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Authors: Wallace Stroby

The Heartbreak Lounge (8 page)

BOOK: The Heartbreak Lounge
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When they pulled up outside the house, the Blazer was back.
“You first,” Harry said and shut the car off.
The jogger got out, limping. He went slowly up the walk to the porch, opened the front door. Harry followed him.
The woman and the blond man were waiting. It was a simple living room, hardwood floor, a bookshelf against one wall, a black leather couch. Glossy decorating magazines fanned out on the coffee table.
The woman wore jeans, a man's blue work shirt with the tail out. When she saw him, she said, “It's you.”
The blond man looked at her. She shook her head.
“No, Jack,” she said. “Not him.”
“I've been calling,” Harry said. “But I've been having some trouble getting through, it seems.”
“Who is he?” the blond man said and as Harry started to answer, the jogger looped a thick arm around his neck, jerked him back.
It took him off his feet, left him without leverage. He pumped an elbow back into a solid stomach with no effect.
“Reggie!” the blond man said.
Harry kicked back, felt his boot heels meet shins. Reggie bent him forward, swung him around like a wrestler so that Harry was facing the floor in a reverse headlock, held him there.
“Jack, get his wallet,” Reggie said. “Check his ID.”
Harry felt blood rush to his head, pain in his lower back. Jack came tentatively forward and Harry back-kicked at him, his boot hitting nothing but air. Jack retreated and Reggie hauled up, big arms tightening around Harry's neck, cutting
the air off. He saw flashes of light around the edges of his vision. He stopped struggling, felt the wallet pulled from his back pocket.
Jack took the wallet to the other side of the room. Reggie eased the pressure.
“Check his license,” he said. “Who he is.”
Harry looked at Reggie's legs, ankles.
“Well?” Reggie said.
Jack said, “I'm looking, I'm looking.”
“His license. What's it say?”
Harry spread his feet for balance, looped his right fist up hard into Reggie's groin. He heard Reggie's breath go out of him, felt the grip on his neck loosen. He reached down, caught both ankles, pulled up.
Reggie went over backward, crashed down onto the coffee table, smashed it. Harry straightened, saw him roll quickly back onto his feet, faster than he'd expected, too fast. He backpedaled, trying to put distance between them, catch his breath. The backs of his legs met the couch. On the end table to his left was a fluted glass vase filled with baby carnations. From the corner of his eye, he saw the woman run from the room.
There was no boxing, no feinting. Reggie moved forward, planted his feet and drove a thick fist at Harry's face, his whole body behind it.
Harry ducked, felt the fist pass above him, reached across with his right hand, gripped the vase, brought it around backhanded. Reggie's arm came up, blocked him forearm to forearm, and the vase flew from his hand, shattered against the wall, spraying glass and water.
Reggie's fist cocked back again and Harry kicked out, caught him in his injured knee. When he bent, Harry grabbed at his warm-up jacket, yanked it down over his head, tangling his arms, blinding him. He brought his right knee up once, twice, a solid impact each time. The jacket tore as Reggie pulled away and Harry got in a final knee, let go. Reggie flew back, fell onto his side, and Harry heard the unmistakable sound of an automatic pistol chambering a round.
Everything stopped. Harry looked at the woman, tried to catch his breath. She held a small .25 automatic pointed at his chest. It was a Phoenix Raven, nickel, with imitation-pearl grips, a junk gun. The muzzle was small, but her grip was steady.
“Put that away,” he said. The gun didn't move. Behind her, the blond man stood white-faced.
“Sit down,” she said.
Reggie moaned, rolled onto his knees. His jacket was in rags, blood dripped from his nose. He looked at Harry, then at the gun.
“Sit down,” she said.
Harry locked his eyes on hers, measured the distance.
“Don't try it,” she said. “Please don't try it.”
“Point that somewhere else.” He took a step forward.
“I said sit the
fuck
down.”
