Page 24 of Loss and Damages

My father doesn’t know the true nature of Leo and Jemma’s relationship, but the truth is moot.

“I’m going out tonight. We’re seeing a play,” he says, setting his glass on the bar. “Drinks at the club afterward. Join us there, if you’d like. Bring someone and find your focus.”

Fuck somebody, stop thinking about Jemma’s pussy, and remember business is the only thing that matters. Reading between the lines is an old game, but one I’ve mastered.

“I’m going to hunt down Wilkins and Pitts. You can’t find one without the other these days.”

“On a Sunday afternoon there’s only one place they’ll be.”

Dad squeezes the nape of my neck and kisses my forehead.

This is the affection I crave, but like any father, I’m sorry, any manipulative father, he uses affection as a tool, as a way to get what he wants from me. He wants the sale of the 1100 block more than anything, and I can’t let him down. I couldn’t bear it if he looked at me the way my mother does.

“The question is, which one?” There are so many in this city.

“It will be easy enough to find out. Be careful.”

“I will. You too.”

“Everyone knows who I am, son. You have yet to teach them who you are.”

He leaves me standing in his office, his parting dig hitting me right where he intended it.

I haven’t been that soft, I just haven’t needed to play that dirty to get what I want.

There’s no reason to dig in the mud if I don’t have to.

There’s no pleasure in being cruel just to be cruel. At least, not for me.

Wilkins is the only one who’s been troublesome lately, more concerned he’s going to lose the next election than wanting to line his pockets with the money I’ll give him if he coaxes Pitts into doing what I want and giving me the free rein I need.

Do I want to play hardball? I haven’t needed to, and what I’ve done so far has been on the up and up, but maybe applying a different kind of pressure wouldn’t hurt. My father’s patience is growing thin and so is mine.

In my own office, I do an internet search.

I discover Pitts has a daughter attending college across the country, another going to a private high school here in the city, and a wife active in the women’s league.

A potential deal this big, he’ll have eyes on them, but there are ways around that.

I print a family picture one of his daughters posted on a social media profile that’s public. Stupid.

It’s three o’clock on a Sunday afternoon. Wilkins isn’t getting ready to go to an evening church service.

Despite the pain pill and booze, my skin feels like it’s on fire. Irritated, annoyed, and pissed off I was shot in the first place, I want to take it out on someone, and I know the perfect person. Rubbing my arm over my bandage, I call one of my favorite snitches. “Where’s the mayor?”

“He’s at the Scarlet Wing,” he says, naming a strip club in one of the seedier parts of St. Charlotte, in the heart of Oakdale Square, coincidentally enough, and not one of ours. That’s on purpose.

“I owe you.” I disconnect the burner cell I use to place phone calls that put a bad taste in my mouth and throw it into a desk drawer that I keep locked.

I could drive myself...I should drive myself.

I’ll look weak if I go with a bodyguard.

I sort through my cousins who would be good company, but the family is still mourning Leo and my aunts wouldn’t appreciate me dragging their sons into this right now.

Jimmy is always up for a good time, and I pick up my cell but drop it back on my desk.

He’s trying to get his life straightened out and something like this wouldn’t help him any.

Bianca’s a good girl, and their kids are still in diapers.

This is the last thing their family needs.

I’m in it alone, but that’s okay. Dad wouldn’t expect anything less.

I fold the picture I printed of Pitts’s family and shove the paper into the pocket of my suit jacket.

I’m not in the mood to fight, and I’ll have to watch my back at the Scarlet Wing.

It’s the type of place where you’ll get killed bringing a knife to a gunfight.

I’m not bringing anything but my wallet and my wits.

They’ve served me well this far, and I doubt they’ll let me down this afternoon.

There are a few cars in the strip club’s parking lot, but I drive past it and park a block away.

The building looks like a piece of shit in the sunshine, and I bet not much better in the dark, the paint peeling and the roof sagging.

A bored hooker stands on the corner offering her services to anyone who can’t get past the weaselly bouncer at the door, but he’s not much of an obstacle.

The music pounds and I already have a headache.

I miss Jemma’s porch, sipping wine while the sun sets.

I miss her easy smile and the quiet respect whenever she talks about Leo.

Maybe they hadn’t been lovers, but she’d loved my brother.

