The Running Game (Reachers Book 1)

by L E Fitzpatrick

  John wrapped his coat around her without a word. She was starting to like him.

  13

  The queue outside the club curled around the next street. Roxy stood on the opposite side of the road, taking shelter outside the Chinese takeaway, blowing thick circles of smoke into the air. He'd been standing there for an hour, slowly building up an empathy with the hordes of scantily clad girls and boys shivering to get into the Cage. Patience had never been his strong point and he was regretting not factoring that into his plan for the night. Getting Donnie Boom was becoming an obsession. The more the Scotsman managed to elude him the more intent Roxy was to see the bastard dead.

  His plan had initially been so simple he'd barely given it any thought. It seemed obvious that Pinky Morris would be grateful to have his brother's killer taken out. Roxy had even fantasized about a reward for his trouble. But that hadn't been the case. For some reason Donnie was protected and Roxy felt a growing desperation to find out why. It was that desperation that saw him standing in the freezing wind, watching for one of Pinky's boys to make an appearance at the club. He needed information and eventually, if he plied them with enough drinks, someone would start to talk.

  But once again things weren't going his way. So far the only people jumping the rope were z-list celebrities and the usual socialite-waste-of-spaces who seemed to think the city couldn't exist without them. He hadn't seen a single face he could tie back to Pinky.

  Roxy tossed his cigarette into the gutter. There was no point hanging about in the cold. If the boys were coming he'd meet them inside, to hell with Pinky seeing him. As he approached the door he smiled at the bouncers and their fat, pink faces. They were the runts of the Morris empire, expendable nobodies who had been left behind in the evening's exodus. If Pinky had ever told them anything important their thick skulls wouldn't remember. Both men knew Roxy on sight and their wide enthusiastic smiles were enough to convince Roxy they were totally ignorant of their boss's troubles.

  “Evening, gentlemen,” he said pushing the obligatory pound notes into their pockets. “Who's in the cage tonight?”

  “Ivon the Terrible, fighting some army dropout, Cole something–doesn't really matter what his name is, he won't last long. You coming in?”

  “Aye, better put a bit of money on Ivon or he'll think I don't like him.”

  That night the club was heaving. The fight in the cage was mirrored across the surrounding dance floor. Bookies bellowed their odds, punch after punch. Money slipped across tables while girls danced overhead. The music was lost in the chaos, only the vibration of the bass reached Roxy, rattling his body like an external heartbeat.

  Ivon was a giant in the cage. The seven foot Nordic fighter slammed his bare fists into a bloody pulp that had once been his opponent. The game would end when the loser called time, forfeiting his fee and his reputation. Some men would rather die, some men did. As Roxy passed the cage his fingers twitched at the sight of the betting. If the night went downhill he'd have to make his own fun.

  He made his way to the bar, winking and smiling at familiar or pretty faces. It may have been Pinky's club but it was Roxy's domain. He ordered himself a scotch and soda, giving the barman a tip to ensure he'd get a good drink and not a watered down glass of piss. From his new vantage point he spotted Pinky's wife disappearing out the back, her tight dress clinging to every curve of her body. He licked his lips at the thought of her.

  His eyes drifted back to the fight, cruising over the spectators. Pinky's men usually held a table at the front of the cage, packed with girls young enough to be their granddaughters and enough coke to recreate the Alps. But today the table was occupied by a group of excitable Koreans, waving pound notes at the fighters as though they were flags. There wasn't a significant face in the building.

  Then he spotted something that changed his mood. He downed his drink and ordered another. In the corner of the club, away from the excitement, sat his old friend Charlie Smith. Roxy felt a surge of emotion take him. That cocky asshole who had stolen his girlfriend. Charlie Smith–the man with a plan, the guy always in charge. Mr Know-it-all. Mr Can-do-no-wrong. Mr Arrives-home-to-find-wife-being-butchered-on-the-kitchen-table. They went back years. Good years, bad years, together they had been as thick as thieves. But the last time they had seen each other Charlie had been stabbed, his wife had been murdered, and Roxy felt about ready to finish him off. Those sentiments hadn't changed all that much.

