The Fearsome Foursome—Jerries One and Two, Rocco and TC—all stared at me.
“Sorry, fellas,” I said, realizing I'd snapped at them. “My head hurts.”
The unusual silence from the crew called my attention to the crowd in the bar for the first time. There were three strangers on stools on the end by the TV. They didn't look like the usual cab drivers who drifted in. Foreign, maybe eastern block, each in a suit worth more than my payday. They seemed familiar, and it dawned on me they were at the fight. I saw them in the dressing room hanging out with Wilkerson, the fight promoter. They also had front row seats.
I figured they probably followed me here for a drink, but then realized they were here before me. Unusual. Behind them, another group chatted quietly while sipping their drinks. A fat balding guy ate an AJ's cheeseburger, getting mustard, ketchup and grease on his face. He didn't bother with a napkin and instead dragged his sleeve in an upward motion across his mouth.
He talked to a forty-something woman in a very sharp suit—way too sharp for AJ's. No spring chicken, but hot enough in that self-confident, cougarish way.
I reached for the whiskey, letting it burn down my throat.
“Be cool, Duffy. Any second now, they're going to approach you, make the offer.”
I cocked an eyebrow at Kelley. “What the hell are you talking about? Did I just walk into a bad spy novel?”
“Lower your voice, dumb ass. I said stay cool.”
I was going to give Kelley more shit but his eyes made me think better. I took another pull on the Schlitz and played along.
“You wearing the wire?” I asked.
I guess I was going to give Kelley shit after all. But he surprised me by saying, “No. You are. Joint effort with the Chicago cops. Stick this in your pocket.”
He passed something into my hand. I glanced down. Looked like a pen drive.
Kelley wasn't the practical joker type. He wouldn't crack a smile on his birthday in a room full of clowns. Maybe my fat opponent had jarred something loose in my head, because I truly had no idea what was going on.
“Pocket,” Kelley said. “Here they come. Tell them yes.”
I felt movement to my right. The three well-dressed foreign-types were standing over me.
“Matching Rolexes,” Jerry Two said. The Fearsome Foursome were appraising the new arrivals. “Daytonas. Platinum bands.”
“White gold,” Rocco said.
“Platinum.”
“I thought white gold and platinum were the same thing, just different colors.” This from KC.
“Different elements,” said Jerry Two. “Platinum is heaver.”
“No it ain't, zipper-head. Gold is.”
“Platinum. That's why it's more, you know, pricier.”
The tallest of the men, the guy who stood in the middle, smiled at me. Dark hair, dark eyes, five o-clock shadow coming in strong even though he smelled like aftershave. He had something on his front tooth. A diamond.
“Mr. Dombrowski,” he said. His accent was Russian. “May we have a word with you?”
“You know how to tell a fake Rolex?” Jerry One. “If it's got a ticking second hand. The real thing sweeps, don't tick.”
“Another dead giveaway is the plastic band with Fred Flintstone on the face,” said Rocko.
Titters from the Foursome. I rubbed the pen drive recorder in my hand, and still couldn't figure out what exactly was going on here. Were these the Chicago cops Kelley mentioned?
“You guys were at the fight,” I said. Seemed like a smart thing to say. “Ringside.”
“Yes. Your performance was…” he smiled, the diamond glinting blue from the neon beer sign, “acceptable. Now can we have a word?” His eyes flitted over to the Foursome, then back to me. “In private?”
In between fights, I made my living as a counselor. Over the years I got pretty good at reading people. These three didn't look like cops, sound like cops, or act like cops. But their expensive suits had bulges under their left armpits, which meant concealed weapons, and Kelley did insist I say yes to them. So I nodded, finished my beer, and stood up.
The trip wasn't a long one. I followed them over to their table.
“Please, Mr. Dombrowski. Sit.”
“I'd rather stand.”
Bling Tooth made a dismissive gesture, but he and his buddies stayed standing too.
“You put on a pretty good show tonight,” he said. His accent seemed to get thicker. “Your opponent, however… the show he put on was much better.”
I waited, not liking where this was going, but not jumping to conclusions.
“We paid him ten thousand dollars to put on that show.”
I felt the burn coming up my neck, to my ears. I'd gone eight rounds with the fat guy, but all of my energy had suddenly returned, tenfold. It all clicked what Kelley wanted from me, but I couldn't hold back the anger and my fists clenched involuntarily, which probably wouldn't be good for the voice recorder in my palm.
“I've heard the rumors,” I said, making sure my rage wasn't in my voice. “New guys in town. Russians. Paying fighters to take falls. But the guy tonight, he hit back. Hard. I know him from the circuit. He's legit. You're telling me you owned him?”
“We can be… persuasive.”
I wondered how much his diamond tooth was worth, and where I could pawn it after I knocked it out of his mouth. But they had guns, and like an idiot I was standing between them and Kelley, my back-up. Plus, Kelley'd told me to say yes. Get it on tape, they go to jail, win-win. All I had to do was swallow my pride and agree to take a dive.
But then Bling Tooth made a big mistake. Two fingers scissored into his vest pocket and removed a photograph.
“We hope you agree to help us, Mr. Dombrowski. Or else we'd be forced to hurt someone you care very much about.”
He flashed the picture at me. It was Al, my basset hound.
These fuckers had my dog.
It didn't sink in right away. It had already been a long night of getting punched in the head. I looked up to see Bling Tooth smile at me.
“You want I send you a floppy ear for proof?” he said. He went to smile but before the corners of his mouth turned something went bad inside me and I hit him with a straight left. It caught part nose and part upper lip. He went down hard, grasping his face. Blood already spurted from between his fingers, and I guessed it was nose blood by the way it shot.
I sat on the bastard's chest and grabbed his thorax with my right. My grip remained sore from the eight rounder, so it wasn't as tight as I would have liked.
“Listen mother—” I didn't get to finish.
I heard a series of clickety-clacks and realized his two buddies held guns pointed at my head.
Then one of them bent down next to me, picking something up off the floor.
I'd dropped the pen drive recorder.
Jack
The trail led us to Crawford, about fifty miles out of New York City. When a murderer crossed state lines, the Feds had jurisdiction. At least, they were supposed to. But neither Herb nor I gave them a call. We didn't even tell our boss, Captain Bains, we were leaving Chicago.
Sometimes being a law enforcement officer meant tip-toeing around the law.
Our suspect, a Russian mobster named Vladimir Polchev, had skipped town before we could haul him in. Polchev had made two big mistakes.
First, he'd murdered a friend of mine. Dirk Wendt, a semi-pro boxer who happened to be my taekwondo instructor for the last six years.
