But it took time to build the relationship with the law that way, and the initial resistance from King had to be dealt with sooner, rather than later, otherwise he’d start to lose any credibility he’d gained since arriving in the city a few days ago. He had to make a bold statement, to show everyone that his way was the only viable option.
He was also confident of his plans for Adrian Hell too. They had history, the two of them. And despite Adrian saving his life not so long ago, Manhattan never forgot the people who had wronged him. He’d learned from the mistakes both generations of Pellaggio had made when it came to dealing with that man, and offering him the contract to kill Johnny King was just the first step to getting his revenge.
He smiled as he walked over to his mini bar and poured himself a small measure of bourbon. He dropped a couple of ice cubes into it, which clinked together loudly in his otherwise silent room. He sat in the chair Tarantina had occupied a moment earlier, took a sip of his drink, and looked out of the window. He wasn’t concerned over if it was too early to drink or not — he simply wanted to relax and be left to his thoughts.
It hadn’t been too difficult to track Adrian down, once you knew how to look for him. He couldn’t be found unless he wanted to be, but Manhattan was in a reasonably unique position, in that he’d crossed paths with Adrian Hell — more than once — and lived to tell the tale. Consequently, he had somewhat of an inside scoop on him, which aided him greatly when it came to locating him.
It was very interesting to him that he’d found Adrian in the same state as himself. He made a mental note to find out what job in particular Adrian was working on over in Pittsburgh. If he was involved, it will likely be a target of some importance, which could be a situation worth exploiting…
Manhattan’s phone rang, breaking the silence in the room and disturbing his thoughts. He hadn’t moved from his chair. He’d spent the time contemplating his next few moves, like playing a mental chess game, theorizing on all the possible outcomes.
He walked over to the bed and answered it. “Yes?”
“Boss, it’s me,” said an obviously flustered Tarantina. “We’ve got a real problem.”
“What’s happened?” asked Manhattan, frowning with fresh concern.
“One of our new businesses, a launderette over in Westwood, has been hit. We’ve got two men dead and one injured. The place was cleaned out.”
“Remind me what this business was…”
“There was a gambling house run in the back. Mostly poker. Illegal, high stakes — most visitors are our kind of people, and were known players in the state looking to spend, and launder, some cash.”
“What have we lost?”
“Close to eighty large,” replied Tarantina with a heavy sigh.
Manhattan’s nostrils flare and his face contorts, as momentary flash of anger before taking a deep breath.
“Who have we lost?” he asked.
“A couple of guys I brought into the organization. Good guys — I’d known them a long time. I ain’t happy, Boss.”
“I know, Paulie. We just need to handle this situation correctly. Have we been able to get anything of use from the survivor?”
“Nothing except a vague description of one of the guys who came in. The details meant nothing to me, but my guess is that it was King’s men.”
“That would be my assumption too, but we need to make sure. Bring me the security tapes, and let me see what happened. If it was King, we will find the men who did this and make an example. Then send Mr. King an invoice for our missing money. This will not go unpunished.”
“You got it, Mr. Manhattan,” said Tarantina, before hanging up.
Manhattan stared at the phone for a moment, before dropping it on the bed, walking back over to the mini bar, and pouring himself a fresh shot of bourbon, much larger this time. He took a long gulp and a deep breath.
He’d expected a few hiccups along the way, but nothing as daring as that. He knew he had to find out who was responsible and retaliate quickly — set an example. And if it was Johnny King behind it, he’d put his head on a spike for the world to see.
16
Josh has just spent the last hour or so explaining the finer details of his plan to assault Trent’s bank balance, which I have no problem admitting made very little sense to me. But the bottom line is we’re going to transfer all Trent’s money into our bank account, which sounds pretty goddamn good to me.
We’ve also been discussing Manhattan’s job offer. Despite the potential benefits, taking down Trent is simply more important, and I don’t want lose sight of why I’m here, so we’ve agreed that the best thing to do is turn the job down. Plus, any dealings with Manhattan would only ever be temporary, and a huge risk at best, so it really isn’t worth it.
It looks like the rain outside has settled in for the duration now. It’s coming down much heavier than a couple of hours ago. Despite being the middle of the afternoon, it’s almost dark outside. The raindrops splash rapidly against the window of my hotel suite, the noise low and constant in the background.
Josh is sitting cross-legged on my bed, his laptop resting on his knees as he taps away, cursing occasionally. I smile. Watching him work is always interesting. You can see it in his eyes — the excitement, the urgency, the intelligence… He’s a very unique individual.
“Right,” he says, looking up from the screen. “I think I’ve got an algorithm that could work. It’ll mask my IP address and bounce my signal all over the world before attacking the accounts, so we’re pretty safe.”
I nod with an exaggerated blank look on my face. “Great! I was just thinking, you’ll definitely need to make sure you mask your IP address…”
He raises an eyebrow. “‘We both know you have no clue what I just said. Leave the sarcasm to me, yeah?”
I hold my hands up and laugh. “Fair enough. So, are you good to go ahead?”
“In theory, yes — I think so. Now we just need the details of his accounts…”
“Well, let’s go and get something to eat and figure out the rest of it. I’m hungry.”
He closes the laptop and puts it to one side, stretching his legs out on the bed before standing. “Sounds good to me,” he says, heading for the door.
I pick my jacket up off the back of the chair and look at my guns, which are hanging underneath it in their holster.
I’m only going for some lunch — I doubt I’ll need them…
I put my jacket on and follow Josh out of the room, picking up the room key from the side as I pass and closing the door behind me. We walk to the elevator and ride it to the first floor. The doors ding and slide open, and we walk out side by side into the lobby. Josh immediately taps my arm and subtly gestures toward the front desk. There are two police officers talking to the manager. They’re holding a picture and the manager’s nodding and gesturing with his hands. We look at each other, the same alarm bells ringing in our heads, then stride on quickly but cautiously with our heads down toward the entrance.
“Oh, there he is now,” I hear the manager say. I can’t help but look over. He’s pointing right at us. “Mr. Hughes? Do you have a moment?”
I look at the two officers as they turn to face us. They’re both about the same height and build. Both dressed the same — beat cops with their waterproof coats on. The one on the left has some stubble on his chin, while the other is clean-shaven. Their eyes narrow as they look first at us, then at the photo in they’re holding. They quickly turn to each other and nod in silent confirmation, and set off walking toward us.