Rob
I was feeling pretty on edge when Chris and Sadie came into the cafe. I’d figured there’d be some friction between Micah and Sadie when she told him about Manny but I hadn’t figured he’d be that hard to convince. If Micah had heard the news it was ten to one that Manny would hear about it before the day was out. If he found out, he might come after me, too—he had to guess that it was someone on the inside who’d told Sadie, and I would be high up on his list.
“I ordered you both coffees,” I said when Sadie and her brother sat down. “Cost of privacy.” Sadie nodded.
“So what do you want to do?” I looked away from Sadie and glanced at Bamber; he’d never been my favorite guy, but I couldn’t help thinking that of the two of them, Sadie was way better off in the business. She’d always been smart—that much was obvious. She’d probably always been smarter than her brother, too. Only a matter of time before Micah would have given her the keys to the kingdom, I thought.
“Here’s the way I figure it,” I said, drinking some of my coffee and lighting up a cigarette. “We all have to talk to Micah. We have to give him the full details.”
“He kicked me out,” Sadie countered. “And I doubt he’s going to be any more willing to see Chris.”
“He will if I tell him to,” I told her. “He still trusts me—he’d have to, to let me keep running things with the girls alongside Manny.”
“So how are we going to do this?” I thought about it for a minute or two.
“I’m going to call him, and convince him to meet with us,” I said. “At Vagabond, in an hour.” I glanced at the window; there wouldn’t be any staff there—Micah would bring Brody with him, maybe one or two other guards to make sure of things, but it would be quiet, and he’d be more willing to meet there than anywhere else.
“And you’ll tell him it’s us with you?” Sadie raised an eyebrow, giving me a doubtful look.
“Yeah, I’ll figure out a way to get him to agree with it,” I said. I wasn’t sure exactly how I was going to do that, but I thought I could find a way. I had to. “But you two need to be ready with good, fast fucking words when we meet with him,” I told them both. “We need proof—more proof than I can come up with.”
“I have my story,” Chris pointed out. “And there’s got to be something we can do to get more info—one of the girls, maybe, or something like that.”
“I can probably get one of the girls to confirm what I’m saying,” Sadie said. “I honestly thought he’d believe me.”
“Yeah, I thought so too,” I admitted. “He won’t believe me on my own, and obviously he won’t just take your word for it, but maybe if we all go at him with the info, he’ll have to at least think about checking it out.”
“Who else might know about the details?” Sadie sipped her coffee. “We need as much proof as a person can possibly get.”
“I’ve got some more info, since I told you about it,” I told her. “That should help.” I finished my cigarette and took my phone out of my pocket.
Sadie looked at her brother and I pulled up Micah’s latest number; he was about to change it, but he always kept Manny, me, and the other high-ups updated on what his newest number was. I texted him first: I need to meet with you. Urgent. I drank down about half of my coffee and waited for Micah to reply.
What’s up? I looked at Sadie. I could only hope we could pull the situation off.
Let me call you. Shit’s complicated. I waited a few moments for Micah to get the message and then dialed his number.
Micah picked up after the second ring. “What’s going on?”
“I need to meet with you,” I told him again. “I’ve got Bamber and his sister with me—before you say no, give me some fucking credit.”
“I don’t want to see Bamber’s sister again. Bitch tried to throw Manny under the bus.”
“There’s been a thing with the girls,” I told him. It was a lie and I knew he’d be pissed for it, but I had to do something; he wasn’t going to agree to meet with any of us if I told him it was about Manny. “She might have a way to make things even bigger, with her brother helping.”
“You think I’m going to let that piece of shit have anything to do with my business?”
“It’s partly his idea,” I said. “Between the two of them and me, it’s a big fucking deal. Not something we can talk about on the phone.”
“You’re not fucking around on me, are you?” I rolled my eyes.
“I wouldn’t do that, you know that, asshole.” I looked at Bamber and Sadie. “It’s important. Either you meet with us for this or you’re leaving money on the table.”