“That's a tiny gun,” he said. Another step. “I don't think you could even—”
She lowered the muzzle and fired once into the couch near his right leg. The noise was no louder than a stick breaking, but he felt the movement of the bullet past his leg, saw the impact as it slapped a hole in the leather. He froze. A thin mist of smoke and gun oil drifted from the muzzle. A shell casing rolled across the floor. She raised the gun again.
“Sit
down,
” she said.
He lowered himself slowly onto the couch, his eyes on her. Broken glass crunched beneath his boots. Flowers lay on the hardwood like fish out of water.
There was silence in the room. Reggie started to get to his feet. He pulled the remnants of the warm-up jacket off, exposing a bloodstained white T-shirt beneath. He touched his nose, looked at Harry. But the violence was gone from the air, the gunshot ending it as quickly and finally as a door closing.
“Nikki,” the blond man said finally, “you know that's Italian, don't you?”
“Jack,” she said, not taking her eyes off Harry, “take Reggie into the kitchen. Make sure he's all right.”
She lowered the gun until it was pointed at the floor. For the first time, Harry could see she was trembling slightly.
“Nikki, are you sure?”
“Go on.”
Reggie had taken his headband off, was holding it up to his nose to staunch the blood. He looked at Harry until Jack took his elbow, started to lead him away. He limped as they went down the hall into the kitchen.
“Maybe I should call the police,” she said.
“Call whoever the fuck you like.” He saw his wallet open on the floor where Jack had dropped it, contents spilling out.
“Jack saw you parked outside. He panicked, called here on his cell. Reggie went out to take a look. They thought … well, you know what they thought.”
He nodded at the floor.
“Can I get my wallet back?”
“How'd you find me?”
“License plate. Like I said, I've been trying to reach you. I called that number you gave Ray. Left messages.”
“That's Jack's cell. I use it sometimes. Why were you trying to call me?”
“To apologize for the way I acted that day.”
“You can't be serious.”
“Believe what you want. I'm going to get my things.”
He got up and she took another step back. He leaned over, pain in his back, picked up his wallet, the things that had fallen out of it—a credit card, a small color snapshot of Cristina on the beach, taken when they were in Captiva last year. He slid them back in the wallet, replaced it in his jeans pocket, stood up. His neck ached.
“I'm sorry if you got hurt,” she said. “He was just protecting me.”
“Whatever. I'm leaving.”
“Wait.”
He shook his head.
“I've had enough. Fuck this. And fuck you. I won't call again.”
Jack appeared in the doorway, looked from her to Harry then back.
“Nikki,” he said, “we need to get Reggie to a hospital. I think his nose is broken.”
“Go ahead,” she said. “Take the Blazer.”
He looked at Harry.
“It's okay,” she said. “It was a misunderstanding. Go on.”
A minute later, Jack led Reggie through the room, a bloodstained dish towel held to his face. He glared at Harry as Jack got coats from a closet, helped him into one. Harry watched him. Jack caught Reggie by the arm, led him through the front door. After a moment, they heard the Blazer engine start, watched through the window as it pulled away.
“Who's William Matthews?” he said.
“What?”
“The Blazer is registered to a William Matthews. That's how I found this address.”
“That's Jack. His real name is William, but nobody calls him that anymore.”
“That makes as much sense as anything else around here, I guess.”
“I'm sorry about all this. Reggie can be a hothead. He comes on too strong sometimes. And I guess we're all a little on edge.”
“Because of Harrow?”
“Yes.”
“Well, good luck with that.”
He went to the front door, had it open when she said, “Hold on.”
He looked back at her.
“You're serious?” she said. “About why you came here?”
“Forget it,” he said and went out the door. He stopped, looked back at her.
“This your package out here?”
“What?”
“On the porch. You didn't see it?”
“What package?”
“Right here.”
He held the door open. When she started to move past him, he threw his weight into her, pinned her hard against the left doorjamb. He caught the wrist of her gun hand, twisted. She flailed and he leaned into her.
“Let
go
of me.”
He got both hands on the wrist, bent it until she gasped and her fingers opened. He took the gun away from her, spun her around and put the fingers of his left hand between her breasts, shoved. She took three off-balance steps into the living room, sat down hard on the floor.
