Sweat

out of the car, face-to-face with the stench of rotting garbage. He stuck his forearm into his nose and shimmied by without getting his shirt dirty.

As darkness fell over the city, Chow Ying smiled at his target’s timing. He marveled at his own patience. From a bench in the stamp-size excuse for a park across the street, Chow Ying watched Jake pull his car into the lot. The Mountain of Shanghai threw his newspaper in the trashcan and crossed the residential street with a slight limp. The situation was as good as it gets. The police would think it was a robbery gone bad. Another good kid killed by a violent element of the city—violence so ingrained in the city’s youth that neither prison nor the potential for an early funeral were deterrents. As Jake slipped from his car, Chow Ying closed in with slow measured movements. With thirty yards to go, Chow Ying’s strides became longer and his hobble more noticeable. A brief crunch of gravel under his foot gave him momentary pause.

Jake, head down, shifted through his keys as he approached the first floor security door in the back of the building. Chow Ying looked around one last time for witnesses, in final preparation to pounce. The kid didn’t stand a chance, ankle injury or not.

Jake pushed his way into the apartment and a giant hand crashed down on his shoulder from the shadows of the hall, the force spinning him around, slamming the security door open.

“Jake Patrick.”

“Jesus,” Jake said, looking up. It took a second to recognize the intruder. “Tony. You scared the shit out of me,” Jake said, panting. The Castello brothers stood at both sides of Tony. Together, Jake’s visitors stood shoulder-to-shoulder in the hall, blocking the passageway, stuffing the corridor from the mailboxes to the recycling room door.

Looking into the doorway from the outside, Chow Ying froze and then slowly retreated into the shadows near the building. He didn’t take his eyes off the scene in the hall.

“Mr. Sorrentino is requesting your presence for dinner.”

“Has Mr. Sorrentino ever heard of using the phone?”

“I just do as I am told.”

“How did you get into the building?”

“You don’t think a locked door would keep us out, do you?”

Jake thought about the question and considered it a moot point. If the three goons in front of him wanted to get into an apartment building, they would find a way. Window. Door. Trash chute. “Well, I can’t make it this evening. I’m kind of busy,” Jake said, still trembling.

“I can appreciate your busy schedule, Jake, but I don’t care. Mr. Sorrentino pays my bills and he is asking me to offer you a ride, to have a civil meal together. Do me a favor and make it easy.”

“Don’t threaten me, Tony.” Jake’s adrenaline startled both himself and his unwelcome guests. Verbalizing the fact that he wasn’t going to be a patsy for Tony or Mr. Sorrentino gave him a boost of confidence. Fear may indeed be a good emotion, he thought.

“Jake…”

“I’ll tell you what Tony. I need to get something from my apartment. Then I’ll go. But not because I have to. I’ll go because I like Kate.” ***

Chow Ying lurked outside the back door of the building as Jake and the trio of Mediterranean bloodlines firmly shut the door to the building and disappeared. Seconds from the kill and the prey had gotten away. There was nothing to do but wait. From the park across the street, Chow Ying watched the movement in Jake’s bedroom window. Ten minutes later, the lights in Jake’s apartment flicked off, and Chow Ying focused on the back door to the apartment. It was wasted energy. When Tony and the Castello brothers appeared with Jake wedged between them, Chow Ying cursed. The college-aged kid, surrounded by seasoned hard-asses, made Chow Ying think. The Mountain of Shanghai watched Jake get into the back seat of the car parked illegally on the main street and wondered if perhaps this kid had bigger problems than he did. ***

Jake sat on a bar stool and watched his three guardian angels play nine ball with skill and language that could only have been perfected in a pool hall. And not one of those pool places in Bethesda or Ballston where yuppies come to pick up chicks and scratch the velvet with the rental cues. No, Jake’s current company used their cues to shoot serious pool, and, he imagined, crack the occasional skull.

Given the circumstances, the basement of the Sorrentino palace seemed like a safe place. If there was a large Asian on the loose in the city with ill intentions, he wasn’t likely to be paying a visit to the Sorrentino residence. Jake’s present company was only marginally better. They cursed and threw money at each other, taunted and shoved. Jake cringed at the guns, the handles of pistols hanging from shoulder holsters and protruding from waistbands. He prayed the guns would stay holstered. Jake was sure the crowd didn’t practice NRA-approved firearm safety.

His guards weren’t happy with their assignment and Jake knew it. They offered him a drink and pointed to the bathroom in the hall. “Don’t go wandering past the bathroom. We understand each other?” Tony said.

“Yes,” Jake answered, completing the longest conversation he had had since he had gotten in the car. Jake excused himself to the bathroom under the watchful glare of six eyes. He turned on the bathroom fan and lights before shutting the door. Then he pulled out his cell phone and made a call. Bring in the cavalry, he thought.

An hour passed and the bets on each game increased with every round. The pile of cash currently on the bar totaled six hundred and change, and the extracurricular violence was getting worse with every missed shot. After scratching on the eight ball, Tony grabbed the older Castello brother, put him in a headlock, and pulled out his revolver just for show.

The door upstairs slammed and Jake jumped in his seat. James “Jimmy” Sorrentino’s feet on the stairs brought the room to attention. The owner of the house entered the room, looking as if he were the only one who hadn’t had a stressful day. His suit was perfectly tailored, his gait strong and youthful. His face was stern, commanding the respect of the room.

“Gentleman, if you would excuse us?” Mr. Sorrentino said to the hustlers.

The part-time pool sharks left, leaving their money on the bar, next to a loaded pistol that the older Castello brother had yanked from his pants. Tony gave Jake a long glare as he passed.

When the room was quiet, Mr. Sorrentino stared at Jake down his formidable, double curved nose, evidence of too many fights to remember.

“Jake, I’m going to be honest with you.”

“Please.”

“I don’t like you.”

Jake smirked with fear. “I’m not sure how to reply to that, sir.”

“I’ve been keeping tabs on you for a week or so, since our little problem.”

“What problem is that?”

“The little problem with the strippers.”

It all became clear to Jake—Tony, the intimidation, the offer for dinner. “Mr. Sorrentino, I wasn’t with those strippers. As I explained to Kate, I was there with my father and one of his clients…”

“I heard the story, Jake. Boys will be boys, I understand this. I have been married for thirty years to the most beautiful woman I ever laid eyes on…but I understand that men have needs.”

“Mr. Sorrentino, I wasn’t with the strippers.”

“But you were coming out of a strip club with them.”

“Yes, but that’s not the whole story.”

“Maybe, maybe. Like I said, I’ve been watching you. Watching you on your way to work, watching you on your way home. To my surprise, you seem to be on the up-and-up. No other strippers. No other girlfriends. No heavy nights on the town. Pretty amazing considering your age.”

“I’m older on the inside,” Jake said trying to lighten the mood.

Jimmy Sorrentino didn’t take the bait. “I sent my guys to get you today for a couple of reasons. First and foremost, I wanted to clear the air between you and me, man-to-man, face-to-face.”

More man-to-man bullshit, Jake thought. The conversation of feeding his balls to the dogs was still fresh in his mind. “Sir, you could have called and asked me to see you. There was no need to send over three guys to harass me.”

“Yes, I suppose I could have,” Jimmy answered, simultaneously dismissing the statement as ludicrous. “The