by Jeremy Brown
“I can hear you fine,” I said.
“No, come closer.”
Eye Patch and his crew moved toward us.
Gil was breathing hard. “Security!”
“They busy,” Carrasco said. His walking stick was planted between his feet. He leaned on it with both hands, relaxed. “Come here.”
I walked. Gil still had a vice grip on my arm—he was either going to let go or go for a ride. He dropped his hand but stayed next to me. We stopped ten feet from Carrasco, Malhar, and the other four. Eye Patch stayed an equal distance behind us, fencing us in. Malhar hissed through his teeth, the veins on his head rippling.
“What?” I said.
“You never answered my question. Who is watching my Pomba Gira if you are in exile?”
“Still me. And her cousins and uncle. The entire Arcoverde clan and every student who walks through the academy door. Hundreds of people.”
Carrasco nodded. “And Detective Rubin, too?”
I didn’t say anything.
“We see him hanging around you, talking to you. This makes Exu unhappy.”
“So light a candle.”
Gil said, “Rubin is our security. Protection from the fans.”
“Oh, they crazy, sure. Their blood gets so hot when they wave the flag and scream their chants. You should know, many of them have left the red candles and knives at Exu’s crossroads, asking for Aviso to hurt you bad.”
“He needs all the help he can get.”
Carrasco’s face twitched into a smile. “If Exu finds out you are working with Rubin and his corrupt police, it will be very bad for you. Exu will make sure you regret this. He will take my Pomba Gira, and her family will suffer. All she loves will be turned to ash because of you.”
Gil’s breathing changed, shifting from the edge of panic into a deep, controlled rhythm of building fury. It was nice to have some company. It hit me how desperate and scared he must have been if he was ready to pull me out of the Aviso fight and run back to Vegas. Gil doesn’t run from anything. He stands like a granite wall and lets the bullshit—all the immaturity and drama and ego nonsense of professional fighters, sponsors, promoters—bounce off him.
And I’d finally worn him down.
My willingness to risk my life—a life he’d saved, dragged out of a steep downward spiral and done his best to keep clean and safe—had swept his foundation out from under him.
The hardest punch wasn’t that I’d made him desperate and scared.
It was that he was right.
I told Carrasco, “I’m going back to Vegas. No more Coluna. You leave the Arcoverdes and their academy alone. And if Marcela chooses to be your Pomba Gira, so be it. But it has to be her choice, because Exu wills it. Right?”
Eye Patch and the other men from the Axila da Serpente grew still, waiting. I’d backed him into his spiritual corner. Now to wall him in.
“That is right,” Carrasco said. “Exu stands at the crossroads, this or that. And she can choose, sure. But Exu already gave you your choice, remember?”
He held his left hand out to his side.
“This door, to leave and never come back.”
Brought his left back to the walking stick and floated his right hand out.
“That door. To run the Coluna da Cobra and see if you are worthy. Which one did you choose? Yes, I’m afraid so. You don’t get to go back and choose the other. If you do, the spirits will be angered. Exu will seek justice.”
He took his hat off and handed it to Malhar. The scarred flesh above his left ear was rippled and waxy under the bright hallway lights. Carrasco’s head tipped forward. He pulled the black sunglasses off and dropped them in the hat. Lifted his head.
His left eye was filled with blood. It bulged beyond his eyelid like a red jellyfish, the fluid swirling and busy. A pitch-black iris floated in the center, flicking left and right, independent of what the other eye did. His eyelid slid down, and the red sac slurped beneath it like a shy tongue.
Carrasco said, “All of it. Everything. To ashes.”
He put his glasses and hat on. Turned and limped away.
Malhar and Carrasco’s men followed without looking back.
Gil shuffled the gear bag back into the prep room, set it down on one of the couches like it was full of the good crystal. He scrubbed his hands over his face and head, asked me, “Are you working with Rubin?”
Gil was ready to give up everything to keep me safe. The least I owed him was the truth.
“Yes.”
