by Mike Ryan
Tiffany spoke up before Jacobs lost his temper, which she knew was likely to happen. “What did you hear?”
“Oh, anyways, I found out about Wilson Ames, man.”
“Ames?” Jacobs asked. “What about him?”
“He ain’t dead.”
“He’s not?”
“Nope. Heard it was a close call. He went to some sketchy doctors, as we like to say, and they were able to patch him up.”
Jacobs looked concerned. “How do you know?”
“How do I know, he says. Do you forget who I am? This is my business, man. I hear things.”
“How credible is it?”
“It’s legit, man. A hundred percent. He is alive and out there.”
“Why hasn’t anyone heard anything before now?” Jacobs asked.
“He was hurt bad, man. Real bad. From what I’m hearing, it’s taken him these three months to heal back up again.”
“Well, this day can’t get any worse, can it?” Tiffany asked.
“Sure it can,” Jacobs answered. “They could all show up at our door in five minutes.”
“Don’t give them any ideas, man,” Franks replied. “And speaking of showing up here, can we please not shoot this place up like the last one?”
“Wasn’t my fault.”
“Hey, whose fault it is don’t matter. You know how many strings I had to pull to get you this place? A lot. You’re becoming a high-risk individual, you know.”
“I’ll do my best.”
“You got a lot of people in your corner in the fight against these slobs, but they also know where you are. Bullets are close by. And a lot of them.”
“So what’s going on with Ames now?” Jacobs asked.
“Word is he’s regrouping. He lost some men to you before. He’s back on his feet and looking to get back into it, you know?”
“So that means he’s probably recruiting again.”
“You know it. And probably hard.”
“Mallette’s probably gonna be doing the same thing.”
“Ain’t no doubt about it. Things are gonna be getting hot and heavy in this town, and probably quickly.”
Jacobs rubbed the side of his face. “Maybe they’ll do us all a favor and take each other out.”
“Hey, you know, I know you’re probably joking about that, but there might be some truth in that. I mean, Mallette’s not just gonna sit back and watch somebody else take over his old territory. He’s gonna want it back. And Ames isn’t just gonna hand over everything he’s worked for so far and slither away. And then there’s Butch, who’s been operating in the background, and he ain’t gonna go away quietly either. So if we say the right prayers, who knows, they just might do us that favor after all.”
Jacobs let out a sigh, knowing that was an unlikely scenario. He had a feeling he was going to have to do battle with all of them at some point. He just hoped it wouldn’t be all at once. Tiffany squeezed his hand a little tighter. She knew what the news meant, too.
Jacobs glanced at her and could see the worried look on her face. The confident look she had in the car outside of school had now faded away. He rubbed the top of her hand with his thumb.
“We’ll get through this.”
“Why? Why do we have to get through this?” Tiffany took a deep breath. “Brett, why do we have to do this? Why can’t we just go somewhere else?”
“And always have to worry about Mallette or Ames coming after us? I can’t do that.”
“You don’t know that they will. If we’re in California or Florida or New Jersey, are they really going to take the time to come after us?”
“I can’t take that chance. They will never catch me by surprise again. I’d put nothing past them, and I won’t take risks.”
“But staying here is a risk. You told me you’d be done with this.”
“I told you when there were no more threats, that I’d walk away. And I still mean that. But there’s still a threat, and now there are two of them.”
Tiffany’s shoulders slumped. Jacobs could tell she was disheartened. And as strong as his feelings were for her, he was ready for her to walk away if this was too much for her.
“Listen, if… if you don’t wanna do this anymore, I completely understand. I’ll make sure you’re safe, I’ll take precautions, I’ll…”
Tiffany threw her arms around him and kissed him on the lips. “I just want us to have a future.”
“We will. As soon as this is done. I promise.”
“But how long will that take? A year, five years?”
“I’ll do everything I can to end it as soon as possible. That’s all I can do.”
She kissed him again. “I just want a life with you. I don’t care where it is. I don’t care if it’s here, or in South America, or Alaska, or a deserted island somewhere. I just want a life together.”
“And I promise we’ll have that. Just hold on a little while longer. OK?”
Tiffany nodded and let out half a smile. It was the best she could do. “I guess that means I’m back in witness protection, huh?”
Jacobs laughed. “Did you ever leave?”
“I guess not. I’d like to, though. Someday.”
“Speaking of protection, should we get Nate back here?” Franks asked.
“Where’s he at these days, anyway?” Jacobs wondered.
“I don’t know. Said he was going to the East Coast somewhere on a job. Said it was hush-hush. Philadelphia or New York or something. I can see if he can get back here soon.”
“Well, I guess it’s worth checking into.” Jacobs looked over and still saw a worried look on Tiffany’s face. He pulled her closer to him, and she sat on his lap. He put his arms around her and gave her a kiss. “I promise we’ll get through this. And then you’ll have the life you want. The one you deserve.”
“I just want to stop thinking and worrying about all this stuff.”
