Patrick stared at him, a street look, his features giving nothing away. He revved the engine to a throaty rumble to underline the moment. Evan took a rag from his pocket and wiped grease off his hands, then finished a last drag on his cigarette and flicked it into the street. “Come inside.” He turned and walked up the cracked sidewalk.
The house was old, with a faint smell of mildew. Patrick cased the place on instinct. No pictures on the wall. The only furniture in the living room was a weight bench, the bar loaded with 250 pounds of cast iron. He followed Evan down a dingy hallway to the kitchen. A card table and folding chairs sat in one corner. Without waiting for an invitation, Patrick pulled out one of the chairs and sat down, his feet up on the table.
Evan chuckled, shook his head. “It’s been, what, eight years?” From a cabinet he took a half-empty bottle of Jameson’s and two highball glasses. He spent a couple of moments rummaging in a drawer, his back to Patrick, and came up with a kitchen towel. He set the lot on the table, poured two doubles, and took a seat. “What’s on your mind?”
Adrenaline made Patrick’s skeleton hum like crystal, and he savored it. “I know what you’re doing to Danny.”
“Is that right?” Evan asked. “He send you?”
“I’m here for him.” No point splitting hairs.
Evan drained half his whiskey, set the glass down lightly. “It’s between Danny and me.”
“He’s not in the game anymore.”
“So I keep hearing.”
Patrick took his feet off the table, sat up. He picked up his drink, using the opportunity to reposition the chair. He needed enough clearance from the table to move quickly. “Why are you doing this? You guys were like brothers.”
“There’s a debt.” Evan’s voice was flat but firm. “Danny pays it, we go back to being brothers.”
“Balls to your debt. Nobody cheated you. You fucked up.”
Evan smiled. “That what you came to say?”
“No.” He leaned forward, his gaze hard. “I came to ask you nicely. Leave Danny alone.”
Evan knocked back the rest of his whiskey. His T-shirt had grease on it, and there were yellow sweat stains at his armpits. “Go fuck your hat.”
Patrick smiled, took a sip of the whiskey. So much for doing it nicely. Time to dance. When he set the glass down, he kept his hand moving, casual-like, to his lap. He could feel the switchblade poke against his calf. “What happened to you inside, man? Just get too used to being a bitch?”
Evan’s eyes narrowed and his shoulders tensed, like he was going to make a move. “Patrick, you shoot your mouth off. Have since you were a little brat used to follow us around like the sun shone out of Danny’s ass.” He refilled his glass and topped Patrick’s off. “Someday you’re going to get slapped for it.”
Patrick slid his hand from his lap, careful not to dip his shoulder. This was the delicate part. He lifted his foot to meet his hand halfway, staring at Evan the whole time. He had to get the blade out without tipping Evan off. His fingers wormed into the soft leather of his boot. “Doesn’t it mean anything to you, all the jobs you guys pulled together?” Negotiations were over, but he had to keep him distracted.
Evan smiled. “It meant more before he sent you to hard-case me.”
His index finger touched the butt of the knife, and he pinched it gently, sliding it out. The grip felt warm from his skin. He braced his feet, one a little ahead, ready to lunge from the chair. The trick would be to do it easy; fast, but not hurried. “How’s this for hard case? You back off Danny, or I’ll come at you with everything I have.” He pictured the moves. Click the knife open, spring forward, clock Evan with a left – it would be clumsy, but it would sting – get the blade to his throat. Dig in enough to bring a little blood. Evan wasn’t the only bad boy on the playground.
Evan smiled, laid one hand on the table atop the rag. “Fuck you, Patrick.”
Now.
He leapt to his feet, the chair falling backward as he thumbed the stud. The knife opened smooth and clean in his right hand. Evan’s eyes tracked him, but he hadn’t stirred from his seat. Taken by surprise. Patrick drew back his left fist as he moved, feeling the blood surge through his body, feeling unstoppable, unbeatable-
The whiskey bottle exploded. Something sucker-punched him, white-hot in his chest. It didn’t hurt, but it stopped him like he’d hit an invisible wall. He stared at the table, at the green bottle fragments and the shattered Jameson’s shield. Evan’s hand rested on the kitchen towel, which was smoking from a ragged hole, the edges burned powder black.
Oh. No.
Evan stood in slow motion, a hint of a smile on his face. His right hand blurred in a backhanded slap. The world burst into black-and-white stars as Patrick felt himself falling. His back smacked the linoleum, the wind springing from his lungs. It was the first thing that hurt.
The second was Evan stepping on his knife hand, crunching down on his ohgodjesus his fingers, his motherfucking fingers!
Then a steel toe caught his temple, and darkness smothered him like a heavy wool blanket.
16
It was after three in the morning, and the diner was nearly empty. Evan took a booth in the smoking section and scanned the place. Two cops hunched over coffee mugs at the counter. A table of twenty-something drunks told too-loud stories that all began with “You’se guys,” like they were in a Scorsese movie. The Italians outnumbered the Irish in Bridgeport these days, but that was nothing to brag about. There was a Buddhist temple where he remembered a Catholic church. Half the signs were in Spanish. And Asians had taken over McGuane Park, trying to pose and play basketball like the brothers.
Once he had his stake, it’d be time to move on.
The waitress called him honey and touched his shoulder, her tits straining against the cheap uniform. He thought about kicking it back to her, asking when she got off, but it didn’t seem worth the trouble. He ordered, then lit a smoke and took it deep.
So Danny had sent Patrick after him. Surprise move.
Typical, though, of the guy he’d become. A couple of years wearing a white collar, and Danny had forgotten what was important. The thought chafed at Evan, the idea that while he’d been doing his time, the smug fucker was busily erasing his past.
You could read the Trib through the burger the waitress finally plunked down. The soup looked like cream of cornstarch. It reminded him of prison food, and he imagined Danny waiting in line at the Stateville cafeteria for a plastic plate of mac and cheese with mashed potatoes, lukewarm milk to wash it down. He liked that image. Liked it quite a bit. A six-by-nine cell might be exactly what Danny needed.
Something to think about.
He ate without relish, keeping one eye on the cops at the counter. They talked quietly, making the most of their break, radiating that fuckoff attitude. He noticed the waitress touched their shoulders, too, cock-teasing for a tip. Everybody had a hustle.
Outside, the lights of the skyline burned above the Mustang, and as he dug for his keys he stared at the towers of money and influence. They were mute, and far away.
The cold air stung – it would be Halloween in a week or so – but he rode with the windows open anyway. A jumble of tract housing and bungalows spilled off either side of Loomis Street. Johnny Cash sang to him, telling him there was a man coming round taking names, telling him everybody wouldn’t be treated all the same, and cruising alone through the neighborhood that used to be his, rolling under the concrete monstrosity of the Stevenson Expressway, heading for a river that flowed backward, he knew it was true.