“Beyond him keeping you safe from fans.”
“Yes.”
He crossed his arms, waiting.
I said, “When Carrasco takes me for the Coluna, Rubin and his paramilitaries are going to stack up at the bottom of the Axila. I find a hole to hide in. While Carrasco’s men are hunting me, Rubin sweeps up the hill and takes them all down.”
“All of them?”
I nodded.
“Whose idea was this, yours or his?”
“His.”
“And you agreed to it.”
“Yup.”
“So who’s crazier, the first guy off the cliff or the one who follows him?”
“Hey, I don’t know what’s going to happen between me and Marcela. So far she isn’t coming home with me. If Rubin gives Carrasco the scorched-earth treatment, at least I’ll know he can’t go after her. Or the rest of her family.”
Gil blinked. “You asked her to come to Vegas?”
“Yeah.”
“For good?”
“Forever. Then pick a time when her judgment is compromised and ask her to marry me. House, yard. What else? Bird feeder? Is that typical?”
Gil wrapped his arms around mine, crushed me in a bear hug. Stepped back, tears in his eyes again—happy and sparkly this time—and said, “Okay. So now we really gotta get you home safe. Both of you.”
“Like I said, she’s not quite on board yet.”
“I’ll talk to her.”
“Good, because I can’t, remember?”
Gil scoffed. “Antonio forbidding you two from seeing each other is the best thing that could happen. Now you’re irresistible.”
“And you’re okay with me helping Rubin, running the Coluna.”
“Fuck no. But now I see you’re not just being a moron. You’re being a moron for a good reason. Kinda. If we can find another way out of this, we’re taking it. Deal?”
A skinny guy wearing a Warrior shirt and carrying a walkie-talkie stuck his head in the door, panting. He let out a grunt of irritation, told the radio, “I found him.” To us: “We need you back on stage for the weigh-ins. Now.”
Gil asked me, “You’re okay going against Aviso, all this shit going on?”
“Okay? I can’t wait. He can’t shoot me or stab me or blow me up with a grenade.”
Gil shrugged. “Right, he just wants to break your arm in half.”
“Kid stuff.”
We turned to the gofer, who shook his head. “Fighters.”
The podium, tables, and chairs were gone, replaced by an intricate scale and officials from Warrior, the Brazilian MMA Athletic Commission, and the International Mixed Martial Arts Federation. It seemed like a lot of guys to make sure none of the fighters were too fat.
Aviso was just stepping off the scale in his black high-cut briefs when I walked onstage. He flexed for the giddy crowd and made his billboard face, eyes half closed and lips somewhere between a pout and smirk. I imagined them split open and swollen, which made me happier than the crowd.
Eddie slithered next to me while I kicked my shoes off.
“Where the hell did you go?”
“I needed to cut a little more weight.”
“Bullshit. You’re nowhere near two sixty-five.”
“Then I needed to add a little more weight.”
Eddie nodded. “Keep it up, keep embarrassing me, you’ll be teaching MMA Pilates at the WarriorDome. Now get your ass on the scale.”
I kept my clothe
s on and came in at 242. The chants of “Vai morrer! Vai morrer!” made it difficult to hear the weighmaster—he had to yell twice to make sure it was recorded correctly.
I stepped off the scale and faced Aviso, Eddie between us and back a step for the pre-fight stare-down. Aviso moved in close enough to put one of his feet behind mine.
“I gonna break your arm, man. Take it home with me.”
“Why, so it can keep smacking you around after I’m done?”
“The counting starts right now. They close the cage, I let you know how much time you got left with two arms. I tell you right now, it won’t be much.”
“You should be nicer to me. I’m giving you a career opportunity—official spokesmodel for poseurs, huge mistakes, and plastic surgeons.”
He drove his forehead into mine and started cursing me in Portuguese.
Eddie and a few Warrior security guards separated us. Gil and I walked across the stage, the chants louder than ever. The crowd had taken up a dance as well, slapping right hands against left elbows with each syllable.
