Without warning

Jules caught Pieraro’s eye for half a second, just long enough for an unspoken question. Where the hell did you find these idiots?

And then the two men were on each other, punching and clawing. Their chairs tipped over and drinks crashed to the floor. The banker’s mistress screamed, knocked down in the sudden eruption. The trust-fund brats simply pushed themselves back to a safe distance and smiled, enjoying the entertainment. Shah moved like a pouncing tiger but Miguel beat him into the fray. A flurry of blows from the Mexican cowboy, a blur of short, vicious punches, laid both of the tourists out flat.

Without consulting anyone, he stood over the prone figures and announced, ‘You will not be travelling on Ms Julianne’s boat. You will need to make your own arrangements. Do not attempt to answer me back or get to your feet.’

Zood opened his mouth to speak and Pieraro suddenly pistoned out one booted foot and kicked him in the face. The man’s head flew back with a nasty click and he flipped over, landing on his back. The vaquero turned a stone face on Cesky, who was glaring at him murderously, reminding Jules of an enraged bull. Pieraro absorbed the full force of the man’s enmity, never breaking eye contact. Eventually Cesky folded, crabbing away from the table on all fours until he felt he was at a safe enough distance to stand up.

A couple of security guards appeared, pushing their way through the throng, which had momentarily turned away from the television. The two Fairmont employees stopped in their tracks, however, at a single glance from the Mexican.

‘Man,’ said Phoebe, a little breathlessly. ‘That was so fucking hot.’

‘Do you wish to come on the boat, seсorita, to escape?’ Pieraro asked her.

She flushed noticeably at his attention. Jules recognised it as a purely sexual response. ‘Yes,’ she replied.

‘Then you will shut the fuck up!’ he barked. ‘And do what you are told when you are told. All of you! Comprende?’

The girl flinched, but nodded. The others all muttered and mumbled their assent. Back at the bar, with the prospect of personal violence abated, the crowd reluctantly turned back to the TV.

Jules saw Shah acknowledge the vaquero’s handling of the situation with the slightest dip of his head. She had to admit, it was pretty fucking cool. None of these rich bastards would give them another moment’s trouble, she was sure of it.

But she was wrong.

* * * *

ACAPULCO BAY

Fifi was never comfortable around mucky-mucks, as she referred to anyone wealthier than a gas-station attendant. Except for Jules, of course – her fall from societal grace and favour meant that she very much met with Fifi’s approval. ‘You’re like Paris or Britney,’ she often told the English exile. ‘Rich but cool.’

The Oregonian was pleased to be away from that crowd up at Acapulco Diamante and back at the marina.

And she liked Mr Lee. He reminded her of old Lenny Wah, the man who rescued her after she’d fled her stepfather’s dream of a family threesome and cable TV fame via the agency of Jerry Springer. Lenny ran a super- cheap Chinese take-out in San Francisco’s East Bay, where she’d fetched up looking for a cheap meal after running out of money. The meal she got, a confronting fried rice/chow mein combo with a rock-hard spring roll, for $3.50. She also got a job offer, washing dishes in a huge clawfoot tub that stood out of view of the customers, in a weed- choked yard behind the cafe. The last dish-monkey had quit two days earlier and Lenny had let the pile of washing- up grow under a layer of cold, grey, fat-caked water.

‘But Lenny was kinda nice,’ she told Lee. ‘He had real soft skin and he smelled of jasmine rice.’

‘Lenny sounds like a bum, Miss Fifi. He try to make jiggy-jig for dishwashing?’

She snickered. ‘Only every fucking day. But he was real nice about it. He didn’t get upset when I said no.’

‘You always said no?’ he asked protectively.

‘Not always.’

The old Chinese sea dog rolled his eyes as Thapa showed the next man through to see them. They sat behind a folding card table on the dock of the marina where Jules had berthed the sport fisher while the Rules lay well offshore, guarded by the remainder of Shah’s men. The hasty patch-up work occasioned by the gunfight with Shoeless Dan stood out on the fibreglass hull, and more than a few of their potential recruits spent their interviews nervously eyeing the damage.

The next guy through – an older, pot-bellied American, with a dense map of broken blood vessels colouring his swollen nose, and a fat cigar perched in one corner of his mouth – snorted when he saw it. ‘Hot damn! I guess I wouldn’t want to see the other guy, eh?’

Fifi glanced over her shoulder briefly at the scorch marks and bullet holes. She tried to find the man’s name on the list Thapa had provided, but the piece of paper seemed to have blown away, leaving her with nothing but a cup of flat ginger beer and a bowl of pretzels in front of her.

‘The other guy is dead,’ she replied. ‘And who’re you, Salty Sam?’

The man grinned, showing off uneven yellow teeth, but his smile seemed warm enough and contained none of the leering suggestion in Larry Zood’s eyes. ‘Rhino Ross, young lady. Chief petty officer, United States Coast Guard, once upon a time. These days, I’ve been running a fishing charter round these parts. And whom might I have the pleasure of addressing?’

‘“Fifi” will do. And this is Mr Lee, who’s our chief… petty… guy. So we already got one a them. What else can you do for us, Rhino?’ She paused and regarded him through narrowed eyes. ‘And did your parents really call you that, or something really gay that you just changed to Rhino?’

Ross smiled again and blew a perfect smoke ring. ‘Rhino A. Ross. It’s on my passport and birth certificate.