“I know. It’ll happen.”
Jacobs wasn’t sure when or how long it would take, but he was determined to give Tiffany that better life. And he was going to do everything in his power to make sure it happened sooner rather than later. It was for his benefit to end it as soon as possible, anyway. Right now, both Ames and Mallette were low on men. The more time they had to build their numbers, the longer it would take Jacobs to get rid of them. No, the time to strike was now. And he had every intention of doing so.
3
Mallette was led into the building that would double as the organization’s new headquarters. It was the second floor of a clothing and textiles manufacturing business that he had acquired years ago under the name of one of his other holding companies. He had several such businesses spread out through the city.
As he walked into the upstairs office, Mallette looked around, unimpressed with his surroundings. He hadn’t been there in a long time. And even when he had been, it was only a room he conducted a few meetings in. It was never a place where he planned on running his entire organization out of.
His men tried to fix it up a little. They put a desk, a table, some chairs for meetings, along with some cork boards and whiteboards spread throughout the room. Mallette held his nose up at it, though.
“What do you think, boss?” Selby asked.
Mallette didn’t even try to hide his displeasure. “To think, I once ran this city out of a dedicated building that nobody could touch. And now… I’m relegated to this place. Hiding out on the second floor of a clothing manufacturer.”
“We did the best we could with what we had to work with.”
“We’ll make it work for the time being.” Mallette walked over to the only window in the room and looked down at the parking lot. “But I refuse to be held down for long. Where else do we stand?”
“We just got word that Ames is back,” Reed said.
Mallette spun around to face him. “You said he was gone.”
“He was. Word we’re getting was that he was in bad shape. Took a few months to heal up. Apparently he’s
better now.”
“Well, we’ll just have to make sure that’s only temporary.”
“Should we take a run at him?”
Mallette looked back out the window. “No. Not yet. We’ll try to do things the easy way first.”
“What way’s that?”
“I want to meet with him first. Introduce myself, let him know I’m back.”
“What good’s that gonna do? We just gonna whack him?”
“I’m going to attempt to use my influence and past history in an effort to persuade him to leave town peacefully. Or if he’d like to fall in under me, perhaps I could use his services.”
“You’d actually trust him for that?”
“Maybe not. We’ll see what he says.”
“No offense, boss, but I can’t see this guy leaving town.”
“I’ll give him the option.”
“Of what?”
“Leaving on his legs, or leaving while lying inside a box.”
“What about Butch?” Selby asked.
“Set up the meet with him as well. He’ll be given the same ultimatum.”
“You think these guys will actually go for that?”
“Probably not. But if I can persuade them to leave, it means we won’t have to risk losing any of the few men we already have in a war with them. I’d like to preserve that as much as possible right now. Unless it can’t be helped.”
“Not to bring up a sore subject, but what about Jacobs?”
“We’ll leave him alone for now,” Mallette answered.
“Don’t even want anyone out there looking for him?”
“Jacobs is another one I can’t risk engaging in a war at the moment. I don’t have the manpower. He’s proven to be resourceful, skilled, and a major pain in the ass. The next time I go up against him, I want to make sure there is no doubt about who will come out victorious. Plus, with all the other players in the city right now, we can’t split our attention—our focus—on different subjects. We have to concentrate on the most important ones first. And that’s Ames and Butch. If we focus on Jacobs, the others might come up behind us. As much as it pains me to say it, we have to let him go for now.”
“When do you want me to try for these meetings?” Reed asked.
“Tomorrow, if possible.”
“I’ll get word to Ames and Butch.” Reed immediately left the room.
“What about your friends in New York?” Selby asked.
Mallette snickered as he curled his lip. “Friends? What friends?”
“Well, weren’t you working with them before?”
“At one point I thought they had my back. But since I was in prison, they tried to replace me, tried to hold me down, and tried to get me out of the way.”
“Aren’t they the ones that gave you Berry?”
Mallette laughed. “By sheer luck, they dumped a rookie on me, trying to make it look good, make it look like they were trying, make it look like they wanted to help me, make it look like they still had my best interests at heart. I think it was more an accident that Berry just so happened to know what he was doing more than they thought he did. I haven’t forgotten how they treated me while I was in there.”
“Maybe it’d be good just to take their help for a little while, at least until we get rid of the others?”
“No. The New York crew are like leeches. Once they put their hooks into something, they won’t let go. I’ll do this without them. I won’t even let them step foot in this city again. They’ve toyed with me for the last time.”
Ames had just walked into his upscale home for the first time in three months. He could move his arms and shoulders around without pain now. It took him a long time to recover from the gunshots, and he wasn’t coming back until he could move around without grimacing. He thought it was a bad look for his men. But now, he was finally back to normal. Well, almost. He didn’t have the same range of motion in his right shoulder that he used to have, but it was nothing that most people would notice unless he tried to reach for something.
