Robert B. Parker's Cheap Shot

by Ace Atkins

  “Yikes.”

  “What?”

  “I said, ‘Yikes.’ It means my knees won’t stop knocking.”

  “If you see anything, suspect anything, or spot anyone in or around Gillette, you call me first. Connor said you’re overly fond of your weapon.”

  I let that one go and simply shrugged.

  “These kids out there don’t have normal problems like you and me,” he said. “Kinjo is probably being followed by a carload of sorority girls who just want to bang him. You make a mistake, and this team looks bad and my entire job is in question. You understand?”

  “Un-uh. Go back to the sorority girls.”

  “Christ,” Barnes said, shaking his head. He walked away.

  I sat back down with Ray. He studied the field and the players fanning out on one knee and listening to the coach talk about their opponent. His chin was lifted as if he hadn’t heard a word. Not looking away, Ray said, “Looks like they got the right guy,” he said.

  “Thanks.”

  “Don’t let that prick get in the way of protecting my brother,” he said. “Kinjo’s a good man. He never wanted Akira to grow up like we did. It’s important to have a father, not just around, but in his life. We never had that. He and that kid go to the zoo, the mall, to movies. Disney World twice a year. That’s why the bad stuff hurts Kinjo. Because that ain’t him. You can talk shit about him on the field, but anyone who tarnishes who he is as a man, that’s about his family honor.”

  “A Southern man’s code?”

  “And all that Japanese shit he’s into. Man loves his family and he takes care of his people. Look at me. I may be good with money, but I never deserved all this.”

  I nodded. “You think it’s really just a carload of girls?”

  “Tell you what,” Ray said. “If it is, I’d better be the one you call first.”

  5

  The next day, I followed Kinjo away from Foxboro and into the city. Akira was to spend the weekend with his mother, and both had agreed to meet at the Quincy Market. This was not my decision, only a stroke of luck, as I had not eaten since early that morning. The Pats had not invited me to partake in their training table for carbo-loading or fruit smoothies.

  We parked side by side at a garage with a nice view of the North End. I hung back as Kinjo followed the sidewalk with Akira, the son a little moody about the exchange. He wore an oversized Pats jersey with HEYWOOD written above number 57.

  There were a few whispers and sideways glances as they made their way into the market. A couple of people stopped him for an autograph. Akira seemed used to all this. He’d smile up as his father signed a piece of paper or someone’s hat. Inside, I bought a turkey sub and sat down with them at a table in the common area under the rotunda.

  “Shit,” Kinjo said. “Nicole’s always late. She can’t help it.”

  I unwrapped the sandwich and offered Akira half. He declined. He said his mother was going to take him to the Five Guys in Medford. As I ate, two unsavory-looking men in leather coats walked from the Faneuil Hall entrance. I watched them move past our table, not a flick of recognition, as they headed toward a pizza vendor.

  “You ever shoot anybody?” Akira said.

  I looked to Kinjo. Kinjo nodded back.

  “Yep.”

  “Dead?” Akira said.

  “As a doornail.”

  The kid nodded with that, liking what he’d heard. He was smallish, even for eight, with bright eyes and a warm smile.

  “Why’d you kill them?” Akira said.

  “Akira,” Kinjo said. “Hush.”

  “I just want to know.”

  “They were very unpleasant people,” I said.

  “Bad men,” Akira said.

  “You might say that.”

  “And they needed to be dead?”

  I looked to Kinjo again. He nodded. I looked to the bright-eyed little boy and shrugged. “It’s a little more complicated than that.”

  Akira nodded.

  “Akira goes to Beaver Country Day,” Kinjo said. “Every student got their own iPad. School where I went in Georgia was just a bunch of trailers. Teachers did the best they could. But they couldn’t do much.”

  I lifted my eyes and nodded at his flat-billed baseball hat. “What’s that R with the squiggles mean?”

  Akira looked at his dad as if I were simple. Kinjo continued to look at the crowded space filled with people eating and talking, coming and going, carrying food from the long food court. I ate more of my sub.

