“Regardless, I want you to have this.” He slides the other two bundles over.
“Can’t take that.”
“The fuck you can’t.” He smiles a little lopsided and takes another drink.
“Patrik, if Bogdan Skansi was standing right here I’d do it all over again…and I…I would pay you.” I laugh loud for effect only. I ain’t that drunk but damn, this is fun.
“You know I can’t make you take it. You’d kick my ass.” Patrik shrugged. “I’m gonna leave it right there and before you go tonight, you’ll have it in your pocket.”
I laugh and drain my glass. I’m letting it drop right the fuck there. No use pushing my luck and being too damn proud and noble. “All this talk makes me thirsty.”
He grabs the bottle and gurgles out two more drinks. “I do have one more thing to talk about and I made up my mind a little earlier when you were falling all over yourself asking to be paid.”
Ding, ding, ding. It’s that fucking warning bell again.
He stares at me and the grin fades to a tight thin smile. He’s got that stony look again. Same look as he had when I thought he was going to pull something. Like he’s stone sober all of a sudden.
“We’ve done very well the past few years.” He nods at the money on the table. And half-ass waves around the room. “We have grown.”
He sips again. His eyes are heavily lidded with the booze and I’m sure I look the same.
“And I’ve got a business proposition for you.”
Instead of a warning bell in my head, it’s a fucking fire alarm going off now.
After he’s done laying it all out, I’m blown away. No wonder about the money and the fancy digs behind the cover of this old bar.
“So you’re selling much more kokaina?”
“Much more?” He raised his eyebrows. “Five times more than what we were when you first went into Joliet and its still growing. When the feds ran their sting and the crackdown came, the Russian mafia was decimated in Chicago.”
“Is all the new business snort?”
“No, we have picked up or stolen the heroin trade as well, and meth from downstate too, but that shit has always worried me. The drug is crazy and so are the people who make it.”
“The escort business?”
“Yes, yes. Small business, as always, but solid and safe. Some of our best and oldest customers are members of Chicago’s finest. It’s been good insurance for years to have them as customers. Escort services have always been sort of tolerated, you know?”
“Victimless crime,” I say.
“You got it.”
“So, Patrik, what do you need me for? Sounds like you guys are running the show.”
“They are coming back in.”
“The Russians, you mean.”
Patrik gives a clipped nod. “Yes, and there will be war because of it. We knew that they would be back as quickly as they could bring people in. Mostly New York but some of their Philly crew has been in town, too. They’re beefing up and so are we.”
I sort of shake my head and shrug at the same time. “I’m looking to live awhile longer, Patrik. I don’t think I got a two-year war in my plans.”
“There has already been some big hits. I lost my third in charge two weeks ago. The pressure is building. I’m at the top of the list. So is Viktor Skansi.”
“Viktor Skansi? The old man?”
“Yes, father to Bogdan. He’s here, here in Chicago somewhere.”
“Well, I’ll be damned. But like I said, you know I love you but this really ain’t my beef.”
“You would have only one job and then you’re out of it.”
”Patrik…I’d be a dead man if I do what I think you want me to. Bogdan was one thing but this would be another.”
“We would protect your identity with a nobody we hire from the west coast. He is a throw away but has a name that is somewhat known.”
“But how do you pin it on him?”
“We contract him openly so that they too are aware of what’s going on. We tuck him away and have him wait. When you’re done he disappears forever.”
“Why don’t you just use the west coast shooter straight out? Then either pay him or make him go away after he’s done.”
“Three things; time, trust and he’d fuck it up. You’re the best for this, Jerz.”
“So you’re feeling the pinch, huh?”
“Yes, clock is ticking. If we strike first and get Skansi, it will hurt them badly. We will win for the time being. Probably for quite a while.”
I shift around in my chair again. I finish my drink and squirm around a little more.
He’s watching me the whole time.
A soft knock on the door breaks the tension.
“Patrik, sorry to interrupt. I need to talk to you.” The voice on the other side of the door is deep and heavily accented.
“Call me in two minutes.” Patrik shakes his head sadly and stares at the closed door. “They are like children, Jerz. Always something.”
“I gotta get going anyway, old friend.”
“Jerzy, tell me you will do this for the Dudek family.”
“I tell you what, I’ll think on it. I know I’m gonna regret this but how much we talking about Patrik?”
“A large sum of money for one job.”
I give him a knowing look. “Patrik?”
He stares me straight in the eye. “Two hundred thousand. I’ve already added in some for the extra negotiating.”
I try hard not to register anything on my face. It’s not really that hard because the vodka has got me pretty numbed up.
The phone buzzes and he picks it up. He listens mostly, speaking only a few words in slurred Polish. Then he simply hangs up.
“Tomorrow noon, on a yes or no?” He finishes his drink, stands up and smiles his old smile.
I nod slowly. “Yes, that would be good. Yes.”
He’s drunk and I am too, but we manage a bear hug as he comes around the desk.
“What was the call just then? Am I shooting my way out of here?”
He laughs and leans heavily on his desk.
“Hardly. It’s nothing. Kos has abruptly quit, left about an hour or so ago. He was a dumbass, anyway.”
“Damn, I hope that little misunderstanding when I came in didn’t have something to do with it.”
Patrik waved my comment away. “Believe me, no great loss, Jerz. Call me early tomorrow eh?”
“I will, you know I will. Hey, what time you closing out there these days?”
“Three o’clock.” He looks at me and smiles. ”The short blond bartender, right?”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“Ania. Tell her your drinks are free. She is friendly.” He winks at me and puts the other two banded stacks of money in my hand. “Now, you either take these or I have you thrown out. No Ania, either.”
I shrug and tuck the bundles into my jacket pocket. “Get me past your soldiers, Patrik. I got serious work to do.”
With that we walk back through the hallways and backroom, arriving back out at the bar. He takes me behind the bar and walks me right up to Ania, introduces me and tells her in Polish to give me whatever I want, on the house. He pats her on the ass and walks away. I’m home free. She nods at me and gives me a little smile. I smile back. I’m fuzzy headed as hell and I don’t care if the vodka’s working its magic, she looks damn good. There’s an open stool at the very end of the bar, right where I like to be. Nothing worse than sitting in between people. I slip around the bar and take a seat.
Since my buddy Kos took off a little early, I’m gonna concentrate on the business at hand. His twinky ass can wait. I’ll find him one of these nights.
I wave at Ania, all shy and everything. She flips her hair a little and comes over smiling.
Gonna be a long night.
SIX
Mick
The light on my answering machine was flashing when I got home. That’s me — the alarm clock barely works, but the answering machine is in perfect order. Like anyone ever calls.
But someone did, apparently.
I shrugged off my coat and dropped it on the back of the dining room chair. I took two steps and was in what passed for my bedroom. A shrill beep sounded when I pushed the button. No high tech computer voices for me. Just old school, lucky you got me and I ain’t broken, technology.