I narrow my eyes at him. I can feel Margot’s stare, burning holes in the side of my face. For her sake, I say nothing.
“Look, you’re out, OK?” Jockey throws up his hands and gives me a big stupid smile. His eyes glitter. “Out-out, out of the game, out of this shit, out of this business. Next, you gotta be out of town, you get me? Because you’re shifty, dude, you make people all jittery. Nobody likes that, least of all me and my guys, OK?”
Jock, you fucking idiot.His guys.Hisguys? Looking at Jockey, seeing the kid I once knew and what he’s become, I realize, suddenly and fully, that Jockey is not at the center of anything but a problem. This idiot isn’t calling the shots. He’s not in charge of anything. He’s a dodgy dirtbag, a bottom feeder getting too hungry, too stupid, to proud of himself. And the minute he’s not useful to hisemployer, he’ll get cut out.
Yet here he is, flexing, puffed up like the guys at his back wouldhavehis back out of anything but obligation, business, or self-interest.
Jockey’s dangerous, I realize, but only in the way that stupid people are dangerous. Now I chance a look at his guys: bored, meat-headed kids, city boys, probably, in too-nice coats with a little flash of too-nice watches at the sleeves. They’re bored, barely watching, probably all too aware of the farce that is Jockey’s perceived leadership. They’re opportunists following the money, and that’s the length and breadth of their loyalty.
I wonder, for the first time, if there’s not a bridge here, between our town and the next, their guys and my old ones. They came around that day to flex, not to shoot and kill Milo. And they only came around because Jockey had been running his mouth, ruffling feathers, talking like there was some rivalry between us, some blood feud no one could trace or really explain. The guns—there shouldn’t have been guns that day. We were all too young, too naïve, too jittery. Milo paid for that.Ipaid for that.
When in reality, if the layers are stripped back—big talk, miscommunication, anxiety, accidents—there’s just Jockey, looking to be bigger than he is, bigger than he’ll ever be.
I chance a look at Margot—Jockey is still talking, but I haven’t heard a word. He’s pacing now, slow and languorous, clearly relishing the sound of his own fucking voice. Margot is watching him, expression almost incredulous—could this guy be this fucking stupid?—her arms crossed and brow furrowed, but she meets my eyes like she senses them. I lift a brow at her—should I go for it?—and she does an exasperated, stressed half-shrug.
It’s enough.
“So,” I say, and Jockey halts midsentence, eyes wide like he actually can’t believe I dared to do it. “So?”
“So?”
“So?” I repeat, more slowly. I kick out my ankles, knees wide, and recline back in the chair, doing bored. “So, what now? I make you jittery, I piss you off, yeah, OK. Whatever. So, what are you going to do about it?”
Jockey’s smile brightens, goes wide and shrinks so fast I might have imagined it. “Serious?”
“Dead.”
One of his guys looks up, casual, but peripherally interested all of a sudden.
“Liam, Liam,” says Jockey, wagging a finger in my face. “What am I gonna do about it? Bud, man, seriously, listen. I know you’re a little fuckin’ thick, so I’ll use small words.” He crouches in front of me, looking up with feral amusement in his too-small eyes. “If you don’t get the fuck out of town, I’llmakeyou get the fuck out of town.”
I watch him lazily from beneath half-low lids. “You,” I say pointedly, “or them?”
Another of the four guys straightens up now, leaning against a desk mirror and lighting another cigarette. He doesn’t look at us, but it’s clear he’s paying attention now.Good.
“Liam.” Jockey is grinning. “You really wanna do this?”
“Jock,” I say back, “I’m fuckin’ waiting.”
He stands, lunging for me with surprising speed. His fist barrels toward me, a lot of force but a little clumsy. I duck the blow and stand up off the chair, catching him by the elbow and using his momentum to throw him into it. He staggers, knees catching the chair, and goes reeling to the floor in a cacophonous spill.
I don’t turn to look at his guys, and they make no move to help a spluttering, cursing, red-faced Jockey to his feet.
“You fucking little prick,” Jockey snarls. He’s back up now, and he goes for me fast, both hands out like he doesn’t know whether to shove or hit me.
I hook him under the ribs, ratcheting force up from my back foot. In the same motion I step back and clock him neatly in the nose. He hisses, a high whine, eyes squeezed shut and blood rushing between his fingers.
I’m calm, cool, stepped back and watching Jockey get his shit together.
But there’s a wild frenetic electricity in my pulse, using these muscles the way they’re meant to be used, and the one prison fight I got into stabs at me through the backs of my eyes, razor memories, flung fast: a knee in my back and my skull against concrete, the wet sicksplish-sh-shof blood sticking to my hair. Me, getting up finally, a dizzy rush of light and animal rage, getting a guy with a few frenzied punches and then slamming the side of his face into a metal table, rhythmic, repeated, over, over—
“You broke mynose,” Jockey barks. “You fucking idiots, you gonna do shit?”
I look back at Jockey’s guys, see his mangled face over my shoulder in a few of the mirrors. His guys look depressed, each seeming to heave a collective sigh before straightening up, smoothing their coats.
“You gotta leave,” says one with thick black curly hair and a thick gold chain around his neck. “Town. Take your girl if you want, but get out. Gone by Monday, or…” He puts up his hands in a lazy half-shrug, but there’s something in the black ink on his knuckles and the resoluteness of his cold gaze that makes me think he’d do it, he’s not just words.
If he’s given the order, he’ll kill me.