  “It’s Rocawear,” Kinjo said.

  “Of course,” I said. “Rocawear.”

  “Jay-Z,” Akira said. “He owns it.”

  “Hat cost a hundred damn dollars,” Kinjo said.

  “Daddy never ate in a restaurant till he was in high school.”

  Kinjo shrugged.

  “And he had three jobs after school when he wasn’t playing ball.”

  Kinjo grinned. “Actually, just two.”

  “Shining shoes and loading shelves at the Piggly Wiggly.”

  Kinjo nodded and put an arm around his son, pulling him tight. “Akira’s gonna work training camp next year. Learn what it’s like to make money.”

  “I don’t want to shine shoes.”

  Kinjo nodded, grabbed Akira’s sneaker and dusted off some dirt. Akira laughed, but Kinjo looked away and shook his head. “Okay. Here we go. Here comes trouble.”

  A woman had walked in from the south end of Quincy Market, splitting the tourists like Moses and the Red Sea. She was diminutive but moved with purpose. Kinjo’s former wife was dark-skinned, with short black hair reminiscent of Audrey Hepburn’s. She wore a blue-and-white vertical-striped sleeveless blouse and navy pencil skirt. Her heels were brown and tall and her jewelry was simple. As she walked closer I noted a tiny silver necklace with a diamond pendant on her long neck.

  She smiled at Akira. She ignored both me and Kinjo. I put down the sub.

  “I’ve been waiting for you outside for fifteen minutes,” she said. “What the hell?”

  “I told you we’d be inside,” Kinjo said. “It’s getting cold. Damn.”

  She turned back to her son. “Don’t you have anything else to wear besides football jerseys?”

  Akira shrugged. Nicole looked to me. I wrapped up my sub and stood. Her eyes were big and almond-shaped. She had full lips and fine features. I smiled at her. She did not return the gesture.

  “Why’d you bring a coach?” she said.

  “He ain’t a coach,” Kinjo said. “He does security.”

  “And why is he here?” she said.

  Kinjo’s eyes shifted from me to Akira and back to Nicole. Kinjo offered his palms and said, “He’s doing some security work for me.” Akira slowly moved away from his father and hugged his mother around the waist. He was content. His mother glared at me.

  I smiled some more. My cheeks started to hurt. A young Hispanic man in a do-rag and a skinny young white man with shoulder-length red hair watched us from a long table on the far side of the rotunda. They spoke back and forth, eyes on Kinjo and Nicole. One of them nodded. The Hispanic man continued to watch.

  I asked Nicole if she’d like to sit.

  She shook her head. Akira unwrapped his arms from her and took his backpack from his father. The kid watched the ground as his parents talked to each other.

  “You get straight with the lawyer?” he said. “You see we doing things right?”

  Nicole looked at Kinjo, eyes flicking across his face. “Sorry I didn’t trust you,” she said. “Don’t know why that is.”

  She turned. I smiled at Akira and winked at him. He returned with a weak smile and looked away.

  I sat back down. I returned to my sub. The Hispanic man and Eric the Red continued to watch us. They watched Nicole and Akira as they passed, hand in
hand. I started to follow, but their gaze hung back on Kinjo. The Hispanic man picked at his teeth with his small finger, eyes unwavering.

  “You recognize those two?” I said.

  “Where?”

  I ate a bit. I motioned slightly with my head.

  “Nope.”

  Eric the Red started to stand. He had a matching mustache and goatee, red hair long and curly.

  “So how the Falcons look this week?” I said.

  “Okay.”

  “You okay?”

  “She shouldn’t talk like that in front of the kid.”

  “I noted a trace of hostility.”

  “Shit,” he said. “She’d be glad if someone did kill me.”

  Kinjo shook his head. Akira and Nicole had disappeared into the long, narrow space of the mall. The Hispanic man joined Eric the Red, and they walked toward us. The Hispanic man had his hand at hip level. Both eyes were serious and intent. Eric the Red licked his lips. His Celtics T-shirt hung nearly to his knees.

