika knew it was too good to be true. Somehow they had found out her plans. Now she would be sent back to Russia. She had been crazy to imagine she could escape her fate. The official checked his form once more and then spoke to her. She didn’t understand a word he spoke, but when he motioned for her to follow him, she understood. She walked with her head down, eyes averted from the other passengers, ashamed that so many had witnessed her failure.
With the official in front and the soldier behind, they led her past the customs lines and through a door into a small office. The official sat behind a desk and motioned for Nika to take a seat across from him. He spoke in racing Spanish, and only when he saw her lost eyes did he switch to English. “Do you speak English?”
“Yes.” Nika was relieved they had a common language.
“Passport please.” Nika handed it over and watched as he stamped it and stapled a form to it. “This is your student visa, it will allow you to stay in Mexico until you travel norte.” Placing her passport into an envelope, he handed it to the soldier, who stood at attention behind Nika. “Welcome to Mexico, and good luck on your travels.”
“Thank you.” Nika couldn’t believe what was happening, she could barely keep herself from shrieking with joy. The soldier led her through a series of halls that traversed the airport out of the public eye. They came out onto a freight dock where a white van was waiting. A middle-aged man with a face ruined by acne scars took the envelope from the soldier and opened the back of the van, it was windowless, like a dark cave. The man pointed for Nika to get in. Something about the man and the van scared her, but she pulled up her courage, reminding herself that nothing good ever came easily. Crawling into the van, she found no seats, only stained rough woven blankets and a few dirty pillows. The slamming door almost caught her feet as she scrambled to get in.
As her eyes adjusted to the dark, she discovered she was not alone. Pressed up against the far wall, two eyes gleamed.
LOS ANGELES — AUGUST 16TH 7:16 AM
A huge sloppy dog kiss woke me. Angel could sleep through the end of the world, but miss breakfast by ten minutes and she broke out in a rash. I had a sick gut and a head full of regret. I felt slow and clogged from my return to drinking. My mouth was dry, swollen and tasted like gym socks. That was it I told myself, no more drinking, I was done, time to climb back up on the wagon.
I poured two cups of kibble into a bowl for Angel and lumbered into the shower. While the hot water worked on my kinked muscles, I tried to reconstruct the previous night. Anya flitting across my inner-vision, beautiful and scared. The Russians picked up Marina at my club, then later Anya and the redhead in Santa Monica. The smaller of the two thugs, the one called Victor, had as much as admitted they were running whores when he denied that they did it in Hollywood. Was the blow job in my parking lot a one-time deal as Marina told me, or was she hooking out of the club and giving the cash to Victor? Was that the new scam, place girls in strip clubs so they could troll for Johns? Why not place an ad on Craigslist?
All these questions but no solid answers. It was time to reach out to Anya and find out what the fuck was going on. Drying off, I discovered a goose egg on the back of my skull, and a dark bruise had flowered on my jaw. Gifts from Victor and the giant.
“Privet! Smart boy, you found me, but sadly I am busy. You know what to do, so do it.” At the beep, I hung up without leaving a number. I didn’t know if Anya’s calls were being monitored. I made the call from a pay phone, if they checked her missed calls it wouldn’t give me up. The less they knew about me the better.
“Walk away, boss. You don’t want to fuck with these psycho Russians,” Gregor said as we sat the next morning, drinking thick Turkish coffee in his Frogtown apartment. “The ink — barbed wire across his head — that’s gulag shit. He was down for life without parole. The skulls, they get one for every man they murder.”
“Maybe they were fronting. Half the punks with spider webs never been locked down or even heard of the Aryan Brotherhood,” I said.
“No. Russian cons will kill anyone with ink he didn’t earn. First they cut the offending skin off. Sweet, yeah?” Gregor was a young Armenian thug, a big boy, six foot and pushing 250 hard. A blanket of baby fat surrounded his face, but the rest was pure muscle. When I met him, I’d broken his nose, then I’d hired him to cover my ass in a rescue mission that went sideways. He took a blast from an AK47 that ripped him up and left scars from his chest to his left knee. He never complained. After he recuperated, I set him up with an apartment outside of the grip of the Glendale Armenian Power boys. I had Manny hire him as a day bouncer. Plenty will say they got your back, Gregor had proven it. In our world, that was better than gold.
“Anya, the dancer, she had a tattoo on her hip, like a telephone pole.”
“Same as Marina?”
“Exactly.”
“Not a telephone pole, it’s a Russian cross. You’d know that if you weren’t a heathen.”
“Fine, church boy, so what’s it mean?”
“Old country bullshit. The Vors would mark the girls in their stable. A warning to other pimps to keep them from poaching.”
“Fuck me.”
“Yup, and they will. These guys are ruthless in ways you can’t even imagine. Best plan, forget the girlie.”
“Not an option.”
“Always an option. Put one foot in front of the other ‘til this is a bad memory. Or is she that fine?”
“She is, if she’s real. If she’s playing me, I’m fucked.”
“Either way you’re fucked, boss. You want me to ride along?”
“Unless you got something better to do.”
“Nothing that can’t wait.”
At nine PM, I loaded my Smith amp; Wesson snub nosed.38 and dropped it into the pocket of my black leather sports coat. I slipped a Buck knife into my Levi’s then laced up my steel-toed Docs. If the shit went sideways, I was going to be ready this time. I picked up Gregor; no bulge showed under his wool greatcoat, but I knew he had his CZ 9mm strapped up under his arm.
Hitting the freeway, I cranked up Amanda Palmer, piano, accordion, hell, even ukulele, all in a punk sound — it was as if the decadent Germany of the twenties had been brought back and replayed through a busted speaker. It was one of the few CDs Gregor and I could agree on. Left alone, I would have played The Clash’s Give ‘Em Enough Rope. Bar none, the single best record ever made. Perfect for the necessary mind-set I was looking for, fuck ‘em all and let god sort it out. Someday, I would convince Gregor of the importance of The Clash, but it didn’t seem like this was the time. Settling into a groove on the freeway, I concentrated on the music. Trick was to let the sound take my head off the present situation. When you have no facts, it’s best not to let your mind make shit up. Conjecture killed more good men than bad intel.
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