Kim Oh 3: Real Dangerous People (The Kim Oh Thrillers) (5 page)

Right now, I could tell that Curt was kind of tired. Given what I already knew about the stuff that had gone down today, that was completely understandable.

“Still shooting that thirty-eight?” I nodded toward the gun on the table.

“We’re used to each other.”

Another awkward moment went by. I made enough room amid the crusted dishes on the table to set my elbows down and prop my face in my hands.

“So.” His turn this time. “What the hell happened out there in Albany?”

“Nothing good.” I didn’t want to go into details right now. Plus I didn’t know how much Curt already knew. “Those people were jerks. That Moretti guy . . .” I shook my head. “And his checks kept bouncing. And that was
after
he screwed me down to the bone on my rates.”

“I told you,” said Curt. “I’ve done that freelancer stuff. Long time ago. You go low-ball – I mean, really low-ball – then people just don’t respect you anymore. Or your work. You would’ve been better off trying to get hired on regular.”

“Yeah, I should’ve listened to you.” Old guys always like it when you say that to them. Like it validates their continued existence on the planet. But he’d had a point. “I don’t get it,” I said aloud. “What’s the point of shopping around for a bargain when you want somebody killed? It’s like that panel van you used to see driving around, with the sign that said
Cheapest Botox in Town
. Sure, like what could go wrong? Stuff’s only frickin’ poison.”

“You’ll never need that.” He gave me a little smile. “You’re so pretty.”

“Glad you think so.” I had my hair loose rather than tied back, but it was kind of flat from my motorcycle helmet. Plus, with my jeans and leather jacket, I figured I probably looked a little hard right now. Some guys like that, though.

“Anyway,” said Curt, “Chinese girls tend to age well.”

I wasn’t going to bother pointing out – again – the difference between Chinese and Korean. What was the point of becoming an old fart like him, if you couldn’t get things like that wrong? As long as you got the important stuff right.

“Super,” I said. “Something to look forward to.”

“Sorry the gig didn’t work out. Maybe I could ask Mr. Falcon to give you another chance. Maybe at one of his other branch operations.”

“That won’t be necessary.”

My smile puzzled him.

“Why not?”

“Don’t you know why I came here?”

“I don’t know,” said Curt. “Maybe you wanted to ask
me
to give you another chance.”

There was a little history between him and me. Not all of it good. That was mainly my fault. Hooking up with his operations – not with him and the others around Falcon, but just as extra security out of town – that had been one of my first gigs after Cole had gotten killed. I might have screwed things up, at least a little bit, there at Moretti’s place. My beginner’s luck must’ve run out when Cole and I had been working at killing McIntyre.

“Like I said before. That’ll be the day.” I shook my head. “That’s not it. You’re way off.”

“Okay. So what is it?”

“Mr. Falcon didn’t tell you?” I leaned across the table toward him. “I’m the new guy. On your crew.”

Curt didn’t say anything. He just gazed back at me in silence.

FOUR

“A woman on the crew? No frickin’ way. No way am I working with some skanky bitch.”

“Jesus, pal.” I looked over at this Foley guy. “I’m sitting here, right in front of you. And that’s the way you talk?”

“I don’t care,” said Foley. “You shouldn’t even be here. That’s what I’m saying. Not at all. No way. No how.”

“Simmer down.” Curt had barely touched the beer sitting in front of him. “We’ve got a lady here with us. So you should watch your language.”

The owner of the bar set a garish cocktail down in front of me. The kind with a little paper parasol.

“On the house,” said Mae. “You’re gonna need it, dealing with these morons.”

“You got that right.” I leaned back in the booth, eyeing the drink with suspicion. “What’s in that thing?”

“Five different types of rum. Mainly.”

“You know what? Maybe you could just bring me a beer instead.” I figured that as long as I was with these guys, in a place like this, I wasn’t going to get carded.

“What kind?”

“Place like this has more than one?” I looked around at the shabby palm fronds and the rest of the aging tropical decor. “Really is upscale around here.”

“Like you wouldn’t believe, honey.” She carried away the weird-ass drink.

“So.” I looked around at the guys in the booth. “Can we talk business now, or is Charm Boy here not yet finished with his tantrum?”

“What’s the point of talking?” Foley apparently wasn’t done. “I’m telling you, it’s not gonna happen.”

“Actually, it is.” Curt leaned across the table toward him. “She’s here because Mr. Falcone wants –”

“Fal-
kun
.” My turn.

Curt shot me an irritated look, then continued. “Because Mr. Falcon wants it like that. So you need to deal with it.”

Foley wasn’t mollified. He shook his head even more emphatically. “No. Way.”

“And I thought you were supposed to be so up-to-date.” Elton, the youngest of the crew – relatively – looked at Foley with obvious embarrassment. “Man, you disappoint me.”

With a narrow-eyed glare, Foley turned on him. “There is
up-to-date
,” he said, “and then there is
out-to-lunch
. Look, we just had one guy killed, remember?” He looked around the booth at the other men. “And I’m not getting myself killed, just because Mr. Falcon wants some more skirts hanging around his office. Hell –” Foley snorted in disgust. “If that’s all the boss wants, we could put Elton here in a dress. He’d probably look better.”

“Hey. Wait a minute.” I took a sip of the beer that Mae had set down in front of me. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

“Figure it out, sweetheart. What’s even the point of having a girl on the squad, when she looks like you? Not like you’re exactly hot, is it?”

“Really?”

“Yeah, really.” Foley brought his crotchety, wrinkled face close to mine. “You look like a twelve-year-old boy wearing a wig. And if I wanted a twelve-year-old boy, I’d get one off the streets. In this town, they’re practically giving ’em away.”