Ames walked through his house, not stopping until he reached the backyard, sitting down in a chair beside the pool. He just sat there for a minute, reflecting on everything that had happened. He was thankful to be alive, but Jacobs was a constant thought. He never thought he had underestimated him before, but he realized that he had. He didn’t think one man was capable of the destruction that Jacobs obviously was capable of. But that would be different now. As Ames stared at the still water of the pool, he began thinking of all the ways that he would settle the score. Jacobs was on borrowed time as far as he was concerned.
“How you feeling, boss?” one of his men asked.
Ames sighed. “I’ll be feeling much better when Brett Jacobs is in a hole in the ground.”
“I hear ya.”
“Where are we on that front?”
“We’ve had an eye on his place…”
“He’s not going to go back there. His cover’s blown. He knows it. It’s a waste of time and manpower by sitting on it.”
“We’ve had guys out and about looking for him, but nothing’s turned up so far.”
“The man is an enormous pest. What about his girlfriend?”
“What about her?”
“Is she still at the same school?”
“I don’t know.”
“What do you mean, you don’t know? Haven’t you been there to check?”
“Uh… no. We were only looking for Jacobs.”
“Imbeciles! You know he has a girlfriend, you know she has parents, why haven’t you been waiting there for him?!”
The man cleared his throat. “Um, I… I didn’t know you still wanted us too.”
“Fools! I want someone at that school tomorrow to see if Jacobs shows up.”
“And then?”
“And then follow him!”
“Oh, OK. Yeah, right on it.” The man left and retreated back into the house, when another of Ames’ men came over to him.
“Yes?” Ames said.
The man wasn’t sure how to say this as he didn’t think Ames would like it. But he had to deliver the message anyway. “Um, we just got a message from someone named Ken Reed.”
Ames immediately shook his head. “I don’t know anyone with that name.”
“He apparently works for Rich Mallette.”
Ames turned his head in a flash, squinting his eyes as he looked at the man. “Rich Mallette?”
“Yeah, he used to…”
“I know who he is! What does this man want?”
“Mallette wants to meet with you tomorrow.”
Ames turned his focus back to the pool. He knew Mallette was getting out of prison, though he didn’t know the exact day. He had other things on his mind these past few months. “Rich Mallette wants to meet tomorrow.”
“What do you think he wants?”
“He wants to reclaim what he believes is his. What else would he want?”
“What should I tell him?”
“Tell him I will meet with Mallette.”
“He said twelve o’clock if that works.”
“Twelve is fine,” Ames said. “Where?”
The man handed his boss a slip of paper with the address. “I wrote it down.”
“Have you looked this place up?”
“Just a park.”
“A park?”
“Guess he figured out in the open, that way neither side would play any tricks.”
“Hmm.”
“Still want to go?”
“Yes. Tell them I’ll be there.”
The man left and went back into the house, though Ames kept his focus on the water. He couldn’t be sure exactly what Mallette wanted, but he had some ideas, and none were to his liking. The only thing he would like was if Mallette said he was willing to throw in with Ames and fall in behind him, though Ames knew that was the longest of long shots. Everything he’d ever heard of Rich Mallette indicated the man didn’t like taking orders from anybody. He doubted
prison changed his philosophy much.
Ames looked up at the sky and sighed. Now, his problems had doubled.
4
Mallette was already waiting in the park by the time Ames arrived. He was standing in front of a water fountain, Selby and Reed by his side. Ames had several of his men behind him, as well. As Ames walked toward the fountain, Mallette stood there, his hands in his pants pockets, looking like a very confident man. Selby and Reed stood there with their arms crossed in front of their chest, their facial expressions not changing, looking every bit the part of tough bodyguards.
Even though he doubted anything would happen in a park, Ames was still on his guard as he approached the men. Though they didn’t look like they were there for a fight, he didn’t trust Mallette at all based on everything he’d heard about him. Ames looked around to make sure there was nobody that looked suspicious waiting on a park bench, or behind a tree, or just standing out in the open with a gun pointed at him, as unlikely as that was.
By the time he reached Mallette, the two men were about two feet from each other. Ames looked at the guards, and then at Mallette.
“So you’re Rich Mallette.”
Mallette grinned. “I hope I do not disappoint.”
“I’ve seen your picture before. It seems prison has been kind to you.”
“Not in any sense of the word. Prison is a nasty experience I would only wish on my worst enemies.”
“I guess congratulations are in order for your early release.”
Mallette put his hands up. “Complete luck, I believe, but luck that was long overdue. Congratulations are in order for you too, no? I’ve heard you had some trouble with a mutual enemy of ours several months ago that took you out of commission for a while.”
Ames smiled. “Yes, but thankfully nothing too serious. I feel fine now.”
“I’m glad to hear it.”
Ames glanced at his two guards, then back at Mallette, and put his arms up. “So, why are we here today?”
“Perhaps we should talk in private.”
Mallette turned to his men and waved them off. They immediately left the area and waited over to the side. Ames motioned for his men to do the same, though they went in the other direction.