“Where?”
“Vagabond, in an hour and a half,” I said. “It’ll be worth your while.”
“Fine,” Micah said. I could tell he wasn’t exactly in a good mood and probably wouldn’t brighten up before we got to him, but the important thing was to get him to agree to the meeting at all.
“He’s going to be pissed when he finds out the real reason for the meeting,” Sadie said when I hung up.
“Yeah, well…” I shrugged. “I did what I had to, would do it the same way again. No matter how pissed he is, it’s not like we’re not doing him a big fucking service in the long run.”
“He’ll only see it that way if we can convince him of what Manny’s doing,” Chris pointed out.
“Yeah.” I lit another cigarette. “That’s the thing: we need a fucking airtight case.” I flicked ash off the end. “But we can do it.” I looked at Sadie. “You’re ready for this?” Sadie shrugged.
“Even if I’m not, we have to get this done,” Sadie told me.
“We should gather some more info,” Chris said. “I can talk to a couple of guys.”
# # #
Sadie
I agreed to meet with Rob outside of Vagabond before we went in to talk to Micah; but before we could do that, Chris and I needed to get our ducks in a row. “I’ll drive,” Chris said as we left the cafe.
“Where are we going?” Chris glanced at me.
“A couple of other guys got snatched from, too,” Chris said. “I’m going to ask them who it was, shit like that. See if we can’t get someone to corroborate.”
“Sounds good,” I said. I could already feel myself getting more anxious; I didn’t know what else we could do but meet with Micah, but I couldn’t shake the thought that it wasn’t going to go well.
I tried to settle my nerves as Chris drove, but even if I hadn’t been on edge, my brother’s driving would have taken me there in a matter of moments; he seemed determined to swerve every few minutes, taking turns a lot more sharply than I thought he needed to, speeding. “Do you really think that’s a good idea, considering you’re apparently a drug dealing pimp?” I looked at Chris grimly.
“Not according to the police,” he said, sounding unconcerned. “I’m more worried that Manny might have someone looking for your car, trying to figure out where we’re going. Better to drive erratically.”
“And get pulled over,” I muttered to myself. I shifted in the passenger seat and focused on suppressing the nausea that Chris’ driving inspired. Coffee was a bad idea, I thought with frustration, breathing slowly through my nose. I wondered what Rob was going to do between the time we’d left him and when we were supposed to meet up with him again. We didn’t have much time before the meeting at Vagabond. Rob likely had something in mind to strengthen his own case, but I had no idea what.
Chris parked in a cracked, crumbling lot next to an old apartment building; the coating on the windows had yellowed from the heavy well water they used in the property’s sprinkler system, and the stuccoed walls looked almost rusty. I shook off my anxiety to try and focus for the time being—I needed to pay attention to whatever Chris and this guy had to say to each other.
I followed my brother to the second floor, and he knocked on the door next to the staircase. One of the numbers had come off, but it had left behind a ghostly shadow: 261 (4). “What do you want?” The guy inside sounded hungover, and I tried not to judge.
“It’s Bamber, I want to talk,” Chris called back.
“What the fuck?” I heard the locks rattle in the metal storm door and then it opened with a creak. Whoever this friend of Chris’ was, he’d definitely seen better days: he had a greening bruise around one eye, a purple-red one on the other jaw, and a scab over his slightly flattened nose. His blue eyes were bloodshot, his bleach-blond hair scraggly and greasy-looking, and his shirtless torso showed other bruises in roughly the shape of fists.
“Hey, man,” Chris said. “Can we come in real quick?”
“I’m already on the shit list,” Chris’ friend said, shrugging and wincing at the same time. “Why not?”
“I may be able to get you off the shit list,” Chris said. I followed him into the apartment; it reeked of pot and stale booze and mildew. I tried to breathe shallowly, and wished that Chris’ friend would at least open a window—though the air conditioner unit for his apartment seemed to be working hard enough as it was.
