Don Winslow - California Fire And Life

A broken record, Nicky thinks. An oldie but goodie, as the American DJs would say.

Driving the boy crazy.

Driving me crazy.

So it's good to get away from that scene.

Take a walk on the lawn even if it is to hear that you are, more likely than not, dead.

"Tratchev is demanding a meeting," Dani says. "For tonight."

"Tonight?"

"They don't want us to have time to get ready," Dani says.

"But they'll be ready."

"Yes."

"Tell him no."

"Then we're at war."

"So we're at war."

Dani shakes his head. "Given our present strength compared to his, we can't win the war."

Nicky can hear the unspoken rebuke in Dani's voice.

And it's deserved.

In my obsession to be a California businessman, I let things deteriorate. To a point where now we are in mortal danger.

Very uncool.

"So we meet," Nicky says.

Dani shakes his head again.

"At this meeting," he says, "they'll kill you."

Tratchev is selling it to the others and it's an easy sale. Nicky Vale is taking my business — he'll take yours next. Unless we stop him, and soon.

"Tratchev will accuse you of looting the obochek," Dani says. "A serious violation of Vorovskoy Zakon. And this meeting won't be like the last. They'll be ready."

Nicky takes a moment to inhale the scent of bougainvillea. The luminescent color of the fuchsia. The bright blue of the ocean and sky.

Beautiful.

"All I ever wanted was this," he says.

"I know," Dani says.

"I'll go to the meeting," Nicky says. "Alone."

"You can't."

"Why should we all die?"

" Pakhan — "

Nicky puts up his hand. Enough.

I will do what has to be done.

I will deal with Tratchev and all the rest.

Dani says, "There's something else."

"Wonderful."

"The sister."

"What about her?" Nicky asks.

"She's been asking about the two Vietnamese."

"What? " Nicky asks. "How do you know this?"

"She's been making a noise in Little Saigon," Dani says. "Putting real heat on."

"How did she make that connection? "

You think you're safe. You think you've used all your skill and cunning to steer through the rapids and the shoals and then this cunt of a sister…

"We'll do what we have to do," Nicky says.

"She's a cop."

"I know that."

"An honest cop."

"I know that, too."

"It's too much for a coincidence," Dani says. "Two sisters-"

"Goddamn it, will you do as I say?!"

I know it's a risk. It's all a risk. But I didn't kill my beautiful Pamela and make my children motherless just to lose everything anyway.

We will do what we have to do — however regrettable — and we will do it soon. And the day after tomorrow we will have our share of $50 million, more than enough to start again.

From ashes come new shoots of grass.

Life from death.

The ritual sacrifice of Jack Wade starts with peanut M amp;M's.

Jack stands in the "observation room" behind the oneway mirror, gobbling peanut M amp;M's and watching the "jury" file in. Jack's been in a couple of dozen focus group facilities and it seems like whatever else they have or don't have, they always have bowls of peanut M amp;M's.

For nervous chomping.

They always serve dinner, too, except Jack's too edgy to enjoy the lasagna bubbling in the heater trays. The meals at these things are usually pretty good, but tonight it's really good — in addition to the lasagna there's roast basil chicken, fettuccine Alfredo, a Caesar salad, and profiteroles for dessert. Also, real plates, real silverware, and linen napkins.

The quality of the meal is a good news/bad news joke.

The good news is that it's a high-quality meal, the bad news is that the reason it's a high-quality meal is because the muckety-mucks from Mahogany Row are there.

Casey ordered the menu.

Casey knows that the mucks tend to take their meals very seriously, so it's prudent to at least feed them well. Especially when the bill's going to be $50 million.

Not counting the tip.

Jack watches them eat.

Half of freaking Mahogany Row bellied up to the trough. Twelve years with the company, and Jack's never seen these guys in the flesh before, just on a few motivational closed-circuit TV presentations. The boys can eat.

So there they are, VP Claims, VP Legal, and VP Public Relations. Goddamn Billy runs it down for him.

"Phil Herlihy, VP Claims," Billy says, pointing to a sixtyish guy with a shock of white hair and a paunch. "Came out of Agency, of course. Doesn't know a claim from a blow job. He's an administrator."

Billy gestures at a tall, thin guy in his fifties. "Dane Reinhardt, VP Legal. Couldn't buy a verdict in a goddamn courtroom, so now he's telling us what to do.

"Jerry Bourne, VP Public Relations," Billy says, pointing to a short fortyish guy with curly red hair and a red nose. "Basically in charge of arranging hookers for the visiting firemen and hiding the bills in his expenses. He's a fucking idiot, but at least he knows it. So's Reinhardt, except he doesn't know it. All he knows is it's a lot safer to settle claims than to take one to trial and lose. Last thing that no-balls so-called lawyer wants to see is another courtroom. Herlihy's the one to watch out for. He swings the big stick in the president's office."

Herlihy looks over at them.

"Billy," he says, "aren't you going to eat?"

"I'm watching my figure."

Herlihy looks at Jack.

"Are you this Jack Wade I've heard so much about today?"

"Guilty."

Herlihy says, "You Claims cowboys from So-Cal…"

Like he's so disgusted he can't even finish.

Jack figures it doesn't require a real answer so all he says is, "Yippi-yi-yo-ky-ay" and walks away, which doesn't score him a lot of points with Phil Herlihy, VP Claims, from the start of this thing.

The observation room itself is shaped like a slice of a lecture hall. A bunch of desks bolted onto the floor slanted down toward the observation window. The dining table is off to the left on the five feet of flat floor by the window and the door. On top of the room, a videographer is getting his camera ready to record the whole mess for the boys at corporate who couldn't make the live show. At the bottom, a table runs the width of the window. Seated at the table are two jury consultants with laptop computers and stacks of questionnaires.

What the two jury consultants also have is a monitor that's hooked up to each of twelve ProCon machines on the desk of each "juror."

The ProCon machines are simple little devices that measure how the juror is "feeling" — generally pro or vaguely con — at any given moment. It's basically a joystick attached to a base and the juror is supposed to keep his or her hand on it at all times. The juror's feeling con about something, he pushes the joystick down. A little con, a little down. A lot con, a lot down. Same with the pro feelings. A little pro, the juror pulls a little back on the joystick, a lot pro, she can whip that puppy all the way back.

It's basically a high-tech version of the old Roman thumbs-up/thumbs-down gladiator deal.

What it does is it allows you to instantly measure the jury's ongoing "instinctive" reaction on a scale from Negative 10 to Neutral to Positive 10 to any witness, question, or answer. They're carefully instructed that they don't need a reason for their reaction — they should just react. If they're feeling "bad" they should push the stick down. If they're feeling happy, they should push it up.

Jack knows this is only for the gut reaction, that they'll get the rational response from the questionnaires and the actual decision from a "verdict," but he also knows that the jury will rationalize its gut reaction onto the questionnaire and then onto the verdict.