  I had one bite to go but steeled myself.

  The men approached the table. The Hispanic man reached into his jacket.

  Kinjo jumped up fast and threw a right hand at the man’s face. I caught his fist in my palm. The man ducked, yelping, “What the fuck?”

  A pen fell to the floor. Eric the Red ducked and covered.

  Kinjo breathed hard out of his nose. His face twitched.

  I let go of Kinjo’s fist. My palm smarted as I picked up the pen and handed it to him. “Sorry about that.” Kinjo took it and forced a smile. “What’s your name, man?”

  6

  The Pats flew out to Atlanta the next morning. Kinjo was now under the watch of Jeff Barnes. I told Kinjo to give him my best.

  As I had a couple days to sleuth, I drove to the Harbor Health Club to search for some company. I found Z and Hawk sparring in Henry’s newly expanded boxing room. Hawk and I had taken turns coaching Z that summer.

  Z wore cut-off gray sweats, a pair of eighteen-ounce gloves, and leather headgear. Hawk wore a black satin Adidas getup with red stripes, focus mitts, and no headgear. Hawk’s head was made of steel and Teflon and shone black and smooth in the harbor’s morning light.

  Hawk played James Brown on the sound system. He had been telling Z he moved more white than red or black, and he needed rhythm.

  “Keep yourself bladed, move, come on, duck, okay, two, three, two. Slip. Up on that toe. Breathe like you live. Don’t breathe to punch. You do that in the ring and you get killed.”

  I stood next to the heavy bag. The new section of plate glass provided a commanding view of the harbor. The boxing room had more than doubled in size, which, at first, Hawk and I thought came from Henry’s undying gratitude. Then we noted the flyers around the gym for kickboxing and something called Punch Fit classes. It didn’t matter. We now had two heavy bags, two speed bags, and a big mirrored room to shadow-box and to offer classes to promising young thugs.

  “Where’s the snap?” Hawk said. “You pushing a punch. Don’t push it. Snap that jab out there. Come on in. Make me back the fuck up.”

  The three-minute timer buzzed. Z was drenched. He winked at me and made his way to the water fountain.

  “As a white man, I am deeply offended by your comments on rhythm.”

  “Only white man could move was Gene Kelly,” Hawk said. “Only white man who could move and fight was Hollywood fantasy.”

  “Besides being part of the Big Brothers program,” I said, “what else do you have going on?”

  “Besides lookin’ good and pleasin’ the ladies?”

  “Yeah,” I said. “Besides that.”

  Hawk shook his head. “Nothing that interest me.”

  “I thought I had something,” I said. “Good pay, too.”

  “Fella offered me a job in a grocery store,” Hawk said, grinning. “Said I’d make a crackerjack clerk.”

  “Crackerjack,” I said.

  “What happened to the job?”

  “Still on it,” I said. “But starting to think it’s all in the client’s mind.”

  “Sounds like Susan’s kind of work,” he said.

  “Maybe.”

  Hawk removed the focus mitts. Without looking at his watch, he told Z to take on the heavy bag. Within two seconds, the buzzer sounded. “So, if it is real,” Hawk said, “what’s the job?”

  “Shooing flies off a man who just may be tougher than you.”

  Hawk raised his eyebrows. He doubted it.

  “Kinjo Heywood,” I said. “Pats linebacker.”

  “Playing a game ain’t the same, babe.”

  “No,” I said. “It’s not.”

  “’Course millions of people don’t pay to watch us kick the shit out of people, either.”

  “True.”

  “They should,” Hawk said. “We good at it.”

  “And Z is getting better.”

  Hawk shrugged. Z worked on the heavy bag. Despite his injuries from a few months ago, his body had healed and his punches had become even more substantial. The bag hopped and bounced on the heavy chains. Z’s breathing was smooth and easy, his muscles bulging from his cut-off sweatshirt. He had cut his long, black hair as short as mine.

  “Full-time job for Z to unlearn all your bad habits.”