“Vai-mor-rer!”
Slap-slap-slap!
Letting me know which arm Aviso was going to break. I stopped and smiled to keep them going—their hands and elbows would be red and swollen for the fight the next day.
Gil said, “Hey,” and nodded backstage.
Rubin waited for us. We stepped out of the lights, which didn’t diminish the crowd’s fervor.
“I just talked to Carrasco,” I said.
“Yes, I know.”
“With eight of his guys standing around. Fifteen if you count Malhar.”
Rubin said, “You seem upset.”
“Where the hell were you?”
“Waiting, of course. To see if they were going to take you. My shooters are on high alert, they can assemble like this.” He snapped his fingers.
“Who else knows about what you and I talked about?”
He glanced left and right, eyeballed Gil and leaned close. “You mean . . . the big plan?”
“Yes. And Gil knows.”
“Man, you got a big mouth. I don’t tell nobody. Not even the men who are here with me, or the shooters. I make the call, they gear up, I tell them where we are going.”
“They don’t need a plan?” Gil said. “Some sort of strategy?”
Rubin winked. “My friend, we have a plan for the Axila already. We practice it all the time. My boys can walk through it in their sleep.”
I said, “Carrasco knows you’re around. I told him you’re keeping me safe from the fans.”
“Which I am, no? I must tell you though, I didn’t think they would hate you this much.”
“Can you guarantee Carrasco won’t know about this until it’s too late? Until it’s happening?”
Rubin sucked air through his teeth. “Guarantee is a strong word. I can assure you I am doing all I can. How is that?”
“No help at all.”
“Well, we hope for the best.”
“We can do more than that. I want your men with Marcela, starting now. And her family.”
“Ah, I did not put in a request for this. If you were with her, okay. But to have men all over the place . . . and at least one woman, because Marcela must use the ladies’ facilities, I assume? Is too much.”
“It’s just right, if you want to get Carrasco.”
“Man, now I get why the fans don’t like you. But I told you before, he won’t go after her. It will make Exu look weak.”
“Not if he finds out I’m working with you to burn his temple down.”
“He said this?”
“He said Exu will want justice.”
“Huh.” Rubin put his fists on his belt, stretched his back. “Okay, I will send some people to look after the honorable Arcoverde family. Maybe we got some tips about foreign fans who don’t like them so much. Good? Happy?”
“I’m smiling on the inside.”
“And you are done with all this bravata now, we can go?”
Gil said, “Straight to the hotel. Dinner and relaxing, then sleep.”
Rubin frowned. “Oh no, we need him out in the public, where Carrasco can find him. He didn’t tell you when you had your chat?”
“Tell us what?”
“My sources tell me the Coluna da Cobra is happening tonight.”
13
Gil and I took a cab back to the hotel, Rubin and his men somewhere behind us. Allegedly.
“This is bullshit,” Gil said.
“I know.”
A dark blue van passed on the left and cut us off. Our driver hit the brakes and the horn equally hard. He wore earbuds, the fast and jangly music loud enough for us to bob our heads to it. I watched the rear doors on the van, waited for them to burst open so Carrasco’s fire ants could pour out, snatch me from the backseat.
The van swerved right and exited the street.
Gil said, “This thing happens tonight, even if you don’t get a scratch—which I highly doubt—you’ll be exhausted for Aviso.”
“I’ll sleep all day tomorrow. Just wake me up on the way to the cage.”
Some kind of truck rode up to our rear bumper and put its headlights on the back of my neck. I squinted into them, couldn’t tell if it was one of the barricades from the Axila or just a shitty driver. I kept my breathing even and moved my head and eyes to avoid tunnel vision—didn’t want to waste an adrenaline dump on road rage.
Gil was antsy, picking at a seam on the gear bag across our laps. “I don’t know, man. I’ve been trying to imagine how I’d feel if you were doing this back home, helping Vegas cops shut down some gang, joining one of their stings.”
“And?”
