by Reid Astor
"My father was a cook," Novik says as if it explains everything. "And my mother was very touchy about her coffee." Then, double taking at his boss, he squints and asks, "Are you… yeah, are you all right? You seem rather... Well, you don't seem as uptight as you always are."
He feels the ghost of annoyance at that remark, but it doesn't rise into anything. It wouldn't do just yet to explain that ‘not as uptight’ is him actually quite intoxicated and tired of the entire world. He just paces through to the counter and reads the orders off the pad, frowning. "These are a lot of new names."
"Ah... Yes boss, they're items from the new menu." Novik's voice is taut with anxiety at that, but he still pulls out the finished macchiato and serves it up to the customer, a skinny childlike woman with large glasses and a beret, with all professional mannerisms and an award-winning smile. It falls right back off as he turns back to his boss and says, eyes wide, "Miss Viola said you did not mind the new menu, so... It's in effect."
It occurs to Niklas that this little bastard is better at running his own coffee shop than he is. At least, Novik can do it with infuriating retail cheer, which he never perfected.
"Excellent," he says, rather dully. "The next order is a diet chai latte. You can handle that," he slips the order over his shoulder without waiting to see if Novik catches it, "I'll do this suka Americano."
He's vaguely aware that Novik is staring as he goes about setting up the machine and shoving in a mug, but he doesn't quite care. Eventually, he says, "Novik."
The youth appears by his side almost instantly, jerking his head to looking between him and the Americano steaming in the fingerless gloves on his hands. "Y-yeah, boss?"
Niklas rings up the Americano in a nonchalant fashion, and then fixes his eyes on the kid. Not really that bad, he thinks, for a street rat. He knows he wasn't half as well behaved or knowledgeable about coffee at Novik's age. "One of these days your captain is going to call you in on something. The one who sent you here saying you would find a job."
He ignores the surprise bugging the boy's eyes out wide in favor of the customer, giving the college girl at the counter an ounce of a smile for her money. Predictably, a tip slips up into the brightly taped-up jar Viola set out with flowers drawn on it. Sometimes it helps to smile, although Niklas can only really remember to when he's at least slightly drunk. "Yes," he says eventually, smile falling off his face as he puts away the money, "You know what I'm talking about."
Novik looks around to see if anyone is listening, then whispers, "I was told you weren't supposed to know everything."
"Don't do your boss the disrespect of thinking he's an idiot," Niklas breathes, feeling a small smile come over his face, and watching the terror in Novik’s eyes as it does. "Even if you did work retail. When the day comes that you are summoned to do an op, Novik, I want you to tell me the details. Let's do this as brothers, not as cat and mouse." With that, he surreptitiously flicks up the sleeve of the shirt he's wearing underneath his uniform, lets the burned skin of his left bicep come into view. He tried to remove the tattoo a long time ago, but for his pain he was left with a withered and twisted barbed rose. It's a casual motion, not something anyone in the cafe would notice, and soon enough he pulls the sleeve back down.
"I-...I'm sorry, I didn't know," Novik murmurs. "I-I mean, well, I know with your eye and all you were... I don't know. I thought you were just a bitter dropout."
I’m that, too. He shrugs. "Of course you didn't know. Now you do, so you know who your allies are," he says, "and I can understand and help you. Now- that chai latte." He watches as the youth scurries to make the drink, giving all the customary smiles and apologies when he finally rings it up.
For once the café almost runs itself.
Hanging back and tasting the vodka deep in the back of his throat, Niklas takes out his cell and starts a text. He's going to remember what Germaine told him.
* * *
Lars is all self-satisfaction when he sits down at the chair, noisily shifting himself into a comfortable position. He's an out-of-place fixture in Niklas' room, and he knows it. The black straps of his gun shoulder holsters gleam in the dim fluorescent lighting whispering on through beyond the doors, and he seems to know that Niklas isn't keeping an eye off of them. "I have business after this tonight," he says, by way of explanation, and thumbs at the creaky windowsill. "Mind if I light up?"
