Harlan Coben - The Final Detail

“Remember our last conversation?” FJ continued.

“Vaguely.”

“I mentioned something about killing you, right?”

“It might have come up,” Myron said. “I don't remember. So many tough guys, so many threats.”

The Bookends tried to scowl, but even their faces were overmuscled, and the movement took too much effort. They settled back into the steady frowns and lowered the eyebrows a bit.

“Actually, I was going to carry through with it,” FJ continued. “About a month ago. I followed you out to some graveyard in New Jersey. I even sneaked up behind you with my gun out. Funny thing, no?”

Myron nodded. “Like Henny Youngman wrote it.”

FJ tilted his head. “Don't you want to know why I didn't kill you?”

“Because of Win.”

The sound of his name was like a cold glass of water in the faces of both Bookends. The two giants actually stepped back but recovered quickly with a few flexes. FJ remained unruffled. “Win doesn't scare me,” he said.

“Even the dumbest animal,” Myron said, “has an innate survival mechanism.”

FJ's eyes met Myron's. Myron tried to maintain contact, but it was hard. There was nothing behind FJ's eyes but rot and decay; it was like staring into the broken windows of an abandoned building. “Sticks and stones, Myron. Sticks and stones. I didn't kill you because, well, you already looked so miserable. It was as though-how to put this?-as though killing you would have been an act of mercy. Like I said before, funny, right?”

“You should consider stand-up,” Myron agreed.

FJ chuckled and waved a well-manicured hand at nothing in particular. “Anyway, bygones. My father and uncle like you, and yes, we see no reason to antagonize Win unnecessarily. They don't want you dead, so neither do I.”

His father and uncle were Frank and Herman Ache, two of New York's legendary leading leg breakers. The elder Aches had grown up on the streets, slaughtered more people than the next guy, moved up the ladder. Herman, the older brother and big cheese, was in his sixties now and liked to pretend he wasn't scum by surrounding himself with the finer things in life: restricted clubs that didn't want him, nouveau-riche art exhibits, well-coiffed charities, midtown French maitre d's who treated anyone who tipped with less than a Jackson like something they couldn't scrape off the soles of their shoes. In other words, a higher-income scum. Herman's younger brother, Frank, the psycho who had produced the equally psycho offspring who now stood in front of Myron, remained what he had always been: an ugly hatchet man who considered K mart velour sweatsuits haute couture. Frank had calmed down over the last few years, but it never quite worked for him. Life, it seemed, had little meaning for Frank Senior without someone to torture or maim.

“What do you want, FJ?”

“I have a business proposition for you.”

“Gee, I just know this is really going to interest me.”

“I want to buy you out.”

The Aches ran TruPro, a rather large sports representation firm. TruPro had always been devoid of any semblance of scruples, recruiting young athletes with as much moral restraint as a politician planning a fund-raiser. But then their owner stacked up debts. Bad debts. The debts that attract the wrong kind of fungus. The appropriately named Ache brothers, the fungi in question, moved in and, like the parasitic entities they were, ate away all signs of life and were now gnawing on the carcass.

Still, being a sports agent was a legit way of making a living, sort of, and Frank Senior, wanting for his son what all fathers wanted, handed young FJ the reins straight out of business school. In theory FJ was supposed to run TruPro as legitimately as possible. His father had killed and maimed so that his son wouldn't have to-yep, the classic American dream with, granted, a rather deranged twist. But FJ seemed incapable of freeing himself from the old familial shackles. Why was a question that fascinated Myron. Was FJ's evil genetic, passed down from his father like a prominent nose, or was he, like so many other children, simply trying to gain his father's acceptance by proving the acorn could be as ferociously psychotic as the oak?

Nature or nurture. The argument rages on.

“MB SportsReps is not for sale,” Myron said.

“I think you're being foolish.”

Myron nodded. “I'll file that under One Day I Might Even Care.' ”

The Bookends sort of grumbled, took a step forward, and cracked their necks in unison. Myron pointed to one, then the other. “Who does your choreography?”

They wanted to be insulted-you could just tell-except neither one of them knew what the word choreography meant.

FJ asked, “Do you know how many clients MB Sports-Reps lost in the last few weeks?”

“A lot?”

“I'd say a quarter of your list. A couple of them went with us.”

Myron whistled, feigned nonchalant, but he was not happy to hear this. “I'll get them back.”

“You think so?” FJ again smiled the reptilian smile; Myron almost expected a forked tongue to dart out between his lips. “Do you know how many more are going to leave when they hear about Esperanza's arrest?”

“A lot?”

“You'll be lucky to have one left.”

“Hey, then I'll be like Jerry Maguire. Did you see that movie? Show me the money? I love black people?” Myron gave FJ his best Tom Cruise earnest. “You. Complete. Me.”

FJ remained cool. “I'm willing to be generous, Myron.”

“I'm sure you are, FJ, but the answer is still no.”

“I don't care how clean your rep used to be. Nobody can survive the sort of money scandal you're about to go through.”

It wasn't a money scandal, but Myron was not in the mood to issue corrections. “Are we finished, FJ?”

“Sure.” FJ gave him one last scaly smile. The smile seemed to jump off his face, crawl toward Myron, and then slither its way up his back. “But why don't we get together and have lunch?”

“Any time,” Myron said. “You have a cellular?”

“Of course.”

“Call my partner right away and set it up.”

“Isn't she in jail?”

Myron snapped his fingers. “Drat.”

FJ found that amusing. “I mentioned that some of your old clients are now using my services.”

“So you did.”

“If you contact any of them”-he paused, thought it over-“I'd feel obliged to retaliate. Do I make myself clear?”

FJ was maybe twenty-five years old, less than a year out of Harvard Business School. He had gone undergrad to Princeton. Smart kid. Or powerful father. Either way, rumor had it that when a Princeton professor was about to accuse FJ of plagiarism, the professor disappeared and only his tongue was found-on the pillow of another professor who had considered leveling the same charges.

“Crystal, FJ.”

“Great, Myron. Then we'll talk again.”

If Myron still had his tongue.

The three men slid into their car and drove off without another word. Myron slowed his heart rate and checked his watch. Court time.

The courtroom in Hackensack looked very much like the ones you see on television. Shows like The Practice and Law & Order and even Judge Judy capture the physical appearance pretty well. They can't of course capture the essence emanating from the little things: the faint, underlying stench of fear-induced sweat, the overuse of disinfectant, the slightly sticky feel to all the benches and tables and handrails-what Myron liked to call the ooze factors.

Myron had his checkbook ready so bail could be posted immediately. He and Win had gone over it last night and figured the judge would come in around fifty to seventy-five grand. Esperanza had no record and a steady job. Those factors would play in her favor. If the money was higher, no problem. Myron's pockets might be only semideep, but Win's net worth was on par with the GNP of a small European country.