That pissed me off. I might not have been star quality, but I figured I had at least a little something going on. Especially compared to the little schlunk I’d been when I was doing all that bookkeeping stuff. Right after I had started killing people, I’d gone up nearly a whole cup size. They might’ve still been mini-hoots, but they were more than the mosquito bites I’d had before. Granted, maybe it had been all the upper-body exercise I’d been getting – those handguns and automatic rifles can weigh a lot, when you’re toting them around on a daily basis – but still. If there were some hormone deficiency going on around here, it was more likely on the part of this dried-up old prune rather than mine.

“Okay. That tears it, buddy.” I set my beer back down after taking a long pull from it. “If I’m going to be working with you, it’s on the condition that you don’t even talk to me. Actually, don’t even
think
about me.”

“Who says you’re going to be working with us?” Foley got even more heated. “Because that must be some kind of a joke. It’s got to be. Falcon’s just dicking with us. I mean, look at you.”

“I thought you didn’t care to.”

“No, I mean
look
at you. What do you weigh? You’d have to be carrying a ten-pound bag of rice to break a hundred.”

“Watch it –”

“If you fired off anything bigger than a cap gun, you’d land on your ass.”

Actually, I had been tossed on my butt by a weapon’s recoil, but I wasn’t going to let him know about that. And it’d been a heavy-duty assault rifle. And I’d slipped in the mud I’d been standing in. This had been back when Cole was getting me ready for the new, more lethal stage of my life.

“Tell you what.” I had already knocked back half my beer, but it wasn’t improving my mood any. “You and me and what I’ve got here in my backpack, we’ll all go outside to the alley. And we’ll see which one of us falls down first.”

“Bring it, sister –”

“Will you two shut up?” Curt swung his gaze from one to the other of us. “Or do you just want everybody in the world to know about our business?”

Elton, the younger and cracker-ish guy, was sitting next to me. He leaned closer. “Pay him no mind, miss.” He nodded toward Foley. “He’s just upset.”

“Damn straight I’m upset.” Foley glowered behind his own beer. “This is bullshit.”

“You’re entitled to your opinion,” Curt said quietly. “But now we’ve heard it.”

“It’s just frickin’ crazy!” Foley wouldn’t let go. “We’ll be lucky if we all don’t get killed!”

“If it doesn’t work,” said Curt, “then it doesn’t work. But just give her a chance.”

Elton looked over at Foley. “You gave me a chance, buddy.”

“You, we already knew about!” Foley yanked open his shirt collar, revealing a pale scar across his collar bone. “
That’s
from you, pal.”

Elton shrugged. “Just doing my job.”

“Yeah,” said Foley, “and that’s why when Curt said he was gonna recruit you out of that bunch that was running around upstate, I said no problem. Because I knew you could do the job. You’d done it on me. At least with bringing you on the crew, I was pretty sure you wouldn’t be firing back at me anymore.”

I looked around the table, ending up with the only one who hadn’t chimed in yet.

“So. Earl –”

He lowered his beer and gazed back at me.

“What do you think?”

“I don’t know.” He didn’t look happy. “Seems kinda strange. I mean . . . a woman doing this kind of job.”

“I’ve done it before.”

“It just doesn’t seem right.” Earl shook his head. “But if it’s what Mr. Falcon wants . . .”

“Damn,” muttered Foley.

“Hey.” Elton kept his easy rural cool going. “Like the man says. Give her a chance.”

“I don’t think you understand.” Foley’s voice was even uglier when he went low with it. “Because there’s things you don’t know. We
gave
her a chance once before. Why there was a slot for you on the crew was because she messed up. Big time.”

“That was then.” My gaze was even colder as I looked back at him. “This is now. Okay?”

“Yeah? What makes it different?”

“I’ve gotten in a lot more practice.”

“Oh, yeah. Very impressive.” One corner of Foley’s lip curled. “Practice doesn’t cut it, sweetheart. This is for real.”

“Lay off,” said Curt. “She had that gig out in Albany. Working for Moretti.”

“What, swatting flies?” Foley turned back to me. “This isn’t some front operation out in the boondocks. This is the big leagues. You’d better understand that. You screw up here, you won’t get sent down to the farm team again. Except in a box.” He brought his voice quiet again. “That’s a promise.”

I glared back at him, but didn’t say anything. I just lifted my beer, finished it off, then set it down.

“Give it up,” said Curt. “It’s a done deal.”

He slid out of the booth, followed by Earl and Elton. I watched them head out of the place, back onto the wintry street beyond the door. Then I turned back toward Foley sitting across from me.

“See you in the batting cages,” I said. I got up and walked out. The whole way, I could feel his gaze digging hard between my shoulder blades.

* * *

Outside the lounge, with the neon palm tree sign fizzing above my head, I leaned forward at the curb, hands against my knees. I was glad that the others had already left, so they didn’t see me hurl. The contents of my gut sent steam rising from the frozen slush in the gutter, as I wiped my mouth with the sleeve of my jacket.

Down at the end of the block, where I’d left my motorcycle under a burnt-out streetlight, I leaned back against its seat. The only thing that went through my mind was,
What the hell have I gotten myself into?

* * *

When I got home, I was glad that my brother Donnie was already asleep. I switched off the TV, then half-carried, half-dragged him to the other room and put him to bed.

I sat at the kitchenette table in the dark, gazing out the window at the night street and wondering about this whole mess I had managed to step in.

I shouldn’t have taken this job. I knew that. When Falcon had gotten hold of me and offered it, I should’ve just turned him down. Should’ve just walked . . .