“I think I’d hate it just as much. Maybe a little less, because I don’t trust Rubin. And who knows what kind of cowboys he has working for him.”
“The kind who want to get rid of Carrasco even more than I do.”
“And probably don’t care who else they shoot in the process.”
“I’ll stay low.”
Gil said, “You find a cast iron bathtub, or a steel tank, or a bank vault, and get your ass inside it. Don’t come out until the ambulances leave.”
“A bank vault?”
A white stretch limousine floated next to us on the right. It was the same color as Carrasco’s linen suit. One of the windows facing me slipped down and a young male stuck his head out and stared at me with slight panic. I didn’t recognize him, but I hadn’t memorized all the faces in the arena hallway.
His head tipped forward and he vomited down the outside of the door, looked at me again with spittle on his mouth and hooted. Someone pulled him into the limo and the window slid up.
Gil said, “You know what Roth does after he makes weight?”
Roth was the Australian fighter who trained at Gil’s gym and had sprayed all my gear with Aviso’s cologne. His nickname was “Cut Snake,” from the Aussie expression “mad as a cut snake.”
“Not much,” I said.
“Right. He sits on the couch and eats Fritos and hot sauce. Plays video games. You make yourself into bait for a military-scale police raid against a Brazilian drug lord who thinks he’s a god.”
“I wouldn’t put it that way.”
“No? How would you put it?”
“I’m doing what is necessary to keep the people I love safe.”
Gil looked out the window for a bit. “Yeah, that does sound better.”
Rubin wanted us sitting outside. We took a table at the hotel’s outdoor restaurant, ordered dinner and tried to keep our shoulders from hunching, waiting for the ambush. Gil ate like a robot. I don’t remember what I ordered or how it tasted.
The only part I remember clear as day is a hand falling onto my shoulder. I turned, ready for Eye Patch and a sweaty ride to the Axila.
It was Marcela.
I knocked my chair over standing up to hug her. She said hello to Gil from somewhere in my chest. We sat down much too soon and she ate something off my plate.
“Yes, but I knew you were busy, I didn’t want to bother you.”
“You could never bother me.”
She scrunched her nose and asked Gil, “Why are his eyes funny?”
“He’s very happy to see you.”
I said, “Does Antonio know you’re here?”
“No, why should he?”
“You haven’t talked to him lately?”
“About what? Is he okay?” She looked back and forth at us. “Wait, is it Jairo?”
I glanced at Gil. He shrugged. “I’m not surprised he didn’t tell her.”
Marcela picked up a steak knife. “Tell me what?”
I said, “Antonio forbid me from seeing you anymore.”
She kept the knife. “Forbid?”
“Yeah.”
“Why did he do this?”
“Woody’s general disrespect,” Gil said. “Lack of etiquette. The way his behavior represents his personality.”
“That’ll do,” I said.
We ducked and covered when Marcela threw the knife onto the table. “Of course. And why would he bother telling me, I’m just a girl, right? It’s not up to me who I am with.”
Gil said, “From Antonio’s point of view, it’s on Woody to be honorable and respect his wishes.”
Marcela laughed. “Wishes? He is commanding. Ordering.”
“I didn’t know he hadn’t told you,” I said.
She turned to me. “Wait, is that why your eyes are so funny? You thought he told me to stay away from you, and I listened to him?”
“Well, I wasn’t sure—”
She punched me in the arm hard enough to turn heads three tables away and called me something in Portuguese that made a busboy gasp.
“Your head is made of bone.” She grabbed my ears and pulled me to an inch from her face. “Even if you told me to stay away, I would not listen.”
“That’s a little scary.”
“You should be scared. Love like this comes once a lifetime. I am terrified to lose it, and so are you.”
She kissed me, her hands wrapped behind my neck, warm and small. I would have stayed there forever.
She let go and sat back. “It is why I got so mad when you wanted to go with Carrasco, run the Coluna and get yourself killed. Like taking my heart out and stomping on it. But that is over. You are here with me, safe.”