  Roxy licked his lips and pushed away his animosity. Opportunities favoured the impulsive and in six long strides he had already started to turn his luck around.

  “Charlie Smith, as I live and breathe!” He bellowed over the noise. “You don't write, you don't call, anyone would think…” He sat down at Charlie's table and stopped.

  A year ago, when Roxy stormed away from the Smith Brothers, Charlie was in a bad way. Things hadn't changed. If anything they'd got worse. His eyes were ringed red and bloodshot. Beneath his stubble his complexion was sickly and grey. He was a husk of the man Roxy had known.

  “Holy shit, what grave did you crawl out of?” Roxy said in alarm.

  “Roxy,” Charlie said, his eyes were wide and surprised. He reached out to shake his friend's hand weakly. “Jesus, I didn't expect to see you here. You look good man, really good.”

  “I'd say you too, but I'd be lying,” Roxy said. “Where's the sharply dressed one?” Roxy looked about the club for the other brother, coming up empty.

  “He refused to come. Not really his scene.”

  “Not really yours either, old man,” Roxy teased. “Last time we were in a place like this I seem to remember you falling asleep at the bar.”

  Charlie shook his head defensively. “Hey, it was pretty late and we'd been on the run for like twenty hours.”

  “Semantics,” Roxy said. “I didn't figure you would be coming back to S'aven, John made it pretty clear you guys were retiring.”

  Charlie shifted his beer from one hand to the other. “Best laid plans I guess. There's not much out there for men like us to do. How are you keeping anyway?”

  “You know me,” Roxy said, sipping his drink. “Always on the up.”

  “You working?”

  “Here and there, nothing like the old days, but I get by.”

  “And your mum?”

  “She's good,” he lied. “On vacation for the winter.”

  They sat in an awkward silence. The air between them was still thick, no matter how much Roxy pretended it wasn't. It would need to be cleared, or he would at least need to clear it enough to ease Charlie's conscience. He was mulling over the best way to broach the last words he had shouted at Charlie:

  “You better hope you don't make it, Charlie, because I will fucking kill you. You hear me? If I ever see you again you will wish you died here.”

  But he was too slow, Charlie broke the silence. “I suppose you're here to kill me.”

  Roxy laughed; before things went bad he and Charlie had been good friends. “Maybe if I was a man of my word, but you know what I'm like, Charlie. Listen, what I said back then, well I…”

  “You meant every word, Roxy. And you have every right to say what you did. I would have said the same. You loved Sarah as much as I did, I don't blame you for hating me.”

  “Yeah, but she wouldn't have wanted me to be such a drama queen about it. I'm not saying it wasn't your fault, but you didn't mean for it to happen. Back then I was still in shock, she was my ex-girlfriend, my best friend and she was suddenly gone.” Roxy let out an involuntary shudder.

  “It should have been me.”

  Roxy couldn't bring himself to lie. “Yes, it should. If it had to happen to one of you, it should have been you,” he agreed. “But even you didn't deserve to go like that. Jesus, I'm not sure I know anyone who does.” He swallowed the bitterness rising in the back of his throat. He never saw Sarah's body, just the look on John's face when he described what they did to her. For the briefest moment he felt a pang of guilt. Strapped to a c
hair, as battered as his wife, Charlie had been forced to watch as they peeled back the skin from her trembling bones. Nobody deserved that.

  “You left before I could thank you,” Charlie said. “I know that you were angry with me. I know that what happened was my fault, but you still helped John get me out of hospital. You didn't have to do that.”

  Roxy sighed. “No, I did. They would have come back for you as soon as they found out you were alive.”

  “All the more reason to stay out of it.”

  “It's not every day the great John Smith comes asking for help. He had to swallow a lot of pride that night,” he said, smiling to himself. “I just kept looking at your brother's big brown puppy dog eyes and thinking if you died too I'd be stuck looking after him.”

  Charlie started to laugh. “Still I appreciate it. I owe you.”

  “It's what friends do, or so I'm told. I'm glad you're alright, Charlie. I really am. What about my little Lilly-Pad? Still no news on what happened to her?”