“Son of a
bitch,
” she said, and then he stepped back into the room, pushed the door shut behind him.
She froze, looked at him, the gun.
He ejected the magazine, worked the slide. The chambered shell flew out, hit the floor and rolled beneath the couch. He put the gun in his jacket pocket, then thumbed the shells out of the magazine one by one into his left hand. When he had all four out, he opened the door again, went onto the porch. He shook them like dice, the brass clinking in his grip, then tossed them out into the yard. He looked back at her, still sitting, then flung the magazine away in another direction, heard it land in winter-bare bushes.
He went back into the living room. She'd made no move to get up. He felt his anger start to fade. He held up the Raven.
“Never point a gun at someone who you're not ready to shoot,” he said.
He lobbed the gun at her. It thumped against her chest, fell into her lap. She didn't try to pick it up.
He went back out, left the door open behind him, went down the walk to the Mustang. He didn't look back.
At least ten years since he'd driven through Newark, but little had changed. Johnny steered the Firebird through block after block of brownstone tenements with boarded windows, trash-strewn empty lots. When he hit red lights, he slowed only a moment before driving through.
When he saw the sign for Frelinghuysen Avenue, he turned left, went up a block and turned left again onto a street of warehouses and garages. The address he'd been given was on the right, halfway up the street, next to an auto body shop with a sign that read COLLISION SPECIALISTS.
He steered into the narrow lane between the two buildings, the Firebird's engine chugging as it crawled along. At the end of the alley, he turned right into the warehouse parking area.
The lot was fenced with chain link and razor wire, windblown plastic bags trapped in the coils. There were a dozen vehicles here, mainly SUVs, lit by a floodlight mounted over the loading dock. Most of the SUVs had cages in the cargo area, the rear seats taken out to make room for them.
There was a single door next to the loading dock and two black men stood there, watching him. Johnny pulled the Firebird up beside a Lexus jeep, cut the engine, wished he had a weapon.
He got out of the car, locked the door. The two men watched him come toward them. The one on the left was tall, wearing a leather jacket and pants, his hands gleaming with gold jewelry. His partner was shorter and heavy, dressed in a suit with a topcoat over it. Both their jackets were open despite the cold.
Johnny stopped about six feet from them.
“Here to see Lindell,” he said. “He's expecting me.”
The men appraised him. Topcoat reached inside his jacket, scratched. Johnny watched his hand.
“Lindell, huh?”
There was nothing to say to that. He waited.
“Chill here,” the tall one said to his partner.
Topcoat nodded and the other man opened the door, went through.
They waited like that, the wind picking up, whistling through the razor wire. Topcoat was looking at the Firebird.
“Looks like you need you some new wheels,” he said.
Johnny looked at him but didn't answer. He got his cigarettes out, lit one. He was halfway through it when the door opened again.
The tall one held it open, cocked his head inside. Johnny gave Topcoat a last look, stepped in. It was a narrow cement corridor lit by fluorescent tubes. At the far end was a dark green metal door.
“Go on. He waitin' for you.”
The tall man went back outside, shut the door behind him.
Johnny started down the hall. There was a surveillance camera bolted high on the wall halfway down. He could already hear the noise, muffled through concrete—talking, yelling, barking.
When he got to the door, it swung open, a heavy black man holding it wide. He went through, saw the door had four different deadbolts and a police lock that fit into a plate in the floor. Mounted on the wall behind it was a closed-circuit TV screen showing the corridor he'd just come down.
Now the noise hit him fully, along with the smell of smoke and sweat and urine. He turned right into a small anteroom lined with lockers. A dead pit bull lay on a tarp thrown in one corner, its gray coat matted with blood, eyes half open.
He went through into the main room. The warehouse was a single open space, maybe two hundred feet in each direction. Metal-shaded bulbs hung on cables from the ceiling and smoke moved in their light.