She’d given him a safe place to go when he needed it, and I’ll always be grateful for that.

The kid swallows when he sees me, and I shove a hundred dollar bill into his hand. The owner’s son, if I had to guess. Trying to save a buck on real muscle will cost him in the long run.

I pause inside and let my eyes adjust. On one side of the room, a lone girl twirls around a pole, her tits perky, her ass displayed in a pink, glittery thong.

There’s a vacant look in her eyes and either she’s wishing she was somewhere else or she’s on something and in her mind, she already is.

There’s another girl on the other side of the room, and near her stage, the bar.

A bartender/bouncer watches her. The way he looks at her.

..they’ll hook up after her shift. Maybe she trades sex for the baseball bat he’s hiding beneath the bar and the security that goes along with it.

I spot the mayor and Pitts sitting in a banquette in a back corner, flanked by two women who are not their wives.

“Get out of here,” I order the girls as I approach, and they scramble out of the U-shaped booth, sliding on heels that are too high to keep them on their feet.

“Milano,” Wilkins growls, a short glass of something in front of him. He’s chewing on a cigar, his bald head shining purple in the neon light above him. “What are you doing here?”

Sliding onto the sticky bench next to Pitts, I say, “I should be asking you the same question.” I jerk my head at the bartender in the universal gesture that says, “I’ll have what he’s having.”

He nods, dragging his gaze away from the dancer who’s now lying on the stage floor, supposedly trying to appear sexy and alluring but looking like she’d rather curl up and take a nap.

I have an overwhelming urge to pick her up, dust her off, spring for a year in rehab, and see what kind of woman walks out.

“Having a little R and R before a Monday morning,” Wilkins mumbles around his cigar. “Saw your little mishap. Just a little more to the left...”

I huff. “Luckily for me, he was a terrible shot, or should I say, luckily for you. We wouldn’t want the sale to fall through, would we?”

“See, this is where you and I are at a disagreement.” Wilkins is a little braver now, maybe some liquid courage, maybe because he’s on his own turf. I agree he belongs in a place like this a hell of a lot more than I do. “I won’t win the next election if I endorse a sale that everyone’s against.”

“I wouldn’t say everyone,” I correct as the bartender sets my drink on the table in front of me. “Add it to his tab.” I jut my chin in Wilkins’s direction.

“Whatever.”

“I wouldn’t say everyone,” I repeat to keep us on track, “and just as a reminder, you can always run again. You’ll be a shoo-in once the residents of St. Charlotte see the positive impact the changes will have on crime in that area. And you can go around the city saying, ‘I told you so.’”

“I could win that election, and this one too. I don’t need to support your project, Milano, and Pitts doesn’t need the money. He’s doing fine with the rents.”

“You’re saying you can’t be bought, is that it, Pitts?” I ask the coward directly, pinning him under my stare. At some point they decided to gang up on me, a situation I hadn’t expected but doesn’t worry me. I’ve never met anyone who couldn’t be bought...or threatened.

“We might need to up the ante,” he says, watching Wilkins out of the corners of his eyes, making sure he’s saying the right thing.

“I may have what we need to get the ball rolling a bit faster.” I pull the picture of Pitts’s family out of my pocket and push it toward him, my arm casually resting against the back of the banquette. I sip my drink. It’s not bad for a dump like this.

“What’s that?” Pitts doesn’t pick it up.

“I think it’s best you look for yourself and see just how far we can up the ante.”

The music changes and the girl on the stage closest to us staggers to her feet and exits stage right. Another girl slightly less attractive but more limber begins her routine doing an upside-down thing that would have interested me if I would’ve been here for any other reason.

Pitts stares at the piece of paper and looks to Wilkins for guidance that doesn’t come. Tentatively, he unfolds it. “What is this?”

“I think that’s your family, or am I mistaken?”

“Where did you get it?”

“From a public social media account. You should tell your girls they need to be more careful with what they post. Pictures...where they check in. You never know when someone will bump into them.”

“What kind of dirty shit is this?” Wilkins asks, slamming his glass onto the table in a pathetic attempt at anger and a play for power he’ll never have.

“I’m merely suggesting if they ever visited the 1100 block, it would be a shame if something happened in such a crime-ridden neighborhood. Especially one that Milano Management and Development is trying to fix.”