  Charlie's eyes saddened. “We've got a contact who might be able to help. But they want a lot of cash for the information.”

  “They know you're looking for a six year old girl right?”

  “They know and they don't care. They heard what we had pulled off in the past and they assume that we can just shit out wads of money on demand.”

  Roxy paused. “You know there was a time when you could. I remember the days when the infamous Smith Brothers could do just about anything, with the help from their incredible associates, of course,” he said with a wink.

  Charlie patted his lame leg. “Not anymore. This is our first job since, well, you know. We spent the last year hunting for Lilly and the first lead we get demands a quarter of a million upfront. I've been out of the game so long even if I didn't have the body of an eighty year old war veteran I'd still be useless.”

  “Nothing a bit of a shave wouldn't fix,” Roxy teased. “Besides you weren't exactly Ivon the Terrible back in the day.”

  Charlie frowned. “Who's Ivon the Terrible?”

  “Doesn't matter. You guys always worked in the same way. John was the muscle, you were the brains and, of course, occasionally I was the creative genius that made everything all the more fun.” Even Roxy couldn't deny that the old team had been a good one. He still missed the camaraderie and excitement of the old days.

  “And Sarah kept us all together,” Charlie said sadly. “Without her we all fell apart and the work dried up.”

  “But you're working a job now, right?”

  “Oh yeah, we took a run of the mill find-and-locate job that has blown up righteously in our faces. Now we're not going to get paid. Hell, we're going to be lucky if we make it out of S'aven in one piece.”

  Roxy gave Charlie his most empathetic look. “Come on, Charlie I know you and you're just deliberately falling at the first hurdle. Look, who're you working for?” He made it sound like he was just asking out of courtesy, trying to help an old friend.

  Charlie paused and then shrugged, he'd always trusted Roxy more than he should. “Pinky Morris.”

  Roxy feigned surprise. “Well, it's no wonder you're not getting paid. You'll have more luck getting John into flip-flops than getting Pinky to pay out. But Pinky's a dinosaur, clinging on to a life that doesn't exist in this town anymore. He's probably just playing difficult to make himself feel like a big man. You and John could take him down in your sleep. And you know it too. Listen if things get out of hand give me a call. I know Pinky fairly well, I could put in a word for you if you don't want to get your hands dirty, but I promise you, Charlie, you can take him.”

  “That's a turnaround from wanting me dead,” Charlie remarked.

  “My friend, your imminent death is on hold until you find Lilly. If I can help get her back then I will. You just have to ask, you know. I've got your back, right, always have, otherwise your brother would kill me. You want another drink?”

  Before Charlie could answer his phone vibrated in his pocket. Charlie checked the caller ID and frowned.

  He answered. “John. What's up?” His frown deepened. “You're where? Jesus, what the hell happened? So you left … Yeah, I know there were cops … Okay, okay … No I suppose you couldn't … Just stay where you are … I don't know, I'll think of something. Is Rachel okay? Good, look after her. I'll be with you soon.” He hung up the phone and put his head in his hands.

  “Let me guess, things taken a turn for the worst?”

  “You could say that. There were cops at our mark's address. John panicked.”

  “Ah, I see. Were they after him?”

  “Not knowingly, but you know how he is. One flash of red and blue and he disappears in a cloud of smoke.”

  “Cop phobic. I'm sure there's a name for that.” Roxy chuckled. “Still I suppose, given he's like the world's most wanted man, he probably is entitled to freak out.”

  Charlie shrugged and then nodded in agreement. “And now he's roaming the streets with nowhere to go.”

  Roxy nodded sympathetically. “Well I've got a couch. John wouldn't touch it with a barge pole but you're welcome to crash at my place, and he can just stand in the corner with his usual disapproving look on his face.”

  Charlie sighed, as though he were contemplating whether he should take up the offer or not. Roxy gave his best “caring, nonchalant face.”

  Eventually he shook his head. “Probably not a good idea. There's a girl with us and she needs to lie low. John's trawling the industrial district with her at this minute.”