There was a ring marked off in the center of the floor, bordered by wooden shipping crates. About twenty men in the room, all black, some sitting on metal folding chairs, some standing, all watching the ring where two men held back snarling dogs. The dogs—one a rottweiler, the other a pit—were raised up on their chains, snapping at the air, barely a foot of space between them. The pit's handler wore a black vest with no shirt, a black cowboy hat. The kid holding the rott was barely out of his teens. He wore a white knee-length T-shirt, a gold medallion and a black nylon stocking cap that lay like a mane on his shoulders.
Johnny stayed where he was, the others oblivious to his presence. A white-haired man in a suit spoke quietly to the handlers in turn, got nods from both of them. They pulled their dogs back, crouched beside them, began to unsnap their collars.
“Let 'em go,” the white-haired man said, and in a flash the dogs were at each other, colliding in midair. As the handlers stepped back, the rott snarled, snapped, caught the loose flesh around the pit's throat, bore it down. But the pit twisted free, bit the rott deeply behind its left ear. First blood. Some of the men began to shout.
The rott pulled free, leaped again, caught the pit's ear and shredded it, but lost its hold almost immediately. The dogs fell and rolled. The rott snapped, drew blood from the pit's muzzle, then released its grip to find a new target. In a flash, the pit was in, locking its jaws on the rott's muzzle, its flat dinosaur face impassive.
The rott kicked, squealed, but the pit held on, its front legs braced against the floor. It dropped, bringing the rott down with it, and Johnny heard the sharp crunch of bone. The pit released, lunged again, buried its muzzle deep in the rott's throat, bore it down once more. The kid shook his head, looked away. The rott's bowels emptied, the smell sharp in the air. It kicked almost reflexively until its struggles slowed, stopped.
“Got
damn,
” one of the watchers said loudly. Johnny
looked up. Lindell had been standing with his back to him the whole time, but now he stepped into the light wash from the overhead bulb, peeling money from a roll. He wore a black pinstriped suit, his hair straightened and pomaded back, goatee neatly trimmed. He counted off bills, handed them to a fat young man in a black sweatshirt and camouflage pants who took the money with no expression. He counted it as he moved away, then handed it to Cowboy Hat, who folded the bills, nodded at Lindell, tucked them into a vest pocket.
The pit was still holding on, though the rott wasn't moving. Cowboy Hat took a wooden breaker stick, forced it into the pit's mouth like a shoehorn, levered up until it let go. Then he caught the pit and pulled it back to the edge of the ring.
Lindell turned, saw Johnny for the first time. He replaced his roll, started toward him. Johnny finished his cigarette, stepped on it.
In the ring, the rott's handler picked it up almost gently, the dog dead weight in his arms, carried it away.
“Johnny Too Bad,” Lindell said. He showed flawless white teeth in his smile. He put his hand out and Johnny caught it in the soul shake. They embraced quickly, slapped each other on the back.
“Lindell. Looking slick as always.”
“Did you see that? That was some sorry shit. Cost me five bills.”
The rott's handler had carried the dog into the anteroom. Now he came back out to stand in the doorway, his T-shirt stained with blood.
“Lindell,” he said.
“Excuse me,” Lindell said. Johnny followed him.
The rott had been laid out on an army blanket, the material already darkening with blood. It lay on its right side with its eyes open, breath whistling through its cracked muzzle, wheezing as its chest rose and fell. The pit had crushed its throat.
“He's alive, Lindell,” the kid said. “I told you he was
tough, that he was dead game.” There was water in the kid's eyes.
Lindell crouched beside the dog, far enough away to keep blood off his suit.
“Yeah, he was game, all right. Not game enough, though. And he may still be alive, that little motherfucker, but he never gonna fight again.”
“We gotta get him to the vet right away, Lindell. Get him fixed up and shit. We gotta get him there now.”
Lindell shook his head.
“Not this time. Not worth it. Give him the shot.”
“But he's trying to get up, can't you see?”
“He's done, boy. Give him the shot. Get it over with.”
Lindell stood, looked at the kid. He was still kneeling on the concrete, a leather case open beside him. Inside were a syringe, three dark brown ampules. One of them would be penicillin, Johnny knew. The other B
12
or another vitamin booster to prime the dog on fight day. And the third an anesthetic to put it down.
“What are you waiting for?” Lindell said.
“There ain't none left.”
“What do you mean?”
“The bottle's empty. I was going to get more from Rakim this week. But I didn't think there was any way T-Boy could lose tonight. Not like that.”
The dog gave a hitch, its legs working for a moment in slow motion. Johnny watched it, could see its system shutting down piece by piece.
“Yeah, well, he lost, all right. And cost me five hundred dollars. Step out the way.”
Lindell reached under his jacket, came out with a silver automatic. He pointed it at the floor, worked the slide. The kid stepped back. When Lindell crouched again, the dog rolled one rheumy eye up to watch him. The nub of its tail moved slowly from side to side.
“Don't look at me like that, you stupid-ass lame motherfucker.” He caught the edge of the blanket, pulled it over the top half of the dog's body.
“Which side is the heart?”
“I don't know,” the kid said.
Lindell put his left hand on the blanket. It rose and fell under his palm.
“I feel it,” he said. He took his hand away, held the muzzle of the gun four inches away from the spot he'd touched.
“Lindell …” the kid said.
He fired twice, the shots loud in the concrete room. Casings hit the floor. The dog spasmed beneath the tarp, one leg kicking slowly, then was still. Urine pooled between its legs, the ammonia smell of it filling the room. The holes in the blanket smoked, the tang of cordite drifting in the air.
The men in the other room had turned at the shots. Handlers had brought in two new dogs, were holding them at the outside of the ring, waiting. Lindell stood, put the safety on the automatic, made it disappear under his jacket again.
“Go on,” he said to the kid. “Get him out of here before he stinks up the place any more.”
The kid looked down at the dog, didn't move.
Lindell turned to Johnny.
“Come on,” he said. “Let's go where we can talk.”
The kid knelt, began to fold the edges of the blanket over the dog, bundling it to be carried. Johnny followed Lindell back into the big room.
“My nephew,” Lindell said. “Trying to school him, but he ain't getting it yet. It ain't no motherfucking game.”
Johnny felt the eyes of the men on him as they walked past, wondering what this white boy was doing in their midst. Lindell gestured to a stairwell in the far wall. Johnny followed him. Behind him, he heard the referee call and then the snarling and snapping as dogs met in the ring.
They went up a short flight of stairs into an office with a window that looked out on the floor. There was an old refrigerator along one wall, a filing cabinet next to it, drawers bent and half open. On top of the cabinet was a color TV, DVD player beside it. On the screen, a blonde woman was performing oral sex on a muscular, tattooed black man. The sound was turned off.
Lindell opened the refrigerator, took out two Michelobs, nodded at a wooden chair near the window. There was a single desk in the room. Atop it were a half dozen DVD cases, the women on them in various states of undress.
He opened the beers, handed one to Johnny, then sat behind the desk. Johnny pulled the other chair closer, sat down. He nodded at the cases.
“What are those?”
“DVDs, man. Get that shit free. One of the perks of the job.”
He moved a newspaper aside, found the remote.
“Video was better, though. This digital technology is no good for porn, man. Lets you see all the lines in these bitches' faces, pimples on their ass. It's depressing.” The screen went gray, then black.
“I wouldn't know.”
“Yeah, I guess you wouldn't, being away all this time. I should have thought of that.”
Lindell put the remote down, sat back.
“You talk to the man yet?” he said.
Johnny shook his head.
“Figured I'd talk to you first, see what the situation was.”
Lindell nodded. “Smart.”
“Funny, though. Last time I was around here, ‘the man' meant someone else.”
“The times has changed.
That
man is
re
tired. And those times ain't never coming back, I'm happy to say.” He took a sip from the beer. “No shit, Johnny. Things are good and gonna get better. Joey been waiting for you to get out, help him get busy.”
BOOK: The Heartbreak Lounge
4.29Mb size Format: txt, pdf, ePub
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