"What's wrong, baby? Your wife coming home?"
"Shhh." I put a hand on her lips. She bit my fingers, still thinking I was fooling around. Somebody was coming up the stairs, and they were on a creep. We had stopped in the middle of the second flight of stairs.
Below me the stairs turned the corner and went down to the first floor and the sidewalk. The stud had to be at that corner. Good thing the cheap sonofabitch landlord hadn't bothered to replace the lights that were supposed to be in the stairwell.
"What, baby?" she said again.
I heard the step and threw the chick down where I figured he was standing.
"What the fuck you doing?" she screamed. As she went down, I went right behind her. She collided with the chump, who'd started back-pedaling too late. The two went over.
"Motherfuckah, I'm going to cut you," she said.
I jumped over her and onto the dude she was halfway on. We slid down part of the first set of stairs. He was big, muscular. This boy was no mugger. Somebody I knew had sent him to do me in.
"Niggah, you don't know how to treat a lady, do you?" Homegirl was still going on.
Me and the dude were tussling, trying to get to our feet. He beat me to it and caught me good in the side with the tip of his shoe. I fell, bringing up my arm. A heavy piece of metal crashed down on it and I yelled out.
"Oh, Zelmont, you in trouble, ain't you?" She'd finally got the picture.
I rammed forward, but this chunky clunk knew what to do. He brought a knee up, catching me under the chin. I sagged down and got clubbed in the shoulder blades as I ducked my head out of the way. Otherwise he'd have taken it off at the root with his metal club.
"Don't worry, honey."
There was a swish of air and then it was the other cat's turn to holler.
"Skank," the dude said, holding his leg. We were at the bottom of the stairs, a little light coming in from the moon and street-lamps. My opponent was dressed in a nylon workout suit I had seen before. But I didn't have to guess since he wasn't wearing a mask. It was Coach Cannon.
The blonde was holding a hook knife, which she'd used to slash him across the leg. Her top was torn. She must have ripped it tearing the knife loose from her bra. Well, a girl had to be careful, I guess. She was dancing around like a welterweight, jerking the knife in the air like she had the shakes. She didn't know what to do next.
Cannon did. He backhanded her with the pry bar he was holding. She flew back against a wall and went to the ground like wet laundry. But that had given me enough time to get moving, and I drop-kicked the coach in the chest just like I'd seen wrestlers do.
Cannon staggered back against the wall of the stairwell. I got up and slugged him.
"Goddammit," he wheezed.
I hit him two more times on the back of his neck with my hands held together like a club. The bear of a man sunk to his knees, still holding onto the hunk of metal. So I brought my elbow down straight on his dome. That disoriented him enough for me to make a grab for the pry bar.
"No." He was on one knee, holding onto the bar with both hands. I was pulling on it with both my hands. We were like Malone and Jordan struggling for the ball. But I had an advantage 'cause I was at a better angle, and I snatched the bar away. Quickly I chugged him under the chin with the end of the bar, stunning him.
I leapt on him, pressing the bar against his throat. "Who the fuck sent you, Cannon?"
"I had to do it, Zelmont."
"Give me an answer 'fore I cave your skull in." I pulled him up, the bar resting against the side of his face.
"Chekka, Chekka sent me after you." He started sobbing like a little girl. I can't stand a man crying. Man got to own up.
"Stop it." I slapped him with the bar, but not too hard. "Why, what's he got on you?"
"My oldest boy, you know about his gambling habits. Chekka got him in debt by advancing way too much to him. Must be more than five hundred grand." He started crying again.
"You the head coach of the Barons, man. I know you can come up with some of that green."
Cannon shook his head, his beard wet with sweat and tears. "He's got more on the boy, real bad stuff." He shook his head again. "I didn't want to do it, Zelmont. But Chekka said he'd have my son crippled if I didn't."
"Chekka told you to kill me?"
"No, you know I couldn't do that. He wanted me to scare you. He wants the money back. If his cousin was going down he needed it to get away. Seems with Ellison pissing in his soup about the Justice Department, most of the boys are out looking for other work or trying to break off part of the enterprise for themselves."
The hook knife chick groaned.
"So why did he send you to mess me up? Don't tell me he couldn't get one of his Serbian slobs to throw in for old times' sake."
"To delay you, my friend," Rudy Chekka said, his voice coming from behind me.
I got off Cannon and turned around. Chekka had on a slick black leather jacket, black shirt, and glossy tan tie. To top it off he had a black pistol in his hand.
"I use coach, I don't owe him money I use any of my countrymen, I got to pay out. That's if I could still trust them." He made a circle in the air with the gun. "I have learned in this country it is better to have a short memory when it comes to who your friends are."
"How'd you know it was us?"
"Unlike the cops, I don't need proof. Garvak, the one you kicked in the truck, described the size of one of the men, and it matched Napoleon Graham. And of course how the other gunman was so concerned for this wounded man's condition." He smiled, stepping closer. "And that championship run up the hill could only have been you, Zelmont. Now let's get that money, yeah?"
"Sure."
One of my neighbors was coming home. I recognized the putt-putt of the beat-to-hell car that always dropped her off at this time. She was Guatemalan or something, and she worked swing at some bindery. The car door closed and her footsteps were coming down the walkway.
"Oh," she said when she came into the crowded stairwell.
"Hi," I said, moving to the side.
Chekka looked at Cannon, who was picking up homegirl off the ground.
"Hey, baby, I told you to be cool on that Hennessy" He was bent over, trying to lift her cold-cocked ass up.
The little Latina started hurrying up the stairs, smiling nervously at us as she went. I was gonna toss her like I did with hook knife woman, but Chekka was wise. He patted the gun in the deep pocket of his leather coat. I let the chick go on up.
"Let's go." Chekka twitched his head toward the street.
Cannon let my girl drop with a thud. That was cold.
"Who's driving?" I asked.
"The coach. You and me will ride together in back."
"Great."
So off we went to fuckin' Oz. Now maybe Dorothy and Toto and the Tin Man might have had an idea of where to go, but I sure as shit didn't. I didn't know if Wilma was in town or had skipped off, making me the biggest dupe of all time. I was more upset about that than the fact Chekka had a rod on me and was gonna gat me as soon as he figured out I had no clue as to where the dough might be.
"Where we going, Zelmont?" Cannon played with the rear view mirror, looking at my face in it. "You give up the money and everything's cool, right?" He started his ride, a Navigator with a dented bumper. He clicked the automatic floor shift into drive and we took off.
"Of course." Maybe coach wanted to really believe Chekka so it would make his guilty conscience feel better. But both of us knew Chekka wasn't planning on letting me so much as scratch my balls for one second after I showed him to the swag. As if I could.
"We gotta jet down to Alhambra."
"Why?" Chekka jabbed me in the gut with the barrel of the gun.
"That's where we hid it, at this clinic that Doc Burroughs owns a piece of."
"Who is this?" Chekka growled.