Don Winslow - The Power of the Dog

Between rounds, the two brothers were too busy giving their boxer hell to give Art any shit. He was grateful for the rest. One more round, he thought. Just let me get through one more round.

The bell rang.

A lot of dinero changed hands when Art got off his stool.

He touched gloves with the kid for the last round, looked into his eyes and instantly saw that he’d wounded the kid’s pride. Shit, Art thought, I didn’t mean to do that. Rein in your ego, asshole, and don’t take a chance on winning this thing.

He needn’t have worried.

Whatever the brothers had told the kid between rounds, the kid made the adjustment, constantly moving to his left, in the direction of his own jab, keeping his hands high, pretty much hitting Art at will, then getting out of the way.

Art was moving forward, hitting at air.

He stopped.

Stood in the center of the ring, shook his head, laughed and waved the kid to come on in.

The crowd loved it.

The kid loved it.

He shuffled into the center of the ring and started raining punches down on Art, who blocked them the best he could and covered up. Art would shoot a jab or counterpunch back every few seconds, and the kid would fire over it and nail him again.

The kid wasn’t going for knockout punches now. There was no anger in him anymore. He was truly sparring, just getting in his workout and showing that he could hit Art anytime he wanted, playing to the crowd, giving them the show they’d come to see. By the end, Art was down on one knee with his gloves tight to his head and his elbows tucked into his ribs, so he was taking most of the shots on his gloves and arms.

The final bell rang.

The kid picked Art up and they embraced.

“You are going to be champ one day,” Art said to him.

“You did okay,” the kid said. “Thank you for the match.”

“You got yourself a good fighter,” Art said as Little Brother was taking his gloves off.

“We’re going all the way,” Little Brother said. He stuck out his hand, “My name is Adan. That’s my brother, Raul.”

Raul looked down at Art and nodded. “You didn’t quit, Yanqui. I thought you’d quit.”

No “faggot” this time, Art noted.

“If I had any brains, I’d have quit,” he said.

“You fight like a Mexican,” Raul said.

Ultimate praise.

Actually, I fight like half a Mexican, Art thought, but he kept it to himself. But he knew what Raul meant. It was the same in Barrio Logan-it isn’t so much what you can dish out as what you can take.

Well, I took plenty tonight, Art thought. All I want to do now is go back to the hotel, take a long, hot shower and spend the rest of the night with an ice pack.

Okay, several ice packs.

“We’re going out for some beers,” Adan said. “You want to come?”

Yeah, Art thought. Yeah, I do.

So he spent the night downing beers in a cafetin with Adan.

Years later, Art would have given anything in the world to have just killed Adan Barrera on the spot.

Tim Taylor called him into the office the next morning.

Art looked like shit, which was an accurate external reflection of his internal reality. His head was pounding from the beers and the yerba he’d ended up smoking in the after-hours club Adan had hauled him to. His eyes were black and there were still traces of dark, dried blood under his nose. He’d showered but hadn’t shaved because one, he hadn’t had time; and two, the thought of dragging anything across his swollen jaw was just unacceptable. And even though he lowered himself into the chair slowly, his bruised ribs screamed at him for the offense.

Taylor looked at him with undisguised disgust. “You had quite a night for yourself.”

Art smiled sheepishly. Even that hurt. “You know about that.”

“You know how I heard?” Taylor said. “I had a meeting this morning with Miguel Barrera. You know who that is, Keller? He’s a Sinaloan state cop, the special assistant to the governor, the man in this area. We’ve been trying to get him to work with us for two years. And I have to hear from him that one of my agents is brawling with the locals-”

“It was a sparring match.”

“Whatever,” Taylor said. “Look, these people are not our pals or our drinking buddies. They’re our targets, and-”

“Maybe that’s the problem,” Art heard himself say. Some disembodied voice that he couldn’t control. He’d meant to keep his mouth shut, but he was just too fucked-up to maintain the discipline.

“What’s the problem?”

Fuck it, Art thought. Too late now. So he answered, “That we look at 'these people’ like 'targets.’ ”

And anyway, it pissed him off. People as targets? Been there, done that. Besides that, I learned more about how things work down here last night than I did in the last three months.

“Look, you’re not in an undercover role here,” Taylor said. “Work with the local law enforcement people-”

“Can’t, Tim,” Art said. “You did a good job of queering me with them.”

“I’m going to get you out of here,” Tim said. “I want you off my team.”

“Start the paperwork,” Art said. He was sick of this shit.

“Don’t worry, I will,” Taylor said. “In the meantime, Keller, try to conduct yourself like a professional?”

Art nodded and got up out of the chair.

Slowly.

While the Damoclean sword of bureaucracy was dangling, Art thought he might as well keep working.

What’s the saying, he asked himself. They can kill you but they can’t eat you? Which isn’t true-they can kill you and eat you-but that doesn’t mean you go easy. The thought of going to work on a senatorial staff depressed the hell out of him. It wasn’t so much the work as it was Althie’s father setting it up, Art having a somewhat ambivalent attitude toward father figures.

It was the idea of failure.

You don’t let them knock you out, you make them knock you out. You make them break their fucking hands knocking you out, you let them know that they’ve been in a fight, you give them something to remember you by every time they look in a mirror.

He went right back to the gym.

“?Que noche bruta!” he said to Adan. “Me mata la cabeza.”

“Pero gozamos.”

We enjoyed ourselves all right, Art thought. My head is splitting, anyway. “How’s the Little Lion?”

“Cesar? Better than you,” Adan said. “Better than me.”

“Where’s Raul?”

“Probably out getting laid,” Adan said. “Es el cono, ese. You want a beer?”

“Hell, yes.”

Damn, it tasted good going down. Art took a long, wonderful swig, then laid the ice-cold bottle against his swollen cheek.

“You look like shit,” Adan said.

“That good?”

“Almost.”

Adan signaled the waiter and ordered a plate of cold meats. The two men sat at the outdoor table and watched the world go by.

“So you’re a narc,” Adan said.

“That’s me.”

“My uncle is a cop.”

“You didn’t go into the family business?”

Adan said, “I’m a smuggler.”

Art raised an eyebrow. It actually hurt.

“Blue jeans,” Adan said, laughing. “My brother and I go up to San Diego, buy blue jeans and sneak them back across the border. Sell them duty-free off the back of a truck. You’d be surprised how much money there is in it.”

“I thought you were in college. What was it, accounting?”

“You have to have something to count,” Adan said.

“Does your uncle know what you do for beer money?”

“Tio knows everything,” Adan said. “He thinks it’s frivolous. He wants me to get 'serious.’ But the jeans business is good. It brings in some cash until the boxing thing takes off. Cesar will be a champion. We’ll make millions.”