Gangster Nation. Tod Goldberg

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СКАЧАТЬ 400 pounds. “Right, Puny?” Puny didn’t respond, which was good, because he would have been out of a job. “D, this pussy can’t tell you what to do.”

      “Chill,” Killer said.

      “I don’t need to chill,” she said. “This marshmallow motherfucker needs to chill.”

      The casino floor was filled with an Elderhostel group, fifty retirees in town for some kind of educational tour of Milwaukee, and they were all craning their necks around the slots now, standing up at their five-dollar blackjack tables; a couple ladies even had their cameras out, getting a real education. This wasn’t a show Matthew really wanted to put on.

      “I’m not going to ask again,” Matthew said.

      “You didn’t ask in the first place,” Killer said. “I know my rights. Fourteenth Amendment and shit. You can’t just be discriminating against me.”

      “I don’t know,” Matthew said. “Felon in possession of a hooker? That seems like a crime. But you can check with the ACLU.”

      Killer stared at him. “I say the word your whole family is in the ground.”

      There it was. He’d been waiting for it.

      First two smacks of his sap went on either side of Killer’s head, right across the ears. Matthew had to hold Killer up by his shirt so he could get his second shot in, since the first probably would have knocked him to the ground, and Matthew had a point to make, something Killer could take back to the rest of the Latin Kings: Listening is important.

      The shot across the lips? Well, that was for talking shit. Matthew busted Killer’s mouth open to the bone and out came most of his teeth, including two gold ones, his girl shrieking like Matthew had hit her, too, which he wasn’t planning on doing.

      He then dragged Killer through the casino by the throat, out through the loading dock, bounced his open wound of a face off a few Dumpsters, giving him a better-than-average chance of picking up a staph infection, and dropped him on the pavement, away from the cameras, not that it mattered, since Matthew was the guy who handled the video. Killer screamed the whole time, or made a noise that used to be screaming, back when his face worked right.

      “I don’t want you walking back in here,” Matthew said. Then he did the only thing he thought would emphasize the point, which was to stomp on Killer’s ankles until they snapped. He then went back inside, found Killer’s girl crouched under the craps table trying to find all of her boyfriend’s teeth, told his floor guys to get her a bag and get her the fuck out of the casino, since looking at her there on the floor, she didn’t seem all that threatening anymore, just a woman who had terrible taste in men but loved one enough to pick up his teeth. That was worth something.

      Was it all an extreme response? Maybe. Washing a few Gs through the casino wasn’t a hanging offense—hell, it was practically why casinos in the Midwest existed—but it was about the point: Matthew Drew hadn’t qualified for assault team work at Quantico, hadn’t made it all the way to the FBI’s top shop in Chicago, so people with their crimes cataloged on their faces could dictate his behavior. That’s just not how life worked.

      And yet.

      He’d somehow missed Ronnie Cupertine walking through the door, as did everyone else working the Eye in the Sky, not that anyone would have complained, least of all any of the Chuyalla management. Ronnie Cupertine was a celebrity, so famous for running the Family that people didn’t really believe he ran the Family.

      It was . . . impossible.

      And yet.

      Ronnie Cupertine gave everyone credit at his half a dozen car dealerships around Chicago. Warrantied every purchase for two years. Paid for the entire Little League from Chicago to Springfield. Donated a million dollars to establish Hope from Fear, a battered women’s home on the South Side. Pumped a couple hundred grand into AIDS and cancer research at Northwestern every year. The Chicago Historical Society needed money to preserve a building? Ronnie Cupertine wrote a check. The Field Museum was short fifty Gs for an art exhibit? No problem. Ronnie Cupertine even gave money for an independent film festival and attended the gala, shook hands with the actors and actresses, his wife on his arm draped in diamonds and furs, because Ronnie Cupertine? He was the philanthropic king of Chicago.

      So he occasionally had a motherfucker killed.

      At least Ronnie Cupertine didn’t have a tattoo on his forehead.

      Ronnie zipped up and flushed, made his way over to the sink next to Matthew. Up close, Matthew could smell the liquor seeping out of Ronnie’s pores. How long had he been at the casino? How many times had Matthew missed seeing him? Ronnie ran the hot water for a few seconds, then took a towel, soaked it, and scrubbed at his face, letting out an exasperated grunt when he was done.

      “Tough night?” Matthew asked.

      “Too much smoke in this place,” Ronnie said. “Feel like it’s in my skin, you know? Lungs are all congested. It’s unhealthy. Even Atlantic City has better ventilation.” He leaned toward the mirror, inspected his face, licked his pinkies, used them to push down his eyebrows. “Fuck it. Can’t tell an Indian not to smoke, right? It was their tobacco in the first place, right?”

      “Everyone’s got their culture,” Matthew said.

      “You believe that,” Ronnie said, “then you should work for me.” He took another towel, dried his face, then reached into his pocket, slipped a fifty from his billfold into Curtis’s tip jar. “You new here?”

      “Been here a few months.”

      “I haven’t seen you before.”

      “I bought my car from you, actually.”

      “Yeah?” Ronnie looked at Matthew in the mirror. “You from Chicago?”

      “Not originally,” Matthew said. “Relocated for a job. Didn’t pan out. So here I am.”

      “You recognize me from TV?” he asked.

      “That’s it,” Matthew said. How much time did he have before one of Ronnie’s boys came in, looking for their actual boss? Two, three minutes? Maybe five, at the most. It would be disrespectful to walk in on a boss while he was taking a shit, so maybe it would be more like ten. But that seemed like an excessive amount of time to be guarding the door, which Matthew presumed they were doing. They must have swept through and somehow missed seeing Matthew’s feet in the back of the handicapped stall. Or they hadn’t looked very hard. Matthew reached into his pocket, took out his car keys, jingled them. “You sold me a Mustang.”

      “You get a good deal?”

      “Not bad,” Matthew said. “Carburetor gave out after twenty-five thousand miles.”

      “I replace it?”

      “You did.”

      “I don’t welch,” Ronnie said. It was a catchphrase from one of his commercials, so popular it was even on the flyers that came in the junk mail and inside the Tribune on Sundays. “My opinion, that’s the problem with Detroit these days,” he continued. Ronnie checked his face in the mirror again, picked a piece of lint from his chin. “It’s like they forgot how to build muscle cars. Give me something with a big trunk, big tires, and nothing with the СКАЧАТЬ