"Yes, I do," he says pointedly, picking up the blister sheet of gum he had prepared for this exact moment and throwing them from the bed. Lars catches them on point, turns them over and round, shrugs, and pops one.
"So what'm I here for?" He asks with a visceral little smile as he starts chewing. "It's gotta be something special if you're finally texting back."
Niklas folds his hands over each other and, from where he's seated on his futon, wonders where to start. There surely is some procedure and trail he could follow to get this done most effectively, but all he can think of is a single straightforward question. "Did you know my father was having an affair with Madam Morris?'
Lars stops chewing abruptly, and looks to him with a sharp expression. "Yeah," he says. "She told me. About the affair, well, it's not the, uh," he gestures faintly. "Well, it wasn't the world's best-kept secret."
He snorts and buries his head in his palm. "Okay," he says, and pushes himself off his rump, striding towards the chair where the man is sprawled. "I should have realized sooner. For all I know, she’s sent you to take this place out of my hands."
The man's brown eyes narrow, a motion barely visible in the shade. "Niklas-"
Lars' chin is tense when he seizes it in his hand, forcing the man to look directly up at him. They're close now, his body brushing the investigator's arm and shoulder, and Niklas can almost see his eyes dilating even more. "This fucking store is cursed," he mutters down into him.
With his free hand, he reaches for the gun in his holster.
He seems to have seen it coming. Without once taking his eyes off him, Lars' hand comes up like a vice grip and snatches against his, clamping down with fierce force. "Not a good way to get me on your side," the man grins even as Niklas' hand tightens on his jaw.
He lets go of his chin and reaches into his pocket. In the next moment, cold metal is biting into the tender skin of Lars' neck, jabbed there. "Classic boxing technique, Verdura. Left jab to cover the right side, right fist to the unguarded. I don't know the charge of this taser. But in my good days," he says, "in my good days I took down a man the size of a bull with this."
If Niklas believed Lars could be upset, he would have thought that was the look in the man's face right then. Just as his grip on his other hand tightens, Niklas presses the taser in tighter. "Shh. Did you know what my brothers used to call me? Bychit Kolya. What am I saying, of course you know. You probably know everything about me. Well, here's a Russian lesson, Verdura. Bychit means little bull, or goby fish. On one hand that nickname meant I was reckless and stupid, on the other... It meant I was young and very dangerous2[2]."
"I get it," the man snaps. "You were being groomed for better shit. And you know what, Niklas?" He says, a vicious grin forming on his lips, "I think it's a damn shame you didn't go through with it." His hands fall away to his sides and, lax, he drops into the chair, chuckling as Niklas' hand and taser jerk to follow him. "I'm yours. Tell me what you want.”
He leans in and rubs the metal through over the surface of Lars' Adam's apple, and with his right hand draws to the holster. The gun snaps free with ease, and with the taser choked against the man's throat, Niklas draws. Lars' smile, obnoxious now, doesn't go off even as the safety clicks away audibly and Niklas jabs the gun straight down into his crotch.
"You're going to tell me everything you know, if I think you're lying, I'll make sure no hooker can ever bounce on this again," he says, tone calmer than it ever has been around this man. "Start with my father, Madam Morris and the coffeeshop."
And Lars just gives him a half-lidded stare, breath a cool, lax shu
dder as the taser is taken away. "I'm pleasantly surprised to see you're still a bull, Niklas," he says at last, "but this isn't necessary."
Niklas decisively jams the barrel down, ignoring how the man gives a groan and pales abruptly. "Humor me."
"J-Jeeesus Christ," he grinds out, gripping the sides of the chair until the pressure is taken off. "That-"
"Means I’m not fucking around," he interrupts. He ignores how, strangely, the gun is meeting more resistance as he speaks. Is Lars... enjoying this? He grits his teeth. "Talk."