  “Thank God you stepped in when you did,” I said.

  “Another month with you, and he’d be ready for the Ziegfeld Follies.”

  “Shall I serenade you with ‘There’s Beauty Everywhere’?”

  “How about I teach Z to fight, and you teach all the useless shit you know.”

  “We each have our calling.”

  7

  Susan and I had dinner at Casablanca. Everything was the same: the polished wood, the gleaming brass rails, the churning ceiling fans, and the colorful murals of Bogart and scenes from Rick’s Café. Even Sari, the restaurant’s owner, kept his place at a back table and whispered in conspiratorial tones with Catherine Boyle, another loyal customer and one of Susan’s friends. I’d never have guessed the restaurant’s days were numbered.

  “How long?” Susan said.

  We stood at the bar. I ordered a Blue Moon ale. Susan ordered a gin martini and waved at Catherine.

  “Sari says the end of the year,” I said. “He says there will be a big going-away party.”

  “Hard to envision Brattle Street without Casablanca.”

  “Or downtown without Locke-Ober.”

  Susan nodded and smiled a bit. The bartender served my beer. He started work on Susan’s concoction. I did not touch my beer.

  She nudged me. “Go ahead, big guy.”

  “I can wait,” I said. “Contrary to popular opinion, I don’t salivate at the sound of a cracking bottle top.”

  “What do you think they’ll do with all the murals?” she said. “I’ll miss the murals.”

  “They’ll be ripped out with the rest of it,” I said. “Progress.”

  The bartender presented the martini. Susan lifted it in a toast and said, “May it pass us by.”

  We clicked drinks. Sari nodded and waved to us. We waved back. Susan cocked a hip and leaned into the bar. She wore a pair of very tight dark jeans and a green scoop-necked cashmere sweater. Her shoes were high-heeled and très chic. I bet I could not pronounce their maker.

  “Before we’re seated,” I said. “Do you mind talking shop?”

  “Do you know how much you would owe me if you had to pay for my professional services?”

  I smiled and tilted my head. “Perhaps I could work it off?”

  “Shrinkage for sexual favors?” she said. “A slight ethical dilemma we have discussed many times before.”

  “This is nothing solid,” I said. “Just some general advice.”

  “On?”

  “Paranoia
.”

  “That’s a very wide topic,” she said. “Aren’t you the one that said paranoia was very healthy in your business?”

  “I said that?” I said. “My wisdom occasionally astounds me.”

  Susan rolled her eyes. She toyed with her drink, taking a short sip.

  “How might I recognize someone suffering from unhealthy paranoia?” I said. “When people come to me and need help, I often believe them. But what if the only trouble was in their head?”

  “Something new with your client?”

  I turned beside me to make sure no one was within earshot. I gave a small nod. I took a sip of beer. Sipping beer fueled the thinking. The thinking would lead to the right path.

  I shrugged. “A couple of guys approached him at the Quincy Market for an autograph and he nearly ripped their heads off.”

  “What did you think?”

  “Maybe it’s contagious. I nearly slugged one of them.”

  “What stopped you?”

  “A Bic pen looks very different than a .44 Magnum.”

  “How does Kinjo treat you?” Susan said. “Does he confide in you or is he standoffish?”

  “Straight ahead.”

  “Besides people following him,” she said, “has he said anything that seems irrational?”

  “He thinks it may be another player who wants him hurt.”

  “Is that plausible?”

  “Sure.” I smiled. “Anything is plausible in the NFL.”

  “Lots of money at stake.”

  “Money, power, ego. Take your pick.”

  I drank some beer. I thought. I drank some more beer and waited for enlightenment. “Something is off about what he’s told me. Something doesn’t ring true.”

  “But he’s your client,” she said. “You’ve given your word to help, and you must trust his.”

  “Yes.”

  “Could he just want attention?” she said.

  “Why would a football hero need more? His picture is on soda cups.”

  “Maybe he has a head injury,” she said. “The man does use his head as a battering ram professionally.”

  “I was told that would only hone your intellect.”