  “Pretty boy like John, he could solve your money worries in a night there.”

  Charlie stood up. “I've got to go.”

  “Hold your horses, pet. I've got this covered. Now, I don't usually drive this sober but for you I'll make an exception. I've got a lockup down there you can hole up in. You can fill me in on the details on the way.”

  “Roxy I can't ask you to do that. This girl, she's in trouble. Big trouble. You don't want to get yourself involved.”

  Roxy dismissed the warning. “Listen to me, Charlie Smith, what kind of friend would I be if I didn't at least offer to help? Besides, I love trouble–we get on like a house on fire.”

  Charlie hesitated briefly. “I'm not even sure what the cut on the job is going to be.”

  “I'll do it for the look on John's face alone.”

  Roxy let Charlie take the lead. Charlie liked to think he was in charge and he would until it was too late. As they reached the door Roxy couldn't help himself. He turned back to the club and caught Riva's eye as she returned to the bar. It could all blow up in his face, so it was important to enjoy himself when he had the opportunity.

  14

  Seven years ago Pablo had walked into Pinky's den. He had looked Pinky in the eye and told him Frank Morris was dead. There were cops outside waiting to break the news, but Pablo had insisted the news came from him. The cops, the rest of his boys, even Riva never saw Pinky react, they never saw the despair or the relief in his eyes.

  And through everything, as business started to dive, as the Russians took over, as Pinky lost his throne, Pablo stayed by his side, watching his boss's back like an obedient dog.

  Pinky stared at him now, taking in his ridiculous hat and pointed shoes and felt that he never really knew Pablo. He couldn't understand why a man would follow with such loyalty and expect to go nowhere. But as they stood together now, standing in Pinky's new warehouse, it was starting to become clearer.

  The closer Pablo got the more he learned. Pinky had shared everything with him, every business deal, every paranoia, and Pablo had been his counsel, Pablo had steered him; controlled him. And now he was trying to do it again.

  Pablo had drawn Pinky aside, taken him into the back office while the others waited outside. This new venture was supposed to impress them, showing them that things were going to change, but Pablo was going to put an end to that–well he could try.

  “Jackie told me he was picking up a girl for you,” Pablo sa
id, the accusation rich in his tone.

  “Jackie's got a big mouth.” Not for much longer, Pinky thought to himself.

  “Yeah well it's not Jackie we need to worry about. I know Donnie Boom is back and I know he put you onto this girl.”

  Pinky folded his arms. “You seem to be poking your nose where it's not wanted.”

  Pablo sighed. He took off his hat, clasping it to his chest. “Pinky, you got me worried. You've been taking bad deals; some of the boys say they haven't had their cut. I know things are tough, but we always had things under control before.”

  “I had things under control,” Pinky snapped. “I have things under control. Tomorrow everything is going to change.”

  Pablo licked his lips nervously. “She's a Reacher, isn't she?”

  He glared at Pablo as though he had just blasphemed. Nobody was supposed to know about the girl.

  “Pinky, don't do this. When Frank brought that Reacher in it nearly destroyed you. It nearly destroyed us all. She came in, she got into our heads, turned us against each other. You must remember what it was like with her breathing down our necks all the time, trying to find out all of our secrets. The men out there aren't going to stand for it, not with business the way it is.”

  Pinky understood now. This wasn't about the girl at all. Pablo had something to hide, something he didn't want Pinky to find out about. Pinky shook his head; he had allowed this man to get too close. It was a problem he needed to solve.

  “Reachers made us what we were,” Pinky said to himself more than anything.

  “No Pinky, Reachers ruined you, and I'm not hanging around to watch history repeat itself. If you bring that girl here, if she starts getting inside our heads, I'm out, Pinky.”

  Pinky turned away and examined the rest of his men as they talked in the main body of the warehouse. They all had secrets. He met Fat Joe's eye, his cousin and his bookkeeper. He trusted the man with his money, but then he'd trusted Pablo. He checked his watch. In a few hours he would have the girl and he wouldn't have to rely on trust anymore. He would know for certain that they were loyal.