"Your dad... Was a hustler. In the navy and out of it," Lars starts. A bead of sweat on his brow catches light from the window- Niklas notices how flushed he is. "In the navy it was little shit like cigarettes and moonshine. Out, well... bigger fish. Laundering and scams. He met and courted your whore mother-" he gasps, and musters a sharp, clipped laugh as Niklas jabs down on him- "Fine, he fuckin'- he met and proposed to your mom off duty and things were sterling- only they couldn't last. Good old Lana rolled in. You know, calling in favors... See, she'd helped Anna get on her feet in the cafe, wasn't easy in that day for a Russian girl to get her own business alone, but you know how Lana is... had to set a price. So Alexei stepped in to help."
"Madam Morris and my father started operating together?"
"Yeah. Out of this very same goddamned 'cursed' coffeeshop," he mutters dryly. "Anna knew- sort of. So that went well for a while, but they got tangled up in each other, and he gets deployed, and Anna starts showing belly... with guess who." He chuckles, and it's almost affectionate, as if Niklas doesn't have a gun ready for point-blank fire into his gonads. "Lana kept doing ops out of the shop. Your freezer became a hotspot for contraband. Police think that all her visits are just social, keeping up impressions with all the folk Mr. Morris hates because that's how their marriage works; little do they know she's hustling most of her shit through there instead of all her little decoy spots. It works," he shrugs, and spits out his gum, throwing out the window and ignoring the look on Niklas' face as he does it. "For a while, it works."
"It sounds like a mess," he comments.
The man's eyebrows raise. "Oh yeah. From what Lana tells me it got worse. Anna figured out the affair, and is like, six months pregnant and fuckin' raving, they get in a bloody catfight. Lana is kicked out of the shop, and get this- all the contraband she got stored goes missing overnight. She comes back the get it a couple days later- nothing. She has the place torn apart- nothing. She gets the building condemned and puts your mom out of business and threatens her with all kinds of shit- Anna doesn't say shit. Your mum's got balls for that.
"So when Alexei gets back, Lana goes to him, threatening to set fire to Anna and her shitty little apartment with his itty bitty baby boy in it too. And your dad has no damn clue what's happened, he tries to talk to Anna but she chases him out, and Lana's threatening to put her down, so he's like... he agrees to work for her for the rest of his life so long as she keeps her hands off you and Anna."
Niklas inhales deeply, and realizes that his arm's been straying in aim for a while. Lars doesn't seem to care, but he points back anyway, pressing his lips into a thin line. "I see."
"Yeah," the man says. "And I'll tell you the honest fuckin' truth, I don't know why I'm here except to houseclean all Lana's tax fraud trails and get the city's most corrupt contractor on to let your place get renovated. All I know is that this is the most personal op she's ever ran. Why? Personal revenge on Anna by fucking with you? Playing favorites with her boytoy's son? I don't know."
He looks at Lars, and feels sorely divided in temptations. On one hand he wants to yank him up, to embrace the man for finally giving him a scrap of something truthful- on another he wants to shoot Lars in the balls and throw him out the window with all the conspiracy bullshit he brought in. Finally, with a sigh, he brings away the gun and steps back, collapsing onto the futon.
The silvery outline of light on the other man shifts as he slumps visibly.
"What would you do, in my situation?" Niklas asks, sitting there with the gun gathering sweat from his palm in one hand and the taser in another. He realizes that his blood has been coarsing harder than ever this whole time, and heavy breathing isn't bringing him down. Just like always, he thinks vaguely, my hands don't shake with weapons in them.
The man rubs his neck. "I’d shoot her, but we can't all be as straightforward as I am, can we?"
"No, we can't," he mutters, wondering why he even bothered asking.
"Well," he sighs. "If I wanna be slick about it, I'd play possum and let her go through for now. Do her ops, do her damn renovation... but I'd put some people of my own in the project so I had more control of the situation than she thought I did. That way you get your debt paid for, if she's good to her word, but you also have witnesses on your side who can back you up if you want to turn it on her. I'd definitely get a lawyer."
