The Blade Itself

There was no way around it. Da

His boss’s head snapped up, surprise on his face. “You did what?”

“I told McCloskey the deal, why we had to shut Pike down for now, and I told him that there was work for him and his crew.”

“Why would you do that?” Richard squinted as if trying to see Da

“Don’t you remember? We talked about it and agreed to keep them on.”

Richard shook his head. “I never said anything like that. I might have said that it would be nice to keep them on, but that’s all.”

Da

Richard closed the contract and looked at him appraisingly. Da

Da

With a scribble, Richard signed his name on the contracts and pushed them to Da

Through the bay window, Da

Later, heading south in his truck, Da

It wasn’t the first time he’d driven through the neighborhood since leaving, but in the past, he’d blitzed along, consciously not looking too hard to the left or right, avoiding the rawest of the old wounds. This time he went slowly and kept his eyes open, intent on yanking scabs.

Things had changed. Things had stayed the same.

Tan and orange bungalows still crowded sidewalks bordered by sagging chain link. The Gothic spires of half a dozen massive churches rose over faded tract housing. White Sox flags hung limp under hazy skies. Smokestacks and skyscrapers loomed at the edge of the horizon, blurring like fever dreams.

He pulled up at a red light as a group of Hispanic kids swaggered along the sidewalk. They wore long basketball jerseys and bright sneakers, hats cocked to mark gang allegiances. A fair-ski

So there were still young lions in Bridgeport after all.

Da

The kid held his gaze, slowing so that his crew moved past. For a few seconds they watched each other, a young predator and an old one, both bathed in the amber light of late afternoon. Then the kid smiled again, trying for scorn but not quite getting it, turned and pimp-strutted back to his friends. Da

Had he kept all of this from Karen to protect her?

Or because he was thinking of doing it?

Was that why he had come here, why his eyes had hungered for the class differences between himself and Richard? His new life, it couldn’t be that thin, so easily stripped of veneer.

Was he just a thief with a better address?

The light changed. He turned the truck and steered north.

18

Salsa was hopping.

Leaning over the balcony, trying to take some weight off her feet – the heels were killing her – Karen had a prime view of the dance floor. The crowd was young, most of them midtwenties, the girls in skintight dresses with sparkles that ended only where flesh began, the men sweating through black linen shirts. Lasers cut rainbow swaths in the swirling cigarette smoke. It was a party bar, and people would stick till the lights came on, throwing down drinks with the accelerating pace of a dreamer who fears awakening.

She straightened, let her head fall back, rolling it from side to side to ease the muscles. The smoke had given her a headache, and she wanted to be rid of it before she went home. Da

She smiled at the thought, stepped away from the railing to weave through the upstairs. When she’d taken over managing the place, the first thing she’d done was convert the balcony to a VIP room. A certain breed of guy would eagerly drop three hundred bucks on a twenty-dollar bottle of Stoli to impress a date in a low-cut dress, and in one stroke she’d upped the bar’s take 40 percent. Which made it her job to ensure that everyone upstairs felt like Very Important People. She moved through the crowd, chatting with regulars, touching men’s biceps and complimenting women on their shoes. It was her routine, but something felt off tonight. She had a weird tingle in her neck. Some animal instinct, like she was being watched. Not gawked at – she was used to that. This was different. It felt like she was being studied.

Hunted.

The word popped into her mind of its own accord, and her skin went cold. She stopped and glanced around, eyes darting over men in Armani, women sipping Cosmos, an anorexic blonde checking her makeup in a compact. Nothing to raise alarms. She moved to the railing, looked down at the main floor, sca

Then he snapped the lighter shut and disappeared.

She squinted, trying to pick him out again. The light bouncing off the dance floor left her night blind, the rear wall a blur of inseparable shapes with way too many cigarettes to make his stand out. But someone had been there. She was sure of it.

Who was he? He had seemed, in that split second, strangely familiar. An old acquaintance? Her nervousness suggested not. Whoever he was, she felt sure they weren’t friends.

“Karen!”

She jumped, spun around fast, heart pounding. Two of her regulars smiled down at her; Louis, a tall, elegant black man with his arm threaded around his partner Charles’s waist. “Join us for a drink?”

Adopting her best hostess smile, Karen turned from the dance floor. If she wanted to get out early, she didn’t have time to jump at shadows.

This was what job security looked like in the bar biz: ten past twelve on a weeknight, and still a line outside the door. The crowd was rowdy, already amped up on drink and eager to get in from the cold. She pushed through them, looking for Hector. Normally she walked to her car alone, but the stranger inside had made her nervous.