“How’s that? You’ve been persona non-grazie for longer than I have,” the friend said. “Who’s this?” He pointed to me.
“My sister, Sadie,” Chris said, shrugging. “She’s helping out.”
“Not bad,” the guy said, looking me up and down. “Oh—I heard about you!”
“From who?” My heart started beating faster again, and I could hear my blood roaring in my ears.
“One of the girls,” Chris’ friend said. He grinned. “You helped her with her makeup, coached her on the clients.” I felt my heart starting to slow down.
“Okay,” I said. The guy raised an eyebrow.
“I also heard you were thick as thieves with Micah,” he said. He looked at Chris. “Is she?”
“She made an arrangement with him for the escort business, to try and get me off the radar,” Chris told him.
“So you’re back on the radar now?”
“Yeah—but we’re here to try and work on that,” Chris said.
“Let me grab you some beers.” I almost told him not to bother—the smell in the apartment was starting to get to me—but I held my peace. Chris’ friend went into the kitchen and opened the fridge. I looked at my brother and raised an eyebrow.
“Just go with it,” he whispered.
“So how do you think you can help me?” Chris’ friend came back into the living room with three Natural Ices, and handed me one. I resisted the urge to cringe and popped the tab.
“You got jumped a while back, right?”
“Twice,” my brother’s friend said. “First from the guys taking the drugs and cash off of me, and then a couple of days ago when Manny and some guys came to kick the shit out of me for losing the drugs and money.”
“Okay,” Chris said. “What can you tell me about the night you got jumped?” I sipped my beer and tried not to intrude on what was clearly my brother’s project.
“It was three or four guys,” his friend said. “They looked like guys I’ve seen around, but they were on me fast as shit.”
“Can you describe them?” Chris’ friend looked at me and I took another sip of the watery, cheap beer. “If you can come up with a description, I can compare it with the people who jumped Chris. See if it’s the same people.”
“We’re thinking it’s someone from the inside,” Chris said, “but we don’t know who.” Finally showing some discretion, big brother! I tried not to let my excitement show on my face.
“Yeah I can describe them—but look: you aren’t going to the cops, right? I’m kind of holding right now...can’t have the 5-0 snooping my place when they come asking questions.”
“Nah, man, this is between us and some people at top,” Chris said.
“But do you mind if I record just the descriptions?” I looked at Chris. His eyes widened and I thought he was going to get angry at my suggestion.
“As long as it’s not going to the cops,” his friend told me. “You swear on each other’s lives, right?”
“Of course,” we both said at the same time.
“Okay,” the friend said, taking a long gulp of his beer. I took my phone out of my pocket and found the recording app.
“Say your name, and then start describing,” I told him, starting the recording.
“This is, uh, Nate,” the guy said. At least now I know his name, I thought. “And this is what the guys looked like.” He described them, and Chris nodded along; he obviously had been attacked by the same guys. I probed for more details—the more I could put together, the more I could show Micah, the better things would be. I might actually have a chance to convince him.
We finished off our beers and I watched Chris and Nate talk about the business, about their options going forward. Neither of them really wanted to work for Micah, they kept insisting. Maybe if they could get off the shit list, they could take up with someone else—someone who wasn’t so over-ambitious. I tuned out, trying to gulp down the beer quickly enough to get out of the apartment as quickly as possible.
Finally, finally we were leaving, and as Chris left Nate’s apartment, he turned to me. “I’ve got one more guy we can go to,” he said. “Think we have time?”
“We need to make it fast—no shooting the shit,” I said. “We need to be at Vagabond in a little more than thirty minutes.”
“He lives like two minutes from here,” Chris told me. “We can ask him for descriptions, get him on record, and get to Vagabond.”
“We don’t want to be late, just remember that,” I said, feeling the lingering anxiety. I took a deep breath and we headed down the stairs to the parking lot.