Niklas looks up. "And you can do that- put people in on the project, on my side, that is."
Lars gives a derisive snort. "I am that, now that I've spilled the beans on your dad and Lana. Yeah, I can, but why would I? I like you, but someone who wants to piss off Svetlana better have a damn good reason to do it, yeah?"
He raises the gun, lazily. "Because I could shoot your eye out."
He shakes his head. "Nikky, Nikky. Come on. Don't be so unsophisticated. You can shoot my eye out, sure, but Lana could make me disappear altogether." He crosses his arms and sits back, as if he doesn't have a gun trained on him. He shrugs, playing his fingers across the surface of the desk. It irks Niklas that Lars doesn't hesitate in the least to pick up his rosary and play it in his palm. "You know what? I feel all right tonight. I'll do it."
He lowers the weapon and frowns, searching Lars' face for any tic, any sign of lying. "You will do it?"
"Yeah."
"Why? After all that explanation of how Lana could kill you and I'm nothing compared to that?"
"For fun. I'll do it, okay? I'll help you set this up. So put the gun down already," Lars mutters. A grin cracks on his face as he adds, "It isn't even loaded."
"For fun. You'll undermine a woman who helped you immigrate when you were a child," he echoes with disdain, checking the weapon himself and realizing, with a flush to the cheeks, that Lars is right. He hadn't even been thinking about the extraordinary lightness of the firearm this whole time. With force, he throws it back to him, not looking to see if he'll catch it, and wipes his hands on his pants. "I'm supposed to accept that."
Lars chuckles a little, then looks him over, and something sobers in his expression. "She told you about that, eh? Look, even when I was a kid, I knew she was up to some shady shit. But yeah, I'm going to do this for myself. And you still don't trust me, do you?"
"Not one bit." It's a bit of a lie- Niklas is beginning to understand that there are certain things he can expect in Lars' behavior- from asking for kisses to testing his limits in other ways. And while that's not quite trust, at least he's becoming a devil that he knows. He stands up and goes for his mini-fridge by the drawer, taking out a bottle of water as he feels the rush of the vodka receding to nothing.
"Then come with me tonight. I'll show you trust and then some." As he speaks, he toys with his gun, running fingertips over the jet black surface and turning it over to catch the light. Eventually, finding Niklas' eye burning a hole through him, Lars holsters it, smiling innocuously.
He shakes his head and goes back to opening his water. "Where would we go? Another shipyard, another meeting with the dirty underbelly of the police? Would you try to gain my trust by shoving me on a wall and pretending I'm a hooker? Very funny. It's late. Don't waste my time."
Lars touches his lips with his fore and middle fingertips like he misses smoking already. "Ah, Niklas. I wouldn't take you on a date where we're going, you deserve better. We'll go out to do business, and this is the best hour." He pauses. "With issues like yours, you look like you could use a night on the town. Don't you miss prowling the streets at all?"
> He takes a swig from his bottle, then puts it down and considers. He considers the streets of his memory, the neon lights and the brothers and the grime and bloodshed. They are a disgusting place, really, Niklas thinks. The city streets at night are when the scared pariahs of the day come out to play, comforted by the disguise darkness grants them. "The streets are a place for rats," he says with abhorrence.
But then, they're opening late tomorrow, and his blood is already on fire from holding a gun.
CHAPTER SIX
The streets of Couer are ragged and twisted as a labyrinth before them, the Toyota often shuddering over the rough, unpatched ground, but they go through. Through the multicolored halogen lights and the watchful eyes of delinquents they go through.
"Not wise to bring a nice car like this to this area," Niklas comments eventually, catching the gaze of a single teenager sitting on a ledge and lighting up. It feels like looking dead in the eye of his past. Scarborough district, Couer, was never famous for elevating its denizens. Not even in his time. He still remembers hazy fights on these same damn curb sides. If anything, the streets have gotten worse- Lars' headlights illuminate dozens of homeless figures prowling, and several small groups of youths hanging together on ledges